You’ll have lots of opportunities to talk about what you’re thankful for tomorrow, and we’ll have a nice open thread for you then (and the newest DAD MAGAZINE.)
But it’s nice to have a place to have a good, solid, whinefest about your stupid cousin and the fridge door you had to duct-tape closed because we now breed turkeys the size of emus. Your orthotics cost how much? Your sister borrowed your copy of Middlemarch and you’re worried Dorothea is going to marry Casaubon and you won’t be able to talk her down? Go on.
Now, eat all the food you can, and tell us of your reasonable and unreasonable grievances. We’re all friends here.
Feel free to return through the week and into the weekend, we’re sure you’ll have some new complaints by Friday.
Tags: complaints, microaggressions, open thread, thanksgiving
Complaint the First : My boyfriend is spending Thanksgiving with his dad, where they are going to sit and be generally unhappy and miserable together and eat Chinese, and when my boyfriend got a free turkey (from the job that just laid him off, he does have cause to be bitchy) and I offered to cook it for him and do a mini-Thanksgiving he was all, “Ehh.” about it.
Complaint the Second: I have to spend Thanksgiving with my aunt’s hideous boyfriend, who asked if I was knocked up when I got engaged to my ex-husband; who defrauds the government by being on full disability while learning how to parachute out of planes; who called the President the N-word at my grandmother’s birthday party. The guy who my aunt has made clear we must at least fake accepting him or she’ll disown us all, and my poor grandmother can’t bear the thought of that, even after he told her she was basically to blame for my grandfather’s failing health.
you should set that horrible man on fire
fire solves all problems, except problems caused by setting people on fire.
In all seriousness, that sounds awful.
Honestly, what I WANT to do is turn him in to the state for defrauding it. He has a son (a nervous, twitchy kid who I’m not certain won’t be a serial killer) that I know he barely pays for because – ahem, disabled. If it wouldn’t ultimately impact my aunt’s home, I really think I’d do it.
When family members and people you care for inexplicably attach to awful human beings and can’t allow their other family members to make boundaries…
I’ve never got it,
If all my family hated my partner so much that I had to bully them into having him round, and it wasn’t for bullshit reasons like racism or homophobia, I think I’d spend a good long time looking at my partner.
I know very well that half my family (the side that endures the hideous boyfriend, in fact) will have lots of issues with my boyfriend, but that’s because they’re all WASPs and he’s very blue-collar and swears a lot. The other half is growing to like him, so I’m appeased.
I think if they both hated him, I’d have to stare at him for a long time as well. My tastes need not equal their tastes, and in many areas we are divergent, but there’s always some truth to be found in sheer numbers.
I HAVE SOME COMPLAINTS TO MAKE
AND I WANT TO READ THEM AND MAKE SUPPORTING NOISES AND HAND YOU A GLASS OF WINE WHILE SAYING, “YOU’RE RIGHT, THAT IS JUST RIDICUFUCKINGLOUS.”
I SPENT THE LAST FIVE DAYS IN A CAR AND I WAS IN A DITCH I WAS IN A DIIIITCH
I was going to say, “is your complaint that you didn’t put snow tires on your rental.”
INTENSEDEBATE, REMEMBER MY ACTUAL NAME RIGHT NOW.
It was not a rental car! It was my actual car that I drove to Texas!
…what are snow tires? I have heard of snow chains, but what are snow tires?
!! Snow Tires are a special kind of tire we wear in Canada between November and May. They’re made of different rubber, so they are no good in summer, but they stop something like a 1/4mile faster on snow and ice. The other kinds of tires are called “Three-Season Tires.” Those being the seasons where snow is considered a bonus as versus an expectation.
They are studded tires for winter driving. If you do not put them on cars in Canada, where I live, you will regret it (I have regretted it!)
YOU DROVE THROUGH THAT WITHOUT SNOW TIRES???
I DIDN’T KNOW WHAT SNOW TIRES WERE AND I DIDN’T THINK THAT THERE WOULD BE SNOW
Yes BUT you got to meet Brenda.
DOROTHEA IS SUCH A NINNY. I mean, I think I like her but Jesus God does she need a get-a-grip friend.
In actual complaint news: I don’t want to be at work today. My family is being really cryptic and uninterested in coordinating Skype time, even though THEY all get to be together and I am all alone on the opposite side of the country, and I am turning into a very pouty 5-year-old about the whole thing.
How far along are you? IIRC, she gets it together over the course of the book.
Oh, I’m pretty early on (she just got married). I’m sure she’ll get it together. She almost has to – she is an infant.
That’s why her sister calls her “Dodo.”
oh, thank god. I had to teach that book earlier in the semester and a frightening number of students fell passionately in love with dorothea from the start (so PURE!) and it freaked me out a little.
My dad is bringing a growler of my favorite seasonal beer to Thanksgiving tomorrow and I’m pregnant.
Thanksgiving is being hosted by my little brother and his girlfriend, who is/was also my best friend. It’s still weird and it’s been three years. She’s invited her whole family including her sister-in-law who once almost threw punches when I said I thought Twilight wasn’t that great, and who got REAL racist during her first pregnancy. BFF and brother also have a gluten-free kitchen, (she thinks she’s intolerant but won’t get tested) and are hardcore paleo, so all starches are being cooked elsewhere and brought there. Last year she tried to make a paleo vegan gravy that was thickened with almond flour and I almost cried.
Upside: my parents are taking the toddler for the weekend so if we don’t get any leftovers, I’m making my own spread my own way on Friday while watching Scandal in the kitchen.
Did she become racist because of the pregnancy, or did the pregnancy just give her the pass to say the racist things that were already there?
Also, hi from Tumblr!
I think the boost in hormones just gave her the opening to say racist stuff.
seriously! I LOL’d at the idea of becoming racist while pregnant, like it was some weird side effect along with morning sickness.
I’m hardcore paleo (and celiac) but when I have people over for meals (any meal, not just holiday meals) I let them bring a dish of their liking, even if I can’t eat it myself. WTF, BFF?
I am both of those things, and this year I am a lucky orphan going to an extremely casual younger-person’s potluck, and… I wish I could bring you, I guess.
Courage! And yummy roasted butternut squash with cranberries, and darkest chocolate truffles made with coconut oil.
i am SO UPSET at the idea of a paleo / gluten free Thanksgiving WHAT IS EVEN THE POINT??? Brussel sprouts? Maybe roasted brussel sprouts.
The racist sister in law is pregnant with #3 and didn’t say any racist things! However, BFF’s dad told me that Trayvon Martin was carrying *WATERMELON* Arizona iced tea and skittles because that’s how you make lean.
There was no stuffing, and the only sweet potatoes were in soup form. There were mashed potatoes, but the snacks pre-meal were KALE CHIPS and unsalted nuts. I brought three jars of pickled things to make up for it and two dozen deviled eggs.
I always feel deprived around Thanksgiving because my husband is vegetarian, so we don’t eat turkey & ham, and I don’t live near any of my family any more so don’t get to go to someone else’s house for it, and because we’re poor and busy &c &c we never really make a thing out of the day.
On the other hand I don’t have to cook a giant stressful dinner for the entire family, ever, so I guess I can give thanks for that.
Aw! You and should get together after Thanksgiving and roast all the birds and eat all the flesh foods and drink gravy right from the pan.
Update, I have to work today, but my boss brought me a well-laden pity-plate of leftovers with all the ham and turkey. I feel so blessed!
My husband is a vegetarian too, and we’re having fried fish for Thanksgiving.
Fried. Fish.
It won’t be bad (it’s fish he caught in a lake in Minnesota, and he fries it deliciously, and I get to make All The Thanksgiving Sides), but COME ON.
My unofficial Thanksgiving motto: GRAVY OR GTFO. I mean, we’re having mushroom gravy, so it’s not like I’m terribly strict, but fried fish, as delicious as it is, does not usually lead to gravy.
I love that! There will definitely be no gravy, unless you count the spiced bourbon apple filling from the amazing pie I plan on making…mmmm bourbon gravy…
Mushroom gravy question: I have some wild mushrooms in the freezer thanks to my mom’s cabin-dwelling bff. I plan to make them into mushroom gravy but I can’t decide what is the best possible meal that could be slathered with mushroom gravy. Thoughts?
Wild mushroom gravy sounds even better! I just use grocery store mushrooms oomphed up with mushroom powder, and it’s great, so I can’t imagine how good yours will be.
We’re having our gravy in a mushroom & winter vegetable cobbler: mushroom, turnip, carrot, and peas cooked in sherry and/or brandy and sage, then mixed with mushroom gravy and topped with scallion biscuits and baked. I made extra gravy to pour over the mashed potatoes, too.
This was a better response than I could have hoped for!
I just had to come back here and tell you that, after reading your post aloud to my partner, he immediately went to the store ON THANSKGIVING to get the ingredients. And then I made this (or something like it, as I didn’t have a recipe), and it was so. good. So, thank you!!
I’ve got a wisdom tooth coming throuhg and I am coming down with a cold or something similar. I can feel it, lurking on the edges of my body and I started sneezing an hour ago.
So I’m in a sulk.
My complaint is aimed mostly at me, since it’s nobody’s fault but my own: my (vegetarian) husband and I are having an at-home Thanksgiving in pajamas, which is AWESOME, and I decided against roasting a chicken because we’ll have so much wonderful vegetarian food.
But now I’m a little cranky that I’m not going to have my traditional leftovers sandwich Thanksgiving night, because that’s my favorite meal of the holiday and the one I remember best from childhood: after dark, all snuggly in my pjs, I’d have turkey-and-stuffing-and-gravy on buttered white bread with potato chips and a big glass of milk.
But I keep telling myself that’s okay, that it’s just an excuse to roast myself a stuffed chicken some night when The Fella’s working through dinner, which means I get to have a second Thanksgiving in pajamas sometime next week. Right? RIGHT?
