The most wonderful time of the year

I never thought I would be one of those people.

The ones who have their Christmas decorations up before Thanksgiving is over. The ones who move right from Halloween costumes to Christmas cards. The ones who start humming holiday music when its still warm enough to wear a T-shirt outside.

This year, I became them. That's right, I bought Christmas lights in October. Before Halloween, actually. I even heard a fellow Target shopper mutter "Give me a break!" as I squeezed my way through the throng of last-minute costume hunters on Oct. 29 to toss two boxes of white lights in my cart right next to my Halloween candy. I thought about giving her a withering look or a friendly little push, but that wouldn't be in theme with the Christmas spirit.

Now, let me explain what brought on the early holiday cheer.

Some moron ruined my pre-lit tree.

It all started after Christmas 2008, when I purchased a deeply discounted 6-ft tall, pre-lit Christmas tree from a local retailer. I then put it into my closet and waited 11 months.

Last year, during the second week of December 2009, I pulled it out of the closet. I had my holiday music going, a mug of hot chocolate, and holiday cartoons on the TV. It was picture-freakin'-perfect for tree decorating.

Until I plugged in the tree to test it out.

Top section: Glowing. Bottom section: Sparkling. Middle section: Darker than the Grinch's dead tomato with moldy purple spots heart.

So I turn to the instructions, which helpfully instruct me that this is NOT supposed to happen. Thanks for that, instructions.

Anyway, I start searching for a missing bulb. They're all there. I follow my instructions and replace the fuse. Have you ever tried replacing the fuse in a strand of Christmas lights? It sucks. Twenty minutes later, with new fuse installed, I plug the tree back in. Lo and behold: a glorious light shone from above.

Just kidding. It still didn't work.

I start examining the wire when I notice an odd knot in the unlit section of lights. What followed was a very un-Christmasy curse word.

Apparently, somewhere in the packaging or creation of this tree, the wire for the middle section was cut in two. Instead of replacing it, someone has just tied the two ends of the broken wire together as if that will reconnect the electrical current.

Seriously.

After some grumbling and name calling towards the unknown idiot, I decide I can fix this. I'll just remove the middle section of lights and replace it with a new strand. My Christmas spirit renewed, I head to Target.

Target is out of white lights. So is Meijer, Wal-Mart, Walgreens, K-Mart, and every other freaking store in the Greater Louisville Metropolitan Area. (I take that back. I did find one box of white lights at a Meijer in Southern Indiana. They had a white cord. Who uses a white cord on a green Christmas tree???)

When I politely inquired from the man at Target when they might be getting more, he looks at me and says "Oh, we're not ordering any more before Christmas. Most people have already put their tree up by now."

Really, sir? Really? By the second week of December all 16 million people in Louisville have set up their Christmas trees? And no one's lights, not one single strand, will burn out between now and Dec. 25th?

Normally, that would be something I would just think to myself as I stare blankly at a person. But I was fired up. So I said it all out loud and waited for his response.

He shrugged.

I went home defeated. That's it then, cancel the kitchen scraps for lepers and orphans, no more merciful beheadings, and call off Christmas! (Name that movie!)

And that, my friends, is why I bought Christmas lights on Oct. 29th this year. Happy Holidays!

Time to get cooking?

Thanksgiving has always been a big holiday in my family, filled with Grandma's country cookin'. When I was little there were anywhere from 14 to 60 people crammed into my grandparents' house, so many that we had to eat in shifts.

The menu stayed pretty much the same every year and that's the way I like it. A few years ago, I sat down with Grandma and asked her to give me all of her Thanksgiving recipes. The conversation went something like this:

E: Ok, Grandma, so I'm clear, I need at least two full loaves of bread to make your stuffing? That seems like a lot. And how do I know what the exact measurement is for "enough chicken broth to make it look right"?
Grandma: Well, hun, I only know how to make it to feed all of us. I don't have the recipe written down anywhere, I just do it. Just make it look like mine.

And that explains why I have a homemade stuffing recipe that doesn't list ingredient amounts, but serves 20-25 people.

Anyway, it was important for me to get all her good recipes, for homemade bread, stuffing, broccoli casserole, creamed corn, biscuits, red velvet cake etc. so that those recipes could be kept in the family forever.

The catch now is that people expect me to actually make those things.

