Shall I a Lizzie be?

I think that when (and necessarily 'if') I get to grad school, I should adopt a new nickname. The lovely thing with a name like Elizabeth is that you have such a wide variety of nicknames to choose from.

For instance, I could be: Eliza, Liz, Lizzie, Elspeth, Bess, Bessie, Betty, Betsy, Bitsy (Bitsy???), and my personal favorite: Eli (which is what my younger sister called me when we roomed together for a summer at college--I called her Reba).

I'm leaning towards 'Lizzie.' It has such a light-hearted Jane Austenesque sort of feel, and I think I could pull it off. I wonder what I would be like as a Lizzie... I think I would have to dye my hair, or at least get some subtle highlights. I would also go way short. Like, boy-short. Which I've talked about doing before and didn't actually do. Also, I would have to wear bracelets. I don't know why--I would just have to.

Maybe being a Lizzie isn't such a great option.

Or I could be an Eliza. That would be nicely formal, indicitave of the suave, cool professional I hope to become. I could be Ms. Eliza and wear my spectacles at a dangerously jaunty angle and adopt a severe hairstyle and wear dark pantsuits. I think I would also need to wear long dangly earrings. I just have this feeling...

Okay, no Eliza.

Or Betsy! I could be a Betsy and wear my blondified hear in two pigtails and get red glasses and don crazy tunics with thick belts and have bright red lipstick and huge gold-chain necklaces and......

Betsy's out.

Then again, being Beth isn't so bad. It's well-worn but comfortable, kind of soft, a little boring, but warm. Definitely warm.

Yes. When in doubt, stick with an old favorite.

--Elizabethary

He cometh.

Remember this?

Well the 12 months are over. And the 12 months before that are over. Making 24 months in all.

And he cometh.

And we goeth to meet him.

Right now.

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaahoooooooooooooooo!

And on Sundays he directs ward choir

I am amazed at how little we can know the people with whom we interact on a regular basis.

I've known David Linn since he & his wife moved to our ward several years ago. I knew he was an artist, and felt some small gratification in the knowledge that I knew someone whose work had appeared in the Ensign and in church museums several times over the past few years.

Yesterday, he joked around with members of the choir as we gathered to rehearse and hash out a new piece we'll be performing in March. He suggested that we go to his website, where we could download audio files of the various parts to facilitate our learning of them.

So I did.

And this is what I found.

I've spent the past twenty minutes or so just browsing his work and reading his biography. I find it stunning--both the quality and depth of his artistry and the fact that I had no idea that this is what our ward choir director is, deep down in his soul where noone really sees. I suppose that, as an artist, he has a better chance of exposing his inmost parts than the rest of us do, but all of these painting suggest a depth that I had not suspected.

I still haven't listened to those music files. I think they'll have to wait until after I've perused the art a bit more.

Macabre

Front of card:

Interior of card:

Because working customer service in a scrapbook company does strange things to you. Very.

Embryonic Meanderings

I've wanted to be a writer for a long time, which is surprising when I remember it, since I went through such a long period of time when I thought that electrical engineering would be the way to go. (Hah!)

So I was looking through some old folders today and ran across this little gem, which, from the cursive handwriting, I would guess was composed sometime during my late elementary school years:

"Why do things always happen the way they do? Why is magic so rare nowadays? Why are there so many burglaries?"

Why are there so many burglaries indeed? This has been a lifelong question. And I still don't have an answer.

Of work and love lives

I love work conversations. I mean really, really love them. They're ways for co-workers to bond, breaking past the "Jill, would you mind faxing this for me," or "What's the status on our Chatterbox shipment?" and into the realm of actual friendship.

Of late, many of our work conversations have turned to the subject of love lives, specifically the love lives of the daughters of my co-workers. One in particular has been having a rough time; the fellow she's in love with rarely contacts her, but when he does, he makes everything entirely confusing.

So today, as she related the latest episode in her daughter's confusing & painful love life, my poor coworker was reduced to tears as she described the warring between her desire to encourage her daughter to be completely done with this guy and her desire to see the two resolve their issues and finally come together.

Alas. I sat there and listened and made small noises of sympathy and (I hope) consolation, all the while feeling lost and burdened myself. I felt so sad, as if I shared with this daughter that sense of endless waiting, painful anticipation burning and tingling at your fingertips like flesh that has stayed too long in one position. I felt sad too that I couldn't express how I felt. I'm not sure why I couldn't share it; it just didn't seem quite the appropriate place to do it. I didn't feel it would be appropriate to pipe up at the end of the conversation and say, "Wow. She has it rough. And gosh--I'm pretty lonely too."

So instead I turned back to my computer and sighed a lot and put my hand to my forehead and in all other ways convinced myself that I was acting a great drama with myself as a lead. But the sorrow was genuine. And pervasive and persistent and troubling.

Darn.

Bleak

I once sent myself a box of Conversation Hearts on Valentine's Day.

It wasn't so much that I wanted people to think I had a boyfriend. (Slim chance, that.) It was more that I liked Conversation Hearts and I wanted to eat some.

Now I'm ashamed.

Because I realize Conversation Hearts are pretty gross anyway.

Happy Valentine's Day.

I've done it.

I - erk - I've applied to grad school. I entered my card information for the non-refundable fee of $35 and I submitted it and I'm done and I've applied and I have actually...I did it.

Of course, this was just the first school of five, but it's the one I want the most. It's where I want to be. And if only, if only only they will accept me, I will feel warm all the way from my scalpity head to my dangling toes.

I may even regain feeling in my fingers which, from crossing them rather too enthusiastically, have lost some circulation, I fear.

What is this strange longing?

I love the music of Vaughan Williams. 'The Lark Ascending' is perhaps the first piece of classical music I ever loved and really recognized. I was passionate about it.

I have since listened to numerous pieces by the man I now consider my favorite composer, but I believe my favorite has become 'Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis.' (In this YouTube link, the end of the piece is cut off, but the music is still good.) I've put it on my CD player these past few mornings and have listened to it while getting ready for work, curling my hair and applying eyeshadow to the rising and falling of this music that winds through me like breathing.

Every time I hear this piece it fills me with a sense of nameless longing. I'm usually a bit somber after it, making the transition from Vaughan Williams to reading the funnies over breakfast a bit jarring. I rather wish I could keep the thing on repeat in my head all day, somehow keep that sense of yearning with me as I putter about with mundane tasks, mindless computer work and writing insipid emails.

And I wish, I really wish, that I could figure out just exactly what 'Fantasia on a Theme' is making me long for.

Why I should never take drugs. Ever.

Last night I dreamed that I saw this enormous spider-like creature that crawled up to my immobile hand and sunk its little pincer-mandibles into it.

Then (in the dream) someone explained to me that the spider-thing wasn't really real; I had taken this drug which caused me to hallucinate and see bits of rock (or maybe it was sponge-cake; the dream wasn't really clear on that) as these spider-like creatures. I was so relieved that I was just dealing with a rock.

And I vowed then and there never to take drugs again.

Yeah. Spiders. The new anti-drug.

Why Institute is Good and Speed Dating is Not

Do I really have to delineate this for you?

Institue: spiritual discussions led by a knowledgeable, worthy priesthood holder charged with the education and instruction of the area's young single adult population. A place in which to gather together to hear the word of God and the history of His church.

Speed Dating: meat market. Emphasis on first impressions and awkward five-minute conversations with members of the opposite gender. An unfortunate lean towards attraction based on superficial characteristics such as appearance.


Institute: great big thick textbooks. With lots of cool information about church history. Scriptures encouraged.

Speed Dating: no books, unless you bring one and place it on your desk as a kind of talisman, or as a way to say to that casual observer opposite you that you are a literary and intelligent person.


Institute: prayers, hymns and cool stories about temples.

Speed Dating: prayers for a quick end to your suffering, dirges, and perfect strangers inquiring about your temple-worthiness.


Really. Need I say more?

And can I start shaking now?

I wrote this today in the early afternoon. I think it's pretty self-explanatory:

I just finished asking the third and final person for a letter of recommendation. Each request was relatively easy, painless, even pleasant.

And my hands just won't stop shaking.

But despite my shaking hands, I'm glad--more so than I've been in a long time--to be taking steps forward after standing so long in a bog.

The thing which has filled my entire heart and soul with trepidation and hesitation and doubt for well over two years has all been resolved in an afternoon. I feel both elated and ashamed.

All things Bronte

Why are some people so cool?

So cool that they can write entire blogs about Charlotte Bronte and her works?

I'll just add one more name to that list of people I admire.

And also, has anyone here read Villette? If so, do you think I would like it?

Little Baby is Growing Up

I'm used to taking baby steps. Lots and lots (or perhaps not so many) little, teeny tiny itty bitty babyish steps. That are also small.

But today I took a BIG step. A really really BIG step.

And my legs are feeling more energetic than ever. In fact, as I returned to work after taking that BIG step, I felt like running. I wanted to dash the couple of hundred yards from my car to the employee entrance. I also felt like singing. And did. (Quietly.)

Guys, I am applying to grad school. I have my essay pretty much wrapped up, and one out of the three letters of recommendation already written. I just have to put together online applications, have my transcripts and GRE scores sent out and baby, I have got this thing in the bag.

