When Travelling Lightly Backfires

Every time I fly, there is always one person in the airport security line who doesn’t know what he/she is doing. There’s the, “What do you mean I have to take my shoes off?” girl and the, “Since when do I have to take out my laptop out of the bag” guy and, my personal favorite, the woman who says, “But that moisturizer is $100 a bottle! What do you mean I have to throw it out?!” Usually, I am the one stuck behind this person and get very irritated at these ignorant and unobservant people and end up angry because their delay means I have to choose between my pre-boarding bathroom break or getting coffee. (You can guess which one wins.)

Well, the last time I flew, I was that person.

I usually don’t pack lightly, and when I fly Southwest, I don’t really care. If I don’t have to pay a fee for a bag, who cares if I check it? But, after all the times I’ve travelled with a large suitcase and then had to battle on public transportation, I decided if I can fit it all into my carry-on sized bag, I would do it. Then I thought about all the times I have a panic attack at baggage claim because my bags aren’t the first out, and I realized if I can fit in all in the carry-on, then why the bother checking it?

I went out and bought a few “TSA Approved” size bottles for my shampoo and conditioner and came to terms with the fact I would have to use whatever hairspray my cousin had at her place. I only brought the curling iron instead of the usual hair dryer-flat iron-curling iron combo I typically take with me everywhere. I cut down the amount of shoes from 6 pairs to just 3. I even pulled out all the liquids from my makeup bag and put them into the one quart Ziploc baggie. I thought I was so prepared.

Until I went through security and they had to open my bag because there were not only tweezers in my makeup bag but also scissors.

In all my careful planning, I hadn’t thought to take the stupid fracking tweezers out of my makeup bag. I honestly had forgotten about the little travel scissors that I stuck in my makeup bag a few months ago while furiously cleaning my bathroom before a guest came over and realized how incredibly vain I am with all of my products and tools. I stood there,  not arguing at all with the TSA agents who are all looking at me like I’m crazy. I think most of the crazy looks were not because I had forgotten to take out these “weapons” from my bags, but because I wasn’t arguing. I was well aware that I had done and was owning up to it. I even let them throw out my tweezers and scissors without protest. The poor TSA didn’t know what to do with someone who was being cooperative.

In the end, I got through security and made it to San Francisco.  Not, however, without a few angry looks from the passengers who got stuck in security behind the dumb girl who couldn’t remember that scissors and tweezers in a makeup bag makes you a possible terrorist instead of just a high maintenance woman didn’t think to check her makeup bag for heavy artillery. I did, however, make it in time for my pre-boarding bathroom visit AND coffee.

Sorry, Charlotte, You're Not Welcome Here!

As excited as I am to be living on my own, there is one thing that I am simply not ok with: spiders.

I was taught from a young age that spiders are not to be killed. My dad used to tell us you want spiders around because they catch and eat all the other bugs. So, if you see a spider, don’t kill it! That being said, I don’t particularly like spiders. I am not afraid of them, like I am of birds, but I don’t really appreciate that spiders can crawl up into my nose and burrow into my brain. I also don’t like how they will suddenly drop from the ceiling and chill right at eye level so when I walk into a room and run into it, I am suddenly doing an embarrassing dance to get the thing off me. I won’t lie, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets didn’t help a whole lot with my dislike either. As stereotypical and traditional as it is, Dad was always the one to get rid of spiders. I made a deal with him from a young age that if he would take them away, I would not kill them.

Therefore, when I was in my very own apartment where there is no Dad, I had a bit of a panic attack as I watched my first spider crawl out of my air conditioning vent.

It wasn’t a huge spider but it was definitely one capable of eating any other bug in its path. It crossed the entire wall above my bookcases and television set and settled into a corner. As I began drafting a letter to my landlord in my head,(Dear Tony, A big spider has moved in with me. While I appreciate all that spiders do in the way of keeping the bug population down, I do not feel like this new arrangement will work. Since my dad has passed away and can no longer help me get spiders out of the house, I have to concede and give the apartment to the spider. Best, Kimmi) the spider crawled a little closer to me and I had an enlightened moment:

I’ll trap it in a glass then take it outside.

