Procrastination Post with Poppy Pod

I saw the above in the garden a few days ago. For a moment, I feared alien invaders. Then I recognized it as the emaciated remains of a poppy bloom. (Unless poppy plants are, in fact, alien invaders. But that's a theory for a whole different blog.) Anyway, I thought it was strange enough to photograph for posterity.

Or for kicking off a pointless blog post written solely to procrastinate on other things.

Po-tay-to, po-tah-to...

Well, as one might surmise by the lack of blog posts, January has been a rather dull month (knock on wood here), poppy pod photo ops notwithstanding. The horrendous winter weather we were promised by grim-faced meteorologists muttering about the horrors of La Nina has thus far failed to materialize... at least in this part of the country. So, I haven't been able to use the weather as much of an excuse to keep myself from doing anything.

Dang it.

With the holidays now a faded memory in the rear-view mirror of life, I've been slowly working on getting myself back on track insofar as Accomplishing Things. While I can't report spectacular success, my efforts haven't been entirely discouraging. I'm at least maintaining my artistic efforts, and I've made a conscious push to resume writing on a more regular basis. I haven't made much progress when it comes to making myself exercise, though I still delude myself into thinking that my job - which involves lots of walking and bending and moving - counts for something here. I'm even getting back into reading again, after the holiday-imposed moratorium. (I stopped reading during November for NaNoWriMo, and December was just too danged busy.) Anyone wondering what I've been reading - or even what I'm reading now - can visit my book review blog, via the sidebar link.

It doesn't make for spectacular blogging material, but it's what I've been doing nonetheless.

In other news, the Golden Taurus is hinting that it might want to visit the shop in the nearish future. Ever since it got back from the previous maintenance visit in December, I've had an intermittent, annoying buzz from the dash area, and occasional issues with the windshield defrost not liking to defrost the driver's side and with air vents blasting cold air instead of warm. In my experience with cars, A/C issues like this are never just A/C issues, and thus it seems to be the case here. I've also noticed, along with the buzz, condensation problems inside the windows. This may or may not be related to a door latch problem I noticed during our last cold snap: the car door latches want to freeze themselves open. I'd get one opening and closing out of them, then the danged things would freeze in the "open" position for several minutes. Spraying deicer stuff onto the latch didn't seem to help. I'd just have to work at it and get the car warmed up enough that the things would thaw. Online research indicates that this may be a sign of moisture getting inside the doors, driving out the lubricants in the latching mechanism and potentially creating rust issues. Moisture, not unlike condensation, which seems to be directly related to the dashboard buzz and the A/C problem.

With any luck, I'll get the thing dealt with before we have another bad cold snap. With even more luck, it won't require me to drain my savings account to deal with whatever's wrong.

Well, I suppose that's about it. I just figured it had been long enough that I ought to write an I'm-not-dead-I'm-boringbusy post. (The fact that writing said post took long enough to count as my self-imposed daily writing quota is an entirely incidental factor, I assure you...)

So Long, 2010!

Well, technically there's another 20 minutes to go on this coast, but I figure the year's pretty much done what it's going to do by now, and the credits are rolling, so it's safe to say the thing is over... unless there's some sort of stinger at the tail.

Let's just hope not...

After the rare full-moon eclipse that saw us through the Winter Solstice, we find ourselves leaving the year under the light of the barest lingering crescent. (I shot the above photo with my little purse camera before work this morning. Came out better than I'd expected, though not as good as my big camera would've done. Didn't help that I was leaning on an icy rail at the time, either...) Appropriately enough, the new moon arrives with the new year - or close enough for horseshoes.

I won't bother retyping my 2010 resolution list for an itemized run-down of how I did. For one thing, I have a cat convinced that I've resolved to rub more kitty bellies this year. For another, I'm just too lazy to bother. Anyway, by my estimation, I hit about three out of the five main goals I set for myself. I could've done more on all of them, but I checked off significant portions of two and at least one item on the third and fourth. The only one I completely dropped the ball on was my exercise resolution, which I readily admit was entirely due to personal laziness. (I said I was too lazy to bother retyping the list...)

So, up for 2011 is pretty much more of the same. I want to keep working on the stuff I made headway on last year, and pick up the slack on the stuff I didn't.

The abridged 2011 resolution list (leaving out specific sub-goals that mean nothing to anyone but me):

1. Increase monetary income. (Pretty much the same as last year, unfortunately...)
2. Draw and/or paint more. (I kicked up my sketchbook productivity last year, but I want to do more in 2011.)
3. Write more. (Been far too lazy on this front, spending most of my time dinking around instead of finishing stories.)
4. Get back into the exercise habit. (Self-explanatory. Walking's been linked to all sorts of health benefits, and unlike insurance it's affordable.)
5. Continue organizing and cleaning. (I made significant progress on this front, and don't want to lose ground.)
6. Start/Continue other personal improvement projects. (Sort of a catch-all for some things I've been meaning to get to. Mostly, I want to stop taking time for granted so much - stop assuming I'll be able to get to it later, that it'll be easier tomorrow.)

Hopefully, I'll maintain my better-than-half average in 2011, starting in six minutes... make that five...

Another Xmas Come and Gone

This is Grandpa's Christmas tree.

It's been at his house nearly as far back as I can recall. It has little silk-strand ball ornaments, traces of old silver plastic tinsel, and two sets of old-fashioned electric lights that blink out of sequence. At one time it belonged to a late uncle, but since then it's been Grandpa's.

