tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-89767702024-03-17T20:03:11.581-07:00JoystoryStory is my joyJoy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.comBlogger3243125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-746741958019378842023-11-28T23:11:00.000-08:002023-11-28T23:11:11.023-08:00Fears, Frailty, Falls and Fractures<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrHlaBPIbciJs4VS6qMhN9TF2rmLP13d54gEh008SxF1Z-H4rbG1VAw0F7F4CqGItP0Kf80jbWEV71ednzfThyphenhyphen2vrSVniwgVt_lHNEOO_mMsV8XBXlpE38moU2dR_ZNtf_PZvua_FaKJwN2V5-oqXj5hCNpVtR_53nGrqchIOxWbxg7o4oWXhq/s555/Mom%202023%20age%2091.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="529" data-original-width="555" height="305" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrHlaBPIbciJs4VS6qMhN9TF2rmLP13d54gEh008SxF1Z-H4rbG1VAw0F7F4CqGItP0Kf80jbWEV71ednzfThyphenhyphen2vrSVniwgVt_lHNEOO_mMsV8XBXlpE38moU2dR_ZNtf_PZvua_FaKJwN2V5-oqXj5hCNpVtR_53nGrqchIOxWbxg7o4oWXhq/s320/Mom%202023%20age%2091.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mom Summer 2023<br />age 91</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />Dropping in for a quick note to explain why I disappeared for a week just as it began to seem I'd established a nice rhythm. One that had held in spite of my falling on my tailbone on my birthday two weeks ago. Even in spite of the fear that colored several days after the scare Mom gave the family complaining of chest pain the night before my birthday.<br /><br />But then Mom ended up in ER last Monday having fallen because she'd fractured and dislocated her ankle. And then fell. But because of her grip on the bar her fall was in slow motion and no further harm was done--no bruises, breaks, scrapes or sprains. But it was hours before we could be sure of that. In fact I think it was nearly a full day before the tests and scans had reassured us and the doctors.<br /><br />She spent four days in ER and I visited her there twice last week. And a third time in the nursing home they moved her to for follow-up physical therapy and occupational therapy and monitoring of the (hopefully) healing bones in her left ankle. <br /><br />They opted to do no surgery as they believe her too frail. It was her hip surgery after breaking her hip in 2008 that led to a clot induced stroke and the aphasia she's had ever since. The known risks outweigh the possible benefits and since she has been bedridden since having COVID two years ago this month her muscles have atrophied. <br /><br />She hasn't walked since then but had still been able to stand briefly during the transfer from the bed to a chair and back again. Now she will not be able to do even that much and the doctors have told us she needs to use a Hoyer lift. And to accommodate the space that needs my brother and sister have been rearranging rooms at home. They are moving her bed into the living room.<br /><br />I visited her at the nursing home again yesterday. I wasn't able to do so today as I had a preexisting appointment. The same is true for tomorrow. But I mean to visit at least once more this week. This event has forced me to see we're on borrowed time with Mom. She will be 92 on January 3rd. Suddenly all the difficulties with my energy, appointments, caregiver availability etc that have made getting over to see Mom even once a month for most of this year too challenging, seem frivolous. I've had a priority reset.<br /><br />Meanwhile I'm also scrambling to get my NaNoWriMo words... But I won't say any more on that today. Words on writing are for my Wednesday post. And maybe the news will be better by then.<br /><br />But I will say this much: due to the upheavals and associated anxieties I had to choose between posting and NaNo this past week. Obviously I didn't choose posting.<br /></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-39757431236287407632023-11-19T23:55:00.000-08:002023-11-20T00:05:41.095-08:00Rocking in the Hot Seat -- Sunday Serenity<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgs1uQQ1k7ZAcocPhXSMe_2td9ZMSlpseuE97_kBb_a_FRkmhyphenhyphen_ZTcK_WkPGDvdoLe2i_4gwOuGsjMWEf11pY8SI3OZCB2ixb0KwjLCSydRgOHweCwDrpc1UFtoZl11THPBStAxo5GHQlJX-HgDTtnCParjklyQrXc5gX7Xe6vOFFXRqwUpGT-P/s1317/IMG_20231119_230012.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1317" data-original-width="1114" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgs1uQQ1k7ZAcocPhXSMe_2td9ZMSlpseuE97_kBb_a_FRkmhyphenhyphen_ZTcK_WkPGDvdoLe2i_4gwOuGsjMWEf11pY8SI3OZCB2ixb0KwjLCSydRgOHweCwDrpc1UFtoZl11THPBStAxo5GHQlJX-HgDTtnCParjklyQrXc5gX7Xe6vOFFXRqwUpGT-P/s320/IMG_20231119_230012.jpg" width="271" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rocking Chair with Long Heating Pad</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />This is where I've spent most of my hours not in bed since last Tuesday afternoon when the fallout from my fall on my tailbone early Monday morning began to grip my back from tailbone to neck. I read, wrote, watched videos, crocheted, ate, and occasionally slept sitting here with my back feeling as tho it was sunbathing.<br /><br />Heat for me is soporific. Which means sleepy as well as serene. But also means lazy. That list above may have sounded productive but in practice it was always snatches of activity soon filled with the static of crossing eyes then hypnogogic images then sleep but also in snatches. Naps of twenty, thirty or ninety minutes.<br /><br />This has untethered me from time so that I forgot to do my Friday Fiber post and did not remember until I was prepping the photo for this one. I have the photo for the update on the Post Virus shawl so maybe I'll go ahead and put that post up retroactive as a record of my progress. This new iteration of my blog is so far mostly a personal journal with an 'audience' in the single digits on most days and I'm not sure how many of those are just bots. So I can't see why it matters.<br /><br />I was already in bed for about three hours earlier and hoped it was for the night so I would have missed this post as well. But I got woke up and then couldn't get back to sleep and thought that my best chance of doing so was to sit with the heating pad again and that's when I remembered my Sunday post so I got the pic before sitting down.<br /><br />Well the heating pad is working it's magic. <p></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-89907765405886166342023-11-17T00:22:00.000-08:002023-11-20T00:54:43.741-08:00Post Viral Shawl Update -- Fiber Friday<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieZ2KC1_Bm0_O3v3EQNWB_q8WCMKLrYB6DsmvVJVR_PSoBMC01dkzkv5yJbK6eT9-VVn1H_IO_Uz-gFM2PxGiK3lnc8mzOUkXj09aZ8O38qgTs9PY_Gpc653AfHDHCAg6r_nJLr9UECaLT1gkwRDkdCbscofUCuvyHxGc5N0nA-dvGJ3GyD-dc/s1200/IMG_20231120_002409.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="785" data-original-width="1200" height="209" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieZ2KC1_Bm0_O3v3EQNWB_q8WCMKLrYB6DsmvVJVR_PSoBMC01dkzkv5yJbK6eT9-VVn1H_IO_Uz-gFM2PxGiK3lnc8mzOUkXj09aZ8O38qgTs9PY_Gpc653AfHDHCAg6r_nJLr9UECaLT1gkwRDkdCbscofUCuvyHxGc5N0nA-dvGJ3GyD-dc/s320/IMG_20231120_002409.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Second Post Section 4/6 Complete</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Can't afford to spend much time on this. Need sleep. So just a few comments.<br /><br />I'm pleased with the progress. Most especially pleased that there has been much less frogging since the struggle with the first post section a week ago. Some combo of sleep and upping the magnification of my reading glasses seems to have solved that.<br /><br />But I laid it against the first shawl which it needs to match so that I can make a poncho out of the two of them and there is a hint of 'shrinkage' in this one. I think if I had been using the wrong hook size from the beginning there would be more than a hint of shrinkage so I suspect it is the tension. To rectify this tho I'm going to switch from the 3.5m to 4.0m hook for the duration of this post stitch section and possibly all further post stitch sections. Unless I learn to loosen up on those sections as I gain confidence that I'm not having to frog so much of them.</p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-77949881548177847852023-11-15T23:44:00.000-08:002023-11-16T18:34:27.414-08:00NaNoWriMo Workstation -- Wednesday Writing<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnXtf1LseWcxaGMQC1Oygj3VSg1RCH-LfiNT6ziKu_Yrg_bBkPww0JJ7bvcBHofZ7ZIj8XMT8Ka88OpVoii0-RhbqvYq0_i5edsPabMtTsl9ooeOFgEPfZS4GoeSAE-XmKhwobKcq75hGDoUyg82nVQ8RPycTw_Z3brgxDc-LXbu64BPA0csiD/s1600/IMG_20231113_030625.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnXtf1LseWcxaGMQC1Oygj3VSg1RCH-LfiNT6ziKu_Yrg_bBkPww0JJ7bvcBHofZ7ZIj8XMT8Ka88OpVoii0-RhbqvYq0_i5edsPabMtTsl9ooeOFgEPfZS4GoeSAE-XmKhwobKcq75hGDoUyg82nVQ8RPycTw_Z3brgxDc-LXbu64BPA0csiD/s320/IMG_20231113_030625.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Full 8ft Long L</td></tr></tbody></table><br />A couple weeks ago I traded my wheeled office chair for a rocking chair. I thought I would be able to manage without the wheels but after one weekend of trying to manage with a stationary chair I realized it wasn't going to work with my work style. It worked fine for those times when I was focused on one task at one desk station. Especially for long sessions on one of the laptops either writing, online research or exploring and reading my story files. But when I needed to spread out physical papers for editing or sorting I needed the wheels zip between the couch and the larger desktops at the far end.<br /><br />The solution was the little wheeled stool like you see in doctor offices. I had a very productive weekend after it arrived. If I hadn't fallen off it at 6am Sunday morning as I was wrapping up my all night session I'd still be ecstatic about it. I'm not about to give it up but I will have to be more mindful while using it.<br /><br />What happened was that one of the times I approached the couch by walking it forward I didn't get quite close enough to reach the item I want to move to the far end so I stood up but that motion caused the stool to scoot back an inch or so and so when I sat back down I sat on the edge and tilted it onto one wheel and it shot backwards five or six feet across the room as I landed hard on my tailbone.<br /><br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj62EwWkPcoTjxNE6r3fXjRc0fVLKgyrYORe7rUYWy9uK-BURWqzjApoZ9sn9Q6iiFfm8bXIiEjc-5q9vDsm7XlRMi5pbZXPjj3pw4LWkCTlMAvCBPaFm-uim3W21RUTrBsk1Utbj5k-fkj5-07LAoUUbA18pa4PsWrhTfl1S3mGHDqv05yzC9P/s1600/IMG_20231113_030822.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj62EwWkPcoTjxNE6r3fXjRc0fVLKgyrYORe7rUYWy9uK-BURWqzjApoZ9sn9Q6iiFfm8bXIiEjc-5q9vDsm7XlRMi5pbZXPjj3pw4LWkCTlMAvCBPaFm-uim3W21RUTrBsk1Utbj5k-fkj5-07LAoUUbA18pa4PsWrhTfl1S3mGHDqv05yzC9P/s320/IMG_20231113_030822.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Serious Writing Section</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><br />That was not a wonderful start to my 66th birthday. <br /><br />The fallout has been moderate tensing of the muscles at several locations along my spine. The two worst at the rib cage and neck and right shoulder. I've been spending a lot of time in the rocker with a heating pad. But so far this is minor compared to three or four previous impacts on my tailbone going back to age 11 when I fell off a horse; age 16 when I fell from the top of a doorway after walking up one doorpost with my back pressed against the other; and at age 30 something while playing with children on a slide. Those were the three times that gave me severe whiplash as well as bruised tailbone. The worst one was the slide. I'm pretty sure based on the extreme headache and vomiting I developed hours later that there was a concussion as well. I did not know before that that you can get a concussion by falling on your butt.<br /><br /><br /><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgp9fo0YT2NqhOqioO3QRhOKD9w_dIHDl1QkiGqGE4FzsCQnPyaNcPC6HmRnyiAhEk78fJ-FEVTOhfKl2jZCV1xZWAh58Vqx3v7kCPKAWgeuz8JYxwYkXbSNKlrMa4t1-145w5eX1wjfR8mtdHidzKmQ5dBFFHjvvfVB8FV0ebk-C-3qCnOmE4/s1600/IMG_20231113_030909.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgp9fo0YT2NqhOqioO3QRhOKD9w_dIHDl1QkiGqGE4FzsCQnPyaNcPC6HmRnyiAhEk78fJ-FEVTOhfKl2jZCV1xZWAh58Vqx3v7kCPKAWgeuz8JYxwYkXbSNKlrMa4t1-145w5eX1wjfR8mtdHidzKmQ5dBFFHjvvfVB8FV0ebk-C-3qCnOmE4/s320/IMG_20231113_030909.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Research, Paper Sorting & Hardcopy Editing Section</td></tr></tbody></table><br /> <br />Well I need to wrap this up so I can get back to work on my NaNo.<br /><br />The big thing I accomplished last weekend was organizing the manuscript pages in my new Go Bag aka Trapper Keeper zippered 3 ring binder. I now have all the stories in an order that makes sense to me with tabbed dividers between them that have pockets for the loose papers of all sizes that I'm finding tucked away in notebooks and folders.<br /><br />I still don't have a wordcount registered at NaNo as I've been doing most of writing by hand and some of it scattered among the already existing application files. For the latter I'm keeping the new words tagged. For the paper pages I'm keeping them in the binder. This weekend's big (non-writing) project will be to add up my word count and report it on my NaNo profile.<br /><br />I know I'm way behind but somehow I'm feeling serene about it. I'm really enjoying the return to the root story of the FOS storyworld and also a return to the process that I had before my first encounter with a computer in my early thirties. I'm enjoying that and I think I'm going to be OK if I don't 'win' NaNo this year. But I also believe that this year for the first time since 2004 I won't abandon my NaNo words after November 31.<p></p></div>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-65939324642427674412023-11-12T23:55:00.000-08:002023-11-13T01:54:52.831-08:00The Peace of Progress -- Sunday Serenity<p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5UNK9wBID3shQpObttH-zu8C-GO0V3MsY9wFIH5BV3qpEutO3GQ7dAaSxQbokgDutzDJIj1zQ7wj45g__8P1OzcVdZqtRB6kvYPIW1_-EZlvx9GhFNxV6Y0tAKjuGeECOjuRtpru88aG7psaieZh11Fot4RwRmv74IpUt1FK5GrDiTNrz7LcN/s1600/A%20Piece%20in%20Resistance.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5UNK9wBID3shQpObttH-zu8C-GO0V3MsY9wFIH5BV3qpEutO3GQ7dAaSxQbokgDutzDJIj1zQ7wj45g__8P1OzcVdZqtRB6kvYPIW1_-EZlvx9GhFNxV6Y0tAKjuGeECOjuRtpru88aG7psaieZh11Fot4RwRmv74IpUt1FK5GrDiTNrz7LcN/s320/A%20Piece%20in%20Resistance.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Piece in Resistance</td></tr></tbody></table><br />This is an update on Friday's fiber art post about the frustration of a day of putting in and taking out four short rows so many times I lost count. Well the next time I picked it up after the photo above, I discovered I needed to take out that row 4 of the post stitches yet again. I'd started front posting on the row I was meant to back post on. Sigh. So demoralizing. <br /><br />I put it away and went to bed and the next time I picked it up on Saturday evening I frogged that row and put it back in without incident and then added the last two rows of post stitch with no frogging. And then started the second virus stitch repeats and so far have gotten two full iterations of the virus stitch with zero frogging.<br /><br />I wonder if it was sleep deprivation playing a roll in the mistakes. Or was it because I switched my magnifying glasses from 1.75 to 2.50 on Saturday..<br /> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDcpzgqTmPkQxQxVM2IUFP7dEcKb3w3njljnEFG4awbLql1uoxpLpCt2oiZJtS4dFtPLtR75u5y2roA2Nv8FOkgbjBZnaKZe_kSWuSuKb3UngwlJrDGWkp7NOVDXf5nw__SUYCSxEwvGoGuSwRMtKeiwIP62r7wQaizV7bZM7XdJS3shij8ZBs/s1167/A%20Piece%20in%20Progress.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="697" data-original-width="1167" height="191" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDcpzgqTmPkQxQxVM2IUFP7dEcKb3w3njljnEFG4awbLql1uoxpLpCt2oiZJtS4dFtPLtR75u5y2roA2Nv8FOkgbjBZnaKZe_kSWuSuKb3UngwlJrDGWkp7NOVDXf5nw__SUYCSxEwvGoGuSwRMtKeiwIP62r7wQaizV7bZM7XdJS3shij8ZBs/s320/A%20Piece%20in%20Progress.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Piece in Progress</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Whatever it was, I'm grateful and was feeling peaceful as I set it aside to prepare for this post.<br /><br />Now, tho, I mustn't sit here and revel in it as it is time to return to my story weaving project. Can you believe we are almost at the halfway point for NaNo? I'm way behind in word count and yet I'm peaceful about it. What matters more is that I'm swimming in the story and loving it. But more on that Wednesday.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><p></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-35149861094472870502023-11-10T23:55:00.005-08:002023-11-11T09:31:12.570-08:00Frolicking in the Frog Pond -- Friday Fiber Art<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy4pbOYTo3gXOJaT1al51u22drOiXoM1SoLCko5FlUuxnJLHXEDWasS7Bp8PPW7C2Q_x_0Osf1ZsD91VdlzUntbBtgF777_3RPqPficYYAq6oTGnuzHTlpfEVCC5VerHwbGinlpdXshKZjLsSqgjV1Vv3t6iRlSTrHsrEFVibWXQRgXB-OlkdJ/s1200/IMG_20231111_053001.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="920" data-original-width="1200" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy4pbOYTo3gXOJaT1al51u22drOiXoM1SoLCko5FlUuxnJLHXEDWasS7Bp8PPW7C2Q_x_0Osf1ZsD91VdlzUntbBtgF777_3RPqPficYYAq6oTGnuzHTlpfEVCC5VerHwbGinlpdXshKZjLsSqgjV1Vv3t6iRlSTrHsrEFVibWXQRgXB-OlkdJ/s320/IMG_20231111_053001.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Post Virus Poncho 50.55% Finished</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />I finished the first Post Virus Shawl last spring and instead of wearing it, I set it aside because I decided I'd rather have a poncho. So I started a second one with the same yarn and colorway. But I barely got started before I set it aside to work on a time-sensitive project and never picked it up again until this past Monday. Monday-Friday should have been time enough time for me to get at least a third of the way--even through the pink section and into the pale blue maybe. But instead I've goofed so many times, I've had to put just about every stitch in more than once, many more than twice and some more than thrice.<br /><br />It's been a veritable frog frolic.<br /><br />It's super frustrating when the piece is still so small. When I can put a whole row back in in under 20 minutes. But eventually I'll get to the rows where it takes me an hour just to get from the top edge to the peak of the triangle. Long before then taking out a whole row will be well beyond frustrating. I know because that happened a bunch while making the first one.<br /><br />And yet I started the second. What was I thinking?<br /><br />I wasn't thinking. I was drooling over the image of myself wearing the finished poncho.<br /><br />But this pattern, tho gorgeous, is very unforgiving. As unforgiving as math on which it is based. If only I could reliably catch my mistakes before I am on top of them about to put a stitch into a stitch that isn't there!<br /><br />A year ago this week the first cake of that yarn arrived on my birthday and I promised myself that I would be wearing whatever I made from it in time for my next birthday. That's a promise I will have broken as there is no way I can finish it in two days. Not even if I made zero mistakes from this moment on.<br /><br /><br /><br />Well, my eyes are rebelling so I'm going to leave you with the video tutorial which taught me how to make the Post Viral shawl. It is the creation of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/@BAGODAYCROCHET">Bag-O-Day Crochet</a> and draws it's name from both the fact that it alternates sections of the virus stitch pattern with sections of post stitches and also because she created it in the months after the pandemic's grip had loosened.<br /><p></p><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="244" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oot0yVKsntY?si=jv8lphh5RvwGd-vj" title="YouTube video player" width="444"></iframe></div>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-57340786078308526622023-11-09T03:36:00.000-08:002023-11-09T03:36:52.271-08:00From Where You Dream -- Wednesday Writing<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjadpvHUYy15k5vmzdKfK5r-04TYbzAdd9WoPOu8AQoWnky7oYPy37UpU2pjC-tkirXDap5zXzzAhZL3GgTrlNwTMVZHPRp8YlK6ZjRbxyB5HoUNepzwxq6Mds9ILl45kT8CP4eX9VyrGZAHEaT28b2DA9WtuU0dLrLfLL0RuJ03HE-68tMl9wd/s218/From%20Where%20You%20Dream%20by%20Robert%20Olen%20Butler.