wookin' pa nub

Wookin' pa nub in awda wong paces...

And it really has been all the wrong places. But I've decided that I've had enough of the wrong sorts of love. Lately, I've been putting up profiles on all the dating sites, and I've been actually looking at other peoples', really looking for someone I could be happy with. I mean, the chances of finding David Tennant or Alexander Skarsgard there are pretty miniscule, but it's an ideal I can aim for. Right along side all the fictional men that I adore. And the knowledge that's been repeatedly smashed over my head that no real guy can live up to fictional ideals, and the slow acceptance of this fact. I know I can't wait for an actor for another country to randomly find me, and even though I want to, I don't want to die lonely and childless because I spent my whole life waiting. How sucky would that be?

So I'm opening up that door again. I'm looking at guys as if I'd like to date them, and I'm allowing myself to hope that I can find someone I like who likes me, who I could see myself breeding with, and who would give me strong babies.

And I'm documenting it all on my blog for the whole world to see. Because I'm cool like that.

letters to the aether

Dear body,

We've got a long way to go together. It'd be nice if we could agree on things sometimes-- like digestion. And having a functioning reproductive system. And keeping a decent dopamine balance. You know, just to make the years skate along a little easier. You're not getting out of this without me, and I'm not ready to go for another century, at least. I mean, with medical science what it is / what it looks like it's going to be, we could be around for ages. Especially if those Futurists are right and the Singularity is only twenty years away. Don't worry; in a post-human world, I don't have much interest in giving up a physical form. i'll just decorate the crap out of you. If I get you some iridiphores and chlorophyll, will you behave? How about a prehensile tail? Think how convenient that'd be.

Love,

Me

things you should know if we ever get married for your greencard 2

I write because I have stories to tell, and because I'm a picky reader and no one is writing the stories I want to read. I write for myself, for the voices in my head that have as much right to live as real people, and because if I don't write, they torment me and it starts feeling like schizophrenia.

I want to publish because I want to shop at Anthropologie and Pottery Barn and Williams Sonoma and Urban Outfitters.

Yeah, I'm totally planning to be that woman. I already am, I just can't afford it.

::sigh::

the list: basic updates

have you forgotten what I Listed for this Project? I certianly did, so here's a refresher, now with 30% more notes!

Writing
1. Write a novel a year (2.75 over the course of this experiment).

This one isn't so easy as I thought it should be. I've been working on two novels, but in a sporadic and not terribly consistent way that sort of makes me feel bad about my ability to be a full-time writer, but I've been accepted for writing school, and that will no doubt force me to do better.

2. Publish at least one short story a month.

I have to first figure out how to even WRITE one whole short story a month. I think it was a quirk of where I was working and the conditions there-of, because it's been much harder since I switched jobs, even when I wasn't working at all.

3. Get into a writing program for grad school, and excel at both writing and making the connections I’ll need for the rest of my life.

This one is accomplished, at least in part. I've been accepted to Seton Hill, slated to start attendance next fall. I just have to get my financial aid worked out. Once I'm there, I think the rest will be easier. I hope.

4. Go to more conferences then just ICFA by picking up one or two conferences a year and becoming a regular at the ones I like.

The lack of funding has damaged this one, but I found a bunch of memberships I can get, alot of which come with conferences.

5. Write a book about the experience of this experiment.

Not an issue yet.

6. Write at least one academic book to high standards and good reviews.

These plans have fallen by the wayside, but haven't been dropped yet.

7. Figure out how / where to publish essays and start doing so, one per quarter at least.

These went with them. Both are dragging behind this wagon, but aren't dead yet.

8. Get all the way through one NaNoWriMo.

It's coming up!

9. Win an award (or at least a nomination) for something I write.

Not an issue yet.

10. Start writing poetry again and study forms, writing at least three of each form that I wouldn’t be embarrassed to read in public.

I've started thinking in pentameter again. I need to read up on forms so I can get them to work in my brain, but I can totally do this between other projects.

11. Write a movie and try to sell it.

Wouldn't that be awesome?

12. Write at least one complete short story a week, and have it typed and sent out before the end of two weeks.

Hm. See above at 'publish one a month'.


Living
13. Eat seasonally for a full year, making at least three home-cooked meals a week, and write a book detailing what I’ve learned and what I experienced.

