etc.

Happy year of the dog, to you.

To-night for supper we had porchetta sandwiches and organic greens. It was delightful, even for someone who doesn’t enjoy the pork much (except for The Bacon). I looked up porchetta after our meal and found out that it is, in fact, roast suckling pig, yet we did not, in fact, roast a suckling pig. We just bought a rounded roast-looking thing and stuck it in the oven for three hours. And it was good, suckling or not.

The two writing assignments that had me anxious and overwrought have been delivered, both drafts, but both complete and in near-final form. Next up? A conference paper, to be delivered a week yesterday. I don’t expect to be anxious, nor overwrought, in preparation for this one, but you never know.

Step back.

Good advice. The tyranny of several looming deadlines meant that I couldn’t step back to knit or go for a stroll (much as I would have loved to!), but step back I did. From one writing project to another, another that has me playing with 43 Things, listening to Last.fm, and tooling around amazon.com.

Much better.

Later: the mister dragged me out to see King Kong. Even better (and it was really good!).

My dears, I am verklempt.

I’m not sure what or why but I have no inspiration to blog, nothing to say, naught to show. I have crafted nothing, knitted nothing, done little over the past weeks. I’m writing a lot (a book chapter and an article, both library-related) and enjoying much of it and disliking part of it too. The writing I am doing at the moment is difficult, not the content but the framework, every sentence is wrenching, I’m feeling none of it. This afternoon, I told myself that I would stay put, sit at my desk and not leave until I had pounded out the entire thing, every last word, I would squeeze dry the outline until there was nothing left, and I did, in the end, I typed until there were no words left in my head. But I’m feeling none of it. There is no hook, I have no affinity for the thing, I strung those sentences together but I hate every word of it.

Forgive me, the drama.

I have the next three days off, all manner of wide open hours to work it out. To-night, sleep. To-morrow, once more unto the breach, dear friends.

I’ve spent a goodly amount of web-noodling time, lately, in search of a fetchingly striped header for this here space and not having found such a header, resorted to creating one myself. It was easy! And fun! I think I’ll do it again! To mark the occasion, I also refreshed the tagline. There, then. Time well spent.

Some films recently enjoyed and not:

• Garden State ***
• The Aviator ****
• Into the Blue ***
• Fantastic Four **½
• Skeleton Key **
• Dark Water **½
• Four Brothers ***
• The Exorcism of Emily Rose ***
• Mean Girls ***
• Red Eye *½
• Brokeback Mountain ****½

I’ve found it necessary to institute the half star; Brokeback Mountain, for example, was a brilliant and lovely film, certainly worthy of more than four, but not quite five stars.

The resolutions are playing out well (things are organized! I’ve read three books already this year! I’ve cooked two meals! I’ve started Pilates and I’m doing yoga again! There has been writing, library writing mostly so not quite what I had in mind, but it’s something!) although I should probably have also resolved to be a better blogger and not allow ten days to lapse between posts. What to say, dear readers, I can’t do it all.

Via Heidi, a meme!

Instructions: Remove the blog in the top spot from the following list and bump everyone up one place. Then add your blog to the bottom slot.

watching me grow
citymama
making (nee stitch marker)
step into my thimble
etc.

Then select five people to tag: anyone! everyone!

More instructions: Now change the meme! I know that’s not what’s supposed to happen, but I just have to. I’m that kind of gal. The new people I tag will get a slightly different set of questions. (Note: I’m not particularly meme-creative, so I copied Heidi’s questions verbatim. You might say I’m meme-impaired.)

What were you doing 10 years ago? I was right in the middle of year three of my BA in English and quickly realizing that I wanted to do my MA and that Medieval devotional literature and hagiography would be my focus. I think I even remember what courses I took that year: The Novel, 18th Century Lit, 20th Century British Lit, The Middle Ages in Film, Women and Childbirth in Literature (which the mister always referred to as “your birthing class”). I remember loving every one of those courses.