Yes, totally roast a chicken just for yourself. You’re a grown up! You can do what you want!
Oh, It. Is. Happening. It’s just a question of when: do I put on boots right now, run through the pouring rain to the butcher’s, wait in the no-doubt appalling line of people picking up turkeys, and grab a chicken so I can roast it tomorrow, even though we have a foolishly huge amount of delicious vegetarian Thanksgiving food already? Or will I be happy enough foregoing my traditional sandwich if I know I’m having a Thanksgiving redux next week on my own?
Next week it is. I HAVE SPOKEN.
I love roast chicken by myself-I get all the crunchy skin! Do it-it will make you happy
stupid vegetarians.
I can’t put this on my (stupid vegetarian) husband; this was all me. At the grocery store this week, he looked confusedly at the cart and said “Where’s your chicken? Weren’t you all excited about your chicken?” and I explained, just as if I were a grown-up with some sense of rational restraint, that I decided against it because why make four times as much food as we could eat? STUPID GROWN-UP WITH RESTRAINT.
I had a whole long thing typed out then I remembered that I post under my real name. So let’s just say that the annual Festival of Passive-Aggression has already started and I would like all the wine now, please.
I for one want you to create an alternate posting name so you can post this, because I have a rough idea of what your complaint is and I’m always interested in shenanigans about That Crap.
I also have some off-the-record complaints that are not getting unloaded here, and I feel it is appropriately passive-aggressive of me to specify that, yes, some of them are grounded in passive-aggressive holiday-season nonsense. HAPPY HOLIDAY.
Festival of Passive-Aggression! FESTIVAL OF PASSIVE – AGGRESSION!
so many likes.
As a Canadian, I am jealous that y’all get to take some time to eat bacon-y brussels sprouts and stuffing. I know we got our own but it was like seven weeks ago! That’s a lifetime.
ALSO can any other Canadians confirm that green bean casserole is not a thing? I don’t think I’ve ever seen one and I don’t really understand it. Are there onions on top? Canned onions? WHAT IS THIS
Green beans cooked in canned cream of mushroom soup with a topping of canned french-fried onions. The only reason it exists is because people need some kind of excuse to eat canned french-fried onions.
No, no, the reason it exists is because it is DELICIOUS. But only if you get all fancyshmancy and make your own “cream of ________” sauce from scratch. No cans (except for the can of French’s fried onions).
I just had to google french fried onions. They look kind of scary. You may keep them.
I am trying the smitten kitchen recipe where you make the whole thing from scratch this year and the onions are the part I am most looking forward to because I think they are the same as the ones in the lentil recipe from the Jerusalem cookbook which are amazing. This is the first year I’ve actually planned a green vegetable for thanksgiving, though- usually I just pretend potatoes+ sweet potatoes counts.
As a Canadian, I have never seen green bean casserole except on TV.
Also, my token American friend moved to Alberta, so I no longer get to celebrate Yanksgiving 🙁
I’ve lived in Texas, New England, and Chicago, and I’ve only once seen a green bean casserole in person: when my brother’s first wife brought it to Thanksgiving (and told her long, funny, anxiety-ridden tale of searching for the last can of cream-of-mushroom soup in the whole store). It was pretty darned tasty, in a 1950s-casserole kinda way.
I don’t think I’ve ever even seen a green bean casserole. But then again, my family is Italian, so I’ve also never eaten stuffing or cranberry sauce at a family Thanksgiving dinner either. I don’t think most people do spaghetti vongole.
I want to come to your house next year….
I am mystified by green bean casserole. It is not a thing in this country.
Not north of the border, that’s for damn sure.
Green bean casserole is an abomination unto the Lord and should be thrown in that volcano mountain from Lord of the Rings
Wait, what?!! *record scratch* Canadians don’t eat green bean casserole on Canadian Thanksgiving? But that’s like… our token non-starch vegetable at my house. Feeling full from all those potatoes? Want something light? Here, have some green beans.
Never mind they are drowning in cream of mushroom soup, milk and fried onions. They are obviously a refugee from the cooking nightmares of the 1950’s. The only one worth saving.
I consented, possibly while intoxicated, to doing a 5K with my ENTIRE family at 8 am Thanksgiving morning. I was not reminded of this until Monday night, when the fees had been paid, the ceremonial T-shirt bestowed, and it was too late to back out. Why. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. It’s cold out, ffs!
I too have a problem with agreeing to wildly optimistic exercise plans when drunk so I am here for you.
You have my deepest sympathies, omg
Thank you. I am so not looking forward to my 6 am wakeup time on my damn day off, and outdoor temperature in the teens.
/cries
That’s just awful on so many levels.
When faced with the prospect of 5 cold Ks at an impossibly early hour of the morning, I keep my focus on my after exercise ritual. That ritual involves laying in bed with beer and, occasionally, chili depending on the temperature and the availability of chili. The beer, however, is an absolute necessity. It is entirely on the basis of bed and beer that I have been talked – and by talked, I mean coerced – into training for a half marathon.
Focus on the beer. Let “Anything for beer” be your mantra.
my husband may or may not have an evolving alcohol problem (he does but he doesn’t really admit to it, just calls himself a “weekend warrior”) and I’m getting to the point where I’m really just shutting down in lieu of watching him binge drink into oblivion. He’s not really an angry drunk, usually. Worst case scenario is that he gets frustrated with me or I get mad at him and then he loses his shit verbally.
He’s recently talked about “cutting back” because he asked some friends if they thought he had a drinking problem, and they said “yes” (thank you, friends). But he’s already gone out for a couple drinks, and is waiting for me to get home where he’ll badger me to have a “pregame session” at our house before going to the bar around 8 with some friends. I’ve said I don’t want to do that, and he already laid into me, telling me he doesn’t want me coming along tonight with my rotten attitude.
I’m completely. Dreading. This holiday.
Ohhhhh man. So sorry to hear that. That sounds horrible and stressful and I have no advice to give, but hugs to you.
I’m sorry, that sounds so rough. Is there any chance that this is just the bumpy road to him accepting that his drinking is a problem? I’m sending good thoughts your way; holidays can be such emotional minefields.
I think it absolutely is. It’s been a very stressful year, with me working full time and schooling almost full time, and he’s developed this habit since then. He’s got ADHD, and I think he feels really lonely with me being out of the house. We’ve talked about it, and he’s usually self aware. But I’ve realized I’ve got to draw firmer boundaries around how he talks to me. And I feel good about it but it makes me sad and nervous and I’m sweating and shaking right now because of him going off on me because I told him I didn’t want people coming to our house.
Darlin I’m sorry, that sounds rotten and rough. Best of luck to you and I hope he gets a wake-up call.
You sound like you’re handling a really unpleasant and difficult situation with grace and respect, both for yourself and him. You’re amazing.
thank you, I’m actually choking up a bit here. I’m learning how to balance loving him and keeping my sanity, and it’s tough but it’s worth it. Hopefully we emerge from this holiday more unscathed than not.
I dated an alcoholic for six years. He’s ended up in the hospital twice, driven drunk god knows how many times, and blacked out even more. He’s doing really well and in recovery now, and we are still the best of friends, but it was/is a long, hard road.
It sounds like your husband has some similarities (ADD, loneliness) but also some advantages (friends who are willing to tell it like it is, a wife who realizes early on that boundaries are CRUCIAL). If you ever want to talk, please email me at [email protected] or find me on Tumblr!
Best wishes to you and yours this Thanksgiving. You’re doing the right thing and he is so lucky to have you.
Yep, no sage wisdom just sympathy, pal. This is a rough time of year for something so complex and socially motivated and eurrrgh. Hope you find a way through it!
Oh, God. I’m so sorry.
My husband also has a sort-of drinking problem (unhealthy relationship with alcohol, mostly on top of it except when he isn’t) and it is so hard and frustrating. An important thing to remember for your own sanity is that it has nothing to do with you whether he drinks or doesn’t, and that he’s the only person with the power to stop it.
Hopefully this is, as has been said, this is his first wobblys teps on the path to getting his shit sorted out. It’s a frustrating and often angering path for sure.
Resenting Thanksgiving this year because it falls right before finals. Like, literally, the last week of my semester is next week, and I’m scrambling to get things done before my family comes into town and I have to spend several days socializing instead of working on my final assignments. I love my family, but I just want to be left alone and push through so I can BE DONE WITH THE SEMESTER fuck grad school burn everythiiiiiing
Toasties, I think I’m allergic to wine 🙁
D: x 1000
What happens when you drink it? Is it all kinds, or just red or just white?
It’s all wine, I think. I can drink even a little bit, and I am almost immediately barfy. Last time I had half a glass of white wine, and the inside of my mouth got a bit swollen. So I’m laying off the wine until I can find out for sure. SIGH.
is it the nitrates?? is there any other liquor you adore you can console yourself with?? i’m quite sorry for this.
Oh noooo!
Oh no!
Time to become familiar with fruit wine?
Oh girl, I am so sorry.
It could be sulphites. If so, organic wine is your friend.
This happened to me! I used to drink All The Wine, and then all of a sudden one day I couldn’t have even a sip without immediate vomiting. Searched webmd (which probably suggested I had cancer) and the rest of the internet in desperation; blamed allergies, nitrates, sulphites, &c; sulked a lot; managed gin & grapefruit juice on occasion.
This is an entirely unhelpful comment, I know, sorry. But, as a glimmer of hope: after a miserable sulky month or so, it just went away! And now I can (and do) drink All The Wine again! So here’s hoping your mysterious affliction follows an equally mysterious trajectory!
Not sure this is a valid complaint, but: I just made a bunch of food for tomorrow, and it smells amazing, but I can’t eat it yet because it’s for Thanksgiving dinner. And we don’t really have any other food in the house besides what we’re supposed to bring tomorrow, so I’ve started eying my dog’s egg and cheese flavored biscuits, because even those sound kind of delicious. WHAT SHE DOESN’T KNOW ETC.
