I don’t think there’s anyone who knows me and does not yet realize I am a nerd. Nevertheless, I am going to admit something to you that makes me a nerd even by the standards of other nerds. And it is this: I am a huge sucker for the holiday content in World of Warcraft. Although it’s almost a year ago now since I stopped playing much WoW at all, I still make a point of keeping my game patched and my subscription active, and one of the reasons for that is my shameful love for the goofy holiday shit. (Another is that Chris and I have a pair of low-level alts we like to play together.)

Anyway, here is some evidence of my problem for your consideration. (Those of you who don’t play Warcraft can safely avert your eyes.) Last December I did tons of instance runs getting red and green Santa hats for myself and my friends. Then in January, I feverishly leveled my newborn hunter so she could pick up some of the seasonal engineering recipes before the Lunar Festival event ended. This fall, I logged in at least twice a day on three different characters to collect Brewfest tickets. But not just for my regular characters: I am that person whose bank alt is decked out in lederhosen. Hallow’s End was much the same - I have so many goddamn Weighted Jack-o’-Lanterns and Hallowed Wands that I have no fear at all of running out before next October. In fact, I have an entire 18-slot bag in my main bank devoted specifically to miscellaneous holiday items - and this is distinct from the 18-slot bag reserved for non-combat pets. This doesn’t even begin to cover the non-soulbound stuff sitting on bank alts.

So there it is. Not only am I the grown adult who has seen every Pokémon movie to date, I’m the one who will be logging in early tomorrow to see the Winter Veil content go up. Speaking of which, does anyone know where those new tailoring patterns come from?

You know that thing where you wake up on, say, a Tuesday morning and think it’s Friday? And it doesn’t stop there, so that your whole day becomes a chain of little disappointments as you continually realize that no, it isn’t Friday?

Yeah, every day for the past couple of weeks has been like that. I think it’s a December thing - my Christmas shopping has been more or less done since Thanksgiving, and I’m so completely ready for a few days off that I keep tricking myself into thinking the holiday break starts tomorrow. When confronted with the awful realization that it’s still only the 11th and tomorrow is not even a regular Saturday, I console myself by adding more movies to my Netflix queue (for lazy post-Christmas watching) and admiring yet more things on Etsy that I ought not to buy.

Anthony (Ant to his friends and baristas) is absolutely correct about my recent Etsy obsession. I spend more time than I care to say browsing the listings there, most recently in search of the perfect scarf. I didn’t find anyone already selling it, but I did find an awesome seller who makes custom knit scarves. A couple emails later, my neck is protected from the cold and snow by the scarf of perfection. What you won’t understand from that photo is exactly how soft and non-itchy it is, and how it goes with almost everything I own. (This may be related to the fact that almost everything I own is gray or black.)

My other favorite Etsy finds so far include glow in the dark Pac-Man coasters, awesome and inexpensive gift tags to be distributed shortly, and this wicked cool ceramic pendant. I have not, however, found the perfect girl for Anthony. Yet.

My own CMOAT had a birthday earlier this week, which resulted in the arrival at our apartment of three highly anticipated boxes: one containing the complete Buffy DVD set, one containing the complete Firefly DVD set, and one containing sweet, sweet cupcakes.

Unlike Chris, I’ve previously been immune to the many and varied charms of Joss Whedon, and so have sampled the delights of Buffy only briefly. But we’ve been making our way through Firefly over the course of a few evenings, and I am firmly hooked. I’m not sure how I missed this when it was on the air (although it probably had something to do with me watching very little television in that 2002-2003 year) but in some ways I’m glad I’m seeing the episodes for the first time in the order in which they were intended to be seen. I think one of the reasons I never got into Buffy was that by the time I bothered to watch an episode or two, there was too much backstory I didn’t know and I found it too confusing to hold my interest for long. It’s possible I’ll start that from the beginning too now that we have the DVD collection.

Although this is our first exposure to Firefly the series, we did rent Serenity a while back. We enjoyed it probably about as much as people who have not seen the series could have enjoyed it, but it’s already become clear that we’re going to have to see it again as soon as we’re done with the show, now that we actually know who all these people are.

So normally this is where I’d proclaim my well-rested and turkey-fed return from Massachusetts and also comment on how much I miss its quiet and calm, but I actually didn’t go home this year. It was a New York Thanksgiving, and while I did miss my family dearly I have to admit it was unbelievably luxurious to wake up late on Thursday morning and know there were no five hour train rides ahead of me. But I am looking forward to getting out of the city and seeing my family at Christmas, especially now that my shopping is essentially done. (This did not entail entering a retail establishment of any kind on Friday, however.)

