lizardek's obiter dictum

BLOGILICIOUS

2013-05-16T17:44:35Z

OMG, how good do these peanut butter brownies look? NOMNOMCITY!

I had to confess to The Things I Don't Drink again today, this time to 3 colleagues during a training course I was at. They all boggled at me. I couldn't decide which one each of them was boggling at me most for which beverage...as they seemed to be equally divided, all three. Yeah, I don't drink coffee. I don't drink tea. And I don't drink alcohol. "For health reasons?" ...no. I just don't like the smell. Or the taste. Here in Sweden, most Swedes can't decide which is worse: not drinking coffee or not drinking alcohol.

It's not that I haven't tried them; I have. I've tried all of them, but not enough to develop a taste for any of them. Bleah. And by try, I basically mean I have sipped them. I have sipped coffee a couple of times. Tea, a couple of times. Beer, once was enough. Ditto most of the liquors, and wine, and champagne. I WILL drink a little kaluha or amaretto or amarula with cream, but that hardly counts since it amounts to a couple of teaspoons, it's basically liquid candy, and it happens, like, once every 4 years.

It's Eurovision week here in Europe, and madness especially HERE, because we are hosting it. Malmö is hosting it! Because Sweden won last year. If you live in the States and have no idea what I'm talking about, go here to read all about it. The first semi-final was Tuesday and the second one is tonight. They have to have semi-finals because there are so many countries that want to participate. There are 39 countries participating this year, and of those, 26 will be in the final on Saturday.

So far this year, I have no favorite. Martin says I shouldn't write this until after tonight, because the contestants tonight are better than the trainwreck full of forgettableness that was Tuesday's semi-final. He knows this because he was at the dress rehearsal yesterday, along with 10,000 other Skåne-area students.

I am enjoying my life right now. My friend Camilla is back in Sweden (at least for awhile), this is one of the most beautiful Swedish springs I've experienced since I moved here, I have a big pile of much-anticipated new books to read, and work has, at least slightly, eased up.

The Saturday after this one, I leave for a week in Singapore. I get there on Sunday so I will have part of that day to see things, plus maybe some evenings, after work. But everything I have researched about things to do/see in Singapore mostly makes mention of shopping (expensive shopping!), eating out and nightlife. I'm not sure what to do while I'm there...anyone been and have suggestions?

BABY, IT'S NICE OUTSIDE

2013-05-12T15:39:49Z

It's true I love my job. I'm good at what I do and I like doing it, and every workday when the alarm goes off, I hop right up (albeit a bit more slowly than in younger years) ready to start the day...but after a long weekend like this? Retirement sounds pretty good.

It's nice to relax, spend the day doing the things I feel like doing, getting things done at my own pace, having time to set chores and projects down and just read for a while. Time to sleep in, go to bed late, plan excursions and enjoy the sunshine.

The first day I thought about work a lot. I am not as overwhelmed as I was a few weeks ago, but I'm still dealing with the aftermath of the crazy...and very much hoping it doesn't heat up again, to that extent, for awhile.

It's good that spring is here, and that everyone has their thoughts focused a bit more outside the office walls, a bit more outside emails. A bit more on the greening trees and budding lilacs. Every tree that can be in flower IS in flower, it seems and there is beauty everywhere your eye rests.

Today I went to a baby shower for a woman that works in my department, but whom I met originally through the AWC. It's the second baby shower in the last 2 months...SIX women in our bookgroup are having babies right now...3 have already given birth and 3 have yet to do so. A lot of baby presents and baby talk and baby memories. I sort of envy them the time off, but I remember what it was like. I had never wanted to be home with babies and I did it for 3 years...that was enough for me. So, I guess a few long weekends in a row and vacation coming up soon should satisfy my craving for downtime.

We played fun baby-related games: a famous mother's name on our backs when we arrived that we had to figure out with only yes or no questions...I was completely blank on mine and had to get a giant hint before the light dawned. Even knowing that I was a cartoon mother, still running on TV, with 3 kids, one of whom is very obnoxious, wasn't enough to clue me in. D'oh, indeed! Then one of the organizers held a baby-themed quiz that included the following questions:

Where in the house should you never put baby, according to Johnny Castle?

Which species sees the male in charge of gestation and birth?

Which mammal has a gestation period of nearly 2 years? sperm whale, elephant, donkey or hippopotamus

What is the largest number of surviving human children from a SINGLE birth? 6, 8, 10 or 12

What is the highest amount of children born to ONE mother over the course of a lifetime? 15, 24, 48, 57, or 69

What can a child 7 months or less do that an adult cannot? stick out its tongue & cross its eyes, sneeze with its eyes open, lick its own elbow or breathe & swallow simultaneously?*

It was fun, and the food was good, but I'm babied out for the time being. I've been slogging through the magazine accumulation of years and am pleased to report that I have only 2.5 years left of Martha Stewart magazines to go through. I haven't ripped out nearly as many pages as I thought I would, considering how pretty the publication is. I was originally more surprised about this, considering how I decimated the Donna Hays, but Martha's recipes, while photogenic and appetizing, all seem to be so much WORK. Plus she has a bad habit of putting pretty pictures of the food in one set of pages, and the recipes all crammed around advertising in the back. I can't be bothered. Much of the time, even when I look at one of the photos and think, "YUM that looks YUMMY" upon reflection and clear-eyed reading of the recipe, I realize...yeah, I'll never make that. Not a chance.

The sky is so pretty, pale blue with fat white clouds floating leisurely by. I think I'll go gaze at it awhile and not think about work for the few remaining hours of the weekend. I hope your weekend has been as nearly perfect as mine.

*Answers:
in the corner
seahorses
elephant
8 (octomom!)
69... BOGGLE. No kidding**
breathe & swallow simultaneously

**baha! no pun intended. Seriously. 69 kids. by ONE set of parents (though Wikipedia says the veracity of the story is under suspicion). Even the next highest amount on the list (39!) makes my uterus shudder.

SPRING IS SPRUNG THE GRASS IS RIZ

2013-05-06T18:35:25Z

There they are! Two days of warm temps and pop pop pop go all the buds! Every year it starts off slow and then 0-60 it's summer...blink and you miss the transition.

SHEEN OF GREEN

2013-05-04T21:14:32Z

The best thing about spring isn't the flowers. It isn't the clear robin's egg blue sky or the puffy white clouds or even the warming temperatures. It's the sheen of green. The sheen of bright, neon green that blooms on every living surface...every bush, every tree, every field, every hedge. It transforms the whole world, just like the hoarfrost does in the winter or the first snow.

