pretty crabby

2007: Flashback

Wow, 2007, you were really kind of hard and sad in parts. My dad has a theory that the odd years are more, well, ODD than the even years and this was definitely true this year.

So. Anyway. I am looking forward to 2008 but first let's look back on 2007, shall we?!

2007: The Year

Theme of this year: I think it was something about TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF and the people you really love. And I know that is simple and boring but I feel like I had a lot of challenging interactions with people this year and I lost some friends for being honest but the people who REALLY matter stuck around and I peeled back the onion to the part that is the most important to me.

Best Month of the Year: July. I love summer, but it was too fast as usual. I also had a nice fall and things seemed to sort of fall into place life wise and that was a nice feeling.

Best Day of the Year: My birthday? Oh, I guess the day I moved. February 3rd. It was a little nuts and stressful but I was excited about it and it was a good move for me. Also, the day I quit my horrible job. Well done, me.

Worst Day/Time of the Year:  May 5th.

Favorite Person of the Year: My best friend, my boyfriend. I chose them and I like them a lot.

Favorite Moment of the Year: The day I was having lunch with my boyfriend and one of my oldest friends in the world and then my best friend walked by outside with her baby, which was unplanned and I hadn't seen her in 4 months. That was a really happy day/moment for me. A bunch of babies were also born this year, which is an easy thing to pick out, but whatever. Babies are awesome.

I also met some cool ladies this year, thanks to the Internet. The lovely and talented Sarah Brown and also Caitlin (of Styrofoam Kitty, who I have talked to pretty much every day for three years) and awesome Danielle. Maybe in 2008 I will get to meet some other ladies I would make out with. (Angela, Wendy, Cat, I am looking at you!)

Favorite CD of the Year: Rilo Kiley, Under the Blacklight. Arcade Fire, Neon Bible. Ben Lee, Ripe (his most grownup and sexiest record, in my opinion. I love the title song and also Blush), Feist, The Remainder.

Favorite Movie: Broken English.  I also really liked Knocked Up and Darjeeling Limited. I saw some from last year (thanks Netflix!) that I really liked like Half Nelson and Stranger Than Fiction. The other day we saw Walk Hard which was really funny. And it is not doing so well but all three of us (with very different movie tastes) all really liked it. So you should go see it too.

Live Show of the Year: Elvis Costello was great. And seeing The Smoking Popes with the dude was very fun for me.

Best Thing I Bought: New camera for Christmas!

Favorite Trip: The dude and I went to Ipswich the weekend before Labor Day and stayed in a cheap place with a pool and had ice cream at Dairy Queen by the side of the road. I liked it. Going to Michigan for my cousin's wedding was also really fun and it was nice to have my whole family all together which seems rare as time goes on.

Book of the Year: God, I just didn't get into any books this year. I started about 15 and I am still reading them all.

Here comes 2008. I am hopeful for more exciting things and more big changes in my life. I will hold on and enjoy the ride and see what happens. It is all I can do. Happy New Year.

(Here's what I said last year, in case you're curious.)

2007: The Year

Theme of this year: I think it was something about TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF and the people you really love. And I know that is simple and boring but I feel like I had a lot of challenging interactions with people this year and I lost some friends for being honest but the people who REALLY matter stuck around and I peeled back the onion to the part that is the most important to me.

Best Month of the Year: July. I love summer, but it was too fast as usual. I also had a nice fall and things seemed to sort of fall into place life wise and that was a nice feeling.

Best Day of the Year: My birthday? Oh, I guess the day I moved. February 3rd. It was a little nuts and stressful but I was excited about it and it was a good move for me. Also, the day I quit my horrible job. Well done, me.

Worst Day/Time of the Year:  May 5th.

Favorite Person of the Year: My best friend, my boyfriend. I chose them and I like them a lot.

Favorite Moment of the Year: The day I was having lunch with my boyfriend and one of my oldest friends in the world and then my best friend walked by outside with her baby, which was unplanned and I hadn't seen her in 4 months. That was a really happy day/moment for me. A bunch of babies were also born this year, which is an easy thing to pick out, but whatever. Babies are awesome.

I also met some cool ladies this year, thanks to the Internet. The lovely and talented Sarah Brown and also Caitlin (of Styrofoam Kitty, who I have talked to pretty much every day for three years) and awesome Danielle. Maybe in 2008 I will get to meet some other ladies I would make out with. (Angela, Wendy, Cat, I am looking at you!)

