meme challenge #17

One of my favorite online boards, twopeasinabucket.com, has a weekly meme challenge: a meme is an idea that is shared and passed from blog to blog, like a question posted in one blog and answered in many other blogs.

This week [Nov 28th] we are taking a cue from Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way exercise for recovering a sense of identity. Our exercise this week is to list 20 things you enjoy doing [rock climbing, roller skating, baking pies, making soup, bike riding, horse riding, shooting baskets, running, reading poetry, etc.]

So let's see, what would be on my list???

Off the top of my head and in no particular order:
reading
traveling
surfing the internet
hanging with friends
playing volleyball
scrapbooking
new activities/experiences
watching tv (multiple channels at once!)
getting manicure/pedicure
getting massage
motorcycling
being with my honey
dancing
visiting with relatives
sleeping late
photography
cruising
driving my vette (silly boys try to race me!)
downhill skiing
seeing/hearing live entertainment (theater, concerts, etc)
watching xtreme motocross
holding/playing with kittens
being creative
singing along with fave songs
drinking a good latte
cooking a nice meal for guests
smelling lilacs
seeing ancient ruins
learning about other cultures
goofing off

Hmmmm.... well.... my list is well over 20, and I could probably keep on going, but I'll just stop it right there.

So what would you have on your list???

the beginning of a new season

Well, today was the day. The "real" end of autumn, the beginning of winter. Yes, we had snow today. Not just the kind that melts right away. When I woke up and opened the curtains, there was measurable snow on the ground. They were plowing and salting the roads.

I always have mixed feelings about winter. This is the fun part, the exciting part. The beginning of winter. A little snow here and there. High temps still mostly in the 30s. The holiday season on its way. Oooohhh - I LOVE Christmas time!!!

But after that hard core winter sets in. Yuck. Weather so cold it hurts to breathe. Blizzards making it darn near impossible to get anywhere, yet we still have to get to work. And no holiday time off seemingly forever.

But even then, there's fun to be had: a cruise or other warm-weather vacation, the annual U.P. ski trip, the bike club's winter get-a-way, a Madscrappin' Diva weekend crop, the annual scrapbook convention....

I guess it's a love/hate relationship! ;-)

bad, bad, bad

I, along with many other crazy scrappin' gals, have been eagerly awaiting the class schedule for CKU-Albums Chicago. And today the list was finally made official. That doesn't mean it's complete and correct ;-) but it is close.

And of course, I already had most of my classes picked out. By following the naming convention CKU uses for its webpages, many of us have been checking daily (or several times each day!) for updates - meaning, we cheated the system. We've watched as the webmaster updated the webpage, so we could see new classes being added, descriptions being changed, photos being deleted and added. And as the webmaster worked, so did I. When I saw new classes added, I researched the sponsoring company and the instructor to check out the typical product of the company, the scrapping style of the instructor and reviews on any classes they have taught before.

Oh, yes. That's me. Overresearch, overanalyze, overprepare. Anticipation is the name of my game.

holiday folk fair

Mom Miller called up recently and asked if I would be interested in going to the Holiday Folk Fair with her. I'm usually game for something fun like that - my schedule was free, so we went yesterday. We watched a few groups do their ethnic dances, some played music. We walked through all the neat shopping booths - lotsa kewl stuff. Then we thought we'd see if we could find the "main stage." Come to find out there were actually 3 different stages for dancing and music. Yowza! We saw some really awesome acts!! The best was the drum group from Japan - they kicked butt - three rows of different drums, perfectly choreographed with exaggerated, stylistic movements - WOW! They got a standing ovation, not once, but TWICE!! But wouldn't ya know, we were trying to enjoy some of the wonderful ethnic cuisine during that act, so altho we tried to get a couple pics of them, they just didn't turn out. It's really hard to juggle a purse, two plates of food, purchases and camera all at once. ;-) Bummer!

In any case, pictures wouldn't do them justice anyway - pictures didn't do justice to ANY of the really great dances or outfits we saw. But here are a few pics anyway... maybe they give just a little glimpse into how neat the event was. I would DEFINITELY go back!!!

whodunit

Our bike club had its annual fundraiser this past weekend. This year, however, we tried something new - a murder mystery. And WOW!!! I had an absolute blast! Greg and I both had roles - we had told the organizer that we would be in it "if they needed somebody." Guess they did... :-) Greg was a bit typecast - the bad biker dude. I was a cocktail waitress, aka the town tramp.

The participants each had a little booklet that described their role and gave the info necessary for that person. We had our booklets a couple weeks in advance, so we could try to learn our parts and get a feel for the role. We didn't practice or anything ahead of time, so it was really interesting during the event to hear all the other info that we weren't given in our own booklet.

OMG, it was just SO much fun. I guess I got pretty much into it. As you can see, I had a bit of cleavage and leg showing - nothing embarrassing - I had a swimsuit top under my shirt. We were supposed to be in Cactus, Texas, so I had a pretty good southern drawl going. And because southern folk are supposedly so much more polite than us northerners, I said ma'am and sir alot. But the best part was my stroll/strut/whatever you wanna call it... LOLOL. I sure wish someone had been videoing the event - I would LOVE to see myself! Anyway, I only broke character twice - both times were for very specific purposes, and only for a couple people. The majority of the people saw me slowly strolling along, swinging my hips, throwing my hair back off my face, etc., at all times. Apparently I played my role TOO well - someone said something like "the girl who's playing the slut is really good - or is she actually like that?!" LOL - the best part - Greg was standing right behind the person at the time!!!! ROFLMAO Someone else came up to me and said VERY tentatively "Our table was talking, and, well, please don't be offended, we think you play a slut really well." bwaaahaaahaaahaaa

I've been thinking about this quite a bit. I think I enjoyed it so much because I was able to act outside of socially accepted behaviors, and it was ok, because I was just "playing a role." Most of us mold ourselves into "correct" humans who behave "correctly." "Correctly" for a married female in her mid-30's, particularly in the good ol' Midwest, is pretty conservative. And I was far from conservative as Crystalline Daniels!! Having a southern drawl seemed to provide me the split I needed to "be" Crystalline vs myself. Both times I broke character to talk to someone as ME, I felt almost naked, overexposed, because I was showing a little cleavage. But as soon as I "became" Crystalline again, I didn't feel that way. Sounds kinda weird, I know. But really, I don't have a split personality. LOL

Anyway, I feel that portraying someone else was really liberating for me, as it allowed me to "safely" and appropriately exhibit some characteristics and traits that would be frowned upon in the real world. I can see why actors seem to get lost in their own little worlds when filming - the more you get into character, the more realistic the role seems, and the less realistic the outside world seems.

my latest scrappin' obsession

Ahhhh..... yes..... ribbon. Ever since the Scrapbook Convention this past spring, I've been into ribbon. Just a bit at first, I kind of dipped my toes into the water gradually, buying one or two, only those that matched a specific layout. Then I got into a ribbon swap at CKU where I ended up with 80, yes EIGHTY, different ribbons. And now I can't seem to get enough. More colors, more combinations, more textures, more designs. When I hear those two words uttered in the same sentence: sale and ribbon - OMG!! it's like I can't control myself. LOLOL



I just expanded my ribbon space to full capacity. Well... ok, I have no more space to hang ribbon rings. So now I am limited to the space I have on the current rings. And this is a good thing..... right??!!