On "commercial" holidays...

To everyone who says they don't celebrate Valentine's Day because it's too "commercial", 

I challenge you to reclaim it! 

Celebrate LOVE instead of grouching about the "obligation" to fill that day with chocolate, flowers, crap bedecked with hearts and splashed with red, restaurants and blah.

Enjoy Valentine's Day because the only thing it NEEDS to symbolize is LOVE. 
You've probably seen some of those pictures and articles that are always circulating at this time of year about the disputed origins of this holiday, and who St Valentine really was (or were), but is all that important enough to care about?
What if you just focus on the only thing that needs to be focused on?
Give some extra love to whoever you love today, and maybe even to other people you don't necessarily love, and let that be that!
Christmas has become a commercial holiday too but I don't let that stop me from celebrating the real, original meaning of it. You don't have to either. 
Next time you hear a whingey sentence involving 'holiday' and 'commercial', suggest that they do something to change that for themselves and their family/friends circle.

P.S. This was posted yesterday as far as I'm concerned.

The Sound of Smoking

Confused by the title?
Thinking Esther is an idiot because smoking doesn't make noise?

Allow me to explain.
First, smoking DOES make a noise. A horrible noise. A noise that makes my insides shrivel and my teeth clench just writing about it.
Most people have their own personal noise-that-gives-them-the-heebedy-jeebies. Fingernails on a blackboard is generally the most unpopular, there's that high-pitched squeal of agony caused by a fork on a plate, and one of mine is the folds of a certain kind of cloth (no idea what it's called) rubbing together. That noise is a low, raspy growl and when I hear it I absolutely have to either get away or make it stop.
But it doesn't compare to the crackle and the intake of breath from a smoker sucking that crap into his lungs. Oh that noise! My eardrums feel like they are trying to fold in on themselves so that they won't implode.
It's true that you have to be fairly close to a smoker to hear it, but if your circumstances keep you near a smoker on a frequent basis you'll find that secondhand smoke is loathsome for more than just it's smell.
To clarify, I love the crisp crackle of a bonfire, of candles, of every other sort of fire. It's just the sound of a cigarette burning that sets me climbing walls to escape.