How are you today? I'm superfantastic.

My Big Fat Texas Thanksgiving

One thing I forgot to mention that I am thankful for: my crazy insane extended family.  (Repetition intentionally used for emphasis.)

See, my dad's side of the family is huge and also crazy.  We always lived in Wisconsin and would have Thanksgiving with just the five of us and also my Grandpa (my mom's dad) for most of my life.  There was parade watching, eating, and football watching all carried out in a mostly orderly manner.  Now that we live in Texas, we were invited to family Thanksgiving at my aunt Nancy and uncle David's house.  We were told that, including us, there would be twelve people.  Which, if we had been thinking, we would have rounded up since obviously there were actually nearly twice that many people coming.  Twenty-three Grahams crowded into my aunt and uncle's house and let me tell you, Grahams are not small people. 

This is due, in large part, to the official Graham family pastime, eating.  When we have a reunion, we plan a few years in advance and after the date and place are chosen, meal planning begins.  Years in advance.  We take it seriously.  So just imagine how an eating-intensive holiday went.  We are fortunate to have several talented cooks in the family, among them three generations of school lunch ladies who know how to cook in large portions.  (My cousin Linda, last in the lunch lady line, has two teenage sons, neither of whom were amused when my sister asked them which of them was going to carry on the family tradition and don the hairnet.)  Probably I did not need the second helping of stuffing and mashed potatoes with gravy, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.  And if you think that in addition to turkey, ham, and miles of side dishes, there were not also five different desserts, then you have clearly not met my family.

The other thing that we take seriously is the art of scaring each other.  The origin of this tradition, as near as we can tell, was when my dad as a kid would catch june bugs and throw them at my aunt Jody.  So now there is pretty much always a fake roach and/or rubber snake around at every family gathering and it never ceases to fool people.  The high point of the rubber snake joke came when my cousins put a huge one in their parents' bed that was apparently so convincing that my uncle Bo SHOT IT WITH A SHOTGUN  (this is Texas, folks) leaving of course a rather large hole in their mattress.  Then there was the time we roasted a pig on a spit when we rented a ranch for a reunion and the head and legs were arranged to look like the pig were sleeping in the bed of one of my female cousins.  The screaming could be heard all the way to Oklahoma and parts of Kansas.  Which sort of makes the little lizard that my cousin's son Kyle threw on my cousin/his aunt Laura on Thanksgiving look pretty tame by comparison, but it was still enjoyable for all of us.  Well, except Laura.

Then once the dishes were done and all reptiles had been taken back outside, there was a white elephant exchange with gifts that Linda and Laura had bought.  Of course there was lots of stealing other people's gifts, in many cases things that the stealer did not even want, but just took to be obnoxious.  (Mostly this was my Dad and his protege in obnoxiousness, my cousin Brent.  Who, coincidentally, is Kyle's father.  We assume he is quite proud.)  After the white elephant gifts were gone, there was Pictionary and the men loudly and repeatedly complaining about getting all of the hard words, right up until one of my cousins got "heart" and my brother got "Wisconsin".  Bunch of whiners.  And then people started leaving and, in what may be a first for us, we concluded an entire family event without one single person getting thrown in the pool.  Mostly, I believe, because the nearest pool was several blocks away. 

And there you have a peek inside the wild world that is a day with my family.  Or one-third of my family, anyway.  Tip of the iceberg, people.

Grateful, Second Annual Edition

Things I am thankful for this year, again in no particular order:

• One last chance to live with my college roomie and all around good buddy Amy before she heads off for the Pacific Northwest and Joe.

• Living in a city with other liberals.

• Puppy love.  Literally.  The puppies, they love me.  I like them ok too.

• You.  You know who you are.

• Friends whose weddings give me good excuses to go on trips and also to see them again after it has been FAR TOO LONG.

• Also having an excuse to hang out for three days with Holly, particularly in Vegas!  Yard of margarita, here we come!

• Reruns of Scrubs on Comedy Central.  Gosh I love that show.

• A really great temp job.  Because let’s face it, this temping thing could have really sucked.

