Drops of Awesome

Personal Blog of Author Kathryn Thompson

Kathryn

NOT RELATED

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One of my sillier film school projects, I thought this script was appropriate to get you pumped for the big sales. Have a fabulous Thanksgiving and be grateful. I know I am. Peace out.

-Kathryn

EXT. MERVYN’S DEPARTMENT STORE – BEFORE DAWN

SAMANTHA, JULIA and DANIEL approach the massive line that is circling around the deparment store. Puffs of breath can be seen rising from all the shoppers into the dark sky. 22 year old SAMANTHA, bundled in a large blue parka with pink earmuffs and huge mittens and boots, smiles as they walk down the line, looking for the end. 10 year old DANIEL is dressed similarily and follows closely on her heals, swaggering like a gangster. They are followed at a distance of about 5 feet by a dead-looking JULIA, age 16….

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Tip Tuesday — Black Thursday

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In an email about the Day After Thanksgiving sales, a friend asked me to do a Tip Tuesday about it. She said:

This is the first time I’m going to brave the crazy American tradition and I’m not sure how to do it. I have specific items I need and have no clue which stores to go to. I don’t get the newspaper and my husband refuses to watch commercials so I feel pretty much [lost] to know which store will have my “must have” item and do I really need to go at 4:30 in the morning and stand in line with a bunch of other people who will probably be heading for the same stinking department as me?

Here are a few of my tips:

-YOU NEED A NEWSPAPER — PERIOD. If you’re not gonna get the ads and plan it out, there’s no point in going.
-Go to the 7-11 and pick one up on Thanksgiving Day.
-Look at every page of the ads. I often buy things for my gift drawer the day after Thanksgiving. I also buy household items that day.
-Make sure to consider small ticket items. You can get some fabulous deals.
-Don’t plan on getting any major item at Circuit City unless you plan to sleep there all night. They hardly stock anything that they advertise and they are very unhelpful.
-Target and Wal Mart rock! They stock a ton of each item and make everything easy to find.
-Don’t forget drugstores. You can get great deals on Christmas decorations, cards and wrapping paper there.
-Map out your plan carefully in order of when the stores open, write everything down and take your marked up flyers with you.
-Find out which stores price-match and go to a store that didn’t advertise the item but is willing to price-match and you’ll have a better chance of getting the item.
-Watch your time. Make sure to keep track of how long the sales are good at each store.
-Take snacks.
-Be nice.
-Take a friend if you can. Try not to lose her.

Do you have any tips?

Deer and Jerky

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How can beware of deer signs be so accurate? Deer — next 3.46miles. If they can predict their whereabouts with that kind of accuracy, why can’t they just build the roads around them? Same thing with the signs that say “Rock” If there’s a rock at precisely that spot that’s perched on the edge of a steep cliff, don’t make the drivers play Wile E. Coyote with their cars. Get rid of the rock.

Doesn’t the song “Ghetto Superstar” remind you of junior year of college, red jeeps and people staying up way too late in the apartment swimming pool? Yeah, me neither.

Speaking of musical genius, Boyz II Men, Sir-Mix-A lot and Tone Loc are coming to Seattle TOGETHER, as I’m sure you’re all aware. Stop by my place for a spot of beef jerky while you’re in town. It’d be great to put a face with your name.

(Okay, I just found out that they already came. Sorry. But seriously, come by for some jerky anytime.)

reasons: feet the shape of hams, Dan home early from work

Non-Alcoholic Lemonade and a Side of Shattered Self-Esteem

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I hear things when I eat.

At restaurants I eavesdrop study human nature by listening to the people around me.

At home, human nature is shoved in my face as Laylee talks and talks her way through each meal. I love it… most of the time.

A couple of days ago, we were eating lunch at Enchilada Town when I heard the teenaged girl in the next booth order her drink. “I’d like a pink lemonade please — non-alcoholic.” Wuss. She must not have had a fake ID. How embarrassing to have to order non-alcoholic lemonade.

Today at lunch, Laylee started the conversation by asking me, “Can you please be exactly like Isabellov’s mom?”
Me: What does she do that’s so special?
Laylee: I don’t know. You just do it, okay?

A couple of bites later, she asked me, “Why are you not as pretty as me?”

I don’t know. Why don’t you ask Isabellov’s mom?

