Dragons

I'm feeling a little old tonight. I remember looking forward to Friday nights. Looking forward to going out to catch a double feature at the movies and not caring that the second movie would end just a little before midnight. Or heading out to the bar after 9. Or just staying up late watching tv or talking or whatever other shenanigans that came our way. Now the biggest thing about Friday nights is the excitement I get knowing that I can sleep in tomorrow. Frig, I know senior citizens who have more exciting lives than I do.Sigh.

It was a long day at work today and a very busy one. Upside was that the day flew by. Downside is that my poor desk once again looks like a tornado hit it. Next week I'm covering for one of our finance admins so I have a bunch of finance stuff I HAVE TO take care of on Monday morning. Here's hoping I don't screw it up too badly.

I watched "How To Train Your Dragon" tonight (See? Told you I have a thrilling life). I've never actually seen it before. I quite enjoyed it. It's a cute little movie and I loved Toothless the Dragon. Adorable. I'm usually not a big fan of animated movies but there are some really good ones out there.

In case anyone is counting, this is blog #199. Hot damn eh? The next blog I do will be my 200th one. I know I'm pretty damn impressed by that. I've been blogging for just over 6 months now and have more than 6000 page views. I honestly can't believe that anyone would want to read my mostly pointless ramblings. Apparently I entertain some people. Who knew? Certainly not me. I guess I'm going to have to sit and think up something really awesome for my next blog. Something really special.

But for now, I'm going to sleep on it. Yes, I'm a single 30 something and I'm going to bed at 10:23pm on a Friday night. And yes, I'm going to bed alone :p

Good Night!

Sarah

It's not a dragon, but it's close!

St. Valentine's Day

Tomorrow is St. Valentine's Day. A day dedicated to love and romance all thanks to a Christian who was martyred way back when. There are numerous stories but the most popular one is said that this particular man, who later became a saint, performed marriages for soldiers who happened to be forbidden to marry and he healed the daughter of one of his captures. The whole notion of romance being linked to St. Valentine's Day doesn't really crop up until the somewhere around the middle ages / 15th Century.

Anyhow, I happen to be single. This means that I'm socially obligated to hate Valentine's Day. But I'm going to let you in on a little secret. I don't hate it. In face, I love it!!

I have tried to hate it before. Gotten all sad and lonely, but that had more to do with depression than anything. Truthfully, I think it's a fun day. Yes, I agree that you should tell the people that you love that you love them every day but this is the one day for OVER THE TOP kind of love and romance and just plain cheezy silliness. I love cinnamon hearts (got a funny story about a friend who sent her bf a bunch of cinnamon hearts one year..only to discover he hated them...LOL) and I love the goofy, cheezy stuffed bears and my god, do I love the flowers. I mean it. I love flowers. Real ones of course. People at work try to bribe me all the time for supplies or info and they never succeed. Now if they showed up with a bunch of beautiful gerber daisies...that might get them somewhere. I'm a sucker for flowers. I buy them for myself all the time just because I love having them around, and if I were to wait for a man to buy me some.... LOL. I'm pretty sure that a man has given me flowers only 3-4 times in my life and that includes my dad giving me 16 pink roses on my 16th birthday. I love the little kids Valentine's Day cards that they fill out and make paper bag envelopes for. I all just makes me smile.

So every year, I treat myself to something for Valentine's Day. This year, I got my hair cut. It's only been 10 months since the last time I had it cut! Oops. I had nearly 4 inches taken off and it feels amazing. I feel amazing. Hell, I even shaved my legs tonight!! Still need to do my nails though.... And I baked cupcakes. But those are for work. We're having a bake sale tomorrow and we're selling Candy Grams too. I spent an hour along with 2 co-workers stuffing bags full of candy. I'm sick of looking at the candy already.

I do have a Valentine's Day tradition. I rent/watch a movie where lots of stuff get blown up (so usually a Die Hard or Lethal Weapon movie), order Chinese Food and have a slice of cheesecake for dessert. This year, the violent movie will be replaced with a new episode of The Big Bang Theory, the Chinese food will be replaced with pasta (watching my wallet and waistline) but I'm still having the cheesecake... if I remember to take it out of the freezer.

I do admit that Valentine's Day is one of those days when it does kind of suck to be single. And don't give me that old line about not really celebrating it or it not mattering much. I've never got to celebrate Valentine's Day with someone special. Murphy's Law I guess. I tend to break up with guys before it and not meet new ones until after it. Even if you've been married for 50 years, chances are you've had a least one special Valentine's Day. I haven't. So don't feed me lines until I've had my chance to experience one with someone special first. There are some things in this world that I'd like to find out for myself. This is one of those things. And I'll get there, eventually.  But until then, I shall treat myself and keep laughing at the cheezy, romantic gestures.

After all, All We Need Is Love :)

Good Night!

Sarah

Invasion Of The Singles and Sherlock Holmes

I just finished reading an article that a friend of mine posted on Facebook. It was all about people who live alone and the change that has had on society. For the first time ever, the number of people living alone has surpassed the number of people living as a family. People living as a couple (so just 2 people), is the highest, with people living alone coming in behind it.

Seeing as I live solo, I'm happy to read that I'm in good company. It used to be that the only people who lived alone were the divorced, widows, spinster and eternal bachelors. Thankfully, the idea of "spinsters" seems to have died away in our society. The societal pressures to get married and start a family seem to be easing but if you look at my office, that's not true. The idea of getting hitched and popping out a kid seems to be alive and well.

Thankfully, I don't get much pressure from my family to find a mate and settle down. It's usually just my grandparents who comment on the fact that I've been single and on my own for what seems like forever. But my parents never say anything. Which means they either don't care or they simply know better. My money's on the latter. They know I'm independent and more than capable of taking care of myself, but I'm sure they'd feel a little better knowing that there was someone else to help me do that. How do I know that? Because some days that's exactly how I feel.

Would I like to have someone else to help with the chores? Yes. Would I like to know that there was a 2nd income to fall back on if I don't get a contract renewal? Hell yes. Would I like to have someone here with me for moral support and a shoulder to cry on when the world gets just a little too overwhelming? Definitely. But for the time being, none of those things are in the cards so I've got to play the best I can with the hand I've got at the moment.

I have to admit that I do enjoy living alone. It has it's perks. Yes, statistically it is more expensive to live alone than it does if you're living as a couple but that's just another hurdle to work around. But it is to know that my chosen lifestyle is now en route to becoming the norm. Perhaps I'm a bit of a pioneer. LOL. At any rate, I'm sure these new trends will give the sociologists something to study for a bit.

Changing topics, I watched another 2 episodes of the BBC series "Sherlock" tonight. It's a very good show. The 2nd episode this evening was one of my favourite Sherlock Holmes stories: The Hound of the Baskervilles". It's a great one and one the scary side too. This show gave it a pretty wicked modern spin which turned out quite well. Perhaps I should hunt down the book and give it a read. I think I may have read it before but it was some time ago.

I probably should get to bed as it is now past midnight. I was up past midnight last night too as I was talking to my buddy Cam. We talked for 2 hours and I swear it felt like 10 minutes. I miss talking to him. For three and a half years I talked to him on pretty much a daily basis.He and his wife were running amuck in the West Edmonton Mall today. I hope they had a blast!  I guess that's a mark of a good friendship...when you haven't talked to each other in a very long time but when you do, you pick up right where you left off and it seems like it's only been days since you last spoke. I'm truly blessed to have several friends like that in my life.

Good Night!

Sarah

Calgary Stampeded 2008. We're pretending to be horses.