Holiday Review

Since it has been sometime since I've posted, I thought I would combine both my Christmas and New Year's post into one post.

This year for Christmas, I did more traveling that I would normally do. I went to my sister's house on Christmas Eve. I left my apartment at around noon. The trip started out to be a bit nerve racking. I have no idea how I managed to do it (other than I'm clumsy), I managed to sprain my ankle getting into the car. It hurt for most of the day. I almost turned around about 30 minutes into the trip. The route that I took to get to the highway was underwater for a portion of the trip. Having never driven through more than a puddle, I was very nervous driving through 6 to 8 inch deep water. Once I made it to the highway, I kept an eye on the roads and ditches. The ditches were about to spill onto the roadways.

After arriving at my sister's house, I had the opportunity to rest a bit. What I thought would be a boring and tedious evening, turned out to be quite nice. All of us (my sister, brother-in-law, mother, step-father, nieces, and myself) had dinner at one of my sister and brother-in-law's church member's homes. After dinner, we all played a few games.

Back at my sister's house, my nieces prepared the plate of cookies for Santa. They were so excited. After a couple hours of hanging out with the family, everyone started to get ready for bed. My sister laid out all of the Santa gifts and I ate Santa's cookies.

Getting up at 6 AM on Christmas day, the girls were full of energy. They got to wake up to a white Christmas. It has been about 15 years since I've seen a white Christmas. Everyone opened their presents. The girls loved all of their gifts.

Around 10AM, after having breakfast, everyone packed up and headed to my Grandmother's house. We all arrived around 1:30 PM. Then the eating began. I think I ate from the time I got there until the time I left around 7 PM. All of the traveling caught up to me because I did take about an hour nap while at my Grandmother's house.

Leaving my Grandmother's house, I went to a high school friend's house. I haven't seen him in some time. It was good to catch up with him and his wife. His sister, mother and father were also there. It has been even longer since seeing them. It's sad to say, but I usually have a better time with his mother than him. I ended up spending most of the night talking to his mother.

Saturday, I was ready to come back home. I left around 1 PM, but I was packed and ready by 11:3o AM. I just didn't want to hurt my mother's feeling by leaving any earlier.

Fast forward to New Year's Eve, myself and several of my friends had reservations at a local restaurant. It was a great night of good food, good friends, and lots of drinks. I celebrated way too much. I had too much beer and too many Jager Bombs. I decided that I was not going to get out of bed until, I no longer had a hangover on New Year's day so I was in bed until 3 PM. After getting up and getting around, myself and my best friend cooked dinner and then went to the theater to see It's Complicated. It is a very cute movie. The theater was packed and it made sitting in the theater very uncomfortable.

As far as New Years Resolutions, I'm not really making many this year. I've set a goal of reading 25 books this year. Since I'm not a fast reader per say, I do enjoy reading so 25 is a good number for me. I also want to make sure I'm not "that guy" anymore. While I'm still going to enjoy myself, I will just make sure I don't make a fool of myself too much. Lastly, I've got a plan to get my credit cards in check. December felt like I was hemorrhaging money. I've got to get that in check.

I hope that everyone has a great 2010!!!

An Idiot Moment

Like many human males and the toilet, my male cats have a hard time hitting the litter box. I'm not sure if they think the liners that I use are an extension of the litter box or if they just don't care, but they miss on occasion.

To add to the problem, I'm not always as diligent as I should be about cleaning out the litter box. I really need an automatic one.

Well, today I was going to clean up their mess and did something that was not only just idiotic, but also harmful to all of our health.

You see, I like to clean with bleach. I actually like the smell of bleach. So after clearing away the litter box and all of the loose litter, I decided that sanitizing the area with bleach was a good idea.

It didn't dawn on me at first when the bleach mixed with the cats urine started to fizz what a huge mistake I had made. It was when I started to mop up the horrible smelling concoction that it dawned on me that there is ammonia in cat pee.

I did have the foresight to clean out the mop, empty the sink of now foul smelling water, and start over.

Books, Books, and More Books

For the majority of this year, I’ve had a book that I have been reading. I’d estimate that I’ve read close to 20 books this year. I know it’s no great feat, especially compared to the lady who is reading a book a day and writing a review about them each morning on her blog. I’m happy with the number and plan on increasing it next year.

All of the books that I have read this year have been gay-themed books. I’ve read some really great stuff and some mediocre stuff. There has only been one that I lumbered through just because I wanted to complete what I had started. One of the best books that I ready this year was The Bishop Brothers by Bart Yates. I’ve also enjoyed works by Michael Thomas Ford and Jim Grimsley.

