Death Cold is everywhere

Sadly, I felt well enough to go to work today. No lying on the couch watching movies. :(  I get to work, and discover that half the office is out sick! I'm wrapped up in a blanket in my chair, listening to jazzy 50's songs by Jane Russell, my favorite little-known singer (but medium-to-well-known actor). Wikipedia doesn't even have that much about her musical career. She's well known for her fantastic rack, but she had awesome comic timing, and a great voice that deserves a ton more respect (if you have Spotify, check out her The Very Best of Jane Russell album).

Cough....cough...gag....

Cardi and boots - Simply Be, Leggings - Walmart.

I might have been a little overgenerous with my brag about being not dead in my last post. I have the Nasty Crud Cold™ with Added Sore Throat™ for extra fun. Hence yesterday's cozy layers.

Suffice it to say, I won't be singing in the choir tomorrow at church or even doing much talking today. But, I want you to be entertained. Why not be entertained and learn something? The Vlog Brothers have another channel, Crash Course, where they teach you little 11 minute snippets of a course over 40 or so weeks. (Or if you're catching up and you get involved, you can mainline them.) John Green has previously done a World History course and is doing a Literature course now, and Hank Green has done a Biology course and is now doing an Ecology course. Here's the first World History

I'm not dead!

Tunic and Boots - Simply Be, Leggings - Walmart.

I took a long break for Christmas and didn't wear clothes. Or maybe I just didn't post them. It was one of the two. I did write a long post the other day, but I accidentally deleted it, so you've been deprived of my brilliance there. With my health issues lately, the only thing that's been making me feel better is buying purses. I know, you thought I was going to say exercising. Pssshhh. Have you even been reading this blog? So I somehow got onto this website (JustFab) that's mostly about shoes, but also has other stuff like purses. And I always have bad luck buying shoes online, so forget that (plus they were 9/10 high heels and I don't like falling down). But the purses....I have no need for extra purses. But they're cheap - $40 each, and they run tons of sales. My first time I got three for $60. And I got them in super-bright candy colors because winter is blah and I need some cheerfulness.

Boston Common

High Society

Top Notch

 Yes, I know the pink one is silly. I like the silliness of having a Barbie purse, even if the strap is shorter than I would prefer. Life is too short not to enjoy silliness.

Guess who had a good report?

Guess who doesn't have PCOS? YAY, it's me!!! I am in need of my Christmas break, though, seeing as how my gyno thinks that this has all been stress induced. (Barring some horrible reappearance of it.) No cysts, a healthy uterus, everything is good! As I'm sure everyone was dying to know! Particularly my few male lurker readers.

Sweater and boots - Simply Be, t-shirt and leggings - big-box stores.

And with this day over, I'm on my Christmas holidays (and I'm also wishing you a Happy Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, a Blessed Solstice, and Happy non-specific Holidays because I'm a lover, not a hater)!  It's time to curl up next to the fire with a giant mug of cocoa and play Barbies with my niece. Dorky side-note: So I have an old Rio doll (Jem's boyfriend from Jem and the Holograms) but he lost a hand, so my sister and I started calling him Mr. Rochester. My niece thinks that's his name, even though she watches Jem on Netflix.

In which I talk about several things randomly

This is our downstairs tree. (Yes, we have two trees, one colorful, one metallic.)

Tunic - B'leev, Leggings - Walmart, Socks - Sock Dreams, Boots - Simply Be.

I've entered that period of winter when all I want to wear are sweater tunics or other tunics. I don't know, it's a thing for me. This year, though, it leaves me with the distinct feeling that, along with my numerous doctor's visits to try and figure out my lady-parts issues, that people might be wondering if I'm knocked up. Not you people. You people get to hear snippets of my issues. Work-type people. And I don't care if you don't like the phrase "lady-parts", I prefer using it to running around yelling VAGINA all the time. And it's a good word for referring to my entire female-genitalia-below-the-waist. Technically, I guess I should run around yelling about my ovarian issues, but that just sounds really tiring since I don't like running.

Sweater - Simply Be, Leggings - Walmart, Shoes - Target.

 Since when did this become the Missy Cranky Pants blog of linguistic failings on the part of science? Since never. Point of the day: I've tried some nice (re: moderately expensive) leggings over the past few months, but big box store ones fit me the best (Walmart, Target). I don't know why, and I don't really care, since they're so cheap. The only issue is that the black ones fade slightly. And if I wasn't so lazy and took the time to do things like always wash them inside out, and dry them on the air cycle, instead of the super-hot-just-get-it-done cotton cycle, they would probably last even longer. I do take issue with people wearing leggings as actually pants with nothing else covering their bottoms. TACKY!

RAMBLE: Leggings, where are the best ones found?

Imagine the elevator from the Shining...

