Thanksgiving was EXACTLY like I predicted. I got very depressed at one point, as I realized how unhappy I was at the moment. I also realized that it has been since 2004 that I ate Thanksgiving with my family. I can't bring it up with Michael yet, but next year we are going to my mom and dad's house.

My day started with a trip to the shop to unload and load kilns, and as I was leaving the house I somehow managed to step of the back stairs wrong and fell and twisted everything. My knees, back, neck and head all hurt. Managed to not rip jeans/get muddy, but did spill coffee everywhere.

So, that probably contributed to my sad day.

Black Friday sale was a total bust. Won't be doing that again. Or will open later next year. Wasn't worth getting up at 5 for it.

Alabama football. We won. Barely. Barely still counts, but it was too damn close. I was nauseated with tension. AND it killed business - we had two customers after kick-off.

My sister-in-law went out to Toys-R-Us at midnight, and got Henry a Leapster for $20. That was awesome, so Santa is almost finished. Or birthday. Still need to figure it all out.

I have no idea what day it is. Between Thanksgiving yesterday and the ballgame today, I'm lost. Tomorrow is Saturday, for the third day in a row.

So, Thanksgiving.

All things considered, I wish I was going to spend the day at work. I'd get so much more done.

I am going in about 8, and Michael and Henry are picking me up at the store and we'll go to my MIL's house. Then we'll endure that, and I'll be on my best behavior and just smile everytime I want to say something... not so nice. And then Michael and Henry will drive me back to my store so I can unload and load kilns tonight. Woo!

I'm opening at 6 in the morning for a beat the clock sale. I have no idea if it will be worth it, but we'll see. I'm terrified of two things: no customers and LOTS of customers, as I'll be working it by myself. It's okay - either way I think I can handle it.

I'm also thinking about our Christmas tree. Since I've opened the store, I've only had a tree once. But Henry is alllll about the tree. I'm going to have to rearrange the furniture to put a tree up, and I'm considering how we'll do this. Hmmm. And when? This weekend is out, so sometime this week? Or do we wait until after his birthday on the 15th, so it can be all about his birthday? I don't know. I do know it will be fake. The way the cats acted with the mums I brought in decided THAT.

I hope y'all have a Happy Thanksgiving (or, for non US folks - Happy Thursday). I hope there is minimal drama and maximum tastiness in your life today!

Oh my god between my husband and my son both just being assholes today, I want to run away from home. I have never been so angry at my son as I have been on *three* different occassions today.

I would also give ANYTHING to not have to go to Thanksgiving at my mother-in-law's tomorrow. ANYTHING. I was talking to my mom today and she was polishing silver and setting the table and getting the sideboard ready. Tomorrow I will eat on a card table on a disposable plate. I know that all families do things differently, but I don't want to go. And the only place I can really say that is here, because it hurts Michael's feelings that I don't want to go there.

But I don't.

And my son is an asshole.

I may need to go talk to some carbs about this.

And one more thing...

I need this tabletop letterpress like I need oxygen. I know that I have a problem with wanting craft supplies to hold and to pet and just show them love, but I saw this and just swooned. I LOVE IT. I don't even know how much it is, but I need to determine if it's something I really need (yes) and when I can get it (soon).

Oh, hell. It's only $150. I can so justify this. Mwa ha ha. Come to mama...

I'm not sure what it says about me, or the world in which we currently live, but my first reaction upon hearing about a mom reporting her one-month-old child being kidnapped (after being left in her running car) was not "oh no! poor mom and baby" but instead "oh no, she's killed her child and trying to hide it." This makes me sad.

And therefore I'm changing the subject. Because that's a yucky subject.

So my city has it's third mayor in a month. Our mayor was convicted of accepting bribes when he was a county commisioner, and so the acting president of the city council was named interim mayor. And then yesterday there was a new vote for president of the city council, and she was defeated as president of the cc, so the new president of the cc is now our mayor. And in a week there is going to be a special election (with 14 people running) to elect the new mayor - the new interim mayor isn't running, but the last one is. She doesn't have a snowball's chance of winning. So, in a few weeks, we'll have our FOURTH mayor in about two months. Awesome.

