New Year, New Christmas

I've been busy happily enjoying my holidays with my family, and it's a well known fact that one does not take time out of happiness to chronicle it because it's too much fun to be happy. and so i sit now to write out of the depths of despair and chaos... okay, i'm just kidding. we are going through a little calm before the storm at work.

the summary on my holidays: fabulous. loved the food, loved the fam, loved seeing long lost friends from the city of angels.

someone has secretly and adorably ordered me a subscription to Vanity Fair, definitely one of my favorite guilty pleasures. i'm such a sucker for annie liebowitz photos and glamour and high society gossip. and, b/c i am now a VF subscriber, i have just gotten an offer to get the new yorker for 25$ a year. by grabthar's hammer, what a savings! i'm sorely tempted. the question is: am i, and do i want to be, the kind of person who *subscribes* to the New Yorker? hmm. it would be very wellesley of me. i don't know--can i be that brand of snotty intellectual? i do like some of their articles--though some of it is just trashy gossip disguised as serious journalism. this is what political science has done to me. i want proof! i want standards!

some good advice i have received lately:

1. practice now being the kind of person you want to be when you are old--this came from my mom who heard it from one of her good friends who works in a hospice center. she says we always think we will become more secure and wise when we get older, but actually it doesnt happen that often. in fact your crankaliciousness and faults often become more vivid.

2. think hard about the person you want to marry, because the little things that bug you about your boyfriend/girlfriend now will become the things that drive you insane when you get married.--i'll leave this anonymous. but since i know so many people getting married or in relationships on the way to the altar, i figured you should hear this. you're like, "oh, it'll get better in time, i'll deal with it." yes you will, and it may be the end of you. joy division said it well: loooove. looooove will tear us apaaaaart again.

speaking of marriage. i am to be a bridesmaid this year. possibly multiple times. campbell and linda are forcing me back to taiwan far sooner than planned (i.e. never). but linda has good taste in dresses, so at least we have that going for us.

i'm a bit of a puddleglum today. one reason might be the fact that i am editing a lesson in which our instructional designers appear to have turned illiterate. i used one of my favorite clint eastwood cuss words to describe it and my coworker anny thought it was the best thing she'd ever heard. email me if you want to know the word, just in case this blog gets read aloud to the kiddies before bedtime...heh heh.

have been trying to cram in as many movies as possible before school starts back up. saw The Queen and it was really good! i was surprised, being as i am not actually very interested in the subject matter. the Fountain--not so good. sort of pretty visuals...it's one of those movies that people who have never thought deeply about death would find deep and possibly revelatory. anyone who has pondered or dealt with death will find it superficial and cheesy. also, i am annoyed that i am supposed to infer from one 2 second clip of rachel weiss running around vibrantly in a red dress that she and hugh jackman used to have a relationship so wonderful and full of love that he is now willing to work crazily day and night and neglect her to save her from death. that is what we call a lack of character development, my friends. also--during weird shebulba scenes (anyone who saw the movie is chuckling--charity, i'm talking to you) hugh jackman looks like howie mandel. this is unacceptable.

i hope to write soon, but will be in england for 9 days from 15-23, so who knows.
i was sending out blessings to everyone i love as i was being happy this holiday season. good luck in this new year.