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="218" data-original-width="143" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjadpvHUYy15k5vmzdKfK5r-04TYbzAdd9WoPOu8AQoWnky7oYPy37UpU2pjC-tkirXDap5zXzzAhZL3GgTrlNwTMVZHPRp8YlK6ZjRbxyB5HoUNepzwxq6Mds9ILl45kT8CP4eX9VyrGZAHEaT28b2DA9WtuU0dLrLfLL0RuJ03HE-68tMl9wd/w210-h320/From%20Where%20You%20Dream%20by%20Robert%20Olen%20Butler.jpg" width="210" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From Where You Dream<br />The Process of Writing Fiction<br />by Robert Olen Butler<br />Edited and with and Introduction<br />by Janet Burroway</td></tr></tbody></table><br />This is one of the writing craft books most influential on my craft. In fact it was Butler who explained the story dreaming concept to me. I can't claim he taught it to be since I'd been doing a version of it from the beginning which was before my double digit birthdays. What he taught me was to respect it as the root source of the stories and the power source for their relevance.<br /><br />He also taught me that for a story teller, daydreaming was the life blood of your work not evidence of laziness. After I internalized this concept, I never had any further belief in writer's block as anything other than having gotten trapped in my left brain where the editor, critic and task master reside. Perfectionists all and all full of disdain for daydreaming. And yet no story and no idea is born in left brain machinations. All things new and meaningful must incubate in dreamtime.<br /><br />I have had this book checked out dozens of times from nearly a dozen different libraries over decades. Now I finally have my own Kindle copy as I just stumbled on a sale while looking for the latest edition of Janet Burroway's Writing Fiction because I found it's Kindle edition on sale last August and bought it and was thinking of writing about it for this post. So I grabbed this book and both images thinking I would write about both of them since Burroway's contribution to Butler's book is why I picked it up the first time as I'd been borrowing her book from my library for nearly a decade by then. That was the 2nd edition.<br /><br />Butler himself refuses to write non-fiction so without Burroway's help this book could never have been. She recorded a series of his lectures made extemporaneously from a stack of index card cues then transcribed them (or possibly had students transcribe them) and then edited to smooth out the rhetoric, remove repetition and the grammatical glitches of conversational delivery.<br /><br />It has been several years since I last read this so it is past time for a re-read.<br /><br />I think I'll save Burroway's book for next Wednesday. Unless I'm ready to talk about my NaNo project by then. Right now that's still incubating. I'm swimming in dreamtime and in spite of little wordcount, feeling as productive as a mother-to-be.<br /><br />Storytellers must believe that day dreaming is not slacking but the ultimate making of meaning out of chaos.<br /><br /></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-15805159854502272332023-11-05T23:11:00.002-08:002023-11-06T03:47:49.572-08:00Meet Mr. Merryweather Giggles -- Sunday Serenity<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZobX7gS_97xzaqH44gaZxiN6uKBmC0WO5b4mRAqNO-o2hOxnLkNPyyQlPq7VFdxnBBlOm0kzRkIJZskT8l1K2h60mJGkLY9Pc4iHCzk0HP6n4_Ltz-YBrIHmHsPsjJiejepKJQdJTbhARcEIWCVBl6VVSSF3dHXeNHesCaacrcgLBNACL6Eyt/s1600/Mr%20Merryweather%20Giggles.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZobX7gS_97xzaqH44gaZxiN6uKBmC0WO5b4mRAqNO-o2hOxnLkNPyyQlPq7VFdxnBBlOm0kzRkIJZskT8l1K2h60mJGkLY9Pc4iHCzk0HP6n4_Ltz-YBrIHmHsPsjJiejepKJQdJTbhARcEIWCVBl6VVSSF3dHXeNHesCaacrcgLBNACL6Eyt/s320/Mr%20Merryweather%20Giggles.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mr Merryweather Giggles <br />and My New Glider Rocker</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />My caregiver, Laura, took me to the Habitat for Humanity thrift store last Thursday. I was looking for a deep glass baking dish for casseroles, hopefully blue. I left with so much more than I knew I wanted before walking in those doors. The two things I've gotten the most joy out of in the last several days is the glider rocker and the blue rooster.<br /><br />I dreamed of having my own glider rocker since the first time I sat in one back before I married while on a babysitting job. But it was never to be. Until now. As soon as I saw it, I had to sit down in it and instantly all the hullabaloo of sensory overload such a place as a thrift store imparts was dampened by the gentle glide. I was instantly serene.<br /><br />Before I could quite assimilate to this sensation tho, Laura exclaimed saying "You have to see this." and disappeared because one step takes her out of my limited visual field. But she was back in seconds and setting something into my arms that nearly filed them and I thought it must be a doll because the first thing I got focused on was the real toddler shoes. Tracking up from the shoes towards the expected baby doll face I found instead the rooster and started giggling.<p></p><p>Laura knew I'd get a kick out of it as it was a form of fiber art and it was my colors which is any shade of blue. I marveled at the handiwork. Someone had put a lot of loving care into the project. Eventually tho I had to hand it back to her to put back on the shelf and found myself saddened by it. But we had to get with it as in about 90 minutes Laura had to clock out with me safely back at home.<br /><br />I found my blue casserole dish and several other glass baking dishes, some of which would work in the toaster and/or microwave as well. I found several DVD, a hand painted snowman ornament and a decorative wooden treasure chest. I'd laid claim to the rocker as soon as I stood up from it and someone whisked it out back for us to pick it up after we checked out.<br /><br />It wasn't until we were checking out that I decided I couldn't leave without the rooster as well. I was still grinning and giggling in my heart every time it crossed my mind that whole hour. So I told Laura and she went back to fetch it.<br /><br />By bringing home the rocker though I had to give up my rolling office chair. As soon as Laura brought the rocker inside she rolled the office chair out and packed it in her van so she could run it over to Habitat for Humanity the following day. I miss being able to wheel up and down my 8ft piecemeal desk and swiveling side to side but it's worth it. So far. <br /><br />I've got a small rug upside down under it so that it slides on the floor. Just not while I'm sitting in it. This allows me to position it in front of the section of desk I want to use or to position it facing either the TV or the front window and then roll or slide the section of desk I need in front of it. It takes a little extra work to set up for a project but it is functioning and so much more comfortable for extended sessions.<br /><br /><br /></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-39570596904776189312023-11-03T22:46:00.000-07:002023-11-03T22:46:21.008-07:00Picasso Ice Yarn Hat & Scarf Set -- Friday Fiber Art<p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjM4vzqxSI5Oc-AMCVyEU6FzAhsuX6EzEgQxON_9R3QOIM6FqonnOJ1wUztm5b-NnZsY6_sLgaEHEF3Habrm1Cq6MnVbaX-JCmmgATm3rNPcBykr6rpc06C29111TTmm2bonHteXjvkHRT-EBrizJ4ubNrC_G1p2PoHP60vf3J6hmCuLuAO2COO/s1311/Picasso%20Ice%20Yarn%20Project.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1311" data-original-width="947" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjM4vzqxSI5Oc-AMCVyEU6FzAhsuX6EzEgQxON_9R3QOIM6FqonnOJ1wUztm5b-NnZsY6_sLgaEHEF3Habrm1Cq6MnVbaX-JCmmgATm3rNPcBykr6rpc06C29111TTmm2bonHteXjvkHRT-EBrizJ4ubNrC_G1p2PoHP60vf3J6hmCuLuAO2COO/s320/Picasso%20Ice%20Yarn%20Project.jpg" width="231" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hat & Scarf Set 2/3 Done</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />I started with 3 of these small balls or skeins. Not sure what they are called. I hoped there would be enough for the hat and scarf set. Now I'm sure. But it was a squeaker. One ball barely finished the hat and one ball barely got me half the length in the scarf I wanted. But it will do.<br /><br />Since I worked the hat between last Friday evening and Sunday evening and worked the half scarf between Monday and this evening, I'm determined to finish the scarf by Sunday evening. I broke my own rule by starting something new before finishing a WIP but I needed something quick and easy to break the ice of the two month hiatus and the WIP I had been focusing on last July were very complex and big so I cut myself some slack. But I'm itching to get back to them now.<br /><br />The stitches used in this project are the simplest. The single crochet into the top of the 3 chain loop. Except for the band around the forehead in the hat which needed to be tightened up so I used the 2 chain loop. In order to get the billowy shape on top I expanded the flat circle faster and for longer and then abruptly decreased half the loops in one round at the top of the forehead before switching to the 2 chain loops. I was making it up as I go. I call it sculpting. I rarely have patience for patterns.<br /><br />The Picasso Ice yarn has a lovely sheen and drape. I love the feel of it in my hands as I work. But there are issues one should know about. It does not lend well to frogging. It snags against itself and knots and snarls easily. Working straight off the ball it comes in is easy for two thirds of the way and then at some random moment the end tail introduces itself to the working strand and curls up it and starts unwinding from the inside of the ball. If not caught soon there will be a massive snarl. The friction caused by the strands rubbing fuzzes up the strands. Frogging also creates the friction fuzz. And I imagine normal wear and tear of any item made from it will create this same frizz.<br /><br />One might think winding the strand into a ball first would be a solution but there are foreseeable drawbacks to that idea. Winding fast risks the friction fuzz. Also if you hold the strand with too much tension as you wind you will stretch it and spoil the drape and the silky feel. My solution was to keep a close eye on the ball and as soon as the empty center was big enough to fit over my left hand, I settled it on my left wrist and tucked the loose end strand up my sleeve.<br /><br />It will make a visually stunning item that is pleasant to touch but know that it will require hand washing and drip drying and still will not fare well with frequent use. Not recommended for an item meant to be an heirloom piece.<br /><br /> </p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-56153541683093445112023-11-01T23:11:00.321-07:002023-11-02T23:04:40.672-07:00Two Kickoffs in One -- NaNo and the Storyworld Go Bag<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtN7UxZq8a5qBiePIJA5L_NFRAXEqCrhhdDbWAJMhjQfIE5SiZprSc8vj1V-oX14HgZMoyQkb8IdylmXvCcsmghlQ1ZUYdJGHM_hda9WHnqZDOg75kWrj5Ux3gfMxVJQGEoBLyQQrhUMtFHq1jQeMbJGz8efP3tA-lyQMVNO_B3xMq3QLEgjjN/s1452/More%20Pages%20for%20the%20Go%20Bag%20File.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="886" data-original-width="1452" height="195" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtN7UxZq8a5qBiePIJA5L_NFRAXEqCrhhdDbWAJMhjQfIE5SiZprSc8vj1V-oX14HgZMoyQkb8IdylmXvCcsmghlQ1ZUYdJGHM_hda9WHnqZDOg75kWrj5Ux3gfMxVJQGEoBLyQQrhUMtFHq1jQeMbJGz8efP3tA-lyQMVNO_B3xMq3QLEgjjN/s320/More%20Pages%20for%20the%20Go%20Bag%20File.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Storyworld Go Bag Filling Up</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br /><br />My new storyworld go bag for my Fruits of the Spirit storyworld was ready for NaNo on Monday night. I got the printed manuscripts of several WIP installed along with a stack of tabbed dividers with pockets for loose papers. I don't have the dividers placed at the head of each separate story yet as I need to reorganize the pages. They are all in protector sheets--two per with often the first page of one story on the back side of the previous one. You can see how that doesn't suit the concept of a divider sheet placed between stories.<br /><br />They've been in a vinyl 3 ring binder like that for years and I was always thumbing through looking for the start of this or that story. I kept putting off tabbing the protector sheets themselves because I'd had the concept of the tabbed dividers with pockets for sometime but I would have had to split the stories between two one inch binders as the first one was already stuffed. I would have also had to expand into separate binders the next time I printed off new scenes or chapters.<br /><br />I was hoping there would be more room to grow in the new 3 inch ring binder but after adding the divider tabs it is already over half full. And with the stuff I put in the expanding file on the left it is already a challenge to zip it shut. Sigh.<br /><br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1i3LhwTAna49QbVXTwHhmrTBF5Kz_P7B7uPN6At0QnkAQ8Mv1MfcHwU3lIJyXaMz548u-18xAHyGy12d0bEwEWbyc0IRQJb6-C6hxj31BxwaJWrGY7hD5LoPK9eN5sxmqSP_P25aIbe-VYKzZPnwpzePr1VbQEXxfQt7WG6Jbx8nHU_7Pvyj0/s1499/Storyworld%20Go%20Bag%20Filling%20Up.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="933" data-original-width="1499" height="199" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1i3LhwTAna49QbVXTwHhmrTBF5Kz_P7B7uPN6At0QnkAQ8Mv1MfcHwU3lIJyXaMz548u-18xAHyGy12d0bEwEWbyc0IRQJb6-C6hxj31BxwaJWrGY7hD5LoPK9eN5sxmqSP_P25aIbe-VYKzZPnwpzePr1VbQEXxfQt7WG6Jbx8nHU_7Pvyj0/s320/Storyworld%20Go%20Bag%20Filling%20Up.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">More Pages for the Go Bag</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />Pictured above is a folder containing the rewrite project for my story Blow Me a Candy Kiss. The rewrite is still unfinished. That all needs to go into the big binder but not just willy nilly. I need to look closely at everything in situ or risk missing all sorts of clues or memories of what I was up to triggered by seeing each item exactly as I left it. But I don't think I'm going to take the time to do that during NaNo as my focus is on a different story.<br /><br />I declared myself a Rebel Wrimo a few weeks ago by deciding that I was going to devote this NaNo to the story that started the storyworld even tho nearly 30K words already exist. But it has become clear to me for some time that all of the stories I start for NaNo that grow out of it all stall out for the same reason: The root story isn't finished. <br /><br />Faye's story in The Substance of Things Hoped For impacts every other story either directly or tangentially. Most of the other POV characters encounter her at least once on their own story arc. But with Faye's timeline still not gelled I can't gel the other timelines.<br /><br />So on Tuesday evening I started setting up my new Dell laptop for NaNo. Once again a prep step that should have been done days if not weeks ago. But I kept shying away because it involves so much tech stuff I don't feel confident doing without a techie in the house. One of the things I needed was to install the Whiz Folder ap that I'd done NaNo on and most of my research and journaling and note taking and book reviews and..... ad infinitum since the early 2000s. <br /><br />I think it was after 2013 when I started using Scrivener for NaNo but continued using WhizFolders for everything else and thus always needed to have both open so I could keep referencing or adding to my notes in Whiz because I'd not got the material transferred over to Scrivener before NaNo Kickoff. <br /><br />And here we are again.<br /><br />This is what was meant by the ROW80 Goal referencing working with my storyworld files both pixel and paper. I set myself the goal in April and one thing after another kept taking priority. Whether properly or by simple procrastination. Until here I am on NaNo Kickoff with a new computer that contains none of my files and only one of the aps I need to open those files. <br /><br />The files are all on an external drive that needed to be ejected from the HP laptop and plugged into the Dell. I've kept it hooked up to the HP because once I'd copied the files last spring I did not want to save anything new to the old files as I feared loosing track of what changes I made to which drive. I know there is supposed to be a way to sync so that any change you make to one will automatically be made to the other but I don't know how to set it up. There is also the fact that the HP hard drive is stuffed to the gills and had been giving me warnings for some time. Especially around update times.<br /><br />So Tuesday evening I ran into a snag when I discovered that the company that created WhizFolders had stopped supporting it. I'd missed the warning emails in 2018 along with my last chance to get the latest updates. The downloads for the version I owned was also no longer available. Luckily I remembered that I'd saved a copy of the setup file from the Pro version I bought in 2008. I'd been using the Delux since at least 2013. But the Pro would still allow me to read and write to my files. After some frantic sifting through my email I found the one with the code I needed to input to validate and lo it still worked.<br /><br />So I spent NaNo Kickoff swimming in my story files instead of generating new words. And yet if felt like the most productive kickoff ever. I discovered a Scrivener file in which I'd set up a title page and at least one scene page as its child for every story belonging to the storyworld that I've ever worked on. Each POV character's story was kept separate as if a separate novel even tho it is probable several of them need to be smashed into single novels with 2 or more POV characters. Nearly each story contained at least one scene I deemed written well enough I was willing to expend ink and paper on them. I need to cross check these with the ones in the binder now because I can't be sure I've got hardcopy of everything I found in this file.<br /><br />The Substance of Things Hoped For contains two complete stories aka chapters 1 and 3. I am still trying to decide whether to do the NaNo words right there or create it's own file. But I think my concept for creating this file was about keeping it clean as a showcase for scenes that were print ready.<br /><br />One interesting note: when I click on the top of the file hierarchy the ap treats it as all one file and gives me the total wordcount. It is closing in on 90K. If only there was a complete novel in that mix. Well maybe by the end of this NaNo I'll be closer than ever before to that goal.<br /><br />I am unsure whether the stories in this file that have a title page followed by a blank scene page are missing words because I felt there was nothing good enough to move there or because I didn't finish combing through them. Each one of those several blank stories have they're own Whiz and/or Scrivener file. Some of those Whiz files are named only NaNo plus the year instead of the story title so I have to open them to identify them.<br /><br />I explored these files all night quitting just after 7am. I tried to get a nap before time for a zoom appointment at 11 but I felt like I was plugged into an electric socket. All I could do was rest in the dark with my eyes closed and swim in the storydreaming. So I was 34 hours awake by the time my caregiver left that afternoon which is why I'm writing my Wednesday post on Thursday evening tho I'm going to predate it.<br /><br />I better wrap this up if I want to have any hope of getting NaNo novel words for day 2....<br /><br /><a href="https://nanowrimo.org/participants/joywrite" target="_blank">Find me on NaNoWriMo</a></p><p><br /></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-2395851749928539632023-10-29T22:26:00.000-07:002023-10-29T22:26:28.624-07:00Breaking the Ice -- Sunday Serenity<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHqmufmySPS-gwIK_jgJDIC4u3vwHWk4ia0Rn_0bqHeD4w1X9BPORzvutarRhP3EK8IpCfpHG9fSzhr3juGx1KFHylqXlbpS70ucjvnx0J6UJK2dXjhmHUaN0pgt0WvGUXO5uvkwEZ8-OYr5VRWwHpwqpviLCzbg3KTSXFcYIMBa4juRSmOAH6/s322/Ice%20Picasso%20Crocheted%20Hat.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="241" data-original-width="322" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHqmufmySPS-gwIK_jgJDIC4u3vwHWk4ia0Rn_0bqHeD4w1X9BPORzvutarRhP3EK8IpCfpHG9fSzhr3juGx1KFHylqXlbpS70ucjvnx0J6UJK2dXjhmHUaN0pgt0WvGUXO5uvkwEZ8-OYr5VRWwHpwqpviLCzbg3KTSXFcYIMBa4juRSmOAH6/s320/Ice%20Picasso%20Crocheted%20Hat.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hat Crocheted with Ice Picasso</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />When I finally had my crochet corner back in order Friday night, I needed to crochet to test drive it but the several projects that were active when I was so rudely interrupted in early August were all quite complex and it is going to take me some time to remind myself exactly what I need to do next--involves a lot of stitch counting and row counting. <br /><br />So I allowed myself to break a rule and start something new before finishing a WIP. Besides a new yarn I bought last month was singing a siren song. Three small skeins of Ice brand Picasso yarn. Enough for a hat and scarf set.