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"This is why we don't visit Starbucks," he grunts to himself as he clings to 2005. Twenty hours to go. Was this the way it was supposed to end? A clack-ball noisemaker sits silent on the desk. There are no champagne flutes, but hopefully someone checked the batteries in the light-up martini glasses. The big finish, the flourish at the end, is at least three grocery stores away. New Year's Eve. This is the speed trap of holidays. Christmas with the family is four lane highways, no traffic. This day is the pounding of pots, pans, and expectations. Don't let that get to you. Fireworks, balls dropping, all the symbols of a fresh start. Perfection, purity, potential, all those p's that never quite come to be. No worries. Smell that, my friend? It's that brand-new-year smell. Nothing like it. My boss won't be thrilled, but you look like an intelligent sort. What's it going to take to get you into a fully-loaded 2006?

2005 Lists

When I wasn't watching TV, or running, or playing Ultimate, I was tracking my life in lists.

States visited in 2005

1. Virginia
2. Maryland
3. Delaware
4. Connecticut
5. New Jersey
6. New York
7. Rhode Island
8. Missouri
9. Iowa
10. Minnesota
11. Michigan
12. Kansas
13. North Carolina
14. Tennessee
15. Colorado
16. Georgia (Provisional- 8 airport visits)
17. Indiana
18. Massachusetts
19. Alabama


Books read in 2005

1. The Effects of Living BAckwards
2. Seat of the Soul
3. Clockwork Orange
4. The Last Juror
5. Cat's Eye
6. The Wedding
7. Angels and Demons
8. Bobos in Paradise
9. Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking
10. Fast Food Nation
11. Count of Monte Cristo
12. Blue Shoes
13. Harry Potter
14. The Notebook
15. Bel Canto
16. The Magician's Assistant
17. I am Charlotte Simmons
18. Truth & Beauty
19. The Tipping Point
20. Jitterbug Perfume
21. The Alchemist
22. Kite Runner
23. Pride and Prejudice


New-to-me movies of 2005

1. A Very Long Engagement
2. Coach Carter
3. In Good Company
4. Hero
5. God is great, and I'm not
6. Spanglish
7. Bride and Prejudice
8. Hitch
9. Whale Rider
10. Million Dollar Baby
11. Anastasia
12. Ray
13. Get Shorty
14. Melinda and Melinda
15. Being Julia
16. I, Robot
17. East is east
18. The Games of their lives
19. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
20. A lot like love
21. Bourne Supremacy
22. The Life and Death of Peter Sellers
23. Pink Panther
24. Kinsey
25. Beautiful Girls
26. (Something about time travel?) Primer.
27. Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
28. The Longest Yard
29. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
30. Crash
31. Ladder 49
32. Wimbeldon
33. Batman Begins
34. Mr. and Mrs. Smith
35. War of the Worlds
36. Fantastic 4
37. Wedding Crashers
38. The Notebook
39. Happy Endings
40. A love song for Bobby Long
41. Broken Flowers
42. The Island
43. The Grizzly Man
44. Kung Fu Hustle
45. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
46. The 40-year-old Virgin
47. Funny Ha Ha
48. Guess Who
49. Serenity
50. Just Like Heaven
51. Elizabethtown
52. Tootsie
53. Stuck on you
54. Matchstick Men
55. Shopgirl
56. 12 Angry Men
57. Pride and Prejudice
58. Walk the Line
59. The Wedding Date
60. Madagascar
61. Good Night and Good Luck
62. Second Best
63. The Family Stone
64. Cinderella Man
65. King Kong
66. Scenes from a mall

Pulled in a sadder direction
I think I pulled a muscle while watching The Gilmore Girls. It'd be fine if it was during the jumping portion of my evening, but it was during the sitting. It's not just any muscle either. It's a back muscle and it's in the worst possible place. I can't reach it. It's in that spot. I reach over the shoulder and nothing. I twist the arm back and under- nothing. There will be no self-massage. I tried to use a letter-opener, but I just bent it. So Johnny Cash strums and I twist in funny ways and feel kind of alone. It's not a bad kind of alone. It's just an I-can't-reach-the-pulled-muscle-in-my-back-so-I-keep-rubbing-up-against-corners alone. The corners aren't working. And Cash, he's kind of down. I think he's upset about that sore throat. Or else prison. As for those Gilmore Girls, while funny, they are not actually roll-around-in-the-cheescake happy. They're closer to reality, but with snappier dialouge. So there's that.

