Backup title: Fuck the holidays.
Not in, like, a “I hate my life, and everything is terrible” kind of way. (Although things might get shaken up at the Professor Haus in an unexpected way pretty soon). There are a lot of things I love about my life. Way more than those that are negative, and that’s the way it oughta be.
Folks can’t expect to have zero bad things in their lives; that is unrealistic. Bad things happen; you can’t avoid them. If you try, you’ll just live your life looking for bad things all the time and forget to notice the good ones. That is not a fun way to live, y’all.
Bad things happen. The thing to figure out is how you deal with them. And also… “bad” is relative. Things happen. No need to label them good or bad… just observe them and then work through them (if that is what needs doing). Okay, this got away from me. I wanted to talk about nachos and why the holidays suck.
Nachos
Nachos are my comfort food. They are the answer to one of the few questions I have a consistent answer to: What would your ideal last meal be?
Answer: Nachos.
Not even fancy ones. I’m talking $2-Only Santitas Yellow Corn Chips and store brand shredded sharp cheddar cheese. Evenly spaced out on a plate like a tortilla chip puzzle and then lovingly (evenly) covering them with a single layer of golden shreds.
I’ve been making nachos this way for as long as I can recall. It’s a true marvel that I wasn’t diagnosed with OCD until my 40s. I think I even called them OCD Nachos at one point in my life, poking fun at myself for taking ten minutes to create a single plate of microwave food. (they don’t taste the same in the oven).
But one day over the holidays, I had a hankerin’ for them. Now, these two ingredients are not in our current staple stable (if so, I’d eat only nachos), and I didn’t want to encourage stores being open on a human holiday, so I was kind of shit out of luck. (i wanted to type SOL there, but then my brain panicked and thought people might not know what that means?)
So, I kind of sat there watching Game of Thrones Dragon House or whatever it is called, turning over the staples we DO keep in the house.
We had tortillas. I could make my own chips.
And so I did! I don’t remember the time or the temperature, because I wasn’t planning on writing a blog about it? IDK even know why I took the pics, really. Just trying to get into the habit, I guess.
The lime juice? That is a recent addition ot my nacho proceedings. I normally sprinkle it over the completed plate of nachos, but this time I did it at the chip stage as well.
Oh, and I didn’t even start making the chips until I knew I had some sort of sharp cheddar for them. I unearthed a block from a crisper drawer and hauled my Kitchen Aid Mixer (thanks, Woozy) to the counter and shredded it up!
Then I placed it atop my homemade chips, which I did not take a photo of because I was very ready for nachos.
After an amount of time (i do not recall how long… a few chapters of The One and Only Ivan, most likely), I pulled the nachos from the oven and placed them on a plate (that I made myself in ceramics class in 2024).
They almost scratched the itch, but not quite. All in all, though, I found it to be a relaxing exercise in enjoying the journey. And I really needed that… because the holidays, amirite?
Why the Holidays Suck
My brain is very schedule-based, y’all. I like knowing Mickey is at work on this day and that day and this day, so that I can plan out what I will accomplish on those days. I have a paper planner that I use religiously for this purpose. I like those days being the same days of the week every week. My brain craves that routine when it comes to work.
And as a freelancer… if I don’t work, I don’t get paid. And I like what I do. I love writing about human-owned businesses. I adore encouraging folks to explore their pleasure in new and exciting ways. I love my ever-increasing side hustle of illustration and logo design. I hope more people ask me to do pitch decks and bios. And I know one of my many secret projects is gonna fly out into the world for everyone to delight over sooner or later.
But I have a lot of trouble doing it during the holidays. The work has slowed down, so I don’t have as much to do. The world around me is lazy, and so I turn into a lump. This is something I can work on in the future, though.
And even more concerning than the lumpy laziness of it all is the all-encompassing money spending of it all. Are all of these THINGS, uh, things that y’all actually want?! Or are they things that the algorithm made you feel FOMO about? I hate what is happening on the Internet these days, y’all. I want human things made with human hands. I don’t even want things I can keep nowadays. I’m here for food and experiences.
So fuck the holidays, I’ll take my normal schedule, please. And zero to none capitalism. Thank you.