Today was so clear you could see forever. It was the kind of day when the hot air balloons come out, though we didn't actually see any. I cut back last year's growth of heather from the garden. Two of the roses seem to be beyond hope, but who know? It's spring! Hope is in everything. The kids and I sat on the trampoline in the sunshine during the afternoon. A bumblebee buzzed us. I could hear the high voices of children throughout the neighborhood and someone chopping something. Our neighbor's wash was flapping on the clothesline in the back. It was warm as well, the warmest day so far, and only going to get warmer according to the forecast.

Anders' birthday is coming up and the kids and I went shopping today: got presents and then some. After, I finished reading Daughter of Smoke and Bone and knew my hesitation in even starting it was correct...how am I supposed to wait until the sequel(s) is available? Book torture!

I have made a dent in the magazines, getting through all the Donna Hay's and now starting on the Livings. I ripped a lot of pages out of the Donna Hays. The recipes sound so good and the photos are so fantastic you feel as though you could take a bite from each glossy page. I found a predilection for what sounds good to me. If there is asparagus, spinach, pastry, meringue, chicken or salmon involved, it was a pretty sure bet that the pages would be added to my growing pile of keepers.

Weekends in spring, in between short weeks, what could be better?

DON'T DO IT!

2013-05-02T19:48:23Z

Don't rub your eyes, don't rub them, don't no no no nooooo

RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!
RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!
RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!
RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!
RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!
RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!
RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!
RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!
RUB RUB RUB RUB RUB!!!

AUGH!

Spring is here.

A GOOD GOOD DAY

2013-04-30T13:45:38Z

Tomorrow is May Day. May First. Labor Day (for us Europeans) and a day off. It's the first day of the FIFTH month of the year. How does that even happen? I mean how does it happen so FAST?

The sun has finally decided, after a long sulking morning, to come out and play...though there are still an awful lot of white blobs bumbling around up there. It's still quite chilly and I suppose my hopes that it would warm up a bit so I don't have to sit outside and freeze tonight by the bonfire (I know, but you DO freeze...on one side) are dashed.

I had a phone call today that made me really happy. My friend Camilla, you know the one who lives in Poland and only comes home twice, maybe three times a year? She quit her job! And moved back to Sweden! Yay! Now I get to see her whenever I want to! (until she moves again, which she will, but we'll be sad about that when the time comes)

Karin just told me that I'm scaring her with how fast I'm typing. She doesn't see all the mistakes I make and have to back up and re-type, but still, yes, I am a fast typer. I type over 90 words a minute or so. I used to play Typershark for fun. Typing fun. How nerdy is that? I took typing class in 9th grade and I still maintain that it was one of the best things I ever did. Anyone who works with words in ANY way should take a typing class. It just makes things so much more efficient and speedier when one can type quickly. I don't know if they even offer it in schools anymore, but if they don't, it's a pity. I don't think it's on the curriculum here at all.

I bought a whole pile of books the other day and that makes me happy too, especially since a couple of them were ones I've been waiting for forever (to come out in paperback, that is) and one I didn't even know existed, by a favorite author. How I will be able to put them down and read the bookgroup book, I don't know. I love reading. Love love love it.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go boil and devil eggs, because what's a freezing cold picnic/bonfire grill evening without deviled eggs?!

A very good day so far, and tomorrow? Even better! Sleeping in, reading, going through magazines, starting Season 1 of Downton Abbey, and relaxing. How will you spend YOUR May Day?

THINGS, SOME GOOD, SOME NOT SO GOOD, SOME GREAT

2013-04-27T19:01:16Z

The light is lying low over the fields, bathing the back of our house in gold and pink. There's a line above the horizon demarcating a nimbus edge just before the blue starts. We had giant puffity clouds today, looking like a line of rounded marshmallow mountains, one an Ewok for a split second before it morphed into just another heavenly cottonball.

There are fat little buds on the cherry tree but no blossoms yet. Everything is just about to burst...we had a couple of days of rain and you could really see the effect...hedges went green, the fields went green, the pussywillows blew up and went pollen. I expect my eyes to start itching any day now.

The kid and I went to see Ironman 3 this afternoon and really enjoyed it. I adore RDJr, and he did a great job. Funny and angsty and just general good old 'splosions and mayhem. Yesterday Martin and I went to sushi night, an AWC event that I organize every couple of months. I rotate around between all the different sushi places in both Malmö and Lund and it makes me quite happy that nowadays there are so many to choose from. When we were first moved here 16+ years ago, there was ONE. Last night it was actually the sushi counter in the central train station...not very elegant but their sushi is really good and the prices even better. It made for a very relaxed, laid-back atmosphere with the 6 of us who showed up. You'd think that in a club of over 200 people we'd have more than 6 at a dinner out, but either the weather or the location or just general spring-busyness kept people away.

Karin wanted me to go see Warm Bodies with her, so I was glad I was able to talk her into Ironman instead. I really don't get the obsession with zombies. Martin went to see it on Thursday with friends and she was really upset because she's been wanting to see it. She'll just have to find her own friends to see it with or wait for DVD.

I had a message from a former colleague and boss from Ericsson that one of our co-workers died this past week; I assume from cancer as she was in treatment for breast cancer 13 years ago when I started there. It makes me sad...she was approximately my age and has a young son. There is a commercial on TV right now that points out the fact that 1 in 3 people will get cancer. 1 in 3! That just freaks me out. :( Not really something I want to think about when spring is in the air.

Tomorrow I'm going to go buy pansies for the garden pots. We need some cheer and color in the yard to go with the green.

I don't know if I mentioned this here, but I decided to start a magazine intervention project for Anders and myself. I have boxes and boxes of Martha Stewart Living magazines and he has boxes and boxes of motorcycle and bike mags PLUS boxes and boxes of old comics. I am resigned to the fact that the chances of getting him to let go of most, if not all of the comics, but I really hope we can ditch most of the rest of the paper that just sits in boxes in closets and on shelves and never, ever gets looked at. Which is ironic, considering I bought SIX magazines at the magazine shop at the train station yesterday, though in my defense, none of them was Martha! Heh.

Martin: We watched a film on Geronimo today in school. Do you know what his real Indian name was?
Liz: GERONIMO?
Martin: No. That was what the Mexicans called him. His real Indian name meant something like "The one who yawns"
Liz: GERYAWNIMO?
Liz: *giggles madly*
Martin: *rolls eyes*

Next week has a bonfire with friends, a day and a half off work, an AWC meeting and the start of May. Woot!

