It's because they're good stories

It's that time of year, friends, when the television is less interesting, and the books become priority. Well, kinda. I mean, I still have a whole lot of other things to demand my attention, chief among them is my kid, and Christmas, and the Task That Shall Not be Named. But in a perfect world, I'd be able, and willing, to settle into some books before the world gears back up in late January and February. Especially since I've got a pile already, and I believe I may be getting more for Christmas.
Also, in regards to reading, I was pleased to see that I'd been a hatchet monster to my magazine stack a couple weeks ago, and all the older mags had been recycled.
So I'm not really behind in my reading; I'm on time but had chosen to overlook a couple issues. I don't have anything else to read in my life, so once the Task is completed, and Christmas is over, I'll look forward to doing a bit of reading.
Books are happiness.

They all smelled good, but not HIM

Years ago, I was a small girl who wanted all the Strawberry Shortcake dolls. They were the hot toys to get, and I learned years later that Mom had to travel to hell and back to find all the dolls for me. In this photo, you'll see the Purple Pie Man, the bad guy, in the back left. He smelled awful.
I found this photo the other day, and it reminded me of my awesome collection. I had Strawberry Shortcake, of course, Blueberry Muffin, Apple Dumplin', Huckleberry Pie, Orange Blossom, Lemon Meringue, Raspberry Tart, Cafe Ole, Angel Cake, and Apricot, as well as all their pets.
I think I may still have these dolls in a box in Mom's storage unit. Or did I donate them? I don't remember. Not that I want them, if I did. But this is a really good picture of them. In fact, this is the first time I've seen the Purple Pie Man since I managed to get him out of my life, because he smelled really bad.
I'm super glad I saved all my dolls and such for my "daughter," should she want to play with them. DINOSAURS.

I watched it so you don't have to

I have an aversion to watching people fight and argue on television. I avoid most every point/counterpoint show, from news and politics to sports. It doesn't seem to me that anyone ever changes their mind based on an argument on television, whether you're the person arguing, or in the audience. By virtue of this, I avoid most everything that looks like it's going to be nothing but people screaming, including movies.
This is why I avoided August: Osage County last year. The trailers, remember, showed little more than Meryl Streep being mean and yelling, and Julia Roberts shrieking. That they acted so abominably to their family made the movie even less enticing. I avoided it very much. ... You must be able to see where this post is going.
Brian, who is the bane of my existence sometimes when it comes to entertainment, decided to land on this movie, "just to see," and then chose to stay with it. I was comfortable on the sofa with my phone and my magazine. I still ended up watching this movie, which I will tell you, is a wretched story about wretched people doing wretched things to each other. Everyone is so mad, or crazy, or vindictive. It was an awful movie to watch. And I don't feel any better about myself as a person, or even as a moviegoer, having watched it. I advise against it.

I make some magnificent mac and cheese

Do you want to know a random pet peeve I've got?
It's with Kraft, in regards to their microwaveable macaroni and cheese. You see, many years ago, when I made mac and cheese for Brian and I to eat every other night because it was delicious and we could easily afford it, the standard blue box had a microwaveable recipe.
I followed the recipe, and by virtue of how often I made it, I ended up memorizing it. And then, just by chance one day a few less years ago, I noticed that the microwaveable recipe no longer appeared on the box. Around that time, the proliferation of "Easy Mac" microwaveable mac and cheese began, and the overpriced, "easy" way of microwaving mac and cheese became the way to do it. I continue to microwave my mac and cheese the way I always have, thank you very much.
Tonight's mac and cheese was delicious, my friends. It was so good, I wished that I didn't have to share it with Brian and Sydney. (I'm an only child, by way of explanation.) You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to post the delicious, microwaveable mac and cheese.
Pour your macaroni in a microwaveable bowl, and add 1 3/4 cups of water. Stir.
Microwave for 9 minutes, stirring every three minutes.
Remove the noodles, stir them.
Then add 1/4 cup of butter (1/2 a cube), 1/4 cup of milk, and then add the cheese mix.
Stir them all together until butter has melted, and everything is delicious and ORANGE.
I season with salt and pepper, but that's a matter of taste.
So, there you go, my friends. Enjoy your microwaveable macaroni and cheese, for far less money than the "easy" way of Easy Mac.

