1. Holidays. Why are they all in the winter? Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, Valentines Day, St. Patrick's Day... it's just too much. I've expressed my rather dire feelings about holidays in general before, so it should come as no surprise that I feel clusters of them are uncalled for. Lucky, the worst is already behind us.
2. Forms. FAFSA, W-4, W-2, Taxes... federal shenanaganizing. Askeroscarooscarfug. (Congrats if you came up with some way to pronounce that.)
3. Snow. *sighs* Alright. I confess. I hate snow, but not really. It's complicated. Just when I think it's bearable and maybe even kind of pretty, it proves me wrong and gets in my boot or tries to trip me up or just generally interferes with the delicate task of living my life.
4. Darkness. I like the dark. It's fine. But the long dark mornings and nights make me want to sleep in and go to bed earlier, and me wanting to go to bed at 5 P.M. is rather annoying and counter-productive.
5. Cold. I loathe being cold. More than being hot, more than being sweaty, more than losing a toe to a shark. Okay, maybe not the last one. Being cold makes me feel like I'm about 100 years old and lacking the appropriate medication for my various conditions that are causing me this aching pain. Dire? Yes. They aren't your joints, so deal with it. (For the record, if they are your joints too, I express my sincerest sympathy and the offer to get together to have a warm beverage and discuss our unnamed condition.)
I know I complain rather a lot. I guess it's because it's the one thing I can do about the things I can do nothing about. And for some reason, complaining about things in a vaguely amusing thing somehow helps me to feel better about them. Go figure, eh?
Showing posts with label snow. Show all posts
Showing posts with label snow. Show all posts
Friday, January 27, 2012
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Friday, December 17, 2010
Ten Ways You Know Christmas is Coming
1) Snow. Dang it. I hate it! I wish it would snow on Christmas Eve and melt the day after Christmas. The rest of the time it can just be cold... Never mind. No snow, no cold. We can just install one of those snow machines in the sky so we get the same thrill of a Winter Wonderland without freezing to death, slipping and breaking bones and having to dig the car out of a 20 foot drift. God bless those of you who live down south. One Midwestern girl is infinitely jealous.
2) Stores. They seem to think Christmas starts in October and ends Christmas day. There are confused people in marketing. It's so long and aggressive it burns me out. You know how bad it's gotten? They made the Charlie Brown tree. You know, the cartoon? Charlie hates Christmas because he's a general misanthrope and because he feels it's overcommercialized. So in beautiful irony, he decorates this pathetic little tree and in breaking free from societies false representation of the "meaning of Christmas", he experiences true joy. Yippee, right? Well now they sell little copies of that tree. Little awful models that slander everything it stood for. Yes, I'm ranting. I was appalled.
3) Presents. "What do you want?" Oh how I loathe that question. I really don't want anything you can give me. I may like some stupid little thing or other, but want is not the right word. When I think want I think about people who have real wants. Needs. I want chocolate. Someone on the other side of the world WANTS clean water. He wants what he needs. No one should have to want that. Again, I'm ranting. Being an idealist. Spank me for wanting good to an unrealistic degree. Slightly better is gift giving. Yet this also finds a way to be difficult. I feel self imposed pressure to find the perfect thing for everyone. And when this thing does not appear, I lose the joy part in the "joy of giving". What needs to change there, I wonder? Lower standards? Am adjustment of perspective? (Stop giving gifts? Just kidding.)
4) Decorations. From trees to lights, wreaths and ornaments, garlands and the like, the world is decked out (inside and out) like no other this time of year. Tastefully done, I'm fine with it. I even kind of like it. Sparkly... who could complain? But tacky, overdone decor is truly horrid in red, green and flashy. It's always horrid, but for some reason, Christmas colors make it even worse.
5) Music. Oh I love music. And Christmas music, like most music, can be done one of two ways: well or not well. If you insist upon writing your own Christmas song, please, for heaven's sake, don't be cheesy about it. If you're just going to recycle phrases we've all heard a hundred times, over strain your vocal chords trying to croon or put it to a generally awful tune, do us a favor and skip it. And please note that the classics are called classics for a reason. You don't have to reinvent them.
6) Food. Cookies! I may have mentioned how I feel about cookies. There are loads of goodies this time of year to make the holidays worthwhi... I mean bright. The traditions revolving around food are perhaps my favorite. What can I say? I have a whole mouth of sweet teeth.
7) Family. Those relatives you never hear from any other time of the year send you a Christmas card updating you on their oh-so important (and until now, highly mysterious) lives. The family hash's out who all is coming and going where. People descend on the home of the poor host laden with gifts, food and more people. You're glad to have them... for a while. But few have enough patience to put up with their in laws for more than a few days.
8) Your Stress Level. Sky rocketing! And you thought fireworks were only for the 4th of July! To do lists, gift lists, a calender full of holiday related activities and people, places and things all demanding your attention! Exhilarating, isn't it? Until of course, you really do make like a firework and burn out.
