I'm a loser.

I've been self-absorbed lately, and I apologize.

In my defense, I've been uber busy dealing with some large scale things:


Christmas:

I originally planned for Christmas shopping to be done online, wrapped and shipped directly to me to avoid the terror I witnessed last year called "Christmas in Findlay: The Nightmare Continues". If you don't know what I mean by that, picture a medium-sized town with one general road for shopping, 500 stores on it, and no side roads to take you there. Then picture Every Single Person in such city (and surrounding areas) shopping Every Single Day (at ALL hours) from Thanksgiving until Christmas. I made the obvious mistake of going out the morning after Thanksgiving at around 8:30 to purchase some wine glasses I needed for my family dinner I was having at my house. I didn't even find the ones I planned on buying, but because it took me nearly an hour to find a parking spot, I figured I'd gotten that far and I was leaving with something. I returned home (after waiting in the checkout lane for over an hour) close to 11, which barely gave me enough time to warm my ham up. (I'm thankful for pre-cooked hams.) So needless to say, as much as I did find online, you still have to put in a little sweat, and here it is, the weekend before Christmas and I'm not even close to being done.


House shopping:

We're buying a house. Our lease ends at the end of April, so we decided we'd start looking now, because these things take time. Well, we found the perfect house almost immediately- huge, affordable, and forclosed, so here we are, not even into the new year, and we're making offers and counter offers. Since we're first time homebuyers, I've had to educate myself on all these things, and it's been very time consuming, although we're moving so fast with the purchase of this house. Well, to make a long story short, our offer was counteroffered, but they accepted our price, just putting in a few little stipulations. My dumbass decides Thursday that since they're pretty much forcing us to do all this over the holidays, that they should cough up another $250 to pay for most of the inspection. Brandon thinks this is a stupid idea, but I say that if you had $250 in the bank and it disappeared, you'd probably miss it, right? (I know I would.) So I accepted all their terms, just asking this one small thing. So, today is Saturday, and I haven't heard back. If I'd done the math I'd have realized since they're in California, and maybe this would take us till Monday to find out, and people could actually offer them something better over those 2 little days. I'd actually pay someone $250 right now to remove this rock I have in my stomach. Shit, I'd probably pay them $500 to know we had the house Friday. In conclusion, Brandon was right.


December is a traffic jam of occasions:

Trying to find the right 2 year anniversary present for Brandon while shopping for his Christmas gift is a bitch. I plan on changing our anniversary to July next year. I finally found him the perfect gift: a "discovery pass" that he can cash in on any number of outdoor adventures, such as skiing, whale watching, deep sea fishing, bungee jumping, parasailing, etc. Oh, and a scrapbook of all our adventures to date. What I got? Dinner for two at a local establishment. In his defense, it was the restaurant of our first date. But now I wish I hadn't put so much thought into my gift. I suppose his gift is the house (he's actually buying it), so I'll quit bitching about it.

Also in this category is my little sis's graduation, which didn't cause me any stress, except for seeing her starting this new grown up chapter of her life. Plus I got drunk in front of my mom at her graduation party and tried to fake sobriety. THAT was a little stressful.


Surgery:

Probably the biggest thing of all going on right now. My surgery is actually scheduled for February 21st, in Chicago. (And our closing date is scheduled for January 25th.) I'll be having it done at Northwestern Hospital, downtown. I'll be there for close to a week, so anyone wishing to see me completly snorked on narcotics, this is the perfect time to make fun of me. (But bring presents if you're planning on doing this. I won't remember you were there unless you leave something behind.) I'm having the bionic woman treatment, which will put me out of commission (and work) for close to or more than 6 months. I have come up with a business idea to pay for things while I'm off, so if you're broke and unemployed, call me. I need drivers.


Well, that about sums up where I've been over the past month or so. I'm really needing some "me" time here, so you may see me out at the bars soaking up alcohol. If you do, buy me a beer, 'cause I don't have any money left.