we have popcorn at home

My online movie services are harrassing me. So I did something about it. That's right! I stood up to the bullies.

A few weeks ago, my friends and I meandered over to the Blockbuster on East Bay and reveled in the glory of three dollar DVDs and close-out candy.  Like almost every other Blockbuster, this store is being liquidated. Is that the right word? I don't care. It's closing and EVERYTHING MUST GO. Including the gumball machine. True story.

So we perused the stacks of discs for what seemed like hours, found a few keepers and proceeded to check out. I got distracted by the discount candy and popcorn (did you know Orville Redenbacher makes "Spicy Nacho" popcorn? I wish I didn't.) and became fixated by the popcorn that comes in its own bucket (just like at the movies!).  The kind I always begged my mom for and never got because "we have popcorn at home." Exactly. Boring popcorn. Popcorn that comes in a bag. How blasé. 

So I bought it. And it was the perfect size to store my new movies in! When I approached the check-out counter, the man working there informed me that if I signed up for a Blockbuster online that I would get some fantastic percentage off my final purchase. And of course I agreed. It was free and would get me extra movies for a month! And that's how I signed up for Blockbuster in addition to my well-used Netflix account and bought three movies and a bucket of popcorn for $6.

End of story? Not quite.

Apparently signing up for this Blockbuster thing was not enough. It wants attention. It wants love. But sadly for Buster, I already have a movie love, and that is Netflix. So Buster got jealous. It seethed as I spent hours enjoying movies and TV online and cursed as I basked in the new excitement of connecting the x-box to this wonderful online service. Eventually Buster grew tired of expecting me to notice how mad it was and started trying to remind me it was there.

Email from: BLOCKBUSTER online: Your queue is low- add new titles. Now. 

Buster was angry. And hurt. I ignored it again.
A movie came in the mail. I forgot about it. Eventually I watched it and sent it back. Another came. I forgot again.

So what did I do? I deleted it for good today, and turned my attention fully to Netflix once again. I feel guilty for treating Blockbuster the way I did, but the truth is it deserved better. And I just don't have the devotion or attention to give.

And Netflix welcomed me back with open arms. It knows what I like:
"British Comedies with Strong Female Leads" or "Emotional Father-Son Comedies" or "Witty Workplace Sitcoms" or "Cerebral British Period Pieces."
It gets me.

And I am happy.

flurries

I haven't written much because a lot has been happening this break. And when I say "a lot" I mean "a lot of knitting patterns." But I won't bore you. I have a story. A little snapshot of Christmas break in the DeBuys house.

In the afternoon of New Year's Eve, all is calm in the house. Mom and Dad are out shopping and returning heinous Christmas presents. Daniel is in the basement, playing Oblivion. Sean is downtown at Tech with his girlfriend. And Ryan and I are sitting, peaceably, in the living room watching the 4th season of The Office as I am knitting a scarf for my friend Mallory. All is calm. All is bright.
So of course you know some disturbance is coming.

Right as Michael Scott is threatening to throw himself off the roof of the building (onto a Moon Bounce castle) the lights flicker, the TV shuts off, and the refrigerator powers down.

The power is out. The afternoon is ruined.

 A quick call to Mom confirms that the electric bill has been paid, and then Ryan and I sit and look at each other, the question "Now what?" hanging unspoken on the air.

Daniel comes rushing up the stairs out of the dark basement. A surprisingly delayed reaction considering he was plugged into the Matrix and was most likely engulfed in darkness almost instantly.

Now we are all sitting in the living room, sadly at a loss for what to do. Then survival mode takes over.
"Daniel!" I scream, as he jumps off the couch, "whatever you do, DO NOT open the fridge! I mean it! Not even for a second! Ryan, check if the phone is working."
Ryan goes to the phone, and picks it up. "I think the batteries are low. Or it's out. It was probably an EMP. Your cell phone won't work either," (my brother is suggesting that the power is out due to an electromagnetic pulse, which he believes can be weaponized and used to "wipe out an entire city's powers of communication"). I remind him that I called mom on my cell phone already, and he looks a bit mollified.

Dad gets home and we discover that the power outage is most likely due to a car crash on the road by our house. Ryan and Daniel actually played outside. With a ball. Together. I even took the dog for a walk (while also observing the power outage around the neighborhood. I felt a bit like a spy. Because I am a nerd).

