Friday Five

I’ve been up since 5:30 this morning and I’m about to (probably) be up all night tonight thanks to what is apparently an allergy not only to scallops but now to all shellfish. Yay.

So on this, the eve of the end of NaBloPoMo, I bring you the Friday Five, which is really just a fanct and alliterative way for me to say “here are five random things that I’m thinking about that I’m going to tell you about because I’m still too exhausted to write the posts I actually want to write.”

ONE DAY I WON’T BE TOO TIRED! It will happen.

1. One year when I was home for Thanksgiving, I met up at Waffle House with some old friends who were also in town for the holiday. We were busy talking and drinking coffee and people kept coming in and we could not figure out WHERE all the people were coming from and WHY they were streaming in at 2:30 in the morning. Then we realized they were Black Friday shoppers getting breakfast before starting their day. We stayed until the second (or third) wave of breakfast-seekers wandered in after having been shopping. Basically, I spent the night people-watching in a Waffle House. Part of me–just a tiny, slivery part–misses being able to do nonsense like that.

2. Christmas stuff is sort of magical. I’m 31 years old and I geek out if a house strings up one strand of lights with only half the bulbs working. It can be the most half-assed display of decorations and I’ll ooooh and aaaaaahhhh like it’s that crazy Mannheim Steamroller house on YouTube. One day I’ll decorate the outside of my own house. The only thing that stops me is knowing that I have to take it all down. Taking down the decorations always makes me sad. (And I will inevitably look up sometime in February to see that the Nutcracker is still on the shelf and then I’ll put him away while frowning.)

3. I was a latchkey kid in elementary school. One year I unwrapped one side of my Christmas presents to see what all of them were and then taped the packages shut again. Then I was sad because I had ruined my own surprises but since I had done it to myself I couldn’t be too sad. One of my gifts that year was a set of hot rollers. I hated them and still to this day use my mom’s Conair set from…1980? They’re older than I am, I’m sure. And they still work just as well as the day she bought them. (I also stole her iron when I went to college. I feel like there’s some sort of correlation between the things I borrowed from my mom with no intention of returning them.)

4. I can’t decide if my tongue is tingling right now because I’m allergic to shellfish or if I’m just imagining that it’s tingling because I read that a tingling tongue is a side-effect of a shellfish allergy. I’m half-convinced I might die (half die?) and also half convinced that I’m a hypochondriac who needs to stop diagnosing herself with the internet. (But seriously. If I die, the King crab was probably as good a last meal as any, you know?)

5. It’s probably time to potty train Emma. I’m scared.