To my family who’s been wondering: I have not yet signed any lease, and I haven’t moved to Chicago more than the boxes piled in the backseat and trunk of my car. I start my job in two days, so technically I’ve moved, but I’m still hanging out through the graciousness and hospitality of NPH’s family. When it does come time to settle for good (this weekend???) all my stuff is all packed and just waiting in IC for a moving van.

I was going to embed a video from last week’s episode of South Park, the best few minutes of television ever to air in the history of cable television, but Viacom pulled it from YouTube. Just know that Slash was on as some sort of mythical Santa Claus character, and I’ve never been more proud.

Here I sit on yet another Sunday evening come too soon, with homework I should do but will not until mere minutes before it’s due, and a tired and sick basset hound slumbering at my feet. This weekend was par for the course in Iowa City, and now I’m playing catch up with things that actually matter because I can never seem to find the motivation to do them anytime before near midnight on Sunday. Fergus is indeed sick– he’s puked three times tonight and sounds like he’s snoring when he breathes. If he’s not better by morning I suppose it’s then to the vet we go (his six month birthday is on Wednesday!) Tonight I was on the radio for the second week in a row, something I find ridiculously self-satisfying, perhaps even more so than this Internet shrine I’ve been pounding out my thoughts on for over a year. My friends DJ a show on our campus radio station every Sunday night, and somehow I’ve been deemed trustworthy enough to man a mic and share my thoughts with the approximately 13 people listening. I’m not allowed to pick tunes, however, which if fine by me because my fellow studio rats still entertained my GNR obsession by waxing poetic on all things Slash and Axl for a solid five minutes. Danke, friends. My parents and really all family who aren’t me or my brother have descended upon Hawaii for my aunt’s nuptials on Wednesday. I am not only jealous because there’s a snowstorm imminent back here in Iowa, but I love weddings and am definitely missing out. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a paper to write and many things for PRSSA to do and a work meeting at 9:30 tomorrow morning that will require me to fall asleep at a decent time.

And Rob, I sincerely hope you found your wallet.

We went to The Fighter as a family today and it was simply fabulous. And I’m not just saying that because Mark Wahlberg has managed to catapult his way into my Top Five Celebrity Hotties, or because the kettle corn was fresh at Jordan Creek. To continue my Oscar predictions long before any nominations are made, Christian Bale will absolutely, positively win most every acting award ever for his supporting performance as Micky Ward’s brother Dicky. When the credits roll and we saw the actual Micky and Dicky, everyone in the theater was like HOLY SCHMOLIGANS because Christian Bale seriously became Dicky. The acting was just impeccable all around– the characters you’re supposed to hate, you’ll really hate– and the story wasn’t dragged out longer than needed. The feel good ending (sorry, did I just ruin it?) doesn’t hurt, and the Bostonian, Masshole accents are the icing on my New England-loving cake.

In other news, some really scientific research has led me to believe that my sanity can spend about 72 hours at home before I start itching for an escape. I mean, I love my family, but they can be at times… challenging. I realize this is not at all a problem exclusive to me, especially around the holidays, and that as I get older things will only become more testy. Perhaps making this all worse is that I accidentally grabbed NPH’s phone charger from his house so now have both of ours… and he has none. His phone is dead for at least another couple days, and I have no texting outlet who is equally as bored at home on his couch. I’ve been passing my time baking a ridiculous amount of Christmas goodies and perfecting my great-grandmothers apricot crescent cookies that will get to make an appearance again finally when we go to my grandma’s tomorrow. Unless I eat them all on the journey there in some sort of emotional breakdown over how much I miss my basset hound.

I have nothing to write about. I could complain about how obese and unmotivated I feel, or fill you in about all of Fergus’ adventures with the family for the past week. I could (belatedly) make a list of things I’m thankful for, but I’d say my Thankful til Thanksgiving thing on the blog was a big fail this year. I finished Ozzy Osbourne’s autobiography I Am Ozzy last night– it was fabulous, as I think most drug-fueled memoirs are (besides my possibly most prized possession, a signed copy of Slash’s autobiography, I also have Steven Adler’s recent book, and Nikki Sixx’s The Heroin Diaries.)
Savannah and I went to the movie Morning Glory for her birthday on Tuesday, and it was really good. Does Harrison Ford growl like that when he speaks in real life? We finished off the night by going to some Adel bars– an, um… interesting experience that I wouldn’t like to repeat more than once or twice a year. My grandmother once again hosted a kick-ass Thanksgiving, though I’m gonna get mushy here for a second when I say both Fergus and I miss NPH something awful. We’ve been trying to put together a Norman Rockwell puzzle for over 24 hours– you’d think 1,000 pieces wouldn’t be that hard with three people working on it, but you’d be wrong.
“Are you telling them how good Fergus was? Grandpa didn’t even take the paper to him once.” –my grandfather, better known as Papa John, sitting next to me. He and my grandmother are definitely my most avid blog readers, and he’s correct in that Fergus was shockingly well-behaved the whole time. They’re probably going to be disappointed at the lack of substance in this post, but I promise a better follow-up later with photos and a better attitude in general towards being out of bed.