Come fall, I am SO going to be taking BIG (not baby) steps onto some campus or other (virtual or otherwise) and learning the ins and outs of the appealing field of Library Science. (I rather feel that the words "Library Science" should be sitting on a pedestal surrounded by blinking Christmas lights, but I can't figure out how to do that on the blog.)

Wish me luck. And wish me brave. And wish me dilligent.

Cause I'll need all three to get this done.

And it is SO getting done.

Why I would like to blog, but I can't:

I'm just a little bit busy. I'm mostly busy trying to put together everything I need to bring with me tomorrow when I talk with a former boss about a letter of recommendation. I keep thinking I don't have all the forms I need, and I know--I just know--I'm going to forget the addressed, stamped envelopes. Darnit.

I'm also tired. It's after 10 and I have this goal of getting to bed by 10:30, but I almost never make it, mostly due to a desire to watch the Food Network and check my email and browse a bit on amusing websites, not to mention the three books that I am currently trying to read. Dangit.

Which brings me to the third reason: Jane Eyre is sitting next to me on my bed. And I need to read it. Like, now. So.

Righto. Tallyho. Farewell.

You ain't gettin' nothin' more outta me tonight.

More for the Misc Category

Going days and days without blogging = having way too many topics by the time I finally get back on track.

For instance:

The moon. I love it. I love it when it's a waxing gibbous form climbing halfway out of the east in the early evening. I love the way the top is sharply defined, curved, smooth as an eggshell, and the bottom is faded, mysterious, unknowable, blending into the darkening blue sky.

Also, seriously, what is up with that whole 'dumb guy voice?' I really, really dislike it when women talk of their husbands or other male acquaintances and quote them using this voice that sounds like a cross between a gorilla and a person who flips burgers for a living. (No offense meant to any burger flippers here. Erm.) They'll say in their normal, reasonable-sounding voice, "So, I said, 'Let's go see a movie tonight.' Then he said [enter gorilla], 'But I like football. And watching it. Grunt, grunt.'" Okay. So, not only does this demean the gorilla-husband, it demeans the person speaking! Why on earth did she marry the fellow if he's such a neanderthal?

And, oh, speaking of men? Yes. I am officially in love with Mr. Rochester.

Just so everyone knows.

Bring on the men 20 years older than I am. Seriously.

The blogs of cooldom

Have you ever noticed how much cooler (or is it 'more cool') a blog is when it's in French?

I have.

And yet, even with all the years taking French in high school and college, I can't really understand any of it.

The coolness is nonethless undiminished.

The problem of pontificating

I was about to write about how I stubbed my toe this evening (developing a rather nasty blood blister on my pinky toe), how I yelled indiscriminately for a minute then gingerly tried to apply pressure, and then how I was swept away by the philosophical consideration of why exactly we have pain, both physical and emotional. I was then about to expand upon and share my musings, dispersing my thoughts like alms to the needy and creating a self-image of smiling, superior, ace-bandage-wrapped benevolence.

I'm glad I didn't.

Because I have just realized that my pontifications (for such they would be) are nothing more than posturing; that I have no more understanding of pain than any other mortal creature.

However.

I do know this: pain happens. If you wonder why it happens, your best bet would not be to read about why it happens on Lizardbreath's blog. Your best bet may just be to read The Problem of Pain, by C. S. Lewis, of which I have just read a summary. (I've never read the book itself, much to my chagrin.)

Or, your best bet may be to reflect on the problem itself.

You see, in my own musings I thought of pain as a way to tell us something was wrong. If you stub your toe and have an unsightly blood blister, your body reacts by sending signals to your brain that something terribly untoward has happened in the region of your little toesies. These signals continue as long as the problem exists. Therefore, when the pain is gone, the problem is gone.

I thought to myself, Oh! This is comparable to spiritual pain! If we experience non-physical pain, it indicates that something is broken in our spiritual bodies; we've transgressed, either by commission or omission.

I thought that the key to such pain would be repentance; healing would only come through that process, and through the Atonement.

All of which is true.

But I failed to take into account that there are more causes of pain than sin and toe-stubbing; there are numerous things that happen that cause us pain. We could feel pain in sympathy for a loved one (for instance if a friend were to stub her little toe). We feel pain in response to death or grief or someone being cruel or life being unfair or when we're lonely or chemically depressed or...

Well, you know. You've all felt it, this non-physical, potent, un-caused-by-you type of pain.

Which is why C. S. Lewis's book is intriguing to me at the moment. It deals with the problem of why we undergo suffering if God is good and truly loves us. Because he is and does; it's just hard to remember that at times when your husband finds out he has cancer, or when you're in a job you dislike, or when you stub your little toe.

But remembering is crucial, because I'm convinced that, just as there are sources of relief for physical pain, God is the only real source of relief for the other suffering in our lives.

I just wish I could figure out how it all worked.

Fifty down, baby!

Every Monday morning at approximately 8am, I weigh myself to see exactly how this whole weightloss thing is going. (i.e. if the weight is still being lost. Waaaaay lost.)

And this morning, to mine joy, I discovered that I have hit the 50lb weight-loss mark. I am now exactly 50lbs lighter than I was when I started this whole rigamarolle, about four and a half months ago.

And lemme tell you; that is a LOT of months without any chocolate cake.

But it's worth it.

And you/I thought I could never do it

I am amazed at myself.

Today, with MUCH help from my patient mother, I did something I've never done before.

I sewed some bits of cloth into a recognizeable, useable shape! (As opposed to a small square of fabric covered in crooked lines.)

This past Christmas, our family put together several newborn kits for the Humanitarian Aid Center. Several of us (mostly my sisters and I) had the task of sewing up baby blankets to put in the kits. Unfortunately, this meant that I had to get near a sewing machine, a thing I generally avoid on principle.

However, today was the day to get it done, and after a little cajoling from my mom and after taking a few deep breaths, I followed my mother's careful instructions and produced this:





And here's how it looks inside the kit:


So, despite the fact that the corners are pudgy and the seams are crooked and one side is decidedly longer than the other, still, some baby somewhere in a country nearby (or far away) will be warm.

And that is a good thought indeed.

And because I don't want to always be looking for it,

here's a handprint I drew for sharing time in Primary.


I admit, to my shame, that I spent at least a half-hour searching the internet before I discovered that there just aren't any handprint outlines out there to be found. Then I realized how stupidly easy it was to draw my own.


But, for the lazy and the uninformed (people essentially like me) here is my very own handprint outline:

So why doesn't anyone set me up with her 40-year-old brother?

I love work conversations. No really--they're possibly the most entertaining part of being in the customer service realm.

Just yesterday, or maybe it was the day before, (it's hard to keep track of time in the customer service realm), a co-worker, who happens to be 27 and single, mentioned that her grandmother (just before passing away) had prayed that this co-worker of mine would find a nice man whose wife had died, leaving him two kids.

(Ew. Awkward sentence there.)

Anyway--another co-worker gasped and said, "That's my brother!"

So, everyone in the office immediately talked about strategies for getting this 27-year-old hooked up with my other co-worker's 39-year-old brother.

Okay. Now, as anyone who has read Jane Eyre knows, a gap of even as much as twenty years matters about as much as a spot of dust in your eye if the two people involved are kindred souls. However, for some reason, this 12-year gap made me grit my teeth a little (Is that why I woke up with a sore jaw the next morning?) and grimace behind the wall of my cubicle.

Then another co-worker piped in with information about her brother, who is divorced and is himself past 40. Amazingly, they both wanted to set this girl up with their brothers! Add this to the twice-divorced brother of yet another co-worker who had been deemed unworthy of my 27-year-old friend.

I began to wonder--what's wrong with me? Why doesn't anyone want to set me up with her 40-year-old brother?

Then I remembered. Of course! That's why! It's always why.

I had begged them not to set me up with anyone. Ever. In a million years.

I guess it's just easy to forget that when you're caught up with all the appealing brothers of your coworkers in the customer service realm.

You make me miss you through your friend-like wiles

Aararargh! Gosh darndit, peoples!

I miss you.

Especially you people who were here but now are not. I missed you all so much today that I drove by Cathy & Ed's old house and mourned over the camper that sits obesely in the driveway that once held the Jeep whose name I cannot at present recall. (My apologies, Jeep.)

I miss you so much that I find myself catching my breath at times when I remember you suddenly! Ah, bothersome friendships where people move and leave and start up elsewhere!

I should be doing the thing I normally do; I should be forgetting about you to the point that if any one of you were to reappear in my life I could spend an hour with you at most before getting excessively uncomfortable.

Unfortunately, this is not the case. I think if we were all to get together again, it would be Good Times. Great Times. Freaking ROCKING Times.

But we can't and we won't and I know it.

But that doesn't mean I have to like it.

An insatiable appetite

I've been going through my books for several hours, adding titles or ISBN numbers to Library Thing, a way to catalog your books online and, as you can see to the right, add a little display of random books from your library onto your blog. (All of these ideas were, naturally, stolen from my ideal blogger.)

Unfortunately, going through all of my books has reawakened a terrible appetite in me: I want to read every one of them.