• The $10 bottle of STELLLLLLLLLLAAAAAAAAAAAAA! and Melissa for telling me that it existed.

• People who leave me sweet and funny comments and even keep coming here when I don’t manage to post more than twice a week on any kind of regular basis.

• A new computer that will stay on for as long as I want it to!

• The music of KT Tunstall.  The lyrics make no sense to me whatsoever, but I sure do like to sing along in my car.

• Everyone who has been supportive about this lunatic NaNoWriMo thing.

• That November, and with it NaNoWriMo, is almost over.

• A long weekend and thus several days to sleep in.  Do you hear me dogs?  SLEEP IN!

• I know I said this last year, but it bears repeating: it is almost Christmas, the most wonderful time of the year and I don't care whether you agree or not!  I love it all.  The lights, the trees, the decorations, the cards, the presents, the music, the movies, the parties and general merriment.  And let us not forget the eggnog.  Mmmmm...eggnog.

How about you?  Got a more profound list?  Or something even sillier that really does fill you with gratitude?  Here's your chance!  Also, tomorrow in addition to being Thanksgiving, is my parents' 38th anniversary!  Everyone say "Happy Anniversary, Russ and Mary!"  Because that is a long time to put up with any one person.  Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving!  I think you deserve extra stuffing this year.  Go ahead, unbutton your pants and have seconds.  I won't tell.

Warning to my brother: this post contains repeated use of the T word.

Among the many perks of working where I do (chief among them being of course the free crack Diet Dr. Pepper) is that we .01% of the workforce who are women are provided with free...er...feminine supplies.  This is via machines in the ladies' rooms which do not require quarters.  Just turn the crank!  Except not too hard or two tampons will SHOOT OUT at you!  Yes, not only does my company offer free tampons, they pelt you with them!

The first time I witnessed this phenomenon, my first thought was Huh.  Projectile tampons.  And then I thought Ha!  Projectile tampons!  Because that is a pretty humorous phrase, don't you think?  And then I thought how Projectile Tampons would be a good name for an angry girl rock band.  Except pretty much all of my anger remains directed toward Corporate Expedia.  I don't think that would make for very good angry girl rock songs and certainly would not be apropos of  the Projectile Tampons name.  So if you or someone you know is starting an angry girl rock band, you are welcome to call it Projectile Tampons.  Just be sure to credit me in your liner notes.

And now Dan, just for you, I will stop saying tampons already.

What Princess Leia might have been doing, had she been an administrative assistant rather than a princess.

I just requested a purchase order for a Space Transformer.  I bet that is no where near as cool as it sounds like it is.

XOXO

Dear Expedia Corporate Travel,

If you must keep me on hold for over an hour, could you please, for the love of God and all that is holy, get some new hold music already!  Because those six bars of crappy imitation "music" you play in between frequent reminders that all of your agents are helping other customers, please stay on the line and you will be with me shortly, are etched into my brain.  Permanently.  You people are holding me hostage to my phone and I think the Geneva Convention and even President George W. Bush would have something to say about this torturous soundtrack.

Or, here's an idea: make your website ACTUALLY HELPFUL.  Then I would stop calling you all together and I bet a lot of other people would too and you might not be experiencing increased call volume causing longer than normal hold times.

I would not mind so much if I were ever arranging any of this international travel for myself, but as you very well know, it is never for me, so give a girl a break already and PICK UP THE PHONE.

And may your dreams be equally haunted by the strains of muzak.

Your valued customer,

Lori

Aw, slattocks!

Did you know that teaching children to read is not only pointless, but also unnecessarily mean?  Apparently it is.  I'm glad I got out of that unimportant field and stopped torturing children needlessly with phonics and reading comprehension!  What a waste!  And if someone happens to beat Michael Rogers senseless with a hardcover copy of Jane Eyre, I will certainly not be responsible.  Mine is a paperback.

