Elementary schools are infamous for sending kids home with cards and valentine bags made of construction paper and doilies.

www.thelongthread.com

Each February when I was a child, I anticipated receiving a list of all of the names of the students in my class. That meant it was time to write out my valentines!

But what I hated was when I would get a teacher who required that if we handed out any valentines, we had to give them to every kid in the class. If it wasn’t an absolute rule, it was highly encouraged.

That rule wasn’t so bad in the first-grade. I didn’t particularly care for the boy who sat next to me and picked his nose, but I also wasn’t phased by the fact that I had to give him a valentine.

The all or nothing standards really made me mad when I was in about the fourth-grade. There were a few girls who I just didn’t like and I felt like a fake to wish them a Happy Valentine’s Day. And that boy who smelled bad and failed all of his tests? Why in the world would I have wanted to pretend that we were friends?

Once I got to junior high school, the exchange of valentines became scarce. I no longer got to make fancy Valentine’s Day bags of fuchsia envelopes and pink doilies. There were no more class parties with cupcakes and conversation hearts. By the time I was in ninth-grade, we were reading Romeo and Juliet in my advanced English class during February as a celebration. Whoopdie-doo!

As an adult, I enjoy putting up a lighted heart and some other Valentine’s Day decorations in my window at home. I will spend this Valentine’s Day helping my boyfriend move into his new apartment, which is perhaps both a measure of love and a reminder of the responsibilities of adulthood. Valentine’s Day is still special, but not in the same way it was when I was a child.

If I could morph into a child and go back to elementary school for a Valentine’s Day party, I’d enjoy every minute of it and happily drop a valentine into every one of my classmates’ bags - even the boy who smells like old cheese.

Wouldn't you love this beer vault in your local gas station?

www.creativeconvience.com

I was in the Trucksville Sheetz at about 10 p.m. on Saturday night when I overheard two young women deliberating as to whether or not they could buy beer in a gas station or convenience store.

Not wanting to see their Saturday night plans go dry, I nosed my way into the conversation and asked if they were Misericordia students. Nope. They lived in New York and for some reason found their way to the Back Mountain, which is probably a story itself that I failed to ask about.

I certainly didn’t know of a local beer distributor that would still be open after 9 p.m., so I suggested the ladies visit a nearby pizza parlor that sells beer to go. Then I started thinking as to why they couldn’t buy beer at Sheetz or similar places. Of course it’s the law, but why? Who cares if gas stations sell beer? I sure don’t.

I’m also not in favor of state-run liquor stores. Why can’t I buy a bottle of Arbor Mist at the supermarket when I’m shopping for items for dinner?

Although I’m no economist, wouldn’t revenue from alcohol sales increase if there was more competition?  Most states don’t have alcohol sales systems run as tightly as ours and it works for them. So why wouldn’t it work here? It’s not like DUIs occur any less often in Pennsylvania because you can’t purchase Smirnoff at Weis.

The next time you go for a beer run at 1 a.m., think about how much easier your life would be if you could drive (or even walk!) two blocks to a gas station instead of finding a restaurant that’s still open or a bar that does carry out.

Imagine that.

 

We could all use a brush-up of our cell phone etiquette. For a good laugh, read "The Ten Commandments of Cell Phone Etiquette" by Dan Briody.

www.infoworld.com

What ever happened to manners?

I went to see “Marley and Me” last night and I still can’t get over how ignorant people were.

A man and woman seated to the right of my boyfriend talked, and I mean talked, throughout the entire movie. It didn’t seem to faze them that they were in a theater as they didn’t even bother to whisper.

I was feeling kind of moody to begin with, so the last thing I needed was for these people to annoy me after I spent $8.00. OK, my boyfriend actually paid for me. At least chivalry isn’t completely dead.

Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, it did. The woman sitting one seat over to my left had a cell phone that rang. “OK,” I thought to myself. “It happens. Sometimes I forget to turn my ringer off in quiet places, too. She’s probably embarrassed.”

Or not. Rather than silence her phone, the woman answered it instead. And she didn’t whisper, either.

Now I was fuming and thought, “Oh no she DIDN’T!” But she did. And then I did something that perhaps I shouldn’t have.

When the woman hung up her phone, I turned to her and said, “That’s rude.” I got no words in response, but she did give me a look of both surprise and death, though it definitely contained more death than surprise.

