A few things-
1. I went to the mall today to finish up my Christmas shopping. Some of the malls here have metered parking. Does that sound like the worst idea in the world to you? Because a) people dont always have quarters so they wont come to shop at your mall when they otherwise would have come and spent $ b) people aren't going to take their time and look around if they're worried about the meter, they're going to go in, get what they came for and leave. Bad Idea, Mall People, Bad Idea! Trump would fire you!
2. Do you ever wonder about people who call into radio stations? Today, apparently, was this DJ's birthday, and I'm listening and this woman calls in. Here is the conversation-
Lady: HI! I just wanted to call and say happy birthday! I hope you have a fantastic day today!
DJ: Well thanks Polly, that's really nice of you.
Lady: So, are you getting out of town for the holidays at all?
DJ: Yeah, I'm going to visit my family in Austin tomorrow, actually.
Lady: Oh, I'm leaving too, on Wednesday, to go over to Pennsylvania to see my sister. Well, I want you to know that we'll miss you every minute that you're gone. Really, I hope you have a great holiday and New Year, and many blessings on you and your family
I'm not trying to be mean, I like being nice to people I dont know, I make an effort to let cars in ahead of me and whatnot, but doesnt this just seem a little crazy for someone you dont even know?
That's all I got.

I've got some really good news, though...

You know how they have those commercials that are really random and then all of the sudden they go "i've got some good news, I just saved a ton of money on car insurance"? Well, that's how I feel right now because I really did just save a lot of money on car insurance. Pretty sweet. I got a cheap quote and $100 off for joining rob's plan so now we have a multi-car discount.
Look what's happening to me, I'm talking about car insurance.
In other news, it really does not feel like Christmas to me at all, I don't know why. I've got a tree, I've bought all of my presents, I even watched The Santa Clause on ABC Family last week (wouldn't recommend it) but it really doesn't feel Christmasy this year.
Speaking of movies, you know what is good? This movie I got called Maria Full of Grace. It's about this girl from Columbia who decides to become a drug mule. It was so good. Get it. It was really interesting.
So, because school ended on Friday, the gym closed too, so I thought to myself, I'll be a scammer and get one of those two week trial passes to tide me over until it opens back up. Okay, Ballys? Madness. Dont go there. Think of the most A.D.D. crazy place you can come up with and you're there. Seriously. First of all, it was the loudest place I've ever been in my life. They were pumping dance music through the locker room speakers. I wanted to cover my ears and scream. And there are like approximately a million people in there. At once.
But, there was good news too.
I just saved a ton of money on my car insurance.
(come on, you saw that coming :) )

Why Rob and I are arch enemies-
Exhibit A- The Cheez-Its and Exhibit B- The ice cream

This is what Rob does. I'll buy something like, say, Cheez-Its or, I don't know, ice cream. And I'll get a little bit of it. But then Rob will eat 3/4 of whatever it is. But he knows that if I go looking for it and he's eaten like, the entire thing before I had a chace to have any, I'll get mad at him. So what does he do? He leaves like, the tiniest little bit. Today, I was looking for something for lunch. So I say, Cheez-Its, yum! I open the cheez-its. Do you know how many are left? Like, 10. 10 Cheez-Its in the entire box, and he put it back in the cupboard so, technically, he didn't eat it all. There is also a bag of chex mix that he ate all of then put the bag back in the cupboard with all the broken crumbs at the bottom. And the ice cream. I took the ice cream out of the freezer today- how much is left? MAYBE two spoonfuls.
I SHAKE MY FIST AT YOU, ROB MACINNIS!!

Dispatches from the library

1:39 p.m.- Someone on the other side of the room is doing that thing where you try to suck the snot out of your nose in much the same was as you gather spit to hock a giant loogie. Over and over again. It's so loud and I'm going to throw up.

1:59 p.m.- Have added page numbers to my paper. Am unhappy to see that the pages go to '11' and not '15', as had hoped. Also, am clearly updating to avoid further work which is nonetheless imminent. Also, have used the word 'imminent' in a sentence.

3:34 p.m.- Read an article on MSN Money that says you shouldn't tip the postman this holiday season.

The 2004 Survey

Oh yes, it's that time once again.
Copy it to your site and fill it out too!

