Chaos Attraction

Last One For Holidailies

2016-12-31, 11:14 p.m.

This is really more of my December 31 entry, except the tradition is to post that meme every year, and I will sadly be at my mom’s house with no Internet (why won’t she call Comcast about this?!) on the last day of Holidailies (that’s January 1, people, not December 31, check the top).

Which means I can’t provide you with an awesome review of the Hallmark movie about the Rose Parade that’s supposed to be on tonight. Darn it. (Okay, maybe I can do it on the 3rd or something.) So whatever the hell I ended up doing for New Year’s, I won’t be getting it onto the Holidailies board because I have to get this posted early. Feh.

(Oh, and I think I’ll actually use that new mailing list now that Holidailies is over, so if anyone wants to know about future updates, there you go. I’ll try to remember the thing is there since I’m out of the habit of e-mailing.)


On the 30th, we hung out with Randall, my cousins’ cousin (that’s the best definition I can come up with for relatives via in-law). Mom hangs out with him more than I do, but obviously I was along for the ride today. We went to Rockridge and hit the bookstores--I’d never been there before and had fun looking around, and getting super cheap Christmas ornaments. I managed to come out with five new books and only paid for two because three were ARCs with a note on them saying “just don’t bring them back here.” Hah.

Then we visited Randall’s mother in the nursing home--sadly she was whacked out on painkillers and not terribly coherent. However, I can say it was literally the nicest nursing home I’ve ever seen in my LIFE. No awful smell of nursing home, which is a miracle on its own. It was French themed. They had a library and a “nightclub” area where people were doing karaoke. It was like living in a super spiffy hotel. I’m keeping that in mind for the future, that’s for sure.

We then went to Randall’s house and had a lovely dinner followed by tea. He gave us a set of ornaments and tiny teapots saying “Keep Calm and Drink Tea,” which were adorable.

Then we went home and watched the ABC special on Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher, which was...wow. The interview with Todd Fisher alone saying he watched his mother say she wanted to be with Carrie and started fading out and dying within 15 minutes of that...He said it was horrible and beautiful and magical all at once. He also compared it to Romeo and Juliet. I’m amazed at how together the man seems in this.

This has been pretty gutting to me and Mom--I’ve been reading all these articles about them, following obit threads and looking for interviews with them online for days. I got “The Princess Diarist” last night and read it in a rush ASAP. I read this interview with Mark Hamill on them and this quote is really my mom and me as well:

”Debbie was the optimist. She has a spring in her step and is really upbeat and has all the qualities you associate with her, and Carrie would be shuffling around in a bathrobe and slippers muttering under her breath. So cynical! It was a real Felix-and-Oscar disparity between their personalities, and yet in many, many ways they were alike.”


I am so ready for this year to be over except I’m afraid we’ll be looking back on this within oh, the end of January thinking that 2016 was the last good year and the word “dumpster fire” will look quaint next to something like “nukes.” I don’t know what else to say. Seriously, I don’t know how any of us can deal with this. Or have any hope for anything not being horrible. Or wish people a happy new year. It’s really hard to do it, even though you gotta to be polite.

I think I’m just gonna finish out with writing a letter to the universe.

Dear Universe:
Here is what I want for myself and others for 2017:

* New jobs for those of us who want them, for those unemployed and for those going out of their minds. Preferably well paying ones that use our skills and work with nice people.
* For certain friends of mine to get an influx of money because they need it.
* For everything to not be 100% ruined, nuked, killed, etc. Please do anything you can to have everything not go to the worst possible point. Please do not have us go back to the Dark Ages or have an actual trumpocalypse or nuclear war or suddenly Trump decides it’s okay to declare a purge on anyone who’s not a white man, or whatever other total insanity.

Thanks in advance--
Love, XOXO, Jennifer. Because we're gonna need some fucking miracles.


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