This one is coming along pretty well! The writing-up, not so much, but I haven't gone unseasonal in months, and I'm finding all kinds of new things to try.

14. Start making my own clothes.

Still in the works.

15. Figure out inventive and stylish alternatives to bras.

I keep coming back to this one, but I haven't made any test-runs yet.

16. Revamp the fish tank, replant it, and get as many natural water-chemistry-balancers as possible, as well as algae-eating fish and other diversities of life.

Now would be a good time for this, as the biggest fish (the last remainder of the Old Tank) just died this week, and there's now space for four-ish new baby fish. I'll see if I can work it into the budget.

17. Become more informed on the politics that apply to me—the environment, paganism, women’s rights, healthcare, gay rights, etc.

Still working on this one. It's just that I get so pissed off at how closed-minded everyone can be, and their closed-monded-ness gets in the way of me figuring out exactly what is going on and what it means to me. So I have to pace myself. Alot.

18. See about starting a community gardens project with City Hall—is it even feasible? Get the info together to make a proper report to whoever it should go to.

This one was actually handled entirely indipendently from me, and I've signed up to be one of the first gardeners. It should be opening up soonish.

19. Downsize my belongings to de-clutter my space, and give away, upcycle, freecycle or sell on ebay anything I don’t need.

I'm switching rooms in a few weeks, and that should make it easier, plus we had a huge garage sale a few months ago, and I got rid of alot of random junk that had been piling up. I'm working on not feeling regretful when I get rid of things, and convincing myself that I don't really need things that I've kept around for no reason.

20. Track and budget my money better so I can replenish savings, afford trips, and pay off my debt (and this includes knowing bank totals, not splurging, and getting to the bank on time so things don’t bounce).

I don't want to jinx it, but so far, so good. I've got a new debt in the old bank I now have to pay off, but I'm contacting all my debtors and setting up payment plans, and I'm using my card as little as possible, and I'm keeping track of what I spend better. It's a relief, really.

21. Find out what goes into planning a CSA program, and see if I can do it.

I was actually part of a CSA for a while, and it was awesome. I think I might renew it again later, (now that they've been paid off), but downsize so that I get the chance to actually use everything. There was alot of waste, and it didn't always seem to be worth what we were paying. Renewal depends on whether we can manage to get to the farmer's market each week or not.

22. Do something new to green my life once every two months.

Currently, I'm test-running making a garden enzyme that's supposed to also improve air quality while it's making.

23. Keep a calendar up to date with deadlines, accomplishments, failures, holidays, notes, full moons, birthdays and anniversaries, schedules, etc for the length of this exercize.

This is much easier since I discovered The Disorganized Writer's Planner.

24. Be a better pagan—celebrate the holidays, keep track of moons and their names, keep track of the months, take up divination again, meditate more, and keep the altar up and seasonal.

I did remake the altar, and then it promptly got eaten by the mess in my room, and it'll likely wait until I switched rooms to get made again. I've been trying to observe the holidays more, and I've gotten a candle lit and cards read, at least, on three in a row.

25. Find three things to be grateful for every day and write them down.

I've been doing this over on the HANGProud blog I have.

26. Plant, grow and actually maintain a proper kitchen garden and get a real harvest out of it.

I haven't yet been able to make a meal, but I had a very small harvest a few weeks ago, and there are okra waiting for me now.

27. Find ways to power through my own procrastination and get more productive and motivated.

Like the Planner! And the tea helps, but giving me much more energy.

28. Organize all the stuff I never scrapbooked into boxes by year, and throw away or upcycle anything I can’t remember the significance of.

Doing better on this one. I've got eight years out of fourteen boxed, though I do keep finding things I didn't know I still had, and that complicates it some.

29. Free up at least one bookshelf for other storage needs / pare down the books to those that really matter and send the rest to Book Crossing.

This is a hard one. I gave a bunch to GoodWill, though, so it's a start.

30. Avoid buying what I can make myself—and actually make it.

Simpler now that I'm broke, but I still haven't made much.

31. Finish at least one unfinished project a month before starting another.

Totoally forgot about this one!

32. Learn a new crochet stitch a month, and use it in something practical and easily-finished.

And this one.

33. Make herb jellies in the spring, salsas and sauces in the summer, jam and preserves in the fall, and jar them all up for the winter, trying out two new recipes per season.

