The Next Dark Age
We're in it Now
Day of Service and Blanket Two
I had to work today, so I didn’t have a particular project for the MLK Day of Service. But just so you don’t think I am a slacker, I will have you know that I am scheduled for stuff with Project Linus, the Refuge and the Library this week. And I finished my second blanket:
Four rows single crochet of Red Heart Soft yarn in Denim Stripe around the solid blue fleece. I am also tantalizingly close to finishing a fully crocheted blanket, but I have to keep stopping for things like work and sleep and blogging.
This was my first full day back in the office since returning to town and it will be my first full week in the office since before Thanksgiving. Also – I really have to work on getting some exercise. But for now? Blankets and audio books.
Her Fearful Symmetry, by Audrey Niffenegger
Book 2
I remember The Time Traveler’s Wife as a book that had a lot of potential that it didn’t quite fulfill. It built this really interesting world and then ditched what I thought were more interesting themes in favor of a love story. I read this book in hope of better things.
Eh.
Woman in London dies and leaves her estate to her twin sister’s twin daughters with the stipulation that the daughters – age 21 – will live in her London flat for one year before selling it. And the parents may not set foot in the flat for that year.
Cool, right?
So the woman is a ghost and stuck in the flat. Her romantic partner lives in the building, too. And upstairs is an OCD guy whose wife just walked out on him.
Still cool. (SPOILERS!)
But the characters are unsympathetic to downright stupid. It occurred to me about a third of the way into the book that one of the girls might die. I was ok with that. The punchline of the book occurred to me the very minute that it was set up. (Thanks to The Skeleton Key, a not particularly good Kate Hudson film that happened to scare the bejeezus outta me.)
Here’s the truth: OCD guy and his wife have, in my opinion, a far more compelling story. He has the kind of OCD where…you wash the floor so as to cause a leak in the ceiling downstairs. More than once. It has obviously degenerated and he can barely leave his own flat. She left him and moved to Amsterdam, saying in effect, “I love you but I can’t live like this anymore. If you want to fix this, you can come to Amsterdam.” So if the guy wants his wife back, he has to get his illness under control which will take time, meds and serious effort. What does he do?
I would read that novel.
The rules of Ghost World are pretty interesting and I don’t think enough attention was paid to them. Perhaps that was because the ghost is learning the rules as she goes along. But I felt left hanging on that issue. Also, the subplot of drama involving the mother and aunt, twins themselves, added nothing to the story. The theme of the super-bond of twins felt melodramatic to me.
The three good things are the interesting premise, story of OCD guy and that in the end, everyone pretty much got what they deserved.
A New Blanket Day
I may have mentioned that every other month, my chapter of Project Linus gathers in a local church and spend a good part of a Saturday making blankets. Finished blankets are “processed” by sewing in Project Linus labels, tagged, counted and bagged for delivery to local hospitals and other organizations that give them to children in need. I have tried to join the “processing” activities, but I don’t sew very well and there are plenty of other volunteers that can manage much better. So I work my own projects.
Today, there were so many people that we ran out of chairs. As you might expect, there were plenty of sweets, as we are all trying to clear the holiday treats out of our houses. One volunteer brought chili. The chapter received donations of yarn and fabric and these were divided up among volunteers to use for various blanket projects. I have two in progress right now, because I didn’t want to bring a half-finished one on the road with me. So I tossed a couple of skeins in my suitcase with a crochet hook. I brought that one with me.
Halfway through the day, I got up to stretch and found the pile of completed blankets:
Around the corner were more blankets that had already been bagged:
And around another corner there were more:
I forgot to ask for a final count, but it looked pretty impressive to me.
If you are local and interested in participating, here is the link to the website. It has calendars for future events and other instructions.
Why I Moved My Blog
It starts with feeling like I needed a new theme around here. I created my Blogger journal for an assignment in my e-business course a few years ago. I cranked out the idea based on what was on my mind at that minute in order to score a good grade. It evolved a different way. Also:
I have been struggling with Blogger for awhile. A lot of it is about formatting. But mostly, I was feeling like Google doesn’t give the product a whole lot of love. Then Marlee, of Marlee in Debt wrote this and I took a look at WordPress.
I started thinking about how Google monetizes. While I am all in favor of Google making a profit, I am rather over Google ads. I would rather pay the company hosting my blog than deal with…geez. I hope Blogger doesn’t go the way of LiveJournal. I don’t really see that coming, but it could happen.
