I have something to confess:

I'm really bad at keeping up with livejournal sometimes. keenween may have mentioned something when we met in person about how he started to worry something was wrong when he hadn't seen any Dancing With the Stars crack posts on his friends feed lately. UNDERSTANDABLE!

( I have been doing things but none of them are very interesting! )

Knitters:

I have been to the land of crochet, and I am returned to you... very much the same as when I left, but with the need of a slightly larger craft bag and the desire to cover the earth with granny squares.

( Just put down the hook, Red, we can talk about this. )

( February Project! )

I think I just figured out how the 60s happened, you guys.

( Granny's Little Habit )

In a few days you're going to be like Jiiiiiminy Christmas, we know it's 2012, we can all put the date on our checks correctly on the first try, stop using your silly graphic. Until then:

( Crochet update! )

I just really wanted to use my cheapie graphic again, OK?

I like how 2012 has stood for the apocalypse for so many years now and now it's just "the year we are currently in." Well, if we all fall off the end of the calendar in December, at least I will have spent a month learning to crochet.

( Crochet! )

FYI, if you have your livejournal settings so you overwrite other people's moodthemes, you're missing T'Pol proudly spearing a breadstick with a fork.

Yay! After 2010's Do 100 New Things resolution (success!) and 2011's "Year of 11" lists (um... partial credit), I was really excited to come up with a fun challenge "resolution" for this year! I mean, there are actual things I really would like / need to improve in my life, but I don't want to start a year off with a drudge list of un-fun things to do for an entire year.

(Okay, I'm doing that for my work resolution, which is "keep my desk clean so everyone things I'm an organized genius" since I've gotten into the habit of keeping stacks of stuff on my desk so people don't think I'm bored. That's not the fun resolution. Moving on!)

I've got two major weaknesses that thwart traditional resolutions: I'm obsessive to the exclusion of everything else... but I lack staying power. (None of this should be a surprise to you.) Having to do something in moderation over a long period of time leads directly to me thinking I suck as a person. But I was thinking this week that maybe, if I frame my life right, instead of banging my head against these obstacles, they could suddenly be awesome traits I could use to my advantage!

Enter:


You know it's legit when I make a graphic in PaintBrush.

( The Rules: Resolutions for Short Attention Spans )

( January Challenge )

My sister and I like to do holiday themes, for both decorations (the "The North Pole Threw Up On Our Apartment" theme is particularly memorable) and gifts (every year we say "Your presents have a theme!" and 9 times out of 10 that theme is Star Trek).

This year, my theme was Handmade Holidays. My goal was to have all decorations handmade out of things I already had, and all gifts be handmade, recycled and/or locally sourced for under $5. I was mostly successful! Mostly.

( Pictures and tutorial links below! )

All of this helped me get pretty far on the last of my 2011 Year Of 11 New Year's Resolutions! I've got a super fun resolution planned for this year which I'll post about later in case anyone else wants to join in!

My friend Storm got me into it and in a fit of holiday crafting this weekend I watched until somewhere in season 3. Okay, knowledgable peeps, give it to me straight: when do I get off this boat?

This series just has that sadistic feeling where it will all just end in tears if you stay too long. You know when you aren't spoiled but just have this feeling that they're going to kill everyone off by the end? And not in a big explosion-oh-hey-we're-all-heroes-and-saved-the-universe-and-defenseless-babies-and-kittens kind of way but more like we've-got-you-hooked-so-now-we're-going-to-have-them-all-probably-kill-each-other-slowly-but-not-until-after-all-their-worst-nightmares-have-been-realized.

Spoil me, people. What is the ratio of "Genuinely Mostly Happy" vs "Insane and/or Dead" of Our Heroes at the end of the series? Because I am all about happiness and muppets and giant space whales and snappy one-liners and everyone randomly sexing each other, but I have no desire to have my emotional face chewed off. I'm very good at stopping at a happy place mid-way through a series and waving off the end without having seen it.

(But then, had spoilers existed in the late 90s, I never would have watched past the end of Season 6 of DS9, and I would have missed out on Ezri and the Alamo and Damar and that one time Vic Fontaine's holosuite program was taken over by mobsters. You see my dilemma.)

Farscapers: discuss.

( One more point... no two... no... )

I'm not mocking your favorite show, guys. I love this. I'm just hyper after a long workday and BASICALLY FOUR WEEKS OF NOT BEING ON THE INTERNET AT ALL FOR NO REASON EXCEPT THAT MAMA RED GAVE ME A UKULELE.

A revelation, while being 29:
There is no need to be special.

An ordinary soul won't fade away
if it stops waiting
to be Called
to create something unique
to change the world.

Often the most remarkable thing I do in a day
is smile in the elevator at others who work in my building
also doing nothing extraordinary.

We don't appreciate only the brightest flower
but all those around them
simply for being flowers
for showing that the rain is working
the soil is good.

We are mostly human, divinely charged to live
from sun up to sun down
glorifying every space in God's green Earth
by leaving our exhaled breath
within it.