You might say that I was just as rude to point out the woman’s bad manners to her, but the whole situation would have been avoided had she not answered her audibly ringing phone in the first place.

I’m far from being “Little Miss Manners,” but I’m not discourteous to strangers who are trying to watch a movie. The children in the theater behaved much better than the adults. That speaks mountains to me.

It’s not your house, people, it’s a public theater!

I feel better now.  =)

www.karatetraining.org

I’ve concluded there are many depressed people in the world.

Even at Christmas, a time of the year that is supposed to be merry and bright, there are enough dismal songs to make anyone blue.

I was listening to Christmas music on the radio last night while wrapping the last of my gifts when “Same Old Lang Syne” by Dan Fogelberg came on. My sister, Alyssa, commented that it was the first time she had heard the song this Christmas season. But I’ve heard it many times.

The song is a good one and it’s even quite catchy. But it’s so…depressing. It temporarily brought my festive mood down.

Alyssa says when she was younger she asked my mom what the song meant. My mother explained it to her. Fogelberg runs into his old girlfriend in the supermarket on Christmas Eve. But now they are both older and different – he’s famous and she has since married and divorced. The two try to hang out but realize they have nothing in common anymore and can’t seem to reconnect.

“We drank a toast to innocence, we drank a toast to now
And tried to reach beyond the emptiness but neither one knew how.”

I mentioned to Alyssa that the song makes me sad and she commented that “Last Christmas” by Wham! is also a gloomy Christmas song. You know that one. It goes like this:

“Last Christmas, I gave you my heart
But the very next day, you gave it away.
This year, to save me from tears
I’ll give it to someone special.”

Let’s not forget the other lost love songs: “Blue Christmas” by Elvis Presley, “Please Come Home for Christmas” by Charles Brown (re-released by the Eagles), and “Merry Christmas Darling” by the Carpenters.

There are two other very popular, sad Christmas songs. “Where are you Christmas?” by Cindy Lou Who is about a grown woman who can no longer find the joys in Christmas. And “Christmas Shoes” by NewSong tells the story of a young boy who buys shoes for his dying mother.

Do these songs make depressed people feel better on Christmas, or do they bring them down even more and allow them to wallow in their troubles? I’m all for freedom of speech, but sad Christmas songs should just be banned.

So on this Christmas Eve, I beg you to listen to and sing happy Christmas songs. “Joy to the World,” “Silent Night,” and “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” should all do the trick. And no matter what your problems may be, please put them aside just for one day and remember the true meaning of Christmas.

Merry Christmas to you and yours!

http://commons.wikimedia.org

The Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center will be lit at 8:58 p.m. tonight and I’ll be watching at home. There’s just something about lighting a gigantic tree that gets me in the mood for Christmas.

This year’s entertainment lineup includes Beyonce, the Jonas Brothers, David Cook, Faith Hill, Jamie Foxx, Tony Bennett and Harry Connick Jr. Not bad, but I don’t know if they can top Nick Lachey (a heartthrob of mine as a teenager) and Celine Dion at the 2007 ceremony.

Last year I was putting up lights in the front window when the hour long tree lighting festivities took place on TV. I kept stopping to watch and frantically called my friend Brian when I learned Celine Dion would sing after the commercial break. Brian loves Celine Dion.

I only saw the tree in person once – when I was on a school trip to New York City with the Coughlin German Club in the ninth-grade. Even at 14, I was able to appreciate how majestic it was. I remember seeing people of many races and ethnicities all enjoying the tree. A large group of Chinese people asked my friend Brian (from above) to take their photo on one of their cameras. I also snapped a photo of them which I still have. A special thanks to Herr Lloyd for taking us there.

This weekend, I’ll be returning to New York City to visit the Christmas tree at Rockefeller once again. I’m even thinking about ice skating at The Rink at Rockefeller Center below the tree. Sigh.

I also plan to visit Times Square, the Fifth Avenue Shopping District, The Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Odditorium New York, St. Peter’s Cathedral and construction on the new Freedom Tower at the site of the World Trade Center.

When I come back, I’ll work on getting my own Christmas tree up. It won’t look like the one at Rockefeller, but it will still be special.
 

About the Author

Rebecca Bria has been reporting for The Dallas Post since June of 2007. She is a 2007 graduate of Wilkes University and previously interned with the company at The Weekender and The Times Leader.

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