etc.

Who can resist a blog popularity test that comes with a funky results banner? Not me, to be sure. Here, go find out what list your blog is on.

30 whole days of blogging, whew! I have to admit, I’m a wee bit proud of myself for making it all the way through. There were nights when I thought I couldn’t possibly string three sensible words together, nevermind write an actual blog post. I like the blogging rhythm I’ve fallen into and, while I don’t think I will ever be a daily blogger (on any long-term basis), I have really enjoyed the habit of sitting down to write. I feel like I’ve relaxed all uptight notions about what constitutes a good blog post and simply embraced blogging for the sake of, well, blogging. How liberating!

And thank you all for listening! I won’t be posting daily in December (unlike some!), but I do hope to show up around here more regularly than I did before NaBloPoMo. I hope you’ll stick around, too!

I wish I had profound bloggy words for you on this, the second-last day of NaBloPoMo. Unfortunately, to-day’s post is purely utilitarian. You see, over the past couple of weeks I’ve received odd email messages from friends and regular-ish correspondents asking, “did you receive my last message?” I’m never too surprised to hear this question because I have a pretty aggressive spam filter on my email that sometimes traps the good with the bad, about as often as it lets through the bad with the good (which isn’t all that often). I try to make a habit of checking and emptying my spam folder on a regular basis, and I’ve been paying special attention to it lately as more people ask why I haven’t responded to their last message. Earlier to-day, I logged into my web-based email client to poke around and look for oddities, and what I found there was odd indeed: it seems that my inbox was somehow cloned and I have a whole bunch (hundreds, actually) of legitimate email messages in there that never made it into the inbox in the regular email client I use (Thunderbird). Huh? Yea, I don’t really get it either, and I have no idea how it happened, but all of this is to say that if you have sent me email anytime since the beginning of November, and you haven’t heard back from me, your best bet would be to go ahead and send it again. I’ve just brewed myself a nice pot of tisane and the plan for the next couple of hours is to go through this mysterious new inbox and start responding to messages. If you’re waiting to hear from me, hopefully you won’t be waiting too much longer! Sorry, and thanks.

And happy second-last day of NaBloPoMo!

I’ve been hunched over my work table for the last 3 hours, stopping only to shovel in the roast beef sandwich the mister put down in front of me (which was excellent, the mister makes a mean sandwich). All I could think when I sat down to write this post was “Three. More. To. Go. I can do it.”

I’ve been meaning to talk to you about Etsy. Have you visited lately? They’ve recently redesigned and I think they’ve upped the server mojo behind the scenes because everything is loading a lot faster, which is a welcome change. And I can’t get enough of the shop-by-colour option (librarian aside: wouldn’t it be nice if library OPACs were as pretty and functional as Etsy? And, what’s this? Controlled vocabulary and tags working well in tandem? Brilliant!). If you’re looking to buy handmade this holiday season, or if you’re just in the mood for some crafty eye-candy, here are a few of my favourite Etsy shops:

• discomedusa designs
• goshdarnknit
• port2port press
• mommycoddle
• Queenthings (closed at the moment but keep an eye on this one!)
• Soule Mama
• The Black Apple
• Katrina Kaye (just bought one of her recycled army bags – fabulous!)
• Imogen
• Aunty Cookie

Me? I clean up the studio! It’s been in a terrible state for weeks (here, have a look) with books piled all about, evidence of projects-in-progress littering both work surfaces, and about a metric tonne of fabric scraps, ribbon ends, and thread covering the floor. I’ve spent the last couple of hours doing some much needed organization, putting things away, sweeping up the floor, and wiping down the tables. Why? Because I’m starting on a bit of a craft project that’s going to require a couple of hours of studio-time everyday for the next few weeks. I’ve been planning this project for months and now that I finally have some time to devote to it (as well as a deadline – the best possible motivator), I can’t wait to actually plunge in! More soon.

I’m sorry for all the memes, truly I am. As you can probably tell, I’m struggling a bit. Perhaps I have over-blogged? Perhaps I am blogged-out? Whatever the term, these last five posts are going to be difficult, and to-day is a bit of a cheat, isn’t it? Blogging about how difficult it is to blog probably doesn’t count as blogging at all.

The mister has Tristan & Isolde on in the background while I am trying to do professorial things on my laptop. It looks like a film I might actually enjoy but, as I was explaining to some friends yesterday, I am eternally ruined for films set in the Middle Ages (or based on Medieval themes, literature, &c.) as a result of a course I took as an undergrad, entitled “The Middle Ages and Film”. It seemed like a good idea at the time (Medieval Lit being my specialty and all) but four months of feminist deconstruction of film will leave one utterly incapable of enjoying any period piece. And now, when I look up from my screen, all I can think is “Objectifying male gaze! For shame!”

Ruined.

