best gift ever

we have a delightful, quirky, one-of-a-kind friend who's got a sense of humor that i just adore. it's a very specific brand of "funny," and sometimes i'll get a thought in my head that tickles me, and i preface it by saying to matt, "ok, this is totally [insert name] humor..."

this friend said he had a little Xmas gift for us, and that he would leave it in our mailbox. it was a homemade dvd, so we popped it in the player. what comes up is like a fireplace dvd with xmas music. you know, just a static shot of a roaring fireplace, i think there's a cable channel dedicated to this. but this is no ordinary fireplace dvd, because after a while... things start to happen. turns out, he made his own fireplace dvd, in real time, and every now and then would make something happen. like a paper airplane flying into the flames. or a nutcracker staging a battle and then getting thrown into the fire. we watched the entire 2 hour+ video, laughing hysterically. i guarantee that watching this will become a Patrick family tradition.