TOTALLY VALID. After cooking all day, I woke up in the wee hours last night and discovered that the house smells amazing, all sage and onions and spices, and wanted to get up and start eating mushroom cobbler and pie and stuffing RIGHT THEN.
Mushroom cobbler? For real and true? I’ve only ever heard of fruit cobbler before. Tell me more, I am sooooo listening!
Well, the first time I made it, it was “vegetarian shepherd’s pie,” which I threw together to empty out a friend’s CSA box: LOTS of mushrooms, caramelized onions, a parsnip, small turnips, and a carrot, all diced and sautéed in batches on the stovetop with sage and rosemary, the pan deglazed with sherry, then everything tossed in mushroom gravy (roux blended with sherry and vegetable broth, seasoned with sage and rosemary and a bit of garlic).
I put the mushroom mixture in a casserole, then top it with scallion-cheddar smashed potatoes with an egg beaten in, and bake it until the potatoes get crispy-crusty and golden brown on top. Let it sit five minutes, then serve with something green. Brussels sprouts are great with this!
Last Christmas at my sister’s, I knew she’d have plenty of delicious mashed potatoes, so instead I made the same mixture, this time with a potato or two added, in a shallow ceramic casserole (a lasagne pan is perfect) and topped it with plain pastry for a main dish that all the vegetarians could enjoy. Mushroom pot pie: SO GOOD.
This year, both mashed potatoes and pastry felt redundant, but my husband specially requested the mushroom dish, so I’m topping the filling with scallion biscuits and baking it. Mushroom cobbler!
I am totally doing this, possibly all three, for Christmas. Thank you!
I had the same problem last night. I got home lateish and was hungry but the only easily-eaten food in the house is for tomorrow so I just ate some peanut butter directly from the jar, drank a little bourbon and then went to bed.
a little peanut butter straight from the jar and some bourbon is my response to most problems.
I don’t know why your screen name says novice when you’ve clearly already attained enlightenment.
That is EXACTLY what I had last night.
Stay away from the dog’s biscuits because they taste like sawdust. Besides which, dogs always know!
I don’t have much to complain about yet this Thanksgiving, except the fact that there are SO MANY attractive people on the train back to my parents’ house, but none of them ever sit next to me.
You could sit next to one of them on purpose?
You could sit on one of them on purpose*.
*Do not sit on one of them. I do not actual advocate this. But you can think about it and smile a secret smile.
Well, I would always rather sit by myself than next to an attractive stranger, so I usually rush onto the train to get a window seat.
My complain is with Ma Nature, who seems to know when I plan on traveling and brings her A Game in snow, cold and sassy, sassy roads. Work with me, Ma.
I got nothing bad. I’m making a pot roast with the husband and chilling out with the Macy’s Parade. Also, just generally eating and drinking and reading.
Reasonable complaint: There’s no Thanksgiving here, so I have to work as usual but there will be far less internet to distract me in the evenings, which is more necessary now than usual as I am languishing in break-up hell.
I’m thankful for my therapist.
The person who sits next to me at work is a gum-snapper. It sounds like she is making popcorn in her mouth. She also sings, audibly, to herself, somehow at the same time as the gum snapping. She makes phone calls on her speaker phone and has now added a horrible wet cough (which I know isn’t her fault) to her lineup. She has appointed herself the queen of everyone else’s business. She makes me crazy.
If you snap and murder her we’ll all back you up
What, did she read a list of “Most Annoying Office Habits” and decide to just hit every one of them? Is your desk littered with broken pencils and tiny ripped up pieces of paper because if you don’t destroy something harmless you’d destroy her? I’m enraged on your behalf.
You have my sympathy.
Sincerely,
A person that sits between an person who mumbles to herself all day and a person who everyday between the hours of noon and 4PM eats yogurt, carrots, nuts and then popcorn in that order.
So, this is going to be the first major holiday in all of my 28 years that I haven’t spent with my family. Not because I’m too far away, or weather, or whatever, but because I am actively choosing not to go home. The last time I was home a few weeks ago my mom spent the entire time berating me and tearing down all of my life choices and it was one of the worst weekends of my life. She’s under a lot of stress right now because she’s caring for a sick relative, but when I failed to read her mind as to what she needed help with she took all of it out on me and it was seriously NOT OK. She also refuses to apologize and keeps acting like she didn’t do anything wrong. So I decided not to go home.
Now my sister is texting me a bunch of sad faces and telling me she’ll be so lonely without me, and I know my mom is going to use this as another reason why I am The Worst Sister and The Worst Daughter. I have a sneaking suspicion that the reason I am seen as The Worst Everything is that I got out of our toxic suffocating clingy needy control freaky family environment, and they can’t handle that I’m doing my own thing and not miserable? I just need reassurance that I made the right choice, I guess. I feel like I’m BETRAYING THE FAMILY, and I know they’re going to bring this up for all time as the reason I BETRAYED THE FAMILY, but I just couldn’t do it this time.
Thanks bunches for this thread, Nicole, I reallyreally needed it today. Also the Jane Austen posts helped a ton too. Love you, Toast!
You made the right choice!! My family is emotionally… well, not quite abusive, but they really know how to press your buttons and say the things that they know will hurt you to your core. I guess maybe that is abusive, but whatever. BUT, I totally think you have done the right thing by not putting yourself in that situation. Stick ti your guns and don’t let your mom/whoever make you feel bad about not coming home.
To echo @CatFoodParty, you made the right choice! That doesn’t sound like fun, and it is NOT ok. How is your relationship with your sis? Can you tell her to lay off the guilt trip?
It sounds to me like you did the right thing. You’ve got to take care of yourself. Maybe try to spend extra time with friends, or doing something fun for yourself during the holidays so you don’t have as much time to dwell or second guess yourself? Family is hard.
Thanks, you guys! I really appreciate the kind words.
@toast_and_jam, my sis and I aren’t close and never have been, hence the Worst Sister Ever title. But we’ve gotten closer over the years and I did offer to come visit her in her city soon to make up for this, so I hope she takes me up on it. I don’t want her to feel like I’m punishing her for my mom being a butt.
@tortoiseshell bat, I do have a few friends here that are having a thing tomorrow, so I’m looking forward to that. Plus, we’re all vegan, so I don’t have to worry about my mom getting grumpy when my tofurky takes up too much oven space or whatever. And I can eat everything! Silver lining! Plus I’m seeing the Hunger Games tonight with my boyfriend so that’s neat. Distracting myself will definitely be key.
You are absolutely doing the right thing! The first time of doing what you want and not being forced to spend what is meant to be a happy time miserable in order to appease everyone else is always the hardest. Once you’ve done it once it’s liberating and people stop expecting you to be miserable for them. You rock!
I KNOW THAT FEEL, BRO. Guilt is a way of controlling the behavior of others. Guilt-tripping is a form of manipulation, and it is underhanded and hurtful. Remember that, and go forth and have a fantastic Thanksgiving without your manipulative family. All I can say is GO YOU!!
I AM THIS EXACT PERSON, and you have all my sympathy. That shit is incredibly hard, especially when you come from a family constructed around Making Sure You Don’t Set Off This One Person. You are absolutely doing the right thing, and you are going to have a much, much happier Thanksgiving this way.
There was a thing on Brain Pickings from Jeanette Winterson lately, and it is relevant to that second paragraph: “I needed words because unhappy families are conspiracies of silence. The one who breaks the silence is never forgiven. He or she has to learn to forgive him or herself.”
You didn’t betray the family. They betrayed you by making this shitty environment what counts as “family.” Walk away. Be happy. Don’t look back.
I’m skipping out on work early to leave to go home for Thanksgiving. I’m only leaving 2 hours earlier than I normally would, but I just got hired in September and I’m starting to feel super guilty about it. But oh well! I did mention it to my supervisor. And there’s hardly anybody here anyway.
It’s fine. Happy Thanksgiving!
My mom and I were supposed to fly from two different East Coast cities today to visit my sister for Thanksgiving. My mom missed last year due to cat issues (kitty ended up dying on THANKSGIVING DAY), and I didn’t want her to be alone this year. Her flight was cancelled, and she was rescheduled to a late connecting flight, which given the way things are going at her airport would most likely get her a.) stranded mid-trip in a strange city, or b.) not getting out at all. So the both of us decided this morning to cancel our trips, and I would drive to her on Friday. We weren’t happy, of course, but then we talked to my brother and he gave me full on GUILT TRIP. I am so pissed at him. Like we can control the weather.
Aw, man, that’s a bummer. I’m sorry you guys are missing out on your trip, but at least you’ll neither of you be alone for the holiday! Get some take out, be lazy, have some quality time and then skype the family you won’t be with – at least you’re stranded at home and not in a strange city.
I’m looking at a four-day-weekend which would be awesome except I have a nasty case of insomnia that’s lasted for almost two weeks and I know I’m going to spend all four days stumbling around like a zombie. If I’m going to be a zombie, I’d at least like to do it on the company dime, you know? Also, I have to go in for a fasting blood test on Friday morning, so even on the (slim) chance that I might be able to sleep in that day, I can’t. Seriously considering drinking myself to oblivion after the blood draw. At least I don’t have to spend the holidays with family, though. SILVER LININGS.
I have wicked cramps right now and I have to drive tonight during the basketball game and I have no idea what I’m getting anyone for Christmas and I’m usually DONE by now and while I adore my grandparents, I’m just not in the mood to come up with responses to statements like “I’m just not ok with this Obamacare. I heard that more people will be on the Medicare rolls. It’s such a shame.”
Phew. That felt good.
In better news, my grandfather is gifting me his leather-bound gold-leafed copy of Middlemarch. Though he did tell me, conspiratorially, that it was a gift to him from “a homosexual” who “was a good friend despite that.” Womp Womp.
