Frelling insomnia. I blame the Australian Open (for hosing my sleep cycle) and the to-get-to list.
That said, there are some major going-to-be-fun things on that list. One of them:
Upper Rubber Boot will be publishing my first book of poetry this spring (in time for my reading with Joanne and Mary at the Nashville Public Library on March 24). It will be available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble, GoodReads, Kobo, and some other venues, formatted for ePub, Kindle, and pdf-reading machines.
Another big thing is that I'll be turning 42 in May. Since it's a rather special number, I'm planning to host an open house that will double as a supply drive for LP Pencil Box.
I'm mentioning this now because it happens to be on my mind, and also because I suspect some of you local peeps may not want to wait until May for an excuse to splurge on office supplies (or to thin down your existing stashes of them).
I can just see the too-cool-for-school kidz rolling their eyes at that last paragraph, but part of being 41 going on 72 is being at peace -- or at least some semblance of detente -- with one's dorkiness. Plus, I'm a calligrapher: having a fetish for paper is part of the territory. ;-)
There'll be more details about both the book and the birthday party once they're closer to showtime. In the meantime, I have my mug of herbal tea, a red pencil, and someone else's book to proofread. But first, a list:
41 things I've gotten to (or got myself into):
1. skydiving
2. ziplining
3. indexing
4. copyediting
5. rode pillion on a motorcycle from Nashville to Phoenix
6. spoke French in France and Switzerland, Czech in the Czech Republic, Dutch in the Netherlands, and Hebrew in Israel. None of it even remotely well, but enough to order food, find bathrooms, and get back to buses on time.
7. rode a camel
8. skinny-dipped in the Atlantic
9. chased after balls for Tomas Berdych and Yen-Hsun Lu (practice match)
10. organized a memorial service
11. programmed the bells at a cathedral
12. scripted training for military personnel
13. danced in a Titans halftime show
14. crocheted two full-size afghans for charity
15. ...as well as one my oldest nephew loved to pieces
16. reported income from paid singing gigs
17. sang the national anthem at the start of a White Sox game
18. took the photos selected for the covers of Prime Number 13 and 17.
19. won a medal in fantasy tennis
20. ...and correctly picked Paes/Stepanek to win men's doubles last week. ;-)
21. taken salsa lessons. Someday I'll get the hang of it.
22. danced alone in a lesbian bar in Amsterdam. Not a highlight of that trip.
23. tried hot yoga. I don't mind the heat, but my wrists hate plank poses.
24. visited a hammam. The massage was awesome. (Props to![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
kass for planting that notion in my head.)
25. baked a souffle, a meringue pie, and a galette
26. I'm better at stews. Especially boeuf bourgignon and cioppino.
27. tried that Dead Sea mud thang
28. raised a very sweet and sassy dog. Not bad for someone terrified of them as a kid.
29. wandered solo around North Carolina and Virginia, and then wrote about it
30. contra-dancing (Asheville, Nashville, Berea)
31. wrote (among other things) nearly 100 entries for encyclopedias published by Oxford and Greenwood
32. learned to drive standard transmission cars. (Unbelievably useful. Especially when the police handcuff one's dinner date [not the BYM] and then hand to one the keys of his car.)
33. chaired three church committees and served as a trustee
34. volunteered for Room in the Inn in various capacities, and trained others
35. celebrated Simchat Torah in Nashville, and in Paris. (I still need to write about dancing with the scrolls in Paris. So. Much. Fun.)
36. hanging out at clubs with names like "The Stiff Kitten"
37. not all those clubs have been my cuppa, though. I reminded the BYM just last week about the skank-den in Detroit where a girl projectile-vomited onto the wall of the bathroom I was in the queue for.
38. served as an executor. I hope I don't have to do that again anytime soon, but the knowledge I acquired on various fronts has already been useful on multiple occasions.
39. lettered more books, commissions, certificates, and envelopes than I've kept track of
40. been told by a drummer (in a band I occasionally sang with), seeing me at a desk: "Oh! I didn't recognize you from the front!" (Hee!)
41. recorded books for the blind. And I'm due back at the studio in (eep!) 2.5 hours for this morning's live reading of the Tennesseean...
Subject line brought to you by a conversation during brunch yesterday, when a friend observed that extroverts often think introverts are boring when we're merely quiet. (Everyone was kidding, of course, but it still got me thinking about relative values of "quiet" and "boring.")
