Halfway Holiday

It's getting to be that time of year again....CHRISTMAS (in july). I effing love Christmas, partly because of the family time and lovey-lovey-ness of it all, but (and let's get real here), PRESENTS is the real reason why people love Christmas.

Now, Christmas in my household is always nuts and it starts right after Thanksgiving. Being as it takes my mother 40% longer than normal people to do just about anything, the tree goes up early because it's going to stay up for a while. I believe the record for my family is the year the Xmas tree was up at Easter. Classy people we are, for sure.

Putting the Xmas tree up can go either one of two ways: if we all help it'll get done in a single night. If only Kelly is doing it, it'll take several weeks, generally culminating in a final family effort late Xmas eve so that there aren't various ornaments lying around on Xmas day. My dad refuses to help decorate the tree. He helps in his own way by making sure all of the Xmas lights work properly. Without fail, it involves a lot of cursing, in addition to bitching about why this family has to have both white lights and multicolored lights in addition to the large multicolored lights and garland. This is coming from the man who likes his Xmas trees with tinsel, which is honestly the glitter/herpes of Xmas decorations because that shit sticks around FOREVER. Even worse, it's a cat magnet. We already have enough problems with our cats attacking the lower hanging tree ornaments without adding some wiggling-in-the-breeze shiny things to the mix.

Then there are the ornaments. All four+ tubs of them. We have so many ornaments that Grammy had to give us her 9ft tree, because our old 6ft tree kept leaning more precariously every year. There are ornaments that I made in preschool, ornaments from when my mom was a kid, sports ornaments, Disney World ornaments, matching ornaments, candy canes--you name it and there's probably an ornament of it on our tree. The worst part is we're still acquiring about five ornaments a year. Without fail my aunt (the one that I don't really like all that much) gives all of her nieces and nephews Xmas ornaments for Xmas (how original). It's always those lamely generic Xmas icon ones from the middle-of-the-mall kiosk that have our names emblazoned on them. She keeps telling us it's "for our own Christmas trees one day". Like that shit's happening. I'll be damned if my future Xmas tree is going to be covered in ugly ornaments that have "SAMANTHA" all over them. I definitely don't want visitors to think that my tree is some sort of shrine to myself. I'm awkward but I draw the line at appearing to have designated the Xmas tree as my personal place of self-worship. Maybe I wouldn't mind as much if she splurged on a badass Hallmark ornament ('cause face it, those things up the swagger of a Xmas tree something serious), but that's not the case so I'm bitching about it.

There's always Dad's work Xmas party to look forward to (NOT), where 'kids' 18 and under get a present from Santa. There's a photo of me at 17 standing next to Santa (some skinny employee with an elastic beard), who is sitting down. Since I was wearing heels (which make me a little taller than 6ft), Santa's face is about level with my stomach. Instead of making me crush him by plonking down on his knees with my flat ass, Santa asked me if I had been good this year (yes...duh), shook my hand, and handed me an envelope with a Best Buy giftcard in it. It was super awkward. Since the party is usually in the beginning of December, I've been spared the embarrassment of attending since I started college. I'm not sure which is worse, having nobody even near my age to talk to, or watching the one family with 10+ kids continue to reproduce (I swear they rival the 19 Kids and Counting family). Not to mention awkwardly meeting my Dad's coworkers who I only see at this party. It's just weird.

Somehow we eventually make it to Xmas eve, which we always spend with my Dad's family by going to Grandma's house. Everybody brings some noms and we eat and carry on and then open presents, going from youngest to oldest. For years and years Grandma got me (and the rest of the grandkids) underwear for Xmas. And it wasn't just normal underwear. No, when I was younger it was Barbie underwear (I loathed Barbies), and when I got older she gave me Granny Panties. I don't understand how she could so grossly overestimate my size. I mean, I know I'm a little chunkadunk, but come on! One year I got underwear that was so large I could literally wear them for a bra and underwear at the same time. The moment that it got to be too far was the year when I got stuck with gross granny panties (yet again), and my much skinnier cousins (who are aprx the same age as me) got thongs. Not that I wear thongs*, but I was indignant that Grandma would treat her grandkids unequally like that. And I was a little jealous too. OK, I was a lot jealous. When I look back I'm a little mad at myself that I was jealous over thongs, especially thongs that probably came from WalMart, but that's the angsty teenage years for you.