<br /><br />I won the argument with myself by acknowledging that a quick finish of a small project would fill me with warm encouragement. And with both warmth and encouragement in short supply that clinched the deal. <br /><br />I would have had the hat finished by late last night but about 3/4 into the first skein I found my working strand snarled with the last several yards of the skein and that snarl took me a couple hours to untangle this evening. I had been just about to start the band across the forehead when I had to quit Saturday night and that took me about an hour tonight.<br /><br />I may go ahead and start the scarf tonight but starting to morrow I will be trading off between the scarf and one or more of the projects interrupted in August. More on them Friday with the next Friday Fiber post. <br /><br />I pondered leaving the story of this hat for Friday but this is about more than the Fiber art. It is about reconnecting with the joy and contentment that crocheting brings me and that is the essence of Sunday Serenity.</p><p><br /></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-13265652861552610362023-10-27T23:11:00.015-07:002023-10-28T04:17:53.747-07:00Stick a Pin in It<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRFlOGdXzA0bn675TgV2sInVzp9QFAzS5MM14b70XO2V7WM-GAc2Eyq41ch06wHgJATih9Tln5wTUI1c1M7gkbHckmvLA5r6i_PafhE45KD32weerxKkBL0aYaFFnotZi6S8QZSR8QyF_3al_VyaXjRvsShtKoA7AGMvkVOBI2kozj8ypWWHcH/s1028/Pincushin%20Mug.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1028" data-original-width="964" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRFlOGdXzA0bn675TgV2sInVzp9QFAzS5MM14b70XO2V7WM-GAc2Eyq41ch06wHgJATih9Tln5wTUI1c1M7gkbHckmvLA5r6i_PafhE45KD32weerxKkBL0aYaFFnotZi6S8QZSR8QyF_3al_VyaXjRvsShtKoA7AGMvkVOBI2kozj8ypWWHcH/s320/Pincushin%20Mug.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pincushion Mug</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />This pincushion in a mug was one of the items I bought at a artisan booth at the Highland Festival I attended last August and wrote about in my post, <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2023/09/jazzed-sunday-serenity-row80-check-in.html" target="_blank">Jazzed</a>. I'm posting it tonight to head the first of my Friday fiber art posts.<br /><br />The pincushion is made of felted wool and it pops out of the cup to access the small storage space under it. The mug is either a vintage enameled tin cup or a modern replica of one. It is a dark blue with white flakes. I'm fairly sure the artist gets her mugs and cups at thrift stores and yard sales as there were no two alike. Tea cups on saucers provide a little more storage on the saucer but I would be sure to break one of those being both clumsy and legally blind. Besides this is one of my fav shades of blue and it gave me a frisson of nostalgia reminding me of something I saw in a relatives home as a child.<br /><br />I've gotten comfortable with the two posts per week (Sunday Serenity and Wednesday's on writing) and have kept them up for a month in spite of loosing the ROW80 accountability group as the motivation. So I decided it was a good time to add another regular post. I'd been debating between a Monday book review and a Friday fiber art. Fiber art won out because I got my beanbag alcove reorganized for crocheting again finally after the forced hiatus that began in August as described in <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2023/08/kit-and-caboodle-chaos-row80-check-in.html" target="_blank">Kit and Kaboodle Chaos</a>.<br /><br />I was planning to get some pics of the several projects that got interrupted in August for this post but instead I crocheted for almost two hours and then it was too late to do a photoshoot over in the alcove as there would be a risk of making noise that might disturb my neighbor sleeping on the other side of that wall.<br /><br />I was able to get a picture of the small mug though and thought that ideal for a statement of intent. Not to mention the need to celebrate the fact that I finally have my crochet corner back. That is huge.<br /><br />All week it has been my intent to get that figured out this weekend in advance of NaNoWriMo as crocheting (or other fiber art) is woven into my writing routine. It helps me reach and sustain the story dreaming zone. <br /><br />Getting my writing area and writing tools ready is also on the agenda this weekend. I actually started with that project but after creating a huge mess that compromised both the couch and the desk chair I needed to sit on the beanbag to rest and while I was there I started fussing with the crochet stuff that was already in reach and adjusting the lamp and sorting the small accessories (hooks, needles, stitch savers) and eventually needed to start crocheting to test drive the set up. Two hours later I heard my neighbor's caregiver leave which meant he was now in bed.<br /><br />So I tamed the chaos I'd made of my bed/couch and my entire desk area well enough I could work on this post. I have a lot more to do to make it NaNo ready but I still have a whole weekend to fiddle at it.<br /><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8MH62xBdKG4x-1LdgF7lKckzhPU_3a2MFSg4caRyvHXfkKgswistE8-qUGbMmB-ijSUOb0K9YNDAZ1zxHYYJ_Ucp5u_71iL0CkXNqZ3TbqWPcaYVefcdi33HQZFacgf5dRz9xgtBfas_hFexxF2tudIu3Yq793nyk_eH_mlgmgx0lLbVzk_BH/s1200/Ewesfluffy%20Fiber.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="641" data-original-width="1200" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8MH62xBdKG4x-1LdgF7lKckzhPU_3a2MFSg4caRyvHXfkKgswistE8-qUGbMmB-ijSUOb0K9YNDAZ1zxHYYJ_Ucp5u_71iL0CkXNqZ3TbqWPcaYVefcdi33HQZFacgf5dRz9xgtBfas_hFexxF2tudIu3Yq793nyk_eH_mlgmgx0lLbVzk_BH/s320/Ewesfluffy%20Fiber.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ewesfluffy Fiber</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />The pic of the artist's business card provides contact info for anyone interested. She is out of Battle Ground WA USA. That's less than an hour's drive from me. But I'm not sure she has a shop to visit since there is no street address on the card. She also dyes wool with natural plant based dyes. Cards it and spins it herself as well. I was so tempted but I'm drowning in yarn and thread and WIP.<br /><br />Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-41320424816672307572023-10-25T23:06:00.000-07:002023-10-25T23:06:23.874-07:00Storyworld Go Bag<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsR-5c733oNZsomHQOhP5SrM6MkPXp-PxzKqi2TdC-HR25qplbFro0oNaPBszRFoPINplvGqIbcAa_BTmRp-2HYjedi8n19E6yZ_5z76_Y_D29tx5mj7YKvx0MSwUnsQthrh9qRsV_QQvVaHSzJHbf71sLJneawA4JafsjjK0EpWLiAPyCIgjh/s1200/Storyworld%20Go%20Bag%20Upright.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1002" data-original-width="1200" height="267" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsR-5c733oNZsomHQOhP5SrM6MkPXp-PxzKqi2TdC-HR25qplbFro0oNaPBszRFoPINplvGqIbcAa_BTmRp-2HYjedi8n19E6yZ_5z76_Y_D29tx5mj7YKvx0MSwUnsQthrh9qRsV_QQvVaHSzJHbf71sLJneawA4JafsjjK0EpWLiAPyCIgjh/s320/Storyworld%20Go%20Bag%20Upright.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Upright</td></tr></tbody></table></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><div style="text-align: left;">Several times since the late 1980s when I first conceived the concept of the storyworld I call Fruits of the Spirit, I've lost much and once most of all of the related materials in a hasty move. That's all but the hundred or so printed pages of manuscript i'd deemed worth the use of ink and paper. I lost all the notes and outlines, character and setting sketches, family trees and timelines, lists of planned scenes and character rosters, research and bibliographies, floor plans and street plans. The last time it happened was the worst as I lost all the computer files as well as all the paper files as the floppy disc drive had not been working for several years and we had to leave the computer and whatever we could not carry on the bus in a storage shed which we never went back for.<br /><br />These incidents haunt me and I've been anxious for several years about how scattered and unprotected my FOS files are now--paper and pixel both. The number of manuscript pages that I deemed 'worthy' of ink and paper has at least doubled and possibly tripled but the computer files have grown exponentially. The NaNoWriMo site started putting a word count on my profile last year and it topped a million words. That's just for the November and the Summer Camp NaNos. That doesn't count the words I put in for JuNoWriMo and ROW80 or any created between challenges I participated in. Nor does it count anything that still exists only on paper.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTAqtzA7yHFgUVtGPc1MnRCg94GxVO-aXOBK2OvCHCNnD-DipCv_H2ScbjJesKhw_0RzZCebSSGtypjMmzHqiAsorp6m8I2ZnbAu0SIpCp9pLc-IJsC4G8O-mmPVBeH2cPMGuIXdbEx9MEBlQlBD_tnhbs4H8yOuAFivQSMuAIZ_iUCwcf8Zsd/s937/Storyworld%20Go%20Bag%20Flat.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="682" data-original-width="937" height="233" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTAqtzA7yHFgUVtGPc1MnRCg94GxVO-aXOBK2OvCHCNnD-DipCv_H2ScbjJesKhw_0RzZCebSSGtypjMmzHqiAsorp6m8I2ZnbAu0SIpCp9pLc-IJsC4G8O-mmPVBeH2cPMGuIXdbEx9MEBlQlBD_tnhbs4H8yOuAFivQSMuAIZ_iUCwcf8Zsd/s320/Storyworld%20Go%20Bag%20Flat.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Flat</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div style="text-align: left;">Well a couple months ago, I remembered a three ring binder I had in Junior High that held about 300 sheets of paper and zipped shut. I wondered aloud to Laura, my caregiver, if they still made those and she said Oh yes! They are called trapper keepers. So I shopped for one on October 11 hoping to snag a Prime sale but this was the one I fell in love with and ended up ordering even though it wasn't on sale and it was out of stock though promising to be available soon. It just arrived today.<br /><br />It has 3 inch rings that will hold 600 pages on one side and an expandable file on the other. When closed it measures approximate 4 inches thick including the outer boards. It has a carry handle and also a shoulder strap and access to the expandable file is available through a separate U shaped zipper on the edge opposite the handle so you don't have to open up the binder to access it.<br /><br /><br /><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgr1cVGGolwmMAmIY8O5IgPphR25uLCC1GuzgUPG8qSuKmTfJ9XzTWXKFcfuyau89AkJ2oIeh10SkX01jYXkMMmurjAlUc9fkij1GXz2TVdF4_UTl_IEoQIjPgQse1MTn7GEd0tsUCxWLoYfRNQC_oxY0Faf_MPnDDPSxI5vfV4oMX5zO-7oDwT/s1383/Storyworld%20Go%20Bag%20Open.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1383" data-original-width="1018" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgr1cVGGolwmMAmIY8O5IgPphR25uLCC1GuzgUPG8qSuKmTfJ9XzTWXKFcfuyau89AkJ2oIeh10SkX01jYXkMMmurjAlUc9fkij1GXz2TVdF4_UTl_IEoQIjPgQse1MTn7GEd0tsUCxWLoYfRNQC_oxY0Faf_MPnDDPSxI5vfV4oMX5zO-7oDwT/s320/Storyworld%20Go%20Bag%20Open.jpg" width="236" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Open</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><br />Now I have a safe place to keep all in one place all my notes and manuscripts. I hope to include all the computer files as well on either flash drives or a small external drive. The story bible I've been working on for several months will be in the expandable file as It doesn't have holes punched for the rings.<br /><br />Next Wednesday, along with my report on NaNo Kickoff, I'll share another pic of the inside showing whatever materials I've been able to gather and organize by then.<br /><br />FYI Product info: <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BQPJVMQP?ref=ppx_pt2_dt_b_prod_image&th=1">Case-it The Mighty Zip Tab Zipper Binder</a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></div><br /><br /><br /></div><br /><p></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-87057034274185546662023-10-22T23:22:00.001-07:002023-10-23T00:45:33.949-07:00Sweet Simplicity -- Sunday Serenity<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcxeTTFrS8HjpxTFmvUz17tFu5eLefN6TpGjicdNjzPn8Pe26St2_qQoTzUIeLR3w3aXJvioyXrca5YhAOVz_oLE6h5WaY_zXy9JUDBvvX38eVGrv1QGXmXfzgAPoI24ApHoP5AU4gQ2qiDFM4ZDPetK_jfdHtdblxClGwt86SXuMReU3u2dnu/s1131/Finger%20Food.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1086" data-original-width="1131" height="307" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcxeTTFrS8HjpxTFmvUz17tFu5eLefN6TpGjicdNjzPn8Pe26St2_qQoTzUIeLR3w3aXJvioyXrca5YhAOVz_oLE6h5WaY_zXy9JUDBvvX38eVGrv1QGXmXfzgAPoI24ApHoP5AU4gQ2qiDFM4ZDPetK_jfdHtdblxClGwt86SXuMReU3u2dnu/s320/Finger%20Food.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fingerfood for Read-a-Thons</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />Today, for the moment anyway, I'm holding this weekend's read-a-thon as a triumph rather than a fail. I only made it fifteen of the twenty-four hours as I couldn't sleep the night before so I was already at twenty-four hours awake by 9am. But the triumph was in reading a novel cover to cover in under ten hours. I'm reveling in that today. Also in the fact that I actually started reading at 3am after two hours of failing to sleep and thus had actually read for seventeen hours. I also added another five hours today after waking from a fifteen hour sleep.<br /><br />Pictured above is one of the thon food treats, a bowl of purple seedless grapes, slices of Honey Crisp apples and slices of carrot. There are supposed to be snow peas in the mix but I couldn't find them in the fridge and don't know whether my caretaker stuck them in some spot I'm not thinking to look or was unable to find them when she shopped for me.<br /><br />The question now as midnight closes in is whether I'm going to sleep again before dawn as a fifteen hour sleep is often followed by over 20 hours awake. But if I don't sleep it isn't just me that suffers but also my caregiver as it affects how I function which affects every aspect of the time she is on the clock with me. My mood colors her mood. My inability to participate fully in the day's activities creates a dynamic that neither of us enjoys. Important chores and errands get put off sometimes causing us to have to cram too much into a single day later in the week.<br /><br />I wish I still had some of the chicken and rice casserole that gave me the nap attack yesterday afternoon... <br /><br /></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-9831440854968327852023-10-21T04:44:00.063-07:002023-10-21T19:45:16.780-07:00My Brain On Books XXXV<p> </p><p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHap-_8ffpDXUg35xjdVRsoPujLyHRMaccoIqlkDhMNWg968wM0b4QiSnCuEpa-qK-VcwADP3TDRhUPFooysPXI8ZtX34Us82GKW7PSxQTHLUw2UTuxew_zWRSNnstigDyBWCx/s1600/Dewey's+24hr+Read-a-Thon.jpg" style="display: inline; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHap-_8ffpDXUg35xjdVRsoPujLyHRMaccoIqlkDhMNWg968wM0b4QiSnCuEpa-qK-VcwADP3TDRhUPFooysPXI8ZtX34Us82GKW7PSxQTHLUw2UTuxew_zWRSNnstigDyBWCx/s200/Dewey's+24hr+Read-a-Thon.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><p> </p><div style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><span style="color: red;">I am reading for</span><span style="color: red;"> <b><a href="http://blog.lettersandlight.org/" target="_blank">The Office of Letters and Lights</a></b> the folks who bring us</span> <b><a href="http://www.nanowrimo.org/">NaNoWriMo</a></b> <span style="color: red;">today as I love what they are doing for literacy with their Young Writer's Programs and because I've participated in NaNo every year since 2004. I have been blessed to have it in my life and would like to give something back if only kudos and link love. I'm putting this plug at the top in hopes some who stop by will check out their site and see all the great things they do to foster love of reading and writing and story in kids. </span></span></div></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: xx-small; font-style: italic;">This post will be organized like a blog inside a blog with recent updates stacked atop previous ones. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: xx-small; font-style: italic;">I may be posting some updates on Twitter @Joystory and the </span><a href="http://www.facebook.com/pages/Joystory/222353494492693" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: x-small; font-style: italic;">Joystory fb fanpage</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: xx-small; font-style: italic;">. But this is where I do anything more than a line or two. Including mini-challenges that don't require a separate post.. </span></div><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-style: italic;"><br /></span></span><br /><div style="text-align: right;"></div><div style="text-align: right;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA7lwHio8hzQ60fhSQRLkAjGV_1WmJUTu-31f_b_9avM88xQ8L7HG7B_OaMWpTtmLRYFXJbZShfJXIzlvGFCTPyR7GSAr9QFlrv1uC4MTJpsCF2N9E3xpRcsTvOoIUEq6xQMgV/s1600-h/Dewey.jpg" style="font-size: 13.3333px; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5326339425104127426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA7lwHio8hzQ60fhSQRLkAjGV_1WmJUTu-31f_b_9avM88xQ8L7HG7B_OaMWpTtmLRYFXJbZShfJXIzlvGFCTPyR7GSAr9QFlrv1uC4MTJpsCF2N9E3xpRcsTvOoIUEq6xQMgV/s320/Dewey.jpg" style="display: block; height: 150px; margin: 0px auto 10px; width: 120px;" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px; text-align: center;"><b style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; text-align: left;">Be sure and see my tribute poem to Dewey and the Thon she birthed at the bottom of this post</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px; text-align: center;"><b style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; text-align: left;"><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px; text-align: center;"><b style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; text-align: left;"><br /></b></div><div><div style="text-align: left;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaA7ASHA6fdIDdhVCP3vamirlaXH6cTg5W3bSGqY9GfExQ8Zj_SMsBmr7QEG4H5OVRmNOGQ3sWHSqfKwt_-X6oblXgMXX0TvPdYi7pQSB5T1lDQ_qYtI8pLjhiLbQUUJ5f1RO46_C8QNVGQVAwNxdbn-mTNITmaBYYl5OgLVBmRq8nY-wJpQ/s1600/Reading%20Buddies.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaA7ASHA6fdIDdhVCP3vamirlaXH6cTg5W3bSGqY9GfExQ8Zj_SMsBmr7QEG4H5OVRmNOGQ3sWHSqfKwt_-X6oblXgMXX0TvPdYi7pQSB5T1lDQ_qYtI8pLjhiLbQUUJ5f1RO46_C8QNVGQVAwNxdbn-mTNITmaBYYl5OgLVBmRq8nY-wJpQ/s320/Reading%20Buddies.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Meet My Reading Buddies:<br />Grace and Jolly<br />They are my sleep buddies and live on my bed but today they join me on my beanbag reading nest</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><b style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;"><br /></b></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms";"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-pGEGdEeXC7sTTN8UMF_JCw3a5E4-uLrkQB7maltUXyFZ1PmXhRxNN-mXhiOOSQZn34qSJDl9T8h9WkSm5qUV30ZcM_s1xMnEXCPcxrc0dSkK-ypq6LiDk869NUDPqYb7VocqQGsM9Ypy9r-4cnEEKcauEqaNxVAi2aG2Lx0LEXsfy72426jH/s680/The%20Invisible%20Hour.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="680" data-original-width="510" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-pGEGdEeXC7sTTN8UMF_JCw3a5E4-uLrkQB7maltUXyFZ1PmXhRxNN-mXhiOOSQZn34qSJDl9T8h9WkSm5qUV30ZcM_s1xMnEXCPcxrc0dSkK-ypq6LiDk869NUDPqYb7VocqQGsM9Ypy9r-4cnEEKcauEqaNxVAi2aG2Lx0LEXsfy72426jH/s320/The%20Invisible%20Hour.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Invisible Hour by Alice Hoffman</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><br /></div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;"><b>7:17 PM - I surrender</b><br /><br />After the 4-5PM sprint Pacific Time I realized I needed to eat something more substantial than the finger foods I'd been satisfied with for twelve hours. But eating something substantial tends to take the blood from the brain and redirect it to the digestive tract which brings on nap attacks. Especially if one is already sleep deprived. Sigh. I tried lighter weight reading fare but even my beloved Little Women can't keep me awake.<br /><br />I would like to say I'm just going to take a nap but since I've been awake for over 24hrs already I know this isn't a nap coming on. It is typical for me after a 24hr wake period to sleep 10 to 12 hours.<br /><br />The clincher for me wasn't even the dozing off. It was realizing that I'm seeing words on the screen that aren't there. Either I'm starting to hallucinate or I'm mistaking words with similar shape for each other: insect for inspect; conscript for encrypt; prefect for perfect... This made for some pretty confusing sentences and since when I read i'm seeing the words, hearing the words and seeing moving images almost simultaneously, it makes for pretty startling mind pictures as well. It is almost like I'm ping-ponging off the hypnogogic barrier which is another way of saying, I'm reading myself to sleep.<br /><br /><b>3:33 PM - I read the whole thing!!!</b> - In less than ten hours. Now that's the way a novel is meant to be read. Total immersion. That's the way I used to read novels. Back in the days before my vision issues forced me to sip novels like I'd always sipped NF and poetry. Back in the days when a book a day was the norm. sigh. Days long gone.