Wouldn't that look good on a stained-oak sign?

Home is where your underwear drawer is.

Two things I learned from Kong

1. If you're scared enough, you can out-run and/or dodge a brachiosaurus.

2. The best a writer can hope for is sloppy seconds from a giant gorilla.

They took the Holiday out of my ham
Same-It's an excellent ham*- for Thanksgiving. This is Christmas and at Christmas we eat Holiday Ham. It's got that sweet outline of crumbly goodness. It's got that hint of reindeer. The pigs that have the honor(misfortune?) of becoming Holiday Hams are obviously raised to the sounds of Bing Crosby while suckling on egg nog.

This year, my family has chosen another pig. It's a fine ham, excellent even, but it lacks the taste of Christmas. Therefore, I will have to rely more heavily on my other 5 senses, 4 considering that my ESP is in the shop. So fellow celebrators, expect a lot of sniffing. Expect a lot of "Whaaat?" Expect some extra looking. If you're under the mistletoe, expect a lot of touching.

I'm sorry. They took my Holiday Ham and I can't be responsible for the other senses in their attempts to make up the difference.


*I didn't know I was so partial to Holiday Ham until they took it away. "They" need to accept full responsibility and stop blaming my mom.

WIS-consin
KC, the good side-I was in the MKE airport reading MKE weekly when I realized that of course everyone's favorite MKE blogger would also be writing half the stories. I looked around to see if I could enjoy a Sprecher Root Beer with tales of a nursing home artist and Adventure-bound Milwaukee-ites, but it was not to MKE...er be.

I've got the Syndication Blues
My TV-watching is creeping up. That 70s Show, Everybody Loves Raymond, Friends, and Seinfeld are on like 40 times a day. It's nearly irresistible. Sometimes I switch between them, 'cause they are all on at once. So it's like That 70s Loves Seinfeld Friends. It's this Voltron of Television. And in this case, the sum is totally not greater than the parts. I end up missing all the jokes. I have to resort to laughing with the laugh track and that makes me sad. Three kinds of sad. There's the "Why can't I just control myself?" sad. And the "You've already seen this episode twice" sad, and then the "And I'm just talking about twice this week" sad. Then I get the sniffles. It's nothing. There's something in my eye.

Chandler, hold me!

A brief history of cake and the call for a breakfast burrito
Birthday cake has had its day. Hundreds of days, really. Thousands even. Sometime in the late 1830s, when egg sales were sagging, the esteemed John Crooker decided he could inject life back into the egg market, though not the egg itself, if he could find a tasty use for the egg. The combination of egg and some other stuff lead to the invention, or discovery depending on your take on cake and its pre-ordainedness, of cake. To make a long story shorter, but not nearly short enough, Cooker unveiled his cake at the anniversary of the birth of his niece Alice and the birthday cake was born. As you know, Alice Cooker went on to marry Ralph Crocker and they birthed Betty who would change the way cooking was done all over the world. And while Betty gets a lot of credit, it was really Alice that was able to spread the cake because she brought the icing. Oh. My. Alice brought the icing like Einstein brought the gravity.

Alice was a natural cheerleader and heavily involved in the church. Using the skills her uncle had taught her, Alice first cranked out cakes for every member's birthday. Later, Alice would put her cake skills into care packages. That church just happened to be the largest church of gold seekers in all of the East coast. When the rush hit, Alice packed up the church care packages and sent the gold seekers on their way with a slice of cake and godspeed. The icing didn't travel well, but the sustenance provided was so delicious and the milk-straight-from-the-cow moustaches so hilarious, that nobody seemed to mind. Since so few from congregation were finding gold, they started a series of bakeries out West called the California Golden Cakes and Icing shoppes. Later the name was shortened to Goldies Cakes.