Melting plastic is pungent

My house is all kinds of stinky right now.
About 15 minutes ago, sitting all comfortable on my bed, I was suddenly assaulted in the nose by the stink of something burning. It took me a moment to figure out that it was indeed coming from inside the house. It's a sharp smell, and one that I've smelled before. But not a good one.
With that, I got up, and proceeded to wander around my entire upstairs sniffing big air and trying to identify and triangulate the smell. Nothing upstairs. Heading down the stairs, the smell got stronger. I woke up Brian, who also smelled it, so I know I wasn't going crazy. We checked outside in the backyard, but didn't smell it.
As I walked into the kitchen, I suddenly realized what the smell was: my dishwasher. I typically set it to an air dry cycle, but tonight, for no real reason, decided to try the heat cycle and see if the dishes dried better. The smell was definitely coming from the dishwasher. Opening the thing was like a punch to the nostrils, all heavy with melting plastic.
Want to know what's weird? None of my plasticware had melted onto the heating element. Sure, I had plenty in there, but all of it was in the racks and safe. Our mutual consensus was that it's the element itself that is stinky, from lack of use or a failure of some kind. I flipped the dishwasher back to air dry and closed the door.
My house still stinks. Bleck.

Mwah! Kisses goodnight to you!

I'm tired, you guys, for no good reason. I've been going to bed at a decent hour the last couple nights, and have been sleeping well and warm. I've had busy days, certainly, but there's no reason why I'm this tired, and unable to come up with a decent blog topic for tonight's post.
So, a sweet kiss goodnight to you all.

"Hooked on a feeling" and a movie

ITEM!: Another first for this year: Sydney is permitted to have an opinion about the holiday cards. I asked her this evening if she would rather have a picture taken tomorrow for the card, or if I should just use one of the pics of her from our Grand Canyon trip. She actually volunteered for the photo shoot tomorrow. Knock me over with a feather; I was not expecting that answer. And now I'm all unsure of exactly where I want the picture, and what she'll wear. Do we play it cold weather? Or run with the Santa hat (my personal favorite)? Or will she insist on wearing her Halloween costume? Any and all of these options could very well happen, so the suspense is killing me.
ITEM!: I started my Christmas shopping in earnest this morning, and have made a bit of a dent in what I have planned for the holiday. Tomorrow is a day off, of course, because Brian will be home, but I've got plans for Thursday and Friday. I could very well be almost done by the end of the week. That would be so weird.
ITEM!: An update on the powder room downstairs: I installed a towel ring on the wall for hand towels. This is remarkable because I had been refusing to install anything on the lovely painted walls, and was making my family deal with an inconvenient and silly over-cabinet-door towel holder. So today, I screwed two big toggle bolts into my pristine wall, and hung a ring on them. It looks okay, and it's super practical, but I'm still not loving it.
ITEM!: Also, happily, we are now a family that possesses the Blu-Ray DVD of Guardians of the Galaxy. It's going to hurt us to not watch it before Sydney's home from school tomorrow and done with her homework. We are dying to sing along and giggle again.

Pizza, pizza, pizza starts with P

Sydney and I decided that we all needed to have frozen pizza for dinner tonight. You see? We were in charge, and that happened.
So you know, the California Pizza Kitchen frozen pizzas are quite good. Sydney prefers the single-sized four cheese. So far, Brian and I have sampled the fire-roasted vegetables, four-cheese, and pepperoni, and tonight, we had the margherita.
I also quite like the Tombstone four-cheese pizza.
Pizza for dinner is an awesome thing.

