Yes; I now have icons for each post. Fear me. I wish I could say it’s a plugin or a clever php code modification, but I’m just hard-coding. (I know, I know; there goes all my mystery.)
Still not one hundred percent sure if every post will have an icon, but more likely than not they will. Maybe. If I feel like it.
Now, if I really wanted to be obssessive and waste time, I could go back and assign icons to everything. But I won’t. Just the past week or so.
Dear government of Quebec:
After months of politely reminding me to send you the cheque, the least you could do is cash the damn payment for my taxes already. You’ve had it for a month.
No love,
Me.
PS: If there was such a thing as interest to collect any more, leaving the money in my bank account to create sweet compound cash love would be swell, but there isn’t, so just take it out so that I stop worrying about if the right amount is still there.
Yes, there’s an anniversary update coming in ten days, but:
The vocabulary has hit seventy-five words. Seventy-five. And that was the count before today’s “mouman” (mountain) and “Jell-O”.
Liam isn’t a big meat eater (it’s the texture, I think), but I chopped up some of the prime rib for him and sprinkled some gravy on it, and he had seconds. He ate more meat than I’ve ever seen him consume in a single sitting, even several sittings put together. Then he ate some broccoli, a serving of Yorkshire pudding the size of my fist, and some potatoes mashed with sour cream. (All with gravy, yes. He tore bits off the Yorkies and dipped them in the gravy. Finally, he’s figured out dipping.) Then he had some Jell-O for the first time (cherry — a big hit as well), and some milk to wash it all down. I’m telling you, watching him plough through a bowl of this was good for the soul after a week of him nibbling a bit of a meal and then deciding he was done.
HRH cleaned his plate pretty quickly, too. All in all, an excellent meal and a nice way to start the calendar year.
New calendar day, except that we don’t have a new calendar yet because our old one had an extra page for January 2007, and we didn’t see anything we liked last week.
I slept dreadfully last night. I’d had a tiring day, as Liam was on the go every moment, and fully intended to go to sleep early. Had a bath. Read Maeve Binchy’s Whitethorn Woods from cover to cover. Was still wide awake around 1:30 AM, and unpleased about it. It made getting up with Liam this morning lots of no fun.
I had a lovely time during our evening drop-in on the 30th; perhaps we will make it an annual thing. I had the opportunity to talk with people I hadn’t really spoken with in, erm, months (I swear it was June just a day ago, I swear), and Liam got to rampage about with Arthur and Devon. The pirate ship was a huge hit among adults and children alike. In speaking with sandman7, I realised that all the events in my life which are supposed to be enjoyable, supportive of the self, or social are work, except for orchestra. This was a huge breakthrough, and further firms my decisions to shed certain responsibilites and positions.
The temperature is stupid. HRH looked out the back door this morning and said, “All my lovely snow is going away. I worked hard for that snow, damn it.”
We went over to my in-laws’ place yesterday for a couple of hours, and they sent us home with a prime rib roast to cook for New Year’s Day dinner. So now you all know what I’m having tonight. And Yorkshire pudding, too.
I don’t make resolutions, but these are some wishes I have for 2007:
– Less self-inflicted head trauma for Liam. In the past three days, he has tripped and whacked three different parts of his head. He’s developing an impressive black eye as a result of not looking where he was going and falling into the heater in his room this morning.
– To regain some sort of interest in food. Food in general, really, but specifically the eating of it.
– The re-initialising of enjoying being with people. I’m trapped between wanting to be out of the house but not wanting to leave, because whenever I do I’m on my way out to do something that has become work and not fun. I’ve never been a people-person, and I’m becoming even less of one because of an aggregate of people-associated irritations (no, nothing specific, just people, argh, you know?).
– Spending more time with certain people. Over the past year I’ve discovered that talking with two particular people either stimulates my mind or makes me relax, and I want to spend more time with these individuals. One I’ve known forever, and the other is still a relatively recent discovery from the past couple of years. (One of them recently said, “So, how are you?” and actually meant it. I can’t remember the last time someone asked me that and meant it, instead of in a light conversational fashion or a general non-specific you-should-take-care-of-yourself address.)