WALKING ON SUNSHINE

2013-04-21T11:26:52Z

The sun is shining, though it's still a little chilly out, and for some stupid reason I am inside. I have a bad headache, which is part of the reason, because I know if I go outside before the headache is totally gone, the sun will pierce through my eyeballs and my brain will spontaneously combust. I was out in the sun a bit yesterday...you have to ease into these things when you're a troglodyte homebody like me. Karin and I whacked down the dead long grass in the front garden and removed the pine branches from the bed under the kitchen window. Woot! Gardening! Yeah, that was all.

A neighborhood cat came right up to us, while we were out there and demanded to be petted and picked up and loved on. She was a black-and-white shorthair, small like my Pooka with a pink nose like my Toby and MAN, did she have a loud purr. She hung around for awhile, and we put her on the trampoline and she followed Karin into the house and back out and then moved on next door after we went back inside. I don't know who she belongs to, but now we all want a cat again. Sigh.

I have a giant to-do list of things to get through before the weekend is over. Some of them are halfway done, but none of them are finished. I still haven't made headway on my taxes and bank reporting forms. I have mostly finished the bag labels for the Lego project and 3 boxes are full of finished ziplocs. But we don't know what to do with them now. The kids don't want to sell any after all, so I suppose it will all eventually go up to the attic for posterity to deal with. Or more likely me, again, someday, when we move out of this house and we have to actually get everything back down from the attic that we have stuffed up there over the years.

I was in the sun more after the mini-fake-gardening stint, because I went to Copenhagen with my friend Debbie to see a play: The Importance of Being Earnest, in English. It was well-done and fun and we had a great time. For all that Malmö is a decent size city, I ran into THREE people I know while I was waiting at the station for Debbie to get there, and then we ran into another of the Wonders on the train going over...she was taking her daughter to the Justin Bieber concert. Copenhagen was mobbed to overflowing with young girls in pink and white and JB apparel and I heart JB facepaint, all heading in the same direction as we were.

After the play, we took the bus back to Nyhavn and had dinner, which wasn't all that great and very over-priced (the conversation made up for it!), and then dessert at a different restaurant, because I had seen a menu notice for rhubarb tarte a tatin, which was delicious though still over-priced and then we took the metro back to the train and I got home right before I turned into a pumpkin.

After 16+ years in Sweden, I get over to Copenhagen once every 18 months or so, and here I've been THREE times since last July. Crazy. And I really, really want to go back again soon to visit the newly opened Aquarium. Maybe the first weekend in May! OMG, it's almost MAY. Next thing you know, it will be Christmas.

WEDDING PLANS & GARBAGE CANS

2013-04-15T18:59:03Z

In the interest of helping my daughter be more organized with her homework, school books and papers, I promised to give her a large plastic case I had up in the back of the closet. It's bright blue with 10 or so pockets and a flap that folds down over the front and closes with elastic bands. The pockets were all neatly labeled and there was an index card in a pocket on the front listing the contents of each pocket as well: ceremony, flowers, reception, catering, photographer, etc. I bought the case in 1995 and used it to hold all the documents and materials that I accumulated while planning our wedding, which took place in June, 1996.

The elastic was stretched out and floppy and the layer of dust on the cover of the case was, frankly, embarrassing, but in my own defense, I HAVE cleaned it out once before...a long time ago, after we moved to Sweden. But every pocket still contained something of enough importance that I felt the need to hold on to it.

Tonight, I went through and winnowed it down again. I threw away the following:

receipts & copies of checks, business cards and contracts for the photographer, the violinist (that my sister met on a plane!), the dress, the DJ, the flowers, the cake, the catering, the reception hall, the church, the hotel room, and our travel itinerary for our honeymoon
spreadsheet of cost comparisons for photographers
1996 White Sox schedule
spreadsheet of costs of each section of our month-long honeymoon (Athens, Istanbul, Santorini, Naxos, Sweden)
lists of household items we already had
wishlists for the wedding registry for things we DIDN'T have yet
printouts from actual purchases from the wedding registry (strangely, no one bought us the $150 espresso machine)
pages ripped from magazines with pictures of my dress (long since sold) and the bridesmaid dresses and a page of flower ideas that I liked
sheet music for the Delsbo Wedding March
The minister's play-by-play for the entire ceremony including instructions such as TELL THEM TO SIT DOWN
page after page after page of photograph orders by number and placement for albums

Things I actually kept anyway for posterity:

The catering contract which listed all the food for the reception including, of course, Swedish meatball appetizers
The questionnaire for the DJ which has NO checked for the following: Hokey-Pokey? Bunny Hop? Polka's? (sic) but YES checked for Ethnic Music and then the description: Swedish—Peps Persson, Dan Hylander :D
Receipts and appraisal information for my wedding and engagement rings
2 copies of the ceremony program
2 copies of the wedding invitations
spreadsheet of the invited guests, which included columns labeled "sent", "likely" and "responded". There are at least 3 people listed that I have no recollection of whatsoever.
copies of our wedding certificate
The angry 2-page letter that I wrote to the first Swedish church that dumped us, just because I write an awesome angry letter

Keep in mind that I have 4 photo albums plus all the original proofs, the guestbook from the reception that everyone wrote in, a framed copy of the invitation that my friend Sharon who sang at the wedding gave to me (currently in the back of the closet) plus a little organizer notebook with most of the details filled out, and which also includes such helpful information as a entire page of text, divided into columns, headed "Who pays for what".

I should scan some wedding pics, shouldn't I? We should go buy a new scanner/printer, shouldn't we?

THE URGE TO PURGE

2013-04-13T21:10:53Z

The dining room table is covered in Lego again, but I swear this is the last time. My mom sent 5 pieces home with Karin from Dallas and now they've been added to the kits that were missing them and labels are ready to be printed. Now we just need to decide what we actually want to do with it all: sell it? or stick it up in the attic for posterity?

There is also a stack of old comic books on the table that Anders needs to go through; Karin and I did a number on her room today and cleaned out a lot of the stuff that has been collecting dust on her shelves for several years. One shelf was full of magazine holders stuffed with her dad's old Tintins and comics. We already have boxes of comic books filling OUR closet and the thought of adding another one makes me hunch my shoulders. In addition to the comics, we need a magazine intervention...I have boxes and boxes of old Martha Stewart Living magazines (they're so PRETTY; how can I throw them away??) and Anders has boxes and boxes of old motorcycle magazines. It's not like we'll ever go back and read through them again, though I COULD see decimating the Livings for recipes, so why do we keep them all?