I ship your grandfather/that homosexual. HAPPY HOLIDAYS
lol that is an amazing gift w a fantastic story. My grand-uncle (is that a thing? general family patriarch?) pulled me aside Christmas after my 1st yr of college to give me a mini lecture on The Gays, which I would discover in college! Because “sometimes you cant even tell!” But he concluded very solemnly that “its important you treat them like everyone else. That’s what I always do.” Which was ultimately kind of sweet, I suppose.
I’m so far from home and I emailed my dad on Monday to find out what the family plan is so I could maybe skype with them while they’re over at his house, but he hasn’t responded. And I’m so frustrated by that – is it unreasonable of me to think that my dad should check his email most days since his only child lives abroad? But he doesn’t – he doesn’t even check his email every week. He is my only living parent and I feel so hurt that he’s never come to visit me, doesn’t even know my phone number (nor would he have any clue how to call me if he did have it), can barely work skype and clearly never wants to talk more than 15 minutes when we do video chat. My dad is a good man who is gainfully employed, he’s got plenty of money and plenty of spare time. I just don’t understand why he’s this way (and has been for all 4.5 years I’ve been living here). And I know I should talk to him about it, but I can’t get him on skype long enough to have the conversation.
I’m hurt, and I hurt worse on holidays.
I’m so sorry. That sucks big time.
When you manage to get him on skype next can you tell him that you need to have a serious convo with him and schedule a time?
I don’t have any suggestions, but that sucks and I’m sorry. <3
oh, i’m sorry. i have something sort of similar though a little different with my main living family member, and the best advice i ever got about it was to “take charge.” as in, if i wanted a visit, not to wait for invitations or whatever, or let myself be hurt that they weren’t forthcoming, but just state that i wanted a visit/was going to visit and these were the dates and which of these options do you want to choose because it needs to happen, and bam bam bam it actually does.
sending you good vibes for when you do find the right moment to talk to him about it.
I ordered something from Canada. It was shipped to me last Monday and has yet to arrive. The USPS tells me that it departed San Francisco on 11/23 but the tracking information does not show any arrival on the East Coast (where I live). After spending lots of time on hold, a customer service representative told me that I was right and it should be here by now, and if I don’t have delivery confirmation on Friday I should call and open a case on it. I understand that international trans-continental shipping is going to take a couple of days, but not being able to see the progress is really irritating.
Also, while I am very grateful to have a family of choice to spend Thanksgiving with, there are people who are invited to dinner who are not My People and I would really prefer that they not be there (including one who is not currently coming to dinner but expressed that she might come over in the evening/Friday for social time and I just was like NOooooooo!)
My experience is with shipping things to Canada from elsewhere, but generally it takes about a week to go through customs, plus at least a few days to get shipped around in Canada (although I live in the middle of nowhere, so it’s usually 1 week from the time it makes it into the country), so I’m just impressed they got it from Canada to San Francisco in 6 days!
It was shipping from Vancouver, so not a long trip to make, but yeah, customs. I’m just not enjoying the delayed gratification.
I have mailed things from Canada to the US, and from the US to Canada, and it is always terrible and takes way longer than I anticipate. Sorry!
I just moved to Chicago this past weekend and it’s 1) unreasonably cold!! 2) My new craigslist roommates are messy and bachelor-y and might be kind of nuts and 4) have prodded the apartment into a state of chaos which I will spend the entire holiday cleaning alone… all while I am 4) pining over for a guy who I think is perfect for me and vice versa but it’s just not going to work out because long distance and ~the universe hates me~ and all that.
Yo, but seriously, Chicago Toasties, can we meet up for drinks or something soon? I promise I’m funnier and more cheerful than this post is making me out to be.
Welcome to Chicago! I too will be cleaning my apartment alone over the weekend after my family (well, one visiting member) departs. Would you or anyone else here like a drink on Sunday afternoon?
Oh, I’m game for Sunday afternoon, and/or for a later time. Walls, I think you know how to find me?
Oh I am so down! This is a google voice # because I’m not sure I can delete this comment. Hit me up at (214) 233-5031
it is unreasonably cold, as a citizen, I APOLOGIZE. smartwool/tights forever. you can do it. you’re one of us now.
I too would like drinks with toasties but can we wait a couple weeks??? life is terrible and busy.
Because I work in a field which never stops working, I don’t really get to mentally check out of work, despite technically being off for the holidays. I’m in charge of organizing part of an upcoming project, and every time I think we’ve finally decided on B, people will say “No, we need to do A!” and I have to patiently explain one more time why we’re doing B. It’s like they forget the previous three meetings we’ve already had explaining why B is necessary. I’m not even particularly interested in the science of this project, and I’m worried I’ve become completely burned out on my job. I’ve certainly come to resent about 90% of the people that I work with. Also, super-cramps, which ARGH. I just kind of want to crawl into a hole and spend the next five days playing videogames and petting cats.
Yesterday I went home on my lunch break from work to make some food instead of spending money on it and in the 20 minutes I was home I GOT A $66 PARKING TICKET. They didn’t even street sweep in that time. The forbidden times are: every 2nd and 4th Tuesday of every month from 9AM to Noon. I have lived in my apartment for 2 and a half years the only way I will remember this MUNICIPAL CASH ROBBING window when I’m busy is if I get it tattooed on my hand. What’s worse: only working class and poor neighborhoods have street sweeping times. Rich neighborhoods have parking stickers so the poors from the ghetto can’t park near their homes. Rich people don’t pay parking tickets for stopping at home to make lunch. The rich are to blame for everything.
Yesss. It’s the same thing in my city, how the poorer areas all have red light traffic cameras, but none of the rich parts do. Down with the rich!
Property is theft. I read an amazing quote that you might appreciate. Union hero “Big Bill” Haywood often said, “The capitalist has no heart, but harpoon him in the pocketbook and you will draw blood.” That’s sort of a complaint. I would like to file an official complaint with all hoarders of wealth for being that way.
whoa, how do the rich neighborhoods not have street sweep times? don’t they get their streets cleaned?
i feel for you. i live on a street that is half in one township, half in another, so different parts of the street are in “street-sweeping mode” at different times. i can only park on the part of my block that is for the township i’m resident in, so that’s a little moot — just irritating. but there are no spaces where anybody lives where you don’t have street-sweeping time periods. that is bizarre.
also, here, you get TOWED, and it’s $90 for the tow company and then another “$50 for the ticket tucked under your windshield wiper after you’ve paid the tow company. arg.
That’s not right. Double gouged. There’s a tow company on the north side of Chicago that is notorious for their racket of towing cars for no reason and charging way too much. Fucking mobster bullshit. Anyway here in Oakland the rich neighborhoods are in the hills and are kept clean by other means. And in other areas street sweepers have this odd ability to GO AROUND a parked car or two. No ticket necessary.
I WAS IN A DITCH
i was in a ditch
Brenda got you out though! Ditches are usual just try not to be upside-down and it will be okay!
did some affable cowboy in a big truck pull you out? It’s my understanding that pulling people out of ditches for free is 90% of big truck appeal
BRENDA PULLED ME OUT did you not even read my post about Brenda
Brenda, the superheroine
NO I’ve been in a dank cocoon of not-reading-things til this morning (because REASONS). I’ll make it up to you.
You’re no longer in a ditch! Things are looking up! #teamnoditch
Aren’t we all in some kind of ditch?
Ah, but there’s Brenda…
in a ditch, covered in petrol, on fire
I want to complain about how internet comments are making me very cranky right now and I can’t calm down because I’ve got the post-lunch “itis”.
Thumbs-up to your name!
My perennial complaint: I put in a load of laundry, set a timer for 45 minutes, and sat down “for just a few minutes” to check in on this thread and my email. The timer just went off. WHAT HAPPENED?
The time gnomes have gone into your brain to have a party.
MY COMPLAINT IS THAT THANKSGIVING WAS LIKE A MONTH AGO FOR ME
I am also complaining that my current new job is terrifying and I know they’re all secretly judging me to see when and if I screw up, and I screw up a lot when that happens because I have workplace performance anxiety
Colin Meloy dissed GoldieBlox on twitter and then someone told me (earnestly, not in an argue-y way) that it’s not even that good and I’m irrationally heartbroken all over the place. that’s my weird complaint for the day, and this feels weirdly liberating.
THANK YOU THE TOAST, YOU’RE GREAT.
That gives me a lot of feels, too.
It’s like when Joanna Newsom dissed Lady Gaga for essentially being too much pop.
Joanna Newsom AND Colin Meloy? STOP BREAKING MY HEART, FAVOURITE MUSICIANS
What makes old-tyme cosplayer Colin Meloy an authority on children’s toys, anyway
I love Colin Meloy, but I essentially came down here to post exactly this. Why does he care??
I didn’t see the tweet. Is he mad because they “stole” music from the Beasties? Also I do have a complaint about Goldieblox. in case you guys didn’t notice: Still pink and pastels. Powered by ribbons. Yes a step in the right direction, but let’s not lose sight of how gendered the toys still are.
They also strike me as pretty limited. I mean, it’s $20 for a construction set with ~35 pieces. Lego makes a largely-pink set with ~200 pieces and an included storage box that you can buy for $15.
My beef, aside from those colors, is that there is a blonde white girl as the center of the story. I mean, Goldielocks, duh, I know. Clever play on the name aside, do little girls really need one more blonde girl with blue eyes and a perky little nose as a protagonist? I would have liked these as a kid, but honestly, I would have looked at her at age 8 or whatever, like, dang, there’s another pretty, skinny girl with great hair and with a little nose (I had an Amy March complex AND body hate early on) that I will never have and continue being fat and ugly.
I am very excited for Thanksgiving but omg so much travel. First to Jersey for dinner with my family, then to Connecticut for Matt’s 10th high school reunion, which they planned the same weekend as Thanksgiving. But mainly I’m angry that I don’t have a giant bowl of stuffing in front of me right now.