<br /><br />This is a very short novel tho and I might even today have read in in 6-8 hours instead of nearly 10, if: <br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;">I hadn't been already sleep deprived, crossing the 24hr awake at 9am</span></li><li><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;">My Kindle battery had not dropped below 30% when I was 30% from the end so that the battery saver kicked in dimming the screen and more than doubling the eyestrain factor</span></li><li><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;">I hadn't needed to stop for food, drink, bios and eye rests at least once every 30 minutes.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;">If I hadn't been triggered more often than that by the references to the Puritan influenced rules of the Commune the young protag escaped from at age 15. The Commune was completely secular, founded and run for the narcissistic supply of it's power and control mad leader and yet the rules were so similar to those I was raised under in the funde sect I broke from in my late 30s I was constantly fending off shivers. Shivers of recognition. Shivers of memory induced shame, fear and anger. 30 years ago and the power for thsese triggeres to put me in a tizzy is still simmering in me.</span></li></ul></span></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;"><br />I'm actually tempted to drop all the rest of my thon plans and start this one over. I regretted not taking the time to highlight the lines and passages that gob-smacked me for their insight into the power of story to transform your life, your world, yourself. The power of story to redefine reality by opening doors on possibility.<br /><br />But I think my sleep deprivation will hinder that project and even if that wasn't a factor I need to put a bit a space and time between finishing and starting over. I have the book for another week so there is time. <br /><br /><b>7:22 AM - Changing it up </b></span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;">I did a rare thing this morning. So rare it might have been the only time I've done it in the thirty-odd thons I've participated in. I started out with the book I was MOST looking forward to. Even tho it was a novel and I'm already mid novel on three different devices. I used to avoid reading more than one novel at a time but the exigencies of library due dates and holds becoming available creates situations where it is unavoidable and this past year there has been quite a few such situations. Like setting aside one novel with a short or no wait list for one with a many weeks long waitlist. Or for the return of my turn on a novel I didn't finish on my first turn and so after a week's long wait I pause all else to finish it before I need to start it over or as a good turn for the next in line since I'm usually well past 50% when that happens.<br /><br />The novel I started this morning was The Invisible Hour by Alice Hoffman. The perfect read for a read-a-thon since it is about books and the power of story. One of the strands of the story follows a young girl raised in a commune where books are forbidden.<br /><br />Ok that's all i'm going to say at this point. Just saying that much makes me long to pick it back up. I actually reached 23% in under two hours so I might be on track to read a whole book start to finish this thon. Another rarity since I always have so many BIP and I read so slow with my vision issues that it seldom makes sense to start a book for the thon just so I can say I read the whole thing during the thon.<br /><br />But I just might stick with this one until it is done. Then I'll book hop the over a dozen NF on my Libby ap before returning to one of the NIP (novels in progress)<br /><br /><br /></span></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><b style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium;">4:44 AM - Intro Meme </b><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: small;">I'm setting this to go live at 4:44 AM but it may be well into hour 2 before I check in again. I'll be joining the first sprint with my first pick sitting in my beanbag chair nursing a hot coffee & Dandy Brew and eating a protein bar.</span></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: small;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: small;"><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><b>1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today?</b></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;">Kelso Washington USA. Across the Cowlitz river from Longview where I grew up and had been living with my elderly mother between January 2013 and late July 2021. I moved into my 400 square foot efficiency unit in late July 2021. <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2021/10/almost-home-photo-essay.html" target="_blank">This post was a photo essay of my new space.</a></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;">So this is my seventh thon in my own home, counting the Reverse Thons in August 2021 & 2023.</div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><b>2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to?</b></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;">Non-Fiction: Enough by Cassidy Hutchinson<br /><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;">Fiction: The Invisible Hour by Alice Hoffman</div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><b>3) Which snack are you most looking forward to?</b></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;">A Double Chocolate Muffin. Swoon</div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><b>4) Tell us a little something about yourself!</b></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><ul><li><a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2020/09/in-memorium-go-forth-ed-and-be-in-peace.html">Widowed September 2020</a><a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2020/09/in-memorium-go-forth-ed-and-be-in-peace.html"> </a> It still smarts at unexpected moments. But at least it is usually only several times a month now instead of constantly. But September brought it back to several times a day. September was his birthday and the anniversary of his Mom's and my Dad's deaths as well as his. So it was still a rough patch three years out. But only half as rough as last year.</li><li>Living alone for the first time ever. Just passed the 2nd anniversary of move in day.</li><li>Legally blind with RP aka tunnel vision. Have only a sliver of vision left in center of right eye. The rest is shadows and shimmers.</li><li>Have struggled with mood disorder of Anxiety and Depression since grade school</li><li>Diagnosed with high functioning autism in 2015. In my 50s!</li><li>Have a caregiver who comes in five days a week to help with chores and errands I can't do alone.</li><li>I proved during this move that I have more volume in fiber art supplies than in clothes by at least thee times.</li><li>I probably have double the volume of clothes in tree-books but since I still haven't got them all moved over I can't be sure.</li></ul></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><b>5) If you participated in the last read-a-thon, what’s one thing you’ll do different today? If this is your first read-a-thon, what are you most looking forward to?</b></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;">This is my 35th thon so there aren't many variations I haven't tried. <br /><br />But if the weather permits I would like to venture outside and sit on the bench about 40 feet from my front door and/or the Gazebo which is across the courtyard. My caregiver helped me practice for months to make those two walks with just my cane and I finally 'graduated' in late August. So now I'm not such a shut-in that I can't take three steps after letting go of the door handle or porch post without panicking.</div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;">Doing anything but especially reading or writing for a full 24 hours used to be my superpower but not so much anymore. Now that I'm in my mid sixties the price I pay for that self abuse is significant as all my systems are less forgiving. </div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br />Also hope to do a better job than in the past of staying hydrated and getting up to move regularly.</div><div style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: 13.6364px;"><br /></div></span></div></div></div><br /></div></div><b></b><br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="font-family: "times new roman"; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4sQw6yJDOnGFeoLU4gKsY0NQCTeSe57UofEfEfr8EcBCX8DkBCZLL0t_yA0OVQhccye1UabMhSsIyGkF3TIJGWa6MBa04l4VczBXsDO8WbCkT3jVkHNweqmYMFcYLEWWDcd7V/s1600/An+Ode+to+Dewey+--+Founder+of+Dewey's+24hr+Read-a-thon.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><b><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4sQw6yJDOnGFeoLU4gKsY0NQCTeSe57UofEfEfr8EcBCX8DkBCZLL0t_yA0OVQhccye1UabMhSsIyGkF3TIJGWa6MBa04l4VczBXsDO8WbCkT3jVkHNweqmYMFcYLEWWDcd7V/s640/An+Ode+to+Dewey+--+Founder+of+Dewey's+24hr+Read-a-thon.jpg" width="384" /></b></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;"><div><b>Ode to Dewey</b></div><div><b>by Joy Renee</b></div><div><a href="http://cheezburger.com/7851749888" target="_blank"><b>vote, fav and share for Dewey</b></a></div><div><b>We Miss You Dewey</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b><b><br /></b></div></td></tr></tbody></table>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-31049070394293814662023-10-18T22:55:00.001-07:002023-10-19T02:12:19.831-07:00To Be--or Not to Be--a Wrimo Rebel.<p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEZZT5yLkcGNSZnFxJgPb7JBzXvROY-k2fCV-Fgz175ckxhsJ2QEpyYETSbH40Zn3KoCeUBihxWAFOpMqzeecTgtCLUaSDosUhMM_UmchRHfwfNQtlTMESqwZU9FbCvjLCaf9teXwb1qQHcQoQCrz_Z8HOZxdku8Id0ycg51gnjNKFzj-r67H-/s610/does-it-ever-seem-like-your-story-will-never-be-finished.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="407" data-original-width="610" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEZZT5yLkcGNSZnFxJgPb7JBzXvROY-k2fCV-Fgz175ckxhsJ2QEpyYETSbH40Zn3KoCeUBihxWAFOpMqzeecTgtCLUaSDosUhMM_UmchRHfwfNQtlTMESqwZU9FbCvjLCaf9teXwb1qQHcQoQCrz_Z8HOZxdku8Id0ycg51gnjNKFzj-r67H-/s320/does-it-ever-seem-like-your-story-will-never-be-finished.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">35 Years, a Million Words and No End In Sight</td></tr></tbody></table><br /> NaNo kickoff is closing in and I'm not ready to commit to a new story in my storyworld. Oh, there are possibilities that tempt me--several minor characters that could step forward and carry a POV story arc for 20-50K. If I'm unsure of one taking it all the way to 50K there is the possibility of pairing up two or three characters into a single story with three separate POV characters each with their own character arc that is braided into one story. <br /><br />Several of them interest me and a couple excite me. That is until I remember all the previous NaNo endeavors that interested me or excited me enough to take me to the 50K finish line only to molder in pixel dust after the clock struck midnight on November 30. I've lost count but I think there are at least 20 separated POV stories set in my Fruits of the Spirit storyworld and since so many of the characters are interwoven into so many of the other characters stories the plots and timelines are a tangled jungle. <br /><br />This tangle contributes to the difficulty in sustaining each new POV story and especially in maintaining the pace for a NaNo 'win'. I put that in quotes because it has not felt like any kind of win for several years.<br /><br />All summer I've been working with the entire storyworld in my story dreaming and in the collecting from my story files all the relevant story facts into a story bible for reference no matter which POV story I happen to be working with. This work has reconnected me with the original story. The one from which the rest have flowered. The one that is still the heart of the storyworld. Faye's story aka The Substance of Things Hoped for.<br /><br />I find myself sad at the neglect. A neglect motivated by the NaNo rule that it has to be a new story not a WIP. The original story--Faye's POV--was already closing in on 30K when I first encountered NaNoWriMo in 2004. Nothing has been added to it except in my story dreaming and notes. But from that I'm confident there is material for another 50K words and I know much of the story I want to tell intimately. I've been living with it and dreaming it since the late 80s.<br /><br />More importantly I already understand it's architecture which is based on Faye's character arc. All of the other POV stories that I've spun off from Faye's story intersect with Faye at some point just not always inside the timeline of Faye's novel but if they do it is a bit part. A line or two or a scene or two and strictly in Faye's POV.<br /><br />My heart yearns to return to Faye's story and give it the same focus as I've given the spin offs each November for nearly 20 years. But not if it too were to end up smothered in pixel dust. So I am caught in a dilemma. I'd rather work with Faye's story than any other right now but I don't want to give up NaNo. Neither do I want Faye's story to suffer the same fate as the 20 odd spinoffs.<br /><br />The best solution seems to be becoming a Wrimo Rebel by investing my November words into a WIP while simultaneously committing to continue working on Faye's story going forward until the story arc is complete and after that whatever rewrites and edits are necessary. I think if I continue to give it half the attention of a NaNo month each month after I could have something close to publishable within six months.<br /><br />See links to outtakes from my FOS storyworld: <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2007/09/fruits-of-spirit-story-world-portal.html" target="_blank">Fruits of the Spirit Story World Portal</a></p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-26104799068447930762023-10-15T23:22:00.001-07:002023-10-16T02:20:32.358-07:00Feeling Eclipsed -- Sunday Serenity<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1zxjHGL8KE0EPpgkv671LUU0OVKYU7GJDXbTxox31sOM_C6Eu_8eCuQ0ojvxfrvQ_B7nLeRI_ygBFjMHConKg261BFChQnxTE5Oho8qGTlIR4yR5ymVOi3JNUWPB5RuTKcjP-ZzxzzJuyPwdgiaJ3UKDV-im2uYil7xKBeheQeZ8HfZw-RlA9/s372/Feeling%20Eclipsed.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="333" data-original-width="372" height="286" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1zxjHGL8KE0EPpgkv671LUU0OVKYU7GJDXbTxox31sOM_C6Eu_8eCuQ0ojvxfrvQ_B7nLeRI_ygBFjMHConKg261BFChQnxTE5Oho8qGTlIR4yR5ymVOi3JNUWPB5RuTKcjP-ZzxzzJuyPwdgiaJ3UKDV-im2uYil7xKBeheQeZ8HfZw-RlA9/s320/Feeling%20Eclipsed.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Swallowed by Shadows or Floundering in Fire</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />My mood has been off all weekend and possibly since as early as Thursday evening. But I noticed it sinking on Friday afternoon and it kept on sinking all of Saturday. I don't feel it is still sinking but I don't feel much better either. It didn't occur to me until late this afternoon that this might have something to do with the eclipse.<br /><br />Everything has been a struggle like I'm wading in mud up to my chin. I make silly mistakes. I feel unmotivated. I'm binging on junk TV. I have to keep rereading sentence, paragraphs even pages. I have to keep backing up the video because I spaced out or dozed off. So I think a nap might help since I seem to be good for nothing else but once laying down I can't sleep. Then at night I sleep only in fits, getting bounced out of the hypnogogic stage by startling images or sensations of falling or flying. And when I do fall asleep long enough to dream I am soon waking from a nightmare.<br /><br />I also have had a mild headache since I woke Saturday morning. Along with mild nausea.<br /><br />I searched for eclipse and mood or feelings and found this is actually a thing. But I didn't have the focus to actually read the articles. I read headlines and scanned section headings and looked at inserts with lists.<br /><br />Here's hoping that the worst is over. If the beginning for me was Thursday evening then that was about 36-40 hours before the eclipse passed over me in the Pacific Northwest just before 9am, then I should be back to feeling myself by the time I wake up. Unless I still can't get a solid sleep but then the variable of sleep deprivation will be in the mix</p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-36560605078069747022023-10-11T23:11:00.027-07:002023-10-12T01:42:24.328-07:00Of Notes and Notions and Drafting Dreams<p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjO3yClE9j7P8o2t2EmphqHknmhu-OdP6oMybk92OP3wtxMVubWgFWfT76-UKcWzuW4jxC21bPip8ah1XZojsd2qrasl2Iwb0FyUVZmX6HZ1SOObTq8biT81we7JHYWFtOhqFbUBl9teF0BtDElcEFiQVTGAYonc-NAGeKo7ls8imnhBIkmuQaL/s1600/Noted.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjO3yClE9j7P8o2t2EmphqHknmhu-OdP6oMybk92OP3wtxMVubWgFWfT76-UKcWzuW4jxC21bPip8ah1XZojsd2qrasl2Iwb0FyUVZmX6HZ1SOObTq8biT81we7JHYWFtOhqFbUBl9teF0BtDElcEFiQVTGAYonc-NAGeKo7ls8imnhBIkmuQaL/s320/Noted.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Boxed and Bindered Scribbles</td></tr></tbody></table><br /> It took four 6-10 hour days of effort to undo the chaos that the forced switch of the beanbag/tramp with the table last August created. As featured in Sunday's post, I have my beanbag and tramp nook recreated and ready for use for resting, day dreaming, reading and crochet on the beanbag and exercise on the tramp. <br /><br />It is still not back to the way it was and never will be as there were too many changes in the configuration and the small adjustments that will be needed won't become obvious until I start trying to use it as intended. I've been using the tramp daily and the beanbag for brief reading or resting breaks but my focus has gone over to the other side of the table which is the living area, my office and my bed/couch. <br /><br />There was much chaos of time and space and mind created on this side during the 8 weeks as the number of activities performed here more than doubled while the availability of homes for the extra items was next to nil to start and by the end I had piles of stuff that kept shifting. I had an archaeological dig on the surfaces of the big table and my entire 9 foot desk.<br /><br />The most disruptive of my writing goals though was the loss of the boxes of notebooks pictured above. There was no way to keep them on the office side so I put one stack on the far wall beside the table facing down the path from the 'office' and the other under it at 90 degree angle facing the hallway. <br /><br />The problem with that was I couldn't get to them by just rolling my chair over and remain sitting as I pulled out what I needed. I had to get up and go over there and then bend over or squat in front of them but this would block all light so I'd need a flashlight but it takes too hands to get most of the items off those shelves so I'd have to hold the flashlight in my mouth. It killed my back and leg muscles. I came away trembling and no longer interested in the project I'd gone over there in service to.<br /><br />I sat on the couch/bed to take that picture so I could get all eight of the boxes in. That also gives a good view of the edge of the table that I depend on to guide me in the dark on the path to and from the bathroom without needing to turn on a light. That was yet another major dysregulation of routine and mental stability. I have two blood blisters on my toes and at least one bruise and one broken nail to show for it.<br /><br />Two of those eight boxes contain new and unmarked notebooks of various shapes and sizes. I am a collector of notebooks. The two vertical ones on the right side contain accordion files, binders and portfolios containing notes, drafts, research, journals, drawings and misc. The remaining boxes hold more of the same in less organized or contained form.<br /><br />My next project is to comb through every folder, binder, notebook and loose paper and organize by category with separate file or folder or binder for each. Categories include creative writing notes and drafts, research notes, book review notes and drafts, journaling, fiber arts notes, sketches and doodles, and lots of lists and notes on lots of topics some not related to the categories already listed.<br /><br />The main motive for tackling this project now is to mine out every last draft or note related to my Fruit of the Spirit storyworld for the storybible project I'm working on for Preptober. This is part of the 'spend time in my story files' goal that has been part of my ROW80 goals for years but I tended to find it easier to click a short cut on my computer than to sort through this jumble that has been through uncountable moves in the last twenty-four years: from across the room to across the house to across the state to across state lines.