Even if I had all the free time I could ask for between opening my eyes in the morning and slipping down between my blankets at night, I would never have enough time to read all the books I'd like to. But I don't have all that free time. I work about 40 hours a week, eat meals, spend about an hour a day exercising, watch empty TV shows, which makes my time boil down to approximately an hour of reading per day. This is the great tragedy in the lives of all bibiophiles--not necessarily that we only have an hour to read, but that the time we do have is always, inevitably too, too short, and there are always too many things to do besides read.

For instance: prepare a sharing time for tomorrow's Primary, compile some biographical information on Wallace Stegner (author of Angle of Repose) for my book club, mash my grad school application essay with a meat tenderizer, apologize to my sister for getting on her nerves, and attempt to explain to myself exactly why I keep buying scrapbook supplies I never use.

It's time to declutter my life. No more scrapbook supplies, no more grad school, no more interactions with family members, no more interactions with anybody. I'm taking a sabbatical month (maybe two) to catch up on all that reading I've been missing.

Do you think it will make me happier?

Life Lesson #1

Never, EVER have a 3-car-wide driveway attached to your house unless you also have a snowblower. Like, an industrial strength one.

Seriously people.

I'm cold and my back aches and my fingertips are still tingly. But other than that, it was actually a pretty good day.

And I've also discovered a trick to keep your face from freezing solid while you're shoveling snow: sing "My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean," and while your cold, back-aching, finger-tingling neighbors will stare at you in shock, your face won't shatter when you next try to speak.

Uh...Archaeology anyone?

Um. I just stumbled across this, and although I'm hesitant to chuckle at a fellow blogger... Still... Some obviously bad translations to English just have to be laughed at.

(I think my personal favorite is: "The conservators who tried to recover a statue of 1,900 years of Venus have put their heads along with the inspectors of the maintenance of the air line who scrutinize welds generally the autogenous and the repairs in the motors of jet for any crack." See the original here.)

*Laughs up pajama sleeve.*

Have I already found it?

Those of you who know me know how long I've been whining to myself about how hard it is to apply to grad school.

You have, in fact, thought to yourself many times, "What the heck! She's talking about it again! I swear--I wish she would just shut up about it already!"

(Yeesh, you guys are mean.)

I've struggled, asking myself if this is what I really want, wondered if my essay was good enough, deciding it wasn't, writing version after version of pathetic attempts to impress admissions boards, and finally today, I just felt sick of it.

Sick, I tell you.

So I decided to revisit my first essay, look it over, and see what needed improvement. And do you know what I found?

(No. Because I haven't told you yet. Hah, I say! Hah!)

Erm.

I found that the essay is pretty darn close to what I want it to be. It is, I imagine, how White Ninja feels in this comic:

(This image (click on it to get a better view) was stolen unceremoniously from White Ninja Comics. Never say I don't give credit.)

In short, I think I may be more ready to submit grad school applications than I thought I was. Except the problem is, I don't know how much more tweaking my essay needs. But I'll get it tweaked. And I'll tweak it good.

And then I'll just have to do that last official line-up for my letters of recommendation! Which should be easy, but I hate doing that too.

Aw, shoot.

Pajama Girl (Or 'Pyjama Girl' if you're British)

We are a family of many Christmas Traditions.


These include Putting Up Christmas Decorations While In a Tiff With Each Other, (which actually didn't happen this year, oddly enough...), Teasing Siblings Mercilessly About How Much They'll Like the Present I Bought Them (which only I practice, I believe), Getting Sick of Candy Neighbors Bring Over and Eating It Anyway, Trying to Watch the George C. Scott "A Christmas Carol" and Falling Asleep Halfway Through It and Then Waking Up to the Awful Screeches of the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come.


And oh. We have many more.


But we've never been one of those lucky pajama families, with that lucky pajama tradition. You know--the one where on Christmas Eve, everyone opens a present and it's a pair of new pajamas and you wear them to bed and you're all warm and snuggled in your spiffy PJs and you wake up on Christmas morning and are still wearing them as you open your presents.


And let me tell you--I've felt the lack of this holiday tradition.


Well, this year we didn't get pajamas on Christmas Eve, per usual.


But we did get PJs on Christmas morning! Hwowza! And here they are! (Er, well...here mine are. Everyone else's are not subject to photography. At least not while I am lazily sitting on the couch blogging.) (And no, I am not wearing them in this picture. I'm not quite that...shapeless. Not quite.)

In fact, I am wearing these spiffy and fuzzy and new PJs right this very moment. And you know--they're just as great as I've always dreamed.

So, how 'bout that cauliflower?

*Whack* Yeeeouch!

Yes, yes, but what about paper?

I wish I could say that I have a juicy journal.

As it is, my journal is currently dusty, dry, and about as unjuicy as a 3,000 year old corpse. (Well, the dusty part is quite literally true. The rest is understatement.)

My journal currently occupies a spot on the floor by my bed where it has lain unopened and un-writ-upon for quite some time. Months. Perhaps years, although I'm not entirely sure. Hmm. Actually, let me check when my last entry was....

(Ew! Dust!)

Yup. It's been a long time. Long time. Tuesday, July 5th, 2005. I am ashamed. And my last entry wasn't even an entry; it was me writing down a three-paragraph story excerpt I had thought up that day. I didn't even list what I had eaten for breakfast that morning! Now that's negligence, I tell you. And oh-my-heavens...my entry before that is just downright embarrassing.

Okay. Now I've remembered why I blog now instead of writing in my journal. Because a blog is public, and because I know you peoples read it, I try to avoid writing things that are too personal. Thus, when I read back through my entries, I'm not embarrassed. At least, not usually.

Unless I've written about cauliflower. Man, that's embarrassing.

Wait--I didn't? Oh.

Thank goodness. And please--slap me if I ever do.

Forget walking softly--somebody give me a stick.

As sprightly youngsters, my sisters and I, in rough and ready pairs or trios, would joust each other freely, using whatever straightish sort of twigs we could find. Stick-sword-fighting was one of our favorite pastimes, or at least it was mine. (I may be coloring their experiences with my own...)

Once, when I found a long thin metal rod, I thought my elevation to knighthood was assured; here was a real sword made of metal, not wood! I felt all-powerful and quickly defeated all twig-bearing opponents.

I've wondered at times, in the years since being that rather fierce five or six-year-old, where exactly all my courage and boldness boiled away to.

When I think of my personality now, I consider myself a shy person, prone to being rather withdrawn or even hesitant to interact with others. And yet, now I wonder whether shyness was something I was born with or if it was something I decided I was, and then became.

Would that five-year-old with mud on her shoes and hair wisping from a lopsided ponytail recognize the cautious creature she has become?

I think I need to find a stick one of these days and shake it a few times at the current dragons in my life. Maybe if I beat them about the head a bit they'll leave me alone. If I bruise them, perhaps they'll respect me. And if I leave them limping and fleeing away, maybe I'll find that I'm still courageous and bold after all.

Nah.

Get thee to the MOA

About a week ago on KBYU (a local PBS station) I saw a string of images set to a piece of music from Robert Cundick's The Redeemer. (This piece of music is perhaps one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard.) I discovered later that the images, all of which were depictions of Christ, came from the current exhibit at the BYU Museum of Art: Beholding Salvation. (For those of you who would like to see what I saw on KBYU, go here and download from Chapter 3.)

I need to get to the MOA.

This past Sunday (while singing with our ward choir) I broke down in tears during John Rutter's "Candlelight Carol," something which almost never happens. I'm usually way too absorbed with how my voice should sound and whether I got the note just right to even think about the meaning of what I'm singing. I leave that to the audience and usually miss out on what could otherwise be meaningful spiritual experiences. But this time, when we began singing, "Find Him at Bethlehem laid in a manger: Christ our Redeemer asleep in the hay," I couldn't go on. I barely hit one note in five, if that.

I finally remembered what Christ is to me, and my whole soul thrilled to the sweetness of Him.

So I think, sometime within these next few weeks, I need to take a trip to Provo and take a few moments to behold Salvation, and to see how others view Him as well. I think seeing Him may help me to see other things just a little more clearly.

And a very merry one at that

I'm afraid I'm a very negligent blogger. So, because I earlier failed to do so, and because most of you are still in time zones where it's still officially December 25th, I heartily wish you all a very Merry Christmas. I hope it was lovely and joy-filled for all of you.

And also because I've been awake since about 5:30 this morning, I think that's all I'll say. Merry Christmas, everyone.

And God bless us, every one.

So--wait--what's wrong with feet?

Okay, people. We are going to get at the root of something here. We're digging deep! We're dredging up stuff that has lain undredged for aeons!

I want to know exactly who decided that feet were ugly. I mean, was it during the Victorian era when pretty much everything below your neck was considered indecent? (And sometimes below your eyebrows?) Was it during the Roman Empire when that prevalent sandal-wearing caused unsightly calluses and really gross accumulation of gunk on said feet? Was it last Thursday when someone posted on her blog, "Ew! Feet are gross," a post which has more or less been altered by me in significant ways? (Inasmuch as no one ever posted it that I know of but I DO know a lot of people actually think this way and I really can't understand why?)

