If it's good enough for you, it's good enough for me.
It's borderline embarrassing how much I look forward to coming into work on Mondays now. Today's pay-day, which used to be the best incentive for waking up on Monday, but that's secondary now; today I couldn't wait to get into the office to check how my fantasy football team did. (I won.) Fantasy football is pretty geeky, I guess, but it's kind of like betting on football, in the sense that it makes you pay attention to games that normally you couldn't care less about. I find myself watching games like Minnesota versus Arizona, not because I care about either team, but in the hopes that my wide-receiver has a great game. Sigh.
Thanksgiving feels like a hundred weeks ago. For the third straight year I spent the day proper at beckon_you_on's parent's house down in the OC, but this year without her dad, and with bonus aunts. Her aunts were hilarious and Thanksgiving-dinner-in-a-box was surprisingly delicious (seriously though, I might be a little biased, because have I ever said that turkey and mashed potatoes and gravy was anything less than absolutely fucking deliciousness?) and here's a picture of what I look like after consuming too much wine and turkey.
The holiday also meant the return of my former roommate to the home that we shared for 3 years. He's only been gone 2 months, which isn't a long time at all, but it felt like ages ago, y'know? The apartment hasn't really changed much at all since he left (because I'm lazy, you see. In fact, his room is practically in the exact same condition as when he left) although he was critical of one of my "decorating" choices: I have a pinata-sized version of former WWF superstar THE ROCK hanging from a hook in my kitchen. I've had him for 5 years (it was a prop from a Rilo Kiley show) and I just can't bear to part with him. And Lord knows I don't use the kitchen or dining area, so it's not like it's in anyone's way. But the Rock scares Brett, and I find that endlessly amusing, so it's going to stay.
I spent a lot of the "holiday weekend" (in between working Friday and Saturday) hanging out with Brett and driving him around 3 separate counties. He'd carpooled down from San Francisco with friends that lived in Camarillo, so I picked him up after work on Friday and dropped him off at EIGHT-THIRTY IN THE MORNING yesterday. Camarillo is over an hour away from my apartment, and we were up until 3:30am the previous, uh, night, so you can imagine how tired I was yesterday. But I decided against driving home and going back to bed and instead went to the Barney's Beanery in Pasadena (where cheekypop and her boy Matt had taken me the week before) to watch the 10am Steelers game. Yeah, that game didn't turn out so well, but Barney's is rad because the tables have individual TVs and you can change the channels and watch whatever football game you want. So I spent my morning eating potato skins and corned-beef hash, drinking thirty-four cups of coffee, reading the Times, and keeping tabs on all of my fantasy football players. Life in the fast lane, baby.
After the morning games, I went to check out Tower's going-out-of-business sale. CDs at 40% off sounds like a bargain, but you still have to be a discerning shopper because 40-off of a $19 disc is "still" $11.40. Not exactly a steal, but a pretty decent value. One of their employees said that they should be closed for good sometime in mid-December. I'm hoping for a couple more increases on the discounts so I can go back and pick up a few imports that were still too rich for my blood.
Between now and the new year, there is only have one weekend where I'll have the apartment entirely to myself. styloroc_2000 is flying in from Texas this Friday so we can go dancing. Then Brett's back the following weekend. I'll have the next weekend to myself, and then Brett'll be back through the new year. The next 30-plus days should be a lot of fun, but I have to be honest with you, I can't wait for 2007. Not that this was a particularly shitty year (though it was in some respects), but I feel like this was such a big transitional year (for myself and many of the people around me) and that a lot of time was spent in a perpetual state of flux. Hopefully things settle down in '07. I'm optimistic (as always) because a lot of things have already sorted themselves out, and already next year is ramping up to be a good one. I can feel it.
In case you're wondering about that picture, my apartment is the first door on the left