Too poor this year to get spring and summer, but I'm aiming for fall this year, if I can afford it.

34. Use only reusable shopping bags or paper.

Doing pretty good on this one, especially since I started just putting little balled-up bags in my purse.

35. Organize all my things so that everything has a place, and don’t get something new if there’s nowhere to put it.

Working on it!

36. Make my own frozen meals.

We need a bigger freezer.

37. Get my holiday gift-shopping / making done before December at least once.

Better get on this one soon...

38. Build self-watering containers to get the food-veg through the summer.

This summer, it's pretty unneccessary with all the rain; I'll see about next summer.

39. Resubscribe to all my magazines and get back on top of all the news and info.

Working on it!

40. Have the next 101 list ready in time to start Round Two immediately.

Not an issue yet.

41. Take up embroidery and make something new and original each month.

I really like embroidery. I made a bunch for Aveomas, and now I need to get back in the swing of it so I can sell some.

42. Plant two trees for each Christmas, and for each of my orchard trees I manage to kill.

I actually did plant a bunch of trees this spring, but most of them never came up. I'll have to get trees that are already living I guess.

43. Make sugar cookies for every holiday to justify the cookie cutter addiction.

Working on it!

44. Develop all the old disposable cameras.

I totally keep forgetting this one.


Working
45. Keep my Etsy shop full and with a good selection, and start selling handmade gifts and cosmetics regularly.

Wayside.

46. Be my own boss.

Working on it.

47. Get traffic / readers to my blogs to justify writing books about what’s detailed in them.

This one's actually coming together on it's own. Thanks, guys!

48. Do better and more consistently as an Avon Rep and make it a major source of income.

Now that I'm back on track, I'm totally going to rock this one.

49. Go to at least one craft fair as a seller.

Wayside.

50. Join at least one professional association.

This one is getting done. I've joined Starfleet (A fan-run academic and service club), and this week I'll be joining STDelta Alumns and Phi Theta Kappa Alumns.

51. Get things done before due dates.

Doing better all the time.

52. Budget my time better so I can accomplish more.

Yay organization!


Fun
53. Learn to juggle / do poi / contact juggle / use the staff for a whole routine, for the purpose of increasing coordination and balance.

Wayside for the moment.

54. Fold 1000 paper cranes and write a wish on each one.

Wayside.

55. Visit Vancouver.

Forgot about this one!

56. Visit London again.

Hmm... Need more monies.

57. Visit Scotland again, and see where I used to live and where we never got to when we were there.

Monies.

58. Visit Morocco and shop in the markets.

Monies.

59. Visit Sweden.

I want to go to school there.

60. Visit Japan again, and tour the mainland before visiting the islands.

Monies.

61. Get new tattoos, the first before ICFA 2009.

Done! I've got two new ones, days before ICFA, and I'm working on many more.

62. Become a rennfaire regular.

Missed this year because of unemployment, but with May joining one for real, I'll have to go when she's on tour.

63. Write a formal bucket list and update it every year on my birthday.

Damnit. Forgot this one.

64. Make a real effort on the webcomics and the blogs—at least once a week on each, gather attention, make banners, comment on other things, link all over.

Blogs are much better off, but the comics are all Waysided.

65. Read at least one book a month that I already own and haven’t read, or get rid of it.

I'm trying to read 100 in a year, so it's actually working out to quite a bit more than one a month.

66. Come up with something to do in the seven extra days I earn each time I try a new food.

Forgot about this one!

67. Be more artistically creative once a month—try something new and time consuming that I’ve been putting off.

Not yet!

68. Own one piece of hot new cutting edge tech when it’s new.

Monies, but I desperately want that new microPC from Sony...

69. Make an origami creation story set.

Forgot!

70. Get better at math—find a text book and work my way through it until I can do all the problems correctly.

Not yet.

71. Be able to carry on a conversation in Swedish and make sense.

I'm back to learning, and it's making more sense to me this time.

72. Learn to play at least one ideal song for all the flutes I have.

And the two new learner's recorders...

73. Attend at least one special class on food—the icecream class at the University of Wisconsin or the Artisan Bread class in San Francisco, or something like them.

Working on it! If I have to pass up on grad school, I'm all over this mess.

