Okay, let’s try to keep this short and sweet, because it’s about to be 2019 and I will have things to do in 2019.
This is a summary, so forgive me if I leave out a few details. Currently, a full transcript of Things I Did In 2018 is unavailable. (2018 isn’t completely over yet anyway. Duh.)
Things I Did In 2018:
I stopped automatically writing 2017 on all paperwork, documents, and checks sometime around my birthday. In February.
I moved east of the Mississippi River. I began to understand and appreciate the value of playing Tetris for hours at a time during my formative years once I had to downsize. (Come over sometime and take a look at my closets. I tried not to hum Russian music faster and faster as the piles of boxes climbed up the walls when I was unpacking.)
This is the river. I live somewhere to the right of it. And, yes, I sell prints of this photo here.
I took more photos. That’s what photographers do.
I wrote more stuff. That’s what writers do.
I wrote lists. That’s what really meticulous people do.
I left grocery stores with a lot more than what was originally on those lists. That’s what hungry shoppers will do.
I decided not to make any resolutions for 2019. That’s mainly for self-esteem purposes, because it’s a little bit demoralizing to find yourself cancelling a gym membership on January 3.
I didn’t win the lottery, but I don’t know anyone who did, so that’s not really a big deal.
I stopped watching as much television. I don’t really feel any smarter, but I don’t feel as though I’ve missed out on much, either.
I probably left out a few things, like what I had for breakfast on April 12 or how long I waited on my last oil change, but I’m working on brevity in my writing since we live in a 140-characters-or-less kind of world these days.
When you tear the tag off a pillow, does it scream? Do alarms and sirens go off in the Center for Pillow Tag Safety or something?
When I was a kid, popular culture (and urban myth) taught me that tearing the tag off of a pillow or mattress was an offense worthy of the torture chamber (or at least a hefty fine and jail time). No one bothered to tell me that it was safe to rip it off once I ACTUALLY BOUGHT THE ITEM, though, so I left a lot of tags on a lot of pillows over the years.
I know I’m the consumer. But, still. Does it make anyone else nervous to think about removing the tag?
Well, a while back, I dug a pillow out of a closet to display in my living room. The tag was still attached, and a decades-old shudder of anxiety ran through my body as I realized that displaying it with the tag still attached would be ugly. I read the tag very carefully, looking for any alarm sensors or tracking devices in the process, mentally preparing myself to remove it.
I am the consumer. I legally purchased this reindeer pillow. Wait a minute…nope, no, I didn’t. It was a gift. Did they purchase it from a reputable, law-abiding vendor? I know the tag says “Walmart,” but anyone could print that in their parents’ basement. Can I actually bring myself to do this? Better make sure there’s not a security camera on this thing…
Gripping the pillow in my left hand and cradling the delicate tag in my right, I walked over to the desk in my bedroom, reaching for my pair of blue-handled scissors.
Here goes nothing.
Snip.
AAHHHHHHHH! The tag! I cut it off the pillow! I’m such a rebel!!!!
It turned out to be a surprisingly anti-climactic moment. I mean, the smoke detector didn’t even go off. No one called from the Pentagon. My neighbors didn’t even complain.
And, for the time being, I have a cute pillow sitting in my living room without an itchy, ugly tag.
I’ll still probably sweat a little bit every time someone knocks on my door…
Every time I read a news story in which someone has stolen a patrol car, I am immediately struck with one thought…
“Gee, do you REALLY THINK YOU’RE GONNA GET AWAY WITH THAT ONE?!?”
Fire trucks, ambulances, and–yes–police cars are among the MOST IDENTIFIABLE VEHICLES on the road. I’m not talking about the undercover, unmarked vehicles (obviously). The marked cars are designed to stand out.
When you were a kid, did you ever have the idea that it would be exciting to ride in one of those modes of transportation because of their innate ability to blend in? Gosh, no! You’d have been sitting next to the driver, feet dangling over the edge of your seat, yelling, “Turn on the lights! Do the siren!”
Whee! I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t notice this on the highway at all! (Riiiiiight…)
You think–just perhaps, maybe, possibly–that if you steal a police car, the police might just notice that? You shouldn’t steal anything, but…my, goodness.
It’s not like taking a few cookies from the jar on top of the refrigerator when Mom isn’t looking. It’s more like wearing a clown costume to the symphony.
