We all know how much I hate to be left out...

7 things in 2005 that rocked:

1. It's unanimous...it's Theo.
2. Papa got better.
3. New friends, new faces, pantastic people in general.
4. Abby's in Memphis, I still talk to her every day. Doesn't get better than that.
5. My house. I am SUCH a grownup, complete with dog and bills to match.
6. Learning to cook.
7. spending so much time with Grandpa, Mary, Andrea, Sam and Theo. Very cool.


7 things in 2005 that didn't rock:

1. I should have probably been more faithful in church attendance.
2. School. I hate it.
3. I should have gone to Sedan more. I'm missing John's senior year.
4. I mean, natural disasters suck.
5. I should have done more for people who are not as fortunate as me.
6. Manage finances. So necessary.
7. Be more healthy. All around.


7 hopeful things for 2006 :

1. Volunteer more.
2. Pray more. Continue to grow in love with my faith.
3. Be healthier.
4. Stop doing something I hate to please others...elementary education is not for me.
5. Be more independant financially. Stop relying on my dad.
6. Continue spending time with my sister.
7. Surprise myself...

Life Goals Include, but are not limited to...

::live in the Metropolitan Museum of Art ( you know, like that book you read in the fifth grade
about Basil's files or something?)

::learn all the presidents in order

::meet Doris Day (she is part owner of the Cypress Inn in Carmel CA--where it should be noted that pets are welcome--and I think we need to go)

::to free Tibet

::never be overdrawn again...this can include either learning to balance a checkbook or marrying
well (reading this one should include a fist in the air like Scarlett)

::get one of thse egg chairs from Ikea in my size

::learn to play an instrument. I think the piano.

::win the lottery

::own every Law and Order ever shown on DVD

::watch said Law and Orders in bed like a glutton for the month it would take

::become a patient person

New things we learned over Christmas.

1. Real emergency rooms are nothing like ER. And things are not solved in that timely one hour time slot. In fact, they suck.

2. The bigger they are, the harder they fall. Navy man? Football player? Manly man florist? Putty in the hands of our favorite Little Man.

3. Digital cameras save the world. As well as saving some unfortunate facial expressions for posterity.

4. No matter how old we are (for example, 22 and 25) Mom still doesn't want us to enjoy some Christmas Cheer in front of her. Or hear fun drinking songs. Or stories. Or even contemplate the fact that we're old enough to go to the Liquor Store by ourselves...

5. Toys that make noise rock. They're fun to play with. Fun to watch Theo play with. Even more fun to know that Andrea has to listen to them at home. A lot.

6. The Candy Cane Train would be a lot of fun now.

7. If the devil had been at Primo's like I thought she was going to be, my mom and my sister would have clawed her. That's nice to know.

8. I don't hold my muscle relaxers well.

9. The communist system might have failed Russia, but it worked well at Christmas. I got Paula Deen out of the deal, so I'm good to go.

10. We need to get a giant red bean bag so we can watch Ttv (That's Theo TV for all you wondering) all the time. And because he looks really cute in it.

I hold these truths to be self evident.

So I realized some things about myself...and others...today as I shopped from one end of Oklahoma to another:

1. I really like to buy gifts for people because it’s a challenge. I mean seriously...what can Adam take to Japan or will Theo like this amazing ball popper in three months when he's big enough to play with it? Challenge.

2. All of this is more fun when I don't have to pay. Mary, I salute your day of Discover. Everyone else, I helped so if you hate it, it was me.

3. I was raised better than most people at the following places: Best Buy, Barnes and Noble, Toys R Us, Wal-Mart, and Target. Because this is such a blanket statement, I will qualify: I was raised better than most of the people I was forced to interact with at those places.

4. Sales clerks or people manning the check out are people too. I watched some horrible woman yell at a sales clerk because she--the horrible woman--picked the ONE thing without a barcode and the checkout girl had to hunt it down. Now seriously, you cannot expect the poor girl to memorize EVERY price in Wal-Mart, it's simply unrealistic. If we were at a regular Wal-Mart, maybe, but this was a Super. Lady, come on...

5. Toys will make it all better. I don't care how old you are, I defy you to not have fun with some toys. Now, some of you may consider your computers, pods, cell phones, etc. your toys. But I am talking about Fisher-Price lawnmower popper toys. They rock.

6. Most of the people that I was raised better than (please see #3) have no idea what Christmas is supposed to be. One chatty woman in line was horrified when I told her we drew names this year. She said the limitation on the haul would be unacceptable. I countered with "we're just happy to be together" a la sappy Christmas movie; she gave me a blank look and then inched away as if I had just spouted a Communist manifesto.