74. Try my hand at all the main categories of home brewing: beer, meade, cider, wine and kombu.

Not yet!

75. Cook outside more than twice in the spring and fall.

We tottally did this spring, and we're now waiting for the bugs to die off so we can again this fall.

76. Go swimming more than twice in a year.

Been to the beach three times, but haven't gotten to the pool.

77. Learn retail-useful phrases in all the major languages we get, as well as sign language, and keep it fresh and usable in my mind.

Forgot!

78. Learn to play at least one song on the fiddle.

D just got a cello, and that makes me want to learn fiddle again, so I'm going to start saving.

79. Build a really neat website and keep it up to date and on track.

Have to get a new one, now, but I have Ideas.

80. Make my own icecream with my own hand-crank icecream maker in fun and unusual flavors like thai tea, rose-ginger, and candied violet.

We actually did make icecream this year, but not the hand-crank kind-- I did find out that they're not that much at Target, though, so maybe I can get one, or, better yet, come across one at betty this fall.



Interacting
81. Pay more attention to Ninja and be a better friend to my friends.

Check, I think.

82. Find love.

Part of the motivation for the room-switch. I need a door if I'm to be romancing.

83. Get more involved in the local and online pagan communities, and celebrate at least three holidays a year in a group.

Hm. Wayside.

84. Write to friends and family more—at least every other month.

Wayside. Bad Sami.

85. Remember birthdays and anniversaries.

Facebook helps alot with this one.

86. Visit mom and dad ON one actual major holiday.

Not yet!

87. Think before I speak.

Ooh, boy, and I working on that.

88. Write more thank you notes, even if I’m just thinking people for being themselves.

Just remembered this one, like, yesterday. Still haven't done it yet.

89. Give more gifts than I receive.

Good one. Forgot about it.

90. Give no less than 5% of each paycheck to a cause or a charity I believe in.

As soon as I get all my bills up to date and my finances balanced, I'm all over this one.

91. Get a mah-jong set and learn to play with three other people so we can have games.
Not yet!



Health
92. Lose 30 lbs at 1-2 lbs a week, then level off successfully and keep it off.

Started to, before, then lost my job and got far again. Now I'm working on whittling my ass back down to 120.

93. Pay more attention to how I look and figure out useful and doable improvements, one a month, that I can stick with.

Forgot about this one, too, but it's a good one that I think I've been doing anyway.

94. Take classes in yoga / bellydance / tai chi / something out of the norm to make exercise fun and to force me to do it.

haven't found a class I can bike to at a reasonable time and price yet. Damn small town.

95. Look better and feel better at 30 than I did at 20.

Trying!

96. Keep up up date on my henna—at least once a month—for the whole length of this exercise.

Wow, already lost this one ages ago. But tomorrow I'm starting over.

97. Exfoliate and lotion all my skin at every shower so I’m never itchy and flaky and ashy.

Did for a long time, then it Waysided, and now I'm back on the wagon.

98. Wake up every day when the alarm goes off, and take no more than one nap if it’s needed.

Working on this one now, too.

99. Eat only high-quality chocolate once the holiday candy is gone.

Totally didn't keep up with this one, but working at Kilwins has given me access to handmade fudge, and that's the main source of chocolate now.

100. Get healthcare insurance of some sort and get all these itchy moles checked out and removed if they need it.

Not yet! It'd be awesome if I could get into one of these writing guilds and get real insurance, though.

101. Rebuild my makeup collection, and use it at least half the week.

Easy peasy since I started selling Avon.

fat girl goes slim: progress!

I'm below 155! Our scale is not terribly accurate, and when I'm trying to read those little lines from all the way up by my head where my eyes are, they all sort of blur together, but it's most def below the 155 mark, and closer to the 150. Which is awesome. I don't know how much longer this will hold out, but I've basically just been eating more mindfully so that I generally eat less, even if I'm still not able to afford to eat better, I've upped my oolong tea intake, which kick starts my motabolism back to where it used to be when I was a tea fiend rather than just a tea addict, and I've started moving more when I'd usually just sit still-- like when I'm at work and I'm waiting for a customer, any customer, and I'd normally just be leaning against the counter, I try my best to stand upright, I tighten up my abs, I swing my arms back and forth, I bend and un bend my knees like little bitty shimmies. It ptobably makes me look impatient or wired, but it keeps me out of the no-customer malaise, and it burns off a little more than I burned before. Oh, and I tightened up my bike so that it's not so easy to coast and it's a little harder to pedal, which keeps me actively involved in getting to work, rather than just coasting around corners the whole way.