Just don’t do it, okay? Consider this a public service announcement and go watch television or something. (I hear “Cops” is still a popular show.)
Oh, you thought this post was about something else. Sorry to disappoint. I am going to discuss hours, though. Waking hours, sleeping hours…the levels of functionality at different hours in the day. You might be bored by this. But, you’re here, so you might as well pass the time by reading. Who knows? Maybe it’ll help you sleep.
I have a window of about three to four hours a day that I feel like I’m operating at totally full capacity. (I think most people feel this way, too, regardless of the caffeine content of your coffee.) So, in my typical overthinking fashion, I’ve decided to break down a normal day so that I can figure out during which hours I function at peak functionality and try to replicate them at other times of the day…time. (Umm, that was a little redundantly redundant. Sorry.)
Let’s take the morning hours to start, because that’s when most people start their day. It’s when I start mine. I’m sure you can relate. I usually set my alarm for 6:15, which means my paranoid “is-the-alarm-going-to-work” internal clock wakes me up at 5:00 and every five minutes thereafter. (By the way, anytime someone tells me that 5:00 a.m. is their finest hour, I’m inclined to run away. The last time 5:00 a.m. was my finest hour was when I wanted to get a head start on Saturday morning cartoons.)
By 6:30, I’m beginning to prioritize which corners to cut on my morning beauty-ish regimen. Knowing that I will regret skipping eyeliner by 10:00, it always takes priority, alongside concealer, which was invented for the express purpose of making a 6:15 wake-up-call appear effortless.
7:00 means breakfast, or something that will pass for breakfast. Whatever takes the least amount of effort. I’m very good at cooking drive-thru, which I pick up thirty minutes later.
By 9:30, I’ve begun to make progress in the field of alertness. Between 7:40 and 9:30 I’ve been functional—and courteous—but not necessarily overly chipper.
10:00 is good. 10:00 works well. If I could harness 10:00 all day, I’d be good. 10:00 to around 2:00 are usually my height of chipper-ness. Lunch helps (hey, we can always use recharging) and, if it’s a sunny day, it’s the mostest, bestest, sunniest time of day.
I do think, though, that the entire universe can relate to the 2:00 slump. If mid-afternoon could be represented by an animal, it would be the sloth.
I don’t actually do that at 2:00. I mean…vegetables? I save those for the day or two I’m on a health kick.
Studies have confirmed that these mid-afternoon lulls are commonplace. If those studies would really help us figure out what to do about them (besides taking a power nap—really, who has time for that?), that’d be peachy.
I usually get my second wind around 3:30, although it’s more like a light breeze. Don’t get me wrong—I AM FUNCTIONAL—I just feel very…oh, what’s the word…blah. By the time evening rolls around, I’m ready to hibernate (especially in winter, my least favorite season), thus lowering the possibility for productivity on home projects, socialization, food preparation, or even changing the channel from whatever I left it on the night before.
Home shopping? Okay, I’ll stare at that for a while.
I still, however, usually force myself to take on more stuff, crawling under the covers around 10:00 and kicking myself for not going to bed an hour earlier from time to time.
Maybe I should put a positive spin on this: I’m really good at functioning while tired. To be fair, I think most of us are. After all, we over-schedule, over-extend, over-exert, and overdo almost everything. So, perhaps getting that 10:00 to 2:00 feeling can be achieved by some simple restructuring.
In fact, let me consult my calendar to see what can be done.
Let’s see. The hours from 10:00 to 2:00 look good for…everything.
Please take a moment to review these standard units of measurement for winter precipitation in the South with your family before submitting reports to neighbors, relatives, and friends. Expert advice for each situation is listed.
Snowing:
1 to 15 snow flurries per hour
Temperatures hovering around 32-33 degrees
Call your local television station. Things just got serious.
Snowing Hard:
50-100 snowflakes per hour
Sticks to grass for a maximum duration of thirty seconds
Take no less than twenty photos and one video for Instagram. Demand that local schools close early.
Blizzard:
A dusting/up to one inch of accumulation
Bigger snowflakes, but still able to be individually counted with reasonable ease
Stay home. Your off-road, heavy-duty, four-wheel-drive pickup truck is useless.
Whiteout/Apocalypse:
Accumulation in excess of one inch
Snowflakes too numerous to count
Call Northern relatives for survival advice, if your phone still works.