1. What did you do in 2004 that you'd never done before?
Voted, got married, moved to NY, started grad school, flew on Aer Lingus, and did and jig on a table for 13 Irish diners (true story!)

2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I didn't have any last year- this year, pay off the damn credit card (right, cause that will happen)

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
um..no.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
again, no. knock on wood.

5. What countries did you visit?
Ireland

6. What would you like to have in 2005 that you lacked in 2004?
A little more $. A published story. Oranges. A fondue set- I asked for one for Christmas.. and then? WE WILL DIP EVERYTHING IN CHOCOLATE! HA HA! And some Oregon Chai, every time I go to the grocery store they're out of the regular kind. And some pumpkin bread. My mom said she'd send me some and I haven't seen a crumb of it. What's up with that, mom?:) Do I sound hungry to you? I am hungry.

7. What date from 2004 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
I don't know. Remember that time Jen and I got up at karaoke night and sang "I Will Survive?" That was a good one. Was that even in 2004? I don't know. It's too hard to remember this stuff a whole year after it happened.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
I got into four of the seven schools I applied to. And I have lived in two very small places with another person without either of us causing the other bodily harm.

9. What was your biggest failure?
Despite my five month plan, I have failed to pay off my credit card bill.
But hey, if youre going to fail, fail miserably, and that I did. (Does this sound familiar? That's because I said the same thing last year)

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
There was that one time I was washing dishes and I cut my fingers open on a huge knife and ran downstairs with Rob's boxers wrapped around them to stop the bleeding and had to go to the hospital. I got two stitches.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
An MP3 player, I use it ALLLL the time! And Netflix! I freaking love Netflix. And my subscription to Oprah magazine. If you have a problem with Oprah I dont want to hear about it.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Sierra's when she won I Spy by claiming that what she spied was an invisible swinging monkey that no one else could see.
Axel's when we were camping and he said "Who do you think liked s'mores better, Lewis or Clark?

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
The people of Michigan when they voted to pass the ban on gay marriage

14. Where did most of your money go?
In the beginning of the year- On going out, having fun, food.
Now- On one very expensive room in a building where the elevator breaks every friday.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
The wedding, going to Ireland, getting the wedding video back from Joe, the new Peanut Butter flavored Cinnamon Toast Crunch. For a while I was really excited because I had this great plan- I was going to send Danny a singing telegram for his birthday and embarrass the hell out of him. But it turns out singing telegrams cost $125. That put a dent in my excitement.

16. What song will always remind you of 2003?
The theme song to Sex in the City, considering I spent a solid two weeks watching every episode from all six seasons.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder?a toss up
ii. thinner or fatter? the same
iii. richer or poorer? oh, quite a bit poorer

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
reading, hanging out with people, playing Balderdash

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
worrying about nothing, bitching about my job at Comstock when it was actually a really good job for the time being, watching American Idol

20. How will you be spending Christmas?
In Michigan :)

21. Who did you spend the most time on the phone with?
My sister, easily.

24. What was your favorite TV program?
Desperate Housewives, Law and Order, The Apprentice. Jeopardy, while Ken was on there.

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
no, I dont think so

26. What was the best book you read?
White Teeth by Zadie Smith. Awesome book. And, I read two Dan Brown books The DaVinci Code and Angels and Demons and enjoyed them both quite a bit.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
I dont think I discovered anyone new. Sorry. You know who I like? JoJo. Don't tell anyone, it's embarrassing.

28. What did you want and get?
A hammock! I spent lots of time swinging in my hammock.

29. What did you want and not get?
A trust fund.

30. What was your favorite film of this year?
Garden State!!! Anchorman was a close second.

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I was 23 and I drove to Chicago and met Lily and we took a picture together next to a giant baby head. Then I came back and Me, Rob, Jon, Jo, Joe, Ryan and Jen went to Shakespeares. I swear I only had two drinks, but by the end of the night I was.. well, drunk. I begged Rob to go to Meijers so we could get ice cream, and even thought it was on the complete other side of town, it was my birthday so he gave in. But when we got there I couldn't remember for the life of me what we were doing there, so I turned to Rob and said "why are we here?" and then he got pretty mad at me.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
More soup in bread bowls from Panera.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2003?
I would describe it as a mix between "Hey, this is clean, I'll wear it" and "hey, this isn't clean, I'll wear it anyways." I would call it the year of the sweatshirt.

