California Vacation 2018

Since we got back from vacation in July, I’ve had alot of ideas for blog posts, but was just too busy to do any.  This is only my second post this month! What?!  I figure it’s about time to put something out there since it’s been a month since we went on vacation.

This is going to be a very photo-heavy post.  We spent a week in southern California at the end of July.  We were able to meet up with my sister’s family, my cousin’s family, and my mom at different times, so it was nice to spend so much time with loved ones that I rarely get to see.  This was also the first time my kids had been on a plane, to the ocean, or to California.  Lots of firsts for them!  I prepared them with horror stories of airplane security check lines and tiny airplane seats with broken junk and options to pay lots of money for more broken junk.  On the way there, we flew Delta and it was the best flight experience I’ve had since I flew Virgin Airlines almost a decade ago.  On the way back, we flew American and my kids were pretty disappointed, but did acknowledge that I wasn’t exaggerating with airline horror stories, haha!  The ocean water and sand even cleared up my skin by like, 95%, but that changed once I got back home.  So, I’ll have another post coming soon about my updated skincare routine.  Either way, I took it as a sign that I need to live on the beach for the sake of my health.  It’s all just for my health, not because the beach is awesome and amazing and fun and relaxing.

Ben, Austin, and Averie on the way to California

Logan and me, excited to be sitting together!

Our first meal in Cali was at Panang Thai, which is near LAX.  No matter which restaurant we chose, the GPS went crazy and kept trying to take us back to the airport.  We finally got decent directions for this place and were grateful for the lovely waitstaff and delicious food.

Growing up in the hood and listening to rap and hip hop in the ’90s, I heard alot about Crenshaw.  I also wanted to get a picture of one of many bikers who had a death wish on the highway.  Why would you pull out in front of so many moving vehicles when the only thing between you and death is a helmet made of plastic and foam?!

I added the moustache to this work of art, but this is otherwise all custom work on a quality vehicle.

When you go on vacation and this is the view you see as you pull up the hotel, you know things are going to be good!

 

Wandering through a closed Chinatown, looking for breakfast, which we did find at a Chinese bakery!

So, of course I spent most of my time at Universal Studios in The Wizarding World of Harry Potter.  I mean, my gimpy feet were bothering me and the sunshine made the temperature hotter.  So, to prevent extra pain and headaches, I just hung out with the Harry Potter stuff, drinking pumpkin juice and walking around in air conditioned stores.  We did all start our visit with fried potatoes, pumpkin juice, and butterbeers at the Three Broomsticks before getting our own wands at Ollivanders.  I did decide on a Cauldron Cake at Honeyduke’s before the evening was over and it was delightful!  I wish the cafeteria at work had these.

Pumpkin juice, Excedrin Migraine, Tylenol, and Advil got me through the day.

Ben, Logan, and Averie came back to enjoy a Simpsons donut from the Kwik-E-Mart on the cool patio at the Hog’s Head.

I had already decided that the first day would be Universal and the second day would be at the beach so that we could just relax and not walk around for miles in the sun.  The beach at Oceanside is much cooler and wilder than some of the other beaches, but we did read up on it first and knew what to expect.  You get used to the cold water quickly once the sun comes out to greet you.

I offered to let this guy look through the telescope, but he was more interested in floor food.  Go figure!

Averie broke her toe a month before we went to California.  So, she was still walking around in a boot for most of the trip.  She wanted to just tape her toes and wear flip flops for anything beach-related, though.  Even without toe tape or boots, I was still limping along behind her.

The kids had a million questions about everything in the water and on the pier.  We have a saltwater fish tank at home, so we were trying to explain to the kids that all the work Ben does with the fish tank is to mimic the environment of the ocean that mother nature takes care of every day.

Ben and the kids got ice cream here the night that we hung out with my family on the pier.

Night surfing!  I can’t even surf during the day.  I so admired this dude.

The waves get pretty big at night.  All you can really see from a distance is the foam.

The resort where we stayed had a viewing deck that we checked out at night when it was less busy.

I get a bit of vertigo when I get close to the edge, but not Logan!

Sea World San Diego!  We didn’t think that we’d be able to afford more than one theme park, but my mom’s friends are both in the military and got some free tickets for us.  There was a whole aquarium filled with adorable sea turtles!

Biting flamingo, kakaw!

While eating at one of the food court patios, I heard Ben say, “Oh, we have some guests,” and felt some fuzzy things on my legs.  I freaked out!  Then, I saw that they were just baby ducklings!  They waddled so quickly that I nearly missed getting a picture.

