Christmas, surveys, and shoes

What is there to say about Christmas? We came, we saw, we conquered? Or something like that. And now it's back to work and regular life. Weird. It's weird to have Christmas be this like two-week-long event in your brain...when in actuality, now- as a grown, non-school-district-employee adult- it's two days off and done. Oh well. 

We started the day having a little Christmas in our own house with just the two of us and our girl. She enjoyed the new toy Santa brought her. Actually, she hasn't acted this happy in months...which means we should probably stop being jerks and get her new toys or something else brain-stimulating occasionally. 

Despite her best efforts yesterday, the pink piggy still has all four appendages, two ears, and a curly tail-- which means I must once again commend Kong for their awesome toys. This one is totally legit by our standards.

We opened our presents to one another-- as usual, Mattie did a great job. He went about even thirds on the makeup-jewelry&accessories-ridiculously soft PJs breakdown, which is just great in my book. Ulta and Target appreciate Matt in December-- as do I. You'll note my new mustard scarf in most of the rest of the pictures today...it is super soft and awesome.

Exhibit A: on the way to work this morning

We spent the rest of the day with Matt's family. There were presents, food, naps, and games. And games and games. And I may never need to ever play another game for the rest of my life. I've used up my lifetime allotment.

An old-fashioned game of highly competitive Monopoly was the first (and favorite) game of the day. And I tried my best to prove that socialism was a viable economic system that we could all operate under (and convinced 3/4 of my fellow competitors to join me in the system) and DAMMIT IF CAPITALISM DIDN'T WIN THAT GAME AGAIN. So sad. Next time I'll know better.

We're back to work today. I anticipate it being an extremely slow day, as most people will probably assume we're not even open today. Therefore I have a few things on my mental agenda to think about when I have downtime:

1. The survey results from Tuesday's poll. I had SO much fun watching the votes come in (this is politics I can get behind!) and trying to blow up your FB newsfeeds with the compelling trends and anecdotes. Now I need to organize and analyze the data-- and also consider my relationship with SurveyMonkey. That's who I've always used for these silly little blog surveys. But the problem is that since I only have a free account, they limit me to viewing the first 100 responses. I didn't used to care, since I'd only get maybe 50 people participating. But the last few surveys have had well over 100 respondents and I hate that numbers 101+ don't count, since they're hidden from the data I can access. But the cheapest plan for SurveyMonkey is $17 a MONTH!!! Umm...from free to THAT? I was thinking there was some $10/year or something thing I could scrounge up some change for. But $17/month?? Do they think I'm Bill Gates or something? Anyone know of any other similar survey companies that will let me view more than 100 responses for free and/or way cheap? 

2. Shoes. I'm contemplating getting some fun little wedge boots with my birthday/Christmas money. But I can't decide what kind. Or if I really want them, because maybe they won't ultimately pass the All Day Comfort test? These are the two kinds I like the best:

Minnetonka (source) | Toms (source)

Anyone have any personal experience with either of these shoes? My other top concern, besides the comfort, is whether or not these shoes get stinky quickly. I don't think I'd wear them barefoot, so that should probably help, but in my personal history, both Toms and moccasins are extremely likely to stink to high heaven long before I'm tired of wearing them...and I hate that. So I don't want to drop cash on shoes that are going to be a Stinky Situation before their novelty has even worn off. And if you weren't around when I shared the True Story of one of my most humiliating life experiences ever (and yes, this relates to stinky feet....), you should do yourself a favor and read it. Have a good laugh at my expense. I insist. 

That's actually all I can handle contemplating right now, so we'll leave it at that. Hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

(P.S. You should know that of the 100 survey responses that I can see, exactly ZERO people indicated that they like blogs about politics. Obviously, that's why I'm including a 'politics' label on this post-- I included the words 'socialism' AND 'capitalism' in today's post, which means this is about as political as I get. Hope you don't hate me too much for it!!)