If you’ll recall, I have quite an addiction to calendars. I bought another one several months ago, swearing it would last me until 2009. I should not even bother faking that type of calendar loyalty. The first moment I thought about the stacks and piles of 50% off calendars post-Christmas? I knew I’d be buying a new one. How could I resist? Have you seen the calendars on those tables? They’re all new! And blank! And needing to be bought and written upon!

So I did it. I actually bought two. One for my desk at work which has antique maps on every page, and one basic, simple calendar for my purse. Both are weekly calendars, giving me plenty of space per day while viewing an entire week at a time. I’ve been taking spare time the last few days to fill in birthdays and anniversaries into my new calendars. This is quite a lengthy process as MrZ and I both have quite a few relatives. And of course, it must be done without a mistake or else the entire calendar is ruined.

(What?)

Here’s my question: Are you a calendar freak? If so - do you write different things in different colors in your calendars? Like - for my purse calendar I’m doing birthdays/anniversaries/annual events in purple. I figure if I need to write appointments in it, I’ll use a basic color like blue or black, that way the birthdays will always stand out. Do you do that? If so - what color do you use? Do you take it to another level and do anniversaries in a different color than birthdays? What about doctor’s appointments? Or school functions? Are they all in different colors or does it solely depend what pen is closest when you write it down?

And as usual, I have to wrap up an entry like this with the typical conclusion: Do I Need To Get Out More?

You know what I did yesterday? I spent 45 minutes trying to figure out why something didn’t work getting flustered and stressed, investigating solutions, only to realize it did work, I just wasn’t patient enough to wait and see the results.

So, to make up for it, do you know what I did? I went to Staples. With my kids.

As we pulled into the Staples parking lot, LilZ and I were joking with NikkiZ that this was our church. I said, “Some people go to religious churches to commune with others of the same religion, some go into nature where they’ll be closer to their God. We? Go to Staples.” It’s just one of those places where we all walk in and it’s like nothing bad happened that day. We can buy new pens! Or calendars! LilZ and I both bought journal type notebooks, knowing full well we’ll probably only use them for a week. We bought NikkiZ art stuff for Christmas. We walked around and laughed and mocked and make our wishlists for Santa.

And I personally walked out feeling much better.

A true sign I’m a total dork.

Remember this photo?

I posted that photo about a year ago to document the sickness I have with compulsively buying new calendars and spending HOURS re-writing birthdays and anniversaries in each one.

How about these resolutions? Especially this one:

7. Do not buy any more calendars this year. Amen. I have this bad habit of buying new calendars every few months. Not only is this a bad habit financially, but it feeds an already unhealthy office-supply addiction. I buy new ones because I don’t like it when the old ones become messy. But - it takes me a full day to transfer everything (neatly) into the new calendar. So, it also becomes a HUGE waste of time. I’ve ordered my desk calendar for the year and I have a daily planner for my purse. I need NOTHING else. If it gets messy, I must suck it up and deal with it. I will NOT buy a new one!

Well, I lied. I bought another calendar this past weekend and finally filled in all of the important dates. I couldn’t help myself. It was so pretty! And it had this great magnetic closure that makes it easy to throw in a bag and not worry about it getting wrinkled. And it has those cute perforated corners so you’ll always be able to flip to the write page. And it’s pretty! Did I mention that? And that I also needed something to do with all of the new pens I bought during school supply outings? And that the calendar is SO PRETTY!

I’m sick.

Guess what I did on Monday? I’ll give you a hint - It’s my FAVORITE activity in the WORLD that does not involve alcohol or nudity. Come on…you know what it is…guess!

School Supply Shopping!