Yes.

I'm sure it's all three.

However, I find that I must take a different road. To me, feet are not ugly. To me, feet are quite nice little things, actually. They arch so agreeably in that inside space between the pad and the heel; they have such interesting ligaments on top; they're tough and leathery on the bottom and smooth and delicate above. And heck--don't even get me started about how much I love toes. (Yay! Toes are great!)

So to all of you people out there who think that our legs would do much better with just a stump at the end, or for all of those out there who insist that feet must be covered up every waking minute lest we all become flooded with inappropriate thoughts about each other, and to those nay-sayers who say, "Nay, feet! Nay!" I say:

"Walk on, feet. Be proud in your feetitude. Be bold, be step-worthy, and above all, be bare."

In everything I don't say is where I live my life

I've been thinking today about the creation of things, how the act of creating moves something from one of hundreds of thousands (or millions) of possibilities into the one thing that is. When I post here, I usually come with some idea of what I want to talk about, whether it be nephews or books or getting stuck in the snow. I taste sentences in my head like someone at an ice cream counter, sampling this flavor or that before I find one that sticks.

Then, when I sit down to write it, it shapes itself into something entirely different, going from chocolate to strawberry to oreo mint, when I had originally intended something more like peanut butter cup.

So even when I intend to write about something, I often end up with something completely different.

And then there are the things that get left out because I don't want to write about them, things like staring into the mirror for fifteen minutes trying to penetrate my own mind on the double fronts of the exterior and interior barriers I've put up against myself, trying to see past my own eyes and find out at last what this creature whose reflection I see is really capable of becoming. Or when I go through days when every song I hear, every line I hear from the television, every comment someone makes reminds me of things that I lack, of traits I wish I had, of people I miss, of things I want in my life but simply don't have.

Sometimes I don't want to tell you about these times, I believe because they make me feel too sad.

But there are so many things that I would tell you, but I can't, because by the time I finally get around to typing my post, the idea is gone, or changed into something unrecognizable. Or because this blog is public, I don't want to really bare my soul too much; instead I'll leave it safely ensconced somewhere behind my breastbone, thank-you-very-much, from which, in the privacy of my room, I may take it out and pat it a few times just to remind myself it's there.

Even now, this post isn't anything I thought it would be. But it is what it is. It's moved into the realm of being rather than just the realm of what might be.

Just know that, when I write about being miffed at choir practice or the joy of having loose and baggy jeans, there's an entire life's worth of unwritten experiences that I have every day but will not or cannot share. (Not that you need to know precicely how my toothpaste tasted, of course--I'm not talking about minutae.) I guess what I'm saying is, please remember that, although a blog is formatted in such a way to give you snippets of my life, it's only the very skin of the thing, never getting beyond the epidermis. But I've got a whole lot of flesh left under that.

As have you.

So come on. Tell me how you're doing. (And in case you were wondering, yes, that meant you.)

Because nephews are, of all things, most wonderful:

I give you this:



Not to mention this:

(Aw. Cute little socks on cute little feet and you'll probably slap me if I use the phrase "cute little" once more.) Hahaha! Please, do forgive a besotted auntie.

I just had to share. (I guess this counts as a shameless plug for someone else's kid. Where's my pride, man?)

What is like falling in love

I've remembered what this was now.

It's music.

Like the music I heard last night, some pieces ethereal and some rousing and energetic. It felt very much like falling in love, that sensation that flares in your chest and rushes out to your shoulders and down to our feet, making you want to race something and strain your legs against the earth, but also to stand unmoving on the crest of a hill while the wind blows through you.

Saying that it was lovely stuff would be true but not accurate. But I can't really think of anything better to say.

For those of you still in Utah (darn few of you), if you have the chance to attend the MoTab Christmas concert with Sissel (who, by the way, has convinced me that I really can become an instant fan of a Norwegian Singing Sensation who, despite an admittedly odd haircut, has one of the loveliest voices I've heard in ages) then you will love it. Period.

If you don't have a chance to attend, at least tune in to the weekly MoTab Sunday morning broadcast at 9:30am (Mountain Time) on KSL for a brief taste of it.

You know. If you feel like it.

And also...

I know, I really do know it's creepy that I read the blogs of people I don't know, but you people have seriously got to see this.

Despite its irreverence, it tickled my insides until they shouted at me to stop.

Hurrah.

Oh, yes. This is why I dislike winter...

Today was the first snow-shoveling day of the year, at least for me. Right after Family Home Evening, we noticed that our dear ol' dad had gone out to shovel the driveway. Now, my dad is completely capable of clearing the entire thing by himself, but because we love him and we don't want him to have a heart attack alone in the snow, my two younger sibs and I went out to help him clean up the durn thing.

Unfortunately, this morning as we all left for work or school or Walmart, each of our cars left a trail of packed snow behind us that absolutely refused to be parted from the driveway this evening. And also the snow was a bit wet. And heavy.

All of this helped me to remember this evening just why I dislike winter. It's not so much the cold, nor the fear of slipping and breaking my tibia (or worse, my clavicle) while shuffling around the church parking lot in shoes that have NO traction whatsoever, nor is it the gloom that descends on our poor minds every time the clouds lower, nor is it the cold. (I already mentioned that? Oh. Well. It counts twice.)

It's shoveling. Particularly when it's snowing at the same time, and by the time you've finally gotten three quarters of the way down the driveway, that first quarter already has another inch on it.

Blech.

Fortunately, that was not the case this evening. It wasn't snowing, and while it was cold, it wasn't frigid, and while the snow was packed and a bit heavy, it was mostly frozen so it wasn't too bad, and we just kind of skimmed over the top of the car tracks, and also there were four people shoveling so it didn't take too long, and also we got some hot chocolate (mine artificially sweetened) at the end of it.

But it was kind of like seeing a preview for a movie you didn't want to see, but you knew for the sake of societal pressure you would see anyway. No. No, that comparison doesn't work at all.

It was more like smelling something foul that you hadn't yet come across but you knew was just around the bend and you were about to run smack dab into it. With your bare foot. Weeeelll...better, but still...

It was like...

It was like...

Yo. It was sooooo like shoveling a driveway full of snow, knowing that winter has only just started and you have at least another thirty or forty days where you'll have to shovel this gunk (and a lot more days where you'll have to LOOK at the gunk) before you finally start seeing green on the trees again.

Yeah. That's totally what it was like. Yaaaaay winter.

A Slightly Irregular Wish List

For all of you out there who are thinking about buying me a smashingly wonderful Christmas gift, (i.e. none of you), I have finally found a gift for me, one that I will love and cherish and adore for the rest of me days.

Now I know that the spirit of Christmas is all about giving, and believe me, I would never have risked my flesh and unbroken bones in the mass of shoppers on Black Friday (i.e. the day after Thanksgiving) to find those few perfect gifts that also happened to be on sale if I weren't interested in giving, giving, giving away just like the Little Stream.

But, because I've had trouble thinking of exactly what I wanted to receive, (I usually just buy stuff I want...when I have enough money...), I thought I would make it easier for any of you. Who happen to want to give me stuff. Um.

In any case, while I was working in the Juvenile section of the HBLL at BYU, I ran across an old picture book called The Slightly Irregular Fire Engine. The pictures are basically cutouts of Victorian-era engravings, and the story is a hodgepodge of strange events and bizarre characters, including a pirate who has knitted his own beard. I was wowed. I wanted one for myself. (The book, not the beard-knitting pirate, although that would be cool too...)

However, when I went to try to find the book, I discovered to my everlasting dismay that it was out of print.

Alackaday!

And yet what were my triumphant rejoicings when today I received an email update about news in the Juvenile Lit publishing industry and found that The Slightly Irregular Fire Engine has been reissued! (They were great indeed. Er...my rejoicings, that is.) And I looked! And it was there! On Amazon!

So, for those of you who are just racking your brains (ouch!) trying to figure out exactly what to get lil' ol' me for Christmas, here's your hint, your one major hint.

Except...if more than one of you intends to get this for me, I would have several copies of The Slightly Irregular Fire Engine. And then I would have to donate copies to local elementary schools and literacy programs in South America, and the poor children would be very confused about the strange disjointed tale and would probably end up working in some terrible industry, like fast food, because they were so disturbed by it.

So maybe I should just buy this for myself. Yes. Yes. Just nevermind this whole blog post.

Please.

Here's a tip--don't shock yourself.

My workplace is saturated with static electricity. It lives in the carpets; it lurks in doorknobs and in the metal corners of cubicles; it leaps from its hidey-holes in light-switches. And if you're unlucky enough to brush your unhappily conductive flesh against any one of these things, you're liable to get a nasty jolt.

So, I've taken to grounding myself at every opportunity. When I walk back to the copier, I brush my knuckles against the frame of the cubicle behind me, touch the metal bookcase midway down the room and tap my fingers against the light-switches next to the copier so that when I put that piece of paper face-down on the glass, I don't get a heart-stopping wallop to my electrical system. (Those are unpleasant.)

However, despite my best efforts, I still sometimes get a good shock. Like today.

