November

Not much to report for the month of November.  Stateside, our Seattle house should close early next week.  We had to short sell, which wasn't ideal but, with our reduced circumstances, necessary.  Although we'll miss our first house, we're actually thrilled to be rid of it.  We're still going through a period of shedding adult responsibilities and living simply with the goal of no monthly payments and no financial responsibilities.  Of course, we still have council tax, rent, mobiles, and internet, and probably always will, but nothing we can't just walk away from.  We have a bit more Stateside debt to shed before we're where we want to be but soon we'll begin to resemble the financially carefree souls we were in our youth (but, hopefully, a bit wiser).

On this side of the pond, November proved to be relatively quiet.  We didn't do anything for bonfire night (Guy Fawkes Night, 5 Nov) nor the Christmas lighting celebration in the city centre this past Friday.  We did, however, venture out for the NEoN Digital Arts Festival where we enjoyed a PechaKucha night and I got to volunteer as a photographer at the debating event.  We also headed out to explore Blair Atholl and Glen Tilt for our November ramble.

As we were reminded recently, last week was Thanksgiving back in the States.  We haven't started celebrating American holidays over here yet and, consequently, it almost completely went unnoticed.  Celebrating American holidays abroad is perhaps something people do when they have children or a larger ex-pat community or perhaps if they're longing for 'home' but, since we're none of the above, we haven't yet felt the need to export any of those celebrations or traditions.  Besides, Thanksgiving is kind of a bullshit holiday.

Forgetting the bullshit origin stories about the harvest or pilgrims and indians and just looking at what Thanksgiving has become, I get that it provides a chance to give thanks and blah blah blah but doesn't the existence of a day to give thanks allow for the option to not give thanks the rest of the year?  Shouldn't one always be giving thanks?  Like the signs I see on public transportation labelling a few seats as priority for the disabled or pregnant; shouldn't all seats be priority seats?  Shouldn't everyone be empowered to offer their seat to anyone who might need it?  The existence of those signs seemingly absolves those sitting elsewhere of the moral obligation to offer their seat when necessary.  I reject the idea that being nice requires a sign or a holiday.  Just be nice.

If you did celebrate Thanksgiving, however, we hope you had a happy one.  And, if you didn't, we hope you enjoyed your Thursday.