Key lime salt water taffy is delicious

I've had a horrible headache all afternoon, and I'm trying to figure out what gross thing I ate today caused it. Well, my day started with my breakfast shake. It was not that. Then, we all went to the art festival, and proceeded to nosh on basically everything. Kettle corn for Sydney that Brian and I had to test several times to be sure it was safe, and continued to be safe, enough for her to eat. Organic cotton candy in chocolate and strawberry flavors (I only had a bite of each flavor to taste). Key lime salt water taffy, because there's a new candy shop on Mill that carries the Taffy Town taffy. A chocolate chip cookie and strawberry ice cream ice cream sandwich. Hot dogs from Weinerschnitzel.
My day was a gastrointestinal delight, kinda, but it left my head aching throughout the afternoon, and even tonight. I contend that I didn't drink enough water. Plausible, but I've had a couple big bottles of water since we got home. Perhaps the hot dogs, but hot dogs have never given me headaches before. It was probably the ridiculous freight train of sugar I consumed over the course of two hours this morning.
I feel like the best way to finally rid myself of this sugar hangover is to sleep it off.

And pints and pints of ice cream

I was very pleased to discover today that Sydney and I both prefer a smaller Christmas tree. Brian, of course, wants a 12-foot tree or some such. I don't, and was happy to have Sydney on my side in the discussion. Instead, we have a lovely, little six-foot tree in the living room right now, and it's quite perfect. All the right ornaments fit well, the lights are bright and happy, and it smells so good already.
We had a bit of an epiphany a couple weeks ago about the tree topper, though. We've had a light-up star for the last several years to go on top of our tree. I never liked it much, because it was too bright and looked cheesy. I found out, in the conversation that led to an epiphany, that Brian never liked it either. This blew my mind because I'm certain that he's the one that picked it out. Anyway, the solution, of course, was to not use the star, but to be creative with something else. Brian's brilliant idea: a Santa hat atop the tree. It looks super cool. Sydney is not a fan, but I've reminded her that we can use a different topper every year. Next year, we'll be creative with something else.
So, come to find out that if Sydney and I were in charge of everything in our house with no discussion, there would always be a small Christmas tree, brownies in the kitchen, frozen pizza for dinner, and little to no television during the day, with music always playing. Also, she would want to sleep in my room every night, and I would probably let her.

Girls on the phone catching up

Julia e-mailed me tonight, you guys! I'm beyond excited about this. It's been just less than two years since I last talked with her, which is a super long time. Her birthday is next week, and I had planned on calling her to wish her a happy day, but she got to me first. It was such a happy treat for me to find her e-mail, and she said that it made her happy to see how quickly I responded. So, we've got a phone date on Monday morning so we have all kinds of time to catch up, with no one else around to interrupt or listen.
I miss my friends. It makes me sad that I'm so far away from them, and I find myself daydreaming quite often about being able to see them more often. Like, wouldn't it be cool if I was able to have coffee with Julia on any day we wanted? Or crash one of Andrea and Ryan's dinners? Or go shopping with any of them? All these things would be lovely. Sure, I see most of them whenever I visit California, but whenever we get together, it's an event, or occasion. I miss getting together "just because," or "maybe some time next week." Being far away takes away the spontaneity and/or casualness of the get-together. So many times, that's the best part.
I'm really looking forward to Monday.

Rain, rain, come back on Saturday

I don't think there's anything better than waking up to the sound of rain outside the window.
Actually, there is something better than that: waking up to the sound of rain outside the window and not having to get out of bed. It was a drag getting out of bed this morning. The rain drops were dancing perfectly on my window and the ground outside, and the thick clouds made for a dark sky. It was the absolute best morning to stay in bed and do nothing but listen to the weather.
But no. I have a kid that had to go to school. So I got out of bed, and had a day in the rain.
Where actually, that wasn't too bad, but still, it would have been nice to stay in bed for a while longer.
I love the weather. I hope it's that kind of morning on Saturday, when I don't have to get up until I want.
Also, it should be noted that I did not post anything on Facebook about the rain. I'm amused by the frequency and speed by which they all post their rain updates, so I thought to not spoil their good time.

