1. “What are you making?”
“What does it look like? I’m making all of our dreams come true.”
“How? By manufacturing winning lottery tickets?”
“NO. Frangelico balls. Gosh.”
2. What is unusual about this manger scene?
If you answered, “hippopotamus,” then congratulations, you are correct! The inclusion of the hippopotamus is part of a long-standing tradition of blaspheming the manger. Usually I accomplish this by replacing Baby Jesus with a plastic Smurf. This year my sister beat me to the punch with the hippo, and I’m kind of proud of her because that hippo looks . . . really good. There’s no denying it. It’s kind of amazing.
You may also notice that the three wise men are about 3/4 of the scale of the rest of the figures, which is because my mother bought most of the figures one year, and the next year, when she wanted to get the rest of the set, discovered that they had changed the scale at which they were being produced. She claims that you can’t notice unless somebody points it out. So I generally spend the holidays pointing out, as much as possible, that the three wise men are from an Eastern pygmy tribe.
Amazing. I’m so glad my hippo went to good use.