MARK MY WORD: DECORATING THE EVERGREEN CAN BE A TOUGH TASK

There's nothing like chopping down the old Christmas tree and stuffing it in a corner of your living room to get you in the mood for the holiday.

Every year, my family and I make the trek to a local Christmas tree farm. I saw down a white pine as my family stands by, shivering and wondering why we don't just buy one of those plastic trees.

We then cram it into our minivan and haul it home. By the time we get there, the tree has grown a whole foot and we've got to cut a hole in the roof just to get it inside.

This strange growing disease also applies to treadmills. My wife, Joni, and I recently purchased one of those exercise devices from a local discount store.

It didn't look so big in the store. But when we got it home and took it out of the box, we discovered it was the size of 10 city blocks.

It now fills up most of our bedroom, forcing us to exercise just to reach the clothes closet.

The tree, fortunately, isn't quite as big as the treadmill, although it's more difficult to decorate.

Decorating the Christmas tree in our household is a major chore. It involves carrying down box after box of Christmas ornaments, lights and other decorations from the attic.

It seems like every year I carry down more boxes than I put away the year before. Strands of Christmas tree lights seem to multiply like some science-fiction plant, just waiting to attack the unsuspecting homeowner who dares to decorate for the holiday.

Decorating a Christmas tree can be challenging, particularly when your 2-year-old daughter is lending a hand.

"Becca, don't step on the lights," I said for the umteenth time as my daughter merrily walked through the strands of tiny lights strung out on my living room floor.

At one point, I discovered her repeatedly plugging and unplugging a strand of colored lights.

Becca has a way of really getting wrapped up in her work. But finding her clothed in colored lights like some sort of human Christmas tree isn't my idea of holiday fun.

Becca likes those colorful glass ornaments. While I was decorating the tree, she decided to hold an impromptu Christmas concert that consisted of striking two ornaments together. Fortunately, they didn't break.

Christmas tree lights do much more than just burn brightly these days. There are blinking lights, racing lights, and even ones that play Christmas carols.

They do about everything but cook the holiday meal.

I don't know how it happened, but this year I managed to escape the "this-strand doesn't-work" syndrome.

Usually, I find whole strands of lights that won't work. Then, I have to meticulously hunt through all those little lights trying to uncover the bad bulb.

After hours of battling bad bulbs recently, a friend of mine simply threw the lights away and went out and bought new ones.

When it comes to Christmas trees, perhaps the best idea is to buy a small, artificial tree. When the holiday's over, you can just stick the decorated tree in a trash bag where it will be ready, lights and all, when you need it next year.

Personally, however, I like having a real tree. It gives me such a warm feeling to know that I'm decorating fish habitat for the holidays.

~Mark Bliss is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.