I think I can, I think I can, I think I can….   I’m getting towards the end of NaBloPoMo, I’m still in the running, but I’m running out of ideas of things to blog about on a daily basis.  But my friend Robin gave me a few suggestions, so let’s try that, shall we?

1. Why do they have Christmas decorations and Holiday music playing in department stores before Halloween even got here? 2. Small dogs or big dogs, which are better? 3. Three things no one knows about me. 4. My fondest childhood memory.

Ok, #1.  Do you really think I have any insight into the hows and whys of retail marketing other than to make money?  I used to work retail myself, but as a minion, not a decision-maker.  While I get excited at all the decorations and how the stores go all out for the holidays, I also take serious issue with the rush.  I mean, we have 3 holidays at the end of the year that are pretty big in retail circles.  Halloween means you need to buy a costume, candy, and other ghoulish stuff.  Thanksgiving is a huge day for supermarket.  And I don’t even need to mention how much retailers love Christmas.  But why do we have to rush them?  Why can’t we enjoy these things one at a time?  It’s no wonder people feel rushed these days.  The women’s magazines give you the whole holiday planning schedule – basically, they schedule out your entire fall and winter season for you, starting in August.  Great.  Now we feel like if we don’t follow their suggestions, we’ll never get it all done.  Just… whatever.  Just have fun.  Holidays are for enjoying.  And the Christmas season officially begins the day after Thanksgiving.  So there.

#2.  Small yippee dogs suck.  They’re too needy, and my mom’s cat can beat up your teacup chihuahua.  The German Shepherd we had when I was a kid, on the other hand, was a great dog – very smart and intuitive.  Her bark meant something, whereas a smally yippee dog is just annoying as heck when it barks, because it tends to bark incessantly, like those battery powered toy dogs they used to have in front of the toy store at the mall.

Three things no one knows about me?  Um, well, my husband knows everything about me (as far as I know, but there’s the chance that I myself could be forgetting something).  But I don’t think he would appreciate me telling those kinds of secrets to the great wide interwebs, so you’re out of luck there.

And now for my fondest childhood memory.  It’s hard to pick just one, but the summer that our dog (the previously mentioned German Shepherd) mated with our big stupid mutt that chased fireworks, and puppies were born.  Having lots of puppies to play with when you’re 9 years old is pretty cool.

Ok, I’m out of ideas for now.  Hopefully I can think of some more by tomorrow’s post.

*Idear is the Boston pronunciation of “idea”.  Though we generally drop our R’s, we will add one at the end of word that ends with an “a”.

It’s the last week of NaBloPoMo, and so far it’s looking pretty good for me as far as accomplishing this.  I am finding it increasingly difficult to come up with stuff to blog about on a daily basis, at least when I’m trying to tend to my own life, Mister, the housekeeping, and getting ready for Thanksgiving.  Usually I end up sitting at the computer with just a few hours left in the day, desperately reading blogs and rapidly scanning the internets for inspiration.  It shouldn’t be like that – I believe that especially with a personal blog such as mine, the posts should happen more naturally.  For those of us that blog, we either think about it every day or we don’t.  If you’re in the group that thinks about it every day, then it shouldn’t be too difficult to find something to write about at least once or twice a week.  If you’re in the group that doesn’t think about it every day, or even once in awhile, then why do you blog?  Do you get a lot of personal satisfaction from it?  Even when I’m only putting a few posts out there per month, I enjoy blogging and reading blogs very much.  I think that’s the purpose of blogs.  I don’t think of my blog as something that can pay me, or as a job, or a way to get rich.  It’s a personal blog.  Personal.  What I get out of it isn’t monetary, it isn’t to boost my ego or make me famous.  It’s just because I like to write, and I like seeing something that I created out there for everyone else to see.  That’s all.

So, anyway, now that I really went off on a tangent there, let’s change the subject.  There’s only one month left until Christmas!  Do you have your shopping done?  Are you braving the crowds on Black Friday?  My answers are no and no, respectively.  I’ve done some shopping and have some ideas in my head of what to get people, but I really need to sit down and make a list and get my shopping organized before I hit the mall.  My card list is done, though, so I’ll be sitting down this weekend to make cards.  I’ve always wanted to do that, and this year I’m crazy enough to try.  Yeah, I’m nuts like that.  But it will make me appreciate throwing a few boxes of cards into my basket next year.  There’s a reason for everything, right?

24 down, 6 to go.  I can do this!

Today I went to a different store to find Bell’s Seasoning.  They don’t have it either.  I give up.  My mom will be sending me a box of the coveted spice blend via overnight delivery.  I could keep looking, but she needs to send it out tomorrow to make sure I get it in time, so I’ll just relax on the seasoning and focus on lactose-free whipping cream.  I’m sure I saw it at Whole Paycheck…

I know I should always listen to Mister when he tells me something, because he’s always right.  He doesn’t like a certain local grocery store that starts with an S because, well, I don’t know why.  He just never shops there.  It’s not that close to us anyway, so it’s not a huge deal.  But tonite I went grocery shopping for the Big Dinner, and for tonite’s dinner I thought I’d make macaroni and cheese.  I like to use a 4-cheese blend, and Kraft has just the product – it’s a blend of American, Wisconsin cheddar, Vermont white cheddar, and Monterey Jack, and that with a dash of Dijon mustard makes the absolute best mac and cheese ever.  I’ve been having a hard time finding it for quite some time, though, so I went to their website and it said I could find it at my local S store.  Liars.  They didn’t have it.

Know what else they didn’t have?  Bell’s Seasoning.  How in the heck can a major grocery store not have Bell’s Seasoning this close to Thanksgiving?  I asked a clerk, just in case they were hiding it somewhere, and I was told that they aren’t stocking it this year.  They did have tons of flavor injectors, though.  No thanks, I’ll go to another store for Bell’s.  Flavor injectors are like, so 5 years ago.

Then, as if my shopping experience wasn’t bad enough, I had to get in the wrong line.  I thought I had picked the shortest line.  In fact, I had.  But I think it was short because everyone else had left to go to other lines.  The customer in front of me was apparently still shopping with 1985 prices in mind.  He had a budget and went way, way over, so first the checker had to explain that he was over, then go over the price of some of his items, then wait while he picked through his already packed order and decide what to put back.  Meanwhile, I was joking with the guy in line behind me about the bottle of Jaeger he had that had a security cap on it and how it would be nice if that cap wasn’t there at that point in time.  By the time I left the store my turkey was nearly thawed, or so it seemed.

So the moral of the story is that when Mister has strong feelings against a certain establishment, I should really listen to him.  But I’m just too stubborn sometimes and insist on finding out for myself.

I still have a headache.  It wasn’t totally unbearable, but I’ve had it all day and it has not budged, no matter how much aspirin I took or despite the nap I had when I got home.  Mister thinks it might be related to Aunt Flo, since she arrived today, and that could be a very plausible answer, but I’d need to keep more accurate notes on that before I can make a definite determination.  In any case, I’m going to the doctor on Monday about this and hoping that it goes away before I wake up tomorrow morning so that I can get some stuff done around the house before the holiday.  This headache is really getting on my nerves.