So I created a WordPress account. I played around a bit. I don’t love everything about it, but I can work with it. And I haven’t even upgraded to a paid account yet. The widgets aren’t as pretty and the layout takes some getting used to but I can work with it.
And then. I was able to import my entire old blog in absolutely no time. Color me sold.
Best Wedding Ever
I was privileged to cap off Big Meeting week in Honolulu with the wedding of Stefphanie, colleague and friend. She and Vince have been together for six years and decided to get married in Hawaii with a tiny group of us and then have big ol’ parties with their families upon their return.
It was to be an in-the-park at sunset affair. The car picked us up at 4:30. One of these:
We arrived to find the minister, who was a bit nervous because the photographer had not arrived. Messed up calendar or something, which really sucked because pictures at a sunset wedding require..sunset. The minister put out a couple of SOS calls and Stef charitably said that if they couldn’t get a photographer right away, they would get married and meet a photographer for pictures the next night.
While this drama was going on, there was some commotion on the other side of the park. Turns out they were filming an episode of Hawaii 5-0. Half of our group went all fan-girl and ran over to watch.
I was not one of them.
But Stef’s cousin, Holly, spotted Scott Caan, walked right up to him and told him the story. Wedding. Missing photographer. Would you mind if..? So the bride and groom were photographed with the actor, and that went right up on Facebook.
Around that time, people starting poking their heads around our limo to see if anyone famous was inside. Heh.
A real photographer arrived and there was a wedding. It took about ten minutes, which is always great. Holly held her phone out on speaker so that Stefphanie’s mom could listen in. Not sure whether that was planned or a “While you are on the line” after we called to tell her about Scott Caan. But it was sweet.
I am not going to give you pictures of people, but here were a couple of the scene.
Then we went back to the hotel for a drink whereupon I left for the airport.
Seriously, it was the best wedding ever.
Pictures Like this Are Why I Love the Chicago Tribune
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| That stupid Marilyn Monroe statue downtown during the first snowfall of the season. |
Island Time
Big Company Meeting in Hawaii this week. Yeah, yeah. I’d explain why it is all a big pain, but you wouldn’t believe me.
Things on the island are more laid back. Meaning that if a meeting is supposed to start at 2pm, it will really be at 2:15. Makes me crazy, actually. But here’s where it got funny:
Last night, my sixth in town, was the end of the big functions. When I got back to my room, there was a gift box on my bed. I opened the card, thinking it was a Thank You. “Time to Relax” would have been premature.
The card read (in short), “We welcome you here to the islands of Aloha…You have our commitment that…Please feel free to let us know how we can make your stay more memorable.” Followed by the contact information of five people.
It was a lovely box of Hawaiian shortbread cookies.
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, by Betty Smith
Book 1, 2012
This is another that falls into the category of, “Books that everyone read in school. Except me.” I’ve been stalling on reading it for awhile, because everyone said it was so sad. Started with the audio book and finished on the airplane – boy are Brooklyn accents harsh.
Eh. I’ve read worse. (SPOILERS)
The novel follows a family living in poverty in Brooklyn, mostly during the years preceding WWI. If you don’t count the infant mortality rate of women that can’t afford medical care (and I don’t because it only indirectly affects our main characters), the saddest thing that happens is the daddy drinks himself to death. It is a tragedy, but we are also told this way in advance. Also, there is so much forshadowing of the event that an 11-year old could see it. Since an 11-year old would be the intended audience. I was braced for it.
There is also a terrible, terrible moment when a 15 year old girl has to decide whether to take a promotion that would make her more money than her fmaily has ever seen before..or go to high school in the fall. Seriously, I found that family discussion more tense than anything else in the story.
I was very interested to read the mother’s consistent feelings about taking charity. She would rather starve. And have her children starve. I am not sure if this was a matter of “a different time” or the immigrant experience, but it was striking.
I also appreciated the running demonstrations of the ways teachers can make or break the aspirations of children.
I loved this book. Loved.
Project Linus – Year One
Let’s start with my last two blankets of the year:
Blanket 69 starts with this blue fleece from Ikea. It is large, as seen on a queen sized bed. So it doesn’t need to be cut at all, just run through with the rotary skip stitch blade to crochet. I forget who in our chapter found this, but at $2.49 it is a great deal. I bought several and swapped them for prepared fleece, then got one back the next time around. I forget what the yarn is, but I want to say it was one from Bernat.