*A few years later I tried out thongs for real. I bought a thong because my friend convinced me that I couldn't say I didn't like it until I'd tried it. Well, I wore that hibiscus thong around the house for two hours before my ass had had enough. Panty lines are worth every second that I don't have to dig my underwear out of my asscrack.

After we open presents on Xmas Eve we go to Church. My family unit is not religious. Sometimes Kelly likes to entertain the idea of being Baptist (as if), but let me tell you that I could give a shit less, and so could Dad and Danny. Dad's family, on the other hand, regularly attends church and his brother's family are the type that are super involved in youth group and choir (aka my Bible thumping cousins). We are definitely the Black Sheep of the family, if you couldn't tell. But on Xmas Eve the whole family goes, so we go. For the first 10 years of my life or so, it was the only other time we ever went to church besides Easter. After that it was the only time I went to church (until Kelly went on a Jesus binge during my middle school years). I tolerate the Xmas sermon, mostly because the Christmas Story never ever changes (it's the same pastor every year), and because secretly, I'm a mother fucking pyro and I LOVE lighting the candles during Silent Night and then getting wax all over the place. I loved it when I was a kid and I still like that part now. Last year my Dad added a new twist into the mix when he got bored during the sermon and we had a trying-to-blow-the-other-person's-candle-out fight. Kelly glared daggers at us the whole time because we were "embarrassing her". It's possible, since my Dad and I couldn't stop giggling about it like a couple of 5-year-olds. I deemed it the best Christmas Eve sermon I have ever attended.

We get home, go to bed, and then the real magic starts.

Confession time here: I believed in Santa until I was 13. I was that kid, the one that insists that Santa is real even when her friends are telling stories of stumbling upon their parents putting out presents while on a midnight potty run. I don't feel so bad about it, mostly because my brother also believed in Santa until last year (he's 14). The main reason I held my conviction for so long stems from a Christmas Eve night when I was 5 or 6 years old. Now I realize that it was probably raining, but at the time my juvenile mind heard pitter-patter noises and immediately thought that there were reindeer on top of the roof. My conviction on Santa held until I became too hard to buy for and my parents started letting me pick out my own presents, which showed up under the tree as, "To: Samantha, From: Santa". After that I just felt super stupid because I'm sure my friends thought I was an idiot.

Even after I stopped believing in Santa I still had to play along for my brother. We still left cookies for Santa (as a mean joke I would put out the stalest and grossest cookies I could find in our pantry) and "Santa" still left us a letter on the paper plate that formerly held cookies. The letter always told my brother and I to behave ourselves, and there was always a a note in there for me to 'stop talking back to my parents'. Thanks, Santa. On occasion, if Danny gave me trouble while I was babysitting him, I would 'call' Santa on my cell and tell him about all the horrible stuff Danny had been up to. In reality, the phone wasn't even calling anybody, but Danny didn't know that.

The worst part of Xmas is undoubtably the photos. Until I was taller than Santa (ie 13), my Mom made me (and later Danny) sit on Santa's lap in the mall and pose for a picture. If there is anything wrong about a young girl being hesitant to sit on a sketchy old bearded man's lap, then sue me. I hated sitting on Santa's lap. So much in fact, that Kelly used to have to bribe me to do it. Usually it was with $20 or so, but there were no set terms on what my face had to look like in the photo. Generally I was scowling. Or giving a really fake smile. Because I am classy as hell.

Finally, we return to the best part of Xmas: the presents. I've gotten some awesome presents over the years, including: my 1st cell phone! (2005), a basketball hoop (1995), a bike (1998), Guitar Hero (2007), a new laptop (2009, to replace the one I had just broken) and more books than I can count (every year!). On the flip side, if I don't give my parents explicit instructions on what I want for Christmas, I get stuff like this: mechanical air pump (2010), 20 shirts--all of which were practically identical but in different colors/patterns (2001), a group of size 18 clothes (2000, I wear a size 14), ugly watches (07/08/09), and an assortment of other weird stuff that might eventually make its way back to the spare gift bag in Kelly's  closet.