9) Your House. This is the humble abode where all this Christmas cheer; the sounds, smells, sights and tastes of the holiday all collide into something best described as... chaos! Even if you aren't spending the actual holiday in your home, chances are you will be going to someone elses home where this takes place. Funny thing about the chaos is that it can also feel kind of cozy.
10) Your Heart. Whether your Christmas spirit quota is reminiscent of a burned out Christmas light (like mine) or a the whole dang tree, this is the place Christmas truly is. You can have the right music, the most tastefully done decor and all the perfect presents and be stressed and miserable. You can also have a wonderful Christmas without any of these things. Christmas is a holiday of the heart.
I hope you have a merry one.
2) Stores. They seem to think Christmas starts in October and ends Christmas day. There are confused people in marketing. It's so long and aggressive it burns me out. You know how bad it's gotten? They made the Charlie Brown tree. You know, the cartoon? Charlie hates Christmas because he's a general misanthrope and because he feels it's overcommercialized. So in beautiful irony, he decorates this pathetic little tree and in breaking free from societies false representation of the "meaning of Christmas", he experiences true joy. Yippee, right? Well now they sell little copies of that tree. Little awful models that slander everything it stood for. Yes, I'm ranting. I was appalled.
3) Presents. "What do you want?" Oh how I loathe that question. I really don't want anything you can give me. I may like some stupid little thing or other, but want is not the right word. When I think want I think about people who have real wants. Needs. I want chocolate. Someone on the other side of the world WANTS clean water. He wants what he needs. No one should have to want that. Again, I'm ranting. Being an idealist. Spank me for wanting good to an unrealistic degree. Slightly better is gift giving. Yet this also finds a way to be difficult. I feel self imposed pressure to find the perfect thing for everyone. And when this thing does not appear, I lose the joy part in the "joy of giving". What needs to change there, I wonder? Lower standards? Am adjustment of perspective? (Stop giving gifts? Just kidding.)
4) Decorations. From trees to lights, wreaths and ornaments, garlands and the like, the world is decked out (inside and out) like no other this time of year. Tastefully done, I'm fine with it. I even kind of like it. Sparkly... who could complain? But tacky, overdone decor is truly horrid in red, green and flashy. It's always horrid, but for some reason, Christmas colors make it even worse.
5) Music. Oh I love music. And Christmas music, like most music, can be done one of two ways: well or not well. If you insist upon writing your own Christmas song, please, for heaven's sake, don't be cheesy about it. If you're just going to recycle phrases we've all heard a hundred times, over strain your vocal chords trying to croon or put it to a generally awful tune, do us a favor and skip it. And please note that the classics are called classics for a reason. You don't have to reinvent them.
6) Food. Cookies! I may have mentioned how I feel about cookies. There are loads of goodies this time of year to make the holidays worthwhi... I mean bright. The traditions revolving around food are perhaps my favorite. What can I say? I have a whole mouth of sweet teeth.
7) Family. Those relatives you never hear from any other time of the year send you a Christmas card updating you on their oh-so important (and until now, highly mysterious) lives. The family hash's out who all is coming and going where. People descend on the home of the poor host laden with gifts, food and more people. You're glad to have them... for a while. But few have enough patience to put up with their in laws for more than a few days.
8) Your Stress Level. Sky rocketing! And you thought fireworks were only for the 4th of July! To do lists, gift lists, a calender full of holiday related activities and people, places and things all demanding your attention! Exhilarating, isn't it? Until of course, you really do make like a firework and burn out.
9) Your House. This is the humble abode where all this Christmas cheer; the sounds, smells, sights and tastes of the holiday all collide into something best described as... chaos! Even if you aren't spending the actual holiday in your home, chances are you will be going to someone elses home where this takes place. Funny thing about the chaos is that it can also feel kind of cozy.
10) Your Heart. Whether your Christmas spirit quota is reminiscent of a burned out Christmas light (like mine) or a the whole dang tree, this is the place Christmas truly is. You can have the right music, the most tastefully done decor and all the perfect presents and be stressed and miserable. You can also have a wonderful Christmas without any of these things. Christmas is a holiday of the heart.
I hope you have a merry one.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Sickly Sweet Childhood Memories
The following is one of, if not my all time, favorite childhood memories.
My younger sister, Clare and I, were outside playing on one of those winter days where it is warm and sunny, even though there is a good several inch layer of snow on the ground. On this particular day, we were getting along pretty well. Which, for us, meant only trying to assassinate the other once or twice.
We squabbled famously until this year. I finally broke down and matured, I guess. She's my closest sibling, as we are a little over a year apart. When this story takes place, I believe we are about ten and nine, respectively, perhaps a little younger.
Any way, on this lovely winter day, we happened to venture out by the gravel road of our rural home and lo and behold! A half emptied bottle of Pepsi- all alone and unguarded, just waiting for two lucky kids like us! We were thrilled to find that this bottle of the ever coveted carbonated treat was still two thirds full, and after some deliberation, we decided the benefits of free soda far outweighed the risks of someone elses backwash.