Blanket 70 was just your average piece of pink fleece and a Red Heart variegated yarn. I think it was the Cotton Candy one again.
And that was the year. 70 Blankets is pretty good for Year One, I think.
So as I reflected a bit on the experience and what I want to do in 2012, I had several thoughts.
First, when I turned in my completed blankets at the last Starbucks night, Peggy pulled them out of the bag to put the special Project Linus tag on them and saw that I had a fully crocheted blanket in with several crocheted-edge fleece. I said, “Yeah. I’d forgotten how long it takes to do them.” I can finish a fleece inside of one average professional sports game (I finished my first 2012 blanket during the Bears game yesterday). Fully-crocheted takes forever. So it is hard to put a number on how many blankets I plan to do next year.
Also, I am still only doing a single crochet. The ladies at Project Linus are certain that at some point, I will want to branch out and stuff takes longer when one is learning.
But what I can say is that I made time to attend more events than I originally thought I could do. I made nearly all of the bi-monthly Saturday events and was a regular at the monthly Wednesday evening gatherings at Starbucks. I have met a lot of wonderful people who welcomed me warmly even though I haven’t a fraction of their artistic skills.
I’ve said that my chapter is large and active. I have already offered to help if they are interested in taking the networking to the next level online. But I’m not sure they even need it!
Overall, I am very happy with the experience and plan to continue as an active donor and volunteer in 2012.
Goal Check – 2011
So here is what I wrote last year and how it went:
We held a fundraising walk on Memorial Day that raised a bunch of money. Another volunteer picked up the grant writing and ran with it, although I don’t know what kind of results she had. Finally, my employer started a charitable matching contribution program that I maxed out in support of the Refuge. I am calling a Win on this goal, but we’d better step it up next year.
At the Library, we have talked a lot about how to keep all of the volunteers better informed. It is really hard to keep everyone on the same page when we are all working one-at-a-time. I owe our director an e-mail on the instructions regarding onsite sales of Amazon listed books.
Didn’t make much progress here. Not all volunteers are online so we have relied on a notebook to keep volunteers informed onsite. But not all of us are onsite at regular intervals. We are having another planning committee meeting soon and I expect we will be discussing this again.
I mentioned that I am beginning to contribute blankets to Project Linus. I am not sure how active I can be in the local chapter, but I think I am halfway through my second contribution.
I rocked this one, and will discuss it further in a separate post.
I was disappointed that I only made it to 50 Books read in 2010. However, it seems to be a reachable goal, so I’d better stick with it. I will commit to reading every book that my Book Club selects, even if I am not able to attend the meetings.
I hit 65 books, thanks to the audio section of the Library. However, I did skip one Book Club Book. The meeting was on the day of a Bears game and it would have been a re-read anyway.
I am not going to commit to visiting any place new in 2011. The winter vacation is a repeat, and unless I have a much better idea, I think I want to go back to New Orleans this year.
I did not visit any new cities in 2011. However, I have a vacation to Kauai planned for late winter (been to Hawaii, but not this particular island) and a conference scheduled for Wrightsville Beach, NC (been to the state, not this area). I do not have hard plans for the summer yet.
Several months of the year were defined by my mother’s health crisis and the aftermath. For the most part, she is recovering nicely. There are some ugly straggling bills coming in, but it could all have been so much worse.
I did some pro bono work through the Taproot Foundation, finishing up my first project recently. It was mostly a positive experience, but it became very difficult to schedule with my other commitments. I should write up a complete post on that.
We lost two pets this year, Shadow the Dog and Spooky the Cat. We adopted Gibbs as a puppy this summer and made a serious goal of making sure he is well-trained and socialized. His training is going well. He does. not. like. strangers. Also, Sigmund the Foster Grey has decided that he is staying. I believe this is called a “failed foster” and his adoption is pending.
Finally, I have used the Internet to do a whole lot more networking and idea-sharing with other non-profits and volunteers. I have not contributed much to Glenview Patch lately, though.
So. I owe posts to my blog on Sigmund, Project Linus, Great Non Profits, and Taproot. I go back to work tomorrow for one day, then leave for Big Work Meeting. I think it is going to be a good year.
The Next Dark Age 