Tips to Beat Holiday Stress

I saw an article this morning on MSN titled Tips to Beat Holiday Stress. I, of course, clicked on it hoping to be given the secret to getting everything done in time without going apeshit at any point (I’m looking for a legal solution here. – no crack cocaine for this girl). I am always stressed around the holiday season. I most likely get it from my mom either that or I ask way too much of myself during the holidays.

I love Christmas, LOVE IT, but there’re certain things that make Christmas perfect like tons and tons of Christmas cookies, the perfect gift for everybody, and the biggest bestest birthday bash for yours truly. So not only do I have tons of shopping, baking, and, planning to do, but I also have finals to contend with…oh and I’ll be out of town two of the weekends prior to Christmas, but my mom has told me I am not allowed to complain about that.

Anyway, my point is how could I not click on this article? I admit I was hoping for a miracle solution…like maybe they knew how Zach Morris was able to stop time on Saved By The Bell. Let me tell you if I had that power I would not spend that precious time talking to the camera that follows me around all the time.

This article was quite the letdown though – it spent most of the time telling me why I’m stressed, really, though, it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure that one out. But there were hardly any tips, as I skimmed it I saw only one: have a potluck instead of cooking the whole dinner by yourself. Are you kidding me?! You do NOT want to get me started about how much I hate hate hate potlucks. So, since this article was so completely the opposite of helpful I thought I would come up with some tips of my own to help people out that might be in the same predicament that I am in, aka easily overwhelmed.

First: Drink a lot. As Homer says, “It is the solution to all of life’s problems…and the cause.” Just ignore that last part. It really helps if you have to go to that company Christmas party (just be sure to leave before you feel like it would be appropriate for you to start removing items of clothing). It improves your acting ability when having to pretend you like a present: “Wow, this is the PERFECT nightgown! I couldn’t have found a more PERFECT one!” I might overdo it sometimes. Or it might decrease your acting ability, but don’t worry that just increases other people’s enjoyment. It also allows you to pass out when family drama gets beyond the point of entertaining.

Second: Hit someone. Preferably somebody that can’t hit back, because having a black eye is not good for de-stressing – it only works when giving them to somebody else.

Third: Call in sick for the company Christmas party. Or if you’re like me, lie and say you’ll be out of town (technically, I will be out of town that day…I’ll just be back in time for the party, but they don’t need to know that!) Or if you’re one of those lucky people who likes their coworkers then go to the party and follow my first tip.

Fourth: Temporarily become bulimic. Who has time to workout during the three weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas? Plus, what kind of person are you if you actually stick to your diet…no friend of mine that’s for sure. So I say just throw up in between meals. What?! It’s only temporary!

That’s all I’ve got. I could really use some more tips though so that I don’t lose my sanity – How do you keep your marbles intact?

Fuck, Marry, or Kill

Ok people we’re going to try this again. Last time I made the mistaken assumption that everybody knows how to play this game because how else do you waste your time when you’re waiting in line at the all you can eat buffet? So here’s how the game works: you are given the names of three people and you have to choose which one you want to fuck, which one you want to marry (it’s a sexless marriage by the way), and which one you would like to brutally kill. Oh, and you HAVE to choose. You can’t be all, “I can’t decide they’re all so hot!” or “I would kill myself before I fucked any of them!” No, no, those are not options. This week is the James Bond version. Girls, you have three James Bonds to make your decision:

Personally, I would fuck Daniel Craig because he’s got one hot bod. I love me some Pierce Brosnan so he’ll be my future hubby. And while I love Sean Connery’s accent and the way he treats Alex Trebek I’m going to have to kill him.

Boys, here’s your choice of Bond girls chosen solely on how ridiculous their names are:

Pussy Galore

Octopussy:

And the only Bond girl James Bond himself married:

I hate Bella. I should be in her place.

I was nervous about my book club at first – I thought it would fail pretty quickly, but it’s been going pretty well. We read a good combination of different books: old classics, modern fiction, non-fiction. Every month the host of that book club chooses the next book.

The last host chose Twilight - a good easy to read no-brainer. At first, I was excited. I bought the book, but haven’t found the time to pick it up and read it despite the fact that I’ve heard nothing but good things about it. I figured having it as a book club book would motivate me.

However, ever since the book was actually chosen I have started hearing not so great things, like how cheesy the writing is. If there is one thing that will make me hate a book it is cheestastic writing and clichés galore. So now I’m all nervous that I will despise it and I truly want to enjoy it!

This morning on my way to work the radio station I listen to was interviewing the “two biggest fans of Twilight on the west coast”. They were two high school age girls and they were certifiably crazy about Twilight.