I'm also just trying generally to take more care of myself. I cleaned up my room for the first time in ages yesterday, I've been using my day and night face creams, washing my face more, brushing my hair more, and I started wearing makeup again, even though there's no one who cares whether I do or not (which was my excuse for not wearing it before). Tomorrow, I'm going to do my hair for the first time in about four months, and when the next Avon order goes in, I'm getting a revitalizing hair mask. I'm paying more attention to when I got to bed, and trying to get up at a decent and consistent time in the morning. I've been researching suppliments that help with moods, with balancing hormones, with managing acidity imbalances, and as soon as I have money (ha!), I'll be adding a few to my diet here and there.

I figure, if I take care of myself better overall, maybe some of the weight gain will reverse just because it was a dumpiness of character that caused it. Hey, it couldn't hurt.

things you should know if we ever get married for your greencard

I've been reading Dooce alot lately, and it makes me want to be more open, and to Air some Neuroses and Strange Facts. So that's what I'm doing.

1. I consider myself to be actively exogamous.

I want to breed with someone from another country, someone outside the genepool of the cultures / communities I was raised in. I want them to be taller, healthier, stronger and smarter than I am, and especially than the average person I meet is-- maybe it's just that I work foodtail in a tourist town and people think it's okay to be horrible to someone you're never going to see again, but I don't want my kids to not know what coconut is, or to think that strawberry ice cream has to be neon pink, or to scream and scream and scream because they're too dumb to know how to do anything else. Currently, I'm all about Swedes and Scots, with the added benefit of a Swede being that I could possibly get to live in Sweden, which is quickly starting to sound like some sort of promised land. I also have an enternal attracktion for Asians with English accents, and Native Americans who have that on-the-res way of speaking. That last one might be Racial Guilt, but they're still hot.

2. There is a mole on my ankle that I catch every time I shave, and I use it as an excuse to not shave.

I really don't like shaving, though I do like hairlessness, and don't like the feeling of wind through my leg hair. I keep telling myself that when I get my second book published (the first one will pay off debts), I'm going to use the advance to get my whole body lazered. Anywhere there's hair I don't want, which is more and more frequent as my hormonal imbalance gets worse, I'm going to get it zapped. But until then, I'm stuck with shaving alone (Nair doesn't work and makes me break out, Smooth Away only works on the straight parts of my legs, I can't figure out threading, and waxing hurts too much), and I always hit that mole and get blood all down my foot. I'm pretty sure it jumps out at me. I'm also pretty sure that more than half of it's mass now is scar tissue, since I've been shaving and cutting it for... sixteen years. God, as long as some of the kids I work with have been alive.

3. I have a latex allergy, and it makes things awkward.

Most obviously, and probably the first thing that came to mind when I said 'latex' and 'awkward', there's the sex issue. Uncomfortable doesn't begin to explain it, and it was many a year before I figured out why it was so awful sometimes. And suck it, whoever decided that non-latex alternatives have to be so damned expensive. But less obviously, there's all the other little things that latex is in, like, say, underwear. Sometimes, in the summer, especially, when my skin is extra tender and all my pores are open, I'm alergic to my underwear and my bra, and wearing clothes is a horrible punishment that I've sort of gotten used to but still don't like. This is probably why I spent big chunks of my childhood in the smallest amount of clothes I could manage, and why I'd cry until my mom cut the elastic out of all my dresses. And other things: I can't wear the gloves at work, so I have to wash my hands at OCD levels, which damages my skin in other ways; If I leave even a covered hairtie on my wrist for more than a day or so, I break out and itch so bad I can't think; band aids eat away at my skin and are used only when the bleeding won't stop; Ace Bandages don't help at all, and give me exema on top of sprained limbs.