Today, as usual, I hit the back of my hand against the light-switch to disperse the electrical charge I'd built up during the past twenty or so steps. Unfortunately, the charge was so great that when I grounded myself the shock was even worse than usual. A couple of minutes later, the back of my hand started to itch, so I scratched it without really looking at it. When I finally glanced over, there was a little welt that looked like a mosquito bite smack dab in the center of my hand.

I was horrified (HORRIFIED, I tell you!) to realize that the welt must have come from the shock I got at the light-switch. ('Cause mosquitos are dead, man. Dead.)

"Holy Canoli!" I shouted (not really)! "That shock of static electricity totally burned me and raised a welt on my skin! Yowza!"

Actually, I just looked at the welt and thought of what a great blog-post that would be. (I just wished I had a camera at the time.)

And really, don't you agree?

And I don't even miss the other chin.

Today was weigh-in day. I approached the scale with trepidation but left it with...er...jollity.

For behold, I have at last reached MY FIRST MINI GOAL! And I won't tell you what the goal was (because it's too embarrassing) but I will tell you that this morning I was 5 lbs UNDER it.

And I didst rejoiceth greatly much. And lots of it, too. Tied up with ribbons. With complimentary pink bunny slippers. And... (what on earth am I talking about???) This makes 37.5 lbs in total, and I find that I'm definitely liking the feel of my now-baggy jeans.

To illustrate my (slightly less large-o) self, here's a pic I took on Saturday. It's blurry, but I think it captures, um, the green of my shirt pretty well. Oh, and did I mention that I finally got that haircut? This past summer?

And here's another pic. Because I think it's funny.

See how wrinkled and studious-looking my forehead is? Yeah. We're talking serious thought processes going on here, including but not limited to: ponderings upon cheese, why "House Hunters" on HGTV is good television even though it seems completely boring, and also thinking that what I had for lunch might actually be an interesting blog post after all.

It was chicken. Mmm.

How, oh how did she get my life?

I've been blog cruising; you know--looking for stuff to read on a Sunday night, browsing around the internet because the only alternative is going to bed muy early and also turning on my nifty space-heater so my toes aren't freezing all night.

And (thanks to Lindsay's awesome links) I happened across the blog of a girl who is living the life that I want.

I wonder if you guys have ever had that experience before, where you open up a newspaper and there, in the local section, is the gal (or guy) who, from their naturally curly hair to their husband (or wife) named Stan (or Jill) is exactly who you want to be.

Well, this girl is it for me. She just got back from getting a degree in Library Science from a university in England, (HELLLOOOOO! COOL!), just got a job as a bona fide librarian, just went on an awesome blind date with a guy who, get this, wrote her a thank-you note for a great date!

Holy---

I just want to go over to her blog, plunk down at her feet and say, "Teach me, oh great one! I will be your willing pupil if only, only you will tell me how to get my hair to curl naturally like that, and how to be a librarian, and also how to get neat guys to write thank-you notes to me."

But I'm too embarrassed to do it. Because I'm living the life that no one really wants. And I'm actually just a little bit ashamed, because by heck and by golly it's my own gosh-darned fault that I'm where I am today. So I'll just keep on lurking and read about her being productive and wonderful and helpful in her librarian position and also having a really great time dating thank-you-note boys.

Urg. *Twitch.* And off I go to customer service tomorrow. Woooo.

Yeah. Bed sounds like a really good thing right now.

YAAAHOOOOOZAH!

I done it! I mean it's done and I did it! I wrote 50,000 words in one month! By, like, steady plodding and sacrificing good writing on the altar of quantity!

Woooooooo!

And also, Yeeeeeaaaaaah, BABY!

Not to mention, GAAAAAAADZOOOOOKS!

(Well, that last exclamation may have been a bit much...)

As a newly inducted NaNoWriMo winner, I get to put this lovely image up on my blog:

(Yeah. I went with the biggest one available. Totally.)

However, as impressed as I am with my own personal writing feat, (and at 166 pages in Word it's the most (by a long shot) I've ever written for any one project), I'm even more impressed with my little sis's writing skills.

Even now she's madly dashing off her last 1000 words, having written an average of about 5000 every day for the past week. WOW. She was only about halfway to the goal a week ago and now... THAT AWESOME AND CRAZY CHIC! SHE'S TOTALLY GONNA MAKE IT!

So tomorrow she and I are going to have our own little "Thank goodness it's over" party. We're probably gonna go to a movie, she'll eat some popcorn ('cause I'm abstaining...shoot...), and we'll laugh and we'll cry and we'll fall asleep onto each other's shoulders halfway through the movie because, by heck, this writing 50,000 words in one month is pretty tiring work.

*Yawn.*

G'night!

Get your car out of the gutter, girl!

It has recently been snowing here in Utah, thus launching the season of white-knuckled, brake-tapping, generally terrifying driving experiences we all know and…er…love? It always takes me a few weeks at least to get used to the different way you have to brake and to recall just how to ease your car out of a spin instead of making it go around in a 360.

In short, I’m still in that How the heck do I do this? stage, currently at least another two weeks away from that blessed blissful moment when I'll be able to skid my way uphill with an inch of solid ice on the road and not get stuck even once.

So it really shouldn't have surprised me today when I tried to park on the street just north of my workplace and ended up in the gutter. Yes folks, the gutter. I pulled up into a nice open spot (which was also unfortunately covered with ice) and when I tried to stop the car, it slid down inevitably into the gutter, and just slid more quickly when I hit the brakes in surprise. (Yeah. Smart move there, Lizardbreath.)

So I got stuck in the gutter. And after a few tries of backing up and twisting my wheels to the left and trying to get back on the road again, I just gave up, kicked the car (not really) and let it just sit and think about what it had done while I went in to work.

Work has been stressful this week because of a large sale we had over the weekend which flooded us with orders, phone calls and emails that all urgently needed attention. So I felt frayed and low when I went back out to the car at lunchtime to see if I could get it out of the gutter and into the parking lot of the local Subway shop.

And call me foolish, but I was so distressed that I decided to pray and ask if I could get just a little bit of help to get my car out of the gutter, mainly so I wouldn't have to ask the company's owner if he could tow me up onto the road. I think I couched it in terms like, "I know this isn't a big deal, and you don't have to if you don't want to, but I would really love it if I could just get out of this gutter on my own."

I think I sometimes feel like God is rather reluctant to answer our prayers, as if He sifts through a stack of them, setting some aside because the requests are too insignificant, or don't match precisely what He knows we should want. At times, this feeling makes me believe that God will not answer prayers at all, but that whatever I'm asking for will be answered with a firm "No."

So I was surprised, and very, very grateful when, with a single backing up and a twisting of my front tires to the left, I was able to get my little Geo back up onto firm road, leaving that gutter behind me (I hope for good).

As I drove off to Subway to get lunch, I found myself in tears. I realized (or remembered) that God actually delights in helping us, and I believe that He will aid us in every small or large thing that He can. He's not reluctant to answer prayers; it's just that we're sometimes reluctant to place our faith in Him. That's why He answers a child's prayer to find his lost dinosaur toy, or a student's desperate prayer to remember the mathematical formula she needs on a test, or a sin-bound person's desire to be freed, at last, from his heavy burdens of guilt and pain.

Answering these prayers shows us that He loves us, but they also help us to learn to trust God and to turn to Him again when we have greater need.

It also changes something inside of us. This morning I was a wretched customer service rep who, frazzled, tried to leap from one task to another and berated herself after every phonecall for sounding like an idiot. This afternoon I was me again: Lizardbreath, who has a Heavenly Father who looks out for her and delights in helping her.

And I hope I don't have to slide into the gutter again to be reminded of that.

I'm in the mood to be insulted.

We had practice for ward choir today, and with all the rather difficult pieces we're doing this year and with only about four weeks to go, it's feeling like we're getting into real crunch time here. I wonder if that might have been part of it.

Also, I didn't really want to come to choir today. It's really that way most weeks--for some reason, I just really want to keep that hour for myself to do something like read. Or sleep. (Both of which I am exceedingly good at.) That definitely was part of it.

And then there's the fact that, in the choir, I'm used to being petted and coddled as the alto 'golden child' who always gets her notes right and leads the section in sounding out her part like a human-shaped trumpet. That was the biggest part of all.

Today, while practicing, one of the good sisters in my section kept insisting that we weren't hitting the notes of a particular section very well, and she kept looking at me while she was insisting it. I started to feel rankled, especially since I've sung this piece numerous times over the past thirteen or so years and I feel like I pretty much know it by heart. So, I got offended. Every time she said we hadn't gotten the notes right, I would dig the fingernails of my left hand into my palm and try to convince myself not to get up and storm out like a tantrumy child. Then when she pointed out a timing problem in another section of the song, I had to physically bite down on my tongue to keep myself from saying something that I knew I would regret.

Now. Let me express to you--I love this sister. She's funny and wry and has this wonderfully deep voice and eyes that twinkle and just generally embodies all that is good. I give her hugs on a regular basis (or rather I used to give her hugs, before I got called into Primary and pretty much lost contact with the rest of the ward).