My family doesn't have many traditions, but of the few we do have a bunch of them focus on Xmas. First off, we always film Xmas. We've done this every year that I can remember. Most years it's kind of dull. I can't imagine that in 20 years I'm going to want to watch myself open gifts at 12. But occasionally there's some weird thing that happens, like my brother calling someone a "fag" and subsequently the entire family yells, "DAN-NY!". It's on video.

On Christmas morning my Dad always makes breakfast. And not just normal breakfast. I'm talking a five-person operation of multiple burners, a griddle, the toaster, and the oven. Breakfast includes: scrambled eggs, fried potatoes, bacon, fried ham, sausage, biscuits, toast, cinnamon rolls, and orange juice. I have to say he's pretty good at cooking breakfast for a man who never eats breakfast.

Generally I spend the next 3 hours in a food coma. I love Christmas.

White Trash Points, as of some time in April

Me:
+50 for being Sam
+3 "can I put cans in the microwave?"
+10 "I love lunchables"
+3 sprinkles
+3 pizza with ketchup
+30 "pudgies tastes the same going down and coming back up"
-2 turning down nutella
-1/2 salad
+5 chinese battle men = samurais
+15 combining wine and sparkling cider
+5 rust is not an element
+10 poop
+1 collecting box tops
+5 flipflops & smartwool socks
+2 microwaving cookie dough
+10 sunday afternoon drinking time
+3 driving with no shoes on
-3 liking Boyf's tofu

Metalhead
+5 birkenstocks & socks
+10 sunday afternoon drinking time
+5 making google translate read porn
-5 decent Russian accent
+5 sweeping dirt under fridge

Chef
+5 eating in his room so he "can watch tv"
+3 being too lazy to give Sam points
+2 "I love Walmart"
+10 domestic abuse (he accidentally hit Metalhead in the nose with a hockey stick and caused her to have a bloody nose)
+2 stripping in the CouchBoat

Giraffes
+10 footie pajamas
+10 for not wearing underwear in them
+10 Sunday afternoon drinking time
+5 farting on command
+8 trying to light her farts on fire & almost lighting herself on fire
+15 trading sex for a burrito ("the burrito was better than the sex")

Pillow talk

I'm not sure if I have ever mentioned this before, but my Mom sleep-talks. Generally I like to think of sleeptalking as the compliment to snoring; unavoidable and irrelevant, so not worth talking about. But Kelly's sleeptalking is a little more....interesting.

To begin with, Kelly is a very heavy sleeper. She also frequently complains about how realistic her dreams are. She'll mention something in passing that she thinks I did, and then when I'm like, wtf Mom? she'll realize she dreamed about it and it didn't really happen. Because of these crazy dreams her sleep talking is often kind of funny.

Just last night, she woke my dad up at 2am, screaming, yelling at him to "get the spiders off me!". Kelly is absolutely terrified of spiders. When asked if he was worried when Mom woke him up with her screaming Dad responded, "Scared? Hell no, I was pissed off! She woke me up at two in the morning screaming about spiders! I told her, 'there are no damn spiders on you Kelly! Go back to sleep.' "

When I was a senior in high school I was being an insomniac one night when all of a sudden I heard Mom go (from the other end of the hallway), "Mike!.....MIKE!....GET THE WEEDWACKER!" ...and then silence. It was probably after 2am.

But the crowning moment of Mom's sleeptalking is the Bear Story. I had stayed up late working on a school project and everyone else was already in bed and asleep. My bathroom was being repainted at the time so I had been taking showers in my parent's bathroom. I had stepped out of the shower, put on a towel, and I had just flicked the lights off and was walking through my parents bedroom (to get to the hallway) when Mom suddenly goes, "OH SHIT!". Immediately I freeze. My first thought is that Mom saw a burglar or something. The next thought is along the lines of how I really don't want to be mugged while wearing nothing but a towel. Naked muggings are no bueno. I'm still frozen and listening when the next thing I hear is Kelly say, in a country drawl, is "I'llllll get dem bears!.........fuckin' grizzlies" and then I hear her roll over and start snoring. I think I just about died laughing.