Sleeting:
1 to 15 ice pellets per hour
Sound against windows resembles bacon frying in small skillet
Put glass outside to collect ice. Sonic will be closed soon.
Heavy Sleet:
Melted residue on car windshield (see also: cold water)
Sound against windows interferes with normal conversation
Advise your family that it could be worse. It could be freezing rain.
Freezing Rain:
Shiny glaze on all elevated objects
Power outages, broken tree limbs, all brick-and-mortar establishments closed
Give up and set yourself on fire for warmth—you’re in this one for the long haul.
I decided, in solidarity with my fellow…umm, fellows, that I would participate in No-Shave November this year. Well, we’re well into the month, and I’m pleased to report that there are no results whatsoever.
Nope, nothing. Not even a little stubble.
While I am grateful for my inability to grow facial hair, I would like to do something for November. November is like the middle child at the kids’ table these days. People pass it over as a bump in the calendar between Halloween and Christmas.
We do have a major holiday this month, folks. A holiday feared by many a turkey down on the farm. As much as Americans love to do two things—gossip and eat—you’d think that Thanksgiving would get more respect. Alas, it’s become a day to scarf down a big meal…after which the men fall asleep after watching football and the women get a jump-start on Black Friday at 3:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Thursday.
I stand corrected. I see a few men.
I’m proposing No-Share November…or, more specifically, No-Overshare November.
You see, I’ve been on a reduced social media diet lately, and I’ve quite enjoyed it. I don’t have to snap photos of breakfast to prove that it once existed or come up with the perfect selfie to prove that I had one good hair day out of the past three decades (give or take).
Brene Brown wrote, “Vulnerability is about sharing our feelings and our experiences with people who have earned the right to hear them.” I think it’s a good thing to limit some of the things we choose to share with the world, since very little is sacred anymore. I have a pretty big list of Facebook friends, but I don’t necessarily want to share my innermost thoughts and feelings with ALL of them. They wouldn’t be innermost anymore if I did, anyway.
The irony is that I wouldn’t mind at all if you shared this post. (Click the button. Click it. Go on. You can do it.) I just think everyone could benefit from stepping away from the screens for a few extra minutes to take in the WORLD without having to prove that you were somehow “better” than the next person.
Just some food (for thought) for this little upcoming November holiday. You know, the one that’s (turkey) sandwiched between two other biggies. It deserves its (just) desserts.
This is going to be a very, VERY quick post to let you know that a) I haven’t dropped off the map, and b) the reason I haven’t posted lately is because I couldn’t find half of my stuff or take time to surf the internets because I just MOVED!
I suppose I should have used boxing gloves. Get it? HA! I crack myself up…
Yep, plenty of things have gone wrong so far, but I found some of the important stuff–toilet paper and the cable outlets. (That sounded weird. Have I mentioned sleep deprivation as a side effect of moving?)
So, stay tuned for future updates as I unbox more stuff that I need to have in order to function. (Where in the world are my paper towels? Oh, right. Bedroom closet. Next to the electric bug zapper. Right where they should be. Yikes…)
I have lots of hair. I have to have lots of hair. Otherwise, I would be completely bald by now. In fact, I’m having a hard time figuring out how I’ve not been completely bald from a very young age.
One trip around the house with my vacuum cleaner and I collect enough hair to assemble a small fur-bearing mammal.
Oh, wow. You’re…cute.
I suppose that’s normal for someone who’s getting–shudder–older. I still have plenty of it attached to my head, though. Very thick. Always has been. Hairdressers usually give up trying to completely dry it before I leave the salon after a trim.
When I was young, I’d listen to the comments from my mom about how much I shed, but my hair was still really, really long and thick. I wouldn’t mind having that hair back again, because it still held some socially acceptable styles and a little bit (entire can) of hair spray usually took care of any issues.
Yes, I’d like to place an order for my thirteen-year-old-self’s hair, please.
I’d like my flexibility back as well, please. (But not that couch. No, no. That’s where Herb Tarlek’s sport coats went to die.)
I don’t dare say I’d like to be my old self again, though.
Think about it.
It’s just another expression I question.