Speaking of shopping, I also want to acknowledge with bewilderment and gratitude those of you who have sent along early Winter Seasonal Happy Fun Time greetings and objects. In particular, I offer thanks to Buffalo, whose bountiful box of Wii-related booty was both an unexpected and heartily welcomed pleasure at the end of a wet Monday that began with the dropping of another umbrella down my garbage chute.

In the past couple of months, Chris and I have gotten our Xbox 360 back from Microsoft and also acquired a Wii, so we’ve been doing the console gaming thing rather more frequently than usual. I though I’d mention a couple of the games we’ve been working our way through, although I’ll note that I’m aware we’re missing a lot of the recent good stuff. (There is, of course, a solution to that problem.) Note: those of you who are close friends and/or relatives who like games but do not already own these games should probably avoid buying them between now and late December. I’m just saying.

Bioshock: We’re making very slow progress with this one because we’re sharing a save file between the two of us, which means we only play when both of us are home, and not busy, and not in the mood to play or watch something else. But what we’ve seen so far is great, and absolutely lives up to the high expectations I had. I’m not a huge fan of shooters, particularly on the console, but I make exceptions for remarkable games. This is a remarkable game.

The Orange Box: Five games, of course, but worth buying for Portal alone. I can’t remember the last time I loved a game so fiercely. And Half-Life 2 is another shooter that’s so good I like it despite its format. You have heard all of this from other people long before now, but it’s all true.

Viva Piñata: For someone with my moderately obsessive tendencies, this is pretty much the perfect game. Chris finds it frustrating, but for me it was like discovering the Pokémon games all over again. Though I reached level 50 a while back, I can still frequently be found carefully nurturing improbable flowers and shouting obscenities at recalcitrant paper animals.

Beautiful Katamari: We skipped the previous two Katamari games, thanks to the untimely death of our PS2 right around the time that WoW came out. Perhaps you’ll find this one lacking in novelty if you’ve played the predecessors, but we were delighted with it. This is another one I’ll probably come back to, as we’ve completed the primary storyline but left many of the smaller objectives untouched.

Super Mario Galaxy: The sole game I brought home with our brand-new Wii, apart from the Wii Sports pack-in. We’ve only just started it, but it’s delectable. I plan to dig more seriously into it over the long weekend.

I have often in this space spoken of various subway encounters - perhaps too often. But recently I found myself in close quarters with such a unique specimen that I have been haunted with the knowledge of her mere existence ever since. An individual whose tastes reflect such a radically different set of thought-processes that she and I may as well belong to different species. Indeed, I think it only too likely that she is in fact an alien, clumsily bumbling around in her stolen skin-suit, managing to be just convincing enough to escape certain vivisection but still inspiring shock and fear in all who gaze upon her.

Picture this, then, if you dare: a female in her mid-to-late twenties, much like myself. Imagine a much-too-small pink tube top with matching pink capri pants, worn in November and crowned with perfect skunk highlights. Then add pointy shoes (pink), the inescapable Victoria’s Secret bag (also pink), and a pair of those hideous insectoid sunglasses of the sort favored wholly unappealing creatures (pink). Now, if you can manage it, insert a brown Zune - only the second I have ever spotted in the wild. And finally brown lipstick in the same repellant cat-shit shade. It’s almost like this being was specifically engineered by some sinister force to destroy my brain.

I am reminded of various Lovecraftian protagonists who, upon facing ancient and indescribable horrors, immediately went mad or killed themselves, or both. I think either would be preferable to living out my days with the knowledge that such people not only walk the earth but also take the F during rush hour.

A few weeks ago I picked up The Zombie Survival Guide for Chris, as it came highly recommended by my brother, who is at least as fond of the living dead as we are. And sure enough, we liked the book so much that I have since acquired World War Z and devoured it whole. It’s definitely one of my favorite novels of the past couple of years, and I have no idea why it took me so long to find out about it. You should buy this book, and you should read it. And Max Brooks should write something else to fill my grim heart-cavity with joy.