My complaint is that, in absence of any sort of plan or commitment from my husband’s family regarding their Thanksgiving plans, we planned our own thing, bought food, decided on recipes, and made an open invitation to anyone who wanted to stop by our house. This afternoon my husband calls and tells me that my mother in law decided last minute that she’s going to have Thanksgiving at her house, and that we have to plan our dinner around hers. I may have said FUCK THAT a little too loudly for an office environment.
Feign a stomach illness and have the Turkey Day of your own making, while laughing all the while.
My complaint is that Canada is still doing the Black Friday thing EVEN THOUGH THERE IS NO SUCH DAMN THING HERE IN CANADA, THANKSGIVING WAS MONTHS AGO AND THE SANTA CLAUS PARADE ALREADY HAPPENED.
*waves tiny, furious maple leaf flag*
*the unchosen blue one with three leaves, representing dead debates that nonetheless have long memories*
RIGHT like just trying to shoehorn in a little more capitalism! WE HAVE BOXING DAY FOR THIS
*flag waving solidarity*
My boyfriend went on a four week vacation to IRELAND without me. Today only marks the half way point. I am tired of looking at his amazing pictures on Facebook and wishing I was with him. Just come home already! Or magically transport me there! Plus, being away from him for four weeks is HARD. WHINE WHINE WHINE.
I hate everything about my job. Even when things are basically perfect (I have lots of happy clients, my coworkers are being decent, etc etc) I am so so so miserable. But I feel like an ungrateful wretch complaining about it since it pays extremely well and I’m not terrible at it I guess. Uggghhhhh though.
You know, if it doesn’t make you happy, no matter how good it sounds on paper, it’s okay for you not to be over the moon and jumping for joy. I worked at one of the worst places *cough Walmart *cough* and everyone knew how much I hated it and they didn’t blame me for it, but on the good days when I would talk about the coworkers who were really sweet to me or customers who didn’t make me want to throttle them, nobody told me I couldn’t be happy at a job I hated. So, in my convoluted way, I’m just saying, you are not obligated to love your job just because it’s great or sounds good.
I love the holidays because it gives me a chance to go all out on baking, plus I get to spend time with old friends who happen to be in town. What I absolutely hate is the fighting that always occurs the day before or day of, when my mom decides we have to clean the house, top to bottom, and then she goes into a rage that has a hair trigger. I’m actually at Panera Bread right now because she was yelling at me for merely asking if I should go out and get food for myself. I wasn’t asking her to cook anything, I wasn’t expecting her to have a plan, merely wondering if I should wait to eat (this is my first meal of the day) or if I have to fend for myself.
I have no plans for tomorrow because I didn’t buy plane tickets to visit family and I stupidly thought a friendsgiving would magically crop up. The saddest part is that no one will taste my green bean casserole or sweat potatoes this year.
UPDATE: My buddy is having a dinner with his poetry masters program alumni and while I will be the odd one out, that has never stopped me before, e.g., Toast-up. He said some poetry will bust out and that usually leaves me feeling hot and cold, but I think I’ll have to blow some minds with either an original of mine or a Henry Rollins poem. (I will not be reading any Henry Rollins poetry.)
I feel like with poetry masters students, you’re going to get a combination of really wonderful humans and really insufferable humans, and nothing in between. So maybe there’ll be a few good people there! And as for the others, you can inwardly laugh at their poetry, which is always great fun.
I just left one side of my city for the other and I’m sad about it. I loved my old side. I was there a long-ish time (five years.) I also strongly associated that part of the city with my ex, who also lived in that neighbourhood. I’m also not over the ex, and we broke up in spring. I’m also still very very angry with him. I am so frustrated that I am not over this, and still consumed with fury. I dread seeing him as the one time I did I unleashed a (totally deserved, but totally mean) torrent on him. And I know he’s moved on, which just hurts like hell.
Oh, lady. My break up was a bit more recent, but I hear you on the all consuming rage of not being over it yet, and knowing he’s moving on. SO FUCKING UNFAIR. Sounds like by moving, you’re taking a step towards getting over him, and that kind of stuff is always a big old mixed bag of feelings. Sadness for sure, even if there is some relief.
Hugs! Take a nice bath in your new place (or equivalent if you don’t have a bathtub).
Hae you listened to “The Ctiy” by Sarah Harmer? It helped me in a similar situation, when I was getting over a relationship linked to a particular geographical part of our city.
Oh, this also isn’t a complaint, but will anyone else be getting up early to watch March of the Wooden Soldiers tomorrow?
…No? Just me?
My complaint is that one of my best friends from high school and super-gay-friendly-college has moved to Texas (ok, she moved there like 7 years ago, I’m still complaining) and has become an evangelical Baptist and posts on FB all the time about being #blessed with #TRUTH and #LIGHT of the #SAVIOR and one time she said homosexuality is a little bit of a sin, like getting drunk D: and it’s just bumming me out so much, because it feels like my best friend is not around any more. Like, I got rejected from a job recently and I texted her about it and she replied “rejection is protection”. I replied with “???” and she said that it’s God’s plan for me to be rejected and something better will come along. I mean…thanks, but no thanks? I know, people change and evolve, and I’m the one with the problem here, and we live like 5000 miles away from each other anyway, but I miss the old version of my friend. That’s all.
You are perfectly right to be upset about that! It sucks when someone you once loved changes beyond recognition. What kind of person, no matter what their faith, responds to a friend’s problem with some empty religious platitude? Not someone who is a good or thoughtful friend, is what I’m saying.
Ugh, yeah I hear ya. I think that’s the part that is most hurtful- that she offers up shallow platitudes a lot more now. She talked me through my depression from afar last year (she’s a psychologist) which was wonderful and helpful and generous, but in a short amount of time, it seems like she is becoming more and more entrenched in her new group of church friends and it’s reflecting in how she talks to me. To be fair, I haven’t seen her in person for two years, so maybe much of what I am noticing is topical stuff on fb and in the group chat we have going with a couple other old buddies and we’ll be normal with each other in person. I don’t know. Maybe she always had a latent evangelical in her, bursting to be free. MAYBE WE ALL DO ::wicked laughter::
Hello yes do any people who are vegans or who are people who aren’t vegans but love vegans have advice for dealing with vegan siblings who you love but are very sanctimonious? My sister has decided that my family is evil for daring to eat turkey in front of her, essentially, and thinks we are being unreasonable when we tell her that it isn’t fair for her to make my mother feel absolutely awful all the time by telling her she’s being “unsupportive of her lifestyle” (by having exactly 2 nonvegan dishes at thanksgiving). It’s unclear at this point whether it would be better if my sister just didn’t come home for the holiday, because she is being absolutely unreal with how awful she’s acting towards everyone, and she’s attacking me a lot for pushing back (usually we’re on the same side of family fights). Is this just a thing that I have to accept for a year or two while she grows out of it? Also what about Christmas?
If that were my sister, I would just get super real and kinda mean with her and say, “Sorry you don’t like the turkey/butter foods, but this is a compromise so everyone has plenty of things they can and like to eat. You are being unfair and making the rest of us/mom feel bad. Please stop or just quit talking about it until Thanksgiving is over.” And if your sister were my sister (which she wouldn’t be, because she is so carnivorous it’s unreal), she would get really pissy at me for saying it but she would listen and stop being a sanctimonious eater.
But, my sister and I have the type of relationship where we can say that sort of thing and be joking around two hours later. If that’s not possible for you… I dunno I would just try to really emphasize the compromise aspect of the meal and then maybe just make a blanket family rule to not talk about it anymore? We do that sometimes for contentious topics at meals. It’s weird and usually precipitated by a tense conversation and/or argument on that very topic but then it’s fine after we agree to all shut up about it.
I would be so tempted to just put a little pat of butter on top of every dish. But I am evil.
Is she your little sister? If so, how little? Do you have the kind of relationship where you can drag her into your childhood bedroom and really take her to task? That’s what I would do if my sister did that. I’d be sure to mention something about how if she loves animals more than her family she should go spend Thanksgiving at the zoo.
It sounds like you are doing a pretty good job of accommodating her needs–i.e. she can eat a lot of stuff–but people can get really touchy about feeling excluded from family meals or not being able to share food on social occasions. (Or they may be touchy about a whole bunch of other things they are hiding under a blanket of food issues! I don’t know your life.)
The mere presence of turkey is tough shit territory for sure, but she may also be frustrated about having no available main, protein-y entree instead. It’s probably too late for Thanksgiving, but one thing that has worked well for families I know is to have the vegan member bring/make a second main entree for everyone. (May have to work out use of host kitchen depending on what it is.) Your family sounds like they’re doing a good job of making other dishes accessible to her, which is great. Other small modifications that may not have occurred to anyone: making second smaller batch of mashed potatoes with vegan margarine instead of butter (whip them all together, obvs, and then separate a portion and use margarine instead of butter), and a batch of vegan gravy (I’ve had some amazing vegan red wine gravy in my life).
(My best friend is vegan but only sanctimonious about her family being insufficiently accommodating at holidays, so I’ve heard a lot of complaining about this over the years. This has generally functioned as a stand-in for feeling unappreciated and insufficiently cared-for by them in general. FOOD!)
graduate school. make it end. the group work. the depressing public housing research (that is still fascinating, won’t lie). the mansplainers. the unavailable advisors. and also the job i have to do to pay for it with micromanagy weird smiley boss who just dumped a bunch of bullshit work on me that doesn’t need to be done today when all i wanted was to leave early and start black Wednesday.
also turning into that person who complains about grad school all the time. 22 year old me is eating so much crow.
What even is the point of being in grad school if we can’t complain about it though
really, I was willing to upvote you for just saying graduate school, since that is my actual complaint. Graduate school plus a full time job plus not being sure whether graduate school will result in a different job.
THANK YOU BOTH. and right now that is like the only point. cheers to you both.