I almost missed the penguin exhibit before I realized that they had it dark and cold inside not because it was closed, but to imitate July in Antarctica.  This lil dude was outside of the penguin exhibit and posed for quite a few pictures while complaining at me when I took too long between his various poses.

Our last meal in Cali was breakfast with my sister and nephew at the Naked Cafe.  The food was amazing!  (Coconut French toast, whaaaat?)  If I had to eat at this place for every meal for the rest of my life, I could probably handle that.

Probably my favorite name for a store ever!

Polka dot is a cool color for a car!

My babies, proudly wearing their California t-shirts at the airport.

Our middle schooler, tolerating yet another photo.

That is the end of our California vacation!  Thank you for reading this far!  I hope you enjoyed the photos and descriptions.  If you want to hear some more about our vacation, head on over to my YouTube channel for some vlogs!  Let me know if you liked this post by clicking the like button below.  Have you ever been to California?  If so, what part?  Do you surf?  Every driven a polka-dot vehicle?  Tell me all about it in the comments below!

Planning – Week of 5.14.18

Hello, interwebz! Today, I have a planning post for you. There aren’t as many pictures as I normally post because I recorded a video of this and took pictures for possible thumbnails. Then, I lost of all of it. Then, I found everything. I don’t have time to edit the video, though. So, I’m going to try to do a June video, but I still wanted to get this one up on the blog.

First up, I wanted to show you an end of the week pic of my planner. I left lots of empty space for doodling, but I ended up being so busy that I didn’t get to doodle. You can see how much I add in here other than just my planned events. I use my journal to track health info, work hours, etc. it’s a record of my life, one week at a time.

For the new week, I kept things pretty simple because I was doing the video. Again, I wanted to leave room for doodling. So, I brought out my washi and stickers.

I had some new mini binder clips that I got from Tuesday Morning. These work well in my planner as a marker for the current week by helping me find the current week when I open up the journal.

Above is my finished before the pen spread. I left lots of space for recording my week as well as any other notes that I needed. I finally got to use my Japanese washi from Daiso. I really could have used a vacation to Japan at that point. That week, exhaustion hit me pretty hard. I think my body was starting to realize that I am back on the day shift and it’s not just temporary. Plus, the temperature outside was getting into the triple digits. I don’t do well in the heat. Exhaustion and migraines have become my two best friends until it starts to cool off in November (I hope!)

Lastly, there’s the end of the week pic. My week was full and I was exhausted. My in-laws were in town (an hour away on the opposite side of the metroplex), so my husband had to drive out there after work every day that they were here to show them where to eat for dinner. That meant that I didn’t get to see my husband much, but I also didn’t have to feel guilty for being exhausted and having a headache all week. I was also oncall, which makes me feel stressed and guilty. That was a hard week and I was grateful when it was over.

Next time, I hope to have a planning video up with the blog post. What do you think about my sparsely decorated planner? What do you do to cope with exhaustion? I’d love to hear what you think in the comments. Thanks for reading!

Random Saturdays – Selfies

Ah, The Selfie.  I hate pictures of myself, so I don’t take many of these.  Friends and family want to take them sometimes, so I take them.  I don’t have a selfie stick, even though my kids have had quite a few.  Ben, luckily, shares this sentiment with me.  That is probably why we’re so bad at taking selfies.  I have started trying to take selfies with my husband at certain events to try to remember that we do things together and even enjoy it from time to time.  It hasn’t been a very successful endeavor.

Here’s one that we took on vacation in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Not so bad, right?  I mean, not the best, but I’m not a professional selfie taker/teenager.  My arms are short, so I’m very limited as to what I can get in the picture, but hey, our faces are 90% in the frame and we’re almost smiling.

Here’s one from when we went to see One Republic.

Hey!  We’re both smiling!  You can’t see our faces, but you can see our teeth and some terrible bright lights in the background.  It looked much better in person and this was the best out of three pictures.  Again, my tiny t-rex arms cropped out parts of our faces, but at least we’re smiling.

We went to see Imagine Dragons and had seats by the second stage.  I wanted to get a picture of us with the band right behind us.  So, I waited and waited and waited.  Finally, the moment came!

This was the third attempt.  The first attempt was just our faces in complete dark.  How did I manage that when there was so much light around?  Talent.  So, I said, “Okay, let’s try one last time,” and Ben said, “Okay, hurry, we’re in people’s way.”  You can see how well I perform under photographic pressure.