After my temper had cooled and after we had moved onto another song I was left to sit and wallow in my shame at having been so taken aback by this sister's implication that I was not getting the notes of this song right. I had simply been offended because I believed she was accusing me of singing the wrong notes, which I believed I was incapable of doing. Aargh! My pride! My vicious, vicious pride!

There are times that I thoroughly despise myself. For instance, when I make a mistake that costs my company a great deal of money, I feel like a slug that has slimed its way across somebody's wedding cake. Or, when I fail to get up on time and walk in a few minutes late to church, I feel like a spider that has crawled into someone's sundae. Man, I hate that!

But the time I despise myself the most is when I let my stupid, bullheaded pride in my minor talents & accomplishments overrule the honest affection I have for someone, when I'm more concerned with being right than being kind, and more occupied with my status than with being humble. I hate that about myself the most of all things.

So, I suppose this free confession to all of you is my penance. Thanks for reading. (Now for some more self-flagellation...)

For one thing we give thanks above all

I must admit--I can be a bit of a scrooge. I'm the one who winces when coworkers break out their Christmas music CDs the day after Halloween, the one who glares at the Christmas decorations that appear on store shelves right next to the swimsuits and beach balls.

Fortunately, by the time Thanksgiving rolls around I'm usually resigned to the idea of the Christmas Holiday Season finally being here, as well as a bit ashamed of my reluctance to enter into the spirit of said season. That was the way I felt today, or rather last night if you want to be particular.

And I suddenly realized what a serendipitous thing it is that the holiday of Thanksgiving is just a month before Christmas. It's Thanksgiving that makes us remember that all good things come from God, from the turkey & jello salad to the birth of a new nephew into the family. Then, just as the holiday closes, we're rushed right into another even busier, hectic holiday season. But this holiday is the celebration of a life for which we should give the greatest thanks of all.

On this Thanksgiving, I'm grateful for my family and for all the wonderful, delicious food which is, even now, bulging my stomach out to indecent proportions.

But most of all I'm thankful that God did choose to send His Only Begotten Son, and that the Son perfectly obeyed the will of His Father in all things, both setting an immaculate example for us to follow and freeing us from being trapped forever by our own stupid, persistent errors.

I'm finally grateful for the Christmas season. I'm finally being a little more grateful for Christ.

Yay! I'm ahead of schedule!

Oh! I'm just swept away with excitement! (And yes, folks, that is the sort of terribly cliche sentence that is oh-so-typical in my NaNoWriMo novel.)

I actually managed to write about 1100 words more today than I needed to. Hurrah! And hooray! And general fantabulous celebratory...erm...actions!

Well, I'm really just pleased that I got caught up enough in the story that I didn't want to stop writing until I'd finished a scene. Hah! That's true authorship for ya, ain't it? Yeah.

It's good to be an author.

(And seriously--NO, I mean SERIOUSLY--I need to think of a blog topic that does not, in some way, involve NaNoWriMo. Maybe come December.)

Holy Eggs!

Wow. I completely forgot I took this picture, that is until I was searching through my image files just now looking for something to spice up my blog, and maybe provide a topic.

So. Yeah. Holy. Cow. Or, rather, holy egg. (That is, if you believe that an egg having two yolks makes it holy. Which, erm, isn't really consistent with any religion I know about, but then I could be ill-informed. Although if this egg was holy, I'm afraid it's long gone by now. And yes, it was delicious.)

Uhhhh... I'm so sorry. You see, I'm spending all of my creative juices (mmm...delicious creative juices) dreaming up unlikely plot elements for my novel. Like finding a box with a compass that's kind of filled in with blue wax. And a woman who appears dramatically riding a glowing bear.

Yes. My story has definitely taken some weird turns. And, like, unexpected ones. And holy heck, (that is, if you believe that 'heck' is holy, which, in my book, it most certainly is not), I haven't even gotten to where the original fairy tale begins. STILL. In fact, as I pointed out to my younger sibs this evening, I'm still roughly five to ten years before the fairy tale starts, depending on what age I decide everyone will be when the adventurous siblings head off into the woods and one gets turned into a deer.

Yup. That's what I said: a deer.

So, I'm afraid my poor little blog posts will continue to be dull and boring and...will have pictures of eggs with two yolks...maybe...until November has ended and I've participated in that giant December 1st "Thank Heaven it's OVER" party. Except, at the rate I'm going (glowing bears notwithstanding) it'll be January at LEAST before I finish the rough draft of this darn thing. Of, like, 2008. So there.

Only a little obsession

Heya, guys!

I just wanted to say, Hi! Here I am! And also, I'm alive!

I just keep having all my free time sucked away by trying to write many words in a novel. So...you may not see much of me. Or, you may see some of me, but it will likely be a me who is trying to escape from novel-writing.

Alas, the current me is tired and still has to email some pictures to herself so she can post them from work. And she also realizes that the last sentence didn't make any sense whatsoever.

Alas, again.

Um.

So, steak is pretty tasty. And water is nice to drink. And bed is calling.

Gooooood night.

Duh. Typical Me.

So the whole reason I turned on my computer about an hour ago was to Google how to clean a chenille throw. And then I thought: Well, as long as I'm online I might as well check my email. So I did. Which took a long time. Then I checked my blog, then I checked other people's blogs, then I tried to listen to a song excerpt from Borders, then I listened to Holst's The Planets for awhile, then I shut down my computer.

And remembered that I hadn't found out how to clean that chenille throw.

Darn me.

(It's apparently dry-clean only anyway. Guess the thing'll have to stay dirty for awhile longer. Ew.)

Still going and going and going

It's getting harder to write 1667 words every day. I guess that's why over at NaNoWriMo they suggest that you get a huge head start that first week in November. Which I didn't. Oops.

I'm still keeping current with my word count, but the time between word-count checks ("Okay--I'm at 13874... Now I'm at 13882. Woohoo! Progress, baby!") is getting shorter and shorter. Also, my plot is moving about in ways I didn't expect. Also, I am easily distracted by babies. Also, my characters are behaving differently than they did when I first introduced them. Also, I am very tired. Also, I don't think I like artichoke hearts.

So, as you can see, writing a novel is difficult.

However, tomorrow my page count should jump up to 54 or 55, which will make this project the one for which I've written the most (my previous attempt, written during an entire semester, came only to 51 pages) and I'm also finding that despite really really wanting to get through those 1667 words so I can go to sleep, I'm actually enjoying my novel. I like the way things are happening, and characters and places are getting described naturally as I go along. I think it's working, mostly, and that's rather surprising to me.

At my book club this past Tuesday, I found out that Shannon Hale (author of recent Newbery honor book Princess Academy) sets a goal of writing 1000 words every day. Hearing that, and knowing that right now, with a full-time job, I'm pulling off 1667 words a day, I thought to myself, "Hey. I could do that."

So, I decided to quit my job, drop all other plans for the future and write full time.

Hahaha! Ohh.... *wipes tears from her eyes* That was a good one. Yeaaah.

Sigh.

Either we are the most boring family ever, or babies are the most interesting things ever invented.

Today was my nephew's blessing day. He's now just over 2 months old and is doing an astonishingly good job of holding conversations with people (necessarily consisting almost entirely of the letter 'g' and assorted vowel sounds, and thus making words like: "ooh...gaaaeeeehhh....guruuruughh"), rolling over, sort-of-standing (assisted in the balance-bit by numerous adult helpers, but pretty much holding himself up), and just generally looking adorable.

Here--see for yourself!

So while my family did play the awesome game "Apples to Apples" for a bit, the majority of the evening (and the afternoon, and a darn good portion of the morning) we spent by simply looking at him, or watching others look at him, or thinking about looking at him except he was nursing at the time and that would have been weird.

It's crazy how fascinating a baby can be. When it's your kid sister's babe, especially. Or a friend's. Or whatever.

Or maybe my family is just boring. (But if we're boring for staring at babies all day, then I say 'boring' is SOOO the new 'exciting, 'interesting' and 'dare-devilish.' Well, maybe not 'dare-devilish.' But it's close.)

Ripping ABBA and The Redeemer and avoiding novel-writing

Hello, all.

I just wanted to tell you that you are all cool. And that sitting here on my bed typing in my blog in the half-dark (because it's cloudy today here in Utah) I kind of miss you all. Because you are cool. And because I currently feel...a little separated from you all. I guess.

Um.

And also, I'm currently transferring more of my (rather eclectic) CD collection onto my laptop so I can more easily listen to music while I type up nonsense for my NaNoWriMo novel. I've just finished ABBA and The Redeemer (an oratorio written by former Mormon Tabernacle organist and LDS composer extraordinare Robert Cundick) and now I'm moving on to the MoTab CD Consider the Lilies and then I'll do Elgar's Enigma Variations. (Mmm. Delicious Elgar... Oh. Er...wait...)

Novel-writing is actually going swimmingly so far, and I've surprised myself by being exactly on schedule. Apparently if you write 1667 words per day you'll just make the 50,000 word mark by the end of the month. So far, I've got 5412, which is just about right on for the first three days of the month. (Of course, I haven't written anything today, but I'm sure I'll get up where I should be. After all, it takes 3 days of doing something to form a habit, right? Right???)