And this year? I got to take Stace’s daughters with me because really, who better to go school supply shopping with than the Queen of Pens herself: Miss Zoot. Highlights from the day included the following:

• Captain Jack Sparrow spiral notebooks and backpacks. Yummy!
• Pulling up to Staples and hearing the oldest girl say, “I don’t think I’ve ever been here before.” LilZ and I both gasped in horror at such an idea.
• Me telling everyone in the car that Staples was my church and that I am the minister there.
• Sequined pencil pouches
• Getting mad at LilZ for buying plain bic ball-point pens. “You are a disappointment to me.” I then forced him to buy fancier pens at our next trip to Target. No child of mine shows up to school with boring writing utensils.
• Pencil Sharpeners in the shape of butterflies
• Buy One Get One Free Post Its.
• Calendars with cute puppies on them. It’s a double-dose of awesome!

Now, I am usually the Queen of School Supplies, but this year I had a little setback. LilZ is taking a home-economics class this year that had it’s own supply list. One of the things on the list was “Trigger Cloth.” I had no idea what that was, but since it was grouped with other fabric-related items, I asked the Fabric Lady at Hobby Lobby for some help. She smiled politely and said, “Yes. That’s another name for Popplin. We don’t carry that. Try Hancock Fabrics.”

Popplin? Am I supposed to know what that is? Of course, I didn’t ask that because she told me in such a way that she obviously thought “popplin” would clear things up for me. I didn’t want to seem like a moron when it wasn’t going to matter anyway because they didn’t have any. I wasn’t going to Hancock Fabrics since that place scares me. I’m saving that for another day when I have a bunch of courage. That is a real fabric store and I fear they’ll smell my ignorance of fabrics from a mile away.

So - this is the first time ever that I’ve had to go home without something on the list because I wasn’t sure what it was. It was a sad day in my school-supply-shopping career. A sad, sad day.

I got tagged by Chrispian to do the 7 things meme. BUT - I’ve done a few variations of that the last few weeks and am out of “unusual” things to tell about myself. (Other than my mayonnaise fetish, but we won’t talk about that.) (Hee. Just Kidding.) (Or am I?) Anyway - so I thought I’d make a variation I could complete, because I’m a rebel like that.

7 Things that I’m Uber-Excited About this Summer

1. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, of course! I’m having a big party for LilZ and some of his friends (and possibly some of mine who may be more obsessed than I am…if you can believe it) and we are going to the midnight celebrations like we have every year before. And then I’m going to read it as slow as possible to savor every last word.
2. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix movie release. I think I’m buying my midnight release tickets today (for 7/10) just to be safe. The book was my least favorite, but it’s going to be a kick-mega-ass movie!
3. One of my BFFs is coming in town from Seattle with her daughter and I haven’t seen them since September. I’m so excited! I’m hoping to lock her up in my attic (I don’t have a basement) so she can’t leave, but don’t tell her that.
4. We’re trying to plan a camping trip for a weekend in July and I’m simply excited about the prospect of it. I haven’t been camping in ages and I miss it. It’s going to be FUN! FUN! FUN! (Until Daddy takes the propane grill away?)
5. I’m going to Knoxville this weekend to visit my Mom and Dad. I’m thrilled about that especially because my Dad’s travels have been cut short and I’ll get to hang with him a little longer than we had originally thought. He is in the process of trying to get rid of some of the “stuff” he’s accumulated over the decades in our house and told me, “If you see anything you want while you’re there. TAKE IT.”
6. SCHOOL SUPPLY SHOPPING. LilZ had accumulated at least one solid ton of pens/notebooks/pads over the last several years and we finally cleaned it all out and decided this year, we’ll start over. I’m trying to encourage him to get organized, so as soon as he finishes reading his summer reading list, we’re off to Staples! I LOVE SCHOOL SUPPLIES.
7. My 32nd birthday. I actually filled out paperwork yesterday that said I’d be over 35 when this baby was born. And it wasn’t really and accident, I did it intentionally because for that moment I thought I was turning 35 this summer. I am so bad with ages, ask my permanently-23-year-old husband. My birthday is July 14th and I’m totally thrilled b/c it is smack-dab in between the HP movie and HP book making it the best birthday week EVER.

What 7 things are you looking forward to this summer? Or do your own variation like, “7 Foods I Like to Put Cheese On” or “7 Recreational Drugs I Did Last Night” - you know, the usual type of stuff.