I drink Sprite. In fact, I drink it by the liter. When I was a kid my grandfather worked for the local Pepsi bottling plant. As a result, our house was always full of free Pepsi, but I was also strictly forbidden from drinking any Coke product, including my favorite soda, Sprite. So I used to have to take my allowance down to the corner store and buy it there. “Do you want a bag?” the clerk would ask. “No thanks,” I’d reply, “I’ll drink it here.” For years, Sprite was a guilty pleasure, one that I couldn’t enjoy openly until adulthood.
So perhaps it’s ironic that now I drink Sierra Mist, which is in fact a Pepsi product.
This reminds me of the first thing I did when I got my first apartment. I whistled the diddy form Snow White Fopr reasons I can’t fathom whistling wasn’t allowed in the house.
My house contains no oatmeal, unless in teh form of a cookie.
Eerie! I had the same experience. Shiver It caused me to clean our apartment and buy a guest bed. I never want any guest at my house to feel as grossed out and uncomfortable as I was at her house. I wore my socks the whole time. Even in the shower.
From the time I was a small child I wanted a pet snake. This was not going to happen in my mothers house. When I first lived on my own, I had a pet python before I had a stereo or a TV.
The food things in my life are pretty trivial.
I buy more than one box of cereal if I like it.
I eat peanut butter and marshmallow fluff with a spoon, right out of the jar.
I regularly eat spaghetti, chili, or pizza for breakfast.
I had some rather permissive parents, but I am about to leave a fairly regimentated place for my own apartment, so I’ll share what I’m looking forward to:
[ul]
[li]Eating what I want, when I want. If I feel like having chicken for dinner, guess what? I’m eating chicken for dinner.[/li][li]Coming and going as I please. Not having a strict curfew. Being able to go to a party or a baseball game or a date and not have to worry about being in at a certain time, nor account for my whereabouts.[/li][li]Not having to go to religious services. If I want to go, I’ll go.[/li][li]Being able to lounge about all day in my nightgown.[/li][li]Not having to keep my place spotless.[/li][/ul]
I eat bananas caveman style. Y’know, the way my mum thought was uncouth - peeling it in four strips, but only halfway down, and holding the unpeeled part. My mum always insisted I take the banana right out of its peel first.
I love travel because my parents never took us anywhere.
I always have a bottle of coke in the fridge because it’s NOT an occasional luxury, dammit.
I’ll have a third helping of dessert.
I sit too close to the television.
I have long showers.
The walk may do me good, but bugger that - I’ve got a car.
Sex, drugs, and Rock & Roll.
Cigarettes and coffee.
[sub] Oh yes, and I hereby swear never to clean a child’s face in public with the handkerchief / spit method (what gives with mothers and that crap?).[/sub]
I’ve been living with my parents for the past year while I’ve gone to school, and it’s been pretty traumatic. Sometime in the next month, I move into my new place. (Cue Hallelujah Chorus.)
Play my music on the stereo as loud as I like, dance through the house while I do chores.
Watch The Pretender without having to explain or defend it to Dad.
Watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel without having to explain to Mom what happened since she fell asleep halfway through the last episode.
Cook actual vegetables in such a way that they’re edible and still possess most of their nutrients.
Wash the dishes or let them pile up, however I feel like it at the time.
Eat a snack when I’m hungry without getting that look from Dad.
Eat dinner at a godly hour instead of an ungodly one.
Put my altar together and actually take part in my own religion as opposed to shutting up about it because it makes the parents uncomfortable.
And maybe, just maybe, one day have sex again. (Wouldn’t that be lovely?)
Oh, I could go on and on . . .
I’m not bitter, but I am way the hell ready to get out of here.
I walk in and out of the house as many times as I want when the air conditioning is running. Sometimes I walk outside and then walk right back inside several times without making up my mind if I want to be in or out because the damn air conditioner is running.
Other than bedtimes I pretty much agree with the house rules.
Share limited resorces fairly. (I may grump about having to share the internet when I’m home, but I can’t complain that they are being unfair about it. I’m just spoiled.)
Tell people where you are going and when you think you will be back. (So they can call the police when you get left in a ditch.) I’m very trusting. So far I have walked into and out of potentially dangerous situations just fine. But its always good to know someone will notice if you don’t turn up.
Other than that, my stuff and space at home is given enough respect that if I want to clean my room, I do, but if I don’t my mom ignores it. just about the living conditions I have on my own.
Food wise, my mom has a philosophy of making people happy. As long as you get basic nutrients daily you can drink Coke, eat brownies, whatever. She’ll buy it if you will take care of it.
We wear our hair they way we want. We wear the clothes we want. If we are happy, healthy, capable people, she doesn’t see anything wrong with what we are doing. (She says she can’t see stepping in unless we are doing something morally or physically dangerous.)
I can keep a clean and neat house. I know this sounds funny, but my parents were slobs. I mean, for a while they were edging towards the Langley brothers: they never threw anything away, just stacked up more and more junk. My mom didn’t do dishes: I did them. Laundry: I did it. For years, I tried and tried to get some kind of organization, but my mom was like, she’d read the newspaper, drop it on the floor next to her chair, and let it pile up until the chair wouldn’t recline. Then I’d hit my saturation point, clear them away to reveal a gray carpet, bundle them up for recycling…and she’d scream because “There were things in there I wanted to save!” My dad was more agreeable: when I swept up the peanut shells that surrounded his workbench, he’d smile and say, “It’s about time somebody did that.”
Yes, they were lunatics. Luckily, I married another control freak. Everything in our apartment, down to the extra soap under the sink is organized.
Add me to the sugar cereal and junk food list. I never got that stuff growing up, except for at the occasional party. I don’t actually eat junk food all that much, but I have an undying love for cocoa puffs. And I have BIG servings of it. Mr Nim refers to my bowl of cereal as my “trough” – I have tripple or more the serving size, and then skip lunch.
I throw away twisties (those little strips you twist to close bags) after one use. My parents had a whole drawer dedicated to these things.
I’m not afraid to have a damned good cleaning out of my wardrobe every now and then, ruthlessly taking out everything I don’t wear anymore, even if it still fits.
I will fix the same thing for dinner 3 or 4 times in one week if I’m really enjoying it.
I’ll play the same cd half a dozen times a day every day until I’m tired of it.
Every now and then I’ll impulse buy things that I want but don’t at all need.
I’ll watch trashy stupid television shows.
When my husband is away (every other set of 6 weeks) I eat dinner on the coffee table in the living room in front of the television. And I time dinner so that a trashy stupid television show is on – they seem to be conducive to enjoying dinner when alone.
I’ll go to bed at 10:30 and stay up past 4am reading.
If I’m not going out, I won’t bother getting dressed, brushing my hair, or making myself at all presentable, beyond brushing my teeth. (It’s only embarrassing when the postman comes to the door – doh!)