<br /><br />It it is time. My work with the files on my computer and my storydreaming has awakened memories of notes I made at some point related to the thoughts I'm having now. I need to salvage them. This time I need to also protect them against ever devolving back into this kind of chaos and danger of being lost forever.<br /><br />I've been contemplating how to corral everything FOS into one location that is as portable as possible. I once upon a time--about 25 years ago--had a file box with a handle that contained the first fifteen years of work on these stories. But that got left behind when we abandoned our storage shed to hop on a bus after being homeless on the streets of Silicon Valley for ten days. <br /><br />This time I need a bugout bag that can contain all the paper files and all the electronic in a regularly updated external drive and/or high memory thumb. I will also back up the electronic files in the cloud but I don't fully trust it and anything that causes a need for a bugout could also make getting access to the internet immediately iffy.<br /><br />As I contemplated this need, my mind lit on a memory of the three ring binder with a zipper that I had in Junior High. The perfect concept. But I wasn't sure they were still a thing until I went shopping for them. Not only are they a thing but they now have handles and carry straps and can be double or triple the size I had. I spent several hours drooling over them. <br /><br />I was hoping to take advantage of the prime day sale but the one I fell in love with was not on sale. But it was still less than some of the sale prices. Nor was it in stock. But the message said they were going to be soon so I ordered it. I will have to wait a little longer for it's arrival but knowing it will arrive has my fingers itching to get started on the search and rescue.</p>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-59723865504933390312023-10-08T23:44:00.069-07:002023-10-09T04:06:40.055-07:00Cloud Sitting -- Sunday Serenity<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQbleLSva2ZVmaFkFcBetWy1Gb8BZMpROv5d2yxmTHNwV69HAdRwQ57pdzDuRdzjd-4H4sFdilC0JRG7WOKJtx_JWG2Tk4x-ivN1DRTs6Ls2za_n2JbOR-ful2aYKGNVh8RuaJDz6vs8LDoYgPjeAkL7wonc6JeAbnSb9okmSGdC8-R6e_hzoP/s1600/Cloud%20Sitting.jpg" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQbleLSva2ZVmaFkFcBetWy1Gb8BZMpROv5d2yxmTHNwV69HAdRwQ57pdzDuRdzjd-4H4sFdilC0JRG7WOKJtx_JWG2Tk4x-ivN1DRTs6Ls2za_n2JbOR-ful2aYKGNVh8RuaJDz6vs8LDoYgPjeAkL7wonc6JeAbnSb9okmSGdC8-R6e_hzoP/s320/Cloud%20Sitting.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Back in My Haven</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Back in early August I had to switch the beanbag/mini-tramp with the table beside it in order to pass an inspection to avoid eviction. I had to move the cooler over to this window as it was the only one that had an outlet close enough to plug directly into the wall. See the photo essay showing the result at the end of my post <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2023/08/puzzle-on-this-row80-check-in.html" target="_blank">Puzzle On This</a>. This was a complete disruption of all my habits and even put my safety at risk. This is what I lost:<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>My crochet station as I was unable to get a light at the right distance and angle.</li><li>Access to 4/5 of the shelves on the back wall as the table was placed against the left edge</li><li>Access to 90% of my yarn and thread whose bags were stuffed under the table and stacked between the table and the window and then blocked by the tramp and cooler</li><li>Access to most of my fiber art WIP which turned out to be moot since I had nowhere to work on them.</li><li>Easy access from my office chair to my notebooks and files</li><li>The intricately organized station with everything in arms reach to the left and the right for crocheting, reading (tree books, ebooks and audio books), taking notes from reading, taking notes from storydreaming, other writing by hand, watching videos on tablets or a portable DVD player, playing video games on tablets, charging station for the electronics, listening to music and podcasts on tablets</li><li>Ability to get on and off the mini-ramp without help thus could only use it during the weekday hours my caregiver was with me</li><li>Ability to get safely to and from the bathroom from my couch/bed in the dark as I'd lost the guidance of the table edge. </li></ul>Among the results were a blood blister on the edge of my big toenail after loosing my way crossing the room on my way back to bed trying to avoid stubbing my toes on the tramp legs that were where I was used to the edge of the table being. I ran into my desk where I'd left a drink bottle which fell on my toe. I don't have to worry about the tramp legs when it is tucked into this nook as it is not on the edge of any pathway.<br /><br />I had to give up crochet entirely due to the lighting issue. Everything else except ebook and audio book reading without notetaking had to be done at my desk sitting in my office chair. I could have watched video on tablets but only if I was willing to hold the tablet as there was no surface on which to set them down and no ability to keep them plugged in so the battery would stay strong. <br /><br />With my vision issues I need the screen brightness at 100 so that gives me maybe an hour before they start dimming it if it isn't plugged in. My Kindle Fire was the only one that would give me more than two hours of full brightness so I did do some significant reading on the beanbag in the last seven weeks.<br /><br />I sincerely believe in this moment that if I'm still in this unit when the time comes to break out the cooler again next spring, I'd rather do without than be put through this disruption again. Of course the first time the temps go over 90 inside I might think again. But then I'd have to do all that work of the shift in the heat. Ugh.<br /><br />I have one possibility in mind and that is to pull the tramp forward about two feet--flush with the front edge of the table. I think we could fit the cooler back there and point it toward the table so it doesn't blow on my neck. But I would have to think about the effect of the humidity it kicks out on the stuff under the table where air circulation would be close to zero.<br /><br />This would throw off the careful calibration of the placement of items within reach to the right and left. But shifting all those items one or two feet forward would be a smaller price to pay than the massive shift and loss of access and use of so much of my things and my space.<br /><br />The solution I'm hoping for tho is for my name to reach the top of the waiting list for a one bedroom unit before time to worry about the cooler.<br /><br />We had to winterize the cooler by October 1st so we did so on the Friday before but I didn't get motivated to start the switch back until Wednesday evening. Last weekend I was pushing hard to finish two Libby library novels that were coming due. So I had myself a private readathon, reading over twelve hours each day. I'd even postponed putting up my Round Four ROW80 goals post on Sunday.<br /><br />Then on Wednesday afternoon as I was preparing to post it, I discovered that ROW80, my writing accountability community, had been unplugged. The moderator had to bow out and there was no one else to pick up the reins. I went into a funk. It was real grief. I've been participating off and on since 2012. <br /><br />I wallowed for several hours and found myself too restless to read or watch videos. I needed to be physical. I needed my tramp which can be a mood regulator for me but it wasn't safe for me to get on it. So at 7pm I started the switch. It was a six hour project. It had been a ten hour project for the first switch. But I didn't really finish on Wednesday night. <br /><br />I needed to sleep. My neighbor had been snoring for hours so I'd avoided rearranging the shelves against that wall which meant a lot of small items still had no homes. So to free up my bed for sleep and desk for morning pages and the floor of trip hazards, I piled the table two feet high.<br /><br />Then on Thursday morning before my caregiver arrived I tried to move the beanbag so I could tramp now that I had the table to help me mount and the window sill to keep me oriented in space. But it was fitted in there too snug and when I took a closer look I realized I'd placed the table three inches too close to the tramp. But it was not going to budge until I pulled half the items out of the 4x4x4 foot cube of space underneath and repositioned the rest to free up the legs. <br /><br />That was not a project to be working on when I was about to be sharing my 400 square foot space with another person needing to be in motion so I saved it for the weekend. I was out of oomph on Friday evening so I didn't start until early afternoon on Saturday. I had the table repositioned in less than an hour but that was just the first step of many to getting the area back to efficient use. <br /><br />I'm still not there. The only thing I've used the beanbag for since getting it back in place is resting between spurts of activity. I would sit there to plan my next moves. Sitting there would help me know where certain items needed to be placed for the easiest access whenever I needed to use them or to put them away without having to get up. Getting up off that beanbag is a bit of a challenge. <br /><br />So every time I got an idea for the best spot for an item I would get up to place it there but most times that meant another item was displaced and needed a new home. Often the best place for it meant another item was displaced and so it went. Late into the night on Saturday and for several hours Sunday afternoon and evening.<br /><br />Today this shelf-shuffle spread away from the beanbag alcove into other areas of my unit as I was getting ideas for more efficient placement of items on or around my desk, or bed or kitchen counters. Somehow in the process I emptied four of the foot square cubicles on the shelves beside my couch and behind my desk. <br /><br />I'm still trying to figure out how that happened. That's two feet cubed of space that was in use and now is not and there is nothing desperately needing a home to fill the space. This gives me hope that I can bring another box of my tree book library from Mom's.<br /><br />Meanwhile, I've decided that I do not want to lose the habit of posting just because ROW80 is gone nor do I want to lose the momentum I'd developed with my writing over the summer. So I'm going to have to hold myself accountable to myself. I'm going to continue Sunday Serenity and a writing themed post on Wednesdays.<br /><div><br /></div><div><br /><br /></div>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-32475051331667885432023-09-24T20:58:00.060-07:002023-09-24T21:35:19.119-07:00Crystalline -- Sunday Serenity -- ROW80 Check-In<p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv2Gs7OasxARn7tGntD-kUP9MlDmO8l34XJio-Mi-6q7VnhFDpAFsscAVheb4U3NZbv5h8lzri0JREQu-ybN3p9IPrER4vDJGZtTpK8zgbrqqxo28DNQVyaRyU8Yx1elJ-aP1N2e8VUv2gLXUt-dwjDTXIzvaGk652fHfygtcy5TU4x5JjM55h/s1176/IMG_20230924_182007.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="921" data-original-width="1176" height="251" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv2Gs7OasxARn7tGntD-kUP9MlDmO8l34XJio-Mi-6q7VnhFDpAFsscAVheb4U3NZbv5h8lzri0JREQu-ybN3p9IPrER4vDJGZtTpK8zgbrqqxo28DNQVyaRyU8Yx1elJ-aP1N2e8VUv2gLXUt-dwjDTXIzvaGk652fHfygtcy5TU4x5JjM55h/s320/IMG_20230924_182007.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Crystalline</td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><p>The crystal sculpture pictured above is another of the treasures I picked up at the Highland's Festival in Kelso WA two weeks ago today. See my <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2023/09/jazzed-sunday-serenity-row80-check-in.html" target="_blank">Jazzed</a> post for details of that adventure. It is still my favorite post so far this year.<br /><br />It graces the top today as a symbol for both the Sunday Serenity and the ROW80 portions of this post. <br /><br />As a serenity tool it serves a bit like a mandala or any other focus aid. But in this case it is 3D so i can hold it in my hand to explore its shape. I can grasp the opposite columns with index finger and thumb of each hand and spin it watching the light flicker in its facets or hang it under a lamp or in a sunny window and watch the slow light show.<br /><br />Yes, yet another fidget toy.<br /><br />For my goals it symbolizes the clarity I've been moving into throughout this round. Not there yet but then it's about the process not the destination Isn't it? I mean we have to keep the destination (goal) in focus but then the process needs to serve that goal. That is why my goals for ROW80 have always been more about the process and the elements of my daily life that support the process than about things like word count.<br /><br />But when the process I set up this round was not working, I blamed and shamed myself for weeks rather than wonder if my process rules had been setting me up for failure. Some of the rules I'd made for myself weren't even made explicit in the goals list I set up. Many of them were based on assumptions no longer valid if they ever were. Some were based on advice I'd gleaned from writing craft books and blogs, from self-help and motivational videos, from the way it once worked for me decades ago.<br /><br />So in the last month or so I've pulled back into observer mode, watching myself as I interact with my aspirations and with my writing tools, my environment, my routines and myself. I'm questioning assumptions. I'm still thinking hard about it but I'm sure my goal list is going to look quite different next round.<br /><br />These are some of the lessons I've learned about my process:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Engaging with a task that requires focus is not something I can do in time increments under an hour. It takes me twenty minutes to get focused.</li><li>I am more productive with the first and roughest of rough draft of a scene with a pen or pencil on paper. This is how I worked before my first typewriter at age 13 and even after I hesitated to 'waste' the ink to compose on it. But I think it was about more than my fear of 'wasting' ink and spendy paper. I think I was a creature of habit and I'd developed a process that worked.</li><li>I am still as always in my memory more productive with hours long sessions at a task. But that is not sustainable if I require it of myself every day. So I'm taking a look at the time goals of X minutes per day. Except for the exercise ones. For the storyworld bible and file engagement I think I'd do better squeezing those 7 thirty minute sessions into one or two several hour sessions per week.</li><li>I have to be willing to accept the incursion of life events that I can't or didn't predict at the time I formulated my goals post and learn to see adjustments to them as something other than failure or proof I'm not serious. Flexibility is not a strong trait for those of us on the spectrum. But finding the balance between accepting the necessary amount and letting things slide into chaos--that is the challenge.</li></ul><div><br />I also had to give myself a bit of grace on several fronts this week as I'm in the second week of cutting back my coffee and other caffeine intake. That process involves cutting it in half every third to fifth day while learning to accept substitutes. This has messed up my daily routines and counterintuitively caused both long sleeps and insomnia. I am now at the place where I need to decide if I can trust myself to maintain a single mug of moderate strength coffee without slowly increasing it again or do I need to eliminate it entirely.</div><p></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s1600/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s200/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption"><div><span style="color: black; font-size: xx-small;"><b><a href="http://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">A Round of Words in 80 Days</a><br />Round 3 2023</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b>The writing challenge that<br /> knows you have a life</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b><br /></b></span></div></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br /></p><p></p><p></p><p><a href="https://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/2023/06/26/round-3-its-your-goal-post/" style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank"> ROW80 Round 3 Goals:</a><br /><br /></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><ul><li>Morning pages daily. Average 40 minutes (ala Julia Cameron The Artist Way and Writing For Life) <b>YES </b>Started May 20. Probably would not have jumped into NaNo and ROW80 without having had a month of morning pages behind me. But the very fact that I've hung on to this YES throughout the crisis' is PROOF that I am committed to the writing and still belong in ROW80. Don't worry, I know the ROWers need no such proof. <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2022/10/taming-my-stella-and-rising-from-her.html">Only my Stella</a>.</li><li>Storydreaming with notebook for noting ideas for characters or scenes. (ala Robert Owen Butler From Where You Dream) <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day 2/7 <b> of a yes since last Sunday</b> (Storydreaming itself is becoming habitual and feeling more natural but the notebook is the key to this goal as without it the storydreams go to the same place night dreams go an hour after waking.) <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal for the duration of the round to ten minutes a day with the caveat that as long as I'm sitting with notebook and pen it counts even if I don't write anything new.</b></li><li>Working on the Fruits of the Spirit (aka FOS) Storyworld Bible at least <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day at least 5 days per week. I'm sure this will expand as I get involved but I need to set a minimum for that jumpstart. <b>YES (except it was one hour on one day. anticipating next round goals here) </b> (still hoping to make this and storydreaming my ROW80 main project for the remainder of this round as I need a substantial start on it in time to use it for Preptober and NaNo next Round.) <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal to 10 minutes 5 days a week or 50+ minutes on one day with the caveat that I don't need to work into the pristine spiral notebook I bought for this project yet.</b> The first task is to get a feel for how that notebook needs to be organized and to figure that out I will start re-reading my files with loose scratch paper or note cards at hand to note down every 'fact' I encounter as I read. I realized one of my sticking points has to do with not being able to visualize exactly what is expected. But I know what it means to 'read' and 'take notes' I've been doing it with other people's stories every day for weeks and weeks. For most of a year in fact.</li><li>Weekly Artist Date (ala Julia Cameron) This is about doing something to recharge your creative battery. I'll go into more detail in one of the check-ins. <b>YES</b> More 24/7 cams discovered. Also screensaver vids of color or image in motion. Some with music excellent for background ambience for writing. Shamanic Drumming to storydream by. I wasn't possible to go out in public for this this week as my caregiver had been exposed to COVID and until we know for sure that she doesn't develop it we won't know if I've been exposed.so we had to limit certain activities we had tentatively planned. Always something right?</li><li>A minimum of 5 minutes of physical activity daily. Either a walk outside with my caregiver or a session on my mini-tramp, or pacing the floor between front and back door. <b>YES </b>(may need to look at upping the expectation soon. this is getting too easy.) </li><li>I want to reengage with my blog so: <strike>Two</strike> One blog post per week besides the two check-ins. Either about encountering other people's stories via print, video or audio which can include formal reviews or about a current fiber art WIP o<strike>r about one of my personal challenges: widowhood, independent living with visual impairment and autism and issues related to health and aging among them</strike>. <b>Not yet. Note: I've adjusted my expectations here for the duration of the round. </b>I removed the theme of personal challenge from the options as it turns out that has been the theme of my check-in posts and those take a lot out of me and a third one would be overloading my readers as well as me. </li></ul>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-52058623640440143212023-09-16T23:11:00.386-07:002023-09-17T02:17:11.335-07:00A Notable Week -- Sunday Serenity -- ROW80 Check-In <p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOQcEJDIMi73HyAMQzCtNtJQS8oJIu6PAKNqkbQr0heSgCrld7yiKSmBWFRsYbKTEIXH_4YEjAv9OtIFAb-WXEJxsPC188gxZZaujMJlMjVVFekeME-pEC4rynmfA4BxVcqUcNy0Gr1PPpwdVgh41vkiXKny26pFlqHCDirLBllZtq4FM1jA3W/s1600/IMG_20230916_224210.