Amberance At Christmas Time: *Face Palm*

Right people. Let's go over this one more time, as much to remind myself as to remind you. Currently it is:

• The middle of The 40 Days of Christmas
• Irresponsible Spending Month
• Almost my birthday
• Cold and snowing

and as such I am NOT TO BE LEFT ALONE in stores that sell anything that is green or red or tartan plaid, or shiny, or that is made of velvet, or fur, or has bows on it, or snowflakes, or depicts Santa, reindeer, elves or anything wearing a Santa hat, EVEN if I have a legitimate reason for being there.

Take, for example, my current need for winter boots due to the fourth bullet point in the above list. I don't own decent shoes for winter. All I have are my chucks, my loafers for work, several pairs of high heeled boots inappropriate for walking in snow (or, in fact, at all) and a few pairs of dress shoes that are not at all designed for traction. So I need some warm, weatherproof shoes with decent traction lest I fall down and break my ass (which I have been assured is not my job and best left to someone else). So I tried, I really, really tried, to find said footwear at Payless Shoes and also at Old Navy. What I didn't take into account on this mission was that the current fashion is such that all the "boots" are made out of sweaters and apparently designed to make everyone look like a cartoon Eskimo. This appears to be all anyone is selling this year. I don't want cartoon shoes that will leave me with wet feet, I want regular black boots like a normal person, one who is not singing and turning cartwheels in the latest Gap commercial on tv.

BrownsFan had helpfully suggested that I try going to Sears. Which was great - I did find black winter boots that don't get wet or turn my feet into Japanimation art. But, Sears is also a department store, one that specializes in cheap, cute, shiny things like socks with kitties wearing Santa hats, or Santa socks with little puffy balls, or panties that read "Naughty" across the front, or (and this is the coup de grace) matching bra and panty sets in red velvet with white ruffles and bows in the front. Given that I was all alone with no one to stop me, do you think that I bought every single one of those things? YES OF COURSE I DID because I am amberance, leader of the Christmas freaks, lord of the shiny baubles, keeper of the chalice of holiday cheer. And now, dry footed underpants spazz. You can't stop me. You can only hope to contain me.

NaBloFAILMo

So this year, the thing I learned about NaBloPoMo was that I can't do it without a laptop*, particularly in a month that contains Thanksgiving weekend and two trips to St. Louis. I will try this again next year.

Coming soon to a Bizzybiz near you:

• A night out in the suburbs with A Kangaroo Court and friends
• photos of my most excellent of Christmas apparel creations EVER
• holiday cheer
• possibly a recap of my night in with the gorilla tomorrow night, if there is anything good to recount and i can remember it

*social life.

Happy Fakesgiving!

Fakesgiving dinner* is always better when it follows that whore Ann Arbor taking it in the ass for the 6th year in a row.

In only slightly related news, given that Thanksgiving falls in the middle of the 40 Days I have decided to start calling it Practice Christmas.


*Fakesgiving is an invention of Mrs. Sizemore and Fancy. It is basically Thanksgiving with friends instead of family because friends are the family you choose.

M-I Crooked Letter Crooked Letter O-U-R-I

I will shortly be hopping a train back to the Lou in order to be at Cap and Mrs. Sizemore's place in time for Ohio State/Michigan football and Fakesgiving tomorrow. And then on Sunday there is Christmas decorating to be done. YYYEEEESSSSSSSS.

In Which We All Live Inside A Kaleidoscope

me: motherboard=broken
insert frownyface here

fish: How much to fix?

me: $250ish

fish: Are you gonna do it?

me: what are my alternatives?

fish: Find $750 more and buy a mac

me: someday...someday in the distant future i will be able to afford you making me a mac convert

fish: I can't wait for the future. The problem is, when we reach the future and have nothing to look forward to, what will we call it? Can we still just call it the future? Like, "Gosh, I'm so glad we live in The Future"

me: i think that is the best solution. either that or we can look forward to an apocalyptic war and a return to an agrarian society

fish: I just want life to be like it was in those fruitopia commercials
Seemed colorful and tasty

Stitchus Interruptus

Back before my angel kitty Kristen died, we used to spend the cold winter nights cuddled up on the couch together. There was usually some football on or something. I would be cross-stitching some dorky Christmas thing and Kristen would lay in my lap on top of a blanket and calmly watch either me or the television (depending on which way she was facing) and purr contentedly. These are some of my favorite memories of her.

Now I know, I KNOW that it's a bad idea to compare my new cat to my old one because they are two completely different cats, and I love Angela just as much as I loved Kristen. But I was really really hoping that, like Kristen, Angie would enjoy laying in mommy's nice warm lap at night while she was sewing. What I did not take into account is that my new cat is a minion of the devil. I can't sew at home anymore unless I wait for her to fall asleep. This is because if she sees me with thread, her reaction is to glare at me as if to say "WTF? All string in the house is MINE!" before launching herself at me and ferociously attacking my stitching. EVERY DAMN TIME. She's lucky it's the 40 Days of Christmas, otherwise the next thing I'd be sewing is a tiny kitty straight jacket.

Nothing Doing

I will not be talking about last night's Browns game today. Not today, and not ever. Because, I mean, there is disappointing and then there is jaw droppingly atrocious. And that game was worse than either of those things. I just, I have no words.