What is it that makes us keep stuff? Especially stuff like this?

Karin went through stacks of old school workbooks and papers and drawings and pitched most of it. She has a really hard time parting with STUFF so I was proud of her for being so good today about clearing some of the clutter. Martin came in to laugh over some of the stuff we were finding, and I said, "don't get too complacent: YOU'RE NEXT" ...but he doesn't have nearly as much junk hoarded in his room as she did, and to be honest, not near as much as his parents do.

I seem to go in waves when it comes to packratting and purging. Sometimes it's so easy to pitch stuff, other times it's impossible. I know part of it is not wanting to let go of the past...or the person I was at various times in my life, but 6 boxes of magazines I'll never look at again? Enough already.

What about you? Are you a keeper or a sweeper?

PLANNING IS BRINGING THE FUTURE INTO THE PRESENT*

2013-04-07T19:35:23Z

You'll be surprised, I'm sure, to hear that I have a crazy week ahead. ALERT THE MEDIA! Something every day! Something every night! This kind of thing NEVER happens.

Heh.

We went to see Oz the Great and Powerful tonight with my cousin Cate and her daughter, whom we haven't seen since forever ago. It was a last minute decision, but I've been wanting to see the movie since I heard about it, so I was excited, and the opening credits were quite clever and I was thrilled and then: meh. Terrible acting, stupid side bits, glurge and ridiculousness. SO disappointed. The backgrounds and special effects were fantastic, though. I always say Oz the Great and Terrible, not Powerful, so now I have to go check my Baum because I don't know which one is correct. However, I shall forevermore refer to the movie version as Oz the Great and Terrible Acting.

There are lots of movies coming out that look like they will be good and fun and exciting, but now I'm feeling wary.

I have several things on my mind that are churning around. One is what to serve my American colleague when I have her over for dinner this week. She doesn't eat fish so salmon is out. Hopefully it will be decent weather and we can grill something.

The other is that my friend Russell reminded me that we had talked a long time ago about going somewhere (all of us) for our big birthdays next year (his birthday is just a few days after mine). I was hoping to stay in denial about the whole thing until after it had safely passed, but I guess I'll have to admit it's coming, even though I still have over a year to pretend it's happening to someone else. He and his wife have traveled all over the world so coming up with a place that they haven't been to, and that we all want to go to isn't going to be easy, especially since if we are taking the whole family, the expenses have to stay reasonable. I thought first about Ireland as I haven't been and would really like to go...but of course they have. Anders came up with Croatia this morning and found some interesting info about it as ammunition. I'm not sure, though. Some of the places I'd really like to see, that I haven't already been to yet, are St. Petersburg, Prague, Ireland and more of England than just London.

And then there are places that I loved and would be very happy to go back to again: Netherlands (never enough), Norway, Switzerland. And there are other places that I have thought about as well: Hawaii. Alaska. South Africa.

Let's face it, I'm not getting any younger as that looming birthday makes clear. So what's the better choice? Going someplace I've never been to or revisiting some place I loved and might not have a chance to get back to otherwise?

*Title from a quote by Alan Lakein

COMPELLED BUT NOT COMPELLING

2013-04-05T19:05:37Z

There still seems to be a pull for me away from the computer and away from writing; I'm not 100% sure what is causing it. I know that part of it is because of sitting at a computer for 10 or so hours nearly every day, intensely working. When I come home, I still check emails and a few other not really essential things on the ipad or PC but to sit down and write seems to take more effort than it used to. Whatever...I'm prepared to fake it 'til I make it.

The sun has been shining nearly every day and it's warming my soul along with the earth, even though the actual temperatures have still to rise far above the zero line. It's coming, though.

The kids and I got hooked on Smash recently, after I bought the first season on DVD. I was already a Katherine McPhee fan, after hearing her on Spotify (I think), a couple of years ago and buying 2 of her CDs. I had seen a commercial for the show before it came out on Swedish TV last year but never actually caught it. So we were able to watch the whole season in one big gulp. Grown-up Glee, basically, in a good way.

It's myskväll tonight but Karin picked Spiderman 2 and I'm not in the mood for screaming and splosions, which helped propel me in here and is now going to compel me to shut the door because GAWD, the screaming and the splosions! I've never seen the movie but the 15 minutes I just put halfheartedly in (while also downloading the last 3 issues of Intelligent Life on the iPad) wasn't enough to make me a fan. Tobey Maguire reminds me of a basset hound, more or less. I don't really get his appeal. And there's no one else in it that I care enough about to sit and watch for another hour and a half.

I've had a head cold all week, completely stuffed up nose and sinuses. I can't tell you how disgusting I find it all. Or how SICK I AM of blowing my nose with no result. I blow my damn nose a lot as it is, thanks to year-round 24/7 allergies, but this week: WORLD CHAMPION of nose-blowing. GAH. I feel fine otherwise, though, which is a bonus. Not being able to breathe through your nose SUCKS.

Tomorrow Martin and I are going to Copenhagen for the afternoon with a new colleague of mine, based in the US who is here for 2 weeks of training. I'm her mentor, sort of, so I want to be sure she feels comfortable and taken care of and not left completely to her own devices for 2 weeks (she doesn't get to have her mom with her, sadly, like I usually do when the situation is reversed). I did manage to get a late morning pickup time scheduled, so at least I don't have to get up too early, and can still enjoy a little bit of a sleep-in. I'm glad Martin agreed to tagging along...I find 3 people is much more fun in situations like this. One of my other colleagues was going to go with us, too, but she just sent me a message to say her husband had scheduled something without telling her, so she's out.

What IS there to write about? My head is too full of gunk and not full enough of ideas, inspiration, words or anything else remotely interesting.

TAP TAP ...IS THIS THING ON?

2013-03-31T18:38:55Z

That lasted longer than I planned or liked, but it felt necessary. And to be honest, one of the major reasons for the break was that I felt like my head was crammed full of work with no time or room for anything else, and that is STILL the case, but I can't keep radio silence anymore. I MISS this place. And if I don't start now, I may never be able to get started so ...

Karin is in Dallas. She's been there for a week playing soccer and having the time of her life in the sunshine, despite having to be goalie (not her regular position) and getting clobbered with balls in the face, and players in the face and CLEATS in the face (she's fine!). By all accounts she did a great job and judging by the low scores of their opponents against them, she managed to put up an excellent defense. Her team made it to the playoffs, but lost in the quarterfinals to one of the top teams.