The Chronicles of Steve II

So Steve, my Grandad, is at is again. This time he hurt himself working out in the yard by straining some oh his back muscles. He went inside to take some of Grammy's pain pills. He popped them in his mouth and grabbed a cup on the counter to wash them down with. He had already drank half the cup when he realized he was drinking dish soap. He later told me he thought he was dying.


My other Grandad, Charles, also had his moment in the WTFuckery column this month. Both Grandads are diabetic, but Charles does not and never has handled his diabetes very well. He wrecked my Grandmother's car (again) because he was having a low blood sugar. A state trooper stopped to make sure he was OK. Well, when his sugar gets low Charles becomes a nasty SOB and gets completely belligerent. Even worse, he refuses to wear a medical alert bracelet so that people will realize he's diabetic in case he needs help. So he ended up getting belligerent with the state trooper and actually kicked him the balls. My 70-something year old grandfather, who is only 5-7, kicked a state trooper in the balls. Then the state trooper wrestled him to the ground and handcuffed him, and then took him to the hospital.

And you people wonder where I get it from. I swear there's a WTF gene in my family.

Sanctuary: Week 1

This was my first week at my summer internship in a Wetlands Sanctuary near my house. It's the first time I've ever had a 8+ hour a day job and I have to say it's pretty tiring, but SO FUN.

Essentially my job for the summer is to help work on the Maryland Herp Atlas. The Herp Atlas is a survey that aims to measure what herps (snakes, turtles, lizards, frogs, & salamanders) exist in Maryland, and approximately where they exist. The last data that MD has on what herps are where is from 1975, which is to say, extremely outdated. In a nutshell I get to run around the woods looking for critters.

As it was, my first day I saw a Snapping Turtle as I was driving in to the Sanctuary. I was 15 minutes early, but ended up sitting there by myself for a good 30 minutes because my new boss, Chris, was a little late. I just made friends with Richard, the old maintenance man, who apparently knows my uncle. Weird.

Day 1 consisted of my intro the Sanctuary and a tour around some of the trails. I learned the difference between American and Fowler's toads, which is cool because I thought toads were only a single species.

Fowler's Toad, dorsal view

Fowler's Toad, ventral view

So the main differences are: 
1. Fowler's Toads have more than 3 warts in each black spot
2. The ridge right behind the eye of the frog (it's about 90 degrees) nearly touches the eye on Fowler's Toads. On American Toads there's a wider gap.
3. American Toads have a very spotted belly
4. American Toads have large warts on their tibia.

Eastern Fence Lizard

I saw a bunch of skinks and got acquainted with the 3 three-legged captive Box Turtles that Sanctuary keeps out back. There are bunch of skinks around and Eastern Fence Lizards. I got to help set up mist nets for bird banding. We also checked some of the cover boards out in the Meadow and saw a Black Rat Snake.

Snapping Turtles

Day 2: I got to go bird banding (and be there at 6:45am) with Chris and a bunch of volunteers. Sandy and Mike are the two guys in charge of the banding (for a project called MAPS); they are older gents and total BAMFs. The first thing I saw when I got to the Sanctuary were two Snapping Turtles digging nests/laying eggs. Then we set off. Seventeen mist nets, checking them once every 40 minutes or so. We checked them six times, walking seven miles in the process. We ended up catching:
a couple cardinals
Acadian Flycatcher
Red-eyed Vireo
Summer Tanager
Ovenbird
Swainsons Thrush
Veery
Common Yellowthroat
Wood Thrush
Downy Woodpecker.

Swainson's Thrush (see yellow eye ring?)

Eastern Wormsnake

We also heard a Prothonatary Warbler, saw a Bog Turtle, and caught a Wormsnake.

