Christmas Knitting Blues

I'm so totally behind on my Christmas knitting this year. It's annoying. Then again, new responsibilities at work, wedding planning, and being generally a social bug, has put a lot of hampers in my plans. That and my determination to make Philip his first sweater (since I have the ring *read: shiney!) knocked out a huge amount of my time to pump through quickie projects that are usually the things I work on for Christmas presents. Hopefully it won't knock out the next birthday present time either, but we'll have to see.

The sweater has been put on hiatus even though it was his birthday present back on the 5th. Mainly because I goofed in a couple places and it has me frustrated. The new goal for the sweater is to be done before January 10th when I want him to wear it at SimTerra... despite my worry of the way the thing needs to be cleaned.

There is still much to be done and I think the stress is finally getting to me. I really dislike stress. :( But anyways, I have a lot of things I need to get done and not a lot of time to do it in. But the week is young and hopefully the bridesmaids dresses will finally be in and I will have at least one less thing to worry about when it comes to wedding planning.

Philip really needs to choose his mens though...

Interesting Irony

So apparently the government agency D.A.R.P.A. created the internet.

Well you wanna know how you submit a proposal to them?

By FedEx.

Storytelling

I've always been a geek for a well told story. This is partially why when I was young I wanted to become a writer. Since I graduated college though my muse has been lacking. I have recently joined with some of my friends from the "The Table" for a Writer's Workshop every other Thursday. I'm also attempting Nanowrimo again this year. So far so good as I've made it past the 10K marker (although by tomorrow evening I should be at 20K). I think I'm doing significantly better than I did last year. Perhaps it's because I found a few good novels to read (well told stories) in a style that I'm far more comfortable with writing (first person).

So far I'm pleased with myself, and I will probably spend some time this evening thinking of the next pieces of the story to put together. Hopefully by monday next week I can be caught up with where I should be in my word count (or past it)... but with SimTerra on saturday, my hope for that isn't very high. So I have my work cut out for me the next few days. Hopefully that proposal Dr. Ganguly had me work on today won't be too time consuming. I'm even forgoing some of my knitting Christmas presents to write this story. One of the downsides of being a knitter at christmas and wanting to write Nanowrimo, is that the two don't totally mesh all that well. At least... not yet.

Philip has started writing a very good story recently in first person (not something i've seen him write in before) and it's really good. It made me remember one of the reasons I fell for him in the first place, I have always loved his storytelling style. His style is more that of a spoken style. It comes across in his DMing our games as well as it makes his writing style very distinctive. This new story shows his voice very well.

So I have found I love telling stories and am finally getting around to getting back into shape of telling them... and I love being a part of the story with my friends, whether it be the Tuesday night group, Saturday group, or Sunday afternoon group... or... whenever. And even if a "game" is over... the story never really stops, because I can still keep writing it or speaking it.

I really love all my characters. They're all showing up in my Nano novel. If I finish I think I may even get the nano novel into paperback as one of their free gifts for "winning". That would be SOOO awesome.

Nanowrimo

I'm going to attempt Nanowrimo again this year. It's going to definitely be a challenge. I'm planning to go through the evolution of a character concept, my character concept of Ariadne. Most likely I will explore her personality and go through her travels and thought processes during the course between Dasaria and Dasaria 2 and eventually training my paladin for Dasaria 2, Amelia Almaran.

Afterall, I think Ariadne Amon in Dasaria was perhaps my favorite incarnation of her to date... but my memories of all the stories that Ari has been apart of is kind of... lacking. So we'll see how things go.

Finally took a picture

Of the veil that I've made. It still needs to be blocked and then I must brainstorm how exactly I can use it as a veil for the wedding of which I keep forgetting to set a date (i hate calling folks and i need to call the pastor and i'm nervous cause i haven't seen him in about 8 years).

That's really all I have for today.

"Health of the Mother"

I may be showing my true blood radical conservative here when I put this one up. I was pleased to hear McCain bring this phrase to the light in Wednesday night's debate. (I didn't watch. for some reason I find it healthy to play violent fantasy video games during debates and other political events so in case I get mad I can smite the evildoer with my paladin anyways).

I am pro-life. I do not agree with abortion being practiced in any case at all, save LIFE of mother. Yes, this is a difference. People can look over the difference between "health" and "life" just fine, but there is a difference. It is the matter of definition and what sort of loop-holes people can find.

You see, health of mother can cover a plethora of different issues from sickness to mental illness... and even "I don't feel good about having this baby." Sure there are actual health problems that one can have when having a baby and the life gets put in danger. That is why there must be a distinction between the two.

My position on abortion is not something I debate often. I have researched the issue thoroughly and I have found there is substantial evidence that life begins at conception/implantation. This is why I believe abortion is wrong. I'm not totally sure about legislating it. If anything, it's the states decision if at all, the government should butt the hell out. If it was me, I'd never have an abortion. In any case. When it is life or death though, that will be where the true decision will lay. That I don't know... and I think I will reserve that judgement when the time is right.

I am not militant. I think bombing abortion clinics is hypocrisy. I think shouting down women outside of clinics like "don't kill your baby" is extremely judgemental and all in all a bad idea (i've heard of a woman who had just had a miscarriage come out of one and had that shouted at her...). It is a very touchy subject and needs to be treated with the utmost care.

But still, arguing over health vs. life of the mother is a valid argument. Health is very broad, life is not. Life is more important in the end. Isn't that the point?

I am a very bad blogger

Because I don't keep my promises to blog more. I mean, how horrible I am!

So today, as I sit down with my Beef and Broccoli and Code Red Mountain Dew, I contemplate the theories on how to be a better blogger. Perhaps I should share with everyone my latest writing, but as I am always uncertain about publishing such things to the masses without trying to get paid for it first, I delay that possibility. Perhaps I could talk about politics...

Well, yes I could talk about politics, but my mind forming coherent thoughts on the election that just will not end for long enough time to write it down is slim to none. I know who I'm voting for, I know who I'm voting against... and that sometimes I just want Obama to lose to make someone annoying cry... but that's mean of me, so I don't let my thoughts dwell on that too long. I don't like being mean.

I could talk about knitting, but I have a hard enough time keeping ravelry updated with recent pictures of my work and what i'm working on... that and i keep changing up projects frequently lately... oh well.

There has just been too much on my mind lately... how my work status is hopefully going to stay stable, but no real telling... how the economy could even change that... how the election itself could be the make or break of my company and my job stability... and oh my God, I really need to get cracking on calling the Pastor and nailing down the church for the day that I want. *sigh*... probably should discuss with philip and the folks what time would be best in the day to have the wedding and then start actually doing something about it... for once.

*sigh* I really want to blog more, I do. But I can't promise anything about keeping it relatively up to date. I will try, but no promises this time around.

Until the next time...