I wasn't VERY freaked out about her flying so far away without me/us as long as I didn't think about it too much, but now I'd like her to be home again, please and thank you. My mom and Aunt Judy and my sister and her family, and my good friends Kathey & Russell were there to cheer her on, take her shopping and out to dinner and I'm so glad they were. She is having a fantastic time and has only one day left and I know she doesn't want to come home.

But! the sun is shining here, too, and it FINALLY feels like spring is realy, truly, just around the corner. Martin and I went for a walk today and even though it still LOOKS like winter, there was no snow and the creekbeds were high with running water and there were some tight small buds on the sun-facing bushes. Almost, the air seems to breathe: almost!

The situation with work is better left unsaid, I suppose. It's consuming me. Trying to put it aside doesn't work. Trying to ignore it doesn't work. Trying to keep up with it doesn't work. My boss is back from vacation on Tuesday and we have a new graphic designer in the US who will be here for 2 weeks training, so I'm really hoping that will begin to make a difference. Time will tell.

I'm so glad spring is nearly here. I am yearning for warmth and lilacs and bumblebees and the sound of lawn mowers and vacation.

HIATUS

2013-03-02T20:38:00Z

I'll be back.

SLEEPLESS IN SOUTHERN EUROPE

2013-02-21T19:41:38Z

What a crazy week. Do you know what word I realized this week I over-use? Crazy. Reflection on my life much? Heh. Landed in Madrid on Sunday night and had no problems getting to the hotel or the office and the trainings went really well, but the flight plan didn't. Iberia Airlines went on strike and our flight from Madrid (actually we were in Tres Cantos which is on the outskirts of the city) to Turin on Tuesday was cancelled. We ended up having to stay an extra night and take the red-eye Wednesday morning to Italy via Munich instead. And the hotel didn't have a room for me on Tuesday night so the Spanish office manager had to move me to a different one.

Beware, she told me, it's ...different. Coralie put it more succinctly, "It's a PALACE! An experience! You will love it!"

I don't know about love, but it was certainly impressive: huge lobby with the biggest crystal chandelier I have ever seen, marble everything everywhere and loads and loads of red, gold and black lacquer Chinese decorations.

.

That photo gives no proportion on how big the room actually was. That wasn't even HALF of it. I opted out of a second super late night out with the Southern European team since the first night hadn't ended before 12 and I had to get up at 5:20 am Wednesday morning to meet the taxi with my colleagues to the airport.

What is UP with the Spanish schedule? I do not get how they can eat so very very late, stay up so very very late and make it to work in the mornings at the same time as the rest of us. I made some joke about siestas and was told they were a myth...but honestly, I NEEDED one after just 2 days!

But I didn't wake up at 5:20 am...I woke up at 3:30 am and couldn't get back to sleep. Alas, alack. So all of Wednesday morning passed in a blur of travel. I called my brother, who works in Munich, and told him where I was and that I would be back the next day for longer and expected him to try to take time out of his equally crazy work life to come meet me for lunch and then we boarded the next plane for Turin.

We got to the Italian office just after 2 pm and they were JUST finishing up lunch, so we shoveled down salad and roast beef and then I jumped right into the trainings, which again went really well (I think I'm getting the hang of it now) and had a couple of hours after 5 to check in at the hotel and rest...crazily enough, I used most of that time to...you guessed it, work.

Then we went out to dinner & entertainment (sadly, the food was not very good (O! Italy! What a disappointment!) and the entertainment was all in Italian, though my entertainment was mostly meeting, talking to, and enjoying the company of my colleagues. But again, not home before midnight, and my wake-up call this morning was 6:10 am. I am not made for early mornings. At ALL.

Taxi, airport bus, plane, airport bus, airport bus, plane, train, taxi and finally home at 4 pm today: muddy and exhausted. Biggest bummer: my brother couldn't get away from work. I know the feeling, but DISAPPOINTED. :(

Back to the grind tomorrow and then it's Anders' turn to leave for a work trip. 2 weeks single-parenting: UGH.

SIZZLE AND SIGH

2013-02-13T18:31:55Z

Feeling the burn, but not the one I should be. More the burn of going down in flames. The searing sound of burn-out headed my way if I don't look out, brake hard, turn this bus around. Teenage drama at home is definitely not helping matters.

Heavy sigh

Paris was a whirlwind one-day zoom in and out of the office. Which is actually in Antony, which is quite some ways from Paris itself, so I never had a glimpse of anything remotely Parisian, though there WERE macarons in the airport, which I restrained from. The plane was delayed an hour which meant my taxi pick-up wasn't there when I arrived at 10:30 pm and after fruitless waiting, phone calls, frustration and just plain ridiculousness, I gave up after an HOUR and managed to find another taxi that would get me to my hotel. My French colleagues commiserated and told me French taxi drivers are the worst.

Training was well-received though I was nervous about the second one and talked too fast...work is stressing me out beyond belief. Not because of the training, necessarily, just the amount of work coming in which is heaping all over me and my team. I don't know why I feel such responsibility to deal with it all. Working weekends and evenings is not helping as it seems to barely keep me from the breaking edge of catastrophe but I never really feel like I'm even close to caught up. My boss is well aware of the problem and is trying to figure out a solution, so guess until then I will just continue to cope.

The airline personnel at Orly airport were also ridiculous and should call up those taxi drivers and go bowling. When I went to the gate, after checking in and going through security, there was a sign above the gate saying that the 9:35 pm flight to Copenhagen was BOARDING NOW in big red flashing letters. I had been going to ask at the gate if they could switch me from the aisle seat I had been given to a window seat so I could try to sleep, but if we were boarding now there wasn't time for that. So I got in the line that stretched from the gate around the corner to another gate. But after 15 minutes of standing there, I overheard someone else asking if the line I was in was the one for Copenhagen, and a man some ways in front of me answered that no, it was for the flight to Nice. HRM, okay, I thought.

So I went back to the original gate and asked why the sign said boarding now for the Copenhagen flight if it was not, in fact, boarding now. Gallic shrugs were the response. Okay then, I asked, can I please switch my seat for a window instead of an aisle? Non non, the plane is full, madam.

Sigh. So I sat down and waited until they actually began the boarding process, only to send us around to that other gate and let us stand THERE for another half an hour before actually letting us board the plane. I was in row 16, exactly in the middle of the plane. Every seat around me was full all the way to the front of the plane. We finished boarding and took off and as soon as we reached cruising altitude I unbuckled my seatbelt, stood up and turned around to go to the bathroom at the back of the plane. And what to my wondering eye should appear? EMPTY SEATS ALL THE WAY BACK.