During our second round of checking nets, we realized that there was a fawn chillin' out right next to a tree we had been literally walking right next too. As soon as somebody said something, we scared her. She was so small that she wobbled about 20 feet away and nestled down in a downed branch.

Fawn (right in the center)

Red-bellied Turtle & Box Turtle

On our last check of the nets we came across a Box Turtle and a Red-bellied Turtle. What Chris (aka new boss) calls Red-bellied Turtles are actually better known as Red-bellied Cooters. He sort of admitted that he's uncomfortable with using the word 'Cooter', which I found somewhat amusing. Chris is the Director of the Sanctuary and he's a nice guy, but definitely has a bumbly air about him. 

Day 3: Saw a large Red-belly digging a nest as I walked into the office. We notched it's shell (turtles have ~24 scutes on their shell that the Sanctuary notches in a special code so that people can fill out reports when they see a specific turtle) and gave a quick demonstration to a 3rd grade school group that was visiting. While letting the Red-belly go I came across a Box Turtle in the Meadow. Chris is something of an expert on Box Turtles and most of the ones in the Sanctuary have notched shells. The cool thing about Box Turtles is that the color patterns on their plastrons (the bottom part of their shells) are unique to each turtle, like reptile zebras. 

Box Turtle from the Meadow

plastron of Box Turtle

 So I took a picture and looked up that specific turtle by it's shell code and the picture I took of its plastron. This was turtle #262 with code L3R3R10.

Later in the day Chris and I started talking about what I wanted to research this summer. Every intern has to do a research project and I'm thinking about doing mine either on skinks or toads. In order to do research on skinks, you have to be able to catch them. If you've ever seen a skink or attempted to catch one, you know it's like trying to catch rainbows. Skinks are super shy and very skittish animals. One way to catch lizards in general is with a noose. Chris made me one so that I could go practice my noosing skills.

My practice noose is made with dental floss and a broken wooden pole from something or other. Very classy, truly. I then spent about an hour and a half down by the water looking for skinks to try and capture with my makeshift noose.

You creep up slowly and then VERY slowly bring the noose closer and closer to the skink and once you get the noose around it's neck, you pull up and enclose their neck in the noose. It doesn't hurt the lizard (very much, I don't think), and it certainly doesn't kill them. It just immobilizes them long enough for you to get your hands on one.

Mud Turtle basking in the bog

5-lined Skink in forest (failed at catching this one)

I attempted to catch six skinks. I failed every single time. Noosing is a lot harder than I thought it would be. Apparently it takes a lot of practice. 

At one point, I almost caught a Northern Watersnake in my noose, but another snake swam by and spooked the first snake. And then I stepped in the wrong place and almost fell into the bog, which would have totally sucked. As it was I submerged one of my boots and had to change into the spare sandals I kept in my car. 

Spider from the sink

Day 4: Chris had a meeting in Annapolis, so I spent the morning renumbering the mist nets and getting lost because they're not in order and there's no map to go by. One of the first things I saw was this giant ass spider chillin' out in the bathroom sink. Nearly had a heart attack because I just wasn't expecting it. I saw a bright red bird with black wings which I later found out was a Scarlet Tanager. Pretty distinct, that's for sure. 

While I was renumbering a net particularly close to the water a Great Blue Heron flew right over my head while calling. Pretty cool stuff. I helped out on a nature walk with a school group (naming trees and stuff) and realized that it's kind of difficult to tell the difference between Maple and Sweet Gum leaves when I've never seen a sweet gum and they're both shaped like stars. Something to work on, I guess. One of the kids found a small Gartersnake in the roots of a tree, which was probably the coolest thing they'd ever seen. 

Green Frog

 Later we also came across a Bog Turtle poking its head out of the water and a Green Frog.

After lunch Chris and I drove to an old farm that the county had recently purchased to do some searching for the Atlas. It was a pretty untouched area with lots of life in it, but it was really hot (around 90 degrees) and most herps like it a bit cooler, so we didn't find much.

One awesome find was the Spotted Salamander we found hiding under a log. They're so chunky and cool lookin'.