Favorite CD of the Year: Rilo Kiley, Under the Blacklight. Arcade Fire, Neon Bible. Ben Lee, Ripe (his most grownup and sexiest record, in my opinion. I love the title song and also Blush), Feist, The Remainder.

Favorite Movie: Broken English.  I also really liked Knocked Up and Darjeeling Limited. I saw some from last year (thanks Netflix!) that I really liked like Half Nelson and Stranger Than Fiction. The other day we saw Walk Hard which was really funny. And it is not doing so well but all three of us (with very different movie tastes) all really liked it. So you should go see it too.

Live Show of the Year: Elvis Costello was great. And seeing The Smoking Popes with the dude was very fun for me.

Best Thing I Bought: New camera for Christmas!

Favorite Trip: The dude and I went to Ipswich the weekend before Labor Day and stayed in a cheap place with a pool and had ice cream at Dairy Queen by the side of the road. I liked it. Going to Michigan for my cousin's wedding was also really fun and it was nice to have my whole family all together which seems rare as time goes on.

Book of the Year: God, I just didn't get into any books this year. I started about 15 and I am still reading them all.

Here comes 2008. I am hopeful for more exciting things and more big changes in my life. I will hold on and enjoy the ride and see what happens. It is all I can do. Happy New Year.

(Here's what I said last year, in case you're curious.)

Please put a penny in the old man's hat.

It's almost Christmas! Ohmygod, I am not ready!! I can't get over that we are already at CHRISTMAS. The year is almost over. It's so weird. And I promise to stop saying that. Someday. Maybe.

Tomorrow is my last day at work before TWELVE GLORIOUS DAYS of vacation. The wisest thing I ever did was use 3 vacation days and 1 personal day to get up to 12 days off (because of the weekends and holidays). Yay for me, I can do math. My dad was so proud that I got around The Man to get my rightly deserved vacation time.

Right now I feel like I am waisting precious time at work. Time where I could be wrapping presents or washing my kitchen floor or doing laundry. There is much to do. I am a Christmas elf!

Friday I am planning to go out into the fray and get the rest of my Christmas shopping done. I also might get myself a new toy. Then Friday afternoon I will come home and make Christmas cookies with Suzanne for our Christmas Brunch on Saturday. Then Sunday I will get a tree. AH, CHRISTMAS OVERDOSE! Christmas day will be me and the dude with family and then the day after Christmas my mom breezes in for five days. And we will shop and consume and be AMERICAN. GLUTTONY!!! MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL!

I hope you are happy and warm wherever you are. Happy Holidaze!

Wow.

So, OBVIOUSLY great parenting skills run in this family.

I need to stop reading the entertainment "news", I can feel it... I think that is my brain slowly dripping out of my left ear.

I like on the OK cover she says she is "scared and shocked". Well, yeah. Sometimes if you stick that thing in there and poke it around a little BABIES GET MADE, y'all!

Do you ever just feel like you are watching the end of the world?

A Friday List

1. It snowed ten inches in Boston yesterday. It was really pretty. It took me two hours to get home (6 miles!) so I had a lot of opportunity to look at it, and walk in it, and get it blown up my nose. Later in the evening when it had been snowing for hours I went outside with Jane the dog and we played and I took some pictures. When it is quiet and everything is white, it's really lovely to live here in New England.
2. I went back to the doctor yesterday morning and they re-checked my lungs and said "we can hear the wheezing!" and then they prescribed me steroids. So, I should be getting better in the next day or so. I can lift you over my head right now! I am the HULK on steriods! (tm styro). I went home last night and cleaned my entire house and shoveled the walk way. It was the first time I have had any real energy in over three weeks. YAY FOR DRUGS.
3. One more week of work and then I am off for 12 whole days. It really cannot come soon enough. What are your Christmas plans?
4. I like this video.

5. Have a nice weekend!

God bless us, every one.

I haven't been feeling very well lately. I actually haven't been feeling well since Thanksgiving which we spent in a dry house with two dogs and HEY GUESS WHAT? I am allergic to dogs now apparently! I figured this out by not being able to breathe through my nose for two full days and looking like death. It was awesome. I put turkey on my pain and muddled through somehow.

