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Showing posts from 2016

Well-Timed Comeback

I'm a little bummed I haven't posted since June. I'd say once every other week there's a second that I think, Oh yeah, I need to post, and then in an instant the thought is gone. Today is November 8. It's election night. And up until about five hours ago, like thousands of other Americans, I didn't think the next presidency was a question. Projections, or at least the projections I've seen, have been nothing but Hillary. Here we are, 10 PM, and only a few states are undetermined as too close to call. Trump for all intents and purposes has it in the bag. As an American, it's horrifying. I can't imagine putting myself in the shoes of any minority American. To be a Muslim right now... to be a minority right now. This is by no means a comprehensive look into this election.  I'm ill informed, because I have rarely tuned into these debates. I've kept my mouth shut for the most part because I don't see the point in debating with friends or

Breaking Up with Friends

This is twice now that I’m blogging from an unconnected notepad to later post—and the gap in time between posts means I’m failing at keeping up the habit. Lots of travel and a title change that boosted my workload significantly, so nearly all habits I’ve been working on are suffering. Less writing, less gym, and I’m even finding that I prefer day dreaming on my commute instead of reading. I partially blame the book I’m reading, but I’m being stubborn about stopping and starting with a new one.  My fears about the fourth book in the Stieg Larsson series came true: the story line is solid, but I’m disappointed with the writing itself. Dialogs seem so unrealistic, and I’m curious if that means the writing is worse or the translation is worse, or maybe both. I believed it, like the originals, was translated from Swedish to English.  But I’m halfway done with it and still feel too invested in it the plot to quit. I don’t know if there has ever been a book I started reading willfull

Continuity

I arrived exceptionally early to the airport this evening, due to a combination of Memorial Day weekend traffic paranoia and some TSA understaffing drama, which fortunately were both non-issues, but it gave me a chance to peruse around the bookstore for longer than usual, which I love. I can typically spend hours reading the backs of books and puttering, although the chance to do so doesn't come up too often. And tonight here it was, but I spent nearly all the time I had contemplating one thing. Steig Larsson's Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy is hands down the greatest thing I've ever read. Each individual book on its own and the series together; I've never been so entranced by a story or characters. Lisbeth is the most intoxicating character I've ever come to find in fiction, and I'll admit, I was a little behind when I started reading them, unaware that their beyond-brilliant author was already gone, and there would never be another part of the series.

Remember boredom?

Something occurred to me today out of seemingly nowhere: I can't remember the last time I was bored. I was walking toward the bus stop that would take me home from another long day of work, and I was thinking about how my to-do list will never be over. Not my work to-do list, not my home to-do list. There are weeks that I make good dents and there are weeks that I lag or that more things than usual get piled on, but even if I had one productive week after another, I can't conceive getting to the bottom of those lists. There are points in my week that I'm doing nothing, sure. Laying on the couch, hypnotized by the TV. But frankly I feel like the downtime is necessary. If all my rebooting time was strictly to sleep, I'd be miserable. I need some mindless goofing off. Both for me and my relationship with boyfriend, CJ. But at no point does the mindlessness last long enough to come close to bored. At some point something in me turns on that says I've had enough nothin

Long live the streak

I have the ultimate test coming up; I'm three quarters of the way through this book on creating and keeping habits and I'm pretty confident I have a good grasp on this (this particular habit being avoiding grains and sugar altogether) and I have a press trip for work this week. It's not just difficult to turn down what you're being served on a work trip; it's rather rude. You're there to experience the area, and that includes their customs and what they're known for. So if you're visiting the bread and beer capital, guess what? So I don't plan on staying on this awesome cold turkey streak while traveling, because it isn't realistic, but I can still decline eating desserts with every meal, and--here's the toughest part--get up early enough to get a workout in. I've packed a handful of gym clothes on every trip since I was probably 16 and I can count on one hand how many times I've used them while traveling. There's something abou

The Anguish of Beginning

Yep. That's a stupid title. But it got me started. I stared at that empty title box, cursor blinking, for longer than I care to admit. I always hate writing titles. There's nothing more satisfying than writing a fantastic title/headline, and I can say confidently after writing maybe thousands of news headlines at this point, that that is terribly rare. Which is unfortunate, because the title can make or break your story. I think books are judged far more often by their title than their cover art. Original point being, I gave up on a clever title for the sake of starting. Something about starting, no matter what it is, is stupidly excruciating. Why is that? Most people would probably agree that if they could snap their fingers and be dressed and at the gym, working out would be a breeze. It's the getting dressed and getting there part that prolongs and even prevents us from all being the shredded beach bods we were meant to be. The book I referred to in the last post abo

Four Years Later

If it takes you years of convincing and self-nagging to get around to doing the one thing you claim to love doing, is it really something you love? It's not a riddle, and frankly, there was no real reason for asking that in second person. I'm rusty... my last blog post (which is on a blog I no longer have access to because it was created in the days when I didn't despise Yahoo! for email) was in 2012. I had just quit my full time job waitressing to dedicate all my time to finding a job doing what I'd moved across the country to do: write. Rather, get paid to write. It took that exhilarating jump (and sudden influx of spare time) to sit down and blog about it. It was short, uninspired. The gist was, here I am, quitting. In a city with soaring rent and not a whole lot of freedom to search for the perfect opportunity. It was stupid, but I knew that when I did it. I knew the chances of taking a pay cut were huge, and the amount of time I would spend searching was unpredic