Goldies Cakes were so delicious that some people forgot about the gold rush all together. Birthdays in the California Territory soon served cake as the primary dish. Meanwhile in the East, Alice and her cakes had become so popular that some people stopped eating vegetables. Increased cake popularity soon spread from the coasts to Middle America. No one really knows how, since people on the coasts at the time considered Middle America nothing more than a big horse trail. Despite that mystery, once a trend like cake takes hold of Middle America and both coasts, there is really no stopping it. Americans everywhere were eating cake on birthdays and often on other holidays. Cake was a rite of passage. Cake was the answer and Where is the fountain of youth? was the question. Cake was the hottest thing since tobacco. There were cake sales and cake parties. There were cake dances and cake town meetings. Abraham Lincoln said, "let them eat cake" when asked about the growing rivalry in the North and South. Little did he know...

It's fairly obvious where I'm going. Cake is wonderful, but wouldn't you rather have a Birthday Breakfast Burrito? Cake had the gold rush and the civil war. Cake had Daniel Boone and Perry Como.

I see an opportunity here. It's time to replace cake. It's time to unveil the Birthday Breakfast Burrito. It's different. It's spicy. It reflects the current values of America. Cake is passe. Cake was great for what it was, but the Breakfast Burrito has so much potential. It's about melding cultures. It's about getting a complete meal in the morning. Fight obesity. Be patriotic. Enjoy the salsa. Celebrate your special day with a Birthday Breakfast Burrito. Carpe Diem means just a little more when it starts with egg, sausage and a hint of oregano wrapped in a fresh hot tortilla.

The Breakfast Burrito is the new cake. Blow that out.

Live. Nude*. Customer. Service.
I gotta tell you- I've been pleased as punch with speaking to actual human beings when I'm cashing in gift certificates for purchases lately. They're friendly. They're helpful. One of them even gave me a dollar!

I love the Internets, don't get me wrong. It's a wondrous convenient place to siphon my money, but every so often, it sure is swell to talk to somebody to place an order for llama**.

Operators are standing by. Call now!

*The nudity of said service is unverifiable.
**No animals were harmed in my purchase. Uh. Er. Unless you count the cows that will be made into steaks. They're a little bit harmed.

Back and buckin'
Lick the salt.
Shoot Jose.
Suck the lime.
Ride the bull.
It seemed straight-forward enough. Yet, I was nervous. I didn't know what I was doing, and not just with the tequila.

Mechanical bulls are bucking saw horses covered in faux-cow skin. Immobile, they look harmless. Headless, buttless, completely still animals often do. To notice the mechanical bull's natural habitat is to question how harmless such a contraption really is. Anything surrounded on all sides by three-foot thick brown cushioning is either dangerous or fun. I was about to find out that this particular breed was a little bit of both.

The riding advice I had received earlier in the evening was of little to no help, but the bull operator must have taken pity on me when I foolishly reached for a second riding glove.

"You only need one," he said beneath his brown cowboy hat. Sheepishly I put the left glove back as he pantomimed the bull-riding posture I should take. "You grab hold and throw the other hand back like so."

I half-heartedly mimicked his gesture.

With a little hop off the cushioning, I climbed up on the bull. The cowboy told me to scoot up. "Git that hand in real close, almost in your crotch."

I did as I was told.

The sign for buck is to throw that ungloved hand up. It wasn't long before the bucking began. At first it was a little like riding a drug-store horse that takes quarters. I may have been a little dramatic in the early part of that ride. When the "head" went down, I leaned back and when it came up, I leaned forward, all the while gripping tightly with my knees and my hand close to my crotch. It wasn't complicated, or even particularly fun. Just really funny and a little awkward. As the bull got more comfortable, or as the operator saw that I did, there was more bucking and even a little twisting. I got caught in a funny position and realizing I had two rides left decided not to fight it and tumbled to the cushions.

I popped right up and rode again. This time the bucking and twisting came faster, but I had the rhythm and the giggles. I found it hard not to laugh as I was spun and rocked all over that bull's home. I rode a good long while, perhaps as much as 30 seconds before I grew tired of having my knuckles slammed into my privates. Again rather than hold on with too much pride, I tumbled off.

I stood up again, a little less ready for my final ride.

"You can take a break," said the cowboy. Sweeter words have not often been spoken.

So I took a break. During my break I considered the chafing on my thighs. I considered the awkward way that my back had been turned. Most of all I considered the giggles. Mechanical bulls make me smile.

I readied for my final ride. When I motioned to the operator that I was going in, he smirked at me. I had a hunch I knew what that meant, but I was ready. Probably four whole seconds of ready before the bull bucked me right off laughing most of the way to the ground.

