Christmas with the Bullards/Reists/Renworths

We've been having Christmas Eve dinner with another family we've been friends with for ages. Mom makes roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, then we play poker till midnight. Lots of wine and beer flow (don't worry, designated drivers abound).

This year, one of the "kids" (my age, they've got kids in college now) brought an exchange student from Turkey. She's going to have a very strange version of American Christmas to tell her friends back home ("They celebrate the birth of Jesus by stuffing themselves, getting drunk, and gambling all night! How come they never show this on Melrose Place?").

I eat more red meat in those few days than I do the rest of the entire year.