seriously?

Forget birds dropping out of the sky. Forget torrential flooding in Australia. If there is a sign that the end of days is nigh, it has to be pajama jeans. Gather your children and atone for your sins, because nothing means the apocalypse is more imminent than PAJAMAS masquerading as JEANS.

And yet I have some hope. Because if there is one thing that can unite America, one thing that can traverse ideological differences and bring us all together in one shared belief, my GOD, it is an uprising against the pajama jean. Unite people. The snuggie may have conquered us, but it is not too late to stop the pajama jean. The evil, evil pajama jean.

thank you jon stewart

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Arizona Shootings Reaction
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I thought this was beautiful and wonderful and so, so human. As Monday night at eleven approached I realized I was waiting for this, to turn on the Daily Show and listen to what Jon Stewart had to say. Yes I'm a liberal and yes I know a lot of conservatives hate him, but the main reason I love the Daily Show isn't for when he mocks Republicans or Fox News or expounds on the ideological issues I share beliefs in. The main reason I love the Daily Show is because whenever the world falls apart, it's the only thing that makes me feel better. And so whenever the world does fall apart, as seemingly happens more and more often, I wait for that next Daily Show. I wait to turn on my TV with a heavy heart and a mind bogged down in anxiety and sadness and confusion only to watch something that makes me feel like it can all be okay again, like the world can and will be put together, if only by the power of shared human decency, if only because of a belief that reason and humor will always exist, even on our darkest of days.

And my God doesn't it feel good to laugh, even if it's just at the silly visual sight gag of Jon Oliver in panda pajamas. Doesn't it feel good to turn on the TV to a show about current events and instead of weeping, laugh?

Thank you Jon Stewart. Thank you for taking the impossible and talking through it until it some slight shred of hope and optimism reveals itself.

thoughts.

I've gone back and forth a million times about writing something about the shooting that took place in Arizona. I've stopped myself, again and again, because I didn't want to be political. I didn't want to be like all those ass hats on television the last few days, on both sides of the ideological spectrum, who only a few days later are already pointing fingers and calling names and talking and talking about everything about what is true and what is honest and that is that what happened is terrible and sad and always will be.

The only thing I want to say, to ask, is how this keeps happening? These mass shootings happen and for a few days it's all we talk about and we suggest solutions and promise change, but nothing ever does change. Enough time goes by that we forget, we get distracted, until the next violent massacre shocks us awake. But we don't stay awake long enough. We never do.

So maybe this time, please let us stay awake. Please let us try, all of us, in a million different tiny ways, in several huge ways, to change our country, to make these shootings what they should be, rare and unimaginable, instead of what they are becoming, common and routine.

A nine year old died on Sunday. Please let us stay awake for her.

And now for the real resolutions

I just couldn't leave the night on that last, very depressing, ahem, self-pitying post. Because one of my resolutions is to try and avoid the negative energy that took over so much of the first eight moths of last year and turned me into a person I didn't like very much. So here are my positive, good energy resolutions for this year, in no particular order:

-work out four times a week

-run a 10k (or at the very least a run/walk combo)

-do more yoga

-not obsess about what I eat, but also eat generally "healthier", whatever that really means

-no diets

-not become so health conscious that I can't enjoy a) a good Mexican dinner or b) chocolate

-write as much as possible (on this blog but more importantly fiction)

-be more open

-be less materialistic (i.e. shop LESS)

-travel outside of the US (even if I have to drive to Canada to accomplish this)

-be a better friend/daughter/sister/person (yes, this one is vague, but it never hurts)

-less People magazine, more Atlantic

-learn how to say "no"

-find ways to challenge myself and do things that scare me, especially things that scare me

-be brave, be good, be kind

2010 hangover

I really wanted to start 2011 fresh and energized and ready to take on the world. I was really ready for 2011, because 2010, especially the first eight months, was without question the hardest, most emotionally exhausting year of my life.

But something feels stuck, like I haven't been able to get my foot out of the old year and into the new one. Maybe because as much as it's the start of something new, right now, this past week, I've more felt the hurt and sadness of endings, the end of a relationship, the end, with nursing school, of the dream of a life I used to have, of being a full time journalist.

And this is all horribly depressing and it's not helping anything. I know that. But I guess I just needed to write, because I haven't in a while, which only makes me more sad. And because I know that this is just my little 2010 hangover. But next week, I'll get my head together and join 2011 with the rest of the world. I'll start instead of end, look ahead instead of back. And I'll hope for beauty and strength and love this year.

Happy New Year to everyone out there, especially if you're dealing with your own metaphorical  or well, even literal hangovers :)