See you in 2010!
So I guess, like, Merry Christmas and stuff.
It's been a weird year. I put together my photo "yearbook" in iPhoto yesterday and titled it: The Waiting Area; 2009 never happened. Because that's what this year has felt like. Limbo. I don't know if this feeling is specific to the year - will things suddenly start moving again when I peel open this year's wall calendar from my uncle? Probably not. But that's what we always hope for, right? That the new year will change something, and we can simply leave behind the things we don't want.
- President Barack Obama. Although I'm a bit non-plussed with the Copenhagen agreement, I am still SO GLAD he got elected. I trust him to make good decisions even if I may not agree 100% of the time, and it has been a long time since I trusted a president. I think I felt pretty good about Jimmy Carter when I was 6.
- Expanded unemployment benefits. If this money weren't available I would likely be homeless by now. That may sound a bit dramatic, but I have now joined the ranks of those just a couple of steps from financial disaster, and once you're on that ledge it's easy to slip off of it.
- Infinite Summer. I joined the ranks of David Foster Wallace fans who read or re-read Infinite Jest over the summer. I'm glad I finally read it, but it really needs a 2nd or 3rd reading...
- I went to San Francisco and finally met Patty, Laurel, Deborah, and karen. It felt like I've known them for years! I'm still kind of amazed by the connections I've made through Vox. It doesn't seem to happen anywhere else on the interwebs...
- My cousin bought a lake house. It's more of a "cabin" really... but it is a place I can stay on Lake Coeur d'Alene in the summertime for free.
- The birth of anemone. I don't really know where it will go at this point, but it has been an adventure planting the seed.
- I've made progress on my memoir and other writing projects. Not nearly as much progress as I wanted to make... but everything slows down in Limbo.
- I'm getting used to a healthier, simpler lifestyle. More cooking, less eating out, and simpler meals to boot. Less compulsive buying, or spending money on things like haircuts. It's really kind of nice.
- I was able to wean myself off antidepressants without major setbacks.
My favorite Christmas Carol is "God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman." It is probably no coincidence that this is also the only actual Christmas carol mentioned by name in "A Christmas Carol." The Christmas in my head is a decidedly English affair, and God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen strikes me as the most English of carols.
I got a yen to hear my favorite Christmas song earlier today, so I headed on over to iTunes to buy myself a copy. I was hoping for a version sung by fat, jolly English baritone types, possibly with an orchestra. This is what I got.
I ended up buying the one by the Chieftans, as a lesser of all evils, but I'm not even entirely sure that scratches my anglophile itch. Vexing.
On a happier note, Merry Christmas everybody! Wishing you and yours the best this holiday.
Well, it's Christmas at last, and from the sound of you all on Twitter your cards are sent, and your presents wrapped. It's been great hearing all your cries of delight recently, as your poor postmen and women have struggled with packages through the snowy weather!
Hope those of you who have time off over the festive season get everything you wish for, and those who are working have more fun than you might be expecting. We've published the dates we're working over the holidays, so if you find yourself in the office, you might well have company here in the UK, or over with the MOO Crew in the US.
We've had a great few weeks spotting unique gifts and ideas created with MOO, here's a few of our favourites:
A tetrabox advent calendar, by Bcome
Also by Bcome, this lovely looking memory game, complete with a great pattern on the back:
This super-cute Mosaic Frame, created by thisiswoly. Filled with 20 Minicards, it features the beautiful baby Sarah.
These wonderful looking alphabet game cards, by taraghb, which look like they were as fun to make as they will be to use!
And last but not least, look at this! another entry into our MiniCard Gift Box competition! Created by emusing-emma, it's really bought an extra flutter of Christmas cheer into MOO Towers. We love his little sledge!
Fancy joining in the fun? Closing date for entries to our competition is midnight PST 28th December 2009. Why not grab some festive paper, and see what you can do! More competition details can be found right here.
And now all that remains for me to say is a Very Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays from everyone at MOO!
Thoughts of these future events are making me happy right now:
- Hanging out with my brother and sister-in-law on Friday. One family Christmas tradition is to go see a bad movie. I'm voting for Sherlock Holmes even though I don't expect it will be bad.
- Seeing a few other friends who are in town for the next few days. It was also nice to see adjunct family who were in town last weekend.
- Moving to a new office space! Only five blocks from home, with daylight (if indirect; it's a heavily windowed interior space inside of a heavily windowed second floor loft that houses five or six other offices) It's a portion of an architect's office. I will be moving in sometime after the first week of January. The unhappy part is leaving the nice people at the space where I currently work.
