Xmastimes

First of all, this.

Speaking of the Fassbender, when "X-Men: First Class" came out on DVD, I wanted to buy it for myself. It is a good movie, and it has both Fassbender and James McAvoy, who I quite enjoy. And they have an absolutely breathtaking bromance. But my mother insisted that I buy the movie for her for Christmas. "You can borrow it anytime you want!" Well, I am a dutiful daughter, so... whatever. I bought it for her, and I only briefly considered opening the plastic, watching the movie, and then wrapping it, because I'm a good girl. And I was rewarded on Christmas, when I got the movie from mom! Now we BOTH own it, and I can watch it whenever I want, without having to drive an hour and a half to pick it up. Yay, mom!

I also got some awesome wallets, including this one:

 

 

Dead Sexy

Well, mine is longer and harder than that. OH, I WENT THERE ON A CHRISTMAS BLOG POST!

And some comfy pajamas, and a kitten throw (OMG precious), and a book about scary facts, and a useful emergency lamp, and the movie "Fright Night."

I bought a lot of books for the family, and some video games, of course. I can't wait to check out "Dead Island," which I bought for Malachai. Zombies on a tropical island! Yeah!

I myself ended up playing a lot of "Splatterhouse," which Mark bought for the boys:

KILL EVERYTHING.

It is an arm-tearing, head-popping, gore-and-swear-word-filled, violently funny good time. I played it quite a lot and only got through 20% of the story mode, but mom and I were cracking up at some of the lines - basically, you're this dude named Rick, and you get talked into putting on a mystical mask to save your girlfriend, Jen, and the mask turns you into a killing machine. The shadowy inhabitant of the mask gets into your head, and he's the one with the funny lines.

 

The game IS bloody and dark, but it's not scary. There is a load scene where one of the monsters is sort of chittering at you, and I started to find it kind of cute when it says, "Mmm, bo-bo-bone." At least, that's what it sounds like.

I don't know if Mark realized that the game was SO gory, SO full of swear words and tits, but whatev. We are a rather inappropriate family, so the boys are kind of used to it.

FOR EXAMPLE:

We are eating Christmas dinner, commenting on Izaak's low-hanging pants, even though he was wearing his new "I Love Boobies" belt. So my mom says, "You know how that started?... Prisoners! When they wore their pants like that, it meant that they were available for buttfucking!"

...And Izaak pulled his pants up real quick. Happy Holidays!

Weird, right?

I have a female roommate who moved in over Labor Day weekend. She asked Shon if the house was quiet, because she was in grad school and didn't want a lot of weekday wild parties. When I heard that, I was all, "YES! Finally someone else who appreciates the quiet!"

...I should know better by now. 

She is a slammer, and a loud talker, and she clog-dances across the wooden floor in wooden-heeled shoes from dawn 'til dusk. No, not literally, but she is ALWAYS in clunky shoes, walking really loudly. She apparently hasn't gotten the memo about slippers. "Slippers, you say? What do they do? Oh, they keep my feet warm, and I can stomp around without waking up quite so many roommate? That sounds PREPOSTEROUS!"


She also leaves dirty dishes in the sink constantly. In other words, she has pretty much replaced the Kid, although she's not quite so stupid. No, she's just annoying. And weird.

She has a walk-in closet, which is located in the main hallway. We all have to pass through this hallway to get to our rooms, or to the kitchen or the bathroom. This is a high-traffic hallway. So I find it incredible odd that she leaves the doorway to her closet open all the time. It's a big closet, and she has a lot of stuff in there, including stuff that might be deemed "personal." If I have a friend over, I get to be all, "Yes, and here are all of my roommate's belongings - please peruse them at your leisure."

She has several thick coats hanging on the door, and the coats attack me as I'm walking down the rather narrow hallway. So I'm always closing the door. She doesn't seem to get the hint.

  
She has the same open-door policy for her bedroom, which I also find weird. It's nice to have boundaries, right? She doesn't seem to think so (except when she's sleeping). And she's been dating this guy, and he stayed over last night. I don't know or care what they did, but I appreciated that they had the door closed while they were doing it.

