Blissful Nothingness

My vacation so far has been full of blissful nothingness. Sure, there's the occasional project--making Christmas dinner, laying new tile, trying to get my car smog-checked and registered--but in general I've had a week and three days of nothing particularly important or pressing, and I've adored every minute of it. I'm making great progress on my Christmas Advent Calendar; something that I've had for two years now and haven't been able to finish, mostly because I only find myself wanting to work on it during Christmas time. And by the way, it's harder than it looks. You have to put each little character together by hand, sequins and all. I also made two hot pads for my Mom. They look sort of like something I would've given her when I was eleven or so. She loved them. I think my brain is trying to recoup a little. Don't worry, though. I'm not forgetting everything that I learned this last semester. I even got a DSM-IV for Christmas. I asked for it. If that's not dorky, I don't know what is. I haven't started diagnosing myself. I figure that I should wait until the end of February or so, when my stress level has returned to normal. I've also been pretty spoiled with the weather--it was 72 degrees today. I don't understand why people wouldn't want it to be 72 degrees over their Christmas holidays. Of course, I grew up with this being my Christmas weather, so...to each his own. I'll be back buried under the tundra that is Logan Utah soon enough.

Let me tell you the best way to be surprised for Christmas. I just discovered it this year. Make yourself a wish list on Amazon.com. Every year my family makes Christmas lists. Everyone is expected to tell us what they want. Then we go and get one of the things on the list for them. We Nelsons love surprises, but we also like to get things that we actually want. This last year I made up a Wish List for myself on Amazon, so that I could remember things that I wanted to get for myself when I had extra money (haha). So when we made up our Christmas lists, I just decided to direct my family members to my Amazon wish list. Then I added a few sundry things that I wanted as well that weren't on my Amazon list, and there was my Christmas list. I really didn't expect my family to look at the Amazon list for things to get me. So, I was really surprised when I opened my gifts on Christmas day and got two movies that were on my Amazon list from my older sister (Space Camp and Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead--classic) and the first season of SeaQuest from my little sister with a tag attached to it that read "For your Sanity." As a side note, have you ever seen SeaQuest? I was ADDICTED to it growing up. Even when it got weird with the aliens and stuff, it was still somewhat interesting. But the first season is the best. And now I have something that I can turn to in those moments of desperation during school when I wonder what I could possibly have been thinking of when I decided to go back to school.

Anyhow, if you want to be surprised with things that you actually want, but forget that you wanted them, make yourself an Amazon wish list. It's amazing.

I'm watching the Kennedy Center Honors. It's pretty great. I love Morgan Freeman and Barbra Streisand. The other four being honored I don't really know, but I love to watch shows like these because I feel like it introduces me to a world that I wasn't aware of before. Like this Twyla Tharp, who's a choreographer that has done amazing things in dance. She reminds me of my old roommate Carly, who could make any dance incredible and moving--the kind of person that makes you wish your nervous system and soul could communicate as well as theirs so that you could create something that beautiful with your own body. I still remember the year that Sense and Sensibility won an Academy Award--I was almost fifteen, and utterly shocked because I hadn't heard about the movie when it came out, so it was the first exposure I'd had to the Jane Austen adaptation. Watching shows like this helps me feel cultured, as Becky would say. So I guess my vacation hasn't been totally useless.
Woot.

The End.