Winter Blahs

I have been totally lame for the past few weeks. I quit doing Thing-a-Day because the site stopped letting me post anything. (Okay, also because I went away for the weekend and sort of gave up.) Then, I had an earache last week and I was cranky. Who gets earaches after they're like six? It was ridiculous.

Really, there is nothing else of note. Case in point: I talked to my best friend on the phone yesterday and I didn't have anything to say. I'm pretty sure we gossiped (there's always a surplus of gossip, isn't there) and then discussed my upcoming trip to Colorado. So that is it, there is nothing else to say other than, well! Another day of work! My dog is learning how to sit! I watched some tv and played my guitar! And that's about what I could say about every single day.

Although, today my sister asked me what cojones were. Explaining that? Not something I do every day.

Thinking

Well, I don't know, but maybe it's a specific kind of bad luck if a black cat crosses your path on Valentine's Day?

Still won't eat a Twinkie

I used to be really good at the game "Never Have I Ever" because there are a lot of cutesy things I'd say that would take a point or two away from everyone else. Things like, I've never eaten a Twinkie, or I've never broken a bone, or I've never gotten a speeding ticket. Because those are three things that a lot of people have done.

And then I broke my finger, and I was all, well, that sort of seals the deal: no Twinkies for me, ever. Two out of three ain't bad.

And then Friday morning, driving to work, I was presented with a speeding ticket and a fine of $81, which I GUESS I deserve. I was mostly just annoyed, because not only do I know that I was speeding, but also I thought I'd maybe get a warning, having not been cited for ANYTHING in the 8 years I've been driving. And it didn't get me anywhere.

So I'm thinking, I can maybe turn this into, "never gotten out of a speeding ticket." But that's just not as good.

Things to know about my dog

• Her name is Francie, short for Frances, because two of my favorite people are named Frances; Frances Nolan from A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and Frances Gumm, better known as Judy Garland. I basically have always known I would have a dog named Francie.
• If I can't find her, she's either under the dining room table or in the bathroom.
• She's in the bathroom because her favorite food is the shag rug.
• She is the noisiest dog EVER. She growls, and barks, and fusses. I don't think she's crabby, but she just always...makes noise.
• She is almost housebroken.
  
• She sometimes sits when I tell her to. Next up? Shake, I think.
• Our older dog? Only a fan sometimes.
• Seriously, she loves this rug.

Ugh.

Okay, I signed up for Thing-a-Day, which is a challenge to create something everyday in February, because I thought maybe I needed something to get me through the rest of the winter and prevent me from the work, eat, sleep routine. And then I realized that I am not crafty. I WISH I were crafty, but I am not; it is a sad truth that I do not like to face. And so for the next 26 days, I will be scraping together weird things while everyone else who signed up creates beautiful little things that the entire internet oohs and ahhs over. This is like that time in 8th grade when I got a B on an art project, and I was like, everyone else's clay animal looks way cooler than mine. Why did I pick a duck?

You can track my stuff here, where I'll write about everything, or over at Flickr where I'll be posting a photo for every entry.

Who knows, maybe I will discover that I possess an undiscovered talent for collage-making.

A day of photos

Here are some pictures I took today.

First, these fabulous highlighers. Not only are they the liquid kind, which feel so good to write with (I often have to fight off the urge to highlight entire pages of my work), they also came organized in rainbow order. For some reason they remind me of popsicles, especially the red and purple. And a tiny little bit of me wants to lick them just to be sure they're not flavored.



I did a silly thing last week and signed up at thing-a-day.com, which means that for the entire month of February I will have to create something every day. I made a terrible little crocheted cupcake today and everyone else made beautiful pieces of artwork. Oh well. 28 more days to try, right?



Every night I take about 5 billion pictures of Francie, none of which turn out because she has a sixth sense that tells her to move because the camera has focused. Seriously, she could be fast asleep and as soon as I press the button to take her picture, she wiggles or yawns or scratches or gets distracted. I am usually frustrated by this but tonight I was kind of impressed. Bummer of a special talent, but...wow, you know?