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOQcEJDIMi73HyAMQzCtNtJQS8oJIu6PAKNqkbQr0heSgCrld7yiKSmBWFRsYbKTEIXH_4YEjAv9OtIFAb-WXEJxsPC188gxZZaujMJlMjVVFekeME-pEC4rynmfA4BxVcqUcNy0Gr1PPpwdVgh41vkiXKny26pFlqHCDirLBllZtq4FM1jA3W/s320/IMG_20230916_224210.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Handmade Leather Notebook</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br />The notebook pictured is one of the treasures I bought at the artisan booths at the Highland Festival I attended last Sunday. If you missed that post, which is likely because I posted well after midnight last Sunday, you might want to check it out as it was my favorite post all Round if not all year.<br /><br />I love notebooks in general but hand made notebooks can actually raise my pulse. I am often caressing them at these artisan booths or stores that sell on consignment but this is the first time I bought one. I just could not resist. The dreamcatcher, butterflies and feathers all have spiritual significance for me. <br /><br />Now I just need to figure out what to use it for. And that will be a challenge as one of the reasons I've never bought one is that I know myself so well. I know that the more I love a notebook the harder it is for me to put a mark in it.<br /><br />I chose the notebook to preside over this week's post as it so relates to the theme of my week and the theme of this week's goal triumph. A triumph I practically stumbled into or was pushed by circumstances. The same circumstances that prevented me from posting a check-in Wednesday.<br /><br />Last Wednesday I woke up to a glitchy computer. Every mouse click or keyboard tap took forever to respond. I spent more time watching spinning wheels, greyed out aps, and 'not responding' or 'end task' messages than I did doing tasks. This caused me to be late to an important Zoom which had to be conducted except for the last ten minutes via phone. <br /><br />By late afternoon, I was worn out by hours of trying to get my computer to cooperate with me and possibly a bit by sleep deprivation so by dusk I was ready for bed. Then I woke at 2am and opened my laptop and there on the screen was a dialog box saying that my computer needed to restart to install updates and a countdown clock that had about three minutes to go. <br /><br />Of course. Doh!<br /><br />Over the next day or two I got requests from several aps for installing updates. So multiple companies were working in the background at the same time. No wonder there was no RAM left for me. Stop me before I start my rant about product service personnel invading our private spaces and commandeering our products at their whim. <br /><br />Would we tolerate it from our car dealership's mechanic? Imagine finding your car in pieces in your garage as you rush out to head to work or school. I don't think so. So why is it OK that once a month for several days the one device that is most integrated into our daily productivity can be made useless for hours on end? <br /><br />Ooops. I ignored that stop sign.<br /><br />So, returning to the story, I managed to get the two aps that might be irritated by a forced shutdown closed and then with a minute to go clicked 'restart now'. Then I read for the nearly forty minutes it took to get back to my desktop. It was what I found shortly after Chrome reloaded the twenty odd tabs that had been closed for the shutdown that put the ROW80 check-in off my radar. <br /><br />Open tabs often serve as my todo list and sometimes I don't close them when I'm done with the task so one of my habits after a restart and reloading of the closed window is to close the tabs I know I'm done with and remind myself what is urgent and to bookmark and close things that can wait. This is how I discovered a tab I'd left as an urgent task but that had still gone off my radar weeks ago.<br /><br />This was a tab to the Evernote site where I had been trying to find out how to unsubscribe from the paid version and whether the free version was still available and if not, what happens to my notes. I'd been researching this after getting an email from them in mid August announcing that my annual payment was due on September 16th and it would be doubling.<br /><br />As if that wasn't bad enough I learned by signing into my account trying to find answers that this had happened once before and I'd never known. So I'd already been paying twice what I signed up for just before the pandemic for two years and now they were doubling it again? No! This is not sustainable on a fixed income. Stop me before I go into a rant about the subscription economy and how it is creating a balkanized caste system of information haves and have nots.<br /><br />But that isn't the theme of this post. This is about me having a fire lit under me to rescue my notes in case I needed to deactivate my Evernote account in order to prevent the autopay from dinging my card on the 16th since I couldn't figure out how to stop the payment. So at 3am I began moving my notes.<br /><br />I identified three major types. There was the web clippings that were either links alone or links with clipped portions of a page or links with notes added. Then there were three types of text only notes: quotes, lists, writings of various lengths. The links alone were easy. I opened them and bookmarked them in the browser. Links with more I found I could copy/paste to a Google Docs. The very short text only stuff I copy/pasted to my sticky notes ap and the longer text pieces to Google Docs.<br /><br />This project took most of twelve hours. I had to stop and eat a couple times. I had to stop and watch a screensaver for ten minutes before doing the 40 minute morning pages exercise about when my morning alarms started going off. I had to stop briefly to get my caregiver started on her tasks. <br /><br />I moved the last note just after 3pm. There had been 120 odd. No way that had been worth what I'd been paying. Not even what I had started out paying. But that was because my life imploded just after I started the subscription so that I didn't use it how I'd envisioned.<br /><br />I'd had big plans for it when I subscribed in 2019. At that time I had multiple devices and was moving from room to room in Mom's house, going to appointments and spending part of every weekend with my husband. I couldn't always have my laptop with me. I'd just bought a Bluetooth keyboard that worked with all my devices except the laptop and thus it was finally possible for me to compose on my android devices wherever I found myself. <br /><br />I got to use Evernote as I imagined for only about three months before the pandemic which was just the beginning of the shakeups in my life. Most of the relevant events are covered in the dwindling posts of those years.<br /><br />After assuring the safety of my notes, I returned to the Evernote tab to start exploring my options once again. The only thing like a FAQ was a Forum for asking questions and I had to register to join it. Luckily my questions had already been asked and answered. Yes the free version was still available and thus my notes would have still been accessible except that any very large ones could not be edited but I'd never uploaded or created anything large. I would no longer have access via unlimited devices and my limit of data moved shrank considerably but again, I'd never needed the extra MB the way I'd been using it. I am still unclear whether I can access via two or only one device. Moving files between devices was one of the ways I used it. But Google Docs works for that too.<br /><br />As it turned out the majority of my notes had been via the Web Clipper browser extension and I think that will be the main way I use it going forward. I discovered that Google Docs was a lot easier to use for the plain text as well as for text with hyperlinks and graphics. <br /><br />But if I'm going to start using Google Docs that way I'm going to have to perform a similar task with it as what I just did with Evernote. Not a note rescue exactly unless you can call organizing files so you can find them when you need them a rescue. I've been dropping stuff in there willy-nilly for ages.<br /><br />Meanwhile I hope no one will quibble with me for giving myself a big YES for working with my FOS storyworld notes this week even though it was all done in a single day rather than spread out over the week. Because the majority of those notes were related in one way or another to my storyworld project from reading notes, character or plot ideas, quotes, research, musings on theme, and even a very rough draft of a potential scene that I completely forgot existed. Sigh.<br /><br />Actually I'm thinking I need to rethink that goal for next round. I was trying to train myself to have a daily or semi-daily habit but that doesn't take into account one of my autism related superpowers: to hyperfocus on one task for many hours.<br /><br />That goal of 30 minutes five times a week also flies in the face of one of my autism challenges: the fact that changing channels in my mind takes twenty minutes. Thus for a thirty minute task I'm lucky if I'm on task and productive for the last ten of it and then I'm irritated if I'm forced to quit and change focus again. <br /><br /><br /></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s1600/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s200/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption"><div><span style="color: black; font-size: xx-small;"><b><a href="http://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">A Round of Words in 80 Days</a><br />Round 3 2023</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b>The writing challenge that<br /> knows you have a life</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b><br /></b></span></div></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br /></p><p></p><p></p><p><a href="https://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/2023/06/26/round-3-its-your-goal-post/" style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank"> ROW80 Round 3 Goals:</a><br /><br /></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><ul><li>Morning pages daily. Average 40 minutes (ala Julia Cameron The Artist Way and Writing For Life) <b>YES </b>Started May 20. Probably would not have jumped into NaNo and ROW80 without having had a month of morning pages behind me. But the very fact that I've hung on to this YES throughout the crisis' is PROOF that I am committed to the writing and still belong in ROW80. Don't worry, I know the ROWers need no such prrof. <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2022/10/taming-my-stella-and-rising-from-her.html">Only my Stella</a>.</li><li>Storydreaming with notebook for noting ideas for characters or scenes. (ala Robert Owen Butler From Where You Dream) <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day 2/7 <b> of a yes since last Sunday</b> (The notebook is the key to this goal as without it the storydreams go to the same place night dreams go an hour after waking.) <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal for the duration of the round to ten minutes a day with the caveat that as long as I'm sitting with notebook and pen it counts even if I don't write anything new.</b></li><li>Working on the Fruits of the Spirit (aka FOS) Storyworld Bible at least <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day at least 5 days per week. I'm sure this will expand as I get involved but I need to set a minimum for that jumpstart. <b>BIG YES (with the caveat that it was all in one day. see above) </b> (still hoping to make this and storydreaming my ROW80 main project for the remainder of this round as I need a substantial start on it in time to use it for Preptober and NaNo next Round.) <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal to 10 minutes 5 days a week with the caveat that I don't need to work into the pristine spiral notebook I bought for this project yet.</b> The first task is to get a feel for how that notebook needs to be organized and to figure that out I will start re-reading my files with loose scratch paper or note cards at hand to note down every 'fact' I encounter as I read: names, dates, descriptions, titles of books and chapters and stories, character quirks, symbolism associated with a character...etc. It occurred to me that my resistance to this task was at least partially related to not wanting to make a mess in that pretty notebook. So now I have permission to make a mess with scratch pads and note cards. Let's see if that makes any difference. Also there is a trick I'm playing on myself here. I almost never do a thing for only ten minutes but if I think I must do 30 minutes I balk at starting thinking of all the ways I'm likely to get interrupted or not fulfill my expectations in some unexpected way. I realized this has to do with not being able to visualize exactly what is expected. But I know what it means to 'read' and 'take notes' I've been doing it with other people's stories every day for weeks and weeks. For most of a year in fact.</li><li>Weekly Artist Date (ala Julia Cameron) This is about doing something to recharge your creative battery. I'll go into more detail in one of the check-ins. <b>A big YES</b> More 24/7 cams discovered. Also screensaver vids of color or image in motion. Some with music excellent for background ambience for writing. </li><li>A minimum of 5 minutes of physical activity daily. Either a walk outside with my caregiver or a session on my mini-tramp, or pacing the floor between front and back door. <b>YES </b>(may need to look at upping the expectation soon. this is getting too easy.) </li><li>I want to reengage with my blog so: <strike>Two</strike> One blog post per week besides the two check-ins. Either about encountering other people's stories via print, video or audio which can include formal reviews or about a current fiber art WIP o<strike>r about one of my personal challenges: widowhood, independent living with visual impairment and autism and issues related to health and aging among them</strike>. <b>Not yet. Note: I've adjusted my expectations here for the duration of the round. </b>I removed the theme of personal challenge from the options as it turns out that has been the theme of my check-in posts and those take a lot out of me and a third one would be overloading my readers as well as me. The main reason I've not posted extra is the same reason I missed the Wednesday check-in: The note rescue caper. Plus I'm still super busy chasing library book due dates and trying to finish books before the next set of holds comes back my way. I sometimes feel like I'm chasing my own ponytail around the 440 track. Boy do I miss the days when I could read 100 pages an hour or better.</li></ul>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-20405636485296915102023-09-11T00:37:00.000-07:002023-09-11T00:37:09.618-07:00Jazzed -- Sunday Serenity -- ROW80 Check-in<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="244" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/jJClStPReeA?si=86kkH0aotFY4lGKW" title="YouTube video player" width="444"></iframe></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p><br /></p><div style="text-align: center;">Celtica Nova & The Wicked Tinkers: "The Atholl Highlanders" </div><br /><br />I went to the Highlander Festival in Kelso, Washington this afternoon and sat through three sets of the Wicked Tinkers. I'm in love. <br /><br />With the drumming!!!<br /><br />I'm so jazzed. It took me hours to wind down before I could be calm enough to put this post together even though I'd been planning it in my head all day.<br /><br />The video I embedded was from someone else's audience experience somewhere else. My ten second attempt was crappy in several ways and not worth uploading. Most of what I found on YouTube was either bad <span style="background-color: white; color: #4d5156; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">amateur </span>video with jumpy image and poor sound or, if more professionally produced, from 6-9 years ago. Good sound and image but not even close to the ambience of my experience so I went with the Celtic Nova offering. It has good steady image and tolerable sound and from only five months ago and thus a very good display of the energy of my experience in the performer-audience interaction.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixj7j6o3ReyeMSea4dZmD8eNYqKQgNXTSzu2k_bF1g9ZmEY4CMGJKZq6LtO7_jDFWxCriG8VI_56cd9a0eVQOPWBDEDIVUFzsBz1UCx198uAgAgG98oqlIn9oBEh1WTMfqnBti4z2KKn-6ula9i58SXA5-xF9CU6kZnab3ClB12sJ7LcBmrEyJ/s1600/Wicked%20Tinkers%20at%20Kelso%20WA%20Highlander%20Festival.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixj7j6o3ReyeMSea4dZmD8eNYqKQgNXTSzu2k_bF1g9ZmEY4CMGJKZq6LtO7_jDFWxCriG8VI_56cd9a0eVQOPWBDEDIVUFzsBz1UCx198uAgAgG98oqlIn9oBEh1WTMfqnBti4z2KKn-6ula9i58SXA5-xF9CU6kZnab3ClB12sJ7LcBmrEyJ/s320/Wicked%20Tinkers%20at%20Kelso%20WA%20Highlander%20Festival.jpg" width="320" /></a><br /><br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;">After one set my caregiver, Laura and I, had our picture taken with the band with my cell. It was only tolerable quality but better than nothing. I can't believe I did that. I've never done that. But I haven't been to that many events and when I was I didn't have someone like Laura with me to ask me if I'd like to have my picture taken with the band and the be bold enough to make it happen. </div><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxzGF-0Tb4TUcYYQ0wp_g0m1yF5IEH2YbtlStQ-OCYwT-zBwqiuyj_lDZK-aZBN4MsEtut0JLx3yHfIpQg--JmJZ_71-Fp_U2JvsIFf_Lr-V1o7C1n13DgaxKLOEVwdgF9x5kT17u7JDlZGMdwOw9NEy4aYjLPsogMWprp4XjivpC85b6FS9lm/s1600/Wicked%20Tinkers%20on%20Stage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxzGF-0Tb4TUcYYQ0wp_g0m1yF5IEH2YbtlStQ-OCYwT-zBwqiuyj_lDZK-aZBN4MsEtut0JLx3yHfIpQg--JmJZ_71-Fp_U2JvsIFf_Lr-V1o7C1n13DgaxKLOEVwdgF9x5kT17u7JDlZGMdwOw9NEy4aYjLPsogMWprp4XjivpC85b6FS9lm/s320/Wicked%20Tinkers%20on%20Stage.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />This was the only pic from today that Laura took for me that turned out well enough to post and it shows only three members and there were at least four and possibly five. It was hard for me to count them as neither they nor the audience between me and them stayed still long enough for me to keep track of them as I counted.<br /><br />One time they all came down into the audience and wandered among us playing. Imagine having one of those knee-kicked kilts a foot from your knees and the drum knocking on your eardrums. <br /><br />Oh my! A memory indelible. Even with my eyes and ears.<br /><br />And the drum so close I could have reached out and touched it. I could have swooned.<br /><br />For the drums guys. For the drums.<br /><br />I'm serious. I'm coocoo for drums. Drums were my first choice of band instrument when I was offered the choice at age eleven but both my parents and the band teacher nixed it. My parents because "You can't plays hymns on the drums." The band teacher because, "Girls don't play drums."<br /><br />So glad both premises have been proven balderdash. Please oh please don't take our girls back to the 1960s!!!!<br /><br />Between the sets, Laura and I wandered the artisan booths and I handled a lot of very interesting, well-crafted art in many categories. Jewelry, crystal and other rock, leather, fiber art and more. A lot of it on the Celtic theme, of course. I'm going to dole out pictures of the treasures I brought home over several posts. It would take me another hour to do the photo shoot and prep the pics and then yet another hour to write about each item and besides this Sunday Serenity and ROW80 focus is on the Wicked Tinker experience.<br /><br />So what do you think ROWers, does this qualify as an artist date ala Julia Cameron even tho it wasn't just me and my muse?<p></p><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s1600/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s200/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption"><div><span style="color: black; font-size: xx-small;"><b><a href="http://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">A Round of Words in 80 Days</a><br />Round 3 2023</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b>The writing challenge that<br /> knows you have a life</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b><br /></b></span></div></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br /></p><p></p><p></p><p><a href="https://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/2023/06/26/round-3-its-your-goal-post/" style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank"> ROW80 Round 3 Goals:</a><br /><br /></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><ul><li>Morning pages daily. Average 40 minutes (ala Julia Cameron The Artist Way and Writing For Life) <b>YES </b>Started May 20. Probably would not have jumped into NaNo and ROW80 without having had a month of morning pages behind me. But the very fact that I've hung on to this YES throughout the crisis' is PROOF that I am committed to the writing and still belong in ROW80. Don't worry, I know the ROWers need no such prrof. <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2022/10/taming-my-stella-and-rising-from-her.html">Only my Stella</a>.