Finally, I said, okay, let’s try a regular picture with the band up front.  Ben rolled his eyes, but humored me, while also repeating his “We’re in people’s way” line.

Nailed it!  He looks like Jesus is coming down from the heavens to bestow a crown of light upon his head as he tells me that we’re in the way.  I am clearly not listening, and we’re both distracted by something in the complete opposite direction of the iPhone.

While some people take beautiful iPhone pics like this, I will probably keep my day job so that I can afford to go to more concerts where I get in people’s ways so that I can take bad selfies.

Stuff People Say – Tall Flat White

Me — Hello!  Could I please have a tall flat white with nonfat milk?

We finish ordering and paying.

Barista — Nonfat tall flat white.  Try saying that three times fast!

Ben — Normally, they’re called supermodels.

Random Saturdays – The Fish Tank

Ben has been planning out his saltwater fish tank for four years.  When we started dating, he was looking over plans to build a fish tank stand.  He built the stand, but it was about half an inch off, so he ended up having to buy one instead.  For some reason, you can’t have a giant glass container of water sit on a crooked stand.  Whatever!  He shopped online and at a local fish stores for supplies.  To save alot of money, he also made his own saltwater, which is actually more complicated than pouring a bit of salt into the tank and stirring.  After all of that time, all of that effort, and all of that money, we finally have fish in the tank!

We have plants and snails in the refugium (where the water comes out of the tank to be cleaned out before recirculating back into the tank) and have snails in the tank itself.  We had a green hair algae problem, but our Mexican turbo snails have taken care of that.  We also have a black limpet snail.  He has cute lil antennae and a snout!  This little fella went halfway around the tank in just a few hours on his first night.  I have never heard of a snail going that quickly before.  I thought the turbo snail was fast, but this limpet dude took his snout and ran laps around the turbo snail.  There were some emerald crabs in there.  The smaller one, died. The bigger one ended up eating two of our fish and we think he killed the other crab.  We stuck him in the refugium and he ate all of the plants except the mangroves.  So, that jerk ended up going back to the store.

It’s only been during the time that I’ve been with Ben that I’ve really learned anything about fish tanks.  Until that, all of my knowledge came from biology classes about closed ecosystems and random nature shows that I watched.  Temika and I had a betta fish named Busker, once, but he died when she forgot to clean the fishbowl.  I’m learning more about fish now that we’re trying to figure out what kinds of fish to get when the tank is ready.  The kids want “Nemo” and “Dory” fish.  Minecraft really likes the dogface puffers, too.  Ben is partial to the tangs.  Apparently, you have to be careful about which tangs you put in the same tank, how much food you feed them, and how many rocks are in the tank.  Tangs are racist and can become aggressive depending on the color of other tangs in the tank, how hungry they are, and how big or small they are.  They made Disney movies about these killer racist fish!  Who knew?!

As for the fish that I want in the tank, I will need to get another job to afford them.  Everytime I see a fish that I like, it’s over $100.  Ben will say, “Oh yeah, those are hard to find, ” or, “We’ll have to see if we can find one on sale sometime,” when I show him the fish I like.  We currently have a banggai cardinal, cleaner wrasse, foxface rabbitfish, and a magnificent foxface.  The rabbit fish wants to kill the magnificent foxface, so we’re trying to find a new home for the rabbitfish.

Elska is still scared of the fish tank.  Pad Kee loves the fish tank, but doesn’t have a good ledge to watch them.  So, he mostly just follows Ben around when he’s working on the tank and ignores it otherwise.  I take care of the cats and Ben takes care of the fish.  I really got the easier and cheaper job, thank goodness!

Random Saturdays – Kitten Worries

I have plenty of Pinterest projects lined up to keep me out of trouble, but I decided to take in a near-death kitten instead.  I just love stressing myself out over an animal I barely know and spending hundreds of dollars that I can’t really afford so that I can clean up animal messes and destruction.  That’s not really how I see it, but that’s how I feel when I look at myself from the outside.

I’ve written on Facebook about how we found the perfect kitten on my in-laws’ farm.  Some jerks dropped off this wonderful cat who is too gentle and loving to be a farm cat.  Something happened to the cat the day before we got back to the farm – the ear was bloody and his tongue was poking out of his mouth, also bloody.  I stressed all weekend about this poor kitten.  We did our best to care for him and clean his wounds, but he needed a trip to the vet.  The employees at the vet’s were amazingly wonderful people who cared about little Pad Kee Meow.  I kept asking for an outright prognosis on his condition.  They would give me the diagnosis, but wouldn’t tell me the words I wanted to hear – “He should be just fine.”  So, my worrying continued late into the night.