On a normal day, we would have fought like cats and dogs over the soda, causing such a stir that my Mother would have come outside to see what all the fuss was about and confiscated our prize. However, the stars were in harmonious alignment that day, and we agreed to share it equally.
We were going over the nitty gritty details of how to split the soda properly when suddenly, inspiration struck. I don't recall whose idea this was, or if this was our intent from the very beginning, but we decided that the same good and kid-loving gods who had sent us this soda had also bestowed upon us a surplus of snow with which to mix it. (Slushies!!)
This presented the problem of how to blend the slushies. We weren't stupid, and we knew revealing our secret would result in either less slushie per person, or no slushie at all depending on who found us first, a sibling or a parent. Thus, we acted with great resourcefulness and efficiency in our covert operation, procuring an old dog dish (yes, it gets grosser) to hold the goods (which I declared, with older sisterly superiority, to be quite sanitary after sitting in a freezing snow bank. Germs freeze to death. Duh.)
Then we found some clean(ish) snow to put into the dog dish and then we poured our precious Pepsi on top. Finding a stick (which was also the very picture of sanitation after we picked most of the bark off of it), we stirred the slushie in song. Seriously. We made up a slushie song. Heck if I know how it went, but I distinctly remember singing. And stirring.
We used sticks to scoop the first spoo...I mean stickfuls into our mouths. We agreed that it was excellent and congratulated each other on our genius. It was then decided that such genius should be applied further and that the fruits of it's labor should be named.
We decided to call it, with the sweet, senseless logic of children, A C Cola, short for 'Anna and Clare's Cola' This was obviously the thing to call a snow saturated Pepsi product. It was perfect.
And so, we ate and made merry and declared it one of the best things we had ever eaten. (I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty darn good.) And dispite our twisted sanitation efforts, we both survived.
I love that memory... I know ya'll think I'm revolting, that's okay, it's true. But that memory so captures what I remember of being a kid. Freedom. Creativity. Simplicity. Innocence. Sure, in theory we knew it was gross to drink someone elses soda, that dog mouths are not clean and neither is what birds put on snow. So what? We did it anyway. And we loved it. We thought it was perfect.
And so, it was.
My younger sister, Clare and I, were outside playing on one of those winter days where it is warm and sunny, even though there is a good several inch layer of snow on the ground. On this particular day, we were getting along pretty well. Which, for us, meant only trying to assassinate the other once or twice.
We squabbled famously until this year. I finally broke down and matured, I guess. She's my closest sibling, as we are a little over a year apart. When this story takes place, I believe we are about ten and nine, respectively, perhaps a little younger.
Any way, on this lovely winter day, we happened to venture out by the gravel road of our rural home and lo and behold! A half emptied bottle of Pepsi- all alone and unguarded, just waiting for two lucky kids like us! We were thrilled to find that this bottle of the ever coveted carbonated treat was still two thirds full, and after some deliberation, we decided the benefits of free soda far outweighed the risks of someone elses backwash.
On a normal day, we would have fought like cats and dogs over the soda, causing such a stir that my Mother would have come outside to see what all the fuss was about and confiscated our prize. However, the stars were in harmonious alignment that day, and we agreed to share it equally.
We were going over the nitty gritty details of how to split the soda properly when suddenly, inspiration struck. I don't recall whose idea this was, or if this was our intent from the very beginning, but we decided that the same good and kid-loving gods who had sent us this soda had also bestowed upon us a surplus of snow with which to mix it. (Slushies!!)
This presented the problem of how to blend the slushies. We weren't stupid, and we knew revealing our secret would result in either less slushie per person, or no slushie at all depending on who found us first, a sibling or a parent. Thus, we acted with great resourcefulness and efficiency in our covert operation, procuring an old dog dish (yes, it gets grosser) to hold the goods (which I declared, with older sisterly superiority, to be quite sanitary after sitting in a freezing snow bank. Germs freeze to death. Duh.)
Then we found some clean(ish) snow to put into the dog dish and then we poured our precious Pepsi on top. Finding a stick (which was also the very picture of sanitation after we picked most of the bark off of it), we stirred the slushie in song. Seriously. We made up a slushie song. Heck if I know how it went, but I distinctly remember singing. And stirring.
We used sticks to scoop the first spoo...I mean stickfuls into our mouths. We agreed that it was excellent and congratulated each other on our genius. It was then decided that such genius should be applied further and that the fruits of it's labor should be named.
We decided to call it, with the sweet, senseless logic of children, A C Cola, short for 'Anna and Clare's Cola' This was obviously the thing to call a snow saturated Pepsi product. It was perfect.
And so, we ate and made merry and declared it one of the best things we had ever eaten. (I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty darn good.) And dispite our twisted sanitation efforts, we both survived.
I love that memory... I know ya'll think I'm revolting, that's okay, it's true. But that memory so captures what I remember of being a kid. Freedom. Creativity. Simplicity. Innocence. Sure, in theory we knew it was gross to drink someone elses soda, that dog mouths are not clean and neither is what birds put on snow. So what? We did it anyway. And we loved it. We thought it was perfect.
And so, it was.
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