I celebrate the Super Bowl exactly how I celebrate religious holidays like Christmas and Easter. I could care less about the “true meaning” of the celebration – I’m just happy I get to spend time with friends, eat delicious food, and be happy. Because those things are what matter, not Jesus or what team wins.

I don’t know what teams are playing, but I do know there’ll be guacamole and laughing at sexist beer commercials. Good enough for me.

I get annoyed every time I have to scroll down a drop down menu to find “United States” because it’s not automatically listed at the top. And every time I have to remind myself how stupid it is to get annoyed.

Feel free to admit little privileged things you do in the comments.

I know I haven’t been blogging much lately. I’m not sure if I have an explanation – I’ve just been feeling particularly uninspired and unmotivated. I’ve been reading lots of interesting and even rage inducing stories that would typically have me typing away, yet it’s not translating into words on a screen. I’ve mentally written long, potentially insightful posts in my head, only to have no will to actually write them out once I’m finally home with some free time.

I have conflicting hypotheses. One is the gloom of Seattle winter. I always get mopey during the winter, but the lack of sunlight and constant drizzle is getting to me. I’m having a hard time waking up in the morning, and it’s pitch black an hour before I’m even leaving work. Bleh. Thankfully I’m visiting my family in Florida for Christmas, so I’ll absorb a little sunlight there.

My alternative hypothesis is that I’ve actually acquired a life. It’s hard to write a rage filled post about misogyny when a kitten is purring on your lap. It’s hard to stay peeved when you’re cuddling with your boyfriend instead. Heck, you just have less time to write when you actually have fun things to do instead.

Unfortunately I don’t have a good way to test my hypotheses, since going to Florida will ALSO remove the kitten and boyfriend variables.

So…a little help with my writer’s block? Ask me questions in the comments about whatever your heart desires, and I will answer them in another post. I know this tends to get my creative juices flowing. They can be as silly or serious as you’d like. Honestly right now I’d probably write more about which Hogwarts house I’d belong to than my thoughts on some philosophical issue about atheism.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! I have to admit, I woke up a little mopey today. This is my first Thanksgiving that I’ve been totally alone. Last year the gloom didn’t quite catch up with me, since I spent my Thanksgiving weekend doing a speaking tour in Vancouver. Even though I was technically surrounded by strangers, they were so nice that I felt like I was surrounded by friends. I used to love Thanksgiving since it was one of the few times in the year that I got to spend time with my brothers (they’re 11 and 14 years older than me). Well, and the awesome food is a perk. But I don’t have the money to fly home for a weekend, so I’m on my own.

But I couldn’t stay mopey for long, because I know I have a lot to be thankful for. Like having great friends who bake you peanut butter chocolate chunk cookies as a thank you for taking care of their cat while they’re gone:

Or for having enough money and cooking ability that I can splurge on a nice Thanksgiving meal for myself:

For having a great roommate who’s letting me play his copy of the new Zelda game while he’s gone:

For having an adorable kitten who’s helping me play Zelda. And by helping, I mean she thinks the Wiimote is her mortal enemy.

For being able to spend your Thanksgiving sitting around in your underwear instead of all dressed up:

(No photograph for this one)

And for having such advanced technology that I can Skype with my family even though they’re on the opposite corner of the US.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today is my 24th birthday. Huzzah.

24 is one of those ages that isn’t particularly special. I can already buy alcohol, and it doesn’t end in a zero. Next year I can finally rent a car without some absurd insurance price hike. Awww yeeeeeaaah.

I do think it’s funny how different birthdays are now compared to when I was a little kid. When you’re little, you’re counting down the days five months out. You’re excited about half birthdays. This year I didn’t even realize my birthday was coming up until I got cards in the mail. And instead of looking forward to cake and a mountain of Legoes, I’m looking forward to going to dinner at a nice Italian place and cuddles.

…Okay, a mountain of Legoes would still be pretty awesome.

Topeka, Kansas is considering decriminalizing domestic violence in order to save money. I don’t care how big your budget problems are – this shouldn’t even be up for debate. Even if you’re looking at this from cold, Machiavellian reasons, it costs the state more money in medical aid and lost work hours to let women (and more rarely but not negligibly, men) keep getting abused.

But legalizing marijuana? What a preposterous idea!