I hope everyone had a lovely Veteran's Day. I myself spent most of the weekend working but on Sunday night I left for Arizona. My cousin Kim lives in Phoenix, as do my grandparents and Aunt and Uncle part time. She just had her second baby so I thought I'd go visit while she was still on maternity leave. Her kids are very cute and we had a good, although short, visit. I wasn't expecting to see them but my grandparents got into AZ the same day I did so we got to have a visit. My Grammy seems to be failing a little more every time I see her and it makes me so sad. She gets so upset when we go. I stayed until Tuesday night and then headed back home. Fun little incident on the way back...
I stopped in Quartzsite which is right before the Cali border, to get gas and food. As I was pulling back onto the highway I noticed a State Trooper just chilling by the side of the road. As I glance in my rear view mirror he turns on his lights and gets on the road. I glance around and think, "Oh crap, I'm the only one out here." Seeing that I wasn't speeding I figured it had to be a light out or something. The trooper comes up to the drivers window, asks for my license, insurance, and registration, and then tells me my license plate light is out. How nice. He then asks me to step back to his squad car. Immediately I think, "What the hell?" I had just heard on the news about women getting pulled over by fake officers and I got a little scared. I walked back there and he shows me which light is out...as if I'm too stupid to figure out that the 'light above the license plate', is INDEED the light above the license plate. As he's filling out the ticket/work order warning, these are the things he asks me. (I make none of these up.) -So what were you doing in Arizona? -Did you grow up there? -No, Alaska, huh? What town? - What did you get at Carl's Jr.? (where I just stopped) -How WAS your crispy chicken sandwich? - How do you like your Jeep? - How's the gas mileage? - What do you do for work in CA?
Seriously? Listen, Buster, you're giving me a lame-o ticket, we're not speed dating here.
I have no idea what Mr. Over-achiever was trying to accomplish, but I guess you get bored sitting on a highway in the middle of nowhere for hours at a time. Anyway, I got home in record time after figuring out I've been taking a lame way all the times before.
Wednesday I had the unfortunate need to get two tires replaced. I hate going to places like that as a girl. They're just so weird about it. I got told I smelled nice, which maybe is why I got a discount, so I guess there's that. I had to do an emergency run to the Getty Museum because I left an assignment until the very last minute. It's a really nice museum with an amazing view of all of Los Angeles. Although sadly enough I'm still museum-burnt-out from this summer's Europe excursion.
Today I got out of my lab super early and stopped by Target to get a few last minute things for our Christmas tree decorating party that we had tonight. Obviously, my tree at my house. No one else is nutty enough to already have there's up. I did promise pictures and I will do so next time I write. So I was on my way home, and I thought for a minute and decided that I was so looking forward to the get together and that I was feeling something close to super happy. After I got home I had to clean out the storage space that's mine in the carport area, in order to get to the Christmas decorations bin. I remembered that I had been worried about a large box of stuffed animals that I'd put in there in January. I should have checked ages ago but I wasn't really concerned until just recently. Turns out my worst fears were realized and that a rat had nested in there at some point. I'm still incredibly freaked out by the thought and am traumatized because I went through it animal by animal and had to throw away some things I've had since I was a baby. It was disgusting. I hate rats. I think it's the book 1984, at the end, where they threaten to put rats in a box on top of someones stomach as a means of torture... that ruined me. We didn't have rats in Alaska to my knowledge. Anyway, my good mood deflated, whether because of that or something else. But again...there IS nothing wrong, I just can't stop the niggling feeling that there is. Maybe it's the weather. It seems whenever I smell the cold winter air it takes me back to last year at exactly this time when I really didn't like myself all that much. It was such a dark time and the residue of all of that remains. I guess I'm not sure how to make it go away, maybe it will when we reach this time next year and I can smell winter in the air without being taken back to a dozen shameful or embarrassing memories.
Regardless of rats and not being deliriously happy, the decorating was really fun. Amy, Julia, and Joey came over and we ordered pizza and watched Love Actually, which is the perfect holiday film. I actually ended up with more ornaments than I needed. This is surprising since my tree is HUGE. I mean it's really really large. 7.5ft tall and 4.5ft at the base. The angel's head doesn't quite reach the ceiling but it's close. It is, however, so incredibly beautiful. I am a sucker for Christmas, and Christmas trees are my undoing. Ever since I was little my favorite thing to do was sit in the dark with the tree lights on, listening to Christmas music. That this tree is all my own...well, it sounds lame but it feels like a tiny step towards actually being a grownup...or something like that. There are just enough ornaments that my mom gave me from when we were growing up, to make it all come together as truly mine. Now as long as my puppies don't eat the fake icicles off the tree, or any of the ornaments, we'll be all set.
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