Spotted Salamander (we put it on some moss for contrast)

Gartersnake near roots of tree

There hasn't been a Day 5 yet because Friday was a furlough day and tomorrow is Labor Day (Holla at my 4-day weekend!). I'm excited though, because the other two interns start on Tuesday. Weirdly enough they're BOTH named Holly. I hope they're cool. 

In other news, my mosquito bite count for 4 days: 73. Ticks: 2. Even though I absolutely hate it, I think insect repellant might have to be a must. 

Metalhead's 21st Birthday

I'm starting to write this at 1:53am on Saturday May 21st. Metalhead turned 21 tonight. And what a marvelous event it was. 

Upon arriving at Chappies (da bar) she was immediately served a whiskey sour, a shot of gin (she loves gin) and a Long Island Iced Tea. Fifteen minutes later those were gone and she had another host of drinks including a Melon Ball, an amaretto something or other, and 2 beers. At around 12:25 all the alcohol finally hit her and she just got drunker from then on. Soon after this, she literally let out a primal scream loud enough for the ENTIRE BAR to stare at her like some sort of demon, and then she licked my arm. 

In the course of an hour, Metalhead managed to lick, bite, grope, punch, and bitch slap me. She was super drunk (all is forgiven) but I will definitely have some hand prints in the morning. She also managed to stuff at least three handfulls of popcorn down the front of my shirt. Quite forcefully, I might add. 

As she got drunker, I (and the rest of our friends who were there) took advantage of her borderline OCD to rearrange her three drinks that looked to be in volume order. She flipped a shit when she discovered that they weren't as she left them and said "NNNOOOOOOOOO!!!!! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!??? THEY NEED TO BE IN FUCKING RAINBOW ORDER!" We must have altered the order of her drinks about three times and every time got the same reaction. Metalhead response to nearly everything was "I WILL SHIT ON YOU (or IN YOUR BED)."

Another quote "I DON'T HEAR ANY WORDS YOU GUYSSSSS" after we had all been talking to her. 

Even though she had to literally be coached through the last two drinks, I'm pretty impressed with the amount she was able to handle. No doubt, she was drunker than I've ever seen her and it was hilarious. ("You think I'm drunk as fuck? WAIT TILL I STAND UP!" - drunk Metalhead). The last drink definitely did her in though, as she ended up puking it up into about 5 beer glasses while still sitting at the table. She put all of these puke-infused glasses under the table. She giggled about leaving her puke under the table for at least 20 minutes, then spent the next 20 minutes super paranoid that Chappies will never let her come there again because she left puke under the table. Even though she did puke, I'm pretty damn impressed that she got the vast majority of it into those beer glasses. Better in there than on the floor. 

On the walk home, Metalhead

-ran into a fire hydrant

-decided to start sprinting up the sidewalk, and I had to run after her to make sure she didn't die

-stopped to wait for everyone to catch up with us, and decided that it was "Sleep Time" and just lay down on the sidewalk. 

-saw a firework somebody let off, stared up at it and said, "LIKE A BAWWWSS!"

-attempted to break down our front door and nearly fell on her face when she discovered it was actually unlocked

-ran upstairs and locked herself in her room, then unlocked it because our friend Jeff had to pee off her front porch

-tried to ride down the banister

-right after she said she was going to bed (I had just gone up to my room), I heard some doors slam and then I heard her scream "YEEAAAHHHH MANNNNN!!!!!!" off her front porch. 

Sadly, although she was pretty damn drunk she avoided all of my attempts to get her to be drunkenly social. At one point she wanted to text her sister but couldn't find her phone. Boyf had already told her he was turning his phone off. What a shame. 

Although she sobered up a bit once we got home, she was still slurring her words and couldn't speak English half the time. No capitaleest peeg dawgs for her. 

I'm sure I'll remember more stories as the day goes on. 

Hoarding

Metalhead has insinuated that I am a hoarder. This is totally false. Hoarding is characterized by not being able to get rid of anything. I totally get rid of stuff. I just haven't cleaned out my stuff lately, thanks. :P

I know that I keep stuff that I really shouldn't, but mostly this stems from my environmental compulsion to never throw anything useful away. Mostly it's just me not wanting perfectly fine stuff to go sit in a landfill. I feel guilty when useful things sit in landfills.