We've had Christmas at Grandpa's every year since I can remember as well. After our family gift exchange, we'd pile in the car to meet the relatives over there for a holiday feast and more gifts, and while away the short hours until evening until the grown-up talk was over and we went home. Pulling out of that driveway meant Christmas was really over. It always seemed a bit surreal, after all the excitement and anticipation, how it seemed a mere blink of the eye before it was all over, the magic gone, the world gone gray again as the year tumbled to a close.

Through all the years, Grandpa's Christmas tree has been there, blinking away every season, not a bulb dimmed, not an ornament shifted, a constant through years of change.

This year, we arrived to find Grandpa shuffling back to his chair, having just been encouraged to clean up for dinner. He stumbled and shuffled and collapsed with a sigh, and gazed about with a vague, watery gaze as though just woken. With some prompting, he put in his hearing aids, but the look didn't change, and his eyes still slid closed as Christmas songs and conversation filled his living room.

At dinner, he shuffled over to the table, and nodded off over his plate, before returning to his recliner to doze off once more.

As gifts were distributed, he napped on. Once in a while, his eyes opened, but more often than not they weren't the eyes of the grandfather I'd grown up with. Vacant, vague, not quite seeing, not quite hearing. Lost in a fog of age and fatigue.

Did he want to open a few gifts? After all, it was Christmas.

No, he'd rather sleep.

Presents were exchanged, conversations waxed and waned. My uncle finally enticed him to open a couple presents. He hardly seemed to know what to do with them. Long moments of looking, of concentrating, of visible effort to wade through the fog before he would slowly work open the wrapping paper. An ornament with his name on it momentarily confused him. The effort sent him to drowsing again, a restless doze.

Some time ago, we got him a game system, in the hopes that the simple controls might get him moving again, get his mind moving, the once-sharp mind of an inventor, an engineer, a builder and solver and doer. Exercise helps, sometimes; moving, walking, can sometimes shake off the dozing fog, the vacant confusion of the years. Tonight, it only drew an occasional glance, a brief moment of open eyes that was not so much waking as a lesser form of sleeping.

Once in a while, he'd notice again. A new camera. A slice of pie for dessert. But the fog would pull him back, and he'd drift away again, never quite waking, never truly resting.

When we left that night, Christmas lights still glowed in the yard, in the windows of neighbors. Garland still hung from Grandpa's ceiling fan. And the immortal blinking lights on the little plastic Christmas tree still blinked, seemingly immune to the passage of time... unlike the old man sleeping in the chair beside it, under a new blanket he hardly seemed to notice, a pile of unopened gifts carefully moved out of his way, remnants of a Christmas he scarcely woke long enough to enjoy.

I wonder if I'll see that little tree again next year.

--

Sorry... bit of a depressing Xmas, in some respects, so I thought I'd get it off my chest.

In an attempt to end things on a somewhat less downer note, I can say that I had an otherwise decent holiday. People seemed to like what I got them. I liked what I got. (The above photo was shot with one of them - a compact camera I can carry around for on-the-go photographic emergencies.)

Oh, I also have photos of this year's ornament blitz results. The theme this year: glitter. Lots of glitter. And plastic ornaments, some fabric paint and glitter glue, and a few rhinestones for good measure... but mostly glitter. Because one can never have too much glitter in one's life.

Family Ornaments - Back and Front
The center shapes were larger plastic rhinestones. I'd intended them to shine unadorned, but the silvering on the back was so cheap that the glue showed right through. So I just coated them more glue and covered them with glitter, then tried to hide the evidence with decorations and embellishments.

Shipped Ornaments - Front and Back
These are the ones I know reached their destination on time. The others might have been lost in the mail. Or the recipients are just too busy to say if they got them... Another case of Salvage Mode Creation - the decorations on the back were not my original intention, but what happened after the original intentions failed miserably with a shipping deadline breathing down my neck. (Actually, they're more 95% complete, here - I had to add hangers and drumsticks, still. But it was pretty much my only chance to stop and shoot a picture, so I took it.)

And off I go...

X minus 7 days... well, 6 and 1 hour... and counting

Well, calendars don't lie, and my calendar says that next Saturday is Xmas.  My calendar also says that Tuesday is Winter Solstice. (And Monday is supposed to be a full lunar eclipse, which - clouds pending - we might even be able to see.) All signs are pointing to 2010 being down to the final dregs.

Things I have done:

• Finished holiday shopping.
• Wrapped everything.
• Mailed cards.
• Avoided sitting through the insipid "Christmas In The Northwest" and the annoyingly pointless and circular "Charlie Brown Christmas" songs once thus far this holiday season. (I did have to sit through "Christmas Shoes" once to do it, though...)
• Needlessly neglected cats to type up blog posts.

Orion!  Get off the keyboard, dang it!

Sorry about that... where was I?  Oh, yes...

Things I have not done:

• Finish family ornaments.
• Publish the December (or November) updates for Brightdreamer Books.
• Read much of anything to justify an update at Brightdreamer Books.
• Check off a good chunk of my 2010 Resolution list.
• Decorate my workbench.
• Listen to my Trans-Siberian Orchestra holiday CD clear through.
• Rub enough kitty bellies.

Okay, okay, hint taken...

And people wonder why I never get anything done...