the one about the real sasha fierce...

and i ain't talkin about beyonce. my mini doxie, sasha, is one of the best things in my life. first of all, she's cute as a button. seriously. look at that picture. but in addition, having a puppy gave my life a certain level of responsibility and structure that feels good. i suppose it's similar to having children in that respect, but much easier :) i mean, even when things are bad, when i feel kind of down, because of sasha, life goes on. sasha still needs to eat, drink, pee and poop. and thus, because my puppy needs to continue business as usual, i continue business as usual. but really -- who could be sad when looking at that face??!

the one where i am back

 so today my dad, the Dog and i drove back down to bham. i'm going to continue my job search from here, at least through the end of the month. i do a lot of complaining about the Parents, but they are pretty awesome. not everyone's dad would drive 13 hours with them (and a hyper dachshund).  my dad is so cute -- he's like "you and your mom have to start getting along better". i'm like, we get along fine - as long as we're not under the same roof! he's right though, i mean my mom's a little crazy and i'm a little. but she's older so i guess that means i should be the one to bend. sigh. it could be much worse.

it's nice to be back in my space, in my own bed. although i love being at home (and will be back in 2 weeks for the inauguration), there's nothing like your own space. i think the Dog was happy to get home also. she likes routine and we've been on the go for the past few weeks, so it'll be nice to have some down time. 

it's weird, while i'm happy to be home, i'm kind of sad. obvi, it's always a wee bit sad leaving the Parents, but i'm also bummed i didn't get to see Brown after she announced that she and Peaches are engaged! such exciting news, i'm so thrilled for her! i also would have liked to say a proper goodbye to AHS. leaving today was kind of a last minute deal so i didn't get to do that, nor did i get to observe LS BFF's costa rica tan - which i'm sure she must have by now :) no fear, i'm back in like 2 weeks - then hopefully for good!

the one where it was christmas eve!

i love holidays! really, any excuse for a celebration is good with me. but out of them all, christmas is my absolute favorite and has been for years. give me mariah carey's christmas cd and i'm golden! i may actually enjoy christmas eve moreso than christmas. i always go up to my room around 9ish, shut the door and wrap all my gifts while playing mariah carey christmas, the temptations "silent night", and kenny g christmas (don't judge - the man is talented). probably the best thing about christmas eve is the fact that still, after about 18 years of wrapping my own presents, i am the worse gift wrapper ever. my gifts are identifiable because they'll look cute from the top...but do not flip that bad boy over. it looks like something a toddler has done. it would actually be quite embarrassing if it was anyone but my parents/sister/brother in law/random other family members. what can i say? i can't be good at everything :)

i also revert back to a five year old christmas eve/morning. i still have trouble falling asleep christmas eve even though i'm 26 years old and generally have a good idea what my gifts will be. and then i wake up super early. at least i'm a little better about that now. when i was younger, my sister and i would wake up, go downstairs, scope out all the gifts and discuss what we thought each one was and then go wake up the Parents. eventually, the Parents got sick of that shit and created a rule stating that we could not wake them up before 6. yes, we would wake up so early that we needed a 6 am rule. as we (okay, mainly me) got older the rule was adjusted to 7 and then 8. now i usually wake up around 8 am, so its perfect! i also insist on playing santa and handing out every christmas gift. i can't help it, it's my favorite!

so i think for this year's christmas resolution (i make christmas resolutions, not NYE -- who wants to commit to something while drunk??) i think i'm going to keep it simple. 

1. find a job that will not cause me to want to vomit every sunday night when i'm thinking about monday morning.

2. finally commit to taking care of myself by working out 3x week.

3. keep pampering the Dog. what can i say, she deserves it!

4. call home more often.

and i think that's about all i can promise right now. all very doable, and very reasonable if i can say so myself!