Kelly is not so fortunate. My madre has what her counselor calls "an emotional attachment to stuff". She's pretty bad about keeping anything and everything that ever meant anything to her at all. I'm talking bikinis from high school, old Home & Garden magazines, and other various shit. Now, I keep a lot of stuff, but it's stuff that I intend to do something with or stuff that I actually use AND it's mostly contained in my room. Kelly just keeps stuff because she can't stand giving it up and not being able to control what happens after it leaves her possession. Plus her stuff is essentially the entire house.

Take, for example, when I decided to clean out our basement two years ago. We have lived in our house since 1998 and we now have more shit than we know what to do with, so it was about time that somebody tackled that hoarding den that is the lower floor. I came across a box full of Kelly's notebooks from middle, high school and community college. When I took them upstairs to throw them in the recycle bin she had an absolute fit and refused to let me do away with the damn things. I mean, these are notebooks full of writings my mom will never, ever use again. Do you think she knows anything about chemistry or the Latin class she took her freshman year of high school (and failed)? Hell no. Has she touched that box of notebooks in the last 10 years? Yeah right. That, ladies and gents, is a hoarder. Her reason for keeping them stemmed from the "poetry and journals" she wrote in them. Jesus mother, tearing out a couple of pages with your angsty teen diary entries is not that goddamn hard. There is no need to keep an entire notebook that is sucking up space in our already cramped basement so that you can save your stupid doodles. We ended up getting into an argument that-- I kid you not -- consisted of us performing tug of war  with a notebook. My father was just sitting in the LayZBoy looking at us like we're nuts. This ended with the recycling of about half the notebooks, and keeping the rest.

Mike the bystander is not so innocent either, he of the can't-find-it-let's-go-buy-a-new-one mentality is another contributor to the household junk pile. There's a giant metal desk that has been sitting in our basement since at least 1999 that he brought home from work. It's still got the plastic on it and everything, but nobody has ever used it. Right now it's just a platform to put more stuff on. He also has this mental disease where he can't resist free stuff. WHY do we need four stress balls shaped like grapes? What about the three kinds of omelette makers? Or the rotisserie chicken cooker that we used once? He brings home so much crap that we don't need and will never use that it's not even funny. It's just a pain in my ass.

The most recent manifestation of this was when I cleaned out our cupboard. Since we moved into our house we've had a coffee maker in the corner of the kitchen. Mike is the only person who actually drinks coffee in the house and he never uses it. Why? Because he loves 7-Eleven coffee and is on a first-name basis with the people who work there. I've never seen him use this coffee maker. The only time it does see use is when we have guests over who want coffee, and even then only occasionally. Usually dad will just go out and get a large thing of coffee from Dunkin Donuts or something. So anyway, I took the coffee maker to the basement because nobody ever uses it and we need the counter space. I also sorted through all the mugs we had because nobody ever uses mugs either (except for hot chocolate) and we had about 50 for four people. I mean, you can only use one flipping mug at a time (and even still, double fisting hot chocolate will bring you to eight) and even with a bunch of guests that number is definitely excessive. So I took about 15 mugs to Goodwill. It took Kelly about three days to figure out something was a little off about the dishes cabinet, and then she didn't speak to me for three days she was so mad. This is the kind of shit I deal with.

Since I've been in college, I've actually gotten much much better about not keeping useless things. I would say about 60% of my stuff is books or clothes, and since my friend Tiedye is about the same size as me (just shorter, with bigger gazongas) I give her all of my clothes that I don't wear anymore, and take anything she doesn't want to goodwill. I would probably also attribute it to reading No Impact Man, which is a book that was made into a documentary. It's about a guy who lives in NYC who tries to live a no impact life with his wife and daughter for a year. It's super funny, and it made me realize that my house had all this stuff sitting around that no one was using. My general rule is that if it's been sitting around for a year and no one has used it, get it the hell outta here. Except then it sets off WWIII with Kelly. Whatever. I'll probably be moving out in a few years anyway.