Christmas shopping season

Was yesterday the official start of the Christmas shopping season, and no one told me?

I always used to love the mall, and I'd go at least a few times a month. I loved just wandering around in all the stores; sometimes I'd buy something, sometimes not, but it was fun looking at everything, and I always pawed through the sales racks in the department stores, looked at jewelry and purses, and just generally treated it like a vacation destination.

Unfortunately, other people started doing that, too--or more people, I guess--the parking lots got so crowded that finding a place to park was almost impossible, and it was a struggle just to get through the aisles of the stores, let alone the aisles of the mall itself.

So at some point a few years ago, I stopped going to the enclosed malls. There's a nice big "strip mall" (although the connotation doesn't really apply to this upscale shopping district) near my house, and between it, my much-beloved Target, and the discount department stores like Marshall's and T. J. Maxx, I haven't missed them. I do a lot of shopping online, and a lot of it in bookstores (which still remain, for the most part, navigable).

But I needed jeans. I knew I needed them, but I avoided it all summer because I didn't wear them much, wearing shorts every day. But now I've got to transition back to jeans, and I only had one good pair. I knew exactly what I wanted, what brand and size, and I knew Penney's carried them. I'm sure they're carried other places, but I didn't want to shop, I just wanted to get in and get them and get out.

The parking lot at the mall was completely full. Completely. Even the outer rows, the ones at the very end of the lot. I was reduced to driving around waiting for someone to pull out. I nearly gave up, thinking it just wasn't worth it, but I really did need jeans, and I didn't know when I'd be able to get back there. So I persevered, found a spot, and trudged in, hoping to find the right department right away.

I was met at the door by a Salvation Army volunteer working one of those big puppets on sticks; and once in the store, it was a madhouse. I could hardly push my way through the crowds of people, and that was just the catalog department!

I won't go through the whole ordeal, but suffice to say that when Bob called on my cell phone and asked where I was, I said, "I'm in Penney's reminding myself why I stay out of the malls."

I finally, through sheer luck, found the right department, and thank goodness they had my size and the right style, and I got two pair and stood in line to pay.

I still had to go to Target for groceries, and it was nearly the same there, although in a store that's so much bigger, the crowds spread out a lot better. The toy and Christmas departments were jammed, but I wanted to look at Christmas decorations, so I persevered (there's that word again), and found a really nice small wreath for my office door and a few small decorations for the tree I keep on my desk at Christmastime.

It was a long day. I was exhausted by the time I got home, and starving. I had eaten lunch at Subway, but a veggie sandwich only goes so far. Bob had been to the store, too, to get a roast to cook to take on a hunting trip he's leaving on tomorrow night, and he had bought some shrimp, so we had shrimp and sauce and I had cheese and crackers, and then later for dinner he had pork chops and I had the side dishes--rice and brocolli.

I'm trying to break myself of the habit of eating between meals, but I think that's the wrong strategy. I certainly need to break myself of the habit of eating candy and chips and things like that between meals, but rather than making the meals themselves larger and more filling, I probably need to break them up, and eat more small meals more often.

This morning I made a big pot (Crockpot) of my homemade vegetable soup, and I'll take that to work for lunch all next week, along with crackers or bread or something.

I'm a little behind on wordcount on the book; by the time I sat down to write last night, I couldn't come up with much, and ended up with only 700 words or so, which isn't nearly enough to keep up. I'm going to try to stay home today and just WRITE--I'll need to pop out at some point to go to the grocery store again--Target didn't have the kind of yogurt I like, so as long as I have to go, Bob wanted me to pick up a few things for his trip, too. I've also got a lot of laundry to do, and that will keep me home, so hopefully I can crank out a few thousand words and get back on track . . .