When Einstein and I got back to the house, Mom was home and we started lighting candles in preparation for the sun going down and what was reported to be a 4 hour outage. Awesome. I convinced Daniel to take a shower while light was still coming in the windows (score!) and Ryan told Dad about his EMP theory.

A few days before this, we all painted pottery with my aunt Colleen. Three of our family's pieces (that's an even 50%) had Saints colors or a fleur de lis. Or both. Anyway, they had finally been fired and picked up and we admired our pieces in the thin sunlight still streaming through the kitchen windows.

Daniel came downstairs, freshly clean, and Mom tells him to unwrap the other pieces carefully, so that we can take a picture to send to Colleen. I went upstairs to retrieve my (awesome pineapple) bowl from my room, and on the way back downstairs, I hear many things. Allow me to paint a word picture of this scene:

Mom: Careful, Daniel, careful-

Daniel: AHHHAHHGHHHH
Ryan: Daniel, WHAT? Ahhhahhhhh! Get it! AAHH!
Dad: WhAT! Daniel! NO DON'T TOUCH IT
[I am still coming down the stairs, faster now, and I see the dog chasing the cat out of the kitchen]
Mom: AH! OW Ow owowowow
(stomping, stomping)
Dad: Daniel! WHY did you do that?
Mom: I tried to warn him... OW, ooh, that was stupid. 
[Daniel, distraught, flees upstairs in a fit]

I finally round the corner to see white fluff suspended in the air, falling slowly like fat snow. My first thought, as I see Dad at the open sliding glass door, is that the cat has attacked some snowy white bird and let it into the house, and now its downy feathers are decorating our kitchen.

The actual story is even better:
Daniel, being careful to handle the potter delicately, and being instructed to "save the tissue paper" that wraps them, had cautiously peeled the paper away from the ceramic box he was unwrapping, and placed the large piece of tissue paper on the kitchen table, right next to the candles we had just lit. My mother, seeing this happen, tried to warn him, but was unable to stop the paper from catching on fire. Wanting to save the table, and our house, from going up in flames, she grabbed the flaming paper and threw it on the floor. This movement made the flame more intense, and ashes (like white fluffy snow flurries) floated around the clouds of stress as my parents stomped out the flames. They then turned on Daniel, who blamed himself for almost killing the family and ran upstairs in tears.

So, the results from this day: 

BAD- 

1. Daniel cried for a little bit until we assured him it wasn't really his fault
2. Mom burned her hand while saving the family (which she has shown me 47 times, because "you didn't believe me that I got burned but I did, look!")
3. and the power was out for a whopping 65 minutes.

GOOD- 

1. Daniel took a shower
2. Einstein took a walk
3. Ryan and Daniel played a game that didn't need controllers
4. the kitchen was swept (to clean up all the ash)
5. Mom got a battle scar, and...
6. I got another fun story to tell.

I think this one goes in the win column.

belly full of turkey

I can see the end, and it is near. But not in a depressing way, not at all.

Two weeks left until winter break. I have planned out every hour of the next 16 days. I have color coded my schedule, and made sure I included breaks for eating. This order is soothing and has made me realize that I can do all the things I need to, because I clearly have the time to do them. Ahhhhh. Like a glass of iced tea on a hot day.

Thanksgiving was amusing, like any other extended time with my extended family.  Topics at dinner included "is it poop or chocolate?", grandparents' newly purchased burial plots, Streetwalker BarbieTM, my aunt's drug habits in high school (she swears she just held other people's "stuff"), coozie in purse + key chain bottle opener = heavy drinkin college student (not true), and "so... Taxes."

I also got to catch up on Mythbusters, start knitting again, and marvel at my little brother's ability to grow a whole effing beard.

Some things will not soon be forgotten.

the NESP wasp

I am freaking out. Just a bit.

Tomorrow is D-Day. It should be happy and exciting, because I really only have two classes standing between me and Thanksgiving, but actually- OH WAIT there is another HUGE thing standing in the way, and that is this damned scholarship.

I have a meeting with my adviser for the NESP (Nastily Exhausting Scholarship Process) tomorrow at 12:30, right before I am allowed to leave for break. It's like seeing a lovely cake on the kitchen table and running toward it in excitement only to find a gigantic deadly wasp sitting in front of it, so that you are so freaked out about the wasp and how to maneuver yourself around it that you forget the cake is even there until the wasp decides to fly away by itself. Tomorrow is kinda like that.

I have a few more essays to write and I have convinced myself that everything I can get on paper (or a word document) is progress. Except it's NOT. Everything I have written is bullshit and that wasp is going to tear me down until all I am is a small weeping child.