The guy who I hope will win, and probably has the best chance (he almost beat the guy who was convicted) lives in my neighborhood, and his kids are in elementary school where Henry will go to school. His youngest son and Henry look just alike. Every time we see him, he does a double-take at Henry. He's a good guy, with good ideas, so I hope he'll succeed.

In store news, the Skutt kiln is up and running again. OH THANK YOU GOD. My friend Jay, who owns two ice cream stores in town, knows this awesome electrician and he has become my awesome electrician. He came over last night and got the Skutt working, and it's like I can breathe again. I was trying to not freak out too terribly much, but at the same time... the freak out was looming. I have two other kilns, but they are smaller and pretty much add up to the volumn of the Skutt. So, I have just doubled my capacity. I can make it now. I know I can.

I can also tell it's the holiday season, because yesterday I unloaded a kiln that was at 180 degrees and didn't wear gloves. Yep. I'm pretty sure I don't have fingerprints anymore, either.

Today we should be smoking busy, and then we're going to get the store cleaned up and ready for Friday morning. I'll come by tomorrow to unload and load kilns, but other than that the shop should be ready for me to be there at 5 Friday. I have beat the clock starting at 6. I've LOST MY MIND. Not only am I giving my store away (woe!) but I have to get up at an ungodly hour to do so.

I made chicken tacos in the crock-pot yesterday. Seriously good, and so easy. Two pounds boneless skinless chicken breasts, two packets of low sodium taco mix and about a half cup of water. Plus this time I added a frozen bag of "Mexican" veggies - corn, black beans, onions and tomatoes. Cooked until done, then shredded. Served on flour tortillas, and I dressed mine with low-fat cream cheese and jalapenos instead of my "usual" toppings and it was FANTASTIC.

I had originally planned to make these creamy, and I was going to melt a block of cream cheese in the mix and then add chopped jalapenos, but when I mentioned this the stare from Michael made me change my mind. I still think it would be fantastic. Next time, and I'll just do it and not tell him.

This is the time of year (for the next four weeks) when I need to really plan ahead for meals. The crockpot is my friend, but it can also be an enemy because I really don't like to use canned cream of whatever soups. The biggest thing I've tried to watch has been my sodium intake, and canned soups are pretty nasty on that count. There is a crockpot community on LJ, and I've been following it. I want to try to carmelize onions and then make french onion soup, because I lurve that.

Yesterday was a good day at DIYC. We had many customers, and made many people very happy. That's always a good day. And we were within $50 of our goal for the day. I feel good for the rest of the week. I'm doing a beat the clock sale on Friday, and I'm totally dreading that. People get nasty when they are trying to be cheap. We'll see.

Of course today it's Monday and so Henry is sleeping in. OF COURSE.

Yesterday we settled on what we're doing for his birthday. I'm such a scrooge - I really don't want to do a birthday party. He just doesn't need the crap. I don't want to do one at the store (although I may the Sunday after his party if I start to feel really guilty). I feel like that's cheating to have the party at the store. We'll see. I would rather eat bugs that have one at a pump-it-up place or any other germ-infested party place. Gross. Double gross.

Anyway. His birthday. It's on a Tuesday this year, so the Sunday before we're going to ride the train from Birmingham to Tuscaloosa, about an hour's ride. My mom will pick us up at the train station and we'll go play in Tuscaloosa for an hour or two. My dad is doing a book signing that day, so we're going to wait until he's finished, and then go to my parents' house for the party. Cake, ice cream, pizza, etc. My aunt and uncle from Bham are driving down for the party (including bringing the cake for me) and then we'll ride back to Birmingham with them.

Woo! And he's getting his bed, so that's his big present. He's going to LOVE it. Yesterday he asked for a slide in his room. HA! I'm ahead of you there, bub.

Must go start the day - get a shower while he's still in bed, and then off to DIYC and then the grocery store. THAT should be fun. I'm terrified.