It really was a perfect plan because the spider had moved closer to me and was now flat on the wall. I went to the kitchen and, after much speculation, decided to use a margarita glass. It had the widest mouth but it was shallow so there was very little chance I wouldn’t be able to get the spider out. I grabbed the old Ulta catalog and in just one try got the spider safely trapped in the glass!!!

With one hand under the catalog and one hand holding the stem of the margarita glass, I made it all the way to the door before I realized one thing: how do I open the door? Very carefully I balanced the margarita glass on the catalog and opened the door.

I got two steps from my door and lifted the glass. The spider took off so fast it made me jump and I ended up just throwing the catalog and running back into my apartment and locking the door behind me.

I’m not sure which is funnier: that I tried to save a spider and ended up getting freaked out and throwing it out onto our driveway and then locking it out or the picture of my landlord going to get into his car and seeing my Ulta catalog on the ground and wondering what the hell kind of tenant he has welcomed into his building.

On a side note, I saw another (or maybe the same?) spider in my shower a few days later. This time, I turned the water on and drowned the bastard. I figure since Dad is not around to take the spiders outside, my agreement to not kill them is null. Sorry, Dad.

I Officially Hate Christmas, Part 3: Taking it All Down

10 Reasons Putting Away the Christmas Decorations was Worse than Putting Them Up:

10.) Broken ornaments made Mom cry, even when it was only a few of the cheap, colored bulbs.

9.) Laughing hysterically at the fact that she was crying over broken colored bulbs and how funny “colored bulbs” are only made things worse.

8.) Climbing up on the old, unsafe ladder was not a good idea in the first place, but became an even worse one because it had been raining and the ground was not solid. Therefore, it sank about 3 inches with each climb, in addition to wobbling like a weeble.

7.) I don’t know how one of the strings of lights became wedged between two roof shingles, but getting it out of there was like an extreme sport. Yanking the damn lights off while on the old, unsafe ladder, was indeed, unsafe.

6.) While on the old, unsafe ladder, there was a preying mantis on the window screen, daring me to make a move so it could attack. I jumped off the ladder, missing the last 4 rungs. It can have the house...and some of my dignity.

5.) Nothing fit into the box it originally came out of, even with a significant amount of brute strength.

4.) Even though no new Christmas stuff was purchased, there seemed to be twice as many boxes as when I brought them down.

3.) Dragging the tree outside and then taking off the $11 stand was more work than putting the damn thing up.

2.) Tied to the roof on the way to the park for recycling, I prayed: “If the tree falls off, please let it be somewhere that will not hurt anyone and where there is no one around so I can just drive away.”

1.) After putting everything away, cleaning up, and getting dusty, sweaty and gross, but feeling overall accomplished for a job well done, I realized that the $11 Christmas tree stand was still on the front porch. I threw in the garage and hope it’s still there next year when someone else puts up the fucking decorations. I’m done.

I Officially Hate Christmas, Part 2: The Stupid Tree

Oh Christmas tree…how I hate thee.

We got a tree from ABC because they give them out to the employees and, since my dad passed away, they saved one for my mom. One of my dad’s coworkers said it should be pretty easy to put up, all I had to do was saw a bit off the end and then just put the stand on and, boom, Christmas tree is up. Sounds easy enough.

I should have known better. Especially after the debacle with the damn lights.

First of all, the tree itself is about 8 feet tall, therefore very heavy and annoying. Trying to take it out of the bucket we had put it in was a total comedy. Then trying to saw off the end…well let’s just say I would have been at it all day if my friend Josh hadn’t come over. See, my dad doesn’t have a wood saw, only ones for metal, so Josh decided the easiest thing to do would be to take an axe to the end of the tree and then use a saw to just even it out. Imagine a black Brawny paper towel guy going after the end of a tied up Christmas tree and you have the image of my front lawn that morning. Possibly not the best way to get it done, but hey, it was faster than the alternative.

With the tree now evened out on the bottom and Josh successfully sweaty and feeling manly, we pull out the tree strand. That is metal. And has no instructions. And has pieces missing. And doesn’t actually fit together anymore because it’s from 1960 (or possibly older). And apparently is no longer legal because it is a fire hazard.