– For the emotional burnout to stop. I’m a listener by nature. People share their fears and frustrations and challenges with me because it makes them feel better to get it off their chest, and this past year has seen it draining me beyond what I can handle. No matter how much I shield and purify, it wears me down. It’s not personal, and it’s not that I want the friends-aspect of it to stop; I just need to take a step back and rebuild my own energy so that I can deal with it properly.
– Rediscover the joy in music in general, and classical music in particular. I have an excellent CD collection, over half of which is classical. Over the past year I’ve been looking at it listlessly and feeling as if there’s nothing I want to listen to, which is ridiculous. I’m toying with the idea of systematically listening to at least one CD from my collection every day, starting with the first one in the top shelf and working my way through the collection. And this wish leads to:
– Rediscovering the joy in playing the cello. I would love to start playing in a classical quartet, with a real coach. I met a Canadian composer last week who asked if I played weddings, and I just laughed. But it made me think. Why not? I’d have to pull up my socks and knuckle down, but it would give me a reason to work on my music more. I am lazy when it comes to practicing, because I can get away with not doing a lot of it. But I always do wonder how much better I could be if I practised even more than the couple of hours a week that I do now. Also, sandman7 suggested that we get together and play just for fun, which is a lovely idea.
Look at that; no wishes about writing and/or career. Things are pretty okay there. Sure, I wish my fiction would take off the way my non-fic has, but there’s time aplenty for all that.
Whitethorn Wood by Maeve Binchy
The Boleyn Inheritance by Philippa Gregory
The Constant Princess by Philippa Gregory
The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale
Pagan Christmas: The Plants, Spirits, and Rituals at the Origins of Yuletide by Christian Rätsch and Claudia Müller-Ebeling
Spider Dance by Carole Nelson Douglas
The Crown of Dalemark by Diana Wynne Jones
Swordspoint by Ellen Kushner (reread)
Black Powder War by Naomi Novik
Throne of Jade by Naomi Novik
I keep thinking there ought to be something important to post, but there isn’t.
We went out and got new fish for Liam’s aquarium today, as the last set died off over the past four months. I must stop flirting with birds and patting kittens in pet shops.
People coming over this afternoon, possibly. We’ll find out when/if they arrive.
I finished The Boleyn Inheritance in a day and a half. I’m enjoying reading instead of working this week. I’d forgotten what it’s like to just devour books. Particularly books not connected to something I’m writing myself, which qualify as “work books”.
I’m struggling with the end of the calendar year approaching and feeling as if I’ve accomplished nothing in 2006, which is a load of codswallop because I wrote a book, mothered a toddler, wrote parts of two other books, saw my third book published, created a new website, performed the marriage ceremony for two of my dearest friends, and performed in five concerts of various types. I read a lot, and researched a lot. I did a lot, but I don’t feel as if I accomplished a lot, which leads me wonder what I’d quantify as an “accomplishment” these days.
There’s more to this thought, but I haven’t yet decided if I’m going to publically post the rest of it. It needs more rumination and work, and while what I’ve written out is plain and true, it doesn’t sound very bright or optimistic. But then, recognising non-beneficial things and planning non-popular change rarely sounds perky or celebratory.
I’ve had a remarkably good afternoon.
Total word count, Swan Sister: 22,525
New words today: 1,985
I finally got past the Major Thing that had to happen in order to get the rest of the book going. There’s another plot point that has to happen directly afterwards, but at least now everyone’s in the right place (geographically and character-wise) for it to occur. It’s going to need rewriting later because it’s all over the place, but now there’s something down that makes sense to my characters and to the story as a whole. Plus I have the added bonus of knowing exactly what happens next when I sit down to write.
It feels so good to not only be working on this again, but to have written through the Big Obstacle that has been lurking there since July. (Not that I’ve really had the time or headspace to work on it, what with ESTC and being ambushed by YA historical fiction. But still.)