</li><li>Storydreaming with notebook for noting ideas for characters or scenes. (ala Robert Owen Butler From Where You Dream) <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day 4/7 <b> of a yes since last Sunday</b> (The notebook is the key to this goal as without it the storydreams go to the same place night dreams go an hour after waking.) <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal for the duration of the round to ten minutes a day with the caveat that as long as I'm sitting with notebook and pen it counts even if I don't write anything new.</b></li><li>Working on the Fruits of the Spirit (aka FOS) Storyworld Bible at least <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day at least 5 days per week. I'm sure this will expand as I get involved but I need to set a minimum for that jumpstart. <b>2/5 of a yes </b> (still hoping to make this and storydreaming my ROW80 main project for the remainder of this round as I need a substantial start on it in time to use it for Preptober and NaNo next Round.) This week the life that got in the way is a crochet project for a birthday on Tuesday. <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal to 10 minutes 5 days a week with the caveat that I don't need to work into the pristine spiral notebook I bought for this project yet.</b> The first task is to get a feel for how that notebook needs to be organized and to figure that out I will start re-reading my files with loose scratch paper or note cards at hand to note down every 'fact' I encounter as I read: names, dates, descriptions, titles of books and chapters and stories, character quirks, symbolism associated with a character...etc. It occurred to me that my resistance to this task was at least partially related to not wanting to make a mess in that pretty notebook. So now I have permission to make a mess with scratch pads and note cards. Let's see if that makes any difference. Also there is a trick I'm playing on myself here. I almost never do a thing for only ten minutes but if I think I must do 30 minutes I balk at starting thinking of all the ways I'm likely to get interrupted or not fulfill my expectations in some unexpected way. I realized this has to do with not being able to visualize exactly what is expected. But I know what it means to 'read' and 'take notes' I've been doing it with other people's stories every day for weeks and weeks. For most of a year in fact.</li><li>Weekly Artist Date (ala Julia Cameron) This is about doing something to recharge your creative battery. I'll go into more detail in one of the check-ins. <b>A big YES</b> More 24/7 cams discovered. Also screensaver vids of color or image in motion. Some with music excellent for background ambience for writing. More walks to the gazebo and back with my caregiver and at least one where we sat reading there for an hour where I could look up from my book and see birds or neighbors walking dogs or neighbors having interactions with each other on their porches or the breeze in the leaves which is better than screen savers.</li><li>A minimum of 5 minutes of physical activity daily. Either a walk outside with my caregiver or a session on my mini-tramp, or pacing the floor between front and back door. <b>YES </b>(may need to look at upping the expectation soon. this is getting too easy.) </li><li>I want to reengage with my blog so: <strike>Two</strike> One blog post per week besides the two check-ins. Either about encountering other people's stories via print, video or audio which can include formal reviews or about a current fiber art WIP o<strike>r about one of my personal challenges: widowhood, independent living with visual impairment and autism and issues related to health and aging among them</strike>. <b>Not yet. Note: I've adjusted my expectations here for the duration of the round. </b>I removed the theme of personal challenge from the options as it turns out that has been the theme of my check-in posts and those take a lot out of me and a third one would be overloading my readers as well as me. The main reason I've not posted extra is the same reason I missed the Wednesday check-in: I'm super busy chasing library book due dates and trying to finish books before the next set of holds comes back my way. I sometimes feel like I'm chasing my own ponytail around the 440 track. Last Wednesday I was still trying to finish the over 800 page Sun House by David James Duncan even tho it was going to be a fail. I closed in on 70% by the time Libby took it from me but I still needed 13 more hours for that last 30%. Boy do I miss the days when I could read 100 pages an hour or better.</li></ul>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-54203616355416370082023-09-03T03:33:00.002-07:002023-09-10T22:41:58.083-07:00Jelling -- Sunday Serenity --ROW80 Check-in<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="244" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/OMlf71t2oV0?si=YNifUAti7QWiuM6e" title="YouTube video player" width="444"></iframe></div><div style="text-align: center;">Live Jelly Cam -- Monterey Bay Aquarium 7am-7pm Pacific<br />If it's black when you tune in just back it up</div><p> <br />I've decided to revive one of my old memes, Sunday Serenity, making it the focus of the Sunday post with the check-in like a footnote with little to no essay above the goals section. Last Wednesday I spent 7 hours on my check-in post and I can't sustain two posts a week like that and then complain I can't get any writing done.<br /><br />I'm not sorry I wrote that essay. <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2023/08/the-game-of-shame-row80-check-in.html" target="_blank">It was a story I needed to tell.</a> It was therapeutic and necessary for me even if nobody ever reads it. But if it is wearing me out trying to do that every check-in, I'm sure it is wearing my readers out. So I'm backing off to one or less of such essays in a week. And from now on if it is not ready to post after three hours I'll save the essay part as draft and post something fun and writing related above the goals section. Even on Wednesday.<br /><br />Well, Sunday Serenity will not always be writing related. This video is only tangentially so as I have found it useful several times since I discovered it Thursday to reboot my brain, to change my focus from one task to another and most useful for writing was when I overslept and didn't have time to do my morning pages before a scheduled Zoom and I used five minutes of watching the jelly fish to put me back in my dreaming mind. It essentially erased an hour's worth of encounters with language so I could do morning pages as if I'd just woken up.<br /><br /></p><p> </p><p><br /></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s1600/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s200/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption"><div><span style="color: black; font-size: xx-small;"><b><a href="http://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">A Round of Words in 80 Days</a><br />Round 3 2023</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b>The writing challenge that<br /> knows you have a life</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b><br /></b></span></div></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br /></p><p></p><p></p><p><a href="https://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/2023/06/26/round-3-its-your-goal-post/" style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank"> ROW80 Round 3 Goals:</a><br /><br /></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><ul><li>Morning pages daily. Average 40 minutes (ala Julia Cameron The Artist Way and Writing For Life) <b>YES </b>Started May 20. Probably would not have jumped into NaNo and ROW80 without having had a month of morning pages behind me. But the very fact that I've hung on to this YES throughout the crisis' is PROOF that I am committed to the writing and still belong in ROW80</li><li>Storydreaming with notebook for noting ideas for characters or scenes. (ala Robert Owen Butler From Where You Dream) <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day <b>2/3 of a yes since Thursday</b> (The notebook is the key to this goal as without it the storydreams go to the same place night dreams go an hour after waking.) <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal for the duration of the round to ten minutes a day with the caveat that as long as I'm sitting with notebook and pen it counts even if I don't write anything new.</b></li><li>Working on the Fruits of the Spirit (aka FOS) Storyworld Bible at least <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day at least 5 days per week. I'm sure this will expand as I get involved but I need to set a minimum for that jumpstart. <b>NOT yet </b> (still hoping to make this and storydreaming my ROW80 main project for the remainder of this round as I need a substantial start on it in time to use it for Preptober and NaNo next Round.) This week the life that got in the way is a crochet project for a birthday on Tuesday. <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal to 10 minutes 5 days a week with the caveat that I don't need to work into the pristine spiral notebook I bought for this project yet.</b> The first task is to get a feel for how that notebook needs to be organized and to figure that out I will start re-reading my files with loose scratch paper or note cards at hand to note down every 'fact' I encounter as I read: names, dates, descriptions, titles of books and chapters and stories, character quirks, symbolism associated with a character...etc. It occurred to me that my resistance to this task was at least partially related to not wanting to make a mess in that pretty notebook. So now I have permission to make a mess with scratch pads and note cards. Let's see if that makes any difference. Also there is a trick I'm playing on myself here. I almost never do a thing for only ten minutes but if I think I must do 30 minutes I balk at starting thinking of all the ways I'm likely to get interrupted or not fulfill my expectations in some unexpected way. I realized this has to do with not being able to visualize exactly what is expected. But I know what it means to 'read' and 'take notes' I've been doing it with other people's stories every day for weeks and weeks. For most of a year in fact.</li><li>Weekly Artist Date (ala Julia Cameron) This is about doing something to recharge your creative battery. I'll go into more detail in one of the check-ins. <b>A big YES</b> More 24/7 cams discovered. Also screensaver vids of color or image in motion. Some with music excellent for background ambience for writing. There was also a walk to the gazebo and back with my caregiver on Friday during which I met two of my neighbors. Finally. After two years. And my adjustment of Cameron's Artist Date rules makes that count for me. But the BIG one happened Saturday while I was home alone. I'm usually tied to my unit by fear of stepping more than three steps beyond reach of my front door without an escort. But months of practice with my caregiver I finally found the courage to push my boundaries. I walked out to the bench at the end of my front walk and sat in the sun crocheting for nearly an hour. One of the ladies I met Friday stopped by for a chat. That was huge. I can't stress that enough. Just about two months ago I was almost ready to try that and then on one of my escorted walks I took that fall that upended more than my body for the next several weeks. My confidence took the biggest hit.</li><li>A minimum of 5 minutes of physical activity daily. Either a walk outside with my caregiver or a session on my mini-tramp, or pacing the floor between front and back door. <b>YES </b>(may need to look at upping the expectation soon. this is getting too easy.) </li><li>I want to reengage with my blog so: <strike>Two</strike> One blog post per week besides the two check-ins. Either about encountering other people's stories via print, video or audio which can include formal reviews or about a current fiber art WIP o<strike>r about one of my personal challenges: widowhood, independent living with visual impairment and autism and issues related to health and aging among them</strike>. <b>Not yet. Note: I've adjusted my expectations here for the duration of the round. </b>I removed the theme of personal challenge from the options as it turns out that has been the theme of my check-in posts and those take a lot out of me and a third one would be overloading my readers as well as me. </li></ul>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-7900149443097769382023-08-30T19:55:00.003-07:002023-08-31T03:09:22.925-07:00The Game of Shame - ROW80 Check-In<p><br /></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s1600/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s200/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption"><div><span style="color: black; font-size: xx-small;"><b><a href="http://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">A Round of Words in 80 Days</a><br />Round 3 2023</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b>The writing challenge that<br /> knows you have a life</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b><br /></b></span></div></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br /><br /><br /></p><p>Shame was the main game we played in my home, in my church, in my classrooms, on my playgrounds. I learned that game so well. I learned to self-shame as a way to avoid the worst of the shaming because self-shame looks like the remorse and surrender that most authority figures and bullies needed to see to believe they'd won the game. <br /><br />I've been doing a deep dive on this theme in my life for most of the past month. I suggested in a previous post that I would share that journey here but I'm not ready to share much of what has been on my mind yet. It is too amorphous and/or triggering. But I can share the one story I hinted at before. The story of an encounter between myself at age 12 with my sixth grade teacher that was suffused with shame and had a direct impact on my relationship to my writing that has me in its thrall to this day.<br /><br /><a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2023/08/puzzle-on-this-row80-check-in.html" target="_blank">As I wrote a week ago Sunday:</a><br /></p><blockquote>I thought I'd already unpacked all the baggage around this incident. <a href="https://joystory.blogspot.com/2006/09/everything-that-rises-must-submerge.html">I even wrote a flash fiction piece</a> and devoted a NaNo to developing a YA novel expanding on that. But apparently I left some seriously stinky laundry in the bag because as I started thinking about what I planned to say in the post while I was working the stuff shuffle in my room, I found myself reliving that moment in emotional technicolor and then I was weeping. And I couldn't stop for four hours. </blockquote>The fictional piece I linked above stays fairly true to the exchange between me and my teacher. I changed the topic of the term paper to Flannery O'Connor who became my favorite author for years after I encountered her in high school. So at least 4 to 5 years after this incident. I did this so I could make that play on a title of one of Flannery's stories. Hers was Everything That Rises Must Converge and I, in my cynicism at the time wanted to argue that no, Everything that Rises Must Submerge because that had been my basic experience in my family in the school system and in my marriage.<br /><br />In my family and Church, 'rising' was too closely related to 'pride' for their comfort and all signs of pride must be quashed. Usually by shaming. As for the school system... They just didn't have the eyes to see anyone who colored outside the lines. So to speak. Unless it was disruptive to others. But when it came to a quiet-as-a-mouse girl who took home all of her textbooks the first week of the school year and had read them all cover-to-cover by her birthday mid-November and had written out all the questions and answers for every single chapter into a notebook she kept at home? Nothing in their training prepared them for noticing anomalies like that let alone for how to respond in a way that was in the child's best interest.<br /><br />The go-to programing for these young twenty-something teachers was to insist that all the rules be followed all the time by all individuals involved. So when the teacher would patrol the class after giving a reading assignment and walk by my desk and find me with a library book open on top of my text book, he didn't even ask if I'd finished the reading assignment, he just confiscated my book and put it in his desk drawer and the rule was that I could not have it back until the due date or the end of term whichever came first. And I would have to remember to ask for the book on the correct due date.<br /><br />It didn't make any difference to him whether the book was a novel or a reference book related to the big semester-long term paper project. He never noticed or at least never commented on the fact that many of these books were upwards of 400 pages and the NF were heavily footnoted and indexed. In other words most of the books confiscated from me at age 12 were college level. <br /><br />This is where my sentiment of 'rising gets you squashed' came from. I'd watched my brother, one grade behind me, get pushed back down in other ways but since he was a boy with a temper and a 'Mr. know-it-all attitude who'd started lecturing every ear in range from playmates to parents from the moment he could speak complete sentences, he didn't fly under the radar as I did and earned one creative punishment after another--as many from the bullies as from the teachers and principals. <br /><br />Until, that is, I had another encounter with a teacher in high-school. My 10th grade typing teacher gave an inspired motivational lecture to the class about the perks of learning to type. (If you've read the flash fiction linked above you know the irony of that) He rhapsodized on all the doors it would open and how merit and hard work was rewarded by the system and all the ways you would find it useful in your personal life.<br /><br />As he spoke, I started weeping. He noticed. I noticed he noticed and began an intense examination of the wood grain on my desk top. He didn't speak to me until the bell rang and the chaos of the class leaving began but then he quietly asked if I would stay and speak to him. I did. He asked why his words had so upset me. Tho I'd had flashes of my own stories I did not share any of them. I shared what I'd observed about my brother including the current crisis in which his 9th grade teacher was threatening to fail him in history.<br /><br />This was because he refused to take notes in class as required and instead doodled and handed that in for a fail every week. He was even able to explain that he was unable to listen to spoken words and write them at the same time but when he doodled he could remember everything that was said by just looking at the doodles. But the teacher wasn't interested in that nor in the corroborating facts that he aced the tests and quizzes and wrote cogent essays, he cared only about the rules. <br /><br />My brother was stubborn and insisted they couldn't make him do what he couldn't do and if they made him repeat the class he would just fold his hands and sit in class and do none of the work for if he was going to fail anyway what was the point? Our Mom had been up on campus for a conference with the teacher, our Dad had lectured him at the dinner table and there were angry stalemates at school and at home.<br /><br />In my mind, of course, I was drawing parallels between what was happening to him and what had happened to me four years earlier. I was now wishing I'd made a stink like he was doing. I was wishing I'd at least told my Mom so she might have advocated for me since she was a witness that at least 3/4 of what he accused me of was untrue. But for some reason I'd internalized the shame of the failure and was too mortified to tell anyone.