One of the reasons I love fall so much is the food. I’m extremely fond of apples and squash, and most especially pumpkins. I enjoy carving them to be sure, but I enjoy eating them just as much. If you don’t, you can probably go ahead and skip the rest of this post. Just go off somewhere and eat a bagel while reflecting on your obvious inadequacies.

This may have been a shitty October as far as layer weather is concerned, but like most Octobers it has been pretty great for pumpkin-related edibles. In the past couple of weeks I’ve had the chance to try pumpkin-flavored ice cream, frozen custard, gelato, cheesecake, bread, muffins, scones, cake, coffee, and doughnuts. There were a couple of clear winners among the lot, and a couple of things I probably wouldn’t buy again.

By far the best of the cold treats, and the most authentically pumpkin-y, was the pumpkin spice custard over at the Shake Shack. It was so smooth and delicious that Nicole and I went back this past Monday for a second helping, even though it’s late enough in the year now that it meant we ate it while shivering in the dark. (Shake Shack’s seating is all outdoors.) The Shack closes for the winter on 5 November, and I’m not even sure if they’ll still be featuring any of the October custard flavors after today, but it’s definitely worth trying the pumpkin spice if you can get your hands on it.

My next favorite was the pumpkin cheesecake Chris and I had at City Crab. Although I was full of swordfish by the time we saw the dessert menu, we split a piece anyway and were very glad we did. Think pumpkin pie, but creamier (as of course cheesecake is wont to be). The texture was perfect, too. The food at City Crab is always great anyway, so I can heartily recommend stopping by. Just save room for dessert.

The champion among the breakfasty offerings was definitely the pumpkin spice coffee cake I found at Trader Joe’s. Perfectly moist, not too rich, and with actual pumpkin flavor. Often things that are labeled “pumpkin” end up just tasting like pumpkin pie spices - nutmeg, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, etc. This was definitely the case with the pumpkin spice latte at Starbucks, the pumpkin doughnuts at Dunkin’ Donuts, and Edy’s pumpkin ice cream, among others. While I enjoy pumpkin pie spice flavor, I enjoy actual pumpkin flavor even more, so the Trader Joe’s cake was a delight.

So there you are: three pumpkin delicacies that you should absolutely seek out if you have the gourd-love as I do. As for me, Chris and I have our usual Halloween plans this evening, which will almost undoubtely include horror movies and the pumpkin soufflé hiding in our freezer.

On Saturday, Nicole and I finally got to see Morrissey for the first time. A series of show cancellations, poorly-timed travel plans, and forgetful ticket-buying had kept me from catching any of the previous shows since I moved to New York, so although I’m in the midst of another cold and felt like hell I was still glad to drag myself out of bed and down to Hammerstein.

Although I had a great time, I have to say I had no idea how fucking insane Morrissey fans in general actually are. I’ve seen a lot of shows with rough crowds and bad mosh pits - Nine Inch Nails at MSG in 2000 comes to mind - but this time I got pushed and shoved and trampled and bruised more thoroughly than I ever would have thought possible. We are, after all, talking about Morrissey. I can’t really complain too much given that at the end of the mad rush to the stage I ended up one row back from the barricade where I had a much better view than I had during the opener. Yeah, seven foot tall guy who reeked of pot and body odor, I’m talking about you.

I also ran into my friend Torchie and her boyfriend in the crowd before the opener. I hadn’t seen her in person in years, so we had a great time drinking and catching up before the show started. After that, we were sadly swept apart by a sea of frenzied Morrissey fans.

All in all, though, the show was excellent, Moz sounded great, and the setlist was almost perfect. And I got to giggle at the fight that broke out next to me over both the sweaty shirts he peeled off and tossed into the crowd. There’s already at least one video from the show up on YouTube, shot by someone a couple people to the right of me. And here’s the whole setlist, if you’re interested:

1. Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before
2. The Last Of The Famous International Playboys
3. You Have Killed Me
4. The Boy With The Thorn In His Side
5. Irish Blood, English Heart
6. I Like You
7. Jack The Ripper
8. I Just Want To See The Boy Happy
9. The National Front Disco
10. Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me
11. Why Don’t You Find Out For Yourself?
12. All You Need Is Me
13. The World Is Full Of Crashing Bores
14. Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want
15. I’m Throwing My Arms Around Paris
16. Sister, I’m A Poet
17. The Loop
18. Death Of A Disco Dancer
19. Stretch Out And Wait
20. Dear God, Please Help Me
21. How Soon Is Now?
22. First Of The Gang To Die