The Weekend Report: How You Know It's Winter Break

Ok, ok, so technically, it's not "Winter Break" for me...because I'm not in school anymore...so I have a "real job"...which means that you don't just automatically get seasonal breaks...BUT I felt the need, so I created my own. Thus, Mollie's Winter Break 2010 was born.

Anywho, words cannot describe how absolutely wonderful Christmas was. And though I love words, and I'm willing to try, you all would probably promptly remove me from your RSS/bookmarks bar/thoughts due to the extensiveness of that potential post! So I'll keep those particular words to myself.

Instead, I bring you a list:


1. You are never sure exactly what day it is. E.g. Well hmmm, I know Christmas was on Friday...so today must be Saturday. Wait, it's not? Today's Sunday? Then what happened on Saturday? Did Saturday happen???

2. Fatstorm. To the max. My daily meal plan looks like: leftover desserts for breakfast - Christmas cookies for lunch/snack/coffee break - dinner (I do that for reals) - dessert - post-dessert cookie - pre-bed snack (i.e. dessert). I know, I know, the scary part is that I'm not even kidding!

3. You play boardgames (without any drinking or dirty jokes) because the age range is 5 to 65.

4. Running can take over 3 hours. (Drive to trails, find a bathroom, run, walk, stretch, wait for lost family-members, drive home.) And that's ok.

5. You can go a whole day without putting on real pants.

6. Read 3 books in 4 days? Bring it.

7. Movies in movie theaters. I forget how good those are!

8. No real responsibilities. (Me: Hmmm, I could check my work email...or I could eat this gingerbread man instead...tough decision...)

9. I forget my phone at home, come back 6 hours later, and see that I have no missed calls. My first thought: Wow, is that kind of pathetic? Should I be worried about my Petaluma social life? My second thought: Time for jammies and cookies!

10. Ants attack our kitchen. This happens every year. Why? I don't know. They destroyed my granola...then a half-eaten box of See's Chocolate! You know the movie A Christmas Story? (How can you not? It's on TV like 24/7 through December.) The dad in that movie vs. the Bumpus Hounds = my dad vs. The Ants. Cover your ears kids, this could get inappropriate!


In other news, I have been recently reminded how beautiful my home area is.

On Christmas Eve we did our annual Point Reyes run/hike on the Bear Valley Trail. You go out 4ish miles through the woods, and then suddenly you're out on Arch Rock, looking at the Pacific, SF, and Point Reyes. Absolutely spectacular. I just stood there for a while to admire it.

The day before Christmas Eve, my dad took me to run Mt. Home trail (which, fyi, is not the actual name of the trail, it's just near Mountain Home Inn on the south side of Mt. Tamalpias). I've done that run before, but this was the first time the air was fog-less and I could see the view. Richardson Bay/Mill Valley/Sausalito on one side, the Pacific on the other. Again, wow to the max.

And then today my parents and I went on a beach walk at Salmon Creek Beach at Bodega Bay. It was only partly cloudy, and not too cold/windy. I guess I just really like the ocean. I don't have any desire to go in it (I've done my fair share of surfing, and I can definitively say - Paddling a ton while swallowing salt water? Not for me.) but I do like to have it close-by.

I guess that's all for now. Happy Winter Break!