Over the Holidays

Here we go again. October . . . Halloween. November . . . Thanksgiving. December . . . Christmas. Time to pull out the holiday season dictionary and get reacquainted with the vocabulary. Let’s see, there’s:

Overachiever . . . One who goes overboard by baking six pumpkin pies from scratch using her children’s Halloween jack-o-lanterns.

Overboard . . . Being overeager to invite twenty relatives for Thanksgiving and volunteering to do all the cooking.

Overeager . . . Committing to make the reindeer costumes for Mrs. Petty’s first grade Christmas program while overlooking the fact that we don’t sew.

Overlook . . . What we do when we ignore holiday calories and gain five pounds by overeating.

Overeat . . . The process of being overwhelmed by all things chocolate.

Overwhelmed . . . The feeling we get when we overestimate the number of waking hours there are in a day to get everything done.

Overestimate . . . What we do to our holiday budget before we overspend.

Overspend . . . What we do when credit card companies overlend.

Overlend . . . What banks do to prevent overdrafts.

Overdraft . . . What happens to our account after we pay one too many overdue bills.

Overdue . . . A feeling that makes us want to pop from being overstressed.

Overstressed . . . What we become when we are overworked.

Overworked . . . How we feel when our calendars and "To Do" lists are overindulged.

Overindulged . . . What happens when we Americans don’t pause to be thankful and to realize that this holiday overload would come to a screeching halt if we didn’t have the blessings of overabundance.