In this interview I was lucky enough to hear first hand the cheesy writing as the host was doing “dramatic readings” of it. These girls kept talking about how perfect Edward was and how they loved the books because they themselves were falling in love with Edward.

The fact that Edwards is “perfect” also bothers me. How is that romantic? It’s easy to love somebody who always does and says the right thing. What happened to loving somebody for their imperfections? These poor teenage girls are convinced that the perfect man/vampire is waiting for them somewhere. He just isn’t in Kent…which is, I guess, a valid point.

It turns out that, funnily enough, these girls were studying Romeo and Juliet in their English class, but, COME ON, that is nowhere near as romantic as Edward and Bella! I think that’s what had me convinced these girls had lost their minds. Maybe if they saw the movie with Leo they would understand the romance behind it…

Despite my reservations regarding this book I am still going to give it a fair chance. I’m going to attempt to forget all those pesky realities about how Bella could never be truly happy with Edward because I mean, really, how is that going to work when she’s forty and he’s still seventeen? Truthfully, chances are I’ll love it. Deep down I am a hopeless romantic…and I will probably agree with the obsessed girls that Bella’s a loser and I should be the one with Edward. On the other hand at the age of sixteen I very passionately hated Titanic so I am proud to say I do not succumb to all things “romantic”.

I thank God every day I'm not a moron

On my way to class on Wednesday night I overheard a very fascinating conversation. There were three girls walking ahead of me and one of them was probably around seven months pregnant and was asking her friends if they thought she could just use her dog clothes as a substitute for baby clothes. You see that way she wouldn’t have to go shopping for baby clothes. Her friends seemed to think it was a good idea. One of them pointed out that it might constrict the baby's movement some, but, hey, it's not like the baby is moving around a lot or anything. It sounds to me like she was really prepared for how her life was about to change in just a few months.

Who knew? I CAN O.D. on caffeine

I met with my marketing group yesterday after work at a coffee shop in Bellevue. Of course, first order of business when I got there was to order a coffee – I went with my usual mocha with extra shots and NO WHIP. God, I hate whip cream.

I had this friend growing up who was always shooting that stuff straight into her mouth and every time she did it I threw up a little in my mouth. Shudder.

I am extremely picky when it comes to my coffee – I attribute this to my six years of working as a barista through high school and college. First of all, if I see the espresso shots have been sitting for too long without being mixed with milk I’ll tell them to throw them out. Unless the person looks sketchy and might pee in my drink when I’m distracted by the annoying high school girls with their high pitched voices whining about that skanky hoe not inviting them to that party last Friday night, but a bad coffee drink can ruin my day – I must take steps to protect it even if that means taking a slight risk of bodily fluids making their way into my precious drink.

My other problem is people have been known to forget the all important extra shot which, believe me, is a tragedy for it makes the drink much to sweet. I am also one of those people who like extra foam on their mocha. First, it also lowers the sweetness factor and second, it keeps the mocha from exploding out of the lid, which has happened all too often to me on days when I happen to be wearing an especially cute sweater.

Anyway, I’m sure you were all dying to know exactly how I like my mocha…but what I was going to say before I got sidetracked is that I really didn’t need those extra three shots of espresso yesterday after work. Our meeting lasted a little over two hours, but since Seattle traffic is such a little bitch I still managed to get stuck in rush hour on the way home in the middle of a “November storm” (that’s what the news kept calling it, not much a storm if you ask me…but I guess the people who are preparing for floods would disagree with me).

The point is that it wasn’t really the greatest for me to be driving in that kind of traffic while having a heart attack. You read that right - I swear to you I was having a heart attack on my way home. If not a heart attack then my heart was at least skipping beats and there was chest pain involved.

My theory is that the three shots I had after already ingesting my normal amount of caffeine for the day (a morning coffee, black tea, pop) was just too much caffeine for me, which I really did not think was possible. I thought caffeine no longer had any effect on me…except for the lack of it causing a headache that feels like people having a party in my skull with jackhammers. Hopefully this lesson stays with me for a while…at least until tonight when I have to go to school and I am once again tempted to drink coffee – there is going to be a guest speaker tonight, which is never good for my attention span.

Sometimes I can be such a scaredy-cat

I am just racked with insecurities today. Man do I hate those days. I know I complain about this a lot, but as I told Chuckles earlier I really do hate not having time to workout and as he said I would have to quit work or school to make time for it so I will just have to survive for now with my once a week workout routine.

I was doing pretty good this summer and ran my first 5K in September and did pretty well according to my standards. My goal when I signed up for the race was to finish in under thirty minutes and I finished at thirty one minutes – close enough for me! Also, I was 74th out of about 2,800 in my division.