That said, there are some major going-to-be-fun things on that list. One of them:
Upper Rubber Boot will be publishing my first book of poetry this spring (in time for my reading with Joanne and Mary at the Nashville Public Library on March 24). It will be available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble, GoodReads, Kobo, and some other venues, formatted for ePub, Kindle, and pdf-reading machines.
Another big thing is that I'll be turning 42 in May. Since it's a rather special number, I'm planning to host an open house that will double as a supply drive for LP Pencil Box.
I'm mentioning this now because it happens to be on my mind, and also because I suspect some of you local peeps may not want to wait until May for an excuse to splurge on office supplies (or to thin down your existing stashes of them).
I can just see the too-cool-for-school kidz rolling their eyes at that last paragraph, but part of being 41 going on 72 is being at peace -- or at least some semblance of detente -- with one's dorkiness. Plus, I'm a calligrapher: having a fetish for paper is part of the territory. ;-)
There'll be more details about both the book and the birthday party once they're closer to showtime. In the meantime, I have my mug of herbal tea, a red pencil, and someone else's book to proofread. But first, a list:
41 things I've gotten to (or got myself into):
1. skydiving
2. ziplining
3. indexing
4. copyediting
5. rode pillion on a motorcycle from Nashville to Phoenix
6. spoke French in France and Switzerland, Czech in the Czech Republic, Dutch in the Netherlands, and Hebrew in Israel. None of it even remotely well, but enough to order food, find bathrooms, and get back to buses on time.
7. rode a camel
8. skinny-dipped in the Atlantic
9. chased after balls for Tomas Berdych and Yen-Hsun Lu (practice match)
10. organized a memorial service
11. programmed the bells at a cathedral
12. scripted training for military personnel
13. danced in a Titans halftime show
14. crocheted two full-size afghans for charity
15. ...as well as one my oldest nephew loved to pieces
16. reported income from paid singing gigs
17. sang the national anthem at the start of a White Sox game
18. took the photos selected for the covers of Prime Number 13 and 17.
19. won a medal in fantasy tennis
20. ...and correctly picked Paes/Stepanek to win men's doubles last week. ;-)
21. taken salsa lessons. Someday I'll get the hang of it.
22. danced alone in a lesbian bar in Amsterdam. Not a highlight of that trip.
23. tried hot yoga. I don't mind the heat, but my wrists hate plank poses.
24. visited a hammam. The massage was awesome. (Props to
kass for planting that notion in my head.)25. baked a souffle, a meringue pie, and a galette
26. I'm better at stews. Especially boeuf bourgignon and cioppino.
27. tried that Dead Sea mud thang
28. raised a very sweet and sassy dog. Not bad for someone terrified of them as a kid.
29. wandered solo around North Carolina and Virginia, and then wrote about it
30. contra-dancing (Asheville, Nashville, Berea)
31. wrote (among other things) nearly 100 entries for encyclopedias published by Oxford and Greenwood
32. learned to drive standard transmission cars. (Unbelievably useful. Especially when the police handcuff one's dinner date [not the BYM] and then hand to one the keys of his car.)
33. chaired three church committees and served as a trustee
34. volunteered for Room in the Inn in various capacities, and trained others
35. celebrated Simchat Torah in Nashville, and in Paris. (I still need to write about dancing with the scrolls in Paris. So. Much. Fun.)
36. hanging out at clubs with names like "The Stiff Kitten"
37. not all those clubs have been my cuppa, though. I reminded the BYM just last week about the skank-den in Detroit where a girl projectile-vomited onto the wall of the bathroom I was in the queue for.
38. served as an executor. I hope I don't have to do that again anytime soon, but the knowledge I acquired on various fronts has already been useful on multiple occasions.
39. lettered more books, commissions, certificates, and envelopes than I've kept track of
40. been told by a drummer (in a band I occasionally sang with), seeing me at a desk: "Oh! I didn't recognize you from the front!" (Hee!)
41. recorded books for the blind. And I'm due back at the studio in (eep!) 2.5 hours for this morning's live reading of the Tennesseean...
Subject line brought to you by a conversation during brunch yesterday, when a friend observed that extroverts often think introverts are boring when we're merely quiet. (Everyone was kidding, of course, but it still got me thinking about relative values of "quiet" and "boring.")