After about an hour and a lot of frustration, we gave up and Josh went home. I tried Chad to see if he knew how the hell to get this thing working, but, after realizing that my dad probably just nailed the Christmas tree to the stand itself, Chad told me to just buy a new stand.

You would think that a week before Christmas, tree stands would be pretty much everywhere. But if you think that, then you would be completely wrong. (Insert annoying game show buzzer noise here.)

I went to Target, where I was informed that they had sold out but would I be interested in a lovely fake tree instead? Let’s see: would I like to spend an exorbitant amount of money on a fake tree when I have a perfectly fine, real tree at home that I didn’t pay for? I think you know the answer, red shirt and khaki pant wearing jerkface.

At both Lowe’s and Home Depot it was the same story, only at those places I was merely laughed at because who the hell tries to buy a tree stand a week before Christmas? Oh yeah, the girl who just lost her dad and is now trying to make her mom feel better by putting up all the damn decorations. Keep laughing, smock-holes.

A Christmas tree lot was next on my list and guess what? They had stands! Only, the stands they had required a hole to be drilled into the bottom of the tree and I need a special bit and I should just bring the tree in and they will happily put the stand on for me. So now, instead of just putting a stand on a tree, I have to strap a Christmas tree to my car, drive it to the lot, and then strap it to the car again and drive it home? No thanks.

At this point, I’m beyond frustrated, I’m crying like a little kid who has just learned that there is no Santa, and I’m ready to just give up on the whole thing. I still had some Christmas cards to buy, so I decided to go to CVS, buy some cards, then go home and take out my frustration by doing what my dad did and just nailing the stupid tree to the stupid stand.

One of my other friends, Andrew, said that CVS might have some and, turns out, they had stands! And, since I’m an idiot and waited until the week before Christmas, it was only $11!!! Woo hoo!! Go me!!!

After that, getting the tree up was fairly easy. It is probably one of the nicest tress we have ever gotten from ABC, with no holes or missing branches. It may be a little crooked because when I was bringing it in the house, I may or may not have knocked the stand on the door frame and been too lazy to try to straighten it out, but at least it’s up and I even put the lights on it with no additional drama.

However, I refuse to do any more decorating, such as putting up wreaths or putting ornaments on the tree. The only dealings I would like to have with any of these things again is when I take them down and get to shove them back up in the attic until next year, when I can pay someone else to deal with them.

I Officially Hate Christmas, Part One: LIGHTS

Note to self:

Hanging Christmas lights on the house sucks and you should never do it again. Here’s why:

~You will get covered in dust and dirt while bringing the boxes down from the attic. Said dust and dirt will make your contacts dry and irritating for the rest of day, thus making you dry and irritated for the rest of the day.

~You will take 10 minutes to figure out which lights should be used (traditional big bulbs, white icicle lights, colored icicle lights, or go all out and use all of them) and then spend the next 45 getting them all untangled from each other.

~You will waste 15 minutes fiddling with the ladder because it is old and probably not safe to climb on.

~You will get cut by rose bushes while climbing on the old, unsafe ladder and have dried blood on your leg for the rest of the day.

~You will almost fall more than once from the old, unsafe ladder because it is, indeed, old and unsafe.

~You will keep using the old, unsafe ladder because you are too lazy and cheap to go buy a new, safe one.

~You will realize, after all the lights have been strung, that you have no way to plug them in because you did not think about making sure you are able to plug them in before you starting putting them on the house.

~You will then have to climb back on the old, unsafe ladder, get cut by many more rose bushes, and nearly fall many more times in order to get the lights in the correct order to plug in.

~You will finally get them plugged in and walk away.

~Mom will come home, look at them and yell at you for getting on a ladder when no one else is home because you could have fallen and gotten hurt.

~You will argue back that you could have fallen and gotten hurt with her home and she wouldn’t have been able to do anything anyway, so it doesn’t matter.

~She will then look at the lights and say, “That’s not how your dad used to do them.”

~You will then slam a door and tell her she can do them herself next year.

~She will eventually say thank you.

~Finally, that night, when you turn on the lights, you will see that there is a foot long section that does not work. When you are retelling this story, everyone will ask you in disbelief, “You didn’t test them before you starting putting them up?” To which, after this year, you may no longer reply, “I’ve never done it before and I didn’t know you needed to test them before you put them up!”