7. Everyone MUST wait until the week of to do holiday shopping. It is a national rule, one of those unspoken ones like American tourists and cameras talking loudly in foreign countries. Clearly, not all of these unspoken rules are beneficial to the populace at large. For more examples of this mania, I can cite several blogs.

8. The weather knows what we want and refuses to cooperate. If it's going to be cold is it at least going to snow and be beautiful? Hell no. It’s going to spit rain and snow intermixed until everywhere is muddy, gray, and fairly depressing.

9. Santa Claus is not Jesus. I just wanted to make sure no one was confused. Mr. Claus, however cool, is NOT the reason for the season.

10. There is, sadly, a generation of people growing up thinking "Love Actually" is a definitive Christmas movie. What. The. Hell. NO! These twits are going to substitute some British movie where a woman discovers an adulterous spouse via a present she didn't get for movies like White Christmas? A Christmas Story? The Disney version of A Christmas Carol with Jiminy Cricket as the ghost of Christmas present (that one might not be definitive, but I sure like it!)? I think that is a sad commentary about our current state of affairs. If you can't finish this sentence: "Every time a bell rings..." with the appropriate blood sugar rise then back to the TV Lounge with you, you need to be schooled. Or I'll have to poke your eye out. Ralphie.


So my family, I salute you for clearly raising me right. SO I'll see you this weekend with our one person presents right after we watch White Christmas and go to midnight mass. Merry Christmas you crazy commies.

Success!

So I babysat the Little Man yesterday--with NO freamin! At all! And it was a substantial chunk of time. From around 11 to around 4. Now, naysayers in the world would ask how long he napped (2 hours) but we were fream free for the rest of the time! We basically played all over and he told me I am his favorite next to his parental units. I told him that was fine but to fake it a little for his MiMi when she gets here because she has a complex.

But I don't. Because we were fream free. I'm just saying.

Please prepare yourself for a rant.

I got a B+ on a paper for doing TOO MUCH RESEARCH. Someone please explain to me how research and an attempt at not plagiarizing said research results in a B !!! Not okay. She wanted more "Erin Simpson" and less "authority." Explain to me how Erin Simpson is supposed to know about Eighteenth Century England without reading aforementioned authorities! And not citing is would be UNETHICAL!

I even wrote a nice note in the back of my blue book thanking her for answering my thousands of questions. I wanted to go back in and rip it out of the blue book. I am IRRITATED.

I'm just saying.

The wretched beast sleeps.

Albeit very happily and most of the day now on her new bed.

Halfy Birthday Theo!

Here are some pictures from Theo's First Halfy Birthday!

Dano-Mano and the Little Man.

Uncle Ethan and the Little Man. Theo REALLY liked the beard!

Pansy would like to say thank you for her new bed.

She's like the Princess and the Pea...

only its the Pug Dog and my former favorite down comforter.

I'm just saying.

Finals

So I have decided that higher education has it all wrong. Why should I be expected to essentially purge knowledge into a blue book at exams time and pray for the best? When in the course of "real life" is anyone EVER going to hand me a blue book and ask me to write, in an incredibly well crafted essay, everything I know about 18th Century England? Why is the summation of my knowledge attached to a number that determines my worth as an academic? Shouldn't we, now hold on, this is radical, come up with some practical applications for some of this stuff?

Basically, here's me trying to justify my mediocre grades with moral reasoning. My ethics could be called into question because I was forced to memorize concentration camps and dates to the tune of "Yankee Doodle" (think about it...Dachau 1941 doo da, doo da). Any mnemonic device in a storm people. (Can you belive that word is spelled that way? I looked it up. I don't think THAT assists the memory.)

Remember this rant when grades come out. I'm just saying.

Startling Realization...

So I was explaining to my favorite Little Man today about my World War II final when I realized that when he studies that, it will be as distant to him as the Civil War seems to me. And right now will be like Vietnam to him. I got wigged out. I'm just saying.

Crankiness Runs Rampant...

So everyone I know is cranky RIGHT NOW. Even Pansy, who in an unrelated story has become addicted to her breath biscuits and is now somewhat of a beggar and is really starting to make me crazy.

Tis the season! But I'm not there yet. I am oddly disconnected and discontent this year. Maybe it's the school work that is doing its best to kick me when I'm down. Maybe it's the fact that due to financial situations everyone will be receiving a construction paper card from me this year. Maybe it's that Christmas can't be Christmas without certain a certain amount of family time--namely so much we get sick of each other and resort to football and dominoes--that seems to be impossible now.

SO I'll keep plugging along and try to remember the Reason for the Season. But every once in a while...

Well, it's just a Bah Humbug situation. I'm just saying.