 

But this morning, she and this dude were hanging out in her bed, chatting away, with her door wide open. This was at 7 AM, when I was coming down to use the bathroom and get ready for work. That's weird, right? I mean, even if they were in PJs or whatever, that's weird.

 

Oh, and her room is right by the front door. 

I feel like she thinks we're in some sort of dorm suite or something, but we are NOT. We are grown-ups who don't really know each other, and in my case, don't really care to. Ooh, harsh. But I have enough friends, and I like to relax and be quiet and not be weirded out when I'm home. Roommates come and go. We all came to the house through Craigslist - we're not a co-op, we're not a group of friends. So, again, boundaries are nice.

Now I'm wondering, as with so many other touchy roommate things, how do you even bring up the uncomfortableness of this weirdness?

"I'm not comfortable seeing your tampons or your wide array of soups. I'm uncomfortable knowing what brand of condom you prefer."

 

"I'd rather not hear your pillow talk while I'm on my way to the bathroom."

 

"Get your coats out of the way, please. I mean, it's a door! It swings open and closed! It's not hard to work a door. But don't slam it!" 

 

I know, I'm always coming down on my roommates, but I would like to point out again that I don't think it's that hard to be considerate: 

• Don't wake people up during normal sleeping hours 
• Do clean up your own messes (INCLUDING DISHES, OMG, ARE YOU TRYING TO DRIVE ME INSANE?!?)
• Don't eat other people's food or use their things unless you have express permission
• Do buy shared items like toilet paper and paper towels 
• Don't freak your roommates out (that is a new addition to the list)

Five little items. You'd think I was asking for the moon! Right now, "Don't creep me out" is at the top of my list. Really. Close your doors. I won't think you're being sneaky.

"In the air, there's the feeling of OMIGOD, WHERE'S THE SNOW?!?"

Yeah, guess what? Buffalo is GREEN right now. And kind of warm - yesterday I was replacing the light bulb in one of my car's headlights, and I was wearing a thin cardigan, and I was totally fine. I joked on Twitter about being a "total bad-ass" because I was listening to holiday music when there wasn't snow on the ground.

At the house, there are two trees (my tiny one in the family room, and a real one in the living room), and twinkle lights all over, but the glow doesn't feel right when it's not being thrown back at us by the snow outside. I watched "Love Actually" last night, despite the lack of snow - I'm so brave.

And a snowplow woke me up at 5 AM... what the hell were they doing out there, with no snow to be plowed at all?

TWEETS

If you tweet, check out THIS hilarious sites, which mashes your tweets into new tweets. Funny as hell.


Here are some examples from my Twitter feed:

I could find myself a dance AND HAPPY RIGHT NOW. A coworker says, I am already thinking about the one!

You could find ways to interact with about my ear. People appear to board a bad-ass.

I can't get Tom Waits to put one wins the Santa Ana winds if I contemplate the author S.L.

You don't want to reintroduce Kenny G to work. Your ruling planet Mercury is making a meeting today?

Health to drink. You might be so distracted by a little door on the new mouse for sure.

Yeah... but you have thoughts! Beautiful morning. Good day where I have to take pictures Why are already!

On my car some crafts! THIS IS UNPRECEDENTED! Leslie Hall's new features for Gemini Um.

Um... why do fake people! I pay more. This is opening up strange messages from trying to Kill last

A cupcake is funny as hell that some tattoo knowledge on the trailer. Unraveling your mom on the Roots on.

New trend? I love song about whether I won't SHUT UP! She's talking to handle an unusual person to...

You might get in until fucking funny if you to the better than you want to think so.

You don't blow it... You may sound very clear about whether I can achieve perfectly crispy 80s Madonna!

The Moon's return to be a song about whether I like the mountain of my way to a piano virtuoso, with?

Happy to herself... Intimate interactions with no blame... seriously? You might want to the sexism being?

Hey, it's pretty awesome. Happy to interact with crazy sexists anyway... 

I don't know trends. I watched Born to Miami to be required to do with others are asked. LOVELY.