Maybe I should have used pie as an example. It's more appropriate for the season.

I can't believe they have pepper imps

I've posted 100 posts! YAY!

OK, bigger news. I went to Harry Potter Land. Or the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Islands of Adventure. Also known as the Harry Potter theme park. Or "Rowling Mecca." 


Look, proof:

me being a dork outside a quill shop. OK, so I was a dork everywhere.

It was amazing. All three days of it. All three butterbeers, all five times I rode the Hogwarts Castle ride, all the stores I went in, all the lines I waited in (which, by the way, are wayyy shorter at the end of the day. duh. Took us all weekend to come to that realization), all the hours of driving and walking it took to get there. All amazing.

Here is a list of the things I couldn't stop myself from buying: 

• a quaffle. Seriously. A "regulation" Quidditch ball from the Quidditch Supply Store, Dervish and Banges.
• a Durmstrang t-shirt. it's really comfy and a little badass
• two packs of peppermint toads. they are delicious. and they were b.o.g.o. free
• chocolate frogs. almost a pound of chocolate- the frog is about as big as the palm of my hand. And by some fluke, I got two trading cards!
• acid pops. they promise to burn a hole through your tongue in the book. I am afraid to attempt. 
• sugar quills! candies "you can suck in class and just look like you're thinking what to write next"
• pumpkin juice. It's delicious. I would drink it everyday if I could, like they do in the books. It tastes a bit like spiced apple cider, but of course more pumpkin-y. Rest assured it is not 100% squeezed-from-a-pumpkin-straight-from-the-patch juice.  Which I would also enjoy immensely. I only drank half of it so that I could attempt to replicate it's wonderfulness. Because I am turning into my mother: "I could make that!"
• butterbeer. it's frothy, it's amber colored, it is so many synonyms for delicious. Like cream soda with a hint more sarsaparilla and a shot of something sweet and creamy like frosting. And the mug is awesome. 

                                         

I highly recommend taking a pilgrimage to visiting this theme park.

The Hogwarts ride is pretty scary though, so if you have really little kids, they might want to stay away from it. Unless they like spiders in their face and almost getting their soul sucked out. And getting spit at by something in the forbidden forest. And getting tossed upside down by the Whomping Willow. And intense Quidditch sequences. Actually, who doesn't enjoy a good Quidditch sequence?

a typical night home

So I am left home with my brothers tonight while my parents are out at some country club function with relatives. They took the good car and abandoned me with Ryan. So let me tell you what that means:

Ryan is a thirteen year old boy. And for any of you who ever wondered "what is the worst age for a younger brother to be?" you would have your answer in the number 13.
He is helpful and considerate at his best, but usually spends his time farting, muttering sarcastic comments in a stage whisper, or trying to break my fingers.
Right now he is playing a video game. Which means I don't hear much from him except the occasional overly loud groans and the deep thud of his foot hitting the wall. In a while, either his eyes will be tired or he will get fed up with a level he can't beat and he will come looking for a fight. Or possibly to watch Buffy. I can never anticipate which way it's going to go.

Luckily, I also have to pick up Sean from work soon, so that at least adds another element to this hormonal puzzle that could either result in a pleasant evening bonding with my brothers over a movie, or stomping upstairs and doors slamming.

Let's see, shall we?

dream on

Ok, for some reason I am sitting in my room re-listening to the "dream" songs from Glee last week (the Joss Whedon one, people. Don't pretend that wasn't the best episode all season).

What am I saying? I know why I'm here.

My Uncle Larry and cousin Christian are coming to stay with us. They should be here any minute, actually. We found out sometime this afternoon, and if my mother's blog is any testament, we're kind of freaking out. Probably because when we go to New Orleans we always stay at their house and it's always really clean. Not that our house isn't.

Well. Maybe it isn't. But it's homey. My friends sometimes call it The Burrow. Which I consider a compliment.

I guess.

Anyway, we've been cleaning cleaning cleaning since I got home from babysitting (I drove home on 400 for 20 minutes with the parking break on. Eff up of the week.) and I have just come up to shower so I can sit on the couch (long story. Well, not really. We washed the slip cover today).

Except sometime in the shower I got the "I dreamed a dream" song stuck in my head and couldn't rest until I listened to the Glee version. We totally called the Idina-mommy storyline, btw.

And here I am. I am probably needed downstairs soon to greet the guests. More later.