Friends

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blackbirdI saw this today and thought of Blackbird. She was the first blogger with real live human non-immediate-family-member readers who linked to my site. We were tight for awhile but like blogging friends tend to do (Except of course me and you. We will be BBFFs ALWAYS), we kind of drifted apart.

I check in on her sometimes and this reminder gave me a good laugh at the grocery store. I still gotta get me one of those bad boys. There are much tackier things I could do this Christmas and things I could spend $150 on that would be much more likely to blow away in a strong wind, I’m sure.

Scroll to the bottom of this post for the story behind the giant snow globe.

Do you have any blog friends you’ve drifted away from but would like to give a shout out to? Leave their URL in the comments section.

Stupid Day for Jerks

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Today was not the best day ever. Parts of it were good. Some parts were very good. But it was kind of like a Polly Pocket gift set. THERE WERE TOO MANY PARTS. Between the hours of 5:30am and 7:30pm, I spent around 20 minutes total at home. Most of the rest of the time I had the kids with me, eating meals in the car and beggin for scraps from the Costco sample people. I did a BlogHer conference call while driving and supervising the younger siblings at preschool with my cell phone on mute…I hope…I haven’t tested that functionality before.

We didn’t even get to finish decorating for Christmas, although I did start yesterday and it is looking AWESOME! Thanks to everyone for your support of my Costco-induced insanity and to Jen for being honest. Is it just me or do you all want the jiggly snowmen so much you may sell a lock of your hair to buy them? (I’m sorry they don’t have a picture on their website, but they are snowmen made out of some sort of gelatinous goo with a light inside and they have a motion detector and they bounce and sing when someone walks past and Magoo shrieks with glee and tries to throw his body from the cart in a fit of ecstasy.)

This morning I was flipping through the Old Testament at around 6:30am because, who isn’t? I randomly opened to a passage in Isaiah that reads:

For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given, and the government shall be upon His shoulder, and His Name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. [Isaiah 9:6]

Which I totally took as a sign because… hello… I think you know where I’m going with this. Isaiah was totally plagiarizing from Handel’s Messiah and although I do not condone plagiarism, I do think it gives me license to let the merriness commence. It’s like I opened the scriptures and God said, “Go forth with the tunes.”

The children whaled off and on all day, spilled large amounts of liquid on themselves, booped at inopportune moments and slammed their heads into walls for no apparent reason. I am TIRED. Can. You. Tell? (I know I spelt “wailed” wrong, but isn’t it so much more of an interesting story that way?)

But everything turned out okay in the end thanks to my brother Mike. Turn your sound on and go play along. It can turn out to be a good day for you too.

reasons: the sippy cup that didn’t leak, piles of leaves, cinnamon sticks, fluffy socks

If Only I Weren’t So Organized

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I started listening to Christmas music yesterday. We try to listen to religious music on Sundays and what’s more religious than the birth of the Savior? No, I’m not rationalizing, mom. It was a very uplifting Sabbath.

It sort of spilled over to today. The music wants to be played and who am I to stop it?

So, I got to thinking. I generally try to restrain myself from decorating until the day after Thanksgiving. But this year because of family in town, I won’t be able to decorate until a FEW DAYS AFTER Thanksgiving. I know. It’s horrifying, really. So my thought is that I need to decorate before the Thanksgiving festivities begin.

That means I should do it on Friday. But I’ll be so busy getting ready all week. I think I have to do it today so I can relax and clean the house for the holiday (the one with the pilgrims). I promise not to put the wreath on the door, decorate a Christmas tree or light the outside lights until after Thanksgiving…much.

Are we still friends?

The Karate Kid — A Retrospective

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Trapped in a house full of munchkins with a sinus headache and feeling decidedly less than lerious, I am reminded that I have yet to do a movie review of The Karate Kid.

I’m worried that once the night-time cold medication kicks in, I’ll be unable to remember all the details of the film that was such an integral part of my formative years. I must get it all down now. It may be hard to believe, but the following synopsical-review is from memory, with no source material of any kind. I have not seen the movie since I was a junior high student in Southern Alberta. Calgarians like sanding the floor and martial arts.