I am running my second 5K this weekend, but this one is a little different and I haven’t been running nearly as much as I was this summer. On top of that I’m part of a team with two other girls who work out every day. Then there’s me who’s lucky to get in fifteen minutes of yoga a week. It is quite frustrating.

My teammates are very sweet and have assured me that they are in no way serious about this and we can run at whatever pace we want, but on this typical Monday I am just feeling slightly nervous about it.

Also, there are obstacles in the course. What kind of obstacles we won’t know til we show up. At least one of my teammates refuses to get dirty so it should be interesting what with me being a slowpoke and our team refusing to participate in obstacles. Chuckles is excited – he thinks it will be quite entertaining for him to watch.

I am also feeling insecure about school. Nothing new there right? We start our project tonight and I am not really prepared. I have this problem where once I’ve finished with my midterms I decide that I deserve a break and next thing I know I’m behind in all my classes and have more tests approaching.

Yesterday morning I downloaded the handbook that we are supposed to have read prior to tonight only to discover that it was 150 pages and I had homework due on the reading in two hours. I think that is also the point yesterday when I yelled at Chuckles and he left to have lunch with his dad as opposed to being around my toxic self. Anyway, I’m sure my group will manage. It is a game and we will be competing with other groups in the class so I hope I can restrain myself and not let my competitive side take over.

After class there is going to be a study abroad fair and there is a class during the intersession that is in the Dolomites in Italy that I desperately want to take and yet I keep talking myself out of it. So many excuses: it costs too much money, I can’t take that much time off work, it’s precious time spent taking a class I don’t need to graduate. It is a class based on emotional intelligence, which I know some people think is bullshit, but I have heard only good things about this class and I have always been desperate to see Italy. Ever since I was thirteen and read Beach Music by Pat Conroy (I know…cheesy, but I was an impressionable teenager) I have been dying to go to Italy and I have always regretted not studying abroad as an undergrad. So part of me wants to go, but part of me is scared to go hiking through a foreign country with strangers where we talk about our feelings. Just writing that out made me think Hells no, I am not going. But then every email I get from the professor has this quote at the bottom:

"You will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in you sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."

I know I would be disappointed if I didn’t go. Hopefully, at the end of class I won’t be feeling too lazy or too anxious and I will stop and get more details.

Spreading the Love

Supposedly there were streets all over Seattle that were flooded this morning (I say supposedly because I did not in fact witness these “flooded streets”, but if Mr. RadioMan says they’re out there I’ll believe him) making for a not very fun Friday morning commute. Not that morning commutes are ever fun, but Friday mornings ones usually rank above average in the sense that I don’t search through the glove box in the hopes that this is the morning I remembered to bring that box of razors.

Basically every street was completely gridlocked and you know when that happens you’re lucky when people don’t block the intersection. Well, this morning as I was waiting to turn right onto one of these backed up streets two cars had pulled up and blocked the crosswalk and some lady, who was waiting to cross the street (and I might add at first seemed totally normal) stepped up to one of the cars and started banging on the passenger side window and screaming, “You’re blocking the DAMN crosswalk you JERKFACE!” Then she kicked the tire for good measure. Then she walked up to the next car, also blocking the crosswalk, and banged on the trunk and yelled at him too.

I don’t know about you…but I’m thinking that was a bit of an overreaction, it’s not like she was unable to get to the other side of the street. Nobody came close to running over her. In my book, that is called “success”. I mean most of the time when I cross the street I come very close to getting run over. In fact, just the other day when I was walking to school I was only one millisecond from being smashed by a red sports car – so, yeah, this lady has issues.

Anycrap, I just felt the need to share that with everyone. But what I’m really here to do is pass on an award. A while ago Jamie at Oh! How Lovely! gave me an award! So Sexciting! It’s a cute award too - just look at it:

Now I get to pass this beauty on to five other deserving bloggers. I decided to share it with some bloggers I only recently started reading…I’m sure everybody else in the blogger world is way ahead of me, but I’m slow so give me a break. So here they are:

Losing It – She’s quite funny and snarky. I have quite the little blog crush on her.

Love Maegan – We have a lot in common – same name, she has a pug and I would give my right ovary to have a pug of my own, we both like fashion. Really the only difference is she’s a hot blonde and I am, well, not.

Genius Pending – He’s pretty much the only other Seattle blogger I know of and he’s funny and he lets me leave offensive comments about setting the elderly on fire and returns the favor by leaving offensive comments here and, well, I think it’s pretty damn funny.

Arjewtino – I learn a lot from him. I mean just the other day I learned that if you search for “Lose your virginity to a dog” you get a lot of results. Yep, very informative.

Stoogepie – So I’ve been reading his blog for a while, but, come on, he writes naughty comics. Emphasis on the naughty.

So that’s that. I hope everybody has a fan-fucking-tastic weekend!