Day Three: Eight ways to win your heart.
….HA! I’m really trying hard to not make all eight of these food items. If you’d like that list, though, I already have it printed out and kept in triplicate in both my Iowa City home, vehicle, and hometown. Because let’s be honest, number 8 is going to be:
8. FOOD. Buy it for me. Make it for me. Really anything except greasily-meated pizza which I still have some sort of aversion against. Gift cards to food places, take me to a restaurant, give me your leftover pizza crusts– the number one (or is this case, number eight) way to my heart is through FOOD.
7. I suppose I should say humor. There’s really no one in my life who isn’t at least slightly amusing, so I figure this just goes without saying. And yes, to those of you who are still under the impression that NPH doesn’t talk– he makes me laugh more than anyone!!
6. Skilled in our non-public times together. Yeahhhh girl, you got it. Contrary to the beliefs most of my family still holds, I have been alone with a male behind closed doors. Purely to work on homework, of course. I realize this one isn’t exactly a way to win one’s heart since one should go before the other, but just in case you were to entrap me in some sort of Ponzi scheme in your bedroom, this would be the best way to spin it.
Author’s note: this one is really hard and even more dumb than the rest on the list. Seriously, I covered it with my first one.
5. Doesn’t think Germany automatically equals Hitler. I suppose this one equals out to “don’t be a dumbass,” but since returning from abroad, this is actually an unfortunately common misconception among my peers. So if you wanna get in these sugar walls, don’t be ignorant. This also applies to all matters of equality rights (goddamn college liberals.)
4. Be employed. Having dated an unemployed schmuck (love you, P. Wood!) I now know having a steady income or two is crucial to wining and dining me. Simply because otherwise I’m the one who ends up footing the bill for aforementioned wining and dining, and well, see number 8– my dining ain’t cheap.
3. …Get along with my family? I’m really just pulling at strings at this point. My family– and I mean as the collective whole, not necessarily the three crazies (love you, immediate family!) I spend the majority of my time with– are quite ahhhh, ummmmm, a piece of work. You’re reading it, and you know you are. There aren’t enough hours in my month to explain the background on these groups, but I suppose the “key to my heart” as per this post, is to just smile and nod in all situations. To be fair, both sides can cook like nobody’s business, and you at least won’t be sober during any interaction with either.
2. Food. Yes, it deserves at least two of these eight.
1. Tell me how awesome I am. Good Lord, she has a blog dedicated to her own thoughts and triumphs– clearly she’d like to be told at least four times a day (in person, by text, and even e-mail are all perfectly acceptable mediums) what an amazing human anomaly she is. …am I right? Yeah, yeah I’m right. Later in therapy it will all come out as to why I think the universe revolves around me, but until then– just feed into it. Feeeeeeed me.

Let’s talk about some of the things I got for Christmas:

– lots of clothes (that I picked out in advance!  And I wanted!  And that fit!  We’re making progress!)  Boots and gloves and scarves so that I won’t actually freeze to death, and sweaters that make me look like a girl, and an official Iowa tailgating t-shirt AND a t-shirt with lobstahs on it that are all speaking in Bahhhhstan accents.  “Pahk the cah!”

–money, in US dollars and Euros (because, if you’re keeping count, I’m 13 days away)

–a digital camera (you, dear reader, should be most psyched about this, suddenly you’ll be getting pics of EVERYTHINGINMYLIFE.) I will try my darndest to not get this one stolen/drop it/ lose it/spill on it… I don’t exactly have the best track record with these things.  Or with cell phones.  Oops.

–And finally, my beloved webcam to Skype everyone whilst abroad.  I’ve also discovered that it takes nothing more to keep me occupied for hours than to watch myself make faces via webcam.  While Skyping NPH last night, I spent more time looking at myself and playing with my hair than paying attention to what he was saying.  Sorry, buddy.

So uhhh MERRY CHRISTMAS– Grandma and T-Bone are currently making enough food for about 30 people even though there are only eight of us for dinner this year.  Last night we did the whole Christmas Eve church thing and there was a REAL BABY playing Jesus.  They passed out candles to light and hold while singing, but they passed em out way too early and the entire congregation was fixated on playing with their candle, trying to melt the plastic protect-y cup it was in, burn their neighbor with wax, send smoke signals up to the Big Man himself… oh wait, maybe that was just me.  Perhaps this is why Kayla says I am like a small child.  No apologies here–  if you give me flame, all other things go by the wayside, unless there’s a REAL BABY playing Jesus in the room, and then my mind is just blown.

Oh, I also got Iowa Hawkeyes barbecue sauce in my stocking.  BE JEALOUS.

A week from today will be 2010!!  Aka, I’ll be waking up with a wicked hangovah next to a hottie somewhere in the Carribbean.  Yesterday I got pretty freakin’ excited for our cruise.  Still not sure which genius planned a tropical vacation right after the calorie-fest of Christmas, but whatever (haha Dad– I kid.)  I’m sure this will be leagues better than last New Year’s Eve which involved a lot of Britney Spears music, a short-lived trip to Union and a rugby player (okay, so last years was actually fabulously boss.  What can I say– it’s terribly hard to live my life.)

