People Born in 2000 Can Drink Now

So it’s a new year, but you knew that. New year, same shit dude. Everyone thought last year was the worst but in all honesty, I made some awesome friends and traveled, loved every minute of “work” and didn’t get my heart broken once. You have to try a LOT harder to beat the dumpster fire that was Elizabeth 2019 after 5-15-19. 

The irony? Just yesterday, January of 2021, someone else pulled an “I know you already have a flight to Tampa booked for THIS WEEK but I changed my mind so bye” which didn’t trigger me at all…I’m still going because I’ll be damned to miss out on a vacation that I’ve already packed for. You all know the effort it takes to make sure I travel with everything I could possibly need. I’m gonna kayak and adopt a manatee. 

I’ll post another time about why we DO NOT date men under the age of 28 at a minimum. Especially when you know damn well what it is that you want and are more than capable of adulting while managing your time wisely. 

Christmas and New Years’ were not much different than the usual but still dope. I got rollerblades and I am determined to figure out how to use them and like, stop, without bleeding. I also got a proper jacket for sub-zero degrees in Chicago and GOT Catan which is so confusing that it took literal hours to figure out how to even set it up. Super love it when people buy me alcohol as a gift and the wine was litty titty. I spent NYE dancing and laughing and tripping with my girl which was more fun than I can put into words. She was my midnight kiss last year too so maybe that’s bad juju but we shall see…

It’s not like RBG and Regis can die again.

I miss SoulCycle something fierce and have been streaming Peloton classes with my spin bike recently that put me in a really great mood. Yesterday I did a quick ride, danced my way through the shower, and was ready to watch The Bachelor with snacks on deck by 7:30. It was a great plan for Mondays going forward. I also want to read a bit more and finish some books this year so I’ll be balancing that with my full-time classload and this mission to actually lose weight before summer. You’d think I would have made some progress by now but half the fun of Christmas is spending days eating shit and drinking while opening presents. Consistency is key and if this year sees reopening the Aerial studio, Soul, or the new dance studio I will be joining, there’s hope. Also, DIRECTLY across the street from my nanny family they’re building a giant new rock climbing gym. Just take all my money already. 

I’ve been asked a few times during this pandemic what my hobbies are and the answer genuinely is “a bunch of shit I literally cannot do anymore” so that’s depressing. I’m getting sick of tv. I’ll always love a movie in bed with a glass of wine or a good show binge but I really feel like I’ve seen everything worth watching now. I can definitely turn up my reading game and try to finish some of these damn books. Of course, they had to make The Stand into a limited series on some channel which means I need to work harder on finishing the last 1,550 pages of that one so I can watch. 

Anyway, I’m packing the other day and looking for my little travel speaker (her name is EWA which is very Avatar-like and was wonderful in Thailand) and she’d been missing for some time which means I had to go through just about everything to find her. I know I talk a lot about my stuff and how much of it I have and how I love it all, and I do. But holy guacamole actually going through it all the other day was a fucking chore. I mean (and please don’t rob me), I own one of everything there is to own. I love that because I’m prepared to travel anywhere or do anything but when it’s all being stored in my itty bitty city apartment and my even smaller bedroom, it’s like JESUS BRO this is a lot. Just under my bed alone, there are three suitcases and three bins of clothes. One of those suitcases houses all my ski gear, which doesn’t include warm base layers that are stored with all of my hats, gloves, and scarves. The rest of my “outdoor” shit is in the giant storage container we have in the hall for that sort of stuff. But if you don’t need a suitcase, I have a duffle bag and a little “weekender” bag to use. When I travel I like to have a smaller backpack or a little crossbody bag for my phone and chapsticks and I have SEVERAL of each of those.

Electronics? Chargers? A jacket for ANY weather? SHOES for any outfit or occasion? A variety of animal slippers? A wetsuit? Three different muscle massagers? Got ‘em. 

The other thing I noticed the other day is that the lighting options in just my room alone are a bit much. I’m at like three different lamps, string lights, strip lights under my desk, a candle warmer with a bulb, and the overhead. My new Pura scent thing also has a light that can be customized to any color. I could literally set them all up to create a friggen light show in my room. Setting a mood is easy but also doesn’t need to be that customizable. Half of them I don’t even need to get up to turn on or off because Alexa controls them. 

If Alexa would hang my clean laundry, I’d be so set. 

Obviously, my skincare collection is beyond everything you could ever need for every sort of condition and I have three different ways to curl my hair that I always wear straight. I buy anything disposable or that needs to be replaced at fucking Costco so you could show up at my place with nothing but the clothes on our back and I’d have you covered for months. 

While going through all of my bags and bins looking for EWA I also found that I keep white strips everywhere and I don’t even unpack them. They aren’t cheap so I’m happy to have about a zillion pairs but teeth can only get so white. 

You just don’t use everything you own all the time so I forgot about some of these items. Most of it was purchased for the purpose of travel or exercise or just a wardrobe that needs to fit a size 0-7 (because my weight is about as consistent as my dating history). I think I know that this year I basically don’t have to buy anything that isn’t food which is sort of a relief. 

That being said, presents are ALWAYS welcome and even encouraged. 

In a different life, my need for total preparedness (which is apparently a word) would mean I was one of those doomsday preppers. I don’t hate the idea of always having something when you need it and I could definitely survive for a LONG time on the amount of flavored soda water, protein bars, almonds, and liquor I currently possess. I mean, we did have a lockdown last year and if COVID was more like the virus in “Contagion” we wouldn’t have been able to shop as often as we did. 

Find the meme about how we don’t leave the house because “I hate people and my stuff is here”. 

Even after last year, most things haven’t changed. The Bears are still a huge disappointment, pizza still tastes better than broccoli, my socks still all lose their partner within days of purchase, I still only wear something other than sweatpants on special occasions, waking up in the morning is still a bitch, and there are still people who think Donny won the election. 

As always, I will keep you updated on my rollerblading progress which will be a bit easier without snow and ice on the ground. If you’re in the city and you see someone who looks unconscious on the sidewalk it might be me so please check.