the holiday season is always kind of a mixed bag for me. i’ve had some bad, bad holidays experiences and so now i sort of look at the holidays with less enthusiasm as i used to. but to offset this moody blue that comes over me, i general apply shopping therapy. and so it’s usually around this time of the year that the deals looks even sweeter than they usually do. and so it’s usually around christmas that i end up getting this or that for myself.

i swear though, i’m going to stop. really. right AFTER the banana republic friends and family sale this weekend. really. i swear.

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the power of positive thinking is amazing.

that being said, it’s really hard trying to keep a positive attitude sometimes. i think lately it’s become more of a struggle than before. someone called me on it today and there wasn’t much that i could say about it. i guess part of the reason why it’s hard to keep a positive attitude is because every time i try to find the silver lining to a situation, that silver lining becomes gray.

but still, i’m stubborn, so i’ll try to find the silver lining…again.

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i’m talking about impulse shopping. it truly is the bane of my existence. today, having never had plans to purchase anything, i got something on an impulse. maybe it’s because i haven’t gotten anything in a while…maybe it’s because it only feels like i haven’t gotten anything in a while. whatever the case may be, today’s purchase was a little excessive. i think that i will have to moderate myself a little bit.

so because of my uncontrollable shopping habits, the people who really suffer here are my friends. cheap-o christmas gifts to you all! =P

the thing about impulse shopping is that you never know what you are going to get. i think this is my favorite form of shopping because i really do enjoy the cool finds that i do end up getting. it’s not as much fun to go shopping with a purpose because you know what you are going to get and after you get, it’s kind of anticlimatic because well…you’ve been expecting it this whole time.

’tis the season to be jolly, fa la la la la la la la la.

i just bought myself my own christmas present. i’m not going to say what it is yet, but i guess this year, xmas will be super heavily happy for me.

ahhhh, finding comfort in shopping. this can become an expensive form of therapy.

my roommate just came home from work. damn, it’s late to be coming home.

well, come to think of it, damn it’s late to be up coding for me.

i wish i wasn’t suffering from so much insomnia lately.

oh well.

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i feel almost dirty. i feel like i’ve betrayed people. a few people have commented about liking the new layout, but there were also a few…no [url=http://www.geocities.com/sushisis/]just one[/url] voice of bloody murder for switching over to “the dark side”.

i sort of feel compelled to blog and blog and blog. but then nothing comes up. i think that’s why i liked waiting until the end of the day to put all of these thoughts together.

anyway, work was a little bit of a rough day for some and an easy day for others. my day sort of fell somewhere inbetween. we had pizza ordered in for the engineers because we had to be around in case anything bad happened for a server upgrade. the upgrade didn’t go quite as smoothly as planned, but i guess these sorts of things happen.

i’ve come to realize that i really hate the sysadmin type of work. it just doesn’t agree with me anymore. i don’t want to find out why hardware things are broken. why a router doesn’t see the internet or share its connection or whatever. i just don’t care. i introduce enough broken things in my code, having to deal with the hardware layer is just pure irritating for me.

but oh well. setting up the wireless router last night was already a bit of a chore for me. i guess i just don’t have the patience i used to have…which is weird because this was probably a whole lot easier to set up than anything else before. i guess i’m growing impatient with my old age.

i’m sort of disappointed with how the journal page looks, i sort of wanted to spruce it up a little…but i fear that i’m far too lazy so it may very well be that this is as good as it gets. content over design, right? actually, i’m more interested in getting some other functional stuff working here that i may very well not touch the look and feel for a while. the first thing that i’m going to have to add is a decent blogroll type feature. it is such a pain in the butt to update that list of links!

girl 1: if i were a guy, i’d totally be checking out your boobs.
girl 2: no way! if it were me, i’d totally be checking out your booty.
girl 3: really? you know, that would make you an ass-man.
girl 1: i’m a boobs man all the way.

…

the things i hear…

—–

we went 3-1 last night. it probably should have been 4-0, but that’s the story of our season. still, we played quite well and i was happy with how it all went. i was hitting particularly well last night. in fact, i was swinging the hardest i think i’ve ever swung before….and they were landing in. it was quite a sight to see.

i’m pretty excited about playoffs. i think both my teams have a good shot at making it through the ranks.

—–

i went to cirque over the weekend in the city. it was a rainy sunday evening, so i didn’t see any of the protesters out there about the recent controversy that cirque was involved in. apparently, cirque let go of a performer who was HIV positive and there’s a lot of protesting involved as a result of that…but i guess the rain stops people from protesting. it’s too bad, i would have lent them my support, but i had gotten these tickets a long time ago and i still wanted to see cirque…though i find their justification for their practices to be completely invalid.

anyway, cirque was cool. i think that i enjoyed varekai more than allegria…it was definitely more mystical and magical.

it’s a shame that they don’t allow photography there, i’m sure that it would have been quite an event to shoot. oh well.

this year i went home for thanksgiving dinner. it was pretty good dinner with the usual dinner items: turkey, cranberries, salad, stuffing, and a zuccini casserole. every year we have at least those dishes. every year i think to myself that maybe, just maybe this will be the year that i will actually *like* the zuccini casserole, but, alas, no…i didn’t like it this year either.

i usually end up trying a little bit of it because my parents rave about how good it is and how much they like it and how i should try it. it’s the same pattern every year…and i still don’t like it. i don’t know why i keep trying it, thinking that i might actually like it this time. i guess some traditions die hard.

after dinner, my dad and i sifted through all of the advertisements looking for the good sales. i think that my dad woke up at 5AM this morning to try and get in on some deals at best buy’s 6 hour sale which started at 6AM this morning. it’s craziness, i tell you…sheer madness.

after we finished looking at ads, my dad challenged me to some games of pool. the first two games were overwhelmingly large victories for me. i crushed him. ph33r m3. but then, he came back and his aim was true and he proceeded to romp me in three straight games. after that i decided to give up and rest.

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