Sweater and Boots - Simply Be, Leggings - Walmart.

So, I referred earlier this month to some personal lady issues that I'm going through. I have some more doctor's appointments coming up before they figure out precisely what it is, but the gist of it is that I've been having my period since November 10th. So if any of my readers have PCOS (a distinct possibility for me at this point, apparently) and want to cheer me up, feel free to leave a message!

This is a round-about way of apologizing for my lackadaisical postings, and the frequent grumpy faces that pop up in the pictures that I do post. I'm also cuddling up in sweaters primarily, because apparently you can't just wear a blanket out of the house. Luckily, Simply Be has plenty of cute tunic-type ones that I had already bought.

Everything - Simply Be. Boom.

How do you dodge an unwanted compliment?

I'm sure that some of you have the same problem I ran into last Friday. I was wearing the outfit above, and we had our work "Holiday Party" which is 1.5 hours at the end of the day with some snacky time foods. In line a coworker told me I looked "so nice" and just as I started to smile and say thank you, she followed it up with "I can tell you've been doing something that works." I know this woman meant to be complimentary, that there wasn't any bit of a passive aggressive dig in there, but still, I had to bite my tongue to rip her a new one for assuming that I wanted a compliment like that. A) I'm not, in fact doing anything to lose weight and I'm not losing weight. B) I find it rude to assume that people are trying to lose weight, because it implies that there is something wrong with their current body.

Weight is such a troubling issue for so many women (men, too) that even compliments can backfire on sensitive people. You might say to someone "You look so great having lost that weight" and they hear 'With that weight you looked hideous'. During the holidays, we'll all run into people we haven't seen in awhile. Instead of talking about someone's weight, why don't you just tell someone they look beautiful if that's what you mean? No qualifiers, no 'you look so beautiful today/in that dress/now that you're skinnier', just tell them they look beautiful. Because when you qualify someone's beauty, you're saying there are times that they don't look beautiful, and I know that you don't want to say that.

Fun 70's effect.

So how would I have dodged that compliment if I had time and I saw that woman for more than a second in a line? I would have said "Thanks, but I'm not losing weight. This sweater is just so pretty, isn't it!" (Which is true, and because of the way it hangs, it does give me a different shape than some of my clothes.) Because she meant well, and I didn't need to go into all of this with a passing business acquaintance. Several of the women in my department are dieting, and they might have liked that compliment. 

How do you address compliments that make you uncomfortable?

Real Ladies can keep it together

Simply Be cardi , boots, and tank, Walmart leggings.

You guys...it's here!! The trailer/teaser for Star Trek Into Darkness with Benedict Cumberbatch as the villain!!!!  My mother raised me on Star Trek, both the movies and TNG, because she's a total sci-fi nut. Plus, you know how I love Sherlock, and I loved the new Trek movie. (Shut up, haters, it was awesome.)



Cumberbatch has such a lovely menacing voice. I would pay buckets to be menaced by him in person. With Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto and Karl Urban and...okay, who is that blonde who's taking up so much trailer time looking freaked and taking away time? Alice Eve, I'm guessing from the IMDB cast list. She DOESN'T EVEN HAVE A CHARACTER LISTED.  Everyone's speculating on whether or not she'll be Carol Marcus or Elizabeth Dehner. I would just like her to not act like such a freaking weenie if she's in Starfleet, since she's in a uniform. Take some bravery lessons from Nyota, random character! Too many sci-fi women are just there to be mindless screamers. I would rather have a cast without women than one where women act like dummies.

I know they need to introduce some more ladies, since the Enterprise is such a bro-fest at the moment, but come on! Not a single glance of my beloved Chekov or Scotty? Nyota is awesome enough to pick up the lady-slack in a trailer. So, the message of the day is: learn from the Hawkeye Initiative. If a man looks dumb doing/saying it, don't have a lady do/say it.

Long time coming

Sweater - Avenue, Pants - Simply Be, Shoes - old.

I've been dealing with some personal lady-health type issues, so I've gotten a little behind. Even though these clogs aren't the most comfortable for long days (or my pathetic attempts at heel wearing), I still like them because they make my legs look long. I hear tell that some people can wear heels all day and not be crippled by them, but I live in flats.

Shirt - Simply Be, Pants - Denim 24/7, Shoes - Target.

 This shirt is brand new. Even though it's winter now (disregarding the fact that it got up to 70 here yesterday), I just thought it was so pretty and fluttery that I had to buy it before it went out of stock. It's still available in a  size 18 as I write this, but sold out in every other size, so that was definitely the right choice.

We put up our first Christmas tree this weekend (we're doing two, and planning to put up the second this coming weekend). Has everyone else decorated already, or do you wait until closer to Christmas/Hanukkah/holiday of your choice?