Mid-December Junk Mail

Here's what going on with me lately:

• You all know a lot of what's going on with me since I've been trying to post more regularly. I've been making a conscious effort to "engage" more in general. This means checking and posting on FaceBook more often, contacting my friends more, stuff like that. When I started version one of this blog (I shut it down after a while and then restarted it again), I used to post almost every day. Over the years it becomes more difficult to post regularly but I noticed my readership is up and the best way to continue that is to keep posting on an almost daily basis. It's also a good way of staying grounded with the writing. Posting on this blog is a great way to balance out the intense fiction writing.

• I'm still looking for a job but it looks like a good one might be in the works. We'll see. I probably won't hear about that one until after December. I heard from another recruiter today about another job so that's good.
  

• I've also been making an effort to have a plan for my days, a schedule. This is difficult for me because I get distracted easily. It's been an interesting exercise. Right now, I feel like I'm just slavishly following a schedule, it almost feels like everything I'm accomplishing right now is secondary to the "schedule." I've had this feeling before and really don't like it but have decided to stick with it for a while to see if that feeling changes over time. I keep wondering what that feeling will change to.

• As part of my recent Christmas Tree breakthrough I also bought some "icicle lights" because I've always wanted a strand or two. I strung them up in my bedroom and...they're almost seizure inducing with the way they flash on and off. I feel like I'm in the middle of some kind strobe light situation with them on. Not good.

• I have all of next week off. I'm so looking forward to it!!!

• I've been seeing quite a bit of theater recently (since early November): West Side Story, Equus (amazing!), The Story of My Life, Coraline, a stage reading of Amadeus, and I saw the jazz trio The Bad Plus. Next week I'm going to Playground at Berkeley Rep Theatre where they do stage readings of new plays by new playwrights.

• I just finished listening to this great audio learning course from the Teaching Company entitled "Social Deviance." Though the course was recorded in 1994, Professor Wolpe does a great job with this fascinating subject and I even found some of the ideas he presented in this course useful for the current NaNoWriMo novel I'm drafting. All of the lectures were great but the ones I found the most mind-blowing were the ones on "Labeling Theory" and "Conflict and Constructionism." I'm looking forward to listening to it again.

• I'm done with: Christmas shopping, button-down shirts that don't fit, "The Book Thief" by Markus Zusak, cleaning out all my email boxes, watching movies in the theater (with few exceptions until I get more income coming in).
  

• I started: a playlist for my post-apocalyptic novel, another bizarre story theory for "Sherlock," "The Name of the Rose" by Umberto Ecco, "A Study in Scarlett" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (reading on my Droid with the free Kindle app), re-learning how to use my sewing machine.

• Three things I'm grateful for other than the super important things like family, friends, living here in SF, and good health: 1) my pea coat is part cashmere and part merino wool (been chilly here), 2) the penguins still know me, and 3) Lipton tea.