Barefoot, you can come over anytime! Just be warned that I have the ability to make you laugh despite yourself! I generally use humour to cope with stress and bad times somehow it works for me
Ellis- does shaking off and stepping up count as exercise?
Come on over Barefoot. And I got to agree with mauvis that humor is a huge coping mechanism. Today has been bad for me, no sleep for 25 hours, and the 3 hour nap I had isn't really making me feel better. Hubby got 7 teeth pulled and his new partial today. He made me laugh so hard.
In First Magazine there was an article called The Secret to Living Happily ever After. My husband says, "Well throw out the bible, the books on philosophy, and quit searching inside yourself. Give first magazine the Pulitzer. They KNOW the Secret". Despite everything today I was in stiches. Absurd isn't it!
Movie marathon heavy sci-fi theme today ;-)
Miss Chris
What a great story Ellis! I am going to remember that one and tell my girls the story too...my youngest especially can get a little overwhelmed by things and feel discouraged, and she will love it.
When I am having a stressful rotten day I write in my journal, watch something funny on TV (like Mr. Bean, Blackadder, the cartoon of George and Martha my girls love too, French & Saunders, Ab Fab etc - having tapes on hand is good!). Diet hot cocoa is good, light popcorn, something not too wicked but nice to have. If I can get my kind DH to give me a massage that cheers me up too!
People magazine, Us, In Style - anything light, NOT the awful stuff on the news on a bad day! Or I work on a hobby like crochet, knitting, family history - just to give my mind a vacation. Travel books and shows are good this way too.
So thanks to my PMS mood I found myself crying because I was typing out instructions for DH upon the unlikely event that I die in some horrible plane crash en route to Thailand or some other bizarre death event on this trip. I take care of all the finances and poor DH would be at a loss if I weren't to come home... so I thought it would be helpful (and well yes a little morbid) if I wrote out all of the info for him like life insurance and who to pay etc. Well geez, pretty soon I am huddled up on the couch crying and cursing this friggin' PMS and imagining my funeral and never seeing my loved ones again. Ughhh. Of course DH is at work this evening so I have no one to comfort me. Plus my stupid car is broken and I am stuck here. Not good. So I downed my dose of Wellbutrin and ate some fish sticks and am now feeling a little better.
Oh Sojo, I do that too...I can get very worked up about imagining everyone without me, and I have to be careful about watching soppy TV commercials about dogs and cats getting older too, because then I get sad about our cats (who are only 3 anyway and THE most satisfied healthy spoiled critters ever, but I love them so much, etc etc)...and then I imagine my girls MY age without me maybe -- if/when I tell DH what is the matter he thinks I am pretty overwrought. Probably! A good laugh and a People magazine usally cheer me up, oh and a chocolate mint stick or two would be lovely...
Sigh... ok, I'm feeling a little better. DH was very sympathetic and showed appropriate sadness when I told him about my afternoon. Now that I am over my walk down self-pity lane I am busy packing donated items and my personal things for the trip. Half of my summer clothes don't fit me anymore (too big!). This is a great but horrible problem to have, as none of the stores carry summer clothes yet.
Sojo...can we all come with you? Your trip sounds like a lot of fun!! I want to hear all about it. Will you have access to a computer while you are gone, or do we have to wait until you come back?
Ellis, I read Nancy Drews when I need to relax and cheer myself, too! My two girls love ND and so we have a large library of them. I used to have about 50 of the original hardcovers (from the 1970s when they cost $2.50 each and when I got $10 birthday money I could get 4 NDs, the best present ever!)...why did I ever get rid of them? (Or my mom did, or somehow they disappeared...) I am collecting them again, though!
Whisky is good too, especially in a whiskey sour (wish I had one right now, with a maraschino cherry!)
I generally use humour to cope with stress and bad times 
somehow it works for me 
I am so patheric...
OK