It's not that I can't cook, it's just that my expertise is more in party foods. Give me an appetizer, a dip, or some kind of cookie and I'm good. But last time I tried to make actual dinner foods, I ended up with chicken that tasted like corn chex and sweet potatoes that tasted like an orange juice-potato smoothie. (For the record, the recipe was for oven baked chicken tenders and mashed sweet potatoes with orange essence. Don't ask what went wrong. It all went wrong.)

Thanksgiving is at my mom's house this year, for only the second time in as long as I can remember. Grandma will be there to help with the stuffing, but it's my job to make the broccoli casserole and the red velvet cake.

That makes me nervous. Last year, I attempted to make the red velvet cake with my mom. It ended with half the cake crumbled in the pan, the other half lying pathetically on a plate, my mom cursing and throwing a dish towel, and my grandma standing in the corner snickering because we had used a glass cake pan. Apparently glass cake pans are bad for baking. (Which begs the question, why do people make glass CAKE pans if they're bad for baking?)

I'm think I'm turning the cake into cupcakes this year. I can handle cupcakes. Probably because they're typically only served at parties.

I hope I don't ruin Thanksgiving.

Lots of ideas, little time

Right. So remember that time I told you I was going to write something everyday? Now, remember that second part where I said don't hold me to it?

I had lots of brilliant blog ideas in the past week, but somehow it was always bedtime before I remembered I hadn't actually written them yet. Oops.

For example, I was going to write about the election, and how I think there should be mandatory comment boxes on the ballot. That way you could explain why you did, or did not, vote for someone. Mine would have read something like this: "Dear Candidate A, While this vote will count toward your tally, please take note that it is not a vote for you. It is a vote against your opponent. I don't like you, either, but you don't scare me half as bad as that other guy. Sincerely, Erica." or "Dear Judicial Candidate, I know nothing about you, your values, your opponent, or your work in the court system. But your name is Erica, thus you should win. Love, Other Erica."

Then I was going to write about how since very few of my election day picks worked out like I wanted (Really, Kentucky? Really?) then surely that meant I would have better luck picking horses at Churchill Downs that week. Spoiler alert: I didn't. I lost $30. And spent some more cash at the bar. You're welcome, Churchill. My tip to win when betting on the ponies? Pick whichever horse I don't.

And then I was going to write about how I can't stop watching this video on YouTube. It's so freakin' adorable. Pandas can do no wrong. Remember when they had the Panda Cam at the D.C. zoo a few years ago when baby Tai Shan was born? I confess I wasted plenty of time at work watching that little butterball. Wonder what he's up to now? Update: He's back in China. Where there's no panda cam. Oh well.

Finally, I was going to write about how I reached a new low this year when I became one of those people who bought Christmas lights before Halloween. Actually, know what? I am going to write about that.

But it deserves it's own entry, so check back.

Meanwhile, I'll go back to work now. After I watch that panda teach me how to dougie again.

Where's Walsho?

I thought I had a pretty good costume idea this year for Halloween. It was a little nostalgic, provided for some humor, and it wasn't a cast member from Jersey Shore so I was pretty sure no one else would have the same costume.

That is until my little brother (By little, I mean younger. In reality, at 6'4, he's got a good eight inches on me) calls me a few days before Halloween.

My brother lives in Chicago now. We get along, but we don't chat all that often mainly because he's not a spectacular conversationalist over the phone. It's like pulling teeth to get that kid to provide a more descriptive answer than "Yeah" or "Mmmhmm".

Since he doesn't like talking on the phone, he usually only calls for two reasons: He needs something from me or he saw something funny somewhere on the Internet that he wants me to watch.

Surprisingly, this call was neither of those.

J: Erica, what are you going to be for Halloween?

E: I came up with something pretty funny, I think. I'm going to be Where's Waldo.

J: (Silence on the line)

E: You there?

J: Ok, Erica, weirdest thing, I'm going as Waldo for Halloween this year.

E: (Silence on the line)

J: You there?

Without knowing it, my brother and I came up with the same old-school Halloween costume. Eerie, right? We're not twins, we have never had some spooky sibling connection where we both know what the other is thinking.

We're just both weird enough to come up with Where's Waldo for Halloween, I guess. Good thing we weren't going to be in the same city, let alone at the same party.

But there's more.

E: I have to be honest, J. The only reason I want to be Waldo is so I can be in the background of everybody's pictures.

J: Erica, that is what I have been telling people all day.

If we both show up at Christmas wearing the same sweater or something, I'm going to be worried.

Erica vs. technology

I’ve never claimed to be particularly adept at technology.

