Hello my three, trusty readers! Are you wondering where I’ve been and why I’ve neglected my blog (and therefore, neglected your need for entertainment)? Well, in case you have (which let’s be real, it’s been your number one question the past two weeks), I’ve been busy packing up my life and traipsing across the Midwest from small-town Sherwood, Wisconsin, to the big city of Minneapolis. GOODBYE corn stalks, crop circles, and dairies and HELLO skylines, rush hour traffic, and skyscrapers! (Cue Demi Lovato)

That and I won’t have Internet until September 6^th, so #YOLO, #bringmebacktocivilization.

So the neglect will continue, unless I decide you all are worthy of my lunch hour. Congrats! You are.

Anyway, onward to more important matters. To say that finding a place to lead a chaotic life (I’m nicknaming my apartment “The Abyss”) was a process is the largest understatement in the history of understatements.

If you’ve read ALL ABOUT ME, then you know that I’ve watched an embarrassing impressive amount of HGTV while I’ve been home job searching this summer (AKA, fending off post-grad depression). This new pastime of mine has proven to be an obstacle in my attempts to find a palace for this queen (or, more realistically, a damp basement for this court jester). Readers, I want to say I’m NOT a snob. However, once you’ve binge-watched a certain amount of Property Brothers and Love It or List It, it’s next to impossible NOT to have unrealistic, shiny-as-a-new-chrome-sink expectations.

Here are three ways HGTV has ruined me:

1. I’ve adopted the HGTV lexicon. By that, I mean I’m fluent in the house hunting, home improvement, and renovation lingo. I’ve adopted phrases such as “open-concept” floor plans and “subway tiles,” and “back splash.” So while touring studio apartments with my parents (AKA looking at POSTAGE STAMPS), I found myself using these. I would say, “Mom, this is a nice open concept studio, isn’t it?” To which my mother would respond “Erin, it’s a studio. It’s automatically open concept because there’s only one room.” Or, “Mom, look at the backsplash behind the kitchen sink,” (AKA, cool designs or decorative tiles/designs) and my mother would kindly let me down, “Air… it’s a plain white wall. No back splash here.” Hey, a girl can dream right?
2. Space. Granted this could fit under the “lingo” category, but it’s used SO MUCH in the home improvement shows that it stands alone. If I had a dollar for every time house hunters walked into a home and announced, “this is a nice space,” or “this is a really GREAT and FUNCTIONAL space,” I’d probably be able to afford an apartment larger than a microwave box. I made this declaration each time I entered a studio. “This,” I announced with gusto, “is a phenomenal space.” Picture my younger brother, Pat, rolling his eyes at me, and it’s basically like you’re right there with me in that great space. So great. So space. #HiPat
3. I’m expecting my future landlords or real estate agents to look a lot like these two house hunting hunks:
   

   #dreamboats #hawteez

4. I have unrealistic decorating expectations that don’t line up with my all too realistic bank account. Self-explanatory. #poorpostgraduate
5. I have unrealistic decorating expectations that don’t line up with my very realistic laziness. Who wants to renovate a house when you can take a nap?

Ladies and gentlemen, the moral of this blog post is this: watch HGTV with caution. Don’t binge watch shows with dream homes when you’re 22 years old and lacking space, budget, and motivation. You’ll end up like me, yearning for an open concept studio to call my own. (Oh wait, I ALREADY HAVE THAT. Come visit me at my postage stamp e’rybody!)

It’s too late for me—my home decorating sense and limitations are beyond saving. But if I can save you three readers… that’s all that I want for a fulfilled life.

Stay undecorated, my friends.

-e