As my three week hiatus from life draws to a painful and wholly undesirable close, I feel the need to reflect back on a few bad habits and addictions that I’ve acquired in this time.
1. Recycling Outfits: Did you know that if you fall asleep in your clothes, wake up the next morning, and keep wearing the same outfit all day, you totally economize on your laundry? Because I do.
2. Caramel Apples: In the past six days, I have consumed eleven of these delicious little beauties. That in and of itself may not seem too shocking, until I admit that seven of them were consumed in one day. I couldn’t help it. The nutrition facts indicate that they’re not that bad, they were in the pantry literally screaming my name, and everything is so much easier to handle with a caramel apple in your hand.
3. Sleeping On The Floor: In case you weren’t aware, I can be a tiny bit neurotic at times and am often governed by my idiosyncrasies. One of those little quirks is that I am unable to sleep peacefully until I have gotten ready for bed, which includes brushing my teeth, washing my face, and taking my medication. If I fall asleep while pursuing another activity like reading or watching television, I will not bother to move to my bed and turn off the lights until I have gotten entirely ready for bed. Therefore, if I fall asleep on the floor, regardless of how many times I awaken during the night, I will not move until I am in the mood to floss. Or until the sun rises. I have discovered, however, that sleeping on the floor while fully dressed significantly increases the frequency of #1 on this list, which makes for great efficiency.
4. Nicknames: My friends and roommates have decided that I will be called Roto-Rooter (because apparently my pants and I are constantly trying to part ways), Theoretical Physics (because me smart but do many dumb things), Quark (because I spend 32/33 of my time outside the universe), Dirty Hippie (because I like to observe the time-honored Middle Eastern tradition of smoking a hookah periodically), and Fruitfly (because my outfit the other night APPARENTLY made me look like rather insect-like). I’m not feeling the love here.
5. Chai Lattes: I am addicted to Panera’s chai lattes, but those are a bit out of my budget at this point (hell, air is out of my budget at this point), so I’ve made do with making my own chai at home. No fewer than three times a day. The worst part is that the two packets of Splenda that I stir into each cup of happy goodness are, um, borrowed from my local Starbucks, because I’m too cheap to buy my own. There, I confessed. Do I still have to go to Hell?
Please note the absence of such things on that list as alcohol, heroin, or hiding in the recesses of my closet while crying and eating Cheetos. I may have nursed a few less than healthy habits in the past few weeks, but come on, do you really NEED to bathe more than weekly?
And with that, it’s back to the real world.