Speaking of habits, I've also surprised myself recently for the last two months by getting up early enough in the morning to give myself roughly an hour of exercise time. (In case you were wondering, I DID exercise that day I slept in--I just exercised rather late in the day.) As a consequence of that (and other little changes like eating NO sugary stuff & consuming more veggies (veggies now quiver in fear at the sight of me, the great veggie predator)) I've now gone down one pant size (hooray!) and only have (mumble mumble) more to go until I'm...there. You know. THERE. Where the beguilingly beautiful women hang out. (I think it's some sort of nightclub, with a blue neon sign above the door that says "The Lovely Lounge," or maybe it's "The Lovely Lozenge." Yes, that's it. In fact, I'm quite sure of it.)

I guess I didn't really need to tell you all that, because it's not really all that important, (except that it's nice to snuggle into pants that aren't quite as large as they used to be, and it's nice to be using holes in my belt that have never been used before), but I thought that since I recently spent a post ranting about how miserably dumb I can be, I ought to post a minor accomplishment as well.

So, I guess I ought to get down to business & actually accomplish something today besides posting to my blog & ripping CDs and making Primary phone calls and reading a third of Princess Academy for the book-club meeting on Tuesday and...HOLY COW! Missing a very important message from Cathy!

Sorry folks--gotta go!

(P.S. It's a GOOD message, so no worries!)

***Edit: Okay! Just got off the phone with Cathy, and she authorized me to tell you that they have a new baby daughter who was born yesterday at about 3pm-ish! Her name is Gwyneth Schaller, although I forgot to check the spelling, and I also forgot to check & see if she has a middle name, so I'll have to adjust this info later. Also, you might be interested to know that she weighs 8lbs, 4oz and that she's 21 and 3/4 inches long. For more info, I'm sure you could call the Schallers sometime, and they likely wouldn't mind. Not even a bit.***

At last! It's time to procrastinate!

November 1st has arrived at last, and with it that feeling of fresh new challenges that every new first-of-the-month seems to convey. However, this month has an even fresher (and newer) challenge than usual. As you may have noticed, I've joined the ranks of those attempting to write an entire novel (or at least 50,000 words) within the 30 days of the month of November. (NaNoWriMos, we like to call ourselves, and for more info about our worthy endeavor, you can check out www.nanowrimo.org.)

So at last I have the chance to get started on that novel that's been percolating around my head for roughly the past, oh, week or so... And what do I do, I pray you, good readers? Naturally I sit and blog about writing a novel, without actually getting started.

Ah. The joys of procrastination. Especially when one has a blog. 'Tis joyful indeed.

(But do wish me luck. My sister helped me figure out that one must write about 6 pages of double-spaced 12-point text in order to reach the 50,000 word goal in 30 days. I have high hopes of being certifiably insane by the end of this month. Huzzah! Oh, and for those of you interested in tracking my progress, my NaNoWriMo username is lizardbreathmcgee (in case you didn't catch that in the comment on my previous post). I'll keep y'all updated anyway.)

Of all the dumb things to do...

***Hey, guys! I actually wrote this early early this morning, but for some reason blogger wouldn't let me upload the post. So I'm uploading it now. Hope it doesn't cause too much confusion!***

Today has been a stupid day. A very, very stupid day.

It all started with the fact that I (oh, so foolishly) stayed up until about 2am Thursday night (or rather Friday morning) because I knew I wouldn't have to work today. (Er, or I guess technically 'yesterday,' because now it's early Saturday morning.)

Anyway.

So, I slept in late (naturally) when I had intended to be up & about by 7am. (Oh, foolish, foolish me.) After kicking myself angrily out of bed at approximately 10:30am (ICK) I managed to mess around doing pretty much nothing for nearly an hour, after which I (finally) exercised & (at last) ate breakfast (which meal was consumed at about 12:30pm).

So, as you can see, I was off. Very much off today.

I meandered back into my room to kill time on the internet, maybe check a blog or two along with my email, and I got sucked into... Huh. I can't even remember now what I got sucked into, so I guess it doesn't really matter.

Then I realized that my back was stiff from the awkward way I'd been sitting with my laptop, so I laid down. On my bed. And also it was cold, so I kind of pulled my blanket up, and then... I woke up at 4pm to a phonecall from my boss asking if I could come in on Monday which, of course, I said 'yes' to, and then, being unspeakably disheartened that I couldn't have a 4-day weekend after all, I plummeted miserably back into the dark depths of unconciousness.

One of the appealing things about sleeping is that you forget for a time that you're you. I mean, sometimes I dream as if I were myself, but more often I take on some kind of different personna. I jump in & out of the heads of my dream 'characters' (I don't know what else to call them) so I could 'be' a guy or a girl or a kid or an alien, or just a 3rd party observer hovering somewhere near the action. Today when I dreamed, I was both myself and my sister and then later I was some sort of space-adventurer man (also sometimes a woman) who was concerned about the air being depleted from his/her spaceship. (I have no clue why gender seems to be such a fluid thing in these dreams.)

Coming to after dreaming like that can be a jarring experience; your contact with the real world begins again with the realization that you're really you, and that the world you're waking into is what reality really is, and that the places and events and people you've recently been experiencing are NOT real, however tangible they may have felt up until the point you opened your eyes.

And it was dark. And you knew that it couldn't possibly be any earlier in the day than 7:30, which is an unbelievably atrocious hour to wake up from a nap, and then you fumbled fearfully for your glasses after refusing to even try to find out what time it is because you knew you'd hate yourself when you did and OH...............................

It's 8:36.

And you have literally slept the entire day away.

Yes, that day: the day you had HUGE plans for, the day you were going to use to get everything done, the day you were going to get on the ball and finally take some steps to assure that you didn't spend the next 20 years of your life living as an appendage to your parents. That day.

Once, before my mission, I went through a period of time that was...just about the darkest time I've experienced. I was completely withdrawn from people; I failed classes, slept through church, never paid my rent on time, and was, in short, a miserable hulk of a human being. I couldn't face anything--I couldn't even face being myself anymore, so I slept. Sleep was a greater escape than even books could be, and I used that escape more and more as I became more and more disgusted with myself and more and more in despair of ever being able to break free of the downward cycle I was in. I've come to realize since then that this period marked an episode of some serious depression (although never fear--fortunately, I never really thought of suicide as any sort of option).

I think one of the reasons why I hate days like today is that I'm afraid it's a return to that dark period. I'm afraid I'm on the verge of swinging back down into depression. It's a place I haven't been, at least for any lengthy amount of time, since then, thank goodness, and I've always been afraid that somewhere in my brain is some balance that, if tipped the right way, could send me swirling downwards into that same place. Sleeping in excessive amounts (like I did today) seems to me to be a tip-off. I'm not sure if I get depressed because I have the unenviable capability of sleeping circles around everybody else, or if I sleep so long because I can't stand being around myself anymore, and my self-disgust is what leads to depression.

Uch. Guys, I'm so sorry this topic is heavier than usual. Please don't be afraid for me. I learned many, many things on my mission: one was the importance of not letting the past prevent you from taking action in the present, and another was to keep moving and keep working and keep getting up every morning and keep going out and doing things. One other advantage I have now is that I work full-time. While I sometimes took the unfortunate view that I didn't have to go to class and could therefore sleep through it, doing the same thing with a full-time job has never been an option. So. I'm not going to start sleeping through every day, lose my job, have my parents shaking their heads in flabbergasted despair, etc., etc.

I also don't live with someone who hates me, which, unfortunately, was also part of that really, really unpleasant time. Part of the reason I slept so much then was also to avoid her. And, while I may have the occasional spat with a family member, I'm really reasonably certain that they actually do love me.

In short, the danger I'm in now is just wasting time that I have available and feeling really bad about myself because of it. And the solution? I guess it comes back to those same mission lessons: repent of your mistakes and then let them go, and BLAST it all, GET OUT OF BED ON TIME! (Which also means that I probably ought to try to sleep soon so I can be up by 8am. Here's hoping!)

***(Edit: I actually got up about 8:30, which isn't bad considering I didn't go to sleep until after 3am this morning. I think I'm mostly normalized now. In more ways than one.)***

It's snowing pizzas!

For those of you who like the thought of whole wheat anything, and for those of you who have wondered all your lives what exactly an uncooked whole wheat pizza with mozzerella, Canadian bacon, tomatoes and assorted bell peppers (not to mention a sprinkling of Parmesan cheese) would look like, I have graciously uploaded the photo to the left. Mmm.

For those of you who have wondered what exactly a cooked version of the same pizza would look like, gaze on this little beaut:















Okay--so the lighting's weird. Okay, so the peppers are all kind of scattered haphazardly and okay, so not everyone likes Parmesan cheese.

But I will persist in believing that my pizza was delicious.


Oh, and while I'm on the subject, isn't October just a little bit early for snow? I mean, I thought El Nino was supposed to bring us a mild winter this time around, so how can it have snowed here already??? For evidence, brace yourself for yet another picture:

(My front lawn this early evening)

And this one (my strangely elongated hand holding a fistful of (very cold) snow...in, like, freaking OCTOBER):

Weeeelll, I guess that's enough pictures for today. I could show you a closeup of those gorgeous tomatoes on the pizza, and I could show you a picture of my tennis shoe (which I am now wearing instead of the flip-flops) crunching down the powdery white stuff, but I won't. Not unless you beg. Really hard.