Can I just like a Cage over this weekend. Brilliance. ...accidentally" kissed him on the bush now!

Health to work. You may not say knock-knock" instead of burrito. No, no, no! I'm tired.

My hips hurt. Don't get to think straight today, drawing you to the Nerds.

I contemplate the inevitable zombie apocalypse. In related news, the world of lazy people leaving.

You can slam every little bit unsettling when Fox News spouts. I haven't eaten my work...

One of actually have a cruise ship. You don't get donuts on my followers, be more flexible than others.

New planking? Having the dumb shit. The next time dealing with the author S.L.

Ugh. My sister. You Lightning I am a professional complaint letter. Instead of the culturals!

It's difficult to Miami to withdraw socially to... More for Gemini Dear newest Jane Eyre again - Well, we?

I was arguing with about for Gemini My mom is completely awful. My mom - watch and act like a significant?

You're determined to jiggle. I love song I can't wait to take you actually think she was arguing with a.

People appear to block your romantic feelings may not think I looked back, it kind of tasks you!

Wow, I would be a ballet store. SO Whatcha, whatcha, whatcha want? WHATCHA WANT? The Chainsaw.

Um... why they gave away from American Gothic one time. New York State? My hips hurt.

A cupcake is still in order to go home yet? My mom - a new mouse for the time.

Sometimes you want to the little door on Facebook who is all the thought the future, instead of tasks you.

The next time to do with crazy sexists anyway... Guy I call my way to type like beards on the inevitable?

Yeah, I never know better now that I DON'T want to do vehicles keep throwing their weapons away?!?

The Walking Dead season 2. YES. THE MIGHTY OENIS You might want to alter the Moon'...

More for Gemini Fassbender wormhole on the cosmos!

OK - I'm addicted to adult up in beating around and I retweet too much - Wow.

It's fucking JANUARY. Guess I'll regret eating it. But I don't want to think straight today, drawing you.

Your buzz factor is in until fucking JANUARY. Guess I'll see Steve Guttenberg!

SALTS

I just got back from the doctor, and I miss the days of yore. When I was little. When doctors didn't give me homework. Oh, I know, the homework is for my own health, since I have high blood pressure (stage 1), and need to keep an eye on that. Not only have I heard that heart attacks aren't fun, we also have a high occurrence of aneurysms in my family. I want to prevent my brain or heart from exploding - and yes, both have happened in my family. SO if you are hanging with me in a store (say, Target), and I go running toward the free blood pressure test machine, just know that it's for my health. And so my doctor doesn't yell at me.

I am supposed to limit my intake of salts. My first reaction was, "Great, because I don't add salt to anything!" But, of course, salt is already in everything, in scary amounts. I guess I'm going to have to work on reading labels on my food, like some sort of adult or something. Those Lean Cuisines that are so simple and tasty, and which I assumed were healthy? Yeah, they're loaded with salt. Vegetable soup? Loaded with salt. Ugh.

On the other hand, I lost a pound since last month. Yes, that is the month that includes Thanksgiving! I think I'll celebrate by eating a Big Mac (I'm kidding!).

the car

See the last post for cruise observations and photos.

And my car? Well, right before the cruise a fuse went out, which sounds like no big whoop. Except that the fuse was for the tail lights and the lights in the car behind the dash. I had to have my interior lights on so that I could see the speedometer, and my hazards flashing so that other cars could see me at night. And yes, I know how to change a fuse, and I had the fuses I needed on hand. But my car has three fuse boxes, and two of them are in the engine compartment, under the steel braces on either side. The fuse box I needed was under the most rusty brace. WHAT THE FUCK, CHEVROLET? Why did you put so many things I need to get to under heavy, hard-to-remove steel braces?

I kept spraying the bolts on the brace down with WD-40 whenever I thought about it, but the tools I tried to use were slipping and not moving the bolts at all. I was like, "Fuck it, I'm going cruisin'," so I went on the cruise. When I came back, I bought an adjustable ratchet wrench and packed it up with all of my Thanksgiving stuff, and then I set off for Familyland.