Right now the only thing (okay one of maybe three things) making life worth living is my number one lover, the Starbucks gingerbread latte. Come here, darling, we'll make out.

So. Anyway. Sick. Sick and coughing and full of phlegm! It's lovely. I went to the doctor on Friday (after three weeks of coughing and supporting the drug store on my salary by buying every over the counter drug available) and they said, well, you don't have asthma YET but maybe you will someday. Merry Christmas! And then they gave me two inhalers which cost me $80 (what the fuck, insurance?!) and sent me on my way. My slow, half the normal lung capacity, way. 

And that was Friday and today I am worse. At least my lungs don't hurt. Or at least, I think they don't but maybe I am just too distracted by all the coughing and the completely stuffed nose to notice. Someone in my office walked over to me today and handed me orange juice. I think she was tired of listening to my cough from her desk halfway down the hall.  I called the doctor three hours ago so maybe she'll call in another insanely expensive prescription for me to pick up. Did I mention I am broke until pay day on the 21st? Again I say, MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Another bright spot is that I have TWELVE DAYS off over Christmas. Oh, it is going to be awesome. I will sleep and clean my house and make cookies and wrap things and also my mom is coming! And we'll go to Ikea! I better not be sick. I have to eat meatballs!

Lastly, there is Elroy who has just been so funny and charming lately, I can't believe he is only a cat. Of course, he is bigger than many small dogs and also babies so it is easy to believe he is a person. He wanted me to show you this picture of himself that he took for Christmas. He also wanted me to remind you not to chew on Christmas ribbon, cause it can really wrap itself around your poop and gross your mom out.

The end.

Missing in action

I am missing an apparently important gene. The ENGAGEMENT gene. Or the wanting to be engaged gene? The wanting to plan a wedding gene? I am not sure what it is called, maybe because I DO NOT HAVE IT.

Lately a lot of my friends have been getting engaged and then (happily!) married. Of course this seems to bring up the question of when I might possibly be getting engaged. Listen up everyone, the answer is never.

I so don't have it that engagement gene that last week when I sent a picture of my friend's engagement ring to Flickr, everyone thought I was engaged. It had not even occurred to me that people might think that. Oops.

I think it is great for people who want that. I am so happy for my friends who do. But I don't. For me, it's a waste. I don't want an engagement ring (until The Dude has to wear one, why should I?) - I would rather go on a trip. Or get a new couch. I don't wan to belong to someone else, until we're married when I do. And then HE wears a ring as well. Look at that! How fair and crazy! 

I won't be changing my name. Unless I marry someone with the last name "Rockstar" or maybe "Ballbuster" - that would be awesome, right? Until then, I like my name just fine. It's MY name.

I have talked to people about this and the impression is something is wrong with me. For not wanting What Everyone Else Wants. I don't know what is going to happen to me but I know what is not. I am not going down the same path everyone else is just because that is what you think I should do. Because that is what everyone wants. People seem to think I am trying to shit on their dream of being married, engaged, etc by saying I don't want it. People think I will change my mind someday.

Just because I don't want what you want doesn't make me crazy or confused.

It just makes me myself.

"Honey, you're the rock upon which I stand."

My best friend moved away a few years ago. It was sad in some ways but we talked on the phone often, like we always did, and that kept us close. It kept us close through marriage drama (hers) and boy confusion (mine). Sometimes I think we felt like we were each others life line. When New York had the black out she stayed inside for a day and a half and when we finally got on the phone to each other she was like, what the hell is going on?! I had to fill her in when she could have just walked outside. But that is what we are to each other. She's my soul mate, she's my heart.

Right now she is looking at houses with her husband and their baby. They are in my state looking at houses, they are getting closer, they are coming home. It makes me so happy and excited, it's unreal. I feel like I am watching a great movie and I know it's getting to the good part. I haven't seen her since June and before that I had not seen her for over two years.

Today I was sitting in a restaurant and I looked up and saw her husband walking by outside on his way to meet with the Realtor down the street. I knew she would be close behind. Before I even knew what I was doing, I pushed my boyfriend out of the way and jumped out of the booth we were sitting in. I ran outside and yelled her name. There was screaming and hugging. We were so loud, the baby started to cry.

It was the happiest most spontaneous moment I have had in a long time.