4. I'm half-convinced that the world is going to end while I'm here to witness it.

The other half is convinced that I'll live through it and I'd better have some survival skills so I don't die of my own stupidity after surviving the apocalypse. Because how lame would that be? I've got mental lists of everything I should stockpile, if only I had the money for it (I want to rent a storage unit and fill it up with camp cots, army rations, chemical heating pads, water, shampoo, feminine products, soap, toothpaste, canned goods, waterproof matches and so on). And the result is that I've been learning basic cultural things that we've almost lost, things that actually aren't that bad an idea for people to preserve: things like making jam, saving seeds and sustainable gardening, generating power off the grid, crocheting and weaving (and I'm trying to learn how to spin yarn), papermaking, sewing, canning, wild plant identification, and things like that. I'm comforted by the fact that I watch all the post-apocalyptic movies and have frameworks to work around in alot of circumstances, and that I've watched enough Discovery Channel to have a basic to fair understanding of how to canabalize tech to make anything I need made.

5. I'm addicted to roses.

I finally got one to grow, and better yet, to produce flowers, and now I want a dozen more plants, a hundred more. I want a whole rose garden, and a retirement spent breeding new rose varieties that I can name after science fictional women (Aryn Sun would be a kick ass rose, hardy and adaptable, while Chiana would be nearly colorless, but almost impossible to kill and Sam Carter would be unassuming, a blonde-yellow, and very dedicated to being a rose (and being secretly dangerous wouldn't hurt the namesake either)). I wear a wonderful rose-scented perfume. I eat lychees because they taste the way roses smell. I spray my face with rose water, use a rose-water facial soap (which gets bonus points for being from Sweden, see how this all ties together?), I bought rose jam and know how to make it, and I love turkis delight because it's rose-flavored. I make my own rose-scented tea. I'm considering naming a kid Rose because it's not already in the family, it's not very common these days, it's my favorite flower, AND it's my favorite companion on Doctor Who, so it has alot in it's favor. I'm obsessed. But I hate that dusty, soapy sort of roseness that's associated with old ladies, and I hate the color that's called 'dusty rose' and is actually the pink version of beige, and I hate things that are decorated with masses of roses in an attempt to be 'romantic'; all these things are insults to actual roses, and I'll be happy if I never see any of them again.

And I think five is enough for now. This will likely be the first of a series of five random neroses and facts and details, as I build this wayward blog into something all about me. Everyone should have something devoted to themselves; it's amazing for self-esteem.

another new segment!

I was going to start a sixteenth blog called Letters to the Aether, but that name's already taken on Blooger by someone who hasn't even updated it and picked much uglier colors that I would have, so I'm going to instead make that a new segment here. Any time I feel like writing random letters, it'll be on this poor little blog that hasn't quite found it's voice yet.

Like this one:

Dear Alexander Skarsgard,

On the off chance that you have a Google Alert on your name, I'd just like you to know that you're adorable. And so much taller than me that I'm overcome with strange urges: I want to climb up on your head and look into second-story windows and touch them with my hands. I want to paint you green and make you feed me peas and greenbeans. I want to sit on the ground next to your feet and look up, up, up, like I'm looking at a mountain. These are all good impulses, in context, I assure you.

I posted something like this almost a week ago on another blog, and I can't get these thoughts our of my head. For all your height, you fit quite nicely in my skull.

Love,

Me

Back in the game!

I'm back on the Avon train after far too long, and I'll be back on this blog as soon as the new catalogues come in!

fat girl goes slim: again

I've decided I'm done with being fat again. And now that I have my spiffy new planner to remind me of things, I have a better chance of remembering what I've eaten and keeping track of what I'm doing. So there.

Currently, as you can see,
I'm somewhere around 155. This is bad, because I'm supposed to be at around 110, according to those charts, which always seem a bit on the light side and don't seem to take muscle mass into account (so i'm aiming for around 120 at first, and we'll see how I feel there), and good, because a week ago I was at 161.

I'm not sure how accurate my scale is, because when I first stepped on, it looked like 153ish, and I know my camera doesn't weigh two pounds, but a rough estimate is probably good enough.

In the first picture, the orange in the foreground is my shirt; I can't see my own ankles because my boobs and belly are in the way, and that's part of what we're working on here.

Current measurements are as follows:

Chest: 34"

Bust: 39"

Arm: 12"

Waist: 35.25"

Hips: 45" at widest part

Thigh: 24" half way between knee and hip

I remember when I had a 25" waist... Depressing as this is, I'm going to work on it, trying to lose weight and keep it up until I reach my goal-- 5ish down, 35ish to go!