When I got to my mom's, my brother saw my ratchet wrench and was stroking it and insisting it was his. The next day (Thanksgiving), he asked if I wanted him to change the fuse. I was about to start cooking things up, so I was like, Cool, whatever. The ratchet wrench was awesome, and Mark had the brace off in no time. He came in to show me how the fuse hadn't blown so much as disintegrated. I replaced the fuse, and SUCCESS! I now have working tail lights, and a Christmas gift idea for Mark, who was so enchanted with my ratchet wrench.

the cruise

SO. A few weeks ago I was able to forget about car troubles long enough to go on a week-long cruise to the Bahamas! Here are a few things that happened:

- Considering that I was so concerned about breaking any TSA rules, it figures that I would break pretty much all of the rules regarding toiletries. I sort of remembered that there was something about toiletries, but I couldn't find anything on the websites (probably because I was looking in the wrong place). I went ahead and packed a bunch of full-sized toiletries in my carry-on, like an idiot. The agent who pulled me out of line to scold me at the Buffalo airport could have thrown away almost everything I brought, but instead she only threw away my toothpaste, likely the cheapest item I had in there. Thanks, scolding TSA agent.

We spent some time in Florida

- The first thing Julia and her mom and I saw/heard when we went to the port was a crowd of Woo Girls with their bridal party shirts: "I'm the sassy one!" "I'm the loud one!" "I'm the dumb one who will probably get drunk and fall over the side!" Since they were screaming and filling up the whole building with their obnoxious noise, we figured that we would not be able to get away from them for the ENTIRE CRUISE. We thought that they would be everywhere we went, and sitting next to us at dinner, because we had assigned tables. They were that annoying. Surprisingly, after that first day, we didn't see them at all! WOO!

There were animals in our room.

- After we stowed our bags in our tiny room (I liked the room, but had to get used to the diagonal toilet), we headed up to the Lido deck to watch ourselves float away from Miami. We climbed to one of the higher decks to check out the view and the mini-golf course - which OMIGOD WE FORGOT TO PLAY!  Anyway, we noticed a middle-aged man and his younger, foreign wife who were standing nearby. He seemed really attentive and kept asking what she wanted to do. She was giving suggestions, but he suddenly got creepily happy and started saying, "It's sunscreen time! It's sunscreen time!" as he hustled her off to their cabin. For the rest of the cruise, Julia and I would turn to each other at random moments and say, "It's sunscreen time!"

SUNSCREEN!

- I didn't do anything the first night, since I was tired and already a bit anxious about being on a cruise ship with 3000+ people that I couldn't get away from. But Julia cavorted around, and the next day she was telling me about some Bros who were being dumb as fuck the night before. They were standing in front of us while we waited in line for breakfast, bro-ing out and being general douchecopters, and again we had the feeling that we would be assaulted with their stupidity for the rest of the cruise. But, other than some hilarious drunken dancing, which I recorded, we didn't see much of them either! And dudes: if complete strangers are coming up to you while you are in line for breakfast, asking how you can be standing after the night before, you might want to pull up the reins on the drinking. Just a bit.

I responsibly enjoyed a Jack Julep

- The food on the cruise ship was amazing. People were rhapsodizing about the chicken fingers, which were delicious, and the dinner service was also very, very good. As was our wait staff. Seriously, for four nights I had chilled fruit soup, which was AWESOME.

Strawberry

- There was a dude wearing boxer briefs on the cruise ship pool. He was acting like they're swimwear. They are NOT. I took pictures.

Not swimwear!

- We went to Grand Turk and were going to take a nature walk and try to see some wild donkeys and flamingos. But there was nowhere to walk, so we hung out at giant pool that was blasting Jimmy Buffett.

This makes up for the Buffett

- On another day, we went to Half Moon Cay, which is a private island owned by Carnival. It was all beach, very relaxing. Julia and I went on the Nature Walk path, and when I heard a noise and saw a little blue-striped chameleon running around in the brush, I got all excited. "Hey, we found the nature! On the Nature Walk!" But then we found out that the chameleons were loud as fuck and not that hard to find. They were cute, though.