What were you doing 1 year ago? Well, let’s see: thinking about an anchoress, sulking about reference librarians being compared to an RSS aggregator, and rejoicing over an anticipated basement flood that never happened. It’s nice to have archives to fall back upon.

What were you doing 1 hour ago? walking up the street with the mister to buy coffee beans at our local Second Cup.

Five creative things you want to achieve this year:

• Paint more. In fact, this was one of my unofficial resolutions for 2006; I’ve been feeling the need to fill my living space with thoughtful art and I have a few ideas sketched out, now I just need a few canvases and a little time. The latter will be more difficult to come by.
• Sew more softies. The last time I made one was July 2005. How did that happen?!
• Start taking pictures again. Sometime last year, I stopped carrying my camera with me wherever I went. I miss it.
• The cooking and the writing you already know about.

Five snacks you enjoy:

• Nutella. Either on bread or by the spoonful.
• milk
• cereal
• dill pickles
• just about anything home baked.

Five things you would do if money were no object:

• travel more (Japan, New Zealand, the South Pacific, the south of France)
• buy a sailboat and live on it
• drive the continent
• buy one of these for my travels/sailboat/road trip
• take my family with me on all of the above

Five bad habits:

• snacking before meals
• leaving craft supplies/thread/yarn all over the house
• sitting in front of a computer (either at my desk at work or with my laptop on my lap at home) for hours without getting up to stretch
• doodling on desks (I’m constantly doodling on paper, but when I have none, I have been known to desk-doodle)
• forgetting about left-overs in the fridge

Five things you like doing:

• driving
• taking long baths
• having long meals with family/friends (with good food & plenty of wine)
• knitting, sewing, generally making things with my hands
• writing

Five favorite gadgets:

• my iBook
• my iPod
• the free flashlight on my keyring
• the mister’s new walkie talkies
• my sewing machine

One thing you really like about yourself: I’m very easy-going. I like that.

A snippet of my astrological outlook for 2006, per Sunday’s paper:

There is something you have long known that you would one day be able to achieve. There is a responsibility you have to take on, a project you have to take charge of, a plan only you can execute. There is no question of this failing to come about. It has to happen. Therefore, it stands to reason that your needs will be well taken care of, financially and emotionally, throughout the coming year. The sky simply has to ensure that this takes place because it has so much that it needs you to do.

Uh-huh. Certain plans have been set in motion (more soon!) but I wasn’t aware that astrology, the stars, heck, the sky, is on my side. Cool!

Just when you thought all the bloggers have had their say about resolutions and moved on, I have a couple of my own to share. I’ve never been much of a goal-setter, but lately I’ve been feeling like things won’t happen unless they get written down first. Last year, it was vague good intentions (and I think I did OK with them, 60/40-ish), this year, there are some tangibles:

• get organized and stay organized. This is a Big, Lifetime goal, but I’ve tried to make it a bit more approachable with realistic deliverables. You know, things like not letting the mail pile up on the front desk for a week;
• read more. My reading record for the past 365 days was abysmal. Of course, last year was also the year that I took up sewing, which I haven’t quite figured out how to do with book in hand, so that’s my excuse. When I was a student, I used to read for at least a half hour before going to bed every night; I used to look forward to that indulgent escape at the end of the day and I very much miss it, so 2006 will be the year that I rediscover the pleasures of reading in bed (which reminds me, I haven’t yet done the year-in-books wrap-up; look for it over the next few days);
• cook more. The mister does all the cooking around here but there are days when he comes home bone tired and a thundering and self-imposed tide of The Guilt washes over me (I should cook to-night! I know I should! I really really should! Is this Guilt a female thing?) but then we usually just order pizza or Chinese. So I’ve made a conscious decision to get better at preparing meals (it’s not the preparation that I have a problem with, it’s mostly that I lack the imagination to pull a meal together), not so much to assuage The Guilt than to simply make myself more capable at providing for us;
• write more. 2005 was a good year for creative tangibles, but this year I’ve decided that I need to work on my creativity with words (how I love words!). I’m not yet sure what manifestation this will take, updates as it takes shape;
• get healthy. Well, well overdue.