Ah�. the Holidays. All those Christmas carols you hear around this time at first are so glorious and they get you into the holiday mood so quickly. There is one song that gives me a kick: "Grandma got run over by a reindeer" which gets me thinking about my own grandmother who we call, "Nan" or "Nanny." I personally like to call her by her first name, which gets me an angry glare from my mother. She's far from the sweet little old lady type though. I'd say she's like that cartoon old lady, "Maxine" on all the greeting cards and calendars. The type of crotchety that makes you love her one minute and the other minute you want to push her down the stairs. She complains all day long, says inappropriate things that get under your skin, puts her foot in her mouth often, and occasionally gets herself into odd predicaments.

One morning, having coffee on the front porch, I thought I was seeing things when I saw her attempting to run with her walker � from a bucking cow hell bent on running her down. Either I was still hung-over or that coffee was bad I reasoned as I tossed the cup of Jo into the bushes. Apparently the cows got loose from the farm next door. But how these lazy, docile creatures came to being provoked enough to chase my Nan across the front yard I have no idea. I guess her irritating way affects not only humans but animals too. So I can totally imagine a reindeer in hot pursuit of her after that incident.

I lived with her as a child for a short period when I was four years old and my parents were in the process of building a house. She was my first babysitter. My parents would get up and go to work and she and I would each have our own cup of coffee and read the paper side by side, her with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth. There I was learning to read except it wasn't about little boy blue but rather all the crime and corruption the New York Post could offer while also stunting my growth with Maxwell House. Her chain smoking probably had nothing to do with my asthma I'm sure. She and I spent many years existing solely on Entenmann's � she bought so much you'd think she owned stock in it.

I also lived with her for a couple years in my 20s. I'd take her shopping and then we'd go to the early bird special dinner up on "the avenue" which was the main drag. She and her friends would flip if they didn't get dinner by 4pm. They'd have strawberry daiquiris, open face turkey sandwiches with stuffing and cranberry sauce, and laugh about the old days. One night she said she wanted to try something different and ordered the "Chicken Condom Bleu". When the waitress looked a little startled at her verbal slip I couldn't help but blurt out, "I think that might be a bit too rubbery for you, Nan" with a laugh. All those old ladies just stared at me deadpan like I was a stupid kid and sneered to stop being a smart ass.

A lecture about every little thing I'm doing wrong came after that as they'd go on and on about me staying out too late and giving the cow's milk away for free and how at my age they all had 10 kids and made stone soup for a dozen people that lasted for three days cuz it was the Depression and they were damn glad to have that stone soup and who do I think I am anyways? Apparently after 70 you don't have much of a sense of humor. Those days, like two typical roommates, we'd fight like cats and dogs and she'd insist she called me a "witch" and not a "bitch" when I just KNOW that wasn't the case.

So now, 20 years later, and since she lives with my Mom and Dad, I stop over to spend time with her. She's gotten even more ornery in recent years (which I didn't think was possible) and still drives us up the wall. She'll read every business and road sign as we drive down the road and repeat the same stories a zillion times in a day and thinks it's Easter when it's Christmas. Strangely enough, I find myself succumbing to her madness from time to time, as I start repeating some of the odd little sayings she has. When I look into a mirror now, I find myself saying "I look like 'who did it and ran'!" Whenever she finishes something, like bringing her dish to the sink, she says, "Good, good good." After hearing it a thousand times I found myself saying "good, good, good" the other day at work when I finished a stack of paperwork that was making me go nuts and want to stick a fork in my eye. If she's had a busy day going to the senior center to "gibby-gab" (another phrase) with her friends she'll say she was "goin' like a house on fire all day" which I said to someone myself and they looked at me quite oddly. And wouldn't you know it but whenever I can't win a verbal disagreement with someone I throw my hands up, look to heaven and say, "You win, I lose!" which pretty much ends the conflict because both of us would burst out laughing thinkin' of how Nan states this signature calling card phrase about 20 times a day in cranky frustration. She'd then storm off wheeling herself down the hall and slamming her door shut to obviously punish us with the silent treatment. This usually makes my mother say, "Give me the strength, Lord."

Now that she's 94 she can't see or hear very well, gets confused often and you never know if she's gonna laugh or cry . When she sees all her little great grandchildren running around and asks me for the fifth time if the little boy is mine, or "who's little girl is that?" we just tell her "Don't worry Nan, there's not going to be a test on this later." She gets flustered so I tell her she's with her family and they all love her and that's the important thing. Strangely enough, most days I'm the only name she can remember and she tells me often that I'm her favorite when I'm lifting her out of bed and changing her. What a shocker. Sigh�. I guess we're a pair, the two of us. So around this time I hear that "Grandma got run over by a Reindeer" song, and get a laugh thinking she probably inspired the song because, if anyone could provoke a reindeer into a flattening rage, it would be her! God Bless ya,' Nan!