partially finished

Like so many things in my life, here is a picture of yet another unfinished project. This is my version of bubby, wonky as he is, I wonder if he will ever have legs or a face, poor bear.

I have also wanted to make kate since the first time I saw her.

absent-minded

I am just finding this term, "absent-minded" so funny today. I don't know maybe it's from lack of sleep, but it just cracks me up. "Roll-call! Okay, Heart? 'here!' Lungs? 'here.' Eyeballs? 'present!' joints? 'here!' Brain? 'here!' Mind? ... Mind?" My mind is absent. Missing in action. Taking a sick day. "May my mind be excused today?"

in the spirit of posting pics

woops, sorry!

I was cleaning out my desk at work (because I quit! woohoo!) and I found a handout about blogging that I got two years ago at a graphic design conference in San Diego. It was given to me in a workshop given by Keri Smith, an illustrator who's blog I've been reading and illustration I've been admiring ever since. I even bought her book, "Living Out Loud," so if anyone wants to borrow it, let me know.

At the time, I really had no idea what a blog was--though I had been following this marathoner for some time without realizing it was a blog--so I didn't give it much thought. Well, yesterday I read through the handout, down to the part where it says: "too much detail can sometimes serve to isolate the reader, share moments that are interesting to you, not necessarily the minutiae of your day." Gulp. So sorry for this. Sorry I isolated you, my three dear readers. Thanks for sticking with me despite that!

time to say goodbye

may my favorite pair of shoes (that my mom bought for me over three years ago) rest in peace. they have served me well. apparently my left foot is a little harder on shoes than my right foot is. I'm one of those people who is weird about shoes. I find one pair that I absolutely love and wear them absolutely into the ground. and then I'm sad when they are finally dead because I have to go find some other shoes that I love, and it's hard to find some that I could possibly love as much as my beloved departed pair. This time, Melanie gave me some birthday money (thanks, Mel!) and I bought a shiny new set that is uncannily similar to the last pair and that I love almost as much, though they have a certain orthopedic quality, but other than that, I like them very much. hmmm. can you say "rut?"

yeah, that'll happen

About two weeks ago at my birthday dinner I "ran into" an old friend. Actually, she would have probably never even noticed me despite being at the table right next to ours, and despite the five waiters loudly singing happy birthday to me. I nudged her on her elbow right in the middle of an animated conversation with her sister. We were the best of friends our freshman and sophomore years in high school. Then, though we never had an official "falling out", we just kind of grew apart, and neither of us did much about it. She made some close friends in her drama circles, I kind of stayed my "loner" self that I had always been, with many friends of varied interests, if you will. In any case, I still greatly admire this friend, I think she is lovely, and I still believe we are kindred spirits, as we always referred to ourselves in 9th and 10th grade. We wrote notes, illustrated notes to each other everyday. Oh, the notes we wrote! The good laughs we had. We doodled for each other. I wish we still had those drawings! She was a very talented artist, and though she did not pursue that interest in college, I think she could still become a children's book illustrator. Her notes were far better illustrated than mine ever were.

It took a lot of guts for me to "out" myself after Kevin had spotted her (ironically, Kevin knew her through some other friends before Kevin and I ever knew each other) because of my tendency to shyness, and I felt awkward interrupting her perfectly nice family dinner. But I did anyway. She was ever so nice about it. She and her sisters are all extremely BEAUTIFUL. And I mean those all-caps. And I wish I would have told them that right then and there, because I don't know that I will get the chance again. They all looked so lovely. It was great to catch up, if only briefly. She got my email address and said she would add me to her messenger list. Visions of renewed friendship started dancing in my head, which was exciting for a brief moment. She has two children now, so I didn't expect her to email me right away, but it's been nearly two weeks now, and I don't expect she will ever add me. It makes me a little sad, as it did when we grew apart in high school. Part of me wants to be all sarcastic and think I should have said, "yeah, that'll happen," when she offered to email me. "You really wanted to talk to me, didn't you?" But I will give her the benefit of the doubt--maybe she lost the email address. Maybe she forgot. Maybe one of her babies is deathly ill. My typical tendency is to think that she got my email address and said she would email me just to be nice (poor, pathetic girl that I am) and after I left, she quickly threw it away from her and said to her husband, "boy, am I glad we got rid of her. What a moron. I can't believe I was ever friends with that nerd." For a while I thought maybe I should have gotten HER email address, but maybe it's better this way, because if she really does want contact me, she can, and if she doesn't, she doesn't have to.

the frustrating frustrationness of it all

Things that are annoying which you have no control over are really annoying. And frustrating. But things which are entirely unavoidable are, in my estimation, even more annoying. and MAN! the frustration. It eats me alive.

I still haven't learned how to make my wishes known, without being rude. How can I politely be firm? I haven't figured it out. Hence, the avoidable happened, and my frustration, it burns again. I am festering with anger and frustration.

Just another night in the life of having an infant

8:00 p.m. nurse. Baby goes to sleep. Is he gone to sleep for the night?

8:44 p.m. Baby wakes up. okay, let's play!

9:00 p.m. Raspberries, everybody.

9:15 p.m. Let's change to pajamas, yeah!

9:30 p.m. He must be tired, we go snuggle in bed and nurse.


10:20something p.m. finally he is asleep. Is he deep enough to put him in his crib? Dunno, I'll just wait a few minutes until he's good and asleep.

12:30 a.m. Wake up startled, look at the clock, it says three a.m., because the power went out yesterday. I'm all
disoriented and confused. Baby still sleeping soundly. Gather baby up, take him to his crib. Stumble back to bed, drift off...

12:40 a.m. Baby wakes up and cries out. K. goes to get baby, baby is hungry, take baby to couch and nurse. Compose this post (and about 4 other posts) in my brain as baby is nursing.

1:40 a.m. finally get back into bed after putting baby in his crib. Aaaaah, sleep finally comes, and it's 2 and a half lovely uninterrupted hours

4:12 a.m. Baby cries out again. Go to baby, take baby to couch and nurse again.

4:36 a.m. don't even try putting baby back in crib, I'm a terrible, irresponsible mother and leave him on couch. stumble back to bed.

6:00 a.m. Wake up with a start, baby crying. Get up to go get baby, baby is sound asleep (still on the couch). Apparently I just dreamed the baby crying. Stumble back to bed.

8:00 a.m. Baby wakes up, cries out, I go get him and nurse him (still on the couch). Yay, good morning sunshine! Let's start the day!

new template, again

So I've been playing around with the look of my blog, and still haven't settled on something I like. I've also had about 50 ideas everyday of thoughts that I have wanted to compose and post, but it's usually 2:30 a.m. and I can't sleep because my mind is racing. Eventually I do get to sleep, and then in the morning, whatever it was that I was so artfully composing the night before is either completely lost, or it is completely ridiculous and makes no sense whatsoever, because it was when I was half asleep. And things that make complete sense when you are half asleep are usually really wack-o upon full wakefulness.

Blah, blah, blah.

the end.