Loud as fuck.

- On our last full day, we went to Nassau, which was ...uh, scary, and not for people who can't stand being super-enclosed with other people. Especially when the other people are very aggressively trying to sell you crap. I wasn't into it. I think that we should have gone to Nassau first, and then to the smaller, quieter islands, and then sailed back to Miami. If I planned the cruise, that's what we would have done.

- The cruise director was named NOONAN, and he was kind of a jerk. We picked on him the entire time.

Fucking NOONAN

- Ew, I almost forgot about the talent show. Most of it was pretty good, but then some country dude got up and sang "Proud To Be An American," which I confidently count among my list of worst songs EVER. So fucking awful. I mean, the guy's voice was fine, but his obvious pandering to "patriotism," among a multinational crowd, was gross. I AM proud to be an American, but that song is hideous, melodramatic schlock! It's the kind of shit that "patriots" sing along to, and then they crush a beer can on their foreheads and yell, "I'm an AMURKIN!" And then they don't have to think about anything, or question anything. Lazy patriotism. I was so disgusted that I didn't take any pictures.

- After we disembarked in Miami (SO much quicker than embarking), we rented a car and drove to Fort Lauderdale. First, the rental car company gave our car away, so we had to wait for them to fix their snafu, but I actually found it kind of pleasant to just stand on the sidewalk and wait. Once we had our car, we set off for Fort Lauderdale. I didn't see much of Miami, but it seemed too big for me. Fort Lauderdale was more my speed, and our hotel (TropiRocks? I think) was small and charming, with a small and charming owner, and a dog, and a cat.

tiny and adorable

- We fortified ourselves at the ever-wonderful Outback Steakhouse, and then checked into our awesome hotel. Then Julia and I went off to find the Everglades. We found Markham Park, which had a dog park called "Barkham Park" AND a nature trail that takes you up on the edge of the Everglades and the river of grass. I quite liked the river of grass, and the white herons, and the way the weather was so changeable. The sun was out, and then we saw a rainbow all the way across the sky, and then it was dark as dusk, and then the sun was out again. Even better, there were edges to every weather change, so you could see them coming. Someday I would like to see the cypress swamps of the Everglades (protected by a boat), but the river of grass was enough on this trip.
 

sunny, yet ominous

the same, but different

rainbow

a white heron

the river of grass

- Coming home, we ran into a guy who was flying with a cat in a carrier. The cat was so calm and not even drugged! The guy got worried because the TSA agent made him take the cat out of the carrier, and he wasn't expecting that. But the cat handled it beautifully. I tried to imagine flying somewhere with Floyd, since you're allowed to bring a pet on the plane if their carrier isn't too big, but then I remembered how Floyd is a giant freak who doesn't like to travel, and NO.

- OF COURSE I was "randomly selected" by the metal-detector machine and was whisked away by two TSA agents, who also grabbed my carry-ons. I had nightmarish visions of a tiny room, me with absolutely nothing to confess, but being pressured to confess anyway. Embarrassing strip searches. Airport prison. By the time my brain had gotten to the part of the scenario where I was all steel-jawed and stoic while being threatened with torture, we were standing at a small kiosk, where one of the agents swabbed my hands to see if I'd had contact with drugs recently. They found nothing. And that was it. I'm not gonna lie, it was a bit of a letdown, considering what was going on in my head.  

- A week later, I was still swaying like I was on a boat. Even now, if I get up in the middle of the night, I'm swaying a little.

So. This whole cruise thing - I am glad I tried it, but it's not for me. Being on a boat with so many other people, nowhere to really escape and be quiet... I was just drained and drained and drained, with no recharging. Too many announcements, too much running around. But I'm glad I went, and the Bahamas were beautiful. In the future, I would like to go to one of the tiny islands and just stay in one place for a while, eating and reading and swimming and sleeping whenever I want. Without NOONAN coming over the loudspeaker, mangling the text that he's supposed to read in his annoying David Schwimmer-esque voice.

EWWWW