A Post About Nothing

I haven’t been feeling very inspired to write anything recently. Sometimes I feel like I’ve talked about everything there is to talk about. Sometimes I can’t even remember if I’ve written about a certain topic already or if I just dreamed that I did.

These days if you have writer’s block (or any kind of block at all really) you go onto Google and see what there is to write about. I typed “what should I blog about?” into Google, clicked on the first entry, and this is what it said:

1. What is your expertise? Readers want to read about what you know and your special experiences. Really!

Okay, geeze. I believe you. Problem is, I don’t have an expertise. Unless you count being able to name every Pokemon an expertise, I’ve got nothin. Are most people experts in a certain area? Is this some sort of life requirement that I missed out on? Should I look into something? I guess history would be my expertise because I got my degree in it, but we all know that’s a lie and I forgot everything I learned right after the final exam.

2. What’s the news? While you don’t have to necessarily be a news breaker, you can give your view on what’s happening in your industry and how it relates to your hobby, life, etc.

Am I supposed to have an industry? I don’t even know what day of the week it is, never mind what my industry should be. I feel like I break the news occasionally, but I usually sway towards celebrity gossip more than newsy news. Can we call it newsy news from now on? The reason I didn’t write about the newest celebrity news is because my heart is broken and talking about it just makes it hurt more.

I’ll give you a hint: It has to do with these two.

3. What is your personality? Do you like to take a stance? Are you funny? Do you like being a contrarian? These insights can help you to write about your topic.

Can’t I just be everything? Why do I have to choose just one of those things? Can’t I be a funny contrarian that likes to take a stance? Maybe I don’t want to be defined by one personality type. I think there are sides of me that are soft and kind and other parts that are funny and playful and other parts that are deep and thoughtful. Notice how I didn’t name any character flaws? It’s because I don’t have any, in case you’re wondering.

4. What are your hopes and fears? Things that you can’t stop thinking about or what keeps you up at night could be good things to share with others.

I would say one of my hopes is trying to live a good solid life. A life I can look back at and feel proud of. A lot of the time I get caught up in trying to make other people proud, but I think I should just be focusing on making myself proud. I try to be the best example to others that I can be.

My fear is that I’ll go to a restaurant and they won’t have my favorite thing on the menu anymore. This scenario has happened to me multiple times and it’s scarred me for life.

5. What are your hobbies? Things that you like to do on your free time are often great topics to discuss.

Um let’s see here. Sleeping is a big hobby of mine. Eating is also another big one. Going online. Driving and listening to music. Walking and listening to music. Just listening to music in general. Traveling to new places. Did I say eating? Um petting soft animals. Laughing at people. Laughing at myself. Not exercising. Shopping. Painting my nails (but only when they’re grown out). Going to movies. Eating popcorn. Eating chocolate. Eating.

I think that’s about it.

Were those prompts supposed to solve my writer’s block? Because I think they made it worse. And they made my self esteem plummet because I don’t have an industry or an expertise.

I guess technically you can’t have writer’s block if you’re not a writer, so I probably have nothing to worry about, right?

Neapolitan, More Like Neapoopitan

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. Whoever invented Neapolitan ice cream is a total psycho. Turns out it’s those damn Italians. Well, just the ones from Naples. Neapolitan immigrants brought their awesome ice cream recipes to the cool side of the pond a.k.a. the new world a.k.a. the U.S.A. a.k.a. Italy is gross. I’m not saying Italians don’t know how to make delicious foods, because they definitely do. Gelato is amaze maze–I’m super grateful for whoever invented that. And remember in Eat Pray Love when Julia Robert’s character has an eating frenzy in Naples because the pizza tastes like heaven? She eats so much that her pants don’t fit. She would. However, Neapolitan ice cream is just downright wrong.

Okay, I’m gonna have to ask you to calm down about the pizza.

Apparently Neapolitan ice cream is a variation (almost an evolution) of spumoni. Let it be said that spumoni is good and Neapolitan isn’t. Have you ever been to a party where someone brings out the ice cream and it’s Neapolitan? It’s super lazy. The host thinks they’re being super creative by fulfilling everyone’s dessert wishes in one, but little do they know, no one wins when Neapolitan is served. It puts an immediate damper on all of the fun food times that everyone’s having. First of all, kids don’t know what Neapolitan is. They can barely pronounce the word. Hell, I can barely pronounce it. Strike one, Italians.

Secondly, people don’t always love chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry. Usually guests will favor only one of those flavors. And I can tell you right now it’s definitely not all of them mixed together. Neapolitan is basically served block style with the flavors packed in vertical strips. If you request vanilla, you’re going to get vanilla with a little bit of chocolate. If you want chocolate, expect some vanilla and strawb, and if you want strawberry, I hope you like chocolate covered strawberry ice cream! It’s an impossible task to get one flavor without getting a bit of another flavor in it.

Ice cream should not look like a brick.

The vanilla is always a neon yellow color. Like, a color that isn’t even found in nature. The strawberry stripe tastes like…not strawberry. It doesn’t even have strawberry chunks in it or anything! And chocolate ice cream always tastes like coffee to me, so I’m probably not the best judge for that one. Except I do enjoy a good old fashioned Frosty. R.I.P. Dave Thomas.

I hope that we can all agree that ice cream isn’t worth eating unless it’s delicious. I don’t want to waste my precious daily calorie intake on ice cream that tastes grody. I’d rather eat something that never gets old and has a cute name like Cookie Dough, or Baked Alaska, or Pralines and Cream. Not Neapolitan.