Today Michael and I were attempting to sleep in. All week long, we've had to wake Henry up at 8. This morning, we were all snuggly ignoring the fact that it was OMG after 7 and still in bed! Then.... Henry woke up at 7:15.

Boo.

We are having angst in our house, sponsored by my stepson and mother-in-law. I won't elaborate, since it's boring to everyone (including me), but I'm really not looking forward to Thursday. At all.

Yesterday at work was really good. We beat last year's numbers, but didn't reach goal for bonuses for everyone. We got close, but didn't make it. I also pointed out how we were just five dinner plates being sold away from making goal, and when the girls realized how close they were to making it, they realized how they can make it next weekend. I don't set weekday goals because they are more hit-and-miss, whereas weekend numbers tend to be more consistent.

OMG and ONE THING: We had a little boy painting yesterday named..... FRANKENSTINE (spelled that way). I SHIT YOU NOT. His name is FRANKENSTINE. He was there with a group painting ornaments and when he told my staffer his name, she looked at the teacher and she nodded. OMG we about DIED. Yes, we took a picture and emailed it to everyone. Because I'm a horrible person.

There were also a set of twins named Asia and India. My dad felt bad for India, being the subcontinent and all.

But.

FRANKENSTINE. ZOMG!

Sometimes, I am technologically challenged. I know this. I'm not happy with this.

To wit:

I cannot figure out how to get the television shows I've downloaded to itunes to transfer to my iphone. I do the "transfer purchases" thing, but I've got two episodes of Dinosaur Train sitting in itunes on my computer but not on the iphone where I need them so Henry can be entertained while I'm at the grocery store without making me a crazy person.

Of course, it's because I have this fear of LOSING IT ALL. When I'm on itunes, if I select my iphone and then television shows, then select the shows and "sync tv shows" and apply, I get a warning that "the iphone is synced with another iTunes library" and do I want to erase this iPhone and sync with this itunes library? I DON"T KNOW. DO I???? Will I lose everything? How can I be sure? Where is that paper bag so I can breathe into it?

I also can't get podcasts to transfer to my iphone. This is making me feel so stupid, and that just makes me nuts.

Also last night, I wrote this thing. It was long and it was good, and I was really happy with it. Except there was a typo, so I clicked on the word but missed the typo point so I hit backspace and THE FUCKING BROWSER went to the LAST PAGE.

GOD DAMN MOTHER FUCKING SHIT HELL DAMN.

I was so pissed. I could not get my flow going again.

So I just got off the phone with my brother, who will talk down to me about computer stuff like nobody's business. He's your basic asshole, but he does know computers, since it's what he does for a living. I'm bringing my computer with me next Sunday to our post-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving. That will make me happy. Or I'll lose it all and I will be seriously pissed. One or the other.

I bought a jar of nutella last week at the grocery, and while I love nutella, I never can think of what to eat it on/with. So, I just... eat it by the spoonfull. Which is good, but I keep thinking I'll learn of something awesome to eat it with. Last night I tried it on saltines, and that was pretty good. The saltiness goes well with the creamy sweetness. Since I love salted caramel, this was yummy. But, I'm totally up for suggestions.

I love twitter, but I can't keep up. I need to just accept this. I do like the lists features, because then I can catch up with part of the twitter feed. But it's so much fun. But I can't. So... conflicted.

Basically, I need to accept that, for the rest of the year, I Don't Have Time. I don't have time for anything. My friend Mac got back from California yesterday, and I haven't seen him in two months - not since right after I got back from convention in September. We were talking yesterday about when we could go to lunch/breakfast/hang out and I have NO IDEA. Another friend called to see if I could go with him to buy his kids Christmas gifts. Yeah... I sent him links on Amazon. Et cetera and et cetera.

This is why I need to get up at 5 in the morning, so I can have time to do anything, before the rest of my house wakes up. Instead today I got up, again, at 6:45. This is why I start the day rushed and never lose that feeling. Not good. Yesterday I was having full-blown anxiety attacks over things, and I know it was because I hate how my life feels out of control when it starts to get busy at the store. Maybe this morning I can get lots done and that will dissapate.