Why would anyone want to be their old selves? For starters…
a) I think that when people say that, sometimes they mean their “younger” selves, because–let’s face it–you probably wouldn’t really, literally want to be your “old self,” unless you’re five years old and haven’t a clue about the mystical wonders of adulthood that await (see also: bills, responsibilities, opening hard-to-open jars by yourself), and…
b) I’d like to think that being restored to factory settings isn’t always the best thing. Maybe there’s an upgrade, and you’re still in the beta testing phase. Perhaps you’d rather be a newer version of yourself…Sara 3.0, or something. You know, work out the bugs.
Anyway, back to the hair…
I recently read an article that said that the haircut I’ve worn for the majority of my life is actually in style for the time being. Perhaps I should clarify…the way my hair wears me has come back into style, because I sure know I can’t make it adapt to trends these days. So, I have to wait around for decades at a time for it to become part of the in-crowd.
Seeing as how I pick up so much of it everywhere, I guess I should be glad I still have it at all.
Group behavior intrigues me. No, no…behavior in general intrigues me.
If you think about how you behave alone–say, in your car when your favorite song starts playing on the radio–that’s not necessarily the same type of behavior you would put on display at a company lunch meeting.
When you were a kid, however, you either amplified that type of behavior in front of your friends to try to impress them…or completely suppressed your hidden, burning love of belting out a Gloria Gaynor tune that would become your karaoke anthem in the years ahead and…ahem, yeah. (Moving on.) In other words, you probably tried your best to be anyone but yourself.
Lest I go too far off the psychological deep end with this, though, let’s keep this discussion shallow. For entertainment purposes.
When I was in junior high, my school installed the most impressive machines any of us had ever seen on a school campus–soda machines. At least, it appeared that way. In fact, to see everyone’s reactions, you’d think no one at our school had ever seen a fizzy, carbonated cola drink in a can IN THEIR ENTIRE LIVES.
If they’d been selling these here Bacon sodas, then I’d have been impressed. (Chill at six degrees.)
Kids were running around at lunchtime tossing a football with one hand and hanging on to a soda for dear life with the other one. The lines at the soda machines were longer than the lines for actual lunch. Never mind that most of us brought sodas to school in our bags for later or that lots of kids would show up first thing in the morning with one.
Apparently, the idea of buying one from the new doohickey plugged into the wall was all the rage.
I observed this phenomenon as a seventh-grader–as it was happening–yet I still brought quarters from home for the soda machine (I needed all the cool points I could get…I was tired of being picked on).
So…does anyone else out there have an experience or observation that compares to this? Let me know!
My mom came over recently to help me clean out some closets and organize a spare bedroom. She opened up a closet while I was in another room and discovered one of my ancient treasures.
“Hey, where’d this TV come from?” she asked me through a wall.
I went into the bedroom and looked at what she had found on a shelf.
“Oh, yeah. That. I won it in a drawing several years ago,” I said.
“I didn’t know you ever had anything like this,” she replied.
“I’ve had it for twelve years.”
(When I say something like that, it usually has the effect of ending a conversation, because I’m notorious for being able to tell someone the exact date they told me my earrings didn’t match my shirt, or something else equally insignificant.)
The television was a very small, portable, black-and-white battery (or adapter) operated gadget with one antenna and–but wait, there’s more–a radio receiver. I won it in a door prize drawing at a required, mandatory staff meeting at work and immediately made the joke that I’d use it the next time we had a tornado. Everyone laughed, because in Arkansas, that possibility is always just around the corner. The “big switch” to all-digital programming was still a few years away, so it was still operational.
“Have you ever used it?”
“Yeah, during the ice storm. Nothing else was working.”
See, based on past experiences, a tornado or a severe thunderstorm was the event most likely to knock out power in my little corner of the world. However, in 2009, just a few short months before all-digital programming would take over the airwaves, Arkansas was hit with a massive ice storm that knocked out power for weeks in some locations. I was lucky that mine came back on within twelve hours, but my new flat screen television didn’t have the capability to pick up a television signal over the air.
That was when I remembered the little portable television. I pulled it out of the closet, plugged it in, and became one of the few viewers of local television during the first week of the storm’s aftermath.
Nowadays, it’s a relic. I could use the radio if I wanted, but the television is useless unless I decide to buy a digital converter (I think), which isn’t exactly worth the trouble.
I guess I could just carry it around and pretend like it’s 1989 or something. Since we all carried portable televisions around like boom boxes back then…umm…yeah.
I’m just jamming to…well, nothing. But I look like one of the cool kids, don’t I? (Am I doing this right?)
