How The Procrastinator Stalled Christmas [- gift-shopping…]

I almost missed Christmas – the whole Christmas season!
But it wasn’t my fault – and for very good reason.
I won’t say it had nothing to do with my slacking
And I won’t even blame it all solely on packing!
My intentions were good, I just had to postpone…
And only because I do not have a clone!

Try as I might, I can’t be here and there
There’s only one me and that just isn’t fair!
I’ve had more than enough to keep 12 of me busy
So my one measly brain has been all in a tizzy.

See, back in September I had a great thought
A marvellous plan of the gift-giving sort.
“Christmas is not just about spending money,
The presents I give should be heartfelt – or funny!”
I made up a list of gifts right then, it’s true
I’d order them early, before they were due.

It would have been perfect, had it all gone to plan
But soon after that, you-know-what hit the fan.

The house we were renting was put up for sale
Assignments were looming – I feared I would fail
My puppy turned three and my baby turned one,
My mother-in-law came to stay with her son
Lil Miss Awesome forgot how to sleep
(though mum-in-law claims to have heard not a peep)
My best friend got a job and he moved far away
But he gave us a Lease – in his house we would stay!

With my parents away and my husband at work,
It was all left to me – I was going berserk!!
I had to do most of the move on my own
Without any power, the Net, or a phone.
I thought I could manage – we weren’t moving far…
Then someone slammed into the back of my car.

So my plans for the presents had to be pushed aside
But family and friends, please remember – I tried!
“My intentions were good but it all got too hard
So you’ll have to make do with this heartfelt Gift Card.”

A very belated Merry Christmas to all my blogging buddies!
Thanks for reading – and here’s hoping I can get my act together in 2012 🙂
(I’ll keep the bad rhymes to a minimum, I swear.)

I’d like to thank the Academy…

It is my great pleasure to announce that
I’ll Come Up With a Title Later, I Swear
is now an *** AWARD-WINNING *** blog!

The Hobbler absolutely made my day today by nominating me for The Versatile Blogger Award, and I can honestly say that this blog would never have achieved such extraordinary heights without her influence. All kidding aside, I somehow stumbled upon Hobbling Around while I was still toying with the idea of starting a blog, and I’m glad I did. Witty humor, advice, nudism – her blog just has it all, and although The Motivator gets the credit for inspiring me to start my blog, I probably wouldn’t have kept it up if it hadn’t been for The Hobbler signing up as my first subscriber (before I really had any content, mind you – how’s that for optimism?) and leaving an encouraging comment. So thank you very much Hobbler, keep up the great work – and for anyone who hasn’t already done so, go check out her blog!

Now, apparently to accept this award there are a few things I need to do. Here goes…

The Rules:

• Thank and link to the person who nominates you.
• Share seven random facts about you.
• Pass this award on to five new blogging friends.
• Contact and congratulate the awarded bloggers.

The Random Facts:

1. I’m a sleepwalker (when I do actually get to sleep). So is my husband. It looks like Lil Miss Awesome is doomed.
2. I love horror movies but I refuse to watch them in front of Lil Miss Awesome because I don’t want her to grow up to be as twisted as I am*, so – since she seems to think she doesn’t need sleep – I haven’t watched any horror for a long, long time. Which is probably a good thing considering I have to get up so many times during the night…
3. My eyes change colour depending on what mood I’m in. Really, they do. For example, if my irises are green that means I’m in a good mood, if they’re dark blue then I’m most likely upset (or about to be hit with a killer migraine), and if they’re black/red then I’ve probably been possessed by some demonic spirit… either that or I’m slightly annoyed… I don’t know what colour they turn when I’m really angry because nobody’s ever survived to tell me.
4. I haven’t quite figured out what I want to be when I grow up, but I’m working on it!
5. Prior to pregnancy there was only one movie that ever made me cry (‘Goodbye, Mr Chips’ – the 1939 original, not some crappy remake). Since then, there have been several. Warning: DO NOT mention the movie ‘Up’ in my presence unless you have a box of tissues on standby. And, yes, I do realise that Up is a kids movie and that it’s not supposed to be sad.
6. I hate poetry (well, at least all the poetry we’ve studied as part of my English major) but when I was a teenager I wrote a couple of poems that ended up being published in an anthology. I keep waiting for a good opportunity to throw the fact that I’m a published poet back in my creative writing teacher’s face – you just wait, next time he complains about me being closed-minded about poetry he’s gonna cop it…
7. I’m not scared of spiders, snakes or even Freddy Krueger…but don’t get me started on cockroaches, leeches or *gulp* oompa loompas…

* I should point out that my parents did not expose me to horror movies as a child, I’m just naturally twisted.

And The Awards Go To:

• Blond Zombie I’d say that I have a lot in common with Blond Zombie – but that’d just sound like I was talking myself up.
• Classy Gallie Ok, so most of her posts make me feel old and uncool but she cracks me up nonetheless.
• H.E. Ellis A great blog and hopefully one day I’ll get around to reading her book, The Gods of Asphalt.
• Mommy-fied I love this blog because my baby is roughly the same age as Mommy-fied’s so I can totally relate to her posts.
• Typical Tracy I’d actually be very surprised if Typical Tracy hasn’t already received the Versatile Blogger Award, but I’m nominating her anyway.

And an honourable mention to Brooke’s Random Ravings – hopefully she gets around to posting some new ravings soon 🙂

My dog didn’t eat my homework…

But one of these things probably stopped me from doing it in the first place:

Facebook
I’m listing this one first because it’s the one I’m most ashamed of. I don’t even like Facebook but that doesn’t stop me from checking my Facebook page at least daily. Usually more. At least I’ve (somehow) managed to avoid the dreaded FarmVille plague that seems to have infected some of my ‘friends’…

Catching up on the ‘news’
Arrgh! I used to have Ninemsn as my home page but I had to change it back to Google. I found that every time I needed to pay a bill online or find a phone number or any other five-minute task it would end up taking me an hour because for some reason I just had to find out what Justin Bieber was wasting $15k per week on and that would lead me to some other very important article. Like the one about someone finding a live rat in their loaf of bread. Compelling stuff.

Housework
At least this one is productive! My house always seems to be the cleanest whenever I have an essay or other assignment due. Not that my house is usually very untidy but I’m just saying, if I have the choice between describing the art-making strategies of the historical avant-gardes in blah blah blah or cleaning the microwave, the microwave wins hands-down.

Looking for random objects that I’ve only just realised are missing but now can’t seem to function without
Unfortunately this one happens all the time. I don’t know why it is impossible for me get started on my filing after I’ve discovered that my left weight lifting glove is missing, but apparently it just is. It doesn’t even matter that the glove has probably been missing for three years (because that’s when The Motivator bought them for me – in his deluded optimism that I might actually go to the gym), or that I have no intention of lifting any weights. I just need it, okay?

Killing zombies
The Motivator recently introduced me to the Zombie game in Call of Duty: Black Ops and, although I can say in all honesty that I am nowhere near as addicted to it as he is, I’m still finding myself drawn to the Xbox far more than I should be…