Wednesday is as Wednesday does

TODAY:
is Cooper's birthday! He turned one year old, and still acts as much the puppy as he was yesterday. I think it's pretty safe to say and tell you that I am smitten, enamored and adoring of my puppy. He's becoming a lap dog, which is awesome; he's sweet and happy, which is lovable; and he's still a bundle of energy, which is exhausting.
my ankle tweaked on the trail again! I blame the ankle this time. Because honestly, why would I turn my own ankle -- the same ankle I turned weeks ago -- on purpose? I wouldn't. The ankle is to blame here, because it's obviously become the weak link in my body chain. I'm not at all looking forward to it swelling, and continuing to be weak and sore.
all the decorations are up! But I still have a couple empty spots to fill. Nightlights and another holiday sofa pillow are required before I will say that the house is done.
Oliver just farted! It was an in-his-sleep, old-man fart, so it was kinda cute, but it was still a juicy, loud fart, so that's nasty. Bad news: he was aiming at me. Good news: it has either not got to me yet, or it doesn't smell.
we watched Home Alone! Sydney hadn't seen it yet, and Brian and I were in a mood for a giggle. I'm so glad that she loved it, because it's one of Brian's favorites, and I still crack up when I see iron marks on Daniel Stern's forehead. Her favorite part, based on the level and sincerity of her laughing, was when Kevin put the tarantula on the guy's face and he screamed. She was hysterical. I wouldn't be surprised if we end up watching it again soon, and it becomes required viewing for every year at Christmas.
is Wednesday! And the countdown to Christmas is looming. I got work to do.

It was still very delicious

It's a super, fantastic thing for me when I find cash in the dryer. Obviously, it means that Brian has forgotten some of his coffee money in his scrubs, but even more than that, it means I've won. I won money for doing laundry.
Last night, a five dollar bill jumped out of the dryer to my feet, and demanded to therefore land in my purse. I was super pleased with this, because it meant that Brian's loss would be my gain, and he would pay for my Starbucks today when I put up the Christmas decorations. (There is always a peppermint mocha consumed on decorating day.) I practically skipped into Starbucks this morning. I ordered my venti peppermint mocha, and happily pulled my five out of my wallet.
"$5.34."
Of course, I had no change with me. Only two or three pennies. So, imagine my disgust with having to pull out the debit card to buy my coffee. With a sigh of disappointment, I put the money back in my wallet.
I mean, really, I was supposed to buy my coffee with ill-gotten gains, not my own debit card.

Such a pretty girl in a pretty dress

If you can believe it, I am starting to think about my New Year's resolutions for 2015 already. I will, of course, surprise you with them on January 1, but the consideration of them has been a hobby lately. I'm almost excited to get started on the new year, which is not usual for me, at the beginning of December.
I think all this is because I'm close to accomplishing most of this year's resolutions, er, EXPECTATIONs, and the biggest of them is looming, but attainable, in the next couple weeks. Who knows what will happen with it, but I feel like just getting it ready and diving in will be a huge deal for me. Yes, I'm being deliberately vague. Soon-ish, I may be more forthcoming, but that will all depend on my state of mind once said EXPECTATION is met.
Also, I did not get all the Christmas decorations up today. It is best to not pile too many things into one day, and setting out seven or eight bins worth of decorations is certainly an all-day, all-encompassing task. I put away the Thanksgiving stuff, and cleaned some stuff out of that, too. I plan on being quite ruthless with my Christmas decor tomorrow, setting aside to donate everything that I don't love and like a whole lot, because the bins are overwhelming me.
Also, my television shows are going on their winter sabbatical, so it's time to break out the books again. I've got another to add to my To-Be-Read Pile, and hope to get through a couple of them over the holidays and the next several weeks. Reading is exactly what I need as a Christmas present to myself.