After two days of meds, food, water, and care, I took Pad Kee back to see the vet.  The vet was amazed at the progress that Pad Kee had made and gave me a much better prognosis this time.  The lovely vet tech cleaned out Pad Kee’s ear again and gave him a dewormer, something they were afraid to do initially since he was so dehydrated and malnourished.  Lil Pad Kee continued to improve.  He ate dry food with his tiny kitten teeth and his healed mouth, which helped his rank breath improve.  His ears still had some scabs, but looked more like he may have scratched a bit too vigorously at them rather than that he must have narrowly escaped some fierce creature that mauled his ear.

The little fighter was still sweet as can be.  All he wanted was food and attention, preferably at the same time.  Taking care of him was alot of work, but it also made me think back to when I adopted Elska.  She was a skinny little rat, with a sore on her ear and fleas.  She was 99% scared and 1% loving.  If you stuck your hand out, she would pet herself on it and purr like a motorcycle.  Then, she would seemingly remember that she was nervous and jump away from your hand to run and hide under furniture.  Anyone who has been around Elska knows that she’s still very nervous and scared, but she has improved a great deal.  She’s an old lady cat now, as opposed to an old cat lady, which is what I am.  She’s about 60% scared and 40% loving.  She’s even started to be brave enough to go out into the backyard at night.  Ben doesn’t think we should let Pad Kee into the backyard because he will gladly go home with anyone that walks by, unlike Elska, who runs back into the house if she hears anyone walk by on the sidewalk at the bottom of the hill that’s beside our brick neighborhood wall. (After I typed that, I moved my leg and she jumped into the air and off the couch where she was napping.)

So, I’m pretty confident that Pad Kee will make a full recovery and be a part of our family for years to come.  I keep reminding myself to take it one day at a time, just like a recovering addict or Valerie Bertinelli.  On the plus side, I have learned quite a bit about various cat breeds and feline herpes.  I could definitely ace those two categories in a game of Jeopardy!  I also got sick a week after we got Pad Kee, which forced me to take one day at a time because I had a hard time keeping track of day and night.  Also, I wished that we hadn’t gone to streaming only because I would’ve liked to had the ability to watch some Jeopardy!

Random Saturdays – Winter Cleaning

Part of my workout routine has been to clean the house.  I live in a house that is way to big for me.  It’s way to big for my cat and me.  It’s even way to big for my husband, my cat, and me.  We have the kids 8 – 12 days out of the month, and that is the only time that the house seems like the right size.  When we have people over for birthday parties or holiday meals, the house feels like a good size.  Most of the time, though, it’s too big.

Most of the time, it’s just Ben and me cleaning, too.

We don’t make the cat clean because she’s spoiled.  The last time we had the kids, we made them clean upstairs (their area) on Saturday so that we could spend the rest of the weekend having fun.  We also told them that if they cleaned, we could try to go to the farm the next weekend that we had them.  So, they worked hard, we worked hard, they argued, they whined, they cried, and they finally got the upstairs clean.

Other than times like that, Ben and I don’t really spend large chunks of time cleaning because we don’t have large chunks of time to spend on cleaning.  Mostly, I keep the dishes and clothes washed, clean the kitchen counters, and try to keep things fairly organized so that anyone in the house can find anything he or she may need at any given time.  Before company comes over, we try to clean the toilets, swiffer the first floor, and clear space on the tables and counters.  Then, I greet everyone at the door with excuses and apologies for how dirty the house is.  Does this sound familiar to anyone else?

I am trying to develop healthy habits, including not being sedentary for too long.  So, I try to get up every hour or so and run in place.  Then, it occurred to me that I could also do spot cleaning in order to be active while also being productive.  The first spot cleaning is heavy duty, but spot cleaning afterwards is much easier.  As it turns out, cleaning burns alot of calories and works alot of muscles that I don’t use when I’m sitting in a chair staring at a computer screen.  Weird, huh?

I don’t think this house will ever be clean from top to bottom until the day we sell it and move.  The spot cleaning makes such a difference, at least as far as my emotional well-being.  I think it also helps my allergies.  It definitely adds to steps on my Fitbit.  I might buy some stock in Swiffer soon.  Those little cloths come in handy in so many ways.

 

Random Saturdays – Happy New Year!

