What's Your Guilty Pleasure?

With summer break coming to a very fast end....I seem to be getting sucked in to thinking about what I'm going to be missing out on when life goes back to the normal hustle and bustle.

No more sleeping in late.

No more spending the day in my jammies.

No more staying up as late as I want watching Army Wives.  DOH!

Not that I mind.  I'm not complaining.  I'll still have the weekends to do all of those things.  And Lord knows, I am definitely NOT going to miss the heat once it finally says good-bye.

I'm not going to miss having the urge to have a little late night snack...and fighting it with all my might.

I'm not going to miss the feeling I often get that I'm being too lazy.

I'll be back to normal routines.  Up early, bed early, scheduled meal times, meal plans, order, and control.

But, not many people get to spend three whole months at home with their families, not having a care in the world, and stumbling upon certain TV shows or books or movies or activities that fill that time.

Last night, for example, I went to bed and decided to watch a little TV in bed - because I'm still having trouble adjusting to going to bed at a "reasonable" time.  I usually watch DVR'd episodes of TMZ.  Yes, I know, but I love TMZ.  It's one of my guilty pleasures.  I'm one of those people that get a small kick out of seeing what the rich and famous are up to in their normal day lives.

Before I got TMZ on, though, an episode of Dance Moms was on Lifetime.  I've never seen the show before.  I've heard about it - but never had any urge whatsoever to actually watch it.  But, I found myself being sucked in after a few minutes.  Not because I was interested in watching a group of girls learning how to dance and perform and be in fancy competitions.  No.  I was sucked in because I just couldn't believe at how the parents on the show acted.

Now, I'm not one of those people that gets all involved with reality TV.  Yes, I have a few reality shows that I like - such as Hell's Kitchen and Masterchef.  But those are more like competitions.  The "reality" reality shows are always so fake to me.  I can't really believe half of the stuff that goes on.  And after watching an episode of Dance Moms last night - I sure hope that's another scripted reality show.  Because I don't want to believe for one second that there parents out there that act that way in front of their children.  Even though, deep down, I absolutely know that there are parents who cuss and scream and throw hissy fits right in front of their children because their child isn't getting enough attention, or their child isn't getting treated nice enough, or their child isn't winning competitions.  But that's all stuff for another blog post some day.

It took Hubby coming to bed to snap me out of watching the show.  I know without a shadow of a doubt that he loathes reality shows like that.  For the exact same reason I do.  Because no amount of money would make me subject my kids to being on TV to see me act that way.  Just never would, could, or will happen.

And in a weird way, I feel kind of dirty and guilty for watching it.  Allowing myself to get sucked in.  I mean, I know that's silly.  It's just a TV show - and probably just as amped up and scripted as all the other TV shows.  And it took all of watching two episodes to get my fill.  I was no longer interested.

But the guilt feeling I had for watching it made me realize that everyone has their guilty pleasures.  And there's absolutely nothing wrong with it.

Like, my most recent not-so guilty pleasure is Army Wives.  Holy TV gods am I becoming addicted to this show!  I started at the very beginning on NetFlix a little over a week ago - and I'm already in to the middle of season three.  There have been a couple of days since then and now that I've actually spent the ENTIRE day watching it.  Watching the show doesn't give me a guilty feeling at all - because it's an amazing show.  But, spending hours and hours watching it?  That's where the guilt part of the pleasure sets in.

And, I'm not really sure why I decided to share all of this....the whole point, I suppose, was my realization that all that extra time I had for those guilty pleasures won't be there, now.  And I'm OK with that.  Life is going to be different. 

While I was in college, it was the busiest time of my life.  I would go days, weeks even without hardly seeing my kids.  Watching TV was a rare luxury.  I could forget about ever picking up a book to read just for enjoyment.  There was no extra time for activities.  And now, I'm a little worried my first year teaching may be just like that... even though I promised myself and my kids that once I got my teaching job - it would be different.

I know that a lot of it is just the nerves talking.  I am nervous.  As the months turned in to weeks, and now the weeks have turned in to mere days until it's time for me to start work - thoughts have started popping in to my head.  I realized my way to deal with them is to just spout off whatever pops in my head right here. 

But now I'm curious... what are some of your guilty pleasures?

Till next time. ;)

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