Super sigh! I asked the attendant if I might move to an empty row and was told immediately that it was no problem. So I got to lie down, which I don't think I've done on an airplane in a hundred years. But alas, I never did manage to sleep.

I wonder what they were thinking of when they were assigning seats, that they packed everyone into the front half of the plane instead of spacing people out in window and aisle seats throughout, which is the usual practice. It seems dangerous to me to cause the plane to be front-heavy, but maybe it doesn't matter?

Anyway, it was planes, trains and automobiles all the way home and I got in just after 1 a.m. The next trip hopefully won't be so crazy as I'm not flying so late either way. I just need to get through this week with my sanity intact and then it's off to Madrid and Turin!

SWIFT KICK IN THE BUTT

2013-02-05T21:19:44Z

Work, sleep, work, sleep, work, sleep, work. Hmmm, I think I might be in a rut. It's not the first time, and I'm pretty sure it won't be the last, but I need to find a way to start climbing out of it. I could do something drastic, but I'm not really the drastic type. Although, come to think of it, maybe trying ON drastic would be a sure-fire way to leap, arms akimbo, from the bottom of this gorge. It's not THAT deep...yet.

Drastic things: quit my job, leave my family, move, shave my head

oooh, far too drastic. Not even in the realm of contemplatively drastic. Not even close.

Not-so-drastic things: take charge of my own boredom, stick with the program, reverse comfortable stagnation

They sound not-so-drastic, but are surprisingly hard to do. If something is hard to do and you do it, does that make it drastic? What does it take to get you to do the not-so-drastic, yet hard-to-do things?

Why is it so easy to slide into slackerhood? You might think, what? Slacker? Lizardek? Hardly! Look at that calendar! Look at all those appointments, obligations and dates and the length of those to-do lists. But the truth is, I do much less than I used to. Maybe I've earned it. Maybe it's okay to slow down and take it easy. Maybe it's just part of growing older. Maybe I'm just tired.

And while all of that is partially true, I don't really believe that is all this is about. I think my inner slacker has become my outer one. I think I have to shed it like a snakeskin, peel it off slowly and carefully and rediscover what lies underneath.

Not-drastic-at-all-in-fact-rather-concrete things: rearrange/renovate rooms in the house, really truly purge some stuff, get out the door and walk (damn it), start art

There. That's the beginning of the answer. Now if I could just figure out how to get things to balance at work I think I'd have the tipping point.

NOT AN EXCUSE

2013-01-31T21:03:32Z

I used to stay up really late. I'd write long blog posts after 10 pm and get them posted right before midnight. If my subject required it I'd spend a lot of time researching information to use in my writing. Or I'd read and read and read all my blogs and sites and use that as fodder for writing. Nowadays, I have to WREST the computer away from my kids or stay up late to use it, and sadly...I'm ready for bed by 10. In fact, most of the time, I'm ready for bed WELL before 10. Even if I do read for another 20-30-40 minutes, I'm almost always in bed by 10 these days. Even on weekends, I don't manage to stay up much later than that.

Is anyone else suffering from winter dry skin? I swear to god, it's driving me bananas. Thank goodness my daughter will scratch my back for me if I ask nicely and then return the favor and she will help me put lotion on my back and I have a backscratcher for emergencies, but AAAGH, I swear. It's horrible.

My dining room table is still covered in Lego. And a big box of photos to sort. And my blog book still isn't uploaded because our stupid Internet ran out at the end of the month again. It doesn't actually RUN OUT, it just gets really slow and impossible to do anything that requires uploading or buffering. No videos, and no image-heavy websites. But! Tomorrow is a new month and it's a short one and hopefully it will be a sunny one in which I get lots of projects FINALIZED so I can quit spending time on them and devote more hours to reading. And walking. In the sun. C'mon sun!

Pie Night, by the way, has been officially scheduled for March 16th. And then I was told that our AWC activities coordinators fell down on the job and didn't get a table booked for the annual St. Patrick's Day dinner and now they want me to make the Pie Night St Patrick-themed. I am not down with this actually. I'm resisting the idea. What is that? Because St. Patrick's has always mainly been (it seems to me) and excuse for people to get smashed and because I am boring and crotchety and also very very sober, I don't really want that to be the focus of pie night. When the focus should be on PIE.

Pie pie pie pie mmmmmmmmmmmmmm pie.

What do you think? I think I sound not only boring and crotchety and sober but OLD and GRUMPY, too. Get off my lawn you kids!

Heh.

We are gearing up for a lot of travel in the next 2 months. I am going to Paris for a couple of days and then to Madrid and Turin for 4 days total in February for a mini training roadshow in our Southern Europe region. Anders is going to Bangkok for 2 weeks in early March and then Karin is going to Dallas for a week over Easter break to play in an elite girls soccer tournament. I am bummed that we can't go with her but my mom and my sister & family will be there to cheer her on. I'm starting to have small palpitations thinking about her flying international without me/us. Eek.

SWING LOW

2013-01-27T18:45:06Z

With most of the family still sick or in recovery, it was wonderful to have a weekend that we were able to convalesce in as well as get things done that have been shoved aside by head cold, coughing, fever and general achiness. Even with being pretty productive, the kids and I got a lot of relaxation in and I feel pretty good about it, even if the part of my brain that is stressing about work had to be forcibly shoved back and down for a few days.

Martin got sick 2 weeks ago, but only missed one day of school. He's still, however, hanging onto a hollow and startling cough. I got it next and had a full-blown flu with everything except stomach upset, missing a day of work, and working through 3 days in a fog. But so far, no indication that it's traveled down to pnemonia this time (keeping fingers crossed). Karin had it the worst, missing 3 days of school, a soccer tournament, referree time and an innebandy match. She ran a high fever several days in a row and dragged about the house with her fleecy Cubs blanket in tow. She's still coughing too but I plan on kicking her to school tomorrow, come hell or high water.

Or blizzard, which is what it's doing right now.

Anders left Friday with a busload of work colleagues for a long weekend of skiing in the Czech Republic and hopefully managed to avoid the entire contagious mess completely.

I was actually kind of glad that Karin was still sick and running a fever this weekend as it meant we could cancel her participation in sports activities both yesterday and today and take it easy. I had a list of things that needed to be done, as cleaning the house hasn't been a high priority for anyone (hahaha, as if it's anyone else's priority to begin with) and craved some downtime of not needing to go anywhere or do anything for a couple of days. It's been non-stop go-go-go since we returned from the U.S.

