With less than six hours left for 2009, what plans do you have for the Celebration? A party? Watching the ball drop in times square on TV? Or just going to a local hangout to be with people?
Me? I’m not going anywhere. I plan on being here, alone in the house, with the cats. The wife has to work so I’ll be by myself.
I have been invited to a party by an old friend that is stationed here at Bragg, but I don;t want to go. My reason for that are
[ol]
[li]If I go to the party I’ll have to drive there. So I can’t drink. Because I need to drive home, obviously. My friend mentioned that I could take a cab or get a ride from some other non-drinker there, but I am not willingly going to leave my car miles away from home only to have to arrange transportation to go get it the next day. [/li][li]Even if I decided not to drink at all, I’m fairly certain there will be a shitload of drunks on the road tonight. And cops. I don’t need the hassle.[/li][li]Oh, yes, my friend said I could always just crash at her place…that ain’t gonna work. My days of waking up in unfamiliar places with a gargantuan hangover are long gone. Its not like everyone will just go to sleep at 12:01 anyway. [/li][li]Since my friend is a soldier too, and she’s told me all of the people she’s invited are soldiers in the same battalion (not the same company, so I will admit I don’t know all of them), I really don’t want to go. I tend to not hang out with other soldiers off duty. Because they always TALK ABOUT WORK AND ARMY STUFF. I can’t imagine a better way to make me want to put an ice pick into my ear. I hate that. If I’m off duty, I’m off duty. I don’t want to talk about that stuff, and in my experience thats what always happens.[/li][li]I also don’t want to be there if God Forbid, something happens. One reason I don’t have big parties at my house is because as a senior NCO in my unit I’m responsible for these yahoos. If I have a party and invite them and anything goes wrong, I’m responsible. The Battalion Sergeant Major has already said if he has to come in to work this weekend because someone gets a DUI we’re all coming in. Yeah, thanks, Sergeant Major. I think I’ll just stay at home.[/li][li]I wouldn’t have fun knowing my wife is at work. Besides, I think I’d enjoy playing PC games and watching TV alone more than a crowded house during a loud party.[/li][/ol]
I will admit that if I wasn’t here I’d be out partying somewhere. If I was still in Europe I’d either be with my NATO friends, or I’d have taken a trip to London, or Paris or somewhere for the new year. Perhaps even Amsterdam…my friend in the dutch army has extended an open invite to visit.
We watched the New Year’s Eve fireworks last night.
This morning I sang at a New Year’s Day mass. And now all I’m planning for the rest of the day is relaxation, with perhaps a swim later this afternoon.
I’m cleaning the house. It’s already in pretty good shape, but I put fresh sheets on the bed, swept and vacuumed, took out garbage and recycling. All the laundry’s away, and I’m going to run and empty the dishwasher. We’ll stay in tonight. I will make my resolutions and also make up a list of the things I want to let go of, and burn those at midnight. I’m also trying to eat up chocolate, potato chips, and Chinese food so it won’t be around tomorrow. That might not tie in well with the cold bottle of wine I plan on opening as I putter about later on, wiping, and dusting. My New Year’s ritual is obviously one of cleansing and feasting, so tomorrow morning I can start off with a clean house and a fresh start.
I’m not sure what my husband’s plans are. Probably dinner of said yummy Chinese food, snacks, a movie. We’ll probably see how Dick Clark is doing, but that’s really painful these past years.
I hate going out to the forced festivities; it’s so loud and bright and brittle and everyone’s trying too hard to have a good time. We’ve become real homebodies in middle age.
I’ve been working a weird combination of swing and day shift this week–I’m in no shape to do anything other than hang out at home and go to bed early.
Thanks to a thread in CS, I’m watching True Grit. I’ve got a baked potato in the oven, getting ready to saute some 'shrooms ‘n’ onions to top a nice steak and some green beans and bacon to go along with them. Oh, and of course NYE wouldn’t be complete without a bottle of bubbly.
Speaking of which, I think I’ll go uncork that sucker right now…
My fiance is a chef, so he’s working. I took a long, looooong hot bath, had some bubbly on my own, watched Mists of Avalon, and am hoping he’ll be home before midnight.
My other, more sarcastic response is: I’m on SDMB at 10:30 on New Years… clearly I’m a loser.
Another loser checking in. I’m doing laundry and then packing. Tomorrow I’m going over to Surly Brother’s house for dinner and to watch the Winter Classic. Saturday early morning I’ll start the two day trek back to Maine (currently I’m in NW IN) with the dog. Here’s hoping I don’t hit snow on the way.
Does anyone else feel obligated to stay up until midnight even though they’re not doing anything?
You’re looking at what I’m doing for New Year’s Eve. I’ve had enough bad times in public venues to put me off going out unless there is something really compelling, and this year, there ain’t.
I’ve just viewed some excellent film and TV (Rear Window, which gets better every time I see it, and an ep from Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 3, which I am just now getting through for the first time). I’ve got a glass of some Spanish sparkling wine that I was surprised to find is actually quite nice, a bit of cheese and Italian hot salami, and some olives. All’s well as far as I’m concerned.
We’ll probably have a BBQ / pool party… but there’s no guarantee of it. Still 4 1/2 hours to go and nothing has started. Everyone is glued to their damn tv’s.
I guess I better get the ball rolling here and get everyone off of their asses. Maybe forcing a round of shots will do the trick…
I’ve taken over my friends’ NYE party, when they moved to California. What I do is invite all of the “usual suspects” who used to go to their party, and I invite them here. Then we all talk to our friends in California via Skype video.
I’ve also been hosting game nights here, so I combined the two. We played “Win, Lose or Draw” WITH the folks in CA by pointing the webcam at the drawing board.
It was pretty fun, although 4 of the people who said they’d come didn’t come. So I ended up with way too many leftovers. Ah well.
We also tried to stick around for New Year’s Pacific but only made it through Central and Mountain. Well, I’M still awake but the folks in CA looked about dead by 2. So that was that.
so I’ll be by myself.