Methinks I’m going to go help more in the kitchen now– I’ve already peeled a bunch of parsnips and chopped an onion and eaten a bunch of food done some dishes.  Happy Freakin’ Holidays!!

Merry Christmas, senate healthcare bill– you passed!  (I only know one person actually happy about that.  In the spirit of the holidays, we won’t discuss politics…)

Papa K and I went to Walmart last night to I don’t know, grab some soda and get out of the house and just generally drive erractically on the roads because he has a Hummer and he can.  TONIGHT is the big night around here– we open presents from the family tonight (and hoooo baby do we get a motherload) and then tomorrow morning we open gifts from Santa.  Who is real.  We will eat Way Too Freakin’ Big (but delicious) Dinner 3 of 4 after going to church and then it’s go time.  I’ll be super dressed up, lookin’ sexy fly, not quite sure why my grandparents don’t attend a church with a much larger 18-25 year old male demographic but WHATEVER.

It’s Christmas Eve, peeps– I’ve got gifts to wrap (not mine, HA as if I have the funds to give anything more than re-gifted dust catchers I found while moving out.)  GET OFFLINE and go hang out with your families.  Give em a hug.  Sing a song.  Pour yourself a drink.

My uncle drove up to surprise his mama, which I thought was very nice.  I was the only one made privy to this information ahead of time– I’m actually very good at keeping secrets if I think they’re legitimate.  Myself, I don’t have that many secrets, I’m like a gd open book, but as my older brotherly figure in 713 once told me, “I feel you know all this stuff about everyone, but you don’t share it.”  Really it’s just because I’m a stalker.  And also fabulous at picking up little bits of info about people and then storing them in my brain and whipping them out at random times.  Also, my mind is like a steel trap with dates.  Like, creepily accurate.  The other day someone needed to know what day of the week November 12, 2007 was.  It was a Sunday.  We won’t get into how I knew that.

I’ve been telling you what I’m thankful for over the past two weeks, so I feel I don’t need to dedicate a whole Thanksgiving post to it.  If I were to make a post about the things I’m not thankful for, that would just be bitchy (and in no way out of character) and I’d probably jinx myself and then BAM!  She said she’s not thankful for her bad complexion and suddenly she has rosacea… so I just won’t go there.  Though I will say I am not thankful for my new ability to not sleep more than eight hours at night.  I’m sure this would come in handy if I were some sort of Eagle Scout and needed to develop an internal clock for a patch on my sash or whatever, but as a college student, I’d like to sleep past 8 am. 

This all started with the second to last home football game, when I got approximately 45 minutes of sleep one night then just went about my day tailgating, then working, then hanging out at 713 and finally going down at about 2 a.m.  I am no rocket scientist, but that’s not much sleep (stop yelling at the computer, Mom– I KNOW, I’m an idiot.)  My theory as to my superhuman ability to stay awake is in the form of a little yellow caffeine pill (available at Walgreens, people, PERFECTLY safe) from one of my friends.  He said it was equivalent to one cup of coffee.  Methinks it was equivalent to a few hits of meth.  Since then, my sleeping has just been a little off.  I’m sure the staying up, mind racing with anxiety each night over all the shit I have to do before Germany doesn’t help.  “MDMA got you feelin’ like a champion/ this city never sleeps/ better slip you an Ambien.”  Ahh yes, thanks Hova.  I knew you’d make it into my holiday post somewhere.

ANYWAY, the last of my thankful posts… Thanksgiving 2009, I am thankful for being single.  (No seriously, follow me on this one.)  We’re coming up on the anniversary of me getting dumped on my ass whilst speeding down I-80 back to school after Turkey Break last year.  At the time I was all Whatever, small bump in the road, I give it three months tops, and everyone who knew us was like Que horror! If this dynamic duo can’t make it then for the love of God WHOOOO CAN?!?!?  (Apparently I have some very melodramatic friends.)  But, we were all wrong and we split ways never to so much as pat each other on the back again.  And it has been one freakin’ fabulous year.  Sure, the first month or so wasn’t exactly rosy, I recall there being a lot of crying and de-friending then re-friending on Facebook.  (The lack of appetite though was ballin’– when you can only eat a few bites of oatmeal each day for a week, those jeans pushed to the back of your closet suddenly make your ass look bangin’.)  But once I got over that, I had some A+ friends waiting in the wings to take me out and introduce me to being single in college.  In the words of my man Borat “Eeets niiiice!”  (<–that sounded creepy.  I swear I did not take my newfound singledom as a ticket to sexual predator-dom.) 

It appears that I’m rambling (and I hear some elevated, aggravated voices from downstairs– it wouldn’t be a proper family gathering without) so I will cease.  I will also shower today, since it’s a holiday and I feel like being generous to those who have to spend the day around me.  And oh look, IT’S NOT EVEN 9:30 AM.  For the love of potato pancakes, I’m gonna need a nap.