But enough of my pre-coffee ranting!  That is not what I came here for today!  I came here today to tell you, Internet, about two very cool people that I met this weekend.  They are Paul and Jobie of Manchester, England (Hi, Paul and Jobie!)  Paul, according to his fancy schmancy genealogy program, is my third cousin, once removed.  He discovered in his research that he had quite a few distant relatives living in Texas, so he and Jobie came on over to visit. 

And have we showed them the place?  Why yes, we have.  (And by "we", I mean "other people" since I really just met them at my parents' house for dinner.)  All of the splendor that is East and Central Texas!  Particularly Wurstfest, which is, as you may imagine, rather beer-intensive.  Why, they even got to go to Sea World!  Where Jobie and Dawn rode the roller coasters without Paul and Dan.  Apparently being chicken about roller coasters exists on the Y chromosome throughout my extended family.

Also strong in my family is the force of Attention Deficit Disorder.  My father has it, I have it, and my third cousin, once removed has it.  We attribute to the ADD our widely varied interests and our shared inability to finish things.  Ah, family.  Who understands you better than distant relatives you've never met who live on a different continent?

And who better to use for free lodging and tour-guiding in a couple of countries you have always wanted to visit?  Because we've been invited to visit and see England and Ireland, an invitation which I fully intend to accept! 

And where will I be staying when I get there?  Slattocks!  This is where Paul and Jobie live, chosen partially for the extra fun name.  (Totally sound decision-making logic, if you ask me.)  Say it, Internet: Slattocks!  Ok, but now say it with an English accent.  Way more fun, right?

In addition to their generous hosting offer, Paul and Jobie have further given me (and by extension, you) permission to use this word any way we want!  Because they don't know what it means, so we might as well make it up, right?  So I have decided that slattocks will make an excellent all-purpose swear word.  What about you?  How will you use it?  And will you maybe water my plants and collect my mail for a while?  I have a trip to take.

I'll have a blue 110th Congress without you

Did anyone else see Tim Russert pull out the white board last night?  And was anyone else shamelessly filled with joy at the time?  You know, I actually saw the actual white board that he used in his coverage of the 2000 election.  It's true!  They had it at the Newseum and part of my job at the time was to take middle schoolers there and my co-workers and I thought that was pretty much the coolest thing ever.  (I believe I have mentioned that this particular workplace was a bizarro world where the geekier you were, politics-wise, the cooler you were.  And if reading this makes you think that I must have been the coolest person there, then you would be sorely mistaken.)  These were the same people with whom I watched the 2000 election returns in a bar at a hotel in Williamsburg until the wee small hours of the morning.  And then with whom, the next day, I attempted to find a TV in Colonial Williamsburg during the students' free time to find out what in heck was going on.  Good times.  (No, seriously, we had a blast, right up until the actual results became clear, days later.  It was democracy in action!  What could possibly be geekier cooler than that?)

Anyway, last night was exciting, wasn't it?  While it is certainly far less fun to watch returns alone than with a big group of civics nerds, at least there was good news this year.  And Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert!  And Rick Santorum losing his seat which possibly made me clap my hands a little.  (Watching alone is, however, vastly more enjoyable than watching at a party full of Republicans where NO ONE WILL TALK TO YOU.)

Of course, here in Texas, we are stuck with Governor Goodhair for another four years, but anyone who didn't see that coming was probably a little delusional.  Perhaps without Kinky and One Tough Grandma in the race, there may have been a chance of unseating him, but in general nothing good can come of a race where two of the candidates can be referred to as Kinky and Grandma.

And now, for all the marbles, Montana and Virginia!  I bet Montana has never felt so powerful!  Enjoy it while it lasts, Montana!  Now get back to counting!  After all, it's 400,000 votes - how long can that possibly take?  Perhaps Tim Russert would lend you his white board so you can make a tally.  And Virginia, sigh, we'll wait.  But there's no turkey for you until you get this sorted out, DO YOU HEAR ME?

Ah, Election Day.  Only 729 shopping days until the next one.  I know what's on my list!

Edited to add: Well done, Montana!  I applaud your speedy counting.  And holy crap, Rumsfeld resigned!  Watch out for flying pigs, everyone!

So

Did you vote yet?

