We have all had good years and bad years, but I don’t remember a year when so many people have expressed that it was a bad year.  However, I don’t remember much of anything so it may have happened every year for all I know.  I also don’t really care about that many people and maybe I just never asked.  Alright, the truth is I’ve never had to scroll through so much 2016 negativity on Facebook, that’s pretty much what happened.  But seriously, some man started a Go Fund Me page to keep Betty White safe, what the heck??  It’s like this past week everyone just ran to their fallout shelter and won’t come out again until midnight.  “Ok everyone, 2016 is gone, it’s safe to come out.”  It will be like the scene from the movie Twister when the tornado is gone and the bulkhead doors in the ground all start to open and everyone sees the sun, except it will be midnight and it will be dark but let’s just go with the sunny image (already feeling more positive).

Everyone must admit this year has been a very strange year.  It has just felt weird, almost as if we were being controlled by aliens or some higher power.  All the notable deaths, terrorism, and let’s not forget the results of the election.  If that isn’t proof of a mind controlling higher power then I don’t know what is. It has also been a very emotional year for many including myself.  As if we are all part of an alien video game where they knock you down, see you start to get back up, giggle, and zap you back down.  “Almost missed that one, haha.”  If I didn’t have Facebook I would just assume that it might be time to have me committed, but this time it isn’t just me.  Yay, there was a positive in 2016.  Honestly, the only thing that has kept me going this year is that for some strange reason radio stations have been playing “Stacy’s mom has got it going on” more than it has in recent years and in my version the song is “Sara’s mom has got it going on” and that little frequent reminder is definitely uplifting.  If it wasn’t for that and the fact that I’m allergic to cats, I would probably be a crazy cat lady by now.

I never make New Year’s resolutions but this year I actually am, I am hoping that once the force field comes down I will be able to change it up a little.  I weigh more than I ever have, my liver is like a wet sponge, I look like I’m 20 years older and my idea of exercise is squatting down to pick up the cookie I dropped fast enough so it stays in the five second rule.   I am ready to make some positive changes in my life, go from sexy to off the charts sexy.  Only look ten years older.  Keep my talking to myself to a one-sided conversation.  I still don’t want to talk to people but I am hoping to read positive posts on Facebook this year. So 2016 can kiss my white Irish butt (there’s plenty of it so it can’t miss).  Here’s to a great 2017!  Happy New Year!

Recently I made a comment on a friend’s Facebook page referencing my pole dancing, as I often do, it’s become a joke among friends.  I received a response from a man I do not know about “how had he never met me” and it made me think, do some people actually think I am serious???   Let’s look at the definition of pole dancing for a minute and see if any part of it could actually pertain to me.  Pole dancing: erotic dancing that involves swinging around a fixed pole.   Erotic – nope.  Dancing – not by the true sense of the word.  Swinging – um dizzily falling maybe. If I ever were to get swinging my breasts could potentially tie themselves in knots.  Fixed pole – germs, germs, germs.  Not to mention the whole concept pretty much defies gravity for me.  If some miracle ever allowed me to get both feet off of the ground and onto a pole, let’s not even think about the parts of my body that would be sagging and scraping the ground.  Bad visual right there.

Let’s further debunk this myth.  Those of you that don’t really know me or haven’t seen me in a while probably picture this really fit woman walking around in a sports bra and spandex with rock hard abs right?  That is pretty much what you would need to look like to work a pole, right?  I’m pretty close but not quite there.  So let’s address those that have actually seen me recently.  Do I really look fit or coordinated enough to swing what God gave me around a pole?   Let’s put it this way, last week I was in Lululemon and asked the sales woman if they sold clothes for people like me and she did not have to think twice about whether I meant the pole dancing type.   I walked out with a nice comfy pair of joggers that happened to be a size 8 and it was a good day.  Not a pole dancing kind of day but a needing only one seat on an airplane kind of day.  I’m not 100% sure I could even hold myself up on a pole even if I was standing on a ladder next to one.  I tried once but slipped when I had to take one hand off to reach for another donut.

Now here’s the big debunker of the “Stephanie’s a pole dancer” myth.  The be all, end all, even if I were fit and coordinated and my breasts stayed where they were supposed to, reason why I would never find myself on a pole,  I am a huge germaphobe.  Let’s think for a minute what kind of germs would be on a pole.  I use a gallon of Purell after touching a railing on an escalator and women’s no-no zones aren’t typically sliding on that railing.  Can you imagine the coma-like shock I would slip into if I actually had to touch a used pole where others zones have slid?  Do they clean those poles?  Are there people that use Wet Ones to wipe them down between pole swinging sessions?  Can you bring your own pole or have a sign designating whose pole is whose?  So unless that pole was brand new you will never see my bad self saunter over to a pole and screeeeccchhhh down it.

So here it is, the day after Christmas.  The day that I realized the entire month of December has been a blur.  The day that I feel mixed emotions of sadness and gladness that it’s over.  Sadness because I was just too busy to enjoy what really mattered but glad because I am exhausted.  Exhausted to the point where the only dinner I have energy to prepare is leftover cookies with a side of gravy.  I added the gravy so my children won’t have the same thing for breakfast, lunch and dinner.  I’m thoughtful like that. The day I try to get what used to be a Christmas tree out of the house with at least one brown needle still attached to the trunk.

I’m going to go out on a limb here, but I’m pretty sure this is not what Christmas is supposed to be like.  Last night my family watched It’s A Wonderful Life, as we do every year,  and every year I cry happy tears at the end.  Tears because it reminds you that friendship and family are the true meaning of the season.  Not excess.  Excess eating, spending, drinking, giving, wanting, doing, etc., which is what Christmas has become for most.  I am very fortunate that I am able to live a life of excess (thank you Visa), but how I envy the days of simplicity.  I bet Mary Bailey didn’t have to wrap herself in a bed sheet the day after Christmas because she ate so much over the last few weeks that she couldn’t squeeze herself into her clothes.  I’m pretty sure that my own personal consumption of butter increased Land o Lakes’ stock by 14%. That’s only butter, let’s not forget everything else.

What happened to the days where people were happy to receive one gift on Christmas?  Now we spend way beyond our means so that it takes hours to unwrap all that is under our tree. So much so that I have found myself the day after Christmas at the blood bank hoping to donate enough blood to help pay off my credit card debt while wrapped in a sheet.  I just keep telling people that I am preparing for my role as Caesar in a play.  Et tu, Brute?  I would normally just try to pick up a few extra pole dancing shifts but they can’t turn the music up loud enough to drown out the sound of my thighs on that pole.  It’s like fingernails on a chalkboard.  People just won’t pay for that.  Maybe next year I will find a way to simplify or at least cut down on the thigh noise.