Exhibit A: I once got into a mini-fight with my then-boyfriend over Tivo. He asked me to set Tivo before we went out to dinner. I tried, I really did. Tivo obviously hated me as evidenced by its refusal to work. Then-boyfriend said something along the lines of “Oh come on, it’s not that hard.” I threw the Tivo remote across the room. Stupid remote had too many buttons anyway.

Exhibit B: I have never owned an iPod. I did own a generic MP3 player that I won at a work Christmas party about five years ago. Actually, I won a personal DVD player but after partaking in a few drinks in the parking lot (It was a dry county and the party was in the high school cafeteria. We had to smuggle our liquor in. Good times.) a co-worker convinced me to trade him for the MP3 player. So that’s what a few vanilla vodka and diet cokes will get ya, my friends: a crappy MP3 player.

Exhibit C: My dad bought me a new flat-screen TV for my birthday this year. My birthday is in August. I still can’t figure out the TV. I don’t have DVR, it’s just regular cable. Except it’s not. There are seven channel 11s. 11-1, 11-2, 11-3….Who needs seven channel 11s?

And now, in the latest battle in the Erica vs. technology war, I am sad to report that once again, technology has won.

I went to the park to walk the other day. Although I still do not have an iPod, I do have an iPhone. (Work paid for it.) So I downloaded (uploaded?) some songs to my phone figuring I’d use the iPod feature and get a good workout while jamming to some cheesy late '90s/early '00s pop.

So imagine my frustration when I’ve get a good pace going, singing along with JC Chasez to Nsync’s “It’s Gonna Be Me” and bam! The song stops. (Coincidentally, that was also the moment I realized I was singing out loud. Oops, sorry fellow park-goers. Also, no judging because cheesy pop songs are the best to walk to.)

I slow my pace, pull the iPhone out of my pocket, give it a quizzical stare, and advance to the next song. About a minute in that song stops, too. After several minutes of standing in place and pushing at random buttons, I figure out the problem.

Clearly, my iPhone has decided all on its own that it isn’t going to play songs all the way through.

The only way I can make it play a full song is to manually select one song at a time from the list. Which means that about every 3 minutes and 24 seconds, I have to stop to change songs because I’m not coordinated enough to walk briskly and use my phone at the same time, thus completely defeating the purpose of getting in some good exercise. I gave up after two miles.

Technology: 1, Erica: 0

Epilogue: So I told a coworker, who does happen to be particularly adept at technology, the issue I was having with my phone and that I thought it was broken. He took the phone, changed one setting, and everything works again. Apparently, techonology only hates me.

I'm giving this blogging thing a go

I’m a recovering reporter, so I don’t write as much as I used to. I feel like all my one-liners, descriptive vocabulary words, and general creativity are fleeing from my brain faster than…hmmm…need an analogy… See? I got nothing.

So I decided to write again. Everyday. Just for fun and just for me.

But then I remembered one of my favorite parts of being a reporter: seeing my byline.

‘Cause after all, what’s the point of writing if no one can read it and tell you how good you are?

I’m kidding. Kinda. I do occasionally love to be the center of attention. When I was in college I used to joke that the world should be Erica-centric and revolve exclusively around me. The world didn’t take my suggestion, so I’m creating my own revolution.

Hence, my new blog: Ericacentric. It’s all Erica, all the time. Or rather, it’s all my random thoughts, wonderings, and opinions. And if you know me (which you would have to if you’re humoring me enough to read this) then you know that I have lots of those. I only hope they’re funny enough to keep you entertained.

Before you commit to reading what I have to say, I feel it’s my duty to at least let you know what kind of writer I am.

• I have a tendency to start every other sentence with the word “so”. So don’t say I didn’t warn you.

• When I took a creative writing class in college, my secret dream was to have at least one of my classmates deem my writing “wickedly funny”. Never happened. Jerks.

• I occasionally look up big words after I write them just to make sure I used them correctly in a sentence.

• I change names to protect the innocent, or the not so innocent as the case is more likely to be.

I told myself going into this that I would blog something, even if it’s just a fleeting thought, everyday. At least that way, even if no one reads it, I would have a daily diary of my life that I can look back on when I’m old and gray and remember “that one time when”… But then I realized that I’m pretty good at starting strong and fading fast (insert your own ‘that’s what she said’ joke here), so I make no promises of how often this will be updated.

So that’s it. Start revolving around me.

Or at least read a couple entries before you get bored and move on. Then lie to me and tell me you read it everyday. I’ll take that, too.