<br /><br />That male typing teacher who was a retired Marine Corp Sargent, in an effort to prove to me that the system works if you light a fire under the right butt, pulled some strings in the school system and got my brother a full blown IQ test. The kind administered one-on-one by a psychologist instead of the multiple choice, color-the-dot-by-your-answer test administered in Junior High. He tested over 160 which was 30 points higher than he tested on the standard one. He'd beat me by three points on that one, I think tho I can't really trust my memory's precision. I just remember wondering if I would also have gained 30 points by having it administered one-on-one and would I have still been just a few points behind. <br /><br />A few years after the fact, I wondered why my typing teacher did not have me tested also just based on the fact that I'd been the one to see the issue and correctly diagnose it. Coupled with the evidence of the books he watched me carrying into class and how based on them he directed me to our school library's set of the Britannica Great Books, introducing me to its syntopicon, the index to ideas, which has become an integral part of my life and of my work on my Fruits of the Spirit storyworld. He would point at a book sitting on my desk and say "If you're reading that, you're ready for Plato or William James or one of the other philosophers that aren't such lazy thinkers."<br /><br />So here is my story unfictionalized: In sixth grade in the late sixties we were presented with a semester length project directly after the Christmas holidays. The Term Paper. It was broken down into manageable tasks to be completed in order and checked over by the teacher over the course of the project. It began with field trips to the school and the public library where we were taught all the intricacies of finding sources and recording them on bibliography slips. How to use the card catalog to find books and how to find references to magazine articles in the Reader's Guide on our topic and then fill out the slip for the librarian to take back into the magazine and newspaper archives. Our bibliography needed to include two of each kind of resource: encyclopedia, periodical, full length book. <br /><br />The moment I comprehended the assignment I was in love. And since I just happened to be in the middle of a 500 page footnoted tome about Jenny Lind the singer whose popularity in her era might be comparable to Celine Dion in ours that was the topic I settled on. The whole project from start to finish was a joy. I loved it. Even with Mr. T. confiscating my books as fast as I could check them out. I just patiently waited for them to be due and took them back and checked them out again. <br /><br />Except the first book had belonged to my grandmother and so I didn't get it back until after the assignment due date. And that was the one that created the crisis in my mind that prevented me from confronting the teacher or asking my Mom to advocate for me or even telling her what had happened. Because I was so sure I was guilty as charged. After all it had been a teacher accusing me and a male at that and men in authority held ten times the weight of women because of the training of the cult I was raised in.<br /><br />So this was Mr T's accusation: No sixth grader can write with this sophistication so either you plagiarized or your mother or big sister wrote this for you. The fact that it is typed just reinforces my theory. I warned the class at the beginning not to submit a typed paper unless you typed every character yourself and you cannot convince me that a sixth grader can type with this proficiency. If you make me prove my theory by going back to examine all your resources to find the material you copied then I will make sure you fail sixth grade and do it over again next year and spend the entire summer in summer school.<br /><br />Then he handed me my paper with zero markings on it other than the c/-c grade which reflected form over content or visa versa. I just took the paper from him silently with burning red cheeks and returned to my desk swallowed up by shame. I had done a rapid calculation of all the existing proof against his claims and of my witnesses but there was one sticking point. That fat book that had kindled my interest in Jenny Lind that I'd started reading during the Christmas holidays and which had spent the last couple months in his desk drawer.<br /><br />I'd finished the read through but I'd not finished going back through to copy out the marked passages on my note cards. And because I was a proficient memorizer having been started on Bible verses before I could read and memorizing chapters at a time by the time I was 9, I knew how easy it was for me to hold onto chunks of text. And because I'd read the memoir of Helen Keller not all that long ago I also knew that she had fallen into that trap as an adult and got charged with plagiarism after using some phrases belonging to someone else as her own because she had not kept good enough notes and since I had not been able to keep good enough notes on that one book it was quite possible he would find the evidence he was so sure was there if I challenged him.<br /><br />I chose silence over taking that risk.<br /><br />Despite knowing that my parents could vouch for the fact I'd typed every word and that I'd been typing for several years or maybe let me bring Mom's typewriter to demonstrate, and despite the fact the evidence I had been doing the work was in the outlines and notecards and drafts in my own hand that he had signed off on over the weeks and in the existence of the books he kept in his drawer. Which books could explain the sophistication of my writing style without being proof of plagiarism. Despite knowing for a fact that I was not guilty of conscious copying directly from the sources without quotations, just that small chance that he would find evidence of unconscious plagiarism which would be impossible to prove was unintentional was all it took to squash me.<br /><br />And apparently I am still struggling with the loss of my self-confidence with my writing that was created in me that day. And there is still a part of me that is willing to believe in the face of evidence to the contrary that a male teacher knows the truth and mustn't be challenged. And in my mind, formed in the sixties and seventies, all editors are male. Could this be why I've submitted a short story only once, in my early twenties, and nothing since?<br /><br /><p></p><p></p><a href="https://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/2023/06/26/round-3-its-your-goal-post/" style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank"> ROW80 Round 3 Goals:</a><br /><br /><p></p><p></p><p></p><ul><li>Morning pages daily. Average 40 minutes (ala Julia Cameron The Artist Way and Writing For Life) <b>YES </b>Started May 20. Probably would not have jumped into NaNo and ROW80 without having had a month of morning pages behind me. Must must must watch my posture. No hunching over. No leaning on elbows. But the very fact that I've hung on to this YES throughout the crisis' is PROOF that I am committed to the writing and still belong in ROW80</li><li>Storydreaming with notebook for noting ideas for characters or scenes. (ala Robert Owen Butler From Where You Dream) <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day <b>NO for over two weeks.</b> (The notebook is the key to this goal as without it the storydreams go to the same place night dreams go an hour after waking.) <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal for the duration of the round to ten minutes a day with the caveat that as long as I'm sitting with notebook and pen it counts even if I don't write anything new.</b></li><li>Working on the Fruits of the Spirit (aka FOS) Storyworld Bible at least <strike>30</strike> <b>10</b> minutes per day at least 5 days per week. I'm sure this will expand as I get involved but I need to set a minimum for that jumpstart. <b>NO for over two weeks </b> (still hoping to make this and storydreaming my ROW80 main project for the remainder of this round as I need a substantial start on it in time to use it for Preptober and NaNo next Round.) <b>Note: I've adjusted the goal to 10 minutes 5 days a week with the caveat that I don't need to work into the pristine spiral notebook I bought for this project yet.</b> The first task is to get a feel for how that notebook needs to be organized and to figure that out I will start re-reading my files with loose scratch paper or note cards at hand to note down every 'fact' I encounter as I read: names, dates, descriptions, titles of books and chapters and stories, character quirks, symbolism associated with a character...etc. It occurred to me that my resistance to this task was at least partially related to not wanting to make a mess in that pretty notebook. So now I have permission to make a mess with scratch pads and note cards. Let's see if that makes any difference. Also there is a trick I'm playing on myself here. I almost never do a thing for only ten minutes but if I think I must do 30 minutes I balk at starting thinking of all the ways I'm likely to get interrupted or not fulfill my expectations in some unexpected way. I realized this has to do with not being able to visualize exactly what is expected. But I know what it means to 'read' and 'take notes' I've been doing it with other people's stories every day for weeks and weeks. For most of a year in fact.</li><li>Weekly Artist Date (ala Julia Cameron) This is about doing something to recharge your creative battery. I'll go into more detail in one of the check-ins. <b>YES</b> I did several things that could qualify under my new rules as described last check-in. I have found several more 24/7 cameras on interesting or exotic locals. Two of them in Africa but their ambience is so different they could be two different planets and I've seen animas I can't even name. Like an 'ox' with a zebra face and horns that look like upside down elephant tusks except black. I've also been exploring the old type of screensaver I used to storydream while watching. They are variations on color or image in flowing motion. Think lava lamp or kaleidoscope. I've also gone for walks in the villa cul-de-sac with my caregiver.</li><li>A minimum of 5 minutes of physical activity daily. Either a walk outside with my caregiver or a session on my mini-tramp, or pacing the floor between front and back door. <b>YES </b>(may need to look at upping the expectation soon. this is getting too easy.) </li><li>I want to reengage with my blog so: <strike>Two</strike> One blog post per week besides the two check-ins. Either about encountering other people's stories via print, video or audio which can include formal reviews or about a current fiber art WIP o<strike>r about one of my personal challenges: widowhood, independent living with visual impairment and autism and issues related to health and aging among them</strike>. <b>NOPE Note: I've adjusted my expectations here for the duration of the round. </b>I removed the theme of personal challenge from the options as it turns out that has been the theme of my check-in posts and those take a lot out of me and a third one would be overloading my readers as well as me.</li></ul>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8976770.post-41708989190627701792023-08-27T20:40:00.000-07:002023-08-27T20:40:14.311-07:00Artist Date for Shut-Ins - ROW80 Check-In<p> </p><p><br /></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s1600/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYnlP6fTWmCIyJ8KgR2B2a4fyjCbIX9WYUhnWCCWRDqwivVGgPaeanxm8N2d78wygl62h8Cb9kYNg6UCrqUPDbM-A5k3mYL6DdrGMR3VzvxUC6u06ry6vE6pszcqMMg7s90mO1/s200/ROW80Logocopy.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption"><div><span style="color: black; font-size: xx-small;"><b><a href="http://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">A Round of Words in 80 Days</a><br />Round 3 2023</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b>The writing challenge that<br /> knows you have a life</b></span></div><div><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><b><br /></b></span></div></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br />I know I promised a deeper dive into the theme of shame and how it relates to my relationship with my writing and my work habits in my last post--last Sunday. And I know I then blew off the Wednesday check-in. But in order not to let this one slide as well I had to give myself permission to dodge the shame story a bit longer. I'm trying to keep this weekend mellow. I've slept nearly as many hours as I've been awake since Monday afternoon which I am attributing to having been riding a stress rollercoaster for over a month with the inspection and failing it, the fall and the resulting inflammation followed by med reactions then a tooth infection and more med reactions. It might also have had something to do with the thunder storm we had Thursday morning coupled with the heatwave on either side of it. <br /><br />So this check-in I'm featuring another of my insights that isn't so loaded with the heavy baggage. <br /><br />I've made several adjustments to the 'rules' around Julia Cameron's Artist Date. Once again my limitations make it impossible for me to fulfill Julia Cameron's criteria. She recommends going out alone and emphasizes the tactile and I do want to get in some tactile time but I can't go out alone so I need an Artist Date I can do by myself. But it is also not good for me as someone on the spectrum to go from being a shut-in to going on outings that shun the social. That is especially true for an artist who is on the spectrum as we need to be strongly encouraged to be social and if we are not careful our art will reflect the lack of social insight and even the avoidance of character interaction which is usually the heart of a story.</p><p>So I'm going to include outings with my caregiver that are not about errands or chores and visits to my Mom and sister. I'll also include the walks with my caregiver around my villa and the monthly game day at the villa Hall. But my newest artist date 'fudge-the-rules' is the online 24/7 cameras. I'm finding them very creatively stimulating especially with the visual stimulation I crave and from which most of my stories are born. It is a way for me to 'see' things that I'll never get close to in real life.<br /><br />I'd never seen a wart hog before my obsessive watching of this bird and wildlife glade in Poland a week or so ago. They feature in a lot of novels I've read over the years and now I have more than a vague notion of how different they are from the typical farm pig I've actually petted on more than one occasion. Now I have a nearly visceral concept of how they behave in the wild. I say 'nearly' as I do realize it is through a flat screen but I saw enough to know I don't need it any more visceral than that I would not want to be sitting at the table with one that's for sure.<br /><br />I clicked to view at first for the birds but I stayed for the random surprise visits from deer, fox, squirrel, and wart hogs. And thunderstorms! Sometime I leave it on just to listen to the babbling brook sound as background. <br /><br />Now it has got me thinking about all the 24/7 cameras out there overlooking all sorts of interesting scenery from wild life to city life and how useful they could be for research or just for ambience for a story. So I'm going to count them as qualifying as an Artist Date. <br /><br /> Please share in comments any links to 24/7 cams you have found interesting. Even traffic cams, especially in iconic cities, might be useful for this purpose. But other wildlife scenes are really calling to me right now.</p><p><br /></p><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="244" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2EZsnPekrGw?si=HKwbvMoFZsl4PV01" title="YouTube video player" width="444"></iframe></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"> Artist Date for Shut-Ins<br />24/7 Forest Glade Birdfeeder in Poland</p><p> </p><br /><a href="https://aroundofwordsin80days.wordpress.com/2023/06/26/round-3-its-your-goal-post/" style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank"> ROW80 Round 3 Goals:</a><br /><br /><p></p><p></p><p></p><ul><li>Morning pages daily. Average 40 minutes (ala Julia Cameron The Artist Way and Writing For Life) <b>YES </b>Started May 20. Probably would not have jumped into NaNo and ROW80 without having had a month of morning pages behind me. Must must must watch my posture. No hunching over. No leaning on elbows. But the very fact that I've hung on to this YES throughout the crisis' is PROOF that I am committed to the writing and still belong in ROW80</li><li>Storydreaming with notebook for noting ideas for characters or scenes. (ala Robert Owen Butler From Where You Dream) 30 minutes per day <b>NO for over two weeks.</b> (The notebook is the key to this goal as without it the storydreams go to the same place night dreams go an hour after waking.)</li><li>Working on the Fruits of the Spirit (aka FOS) Storyworld Bible at least 30 minutes per day at least 5 days per week. I'm sure this will expand as I get involved but I need to set a minimum for that jumpstart. <b>NO for over two weeks </b> (still hoping to make this and storydreaming my ROW80 main project for the remainder of this round as I need a substantial start on it in time to use it for Preptober and NaNo next Round.) A month ago the reason was days of pain. The following week the reason was pain and side-effects of steroid treatment for pain. Two weeks agi it's a tooth infection going on for over a week. Last week it was the chaos and the work around preparing for a HUD inspection under threat of eviction if I failed again. This past week was primarily about coming down off the anxiety roller coaster with an element of build up to a thunder storm as between Monday evening and Thursday morning I slept an average of 12 hours out of each day in chunks of 3 to 6 hours. And also my caregiver and I were working extra hard to catch up on things neglected while we focused on the inspection and preparing me for a nearly 4 day stint by myself as she'd had a 3 day weekend on the schedule for months. I'm nearing the end of that long weekend now and I've spent more than the usual time sleeping again but in between I was reading the new David James Duncan novel, Sun House, via my Libby ap. An event for me that I've been waiting two decades for. Because of the font size I need the book is over 5000 screens on my ap and I must finish it in another 10 days or wait months for another turn. I'm on track having reached screen 1500 late last night. This book is important to my FOS storyworld theme as it features a lot of reference to the spiritual in metaphor and symbol as well as referencing many of the mystics over the centuries. It's the kind of novel I need to take notes as I read which also slows down the progress.</li><li>Weekly Artist Date (ala Julia Cameron) This is about doing something to recharge your creative battery. I'll go into more detail in one of the check-ins. <b>YES</b> In two ways. The first was going on an outing to a nearby park and sitting in the sun and the breeze and watching small children play and birds cavort and the breeze in the leaves. Glorious. The second was discovering and becoming addicted to the 24/7 Forest Glade bird feeder I've embedded in this post. Also due to my being on the autism spectrum it is crucial that I force myself into social situations otherwise my stories have a chilling deficit in character interactions. That's why I count visiting my Mom and going to the park. So now I can look forward to more YESes on this goal.</li><li>A minimum of 5 minutes of physical activity daily. Either a walk outside with my caregiver or a session on my mini-tramp, or pacing the floor between front and back door. <b>YES </b>(may need to look at upping the expectation soon. this is getting too easy.) Solid yes in spite of tooth infection and feeling like I have the flu. Definitely need to up this eventually. But right now I need at least one easy YES to keep me in this game. -- I do believe that having kept up this goal made all the work prepping for the inspection redo possible. I discovered I could get a lot done over time in 5-15 minutes of activity interspersed with an equal amount of rest. As long as I kept my mind on the project during the rest periods.</li><li>I want to reengage with my blog so: Two blog posts per week besides the two check-ins. One about encountering other people's stories via print, video or audio which can include formal reviews. The other about a current fiber art WIP or about one of my personal challenges: widowhood, independent living with visual impairment and autism and issues related to health and aging among them. <b>NOPE </b>This past week it was the extra sleep that stole my usual blogging time from me. I'm hoping that I will have recovered from riding the stress train for a month by the end of this quiet weekend.</li></ul>Joy Reneehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04976987581528470589noreply@blogger.com3