The film has an amazing cast including Elizabeth Shue and Daniel Laruso, also known as Daniel Son. According to the film, wise old Japanese men think every young boy is their son. It takes place in New Jersey or California. Come to think of it, everyone is blond in the movie and my mom is not blond and she’s from Jersey so either it takes place in California or it was directed by The Beach Boys or my mom is lying about her place of birth.

No, I think Daniel Son grew up in New Jersey and he moved to California with his mom in their station wagon so he could listen to Cruel Cruel Summer (not the Ace of Base version. It hadn’t been invented yet.) on a ghetto-blaster while people played soccer on the beach and ground his face into the sand.

His mom has a bad perm. Good then, bad in retrospect. Their station wagon has wood paneling and needs to be pushed to start. He works as a waiter/butler guy until he gets fired for throwing spaghetti on rich people and he’s skinny but highly attractive to 13-year old girls. These factors combine to make him a total loser and therefore the ideal underdog romantic leading man.

Come to think of it, I’ve always liked em skinny…and I’ve always liked em named Daniel.

So he gets beat up a lot. He walks to school. He gets beat up. He eats lunch. He gets beat up. He wears the coolest Halloween costume in history (a bubble-blowing shower stall) and consequently gets massacred. Everyone at his school goes around at night dressed up like skeletons and they’re all karate black belts at a local dojo where the sensei’s life’s work is to train evil high school skeleton bullies to rule the world.

They do.

Daniel-son gets saved by his apartment janitor. Oh. That also makes him a loser. He lives in an apartment and has come in contact with a janitor. I think you’re still okay if you happen to periodically rub shoulders with a butler but janitors are right out.

Luckily the janitor is a karate master who has been chillin’ in the basement, carving miniature shrubberies, eating flies with chopsticks and waiting for his next pupil to surface. He owns a beautiful home and a fleet of vintage cars but has no one to wax the cars, sand the floor or paint the fence. He sees Daniel as an ideal slave and sufficiently unwilling apprentice. It’s no fun to train a student who comes to you willingly. Half the joy of mentoring someone is humbling them into submission, while mumbling incoherent sound bites of ancient wisdom and watching them do all of your housework.

In some ways, I see The Karate Kid as a flawless parenting guide.

Another truth I found in this movie that’s served me well is that the best person to date is your boyfriend’s arch-nemesis. It ups the drama and you get to scream more. By the time the next movie comes around, you’ll probably be dating HIS nemesis so that he’s free to move to Japan and date Mr. Miyagi’s zucchini-farming relatives.

As he does his sanding, waxing and painting, Daniel-Son becomes a karate master and scores a sweet ride with which to take Elizabeth Shue on a date to a montage of amusement park rides.

My throat hurts.

He ends up facing down his enemies in the ring at some big tournament where the evil dojo master encourages his legion of Aryan-Nationesque foot soldiers to maim Daniel slowly so that he ends up like the black knight from Monte Python by the end, spurting blood and standing on one leg. The baddest high school dojo kid is encouraged to “SWEEP THE LEG” and others heckle to “put him in a body bag.”

Mr. Miyagi performs some black magic in the locker room and Daniel wins the fight, the respect and the girl, who proceeds to run him over with an overpowering hug. The skeletons cry, Mr. Miyagi almost smiles and someone in a suit gives Daniel Son the Stanley Cup.

A few more things I remember are that no one is impressed with Daniel Laruso’s fabulous BMX stylings. I’m not sure why. I think they forgot they were in the 80s. I also think there is something about Mr. Miyagi being a widowered WWII vet and I’m fairly sure someone burns his house to the ground. When this happens, Daniel Son may or may not yell “NOOOOOOOO!” and cry a lot.

It’s a good one. Rent it this weekend. No, I was not paid by The Karate Kid or any of its subsidiaries to write this post.

There is Blue

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I’m not sure quite what to make of it. It’s rained so much for so long that it appears to have done something strange to the sky. It’s all discolored and odd-looking with these large patches of a bluish color. They look quite pretty. I’m just wondering what kind of rain falls from a blue sky. Will the rain be blue? It’s unnerving to just sit and wait like this.

We still have power, though not much of the “will” variety. We ate too much pizza last night and I slept in and missed my date at the gym. I hope she still loves me. We’re waiting for the water to go down so we can see if there are still bridges and roads under it and I suddenly have a craving for a manicure and a trip to the mall. No, it’s not prom. I don’t think. I just want to go because I can’t.