Need sleepy

Good Monday morning, everyone.  Are you feeling well-rested by a nice relaxing weekend?  Well GOOD FOR YOU.  I, for one, am tired.

I'm finding that writing up until bedtime and then going to sleep is not working so well for me.  My brain just does not want to shut off.  I used to be able to do this, only because I would stay up writing until four or five in the morning, at which time sheer exhaustion would take over and I would have no trouble drifting off.  This worked exceptionally well for me, right up until I got a job again.  There were those years, back in college when I would have been perfectly capable of staying up until four and then being somewhere at eight and feeling at least functionally coherent all day.  Those days, I am sorry to tell you, are long gone.

Additionally, I participated in Race for the Cure this weekend along with several of my family members and co-workers.  This is my seventh year participating and my problem with it this year is the same issue I have every year.  It starts very early in the morning.  This year we were supposed to meet up with the team beforehand, so Amy (God bless her for not making us get up earlier to find parking) dropped us off at 7:15 for the 8:00 Race.  We got our team photo taken and proceeded to the big mob o' racers.  Except before we could participate in Race for the Cure, we had to participate in Stand Around for the Cure.  Because the start line was closed off to smaller than one lane of the road, creating a massive bottleneck.  We didn't even start making forward progress until 8:40.  Not cool, Austin race planners.  I could have slept for another hour at least.  But once we made it through the start gauntlet, we made short work of the 5K and proceeded out to breakfast without passing Go.  I took a nap and all (what, after all, is a Sunday without a nap?) but then I was up writing again until I attempted to go to sleep around 12, with little success.

(Normally, I would have put up a link to my Race page so you could have all gone and donated, but since I was on a workplace team, it seemed a bad idea to advertise to the entire Internet where exactly I work.  I mean, it's not YOU I don't trust, it's those OTHER people.  You know, them.  But I'm sure you could go to www.komen.org and make a donation on behalf of my lost sleep.)

So I believe I will be climbing on the caffeine carousel a little early today.  And I further believe that November is going to be a long and sleepy month.

(Also, don't you think Typepad should begin giving me kick-backs of some sort?  Now that I have sent them Lisa AND Dave?  Where's my cut, Typepad?)

Love Thursday: Getting this one in under the wire

I intended to write this post much earlier in the day.  But see, there's this novel that I'm writing.  (I had a dream last night where I started getting angry comments demanding that I stop writing about NaNoWriMo already gosh we are so sick of hearing about it!  Which may be coming eventually, but I don't think we've quite hit that wall yet, have we?)  I do feel that I should point out, lest you overestimate my ambition, that while 1,667 words is what you get when you divide 50,000 words equally by 30 days, it is recommended that you shoot for 2,000 or 2,500 per day in the first week.  Apparently week two really crushes your spirit, so they suggest that you take advantage of the first week enthusiasm.  So really by shooting for 2,000 words a day this week, I am still really putting in the least amount of effort possible to get by.  (If this novel were flair, I would SO be wearing the minimum required amount.)

On to non-novel-related things!  I figured that since I had already asked you about your strong dislikes that one Monday, I should find out what we all love.    So here is your assignment: list ten things that you love.  Anything you want.  (I am limiting it to 10 since when some friends and I discussed this question it was terribly interesting and we really came to learn a lot about each other, but it took quite a long time.  So ten it is.  No cheating.)

I will start by listing the first ten things that come to mind in an effort to keep from staying up all night trying to come up with the ten most important things.

1. Good conversation.

2. Dark chocolate.

3. Thunderstorms.

4. Things of beauty, particularly beautifully-written things.

5. Kids.

6. Christmas.

7. Fall.  Real fall though, not South Texas fall.

8. Comments.   (Really, this is not a desperate cry for comments.  It's just true.  Comments make me really irrationally happy.)

9. Driving fast with the windows down and the sunroof open.

10. Traveling.  Also staying home.

I'm off to bed now to rest my weary hands and will make every effort not to get up and log back in once I think of better things to put on my list.  But promise that you all will not think too hard about this either, ok?  I don't want to be the only one half-assing this assignment.