Learning A New Way To Sit Will Change Your Life...or something...

This weeks headlines from top womens magazines as seen while either queuing for the cashier in the supermarket or waiting to hear your name being called at the hospital lab...'' Two Weeks to a Happy Life''. '' Learning a New Way to Sit Will Change Your Life.'' And of course, the one that promised to tell me how to ''Have the Best Christmas Ever'' just by choosing the right nail polish color and suitably foxy lingerie. Now, I have nothing against new and mind-blowing ways of sitting, and as to the nail polish, well, it's just, you know, nail polish, it's not like we're going to build world peace by just choosing the right color or brand. And lingerie, well, I just realised that unlike in the English language, in my mother tongue we don't even have the division between underwear and lingerie. What does that tell you? No wonder they need to run these headlines in the magazines, the lingerie business would go bust if it were left to us practically minded ladies to choose our underwear. Bust, eh? Just call me the queen of the bad pun. And as to the first one, the one promising happy life in two weeks, I can not even begin to imagine what that would entail. It all reminds me of another headline I remember from last summer that caught my eye, this time it was one extolling the virtues of  ''Learning Your True Buttock Shape''. And then what? Or maybe I just really need to learn my true buttock shape in order to be able to truly appreciate the wisdom that goes into making these headlines. Right. I'll pass.

Bette Davis, 1939.

Classic.

But I bet she had no delusions

about the miraculous

powers of her nail polish.

And as the endless queue in the supermarket was slowly inching it's way forward, another header for an article in an entirely different type of magazine loomed my way. '' Ten Steps to No Christmas Stress''. I bet the first real step in that direction would be not to buy that magazine and to not read those 'ten steps'. Come on now, we are talking about a stay-at-home-mum oriented family magazine here. And if you are a stay-at-home-mum prone to Christmas stress, then I bet buying a magazine otherwise full of things to make and do for Christmas, going through them, and then on top of that, reading a list of ten things more that you can do in order to avoid that said stress that I bet just got hell of a lot worse, would be really rather unproductive, to say the least. Phew. Now, I used to be a stay-at-home-mum, and loved it. I loved the time I got to spend with my Daughter. But I was not then, nor am I now, prone to Christmas stress. Granted, I still haven't gotten all the decorations up and will probably, again, send my Christmas cards on the 23rd or something, but in the end I know that the actual Christmas will be just fine. Who cares if my hummus and eggplant spreads look rather alarmingly like wall-paper glue, and everybody just looks all ''well, ahemmm, interesting, very interesting'' when you present them with your giant capers as starters. 

Thats me, right, 

getting ready to serve yet another

of my delightful Christmas Day

lunches.

Yeah, sounds a bit strangely Middle-Eastern for a Scandinavian Christmas menu, doesn't it. You see, I am not too fond of the actual traditional Christmas Food that's supposed to be eaten on Christmas Eve, so I leave taking care of that to my Mother. And they leave coming up with something for a loooooong lunch on the 25th to me. Weehey. So, last year they got a vaguely Middle-Eastern spread. Don't get me wrong, some of it was actually pretty good and went down nicely, unlike the eggplant spread that I found still lurking in my Mother's fridge quite a few weeks later. I haven't yet decided what to do this year, but sushi, anyone? Just kidding. I think that might be stretching my family's open-minded Christmas spirit just a tad too far. 

That pretty much sums us up.

I've also been thinking about what attracts us to each others, again, thanks to that unbelievably slow queue. Another headline, I think this one was in Cosmo or something. '' You Fell for Your Man's Smell''. Okey dokey. Without going further into evolution biology, I can only say that the advertising agency responsible for those AXE ads must be behind this one. But what is it that attracts us to each other? I recently read an article in another magazine in which the woman being interviewed claimed to have two 'Men Types' that she always goes for. The skinny, artistic type, and the burly, beary sort of fellow. Her words, not mine... I never understood what was it that people mean by this. Are they implying that those outward characteristics come attached to certain personality types? That all 'skinny, artistic types' are the same? By this rationale, let's imagine a man claiming his type to be tall, green eyed blondes with big boobs and pouty lips. What do you think he's looking for? Well, he would most likely be in for one hell of a disappointment should he be unfortunate enough to mistake me for his 'type'. And trust me, many have.

So you think you know what she's like?

You sure?

And maybe it is precisely because of this that I find this  'my type' business based on looks so absurd, unless, of course, you really do not care one whit about what's on the inside. To me, some people just 'have it', regardless of their looks, and I have had the weirdest of incidents in my life to prove that. Case in point. Quite a few years ago I was sitting at the Brussels airport, in Belgium, waiting to board a plane to Lisbon, minding my own business, when I saw a pair of sneakers appearing on the floor in front of me. ''Mam, would you mind taking part in our survey? It would only take a few minutes?'' said a voice on top of the sneakers. I lifted my eyes from my book already mouthing the words ' no thank you' when suddenly I found myself smiling from ear to ear as I could not help but stare into the eyes of the increasingly red faced young man in front of me. To this day I could not tell you what he looked like, only that it was certainly nothing out of the ordinary, but we ended up doing the survey while grinning like idiots and I boarded the plane feeling all giddy and light. Attraction, pure and simple. But what was it that I was attracted to? His looks? Hardly. His personality? Very unlikely. So, what was it then?

And to further prove my point. This time at the Frankfurt airport. What is it with me and airports... Well, at one time in my life I seemed to be spending so much time at airports no wonder I ended up meeting all sorts of curious characters there. Well, this time I was approached in a cafe by one super confident, super smooth man asking if he could sit at my table. Seeing that most of the chairs at most of the other tables were taken, I said he could. The result? A full on flirt attack. That left me just plain bored bored bored and wishing he would just go away already. Sure, he would've ticked all the women's magazine boxes for a stereotypically handsome, stylish and witty male, but there was just simply nothing there. Nothing. Maybe, based on my outward appearance he thought I was something I am not. Well, tough. 

And it's been a tough few weeks here for me too, like I said in the previous post. Eight years ago at the end of November I got married. This year, about the same time, the divorce decree came through. I have changed my name, and am finding it rather weird to look at my new, old name. It's going to take some time before I get used to signing it again. People being born and dying. Falling ill and getting better. Life, I guess you could say. My youngest sister brought this angel cookie cutter set from her recent trip to Berlin, and I have yet to put it to use. Maybe tomorrow I should just bake some sugary sweet vanilla cookies for the Daughter's kindergarten class. I've already taken them a batch of gingerbread and another one of gooey chocolate chip cookies, and let's just say they were not complaining. What can I say. I like to cook. I like to bake. The kids like to eat what I bake and there always seem to be some adventurous souls who are willing to brave my cooking. Perfect.

Thanks, Sis. 

And yeah, I just realised that I have actually bought one Christmas Present. One. And I don't think I have the faintest of ideas where my address book is. Hard to send those cards without addresses. Blimey. And no, I haven't made a single present yet either. So how many days was it again until Christmas? Ten? Oh, but no worries then, it'll all sort itself out. I'll just make myself a nice cup of hot cocoa, dunk some marshmallows in there and just sit and relax. Isn't that what the 'holiday spirit' is about anyway? And I bet I won't be saying that come the 23rd...