34. What kept you sane?
Pop. Mmmm.. Coke in a can.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
I have a crush on Jon Stewart. And Elliot on Law and Order.

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
Oh God, let's just forget it. Seriously, let's pretend it never happened.

37. Who did you miss?
My sister, even though Rob would say "how can you miss her, you're on the phone with her for an hour every day", Danny and his badnickness, my parents, tanya and our champagne dates, Erin C., everyone in Kzoo (desperately), everyone at Food Dance (except Paul H., who I couldn't stand) even though I wanted out of there desperately in the end, and Sar even though I see her every few weeks because we used to live together and that was fun.

38. Who was the best new person you met?
You know, I don't really have a good one. There's a lot of other grad school students I really like, but no one I've gotten to know really well.

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2003:
Park your car in a well-lit place so it doesn't get broken into. One Long Island Ice Tea is enough, no need for a second.

40. Quote a song/movie lyric that sums up your year:
"Umm..I just ate a big red candle"

P.S.- Don't be skeezy

People bug me sometimes.
Today at the mall I watched this woman take all of her fast food trash out of her big old SUV- cups and bags and wrappers- and set it all on top of the base of a light pole in the parking lot. It's really cool that you think that someone else should take care of your trash instead of just taking it home and throwing it away yourself.
I get good movies from Netflix tomorrow! Dodgeball, The Terminal and the third Harry Potter!
And the fifteen page paper I'm supposed to be writing? Congratulations to me, I finished reading all the books and decided on a topic. I even went to the library and printed off criticism to cite for the paper. Now.. about actually starting to write it...

Freaky Deaky

Okay, seriously people, what the heck is this?
I saw it in the grocery store today and it seriously freaked me out. Apparently this is some new TV show? What is with all these new shows, it's like they're getting freakier and freakier. You know what that toy reminds me of? the movie Hellraiser, the guy who has nails coming out of his head. Here's what drives me crazy- I went to Toys R Us looking for walkie talkies for Sierra for Christmas. Oh no, they don't have walkie talkies anymore, unless you want the $40, high tech adult kind. Walkie Talkies have been replaced by a big, blue, fur-halfway-up-it's-head toy?

I'm really reaching this time...

I haven't posted this week because not a damn thing has been going on.
Anyhow..Whenever I go to Blockbuster or other places, I always want to buy those previewed movies. But really, of all that I've bought there are only two that I ever watch- Good Will Hunting and Love Actually. Over and over again. We just watched Love Actually again.
Today, I was in the locker room and, I always seem to get done working out just as the senior citizens swimming class is getting over with. These two ladies were sitting there talking about their nannies/housecleaners today. Because everyone here has either a housecleaner or a nanny. These ladies were crazy. One of them was going to fire her housecleaner because she was convinced that she had stolen her pants. Yeah, lady. Your housecleaner has got her eye on your pants. Get real. She's like "I can't ask her about it because she doesn't speak English."

And for your random knowledge, here are the first lines of the first fifteen songs currently on my MP3 player.
1. Now usually I don't do this, but uh, go on break um off with a little preview of the remix.
2. When I step into the light, my arms are open wi-ide.
3. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go shorty, it's your birthday.
4. Hey ma. What's up? Let's slide. Alright. Alright.
5. Poison. Yeah spot a man of freedom for a fact aah-aah uh-hum. Poison you ready Ron? I'm ready.
6. Just in, where to begin? Grin and bear it, it's bear and grim.
7. It's a new day, but it all feels old, it's a good life, that's what I'm told.
8. How do you want it? How does it feel? Comin up as a * in the cash game, livin in the fast lane, i'm for real.
9. Change? Shit. I guess change is good for any of us.
10. I seem to recognize your face... haunting familiar, yeah. I can't seem to place it.
11. Oh, walkin, oh. Just the other day. And it was so hot outside, oh, you could fry an egg.
12. Andelay, Andelay, Mama, EI, EI.. UH OHHHHHH!
13. Well, I woke up in mid-afternoon, cause that's when it all hurts the most.
14. I've been. Waiting a long time. For this. Moment to come, I'm. Destined. For anything at aaaa-a-all.
15.One more time. (coincidentally, this is the last line, and almost every line in between too!)

Well, there's ten minutes you'll never get back, eh? :)
Hope you're having a more interesting day...