- Spending New Year's Eve with M-----l (plus a fews eves afterward). I usually celebrate New Year's Eve by going to sleep before 11 and being grumpy when fireworks and carousers wake me up an hour later. That might happen this year, too, but it should be more fun shared. Or maybe we'll play records.
- Meeting Crankypants and Elvis in February! I'm looking forward to spending the first half of President's Day weekend in Philadelphia with them. If Cranky can stand my company any longer than that, we may carpool to the D.C. area in time for the infamous annual Karaoke to the Death competition. I'm going for sure, and am looking forward to meeting other Voxers there. Hopefully M-----l will be part of that weekend, too.
Happy holiday wishes, dear Vox neighbors!
I've got one of those stat counters hooked up to my Vox. It allows me to see which posts are getting hits and where the viewers are located. I'm not sure how accurate it is, but I assume that when it says someone in Spain is looking at my picture of Scott McCaughey's shoe, then there's actually someone in Spain looking at my picture of Scott McCaughey's shoe. (For some unknown reason, his shoe is very popular throughout the world.) I know you can get these things routed all over the place to hide your true location, but I don't get into that. As far as I'm concerned, Spain = Spain and Oman = Oman.
As Valerae recently mentioned in a post covering similar territory, there seems to be a trend where people from Middle Eastern countries trawl Vox for titillation. I've noticed over the last six months or so that about a fourth of my hits are coming from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and a mysterious place called Yemen. From what I can tell, they're not here to read my opinions on books and music. Instead, they seem to hit the same slightly suggestive images over and over again. I'm not sure what the internet is like in that part of the world, but I'd assume that their access to smut is severely limited when compared to mine. They're doing the best they can with what's available to them.
More to the point, I've decided to gather all my most popular titillating images together in one spot. That way my friends on the other side of the world won't have to waste so much time going through the 2,800+ images in my library. The attraction of some of the pictures is obvious. The popularity of others only becomes apparent when you realize I've given them misleading names like "sexy results" and "big cock" (for the watermelon and the rooster sign, respectively). But anyway, here they are all together for the first time ever. Enjoy!
May you find joy in the little things around you.
I wish all my Vox friends and acquaintances all the happiness and comfort that could possibly come to you, whether it be in family, feasting, furry friends, or a simple mug of hot chocolate or the smell of pine boughs.
Love to you all,
Laurie
I decided to stay in Seattle for the holiday after much hemming and hawing and then more hemming and a little waffling. I feel bad about it. I would like to see most of my relatives, but not in conditions that are hostile to sanity. So I'll be spending a quiet week in (and out of) my quiet apartment. Here's what I plan to do:
- Catch up on laundry
- Read Proust, Rorty, and Murdoch
- Write my year/ decade - end lists, analyses, etc.
- Find some new music to listen to
- Clean the bird cage
- Vacuum
- Go to a movie (which one? dunno)
- Watch the 2 Netflix I've had for 6 weeks
- Re-order my Netfilx queue
- Send a holiday letter to my uncle Phil in Sweden
- Drink some brandy & eggnog
- Do yoga
- Sell some books
- Make a mix CD to give to friends
- Plan a quick trip to Portland next week
- Go to my ex-husband's xmas-eve punch party
- Go for a run or 3
- Make myself a nice meal
- Figure out what I'm doing with my life
Well, that last one may extend past this week...
I can't help but post these types of things every time I get them from my aunt or cousin, complete with their little comments at the top:
OBAMA AS SEEN BY THE CARTOONIST
Think
about this: If you don't want to forward this
for fear of offending someone-- YOU ARE PART OF
THE PROBLEM!
It is Time
for America to Speak
up!
Everyone is entitled to their opinion and the freedom to express it. I don't actually agree with everything Obama or his administration does, but it disturbs me when people take things a step further than they really need to go. I feel like I've been hearing the popular Slippery Slope fallacy a lot lately, and I think that's what happens when people start taking their news from pundits and the Opinion section of the newspaper.
I love how this email closes out, too. Really? If I don't forward a fucking email (in the case that I agreed with it) because I'm afraid, I'm part of the problem? What about making legislation that quietly limits the natural-born rights of all humans out of fear? Oh, that's not as much of a problem, apparently. How about actually doing something that matters? Write your representatives and tell them what you want. Forwarding an inflammatory email isn't going to fix the problem, whatever your idea of "the problem" is.
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