So, I'm halfway through re-reading the first book of the Lymond Chronicles and have made major headway on 2 of my big projects, and did get some work done for the day job as well, though not as much as I'd have liked due to the end-of-month Internet dry-up. The kids and I watched several episodes of season 5 of The Big Bang Theory and the house is presentable again. Bills are paid, laundry is completely caught up and we're ready to start a new week.

I don't know about you, but I feel so much better when I'm caught up, on top of things, and have a planned idea of what lies ahead for the week to come.

SUCKS TO BE ME

2013-01-20T15:12:58Z

Gorgeous sunny weekend but I've been down with a head cold and bad cough and couldn't enjoy it much. *suck*

When I wasn't lying on the sofa feeling sorry for myself or in bed listening to what I suspect is my lungs wheezing (OMG NOT PNEUMONIA AGAIN, please god) I have been working on the Lego Project or my journal 2012 project or work. And trying to nail down a date for Pie Night.

Bleah. Also, cough cough coughcoughcoughhack

That is all.

SUBZURRRRO

2013-01-16T21:42:39Z

The trees have got their bling on again. Snow-sparkle ephemeral diamond gorgeousness. Yesterday, when I drove home the fog was so dense it was BLACK. Have you ever driven through black fog? It was creepy as all get-out. It was only when other car's lights hit it that I could see the whiteness. It's been FURRRREEZING this whole week, in the minus teens celsius. Then I drove Karin to soccer practice...outdoors. -11 degrees celsius, fog so thick they couldn't see halfway across the field and still, an hour and a half practice on snow-covered (unswept) artificial grass. CURRRRAZY.

I'm adding the URRRR as in BRRRR.

Hoary birches (make sure you read that right, haha!)

So much for the never-mentioned, mental-only resolution to write more often. I just looked up and dammit if another week hasn't gone by while I was working my ass off at work, working on projects at home, being REALLY grumpy and PMS-y but managing to keep most of the ranting to myself (cue husband snorting in disbelief, also children rolling eyes). If they think it was bad, they really have NO idea of what was actually going on in my head. Restraint, par excellence, I swear.

Work is INSANE. Add that to the grump, times it up by 10 and it makes for a VERY GURRRRUMPY lizardek. I keep trying to shake it but the only thing that will get it off my back, I suspect, is time. Either that, or another vacation. The problem with vacations is, while I'm getting my relax on, things are piling up back there at the office, which just stresses me out even more thinking about it. Argh. Gah.

Was having a very very selfish flash earlier this week. Did not want to come home and have to cook for anyone else or do laundry for anyone else or clean up after anyone else or even TALK to anyone else. I needed a hole to crawl into and growl for awhile. I still need it, on reserve. Do you ever feel like that or is it just me?

It's FURRRREEZING in the house right now. The furnace is out of whack and the only way to adjust it is to get down on the floor, behind the laundry room door, nearly flat, and reach your hand in between burning hot pipes and stuff and turn some knob that I can't even see. Yeah, that ain't happening. Anders is gone skiing tonight (in below -13.5 celsius weather, what is it with these Swedes??) so I can't ask him to fix it and Karin refuses to do it because she burned her hand last time.

Did I tell you we are paying double electric bills right now? We are paying for what we are using right now AND we are paying for electricity that we used in 2010 but were never billed for. If there wasn't a law stating that if a company has forgotten to bill you longer than 3 years ago, we would ALSO be paying for electricity that we used in 2009 but were never billed for, but thankfully there IS such a law. But still, it means double electric bills right now, so there's just another incentive NOT to turn the heat up, even though it is, as mentioned REALLY REALLY COLD. There's a draft on my ankles. My fingers are aching, but I type on; that's how dedicated I am. THAT'S how much I love you.

I'm reading, appropriately, an excellent book with a snow theme. The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey. It's really, really good and I can't figure out how it's going to end, which is ratcheting up my anxiety about the characters and also chilling my fingers into immobility because I have to hold the book outside the covers in order to get the light on the page.

I think I'll go microwave my dinkel-pillow and take it to bed with me, along with my mukluk slippers. Arctic! BRRRRR!

HAD TO BE DONE

2013-01-12T14:03:26Z

The other day I beat my husband home from work by only a few minutes. I had just sat down on the couch when he came in. It's cold again here in Sweden after several weeks of rather warm for winter temps and rain. We had a dusting of snow last night and I've plugged the car heater in each evening for making sure I could start it in the mornings.

When he walked into the living room I tipped my head back and said, "Hey there." He responded by putting his hand on my forehead. It was ice cold. "Aaaah," I said. He put the other one on my head, too. "That feels great," I remarked, "But why are your hands so freezing cold??"

"Because my heart is so warm," he said.

At dinner the next night, which happened to be at my sister-in-law's home, to celebrate the 16th birthday of her son, I repeated this story for my mother-in-law and then had to repeat it for everyone else while Anders put his head in his hands, all embarrassed. I leaned over and told him, "I am so blogging this, you know."

After I related the story again for my father-in-law, who is hard of hearing and had missed most of it the first time around, he said, with a perfectly straight face, "But the heart maintains a steady temperature of 37 degrees celsius" and couldn't understand why we all burst into laughter again.

I leaned over again to Anders: "TOTALLY blogging that, too."

***

16 years in Sweden. Plus the 6 in Belgium and Germany as a teenager, that makes 22 years abroad. In only 2 years, I'll have lived half my life overseas. I find it more remarkable every year, but really, what's remarkable about it? It's just my life and my home and how it is.

***

I have 3 big projects to work on right now, plus feeling like I should really do some work for WORK, at which there is too much to do to keep up with during work hours. I still have to finish the Lego Project (bwahahaha! Who am I kidding with that optimistic "finish"?), and I pulled out the big folder of photos I have crammed into the bookshelf to start sorting through. And I just PDF'd my 2012 journal entries so I can start formatting my next book. What? There's always SOMETHING to do!

***

We're going to see Fanny & Alexander tonight at Malmö Stadsteater. It's one of my favorite movies, and I love the story, so I'm looking forward to it, though the kids are much less enthusiastic about the prospect. I had asked for tickets for Christmas but didn't realize that Anders would buy 4 for the whole family. Oh well, chalk it up to cultural experience and hope they get something out of it for character growth, right?

STATE OF MIND

2013-01-09T23:09:34Z

We got talking at dinner time about the fact that our kids don't know a lot of American history. Yesterday I was doing a quick anacrostic that I had printed out before we flew home to do on the plane and then forgot about, and it was titled "Are you smarter than a grade schooler?" Martin was sitting with me while I was flying through the answers, and then complained that all the questions were too "American". In other words, you had to have been educated in the States to know most of them. So, tonight, back on the subject, sort of, Karin said she didn't think she could name all the States.