Graduate school plus a full-time job was THE WORST (like, doubled the alcohol consumption, doubled the meds, doubled the coffee), and I’m still so burned out from it that I can’t bring myself to look for a job in the field that I now have a degree in. I mean, at least I kept the student loans under $20k, but damn.
this is my number one fear. thank you for your honesty and also GOOD FUCKING JOB on the debt because haha kids in my program are cray.
That’s what I have to keep reminding myself, because seriously, that was a really hard time. Basically the way I got through it was reminding myself that quitting school wouldn’t be the end of the world, if that was what I really needed to do.
So two weeks ago I was mulling around my darkened apartment, as one does, and stepped on an unworn shoe (which happens OFTEN), such that my ankle rolled and my full weight came down on the right side of my right foot. It sounded like someone had cracked a knuckle really loudly. It hurt and was insanely swollen.
Doctor dad said it was probably a bad sprain, so I was careful but not super careful, until a few days later when I woke up and my foot was covered in random bruises – between my toes, on the rims of my feet, in the heel. Doctor dad said this was the result of pooled blood from an internal rupture. So we went to an urgent care place and X-rays came up with what they call an “avulsion fracture”, meaning that when I rolled my anke the tendons in my feet were pulled so hard that one of the bones they were attached to cracked. There’s a little red splotch on the top of my foot now, where a free-floating shard of bone is just hanging out.
These last two weeks have just been kind of brutal. My dad had broken his knee some weeks prior but had slipped on the hardwood moving around our house and nearly broken it again, he was super emotional about it in a way that made me bristle involuntarily – our family is usually very stoic and it made me uncomfortable. My mom, who has problems with her hearing and memory and exhaustion due to the medications she takes, had to take care of both of us until I could move around again.
My foot feels better now but I haven’t regained full motion and I can’t run on it for at least 6 weeks, which sucks so much because now I’ve got no outlet for my stimming impulse and it adds to the anxiety I already feel around the waning daylight hours. I was getting into shape, too, and I haven’t been able to work out for two weeks. At least school has been easy.
Also my dog caught stage two cancer and had to get a tumor on her leg removed. It was quite a sight around our house, my dad and I and our dog all in leg casts, like we’d entered into some sort of comically injurious pact.
So that’s why I haven’t been around. But I finished a pitch! Took me four months, per usual, and I don’t know how I feel about it, but I gave my word that it would be made and now it has been made. Bring on the dry bird meat.
Danzig <3 I’m glad your feeling better! Broken feet are no fun at all.
It’s true. But I got to spend lots of time with my cat! Here he is working his upper abs https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BaDtjNtIgAAncF_.jpg
Your cat is better at exercise than I am.
Your cat’s gettin’ totally swole, bro.
So’s my belly, as you can also see!
Also, sorry about your ankle. And your Dad. And your pets. I made the D: face reading that. I am actually still stuck in D: I hope you all heal, and quickly!
OH YIKES. I’m glad you’re feeling better, but may I repeat: OH YIKES.
Congratulations on the pitch! It’s a great/sickening feeling, isn’t it? High-five!
Yes! Onto my other pitches for the time being. I ride or die for my editors
Heal soon! That is an order.
YES DRILL SERGEANT
Sympathy! i’ve had an avulsion fracture in my index finger this year as I tore a ligament – it hurt like a bastard! Worse than normal broken bones as mine started knitting back on over a nerve so I’ve had horrible nerve pain for months.
I hope you and dad and dog are all on the mend.
ahh that sounds awful. My mom has chronic nerve problems and it’s no fun at all. Get well soon!
We’re all doing well so far, it’s just frustrating being tied down, you know? I want to go on walks and the like.
My complaint to lodge: my brother has been having a rough couple years and lives in Southern California away from the rest of the family (I live in Northern California, Mom/stepdad live in Washington state, Dad lives in Mexico). I’m going up to Washington for Christmas for the first time in like five years, and my brother–who is notoriously difficult to get ahold of–mentioned offhand to my mom at one point that he might come too. Since then, I’ve texted him three times to ask if he’s actually coming, because Mom can’t get him on the phone, and he hasn’t responded to any of those texts but decided to have a long text-conversation with me last night about Attack on Titan. I feel bad nagging him because things have been difficult for him (major depression and a possible alcohol/substance abuse problem) and I don’t feel like it’s my place to get in his face about it, but we’re less than a month out and nobody even knows if he has a plane ticket.
That’s a drag 🙁 at a certain point you gotta abdicate responsibility for him, tho. Make one last plea if you feel you need to.
WIthin the last three weeks, my car was totaled in a hit-and-run and my dad’s car (which I was driving in the interim) had its bumper knocked off in the work parking lot (possibly by a coworker, but no one will ‘fess up). I will be fine and a new car is in the works and I’m taking it to the body shop soon, but I am so, so frustrated with the entire situation.
This is the first post-dead-mom Thanksgiving, and I am worried it is going to be stressful and awful, and I am moderately resentful at the world for doing this to my favorite holiday.
I plan to spend Thanksgiving a) eating rolls and b) drinking with enthusiasm.
Oh, man, that is so hard. I am sorry. I very much hope it’s not as stressful as you anticipate. And listen, there is no shame in ducking out early and going home to a hot bath, a plate of rolls, a glass of wine, and a good book.
I need to keep that in mind. Thank you very much for the kind words!
First post-dead-mom holidays are super hard, and I’m sorry you have to go through it this year. I hope there is plenty of delicious food and booze for you, and whatever kind of support you need from the people around you, but if not, hugs from the internet.
Thank you very much! I think there will be lots of both, for which I am exceedingly grateful. And for Internet hugs. 🙂
Another big internet hug coming your way. Those holidays are the toughest, and like Safvn says up above, no problem ducking out if you need to. Be sad if you need to, but I do hope it is not stressful and awful. Best wishes.
I AM HIDEOUSLY EMBARRASSED AND WANT TO CRAWL UNDER MY DESK AND DIE. I was watching Brooklyn Nine-Nine on my lunch break and apparently I was laughing so loud I was disrupting someone’s phone call because they were working over lunch. /o The HR guy had to come over and tell me to laugh more quietly. *dying of shame*
1. Brooklyn Nine-Nine is a hilarious show, and I’m happy that you got to inject some hilarity into your day!
2. People who work over lunch deserve to be disrupted by the laughter of people enjoying their lives.
In the cold weather
My hand skin becomes quite thin
Touch me and I bleed
My lovely expensive red hair is now a sadly washed out shade of off pink, and my hair dye is still in the post. And we don’t have thanksgiving here, but I have been to the land of the Freedom Turkey and tasted the forbidden fruit, so I know what I’m missing. WOE.
This is how my low blood pressure is making me feel right now:
But, the alternative is much worse so I’ll take it.
Low blood pressure is the worst. That gif is the best.
ahh, you totally made me laugh out loud despite everything with that gif, thank you!
low blood pressure is a bitch. take good care of you!
My complaint is that every single American I spoke to on the phone today (while booking hotels for some travelling members of my company) was WAY NICER THAN I HAVE EVER BEEN TO ANYBODY and I am CANADIAN and I am supposed to OWN THIS GAME COME ON FLORIDA HOW DARE YOU “MA’AM” ME AND OFFER ME TWO NIGHTS FREE IN YOUR LOVELY BEST WESTERN.
The thing is we’re all just really competitive, and don’t like not being number one at something, even if that something is bullshit like “niceness” 😀
I just laughed and laughed and laughed. Thank you. You rock.
This is the best of the comments.
Tomorrow instead of Thanksgiving I’m going to transcribe interviews and then eat leftovers and watch TLC. I don’t have any real regrets about moving out here and doing grad school but I miss Thanksgiving. 🙁
Transcription party? Thanksgiving will happen later here, but if I’m “working” on a “thesis” then I can avoid the discussion when the MIL asks if four cans of cranberry sauce is enough for the fiftieth time.
My complaint is that I pulled my hip flexor muscle back in July while traveling and it still hurts! I iced it, I heated it, I’ve stretched it, I’ve been popping naproxin like nobody’s business, and I don’t think it has gotten better at all. I feel like one of those dollar store knockoff barbie dolls with the shoddy hip sockets 🙁
Ugh, what a pain in the vicinity-of-your-ass.
Boo. If you were really a doll, we could just put a new rubber band in you and you’d feel better.
We were told that we were going to have the customary Thursday/Friday off for the holidays (office job, so, customary, and posted as 2 of the 8 paid holidays), and then they flip around, and say, nope, it’s mandatory y’all come in, btw, here’s a bullshit “floating holiday” that you need to use in the next 3 months, one of which is a blackout period for vacation, oh and you’re not getting holiday pay to come in, that’s why we gave you the floater.
This seriously impedes my plans to sit around in a leopard onesie and drink wine and catch up on all of Sleepy Hollow on Friday.
What? That is some bullshit. I’m pretty sure there’d be a riot if the powers that be tried to pull that stunt in my office.
I live in one of the worst states for employee rights, for a company that only grudgingly follows OSHA rules. Did you know that it is perfectly legal, federally, to require your employees to work 20 hour shifts for 13 days straight?
I did not know that. That is really just 31 flavors of fucked up. I’m sorry.
Thanks. I really should have looked into it more before I moved away from my semi-socialist homeland of SF. But at least I’m now well aware of federal labor laws, and how screwed up they really are?
No real complaints here, although I have some minor gripes. We are having a small Thanksgiving (6 people), so there will be only one pie. ONE PIE! If there can be only one, it has to be pumpkin. APPLE AND PECAN, I WILL MISS YOU!
Also, since I am a Gestating Earth Mother, there will be no champagne for me, but that is alleviated by mucho apple cider, and possibly eggnog, if my father has been included in pre-Thanksgiving shopping trips.
Lies. You can totally have all 3 pies. More pie means more leftover pie. More leftover pie means more breakfast pie, because you are an adult, dammit, and pumpkin pie has eggs in, so totally counts as a breakfst food.
