Getting My Shit Together Monday

Week Five - What I'd really like to be getting together this Monday are the scads of holiday gifts on big ol' master list. I'd like to spend nap time the afternoon surfing through those free shipping emails anxiously waiting for me in my email inbox and with a couple of happy, productive clicks, send off lovely little gifts to our friends and family in Portland, Richmond, Jackson Hole and Phoenix. I'd like to get all the toddler goodies out of my many cyber shopping carts and know that one of Santa's babies will have the delight of seeing gifts under the tree very soon.  I'd like to run out to the Home Depot parking lot and buy a loose-needled and green-spray-painted full and luscious Scotch Pine for our little apartment.  I'd like to get my boy all dressed up in his adorable Christmas jammies and take 500 photos of him that will hopefully produce one perfect shot for the 75 cards I will do my very best to send out before 2007. All of that wonderful stress sounds so good to me today, and I'd love to take advantage of the adrenaline and the opportunity to dive into the holidays.

Alas, today I won't be doing any of that. We're in that irritating time between paychecks, when the car payment and insurance have priority. We're living in an apartment that will need a good dusting off before decorating. And we're definitely taking Lil E to get his hair helmet trimmed down before loading up the memory card with potential Christmas pics. This week's Getting My Shit Together Monday will allow me to rewind a bit and take care of some of the tasks that will push me right into the holiday season.

I have three goals for today:

• Vacuum up the place (since, I kid you not, Lil E actually found a pine needle from last year under the dining room table yesterday...who someone clearly -ahem- tracked in)

• Clear out the toys and the clutter (at least in one corner) to make room for the tree

• If all is good with Santa, Baby Jesus and the universe, take Lil E to get and actually get a haircut *

This isn't the big-time, 45 color-coded baskets type of organization that I envisioned when I began Getting My Shit Together a month ago. It is, however, the little stuff that will help me sleep better into Tuesday and just plain old needs to get done (and isn't...or hasn't yet).  It won't make me feel all giddy from a combination of cleaning fluid and plastic tub smell, but it will clear the path for bringing Christmas into our little home (or at least bringing the plastic tubs marked CHRISTMAS up from the basement).

I'd take a picture of all the shizzleiciousness going on in our apartment, but I know it'll take me at least a week to get the before and afters off of my camera. Plus, I need to save as much of my memory card as I can for a Tuesday photo shoot with my clean-cut, Christmas-crazy boy.

* I can't bring myself to give a bullet point to one more goal that is just a wee bit embarrassing: Finally ditching the pumpkins and gourds centerpiece. Happy Holidays, alley critters! Yikes.

UPDATE:  All good intentions and motivation (even to clean and clear clutter) are somehow inevitably met by a child with an inexplicable fever, unabandoned energy and unable to go to co-op. Foiled again! Criminey.

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Caution: wet paint ahead

I won't give away too many clues to you crowds of loyal readers, but I will tell you that a new  design for my lil ol' blog is under way. The preliminary graphics are in and I love them. They are, aptly, pretty sassy. I will keep you posted on the progress if you promise to keep checking back for ridiculous coolness that will soon be at home here on Sassafrass.

Photo credit: Brush by Marcelo Moura / www.sxc.hu

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Keep it together, grrrlfriend

By now, I assume everyone has seen the shots of Brit's vajayjay spread eagle on the Internet. I assume that because even my dad has seen them. He's retired, so there are clearly more hours in the day and less firewalls on the network to deal with when hunting this millenium's version of Vanessa Williams's Playboy and Penthouse pics.

I've seen the pictures and read a slew of snarky comments about how Britney's stability as a mother are surely undermined by her association with Par and Lind. It just seems to me that Brit is a wild child drawn to other people who have a penchant for partying like rock stars (note to Paris and Lindsay: I said like rock stars) and then doing a lot of PR clean-up over a Red Bull the next morning.

The thing that gets me are the frames and frames of vulva shots caught by the paparazzi that tell all of us that the Brazilian waxers are doing juuuuuust fiiiiiine in L.A.

What you do with your business is obviously your business, but I am one of those freaky feminists who tends to think that a grown woman's purposely nakey vulva is akin to some kind of strange pre-teen sexualization.  This is more of a guideline than a rule, but for this situation, I feel safe filing it under uncomfortable (and I don't just mean because of the itchy factor).  As for Brit, I don't get why she is going so Mickey Mouse Club in her post-Chaotic days.

While I'm sure I could get a thesis worth of analysis out of the Teen Beat Trio here, I will leave you with some other people's preaching on the subject: I highly recommend you check out this kickass commentary by Lisa Gabriele. The author put all I was thinking (and much, much more) together perfectly. I'm also getting a good giggle in while reading the ongoing commentary on Brit and friends here. While you're at it, be sure to read the post up on Britney's official website, clearly some clever writing and strategy by one of the (ahem) cheekier people on her staff. 

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