Today is the first day of the Year of the Fire Rooster.  This is especially exciting to me because I am a Rooster.  Ba-kawk!  It also gives me another opportunity for a New Year’s post.  I haven’t posted anything since before Christmas because I was on vacation, and then got sick, and then became very busy trying to get back into the swing of things.

January hasn’t ended yet, and it seems like my calendar is already packed to the gills – places to go, things to do, people to see, bills to pay.  Recently, Minecraft told me about how this school year seems to be flying by faster than any other school year.  He couldn’t believe that it was already Christmas and his birthday is just around the corner now.  I told him that the first time I had that feeling was in the 4th grade.  Every year since then has seemed to go by faster than the year before.

I haven’t made any real resolutions this year because I am constantly battling with my health and constantly trying to figure out how to put more than 24 hours into the day.  I did sign up for the Run The Year 2017 challenge with Cathy.  I’m trying to be more active for the sake of my health.  I’m sick so much of the time, but I don’t want to sit around when I’m not too sick to be active.  I’m hoping that will help me feel better more often so that I can enjoy more time with friends and family.  I also learned over the holidays that I tend to be GO-GO-GO!!! one day and then need to rest the next day (or two) to recover.  If I do that, I don’t seem to get sick quite as easily.  If I’m not sick as often, then I’ll have more time to enjoy with my friends and family.  It’s the closest solution I’ve found to putting more hours into the day.

I wish that I were healthy, that I could just wake up, work out, go to work, eat healthy, take some vitamins, and call it a day.  I’m tired of beating myself up over the fact that I’m not like that, though.  I recently signed up for some newsletters and videos from Dr. Christiane Northrup where she talks about accepting your limitations and the signals your body gives you.  If your body tells you something, then you should listen.  It doesn’t mean that you’re weak or flawed, and acting on those signals will make you healthier and happier in the long run.  I felt like that was The Universe telling me that I’m getting on the right track with self-care (finally).

Since I am a Rooster, this year is supposed to be unlucky for me.  I’m just going to ignore that and try to wear red socks when I work out and red PJs when I’m recovering.  If anyone has any better ideas, please let me know, especially if they involve getting more sleep or eating more cookies.

新年快樂!

Random Saturdays -Christmas Decorating

Oh man.  I have been such a procrastinating fool about decorating.  To be honest, since we moved into this house, it’s been a struggle to finish unpacking while keeping the house clean.  Decorating has been on the backest of the back burners for awhile.  Since we didn’t have the kids for Thanksgiving, though, I wanted to get Christmas decorations up for when we first got them in December.

At first, three plastic bins and a few smaller boxes seemed like alot of decorations.  I guess I was still thinking of my single days of living in small apartments with the cat because the more decorations I put up, the less decorations it looks like I have up.  How is that possible?  Is this house growing as quickly as the kids grow?  Did I move into the Tardis of Tardises?

Decorating for Christmas this year also reminded me, yet again, that I’m old.  I never used to understand how people could spend so much time looking over fake plants or getting excited over plastic flowers.  I’ve already bought 3 different kinds of fake greenery to go with the box of fake greenery that I already had.  What in the world is that?  I really don’t even understand why that makes me happy or how that makes it feel like Christmas, but it does.  I’ve used the real stuff and I actually do not prefer it because that crap has to be watered, sheds on the floor, makes me sneeze, and then I have to throw it all out anyway.  The fake stuff seems less wasteful.  It blends in well with the bonsais and bamboo that we keep the rest of the year too.

Some of the decorations in the collection were made with the help of the chillrens over the past few years.  Other parts were just Ben and me going, I’m an adult with a job, so I can finally go into debt buying the crap I wanted as a kid!”

Decorations I’ve bought:
Ceramic Tree – I couldn’t find it online, but we bought it at Cracker Barrel.  Ben and I both got stupid excited over this tree.  It had a train that drove through it, played different Christmas songs, and had changing lights.  Oh yeah, the kids love it too.  It looks kinda like this one, but was not nearly as expensive.
Fake Berries – I don’t know why I think this stuff is so pretty, but I do.  It’s honestly hard for me not to eat these.  They just look so pretty and delicious.  I wish I had enough to fill the whole house with them, like some kinda Christmas candy forest!

Decorations I’ve made:
Ho Ho Ho banner – This was pretty quick, but not quite as easy as I thought.  I decided to write the letters myself instead of printing them out, which is why my banner isn’t as pretty as the one I pinned.  I still think it’s cute, just not cute enough to put up on Pinterest.
Snow Man Door – Lego helped me make ours a few years ago.  He also named it, “Shuger”.  He’s a better speller now, mostly.  This was another one that looked quick and easy, but was not quick and was only mostly easy.  That’s Pinterest for ya.