1 bowl of granola
2 hours in a fabric store
3 newspapers
4 loads of laundry
5 days left
6 bills paid
7 minutes of cat grooming
8 hours of sleep

(format swiped from here)

I came this close to posting a photograph to fulfill to-day’s blogging commitment, but then I remembered saying that this month would be about words, not images. Thank goodness I didn’t make any promises regarding memes.

This one is called Friday Random 10 (FR10) and the point is to set your MP3 player to random and blog the first ten songs. I first saw FR10 in action on Blatherskite, where Moni does a lovely job of sprucing up her FR10 posts with album cover thumbnails. Unfortunately, you’re not getting any of that value-added content here because I’m lazy. What you do get is a brief, parenthetical reaction to each song, because that’s a lot easier to do than scout out for album cover thumbnails.

• Missing You, Jem. From Finally Woken (Good!).
• Le Cou de ma Bouteille, Les Charbonniers de L’Enfer. From Wô (This is the French band I mentioned a couple of posts ago. Scary how my iPod knows just what I want to hear).
• The Oracle Said Wand, Sufjan Stevens. From A Sun Came (Meh).
• Diamonds from Sierra Leone, Kanye West. From Late Registration (Why, thank you, Mr. west).
• The Bleeding Heart Show, The New Pornographers. From Twin Cinema (I’m really not happy that I had to put that word on my blog; just you stand back and watch as the trackback and comment spam comes pouring in).
• I’m your Villian, Franz Ferdinand. From You Could Have it So Much Better (Brilliant!).
• Time is Running Out, Muse. From Absolution (Oh, I miss this song!).
• Mr. Brightside, The Killers. From Hot Fuss (More brilliant!).
• Life, Our Lady Peace. From Spiritual Machines (Our Lady Peace just came out with a Best Of album and I didn’t have to buy it. Why? Because I own everything they’ve every recorded so I just cloned the tracklist and created my own playlist!).
• Slow Pony Home, The Weepies. From Say I Am You (I lovelovelove this album. In fact, I’ve just decided that it will be the soundtrack for my ride home this evening).

And, before I leave you, don’t forget what to-day is. Act accordingly.

Just a quick one tonight. I received three email messages with questions about how I create my headers, so I thought I’d jot down a few notes that might help anyone who is interested.

• I use Photoshop to create headers. I’ve never had any formal training with the software so everything I come up with is the result of a lot of futzing, tweaking, and clicking on buttons to see what they do. I’ve found a lot of cool functions as a result of all this messing around, it’s a strategy I highly recommend!
• I pick a colour palette and use the brush tool to fill in the background layer. For the current header, I painted the entire canvas sage green, then I used a wide square brush for the blue band. And finally, a really tiny square brush for the thin, gray line.
• While using the square brushes, I accidently stumbled upon this neat trick to draw straight lines: hold down the shift key as you drag the brush across the canvas and, voila! Miraculously straight line. This works with all the brush tools.
• The text tool takes care of any text I want to add to the header and a drop shadow on the text layer gives it a little added dimension. Which is good if it’s dimension you’re going for.
• And the snowflakes? Another brush tool! Oh, the brush variety! It makes my head spin.

And that was about it for the current header. If you have any other Photoshop tips to share, please do!

It never fails. Every time I have something Really Important to work on, I start messing with my site design. Why? Because this Really Important Thing is something I just don’t feel like doing and hey! I think it’s time for a redesign! And, oh hey! To-day is a really good day to work on a new header for my blog! If you’re reading this in an aggregator, don’t bother clicking out to the site, because while I have spent a stupid amount of time tweaking my stylesheet, and while I’ve sunk hours into a new header that I deleted seconds ago (on purpose), there isn’t much to show for it other than a border here, a wider column there, and a whole lot of nothing everywhere else. And now I have 60 minutes to work on said Important Thing before bedtime.

It never fails.

60 minutes later: guess who still hasn’t done any work on the Really Important Thing? But, hey! Check out the new header! That was a lot more fun.

You. Can. Only. Type. One. Word. No. Explanations.

1. Yourself: tired
2. Your spouse: favourite
3. Your hair: straight
4. Your mother: strong
5. Your father: hero
6. Your dream last night: none
7. Your favorite drink: water
8. Your dream car: none
9. Your bedroom: cozy
10. Your fear: loss
11. What you want to be in 10 years: happy
12. Who you hung out with last night: mister
13. What you’re not: ready
14. Muffins: carrot
15. Time: none
16. The last thing you did: dinner
17. What you are wearing: black
18. Your favorite weather: warm
19. The last thing you ate: Thai
20. Your life: good
21. Your mood: relaxed
22. Your best friend: mister
23. What are you thinking about right now? this
24. Your car: silver
25. What are you doing at the moment? typing
26. Your summer: short
27. Your relationship status: happy
28. What is on your TV? hockey
29. What is the weather like? cool
30. When is the last time you laughed? recently