I bought myself a little buttermilk pie for breakfast this morning, because no one is making buttermilk pie tomorrow and I figured I may as well have it before the rest of the food makes me unwilling to go there.
Who says you can only have 1 pie for 6 people? You have 2 pies, there’s leftovers, then you get pie to eat for breakfast Friday morning. I’m also having a 6-person T’day, but made sure there will be pumpkin pie and a brown-butter walnut pie. This is the time for excess.
You make little pie tarts, with ALL THE FILLINGS.
What is this one pie heresy? We have two plus pumpkin pie ice cream and cheesecake. Because dessert for breakfast Friday:)
Dear IMPOSSIBLY LOUD ALARM coming from nearby building*: you are damaging my calm.
*One or the other:we’re smack-dab between the elementary school and the elder care building, and both have the same alarm that sounds off frequently and IMPOSSIBLY LOUD, so loudly they sound like they’re coming from everywhere, and continue for as long as 30 minutes.
I am currently sitting in a classroom with ONE STUDENT IN IT because our university doesn’t cancel classes the day before Thanksgiving–meaning that all the students say “fuck it” and leave, but the TAs have to show up anyway. I teach another section in 20 minutes. I’m hoping nobody shows up so that I can go drink with my boyfriend, who is visiting for the weekend.
I’m throwing a rocking Thanksmukkah party and I planned the menu really well and created informational booklets for people with good jokes and have been prepping food for the past three days (which I love). HOWEVER:
I have to work at 7am on Friday. Ie leave the house at 6am, ie wake up BEFORE 6AM and shower and dress and be presentable in an office context and I AM PLANNING AN AMAZING PARTY WHY CAN’T I GET DRUNK AND PASS OUT :((((((
I am spending Thanksgiving tomorrow with my family, whom I love, but my sister and I haven’t spoken in three weeks because she disapproves of everything about me (how I spend my money, that I’m back together with my boyfriend, that it’s taken me so long to get a degree, that when she asks me a question about something I tend to actually think about it and reply in depth [“lecturing” her], that I have been having mental health issues for the last year and she has to “tiptoe around my issues”), and I am really stressed about seeing her, also my alcoholic drunkard bastard of a grandfather who won’t fucking die. Also I am low on the required number of hours needed for my internship this semester, so I have to cram at least 12 hours in in the next week and a half before my timesheet is due.
Also, finals are coming, and my stupid major requires group finals. Who assigns term papers to be done in PAIRS?! I love you, Ethics prof, but the fuck are you doing to me? Also I only have one more session with my campus therapist before I am out of classes for nearly two months, and I can’t afford the therapist I was seeing during the summer. And I have no job prospects for the interim and I am way stressed about money.
Basically tomorrow will be me drowning my sorrows in carbs and gravy and cream-braised brussels sprouts, because I can’t drown my sorrows in booze anymore.
This year my mum died, my boyfriend’s grandad died and he’s probably being laid off from his job on Friday right when we were planning moving in. Oh and my dad refuses to go to his brother’s for Christmas, meaning that I have to provide Christmas for him.
Oh, no. 🙁 I am so sorry. I very much hope that you can have a Thanksgiving that provides a brief respite from all of this, but if not, at least maybe get a bunch of sleep? I don’t know. I hope things get better for you soon.
Oh, that all sounds so, so hard. I’m sorry. It’s so hard to sort out the holidays after a loss in the family, and doubly hard to sort out how to take care of yourself while still showing love for the rest of the family. Sending good thoughts to you.
Earlier this week I experienced an elapsed time of eight (8) hours between “hmm, pretty cold, guess it’s time to put on my favorite fuzzy hat for the first time this winter” and “OH SHIT I LOST MY FAVORITE HAT.” A personal record!
Also serious, incurable, progressive rare diseases for self and family members. But it’s the hat that really rankles.
COMPLAINT-BRAG
We just bought a house and I will be spending my lovely, “relaxing,” four-day weekend painting rooms and moving heavy objects while everyone else visits families and has cozy holiday meals. Or so I am picturing.
Also my family posted pictures of the perfect, fluffy lovely snow they just got (so festive!) and it is 55 and sunny here. I shouldn’t complain about beautiful fall weather, but it doesn’t feel the like Christmas and it is hard to shop when it doesn’t feel like Christmas yet.
My complaint is that I have no Thanksgiving plans. I was too busy with work to travel anywhere, and I was originally going to have Thanksgiving with a friend and her family, but those plans fell through … and my friend forgot to TELL me that they had fallen through until Monday afternoon, when I asked her what I should bring for Thanksgiving 🙁 I know that I started out having no plans for Thanksgiving, but thinking that I had plans and then turning out not to have anywhere to go feels way shittier.
OH THAT STINKS. I totally get how having plans that disappear feels especially vexing. If you’re staying home alone, can you plunge into the at-home-alone thing and make it fun? Maybe a movie marathon and a favorite meal that no one else loves as much as you do?
Thanks, Elsa. That’s exactly what I ended up doing — green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, rotisserie chicken, and the Thanksgiving episodes of Alias and Buffy 🙂
Okay here’s my real complaint: the 24-hour Christmas music stations started up on Halloween and my mom, being a terrible detestable person, will listen to naught else. Please send help.
On the bright side, I’ve been watching Brooklyn Nine-Nine and as I told Mallory in an unsolicited but surely welcome message, Stephanie Beatriz is my dream woman, assuming she is just like her character.
I am going to my 10 year high school reunion tonight and it’s gonna be weeeeeeeeird, y’all. Anyone have any good tips for how to get through it / amusing stories from their own reunions?
Try not to stare when that one guy (okay, fine, those two guys; they’re twins) turned out to be stone cold foxes. Sure, they were pretty cute back in the day, but some freak alchemy happened and now they cause spontaneous drooling and it’s hard not to stare. But be cool. Don’t stare.
(Also don’t stare at the number of bald men, but keep a tally, because it’s kind of funny how quickly guys go bald sometimes.)
Other than that, just try to locate the alternate bar quickly, because there’s probably an alternate bar somewhere and you don’t want to get stuck standing at the main bar crushed in with a bunch of people who you haven’t thought of anything to say to in the past ten years.
The dog in one of the apartments downstairs from me has separation issues when it’s owner leaves. Last night it barked nonstop from 8pm until after 12:30 (possibly longer, but that’s when I went to sleep). It does this oh, about once or twice a week, always at night, always for hours on end. My other downstairs neighbors play their music so loud my apartment shakes. Often playing it until 4am, or else starting at 6am. I made a complaint to our apartment managers, but it really didn’t help. Neither did pounding on the floor or trying to talk to them. And until music-players moved in and the others got a dog, I never heard a single thing from any of my neighbors, it was the quietest apartment I’d ever lived in.
My long distance bfs not coming to Thanksgiving bc we’re momentarily impoverished but I do get to see him in 10 days for a whole month, but Thanksgiving was always OUR holiday, w all the Friendsgivings etc. and sometimes just us making a ridiculous amount of food and watching football and drinking seasonal beer… Plus I have to suffer through my moms new bf who she flutters about ceaselessly and it would probably be endearing if I wasn’t in such a “fk this holiday I hate it” mode. On the other hand, pumpkin pie? Pumpkin pie.
Recently I’ve been having a lot of inexplicable anxiety and anxious stomachaches, and there are a few things in my life that I’m worried about but I feel like I can never pinpoint a real reason. I just leave work, where I am busy and occupied, and arrive home and immediately become sad. So I am going back to my parents’ house for four days of non-work, and I’m excited, but I’m also worried that in the absence of Things To Do the anxiety will take over again and I’ll just feel ill and shaky and won’t be able to explain why. :/ anyone have any suggestions?
(I am also making 48 butter rolls though and I’m pretty unequivocally happy about that.)
Oh dear. 🙁 That happens to me a LOT. I’m sorry. I would try to give myself a lot of tasks (even dumb stuff like being the drink fetcher for the Thanksgiving dinner or doing all the dishes or bring along a book of crosswords/soduko and just go crazy). Sometimes when I get in those states I just have to sleep all day and watch Scrubs on Netflix until it passes. And if that is what you need too, then that is ok and you shouldn’t feel bad about doing it. Maybe ask your parents to do a movie marathon with you and that way you can anxiety hibernate but still spend time with family.
My only complaint thus far is that I’m still at work instead of at home where I can wear fuzzy pants and mull cider. Boooo working nights.
I am driving 3.5 hours both ways tomorrow to my Grandpa’s for Thanksgiving, because I have to work Friday, and my mom was upset I wasn’t planning on coming. And I’ve been sick and still don’t have much of an appetite, even for amazing Thanksgiving food. And I forgot to claim making the stuffing myself in time, so it will probably be Not How I Like It.
Also, everyone is going to ask me about my boyfriend and new job, but boyfriend just broke up with me, because of the long distance created by me accepting this job, which turns out to be terrible. At the time, it seemed like if I didn’t accept this job, I’d be unemployed, but I keep feeling like if I’d had my act together, things would be less terrible, and I’d at least still be with the boyfriend I’m still in love with.
oh, i am sorry to hear all that. but he is probably not the best boyfriend in the world for you if the distance created by accepting this job means he breaks up with you instead of talking with you to find a way to fix it.
My son ran out of diapers at daycare and rather than calling me to ask for more or borrowing one from another kid, they left him in a shitty diaper for half the day. They hadn’t even warned me he needed more diapers. And they only fed him graham crackers all day even though I left him plenty of other food. He also had a bruise on his forehead from falling down… for the third time in a month. They are the worst and I really want him out of there. I feel like a bad mom for not pulling him out. I want to kill those bitches with my hands for being so lazy and incompetent.
Definitely a minor complaint in light of some of y’all’s complaints BUT I am super annoyed that no matter how much water I drink, and how much heavy-duty moisturizer I slather on my person all the time my skin is still just HELLA dry. I feel like one false move and I’ll crack and start flaking into an ash pile in the vague shape of a human lady, like someone out of Pompeii.