I am probably missing a whole segment of the gay-themed fiction genre because I am extremely picky about the books I read. I’m looking for stories that are as real as possible. I don’t want to read about any enchanted lands, any mythical creatures, any supernatural events, or any elaborate murder mysteries. I like reading about the daily trials and tribulations that the characters are faced with. Because I’ve limited my selections so much, I’ve been able to lump most of the books that I’ve read this year and in previous years into three categories. As much as I hate to reduce the hard work of the authors, it is something that I can’t help but point out. Those categories are: hustlers that turn good, coming out stories, or the classic fairy-tale ending romance. My favorite of the three is the fairy-tale ending.

Books have always been like great friends to me. I'd rather buy the book, than borrow from a friend or the library. I'm hesitant about lending a book out because I worry I won't get it back. I hope to one day have a room dedicated as a library.

Books are the greatest escape. You can easily loose yourself in the lives of the characters you are reading about. You feel very real emotions for the characters. When I read, I create a world for the characters. Not only do I have an image of what each character looks like, I also create their surroundings. I imagine what their apartments look like, the coffee shop they visit, and the layout of the town they live in.

For the upcoming year, I've decided to challenge myself to read 25 books. Twenty-five is just high enough of a number that it will be a challenge, but it will also seems achievable.

Victoria's Secret Fashion Show

I just finished watching the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show and thought I'd weigh in on what I thought of the show.

• The Black Eyed Peas performance of Boom Boom Pow and Meet Me Halfway was so so. I've never really enjoyed hip hop music performed live because it never sounds the same as the recorded music.
• There were two Kings of Leon songs played within a 20 minute span. I think they could have spread them out a bit longer.
• I wasn't really impressed with the $1M bra. (right)
• I was glad that Kylie won the Angel search competition
• Heidi Klum's tits looked fabulous. It's amazing she lost all of the baby weight in such a short time.

Shane Mack - Lie To Me

From the soundtrack for Shelter.

Maine, The Matthew Shepard Bill, And Slipping One Through The Cracks

Yesterday, the voters of Maine decided to take away marriage right of its LGBT citizens.

I haven’t done the fact checking (because I’m at work) so at best, I’m just spreading a rumor, but I received a text message this morning from a friend who stated that NPR was reporting that Maine had a job stimulus bill attached to the Yes side of the vote. It seems to me the measure was destined to fail to begin with.

Recently, a federal hate crime bill was signed into law by President Obama. I was proud that something like that was pushed through all of the branches of the government and signed into law until I was told that it was a rider to the Department of Defense’s budget. Then I didn’t feel that the bill had as much of an impact.

I don’t want my protections, my rights, or my freedoms as a gay man to be signed into law because it rode in on the shirt tails of some other bill. I want those protections, rights, and freedoms to be granted to me because they have already been bestowed upon me in the Constitution.

I realize that this has been a practice in Congress and state legislature for a long time. It just seems wrong to me to allow a separate and probably unrelated bill to be signed into law as almost an afterthought to original bill.

I also realize that through out any session on Congress or state legislature meetings that there is a full docket and it can be very hard, if not impossible to get through. Lumping a few bills together, I assume, can expedite the process of having a bill signed into law.

While I want the protections, rights, and freedoms that I deserve as a citizen of the United States, I don’t want them to be an afterthought because they were a rider to another bill.

iTunes Meme

I borrowed this from Erik at gambrinous with griffonage. I'll probably embarrass the shit out of myself but here goes...

How many total songs?
4005, equivalent to 11 days of continuous play.

Sort by song title - first and last
Abilene - Sheryl Crow - C'mon C'mon
9 to 5 - Lady Sovereign - Public Warning

Sort by time - shortest and longest
Spinnin' - Janet Jackson - Discipline - 0:08
Resentment - Beyonce - B'day - 15:29

Sort by album - first and last
Garbage - Absolute Garbage
Usher - 8701

Sort by artist - first and last
A.F.I.
50 Cent

Top 5 played songs
Beyonce - Sweet Dreams - 21 times
Jeremih - Imma Star (Everywhere We Are) - 17 times
Pitbull - Go Girl - 14 times
Colbra Star Ship feat. Leighton Meester - Good Girls Go Bad - 12 times
Kaci Battaglia - Crazy Possessive - 9 times
Jennifer Lopez - Mile In My Shoes - 9 times

Find the following words - how many songs show up?
Sex - 45 songs
Death - 5 songs
Love - 265 songs
You - 501 songs
Home - 24 songs
Boy - 137 songs
Girl - 87 songs

First 5 songs that come up on iTunes DJ
Pet Shop Boys - A Red Letter Day
Ciara - The Evolution of Dance (Interlude)
Michael Buble - Feeling Good
Jeremih - Runaway
Annie Lenox - Womankind