"That's when I have my fun," the cowboy smiled. "The third ride is for me."

"I figured," I smiled back.

After that I watched the bull toss the likes of frat boys, cowboys, and 45-year-old birthday girls having a whole lot of fun. I watched the bull get seduced, ridden backwards, and treated like a diving board. A debate roared inside of me. Chafe some more and ride the bull or wait for another day.

My legs won out, but I will ride again.

Time out
Sometimes it feels like everyone is watching and listening and I can't hide. On those days, I erase blog posts and feel very paranoid. Today is one of those days. It snowed last night. But then you knew that. Because you're watching. In the old days it was enough to gossip among the people I knew. Now I end up gossiping to the general Internets. Gossip to the general Internets doesn't feel right. I'm going to take a few days to think about what I've done. It's very age 10. You should try it.

Mmmm.
I like that the Godiva Hot Chocolate packet says please.
Please prepare Godiva Hot Cocoa with milk only.

I think I like my generic Marshmallow Avalanche Hot Chocolate better though.

Remember this kids: Manners and a fancy box will only get you so far.

The post went sour
This was going to be a self-deprecating post. It might have been clever, but not entirely on purpose. It was going to be a post about a boy, who by most definitions was now a man, had overcome some obstacles, though not the obstacles to very likely become a winner. The boy was proud, but rather than admit it, he'd announce that he was a winner with a smirk on his face.
"I'm a winner, but..." he'd say. The list of buts wouldn't be long, because the boy's ability to mock himself was limited by his pride. Age-old struggle. Modern-day twist. "I'm a winner, but only in my age group of paying members of my running club. It's probably 10 or 15 people."

The smirk would say "It doesn't matter."

The eyes would tell a different story.

In the seeds of the thought that was going to lead to the self-deprecating post, the boy realized something. He was a winner. He is a winner. Somewhere he thought he heard Dr. Seuss giggling, but he pressed forward with the idea that had been in the seed. Every event, every competition, everything he'd ever been in was about a niche. He was proud when he was the best runner in high school. Heck, he was proud when he was the best runner in his class. Whittle it away and that wasn't 10 to 15 people. Sure, there were 400 people in the class, but he only had 5 teammates his age. If it was ok to be thrilled by being 1 out of 5, then it's ok to be thrilled to be 1 out of 10. Why not relish the victories of a niche? Because before any of us can be best in the world, we have to be best in the room. And then best in the building. Best in the city. The county. The state. The country. The hemisphere. And there's no reason not to relish every step of the way. There's no reason not to take pride in besting those 10 to 15 people. And better yet, though the boy hasn't mastered that lesson nearly as well, there's no reason not to take pride in trying to best those 10 to 15 people. More than winning, it means something to attempt to win. Or even to attempt to best, or just test one self. To be proud to get out and run a 5k in 19:31, a mile in 4:52, 3000 meters in 10:14, another 5k in 17:56, and then 10 miles in 66:04.

Whether those were age-group victories or not, doesn't the attempt and the gratification that came with each race make the boy a winner?

And isn't self-deprecation so much easier to read?

Winter has its moments
Coffee-flavored gelato (Gelato! as the sign says) at the cafe that I pass by twice everyday. The hot chocolate and letters written to the sounds of Dawn Landes, Hem, and Autumn Defense. The laundry was done until I went and perspired again. I sat, quietly on a bench, and tried so hard not to wait. It always feels like I'm waiting, but I don't want to always be waiting, sometimes I want bench-riding to be, to be, the activity. I got a real letter today. I think my friends are trying to make sure the post office doesn't die. I finally made it to the post office, myself. I'm trying to do my part too. I helped a lady pick up what she'd dropped, which inspired me to try to help a man save a button. He was too quick. I am not a button-saver. When I said "thank you," I meant it. I think the clerk knew, because she smiled. It looked like a real smile. I think I still know the difference. I'm not sick. The words are coming out and I like the way some of them sound. It feels like I'm pushing at the door that opens up to the hallway that leads to a good place. But then the darkness comes so fast. The good things that happened in the light, fall into the shadows. The trees get naked, but they don't seem to enjoy it. It doesn't smell like snow yet, but the sky remembers. Then the stars remember. Then I remember- this used to be my favorite season.