Decorations I’d like to buy or make:
Snowflake Table Runner – I remember learning to make paper snowflakes in the 1st grade.  I got very sick the weeks of Christmas and New Year’s, but I spent alot of time in December and January making paper snowflakes, wetting them, and sticking them to the windows.  This seems like a version of my snowflaked youth.
Elaborate Wreath – Of course, it would only be complete with an elaborate porch.  See how the red reindeer looks upon the grand wreaths with awe!  Gaze upon the door that is too pretty for a mortal hand to knock!  Be gone with ye, but return when you are bearing gifts of cookies!

I buy most of my holiday stuff after each holiday, when it’s all on clearance (at least 50% off, but preferable >75% off).  I’m still discovering the sale goodies that I found last year.  Hopefully, we’ll be done decorating the house by the end of this weekend and I can go back to focusing on keeping the floors, countertops, and dishes clean.

 

 

Random Saturdays – Thanksgiving Guide for Aliens

We do not have the kids this Thanksgiving (and I’m writing this post before Thanksgiving).  It took longer than normal to figure out what we’d do for Thanksgiving this year because we didn’t have to figure out when we’d pick up the kids, what activities they had, what activities our friends and families had, and how to be as efficient with our time as possible so that everyone got to see the kids and nobody’s friends or families were forgotten.  When we realized that we wouldn’t have the kids this year and that nobody had offered any solid plans for us to add to the calendar, we had no idea what to do with our time.

I had been talking to some friends about their different plans for the holiday and I read many articles in magazines and online about how to plan a stress-free Thanksgiving or how to deal with the stress of Thanksgiving.  There are also plenty of articles on how to decorate, clean, and cook for Thanksgiving.  I love Thanksgiving!  I love that we, as a country, set aside a time to be grateful for anything and everything.  If an alien visited the U.S. during Thanksgiving, though, how would we explain Thanksgiving?  I mean, there’s history with Pilgrims and Native Americans and whatnot, but that would mean nothing to an alien.  How do we explain how we celebrate Thanksgiving now?  The obvious answer is that we’d compile a list of Must Dos and post it on the internet for all the aliens to read.

Thanksgiving Guide for Aliens

1. Figure out when the most people are the most available.  Is everyone off on Thanksgiving?  Would meeting the weekend after work better?  Does anyone have child custody, probation, or Mogwai time restrictions that must be followed?
2. Find a location big (or small) enough to hold the available people.  This could be someone’s house, a restaurant, or the neighbor’s backyard since they have a better landscaper than you and are out of town this week.
3. Make a menu.  This is really important because the timing of everything else depends on when the food will be ready to eat.  My family always had Thanksgiving dinner.  Ben’s family always had Thanksgiving lunch.  I’ve even heard of Thanksgiving brunch.  It really doesn’t matter as long as the person cooking and the person arranging the location for eating are on the same timetable.  Everyone else can do whatever they want as long as they don’t make the person cooking wait to eat.  It’s even better if everyone makes a little something so that no one person has to do all the work.  I say this (a) having made entire Thanksgiving meals from scratch by myself because my perfectionist attitude and my tastebuds told me to and (b) my antidepressants now make me really unmotivated to do much of anything 90% of the time, despite my tastebuds.
4. Cook, travel, gather, and eat.  Don’t argue (or fight) over something dumb.  This is a time to enjoy family, friends, and food.  As long as you have a sliver of one of those, then you’re doing well.  Don’t instigate arguments.  Don’t be snarky.  If someone says something snarky to you, ignore it.  I always feel sorry for those people because they are bursting with so much negativity that it just spews from their mouths like stinky farts.  Also, if you’re with your loved ones, then it’s safe to assume that they did not mean what they said in a way that would hurt you.  They either have diarrhea of the mouth or it sounded better in their heads.  Even if you know this person just likes to complain and pick arguments, consider it a mouth fart and be glad that you don’t mouth fart.
5. Sleep.  Watch the parade.  Watch football.  Play games.  Eat way too much.  Read.  Go for a walk.  Enjoy this time because it will be a memory in the past before you know it.

That’s my guide to Thanksgiving for aliens.  There’s no need to thank me.  I just like to volunteer out of the kindness of my heart to check things off the Alien Invasion Preparedness List.

H A P P Y   T H A N K S G I V I N G !

Or Happy Random Thursday if you are not in the U.S.!