What a relief!

Thank God that ended well! Am I right or am I right? I have to say that is the first time I voted for a winner. YAY ME! As I shared with you yesterday, and I know you were all sorts of jealous, I hung with the fam last night and we watched the results together.

When I got there after a hellish commute my big sis with her two little boys was already there and those boys were well on their way to creating havoc. That’s not completely true. But what is true is that when my mom asked Jared what kind of pizza he wanted he forcefully replied, “COOKIE!” Unfortunately, we were never able to convince him that there was no such thing as a “cookie pizza” regardless of how unbelievably cool that would be, so, needless to say, he was quite disappointed when the pizza came and there were no cookies on it as toppings. Travesty!

After we had chowed down on plenty of cheesy pizza and had plenty of delicious wine we started our game of election night bingo. It had typical sayings on it: voter turnout, concession speech, absentee ballots. Unfortunately, we were watching some of the Daily Show because the graphics on NBC scared us and Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert were talking about…well, not voter turnout. At one point (don’t ask me why) the phrase “Giant Shit Burger” was uttered. This caused my dad to scour his card only to find that it was nowhere to be found. We were not happy with that blatant oversight.

Also, I don’t think my mom really put a lot of thought into how last night would play out in terms of playing a game with my dad, my sister, and I. You see the three of us are extremely competitive and every time somebody would say a phrase that was somewhat close to one on our cards she would want to mark it off and all three of us would yell at her, “It’s not exact! It has to be the exact phrase.” I think at one point or possibly multiple times (I can’t really remember…blame it on the wine) I accused my mom of cheating. She did win after all. I would have more vehemently protested, but she was nice and shared the prize: a box of mint frangos. Nummy.

Later after we decided we’d stayed too late and couldn’t wait any longer for Obama’s speech my sis went to wake the boys and we gathered our stuff together. When she got downstairs she asked Jared which parent he wanted to go home with and he just kept staring at me causing us all to think he was on the brink of saying Auntie Megan! Which would have been the wrong answer…despite that we considered it for a second. Simply because it would have been funny for me to show up at home: Look, honey! I won election night bingo and the prize was a four year old boy. I wonder if he does any tricks.

I did my part. DID YOU DO YOURS?

I voted this morning. I was a good citizen. I was a bit freaked out last week because I thought I wouldn’t be able to vote. You see I am still registered at my parent’s house and I am supposed to be a “permanent absentee” voter, but they never received my absentee ballot. Then when I searched to see if I was still registered there King County had the gall to say I wasn’t registered at all. Wha???? It’s not like I haven’t voted before. PLUS I was active in the caucus and King County said I was registered then. I smelled something fishy. So I called them yesterday and for some unknown reason my voter status had been changed to “inactive”, but they said I could still vote. Wheee!!

So early this morning I headed to my voting place to find there was zero parking. After driving around a while I caught somebody leaving and was able to steal their spot. I headed on in to find the voting room filled to the brim – there was absolutely no room to move. None. Zilch. I was somewhat confused as to why they had it in this tiny little meeting room when in the past the voting was done in the junior high’s library. I guess they heard the voter turnout would be smaller this year? I don’t think Kenmore is very smart. Maybe that’s why we’re called Kenmorons…I went to the democratic caucus and they were far from prepared for that too. That was in the junior high cafeteria and people were so crowded together I have no doubt that is was a fire hazard. It was unbearably hot and nobody could hear you talk. Any time somebody had something to say they had to stand on top of a table and scream. Yep, not prepared at all.

Anycrap, I was finally able to get in line and, luckily for me, some crazy lady got in line right behind me. She was quite dressed up in a Christmas turtleneck and baggy sweatpants. She was also quite creepster in her insistence to speak to every small child there. You wouldn’t think there’d be a lot of small children, but, believe me, there were. In front of me was a mom with her ten year old daughter and her daughter was telling her how she thought that voting meant putting a candidate’s name on a piece of paper and putting it in a box. Creepster lady interjected here to say, excruciatingly slowly, “Well, little girl, that would work in a small election, but with millions and millions of people that would take a long time to count. Don’t you think?” It was unbearably condescending. I wanted to turn around and say she’s a kid, not retarded, but I thought that might be construed as offensive. To another little boy there she kept saying to him, “I bet you could walk right under that table! Walk under the table! Walk under it! Walk under the table!” Oh dear God, it was intolerable.

But I am happy to report that I survived without hurting creepy lady and am now at work anxiously watching the minutes tick by as I wait for the day to end so I can plop myself in front of the TV hooked to the results. I’m going to watch the coverage with my parents while we chow down on pizza and drink wine and play an exciting game of election night bingo that my very cool mom has put together for us.