Why Whole Wheat Flour is Super-Oopity-Duper

Ahem.

So when I say I'm going to post on my blog sometime later that day, what I really mean is that if I were a less flawed version of a human being, I would post later that day in accordance with my less-flawed and more-perfecto way of doing things. I would not delay something I said I would do; I would not gaze at my lappy with apathy and turn (yet again) to flipping the channels on the tv set, watching a steady stream of mundanity flow by.

I would post, by gum.

Alas. I am not as perfecto as I would wish.

So, in accordance with my rather more-flawed way of doing things, I am posting about whole wheat flour today, dutifully (nay--blissfully) ignoring the promise I made to talk about it, oh, um, three or so days ago.

...

...

...

So, that whole wheat flour, huh? Pretty nifty stuff!

Actually, I'm really rather excited about whole wheat flour at the moment. You see, I've sworn off (at least for the forseeable future) refined white flour & all the attendant easy-digestibleness thereof. So whole wheat flour has become my semi-staple, my way of eating lovely bready foods like...bread...and........dough. Actually, the only thing I've made so far with said whole wheat (hereafter referred to as "ww") flour is some (or is it 'was some') ww pizza dough, to which I added toppings like fistfuls of mozzerella, sliced tomatoes and (mmm) triangles of Canadian bacon. Yummy! (Is it just me, or is the word 'yummy' a trifle too...perky?)

I hope to soon go on (ooo...a split infinitive) to ww bread (in loaf format) and ww rolls, soon to be followed by ww chocolate chip cookies (sweetened with Splenda) and ww brownies and other delectable artificially sweetened bits of not-so-decadent-decadence.

And perhaps, perhaps in a very long while, I'll feel prepared to make and bake and eat a lovely, dark, whole wheat chocolate cake, that will be mine...all my own...in memory of that cake I never had.

Mmmmmmmmmm. How I long for that delicious whole wheat chocolate cake. And I won't share. No, not one bit.

Well, maybe just a little.

Argh! I will post!

For those of you who believed I was dead, fear not. I am yet alive.

In fact, I will do my best to post a little something this evening...Hm... I think it will be about whole wheat flour & all the joys associated with it.

Yes. Mmm...

So, like, later, yo.

Oh. Ouch.

I got hit really hard today. I mean really hard. Like a guy with brass knuckles kind of hard. My day had been...less than stellar already & I was feeling, erm...disappointed in myself (yet again) and I came home & checked out my mail, and lo & behold I got a bill for $2400. Yep.

Apparently a surgery bill I thought had been covered by insurance really wasn't, and now I have to dish out a little over $2000. (The insurance company was kind enough to furnish roughly $370.)

I seriously went through the stages of grief, as if that big ol' chunk of cash was some beloved relative who was quitting this sphere forever and whom I would never see again until the blessed eternal realm. I was shocked; I denied it, tried to prove the bill wrong; I realized it was really real and sat on my bed & bawled. I think I was angry in there too somewhere ($370??? COME ON!!!!) but I can't remember exactly when it hit.

Actually, I'm now a little ashamed about the way I reacted. I mean I sobbed. I haven't sobbed in a long, long, LONG time, and there I was, unable to draw in a single breath without it breaking up like a teenage rock band after high school. And really, when it comes down to it, it's only $2000. I can cover that. Granted, my savings account will take a serious blow; granted, I'll have to postpone some things that I wanted to do NOW because I simply don't have the cash I thought I did; granted, my plans are utterly and completely screwed up now...(Oh! THERE's that anger!) But I am glad that at least it wasn't some astronomical amount that I didn't have. I'm glad that I won't need to be like Fred Vincy in Middlemarch and foist out my debts on other people. At least my parents won't have to pay this. At least I won't be more of a burden to them than I already am. (Darn [mumble-mumble]-year-old living with her parents still...)

And, when this bill is paid, then I'll be square. I'll be completely free of debt & I'll feel all nice & liberated (even though I already felt liberated; I just didn't know I wasn't liberated at the time).

So, to all of you who thought that I was going to move on soon? Oh, no. I ain't. Not now. Nohow. No-can-do.

Blech. Sorry. That's even too bitter for me to swallow at the moment.

Does this hymn make me look hot?

Just as I was wrapping up my singing this evening for the folks at that one retirment home, (you know--the one where I thought I saw Donny Osmond), some folks from the next group arrived, just a bit early. In fact, I was just starting the introductory measures of "Be Still My Soul" when about 5 of them walked in and surreptitiously took seats in the back of the room to listen to my warbling.

While I was a little distracted (I always find it easier to just sing to the old folks rather than younger people) I still felt like the last hymn went off pretty well, which was fortunate since my voice, by that point in the evening, was pretty much shot.

I finished singing, gathered my various books from the piano & floor & started to make my way down the aisle to shake hands with the afore-mentioned (and very, very nice) old folks and thank them for taking the time to come & listen to my poor renditions of old familiar hymns. As the five members of the second group came forward to claim the piano, several of the people in the group (all males, I noted) nodded at, smiled or complimented me on my singing. One of the guys even grinned at me & said, "Great job!" (And he weren't bad lookin' neither.)

So, I have to inquire: does singing hymns make you seem hot? Does singing hymns well to old folks make you appealing to the opposite gender? Did those smiles and nods and little teeny itsy bitsy compliments mean that these young men somehow found me attractive???

Well, no.

Does it mean it gave me something to write about on my blog this evening? (And a super-duper post title?)

Heck, yes.

Blah.

No really, I mean it. Just: blah.

I must apologize to you all, because frankly, that funk that I mentioned earlier has come back. With a vengeance. And it's been hovering incessantly for the past week. Obviously impeding my ability to write complete sentences. Yerg.

And, to top it off, Cathy & Ed & Morgan have moved, darn it. And I hate goodbye-ing. You always feel like you should be saying something profound that you all will be able to treasure in your hearts for years to come, but what you actually end up doing is standing (or sitting) around stupidly for a couple of hours, helplessly trying to think of something wonderful & comforting & warming to say & failing utterly, and then leaving, only half-convinced that you're worth much of anything as a friend. Ugh.

So, Cathy, when you get a chance to peruse this blog again, I apologize. Mostly for being a little bit dumb & a lot self-centered &...not able to do the whole goodbye thing very well. Hwaet.

(Leave it to me to use an old Anglo-Saxon word improperly. It was just the first thing that came to mind, okay? Ptooey.)

Okay. So, I guess that's it. I'm just blue & have been for a while...I'm sure I'll snap out of it soon. Give me a good spiritual experience or 5 minutes doing something I really believe to be productive & I'll be back to me old chipper self. So I will. And I will be jocular & verbose instead of the taciturn wretch I've been for the past week. Yeppers. And I won't cry over accidentally dousing my dad with cold water. And I'll get out of bed ontime. And also there will be a little bluebird singing merrily on my right shoulder. And if it...does its business once in awhile on my tshirt, I'll only have myself to blame. My very, very happy self. Ick.

So if you ever start packing...

Okay--so my blue funk is gone at the moment, mostly because I'm just so darn tickled at a dream I had last night (or more accurately this morning).

Sometimes I have dreams that I'm moving; these dreams usually involve some sort of process of packing up all of my belongings & trying to get them over to some other place. (Which I guess is the essence of moving. Duh.)

Anyway--while these dreams obviously have distinct differences from each other, (like the one this morning had me moving from one room in a house into another room in the same house--the new room had a bathroom inside the bedroom & two bathtubs--I even asked one of my roommates why on earth they put two bathtubs in the same room...but anyway--), they always seem to have a single thing in common.

I pack up what I believe is all my stuff, and then I suddenly realize that--HOLY COW!--I've forgotten to pack up the stuff in my closet & all the stuff in my drawers, so I still have TONS of things to go through & try to get in boxes. (Usually this is also accompanied by a feeling of urgency, like I have to be out of the room in 10 minutes or something.)

Delightfully, the dream this morning contained the same familiar scenario. I still had all my clothing (and board games--who would dream about board games???) hanging up in the closet, and I noticed several boxes kind of lying around in a tumbled heap that I hadn't sorted through yet.

I woke up this morning & just had to laugh at myself, mostly because it's really kind of a silly thing to dream about.

However, I still haven't been able to figure out exactly what this dream means. Here's one theory though: I want to move on in my life, but I still have things that are holding me back. I want to ignore these things, but heck--I can't move on without my board games, can I??? So, I still have things to do before I can make a clean transition.

Hey! That actually doesn't sound so bad. Maybe the important thing about dream interpretation is not that you figure out exactly what your silly brain was trying to process, but that you discover something important about yourself that you need to address, whether it was what your subconscious was trying to tell you or not.

So, if you'll excuse me, I have a few boxes to pack up.

And also, here's a weird picture I made out of a closeup of a peach blossom (ooooh...neon....). Seemed kinda dream-like, so I thought I'd include it. Enjoy!