"I bet you can name more than you think," I warbled, and grabbed a pencil off the fridge and flipped over a piece of paper on the table. "Shoot!"

She started with Illinois and Michigan and I started writing down the 2-letter state abbreviations in a column.

IL
MI
FL
CA
NY
WA
TN
NC
SC
TX
WY
ID
HI (I didn't think that was right when I wrote it down, but turns out it is!)
ND
SD
OR
VA
WV (Karin then asked if there was a South Virginia)
VT
AK
AR (which she pronounced R-KANSAS. Cue mad giggling)
IN
PA
GA
MD
AL
MN
MS
KY

and then she got stuck. Really and totally stuck. "C'mon," I encouraged, "You're doing great." Struggle, struggle, think, think. Anders and Martin started giving her clues. 29 states down, 21 to go. And under extra pressure because she had to go get changed and ready for innebandy practice as we had to leave in 15 minutes.

CO
NJ
NM
NV
ME

...all with a LOT of help, but she DID finally come up with them. At that point, 34 states down, with Karin out of the room, yelling questions from the bathroom, Anders and Martin started trying to figure out which ones were left. "Oklahoma," said Martin, "Write them down on the back."

I turned the paper over, wrote OK, looked at it, looked up at Martin and then busted out laughing at the same time he did, while Anders looked on at us bellowing like hyenas, with complete bewilderment. I gave myself a headache laughing.

So now there were two parallel contests going on. Karin still trying to come up with as many more states as she could before our departure deadline and Martin and Anders trying to finish the list, too. I struck out the ones on their list as Karin got them.

Karin
MA
CT
LA
AZ
IA
MO
WI
NH
NE
RI

Martin/Anders
OK
AZ
NH
MA
RI
IA
MT
DE
WI
KS

Years ago in school one of my social studies teachers used to make us do lightning pop quizzes naming all the states IN ORDER. All I remember from it, though, is that there is one state starting with G, one state starting with H, and 8 each for M and N.

Karin had come up with 44. Anders and Martin had gotten an additional 4. As Karin and I headed out the door, Martin and Anders were puzzling over the fact that I had told them they had forgotten a big one.

Because of innebandy and shopping and putting groceries away and finishing laundry and then getting distracted by the last level unconquered on Where's My Water? we never got back to the game. After the kids went to bed, I came in to give them goodnight kisses and hugs and as I left Martin's bedroom, he whispered, "UTAH" behind me.

But nobody, not even me, remembered Ohio.

PUT A POST IN IT

2013-01-07T04:31:55Z

Walking into your home when you've been away for a couple of weeks is weird. Everything looks new and familiar at the same time. You notice small stuff. It takes several hours before your mind adjusts, but jet lag doesn't help any. We left a white wonderland for gray and rain, but it feels good to be home, though I already miss my mom and Michigan. How long is long enough?

Things that are different: tap water tastes better in Michigan, but the shower water is better here.

I have so much churning about in my head, but it's 5:30 in the morning and I've been awake for 2 hours and I have to get up in only 1.5 more to work for the first time in weeks and my head needs to get organized so I can do it. I just caught up with emails but can't catch up with LJ since it keeps going down.

I just caught up with my family and America but now I need to catch up with the rest of my life. Eek! 2013 is here, can you believe it? And now I've posted in it, so that's a start. A small one, but a start nonetheless.

RETROSPECTIVE

2013-01-01T03:11:12Z

e left snowy Sweden a week and a half ago, when the snow was melting and the rain was coming down...to come to Michigan for the holidays, where it was relatively warm and still green. A couple of days after we arrived, the snow came, too and it's been a real winter wonderland ever since...a true white Christmas. My sister and her family joined us at my mom's and the festivities included a huge party 2 days before Christmas with many of my cousins and other relatives, 2 college friends and their families and one friendly internet psycho (hi thehula!) and a boatload of food that we are STILL eating the leftovers from.

Christmas was good to us all, and the after-Christmas sales have been even better. >:) Now we're winding down a bit. Anders and Karin are going up north to ski for a couple of days and Martin and I will help my mom with things around the house. My sister left 2 days ago, taking her family home, and it sure got quiet quick around here. But we got in lots of cribbage and quality family time before they went, and I have to say, I miss them ALL already.

We've been to see The Hobbit and Life of Pi and still want to see Lincoln and Les Miserables if we can swing them before we head back to Sweden at the end of the week. Time sure flies when you're having fun!

Family & Personal Highlights of 2012

Weekend trip to Italy in April
A month of reading old favorite books
Reunion with my first family in Germany in early summer
Mom's 3-week visit in July
Karin's soccer team winning Gothia Cup in July
2 week work trip to Boston with Mom and Labor Day weekend with Sam & Joanne
Martin's class winning a science contest and a 3-day trip to London
The Lego Project
Committing to a 12-week Fitness challenge
First Christmas holidays in USA since 2002!

I read 101 books this year, slightly down from last year, but the same as 2010. I seem to hold steady just over 100, averaging 8.41 a month.

Best Books of 2012 (in no particular order and not including re-reads)

The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker
The Hare With Amber Eyes by Edmund de Waal
City of Thieves by David Benioff
The Vanishing Act by Mette Jakobsen
A Field Guide to Now by Christina Rosalie
Backseat Saints by Joshilyn Jackson
Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand
Doc by Mary Doria Russell
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
Among Others by Jo Walton
Lips Touch by Laini Taylor
The Sentinel Mage by Emily Gee
Troubled Waters by Sharon Shinn
Blackout and All Clear by Connie Willis

I don't remember what films I have seen other than the ones this week...I don't know why I don't keep track of them each year!

Best musical discoveries in 2012

Of Monsters and Men
Kina Grannis
Beth Hirsch
Kate Voegele
Imagine Dragons
Maia Sharp
Priscilla Ahn
Stiftelsen
Sophie Ellis-Bextor
Sarah Slean
birdpaula
Mariha
Yuna
Annika Moa
Pentatonix
Charlene Kaye

Some manageable goals for 2013

Walk Walk Walk!!
Possible family houseboat vacation in England
Getting a new bed and a new washing machine

It's 2 hours to midnight...we've got sparkling juice, sparklers and poppers to usher in the new year with. May 2013 bring you kindness, love, comfort and a sense of accomplishment!

(Drop cap courtesy of Jessica Hische's Daily Drop Cap)