Ugh I commiserate. I live in a Pacific coastal rain forest and I feel the same way. What do you use as soap? I had to stop using cetaphil on my face because it was drying me out so bad. I’m making face wash from a cup of honey and a tablespoon of dr bonner’s gentle baby soap, and that’s been an improvement. Argan oil from the health food store for moisturizer (it’s $12 compared to Sephora’s $40). Nothing is touching my lips though 🙁
Shea butter! Do you have a L’Occitan near you? (Or another source for pure shea butter?) I get their wee pocket-sized tins in winter and just use that stuff as lip balm. I may start using it ALL over my face, too, at least at nighttime.
I am actually relieved, and guilty about being relieved, that I won’t be home for Thanksgiving, as there is hellaciousterribleawful family drama that I’m actually talking to my therapist about how to deal with. Well, about how to set my own boundaries with. Obviously I can’t fix them, but when your two defensive responses to conflict are FIX or AVOID, having to enter put up and shut up mode sends me into a meltdown.
I’m also terribly sad to be away from my (immediate, non-drama) family, just in general. I’ve been in the wrong place geographically, career-ly, emotionally, for several years now and been fighting to to get out of it.
… what are the other responses besides FIX or AVOID? Have I been doing Life wrong?
I keep getting weird blisters on my knuckles. They appear, they hang around for a few days, they go away, new ones pop up in different spots. They’re about 2mm in diameter. They don’t itch and they aren’t painful but they annoy me whenever I see them. I’ve got three right now.
Yesterday was my 21st birthday and I had plans to go to the bars with friends but half the people bailed because they were ‘tired’ and a lot of my friends left for thanksgiving so I went to a bar with one friend and received like 3 texts from bailers and thought nobody was coming. BUT some coworkers showed up and bought me too many drinks and then I threw up a lot in the bathroom (barely made it) with a new coworker who helped me out and I love her. Now I’m still hungover and need to go grocery shopping but I don’t want to because I work in a grocery store and worked on my birthday which is the busiest day of the year and I don’t want to go in again but I have to get a tofurkey. My headache won’t go away and I want to barf. Looking forward to friendsgiving tomorrow though.
Aw, happy birthday! I’m sorry you got sick/hella hungover, but I hope you’re all recovered now and enjoying your Thanksgiving.
My mother-in-law is cooking every single thing tomorrow, which is really nice, but she’s also the same human being who told me last week that it’s my fault if my husband’s wet towels are left on the bathroom floor all day , because I’m “the lady of the house.” THE LADY OF THE HOUSE. I’ll admit to being terrible at housework, and my husband is generally much better at it than I am, but ffs, that is literally the only messy thing in the house that ISN’T even a little bit my fault and that’s the one she wants to talk to me about? No. No no no noooo.
WHOA. i think humorous disengagement and goodnatured comic puncturing of all expectations are definitely the way to go here. picking up your husband’s wet towels is definitely not a lady-duty.
i guess i feel comparatively lucky that my husband and mother-in-law already have decided that i am the sloppy one and they already insist on doing all the cleaning tasks themselves. the only hill they have decided to die upon is the one in which *they* feel very uncomfortable unless *i* am wearing slippers on my feet indoors at all times.
I am being virtuous and not complaining about how Thanksgiving being late is destroying my plan for writing two papers and finishing a dissertation chapter by Christmas done because it is stealing the beginning of December.
Instead I will complain about Thanksgiving day holiday bus schedules, and also traveling in general. It isn’t enough that I have to get the train to the airport at 6:00 am. But in order to get that train, the latest bus I can take will drop me off at the train station at 5:40 am. UGHUGHUGH. What am I to do for 20 minutes in the cold and the dark and the sleepy?
I’m a teenager; I have angst and ADHD; I’m lying to my parents about having completed a paper due halfway through the (now-ended) fall term which I’ve supposedly been working on for the past 3 days and have written a total of two sentences for, yet somehow I have this weird mental block that is almost physically blocking me from telling them the truth. Oh, and my dad tripped over my computer cord and crashed onto the ground and hurt his hip and now he’s telling me to go to hell. So I’m a terrible person and everyone in my house hates me right now and I probably deserve it. Fun times.
One of my roommates ate my potatoes so now I am crying, because I am a super-lame excuse for a human.
My complaint, and it’s not about Thanksgiving per se. I do like Thanksgiving, although it isn’t my favorite holiday. But I enjoy the family I don’t get to see much, the conversation, sports, and sitting in the corner reading a book as my family drones on in the background. This is wonderful.
But sadly, like today and all other holidays, I will be alone. I am single for every holiday. This just makes me sad….
-I am menstruating heavily, one-super-an-hour heavily.
-It will be weeks until my new antidepressant kicks in.
-My nose is wildly congested, and I sound like a muppet
So that’s MY gloom spiral
My mom is having a fight with my aunt, who is coming for Thanksgiving tomorrow, and it’s awful. They’ve been talking for months but apparently still haven’t settled whatever happened. (She won’t tell me, but apparently Things Were Said). She’s set up the table so that our family and my aunt’s are at opposite sides of the table, instead of mixed like we have every year, and it’s breaking my heart.
It’s extra sad because my mom always has at least one huge holiday related freakout, but she’s been much better this year, and we’ve all been so organized and so far the prep is going really well… but even if everything is perfect, there’s going to be this tension between them and I hate it.
Christmas will only be worse, because Christmas is a Big Deal between our two families, but for financial reasons we won’t be able to go to my aunt’s this year. So there’ll be this big hole in our holiday that would suck regardless, but it’s worse because of the bad feelings. *sigh* family.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING TOASTIES I <3 U ALL!
I am here in cold-ass dank-as-fuck-in-November-England, swaddled in a fucking blanket after being on hold for half an hour with the fucking city council about our fucking bill which I couldn’t talk to them about anyway because it’s my damn husband’s name on the bill not mine and he wasn’t around to talk to them and ARGH. Now I need to figure out how to cook a fucking thanksgiving circus carnivale dinner in the next 8 hours because the damn husband is at work and can’t help with prep and we did nothing last night but watch Boardwalk Empire like a couple of fucking goonballs so now I am being punished because of our slothfulness.
I FEEL SO MUCH BETTER AFTER THAT RANT YOU GUYS! It’s 10:20 am and who’s ready for a fucking first drink of the day? It’s ok, I am #blessed that I’m only cooking for two people and even then, I’m only doing a chicken instead of a turkey. But still, gimme the bourbon.
Stupid complaint, but all I want to do is drink wine to get through today and I can’t because the parents give me judgey side-eye for drinking. I’m 25. I’m not an alcoholic. They drink too.
Ugh.
I’m still questioning my decision to visit home instead of doing Friendsgiving.
So, I scratched my cornea and I can’t wear contacts for a week until it heals — have to wear glasses. But glasses don’t correct my vision properly because they shift on my nose, changing the amount of correction going on, and I am super super blind so this makes a big difference in my vision and means I can’t see things properly and have terrible depth perception.
But I love looking at things, even if it’s just leaves on trees, and I miss seeing people’s expressions when talking to them from more than a foot away, and it’s kind of depressing that people who don’t have really bad vision (including my optometrist) kind of pooh-pooh how unpleasant it is, as if seeing people’s expressions properly when you talk to them and being able to see (and read) the things in your surroundings and do sports are all just superfluous luxuries. it really really sucks.
venting helps, though!
Complaints! I say! Do I ever have complaints!
– We are moving from Perth Australia to Calgary Canada in January because we are mad. The temperature gap could be as much as 70 degrees (from 40 degrees here to -30 in Calgary). I haven’t seen snow in decades. I don’t know how I will leave the house, let alone drive, or get food, or meet people in a new city. I will probably end up IN A DITCH.
– Moving is the worst OMG.
– Moving with a toddler is even more worst.
– Plus we have to get out house ready to sell or rent out and it’s haaaaaaard getting everything all nice and painted and tidy.
– Also we have to sell stuff which is such a horrible process and also I need a washing machine but I need to sell it so what do I do? I don’t know!
– My toddler is sick again.
– So she’s not sleeping.
– Also she needs day surgery to get grommets. My baaaaaaaby.
– And we are leaving our dog in Australia. My fur-baaaaaaby.
– Also I am leaving my awesome job and all my friends. *weeps*
– Can’t drink to cope with it because due to having offspring, I have lost all my tolerance to booze and also we don’t get any sleep and hangovers on no-sleep are just awful.
– I am so anxious about it all I have dreadful insomnia when the child does sleep.
That just about wraps up. Thank you, The Toast, for this opportunity to offload.
Calgary is great! There are so many excellent things about Calgary, not least of which are the mayor or the fact that you can be in the mountains with about 1.5 hours driving! There are tons of great festivals and places to explore. (I am not from Calgary but visit it frequently, and have really come to love it.)
But get a good winter coat before you come, and bring it on the plane with you, because you will never be so cold in your life otherwise. Prairie winters are just a clusterfuck of awful all the time.
OMG Samatha Irby and Claire Zulkey at The Hideout tonight (Friday)! C. and I are going and you should come! We can plan for Sunday afternoon there.
I spent thanksgiving with a Friend’s family / friend’s future mother in law. We ended up doing ALL THE COOKING 12 HOURS! 12 HOURS! I accidentally poured some hot liquid on a dog (one of five) that arguably should not be allowed in the kitchen. AND there was a lot of friend’s future mother in law shouting “I NEED THE TURKEY CARCASS” “I NEED A CAN OPENER” “I NEED SOMEONE TO HANG THIS SIGN” “I NEED THIS FLOOR MOPPED” (Oh, I moped her floor) AND poor 80 year old Irma went and got the turkey carcass in its huge roasting pan. Ooofff. It was a long day.