Brain Flotsam V2.007

So begins my quest to blog more frequently...

Last night I visited the ancestral homestead, where I picked up various fun things like my laundry, a box of things Mom wanted to get rid of (mostly my bookends - two of them are carved stone figures that are bloody heavy, even for bookends), and some of Mom's lentil soup, this time the cumin and coriander variation.
I am eating the soup right now and it's awesome, but I do wish I'd had the forethought to add some cheese to it before I left. There are so few foods that cannot be improved by the application of some extra sharp cheddar.

It's a rather nice change to have so much of my floor visible at home, although I still don't have all my flat spaces cleared. I can't sew yet, for one thing. But I'm close, very close.

Yesterday I did actually draw something, too. It may or may not morph into a full-blown illustration, we'll see.

Also, I took a Democratic Party political survey, the mail-in kind, and I mostly wished I had a big red marker to strike through half of it. "Mark the issues most important to you right now" - well, it's hard to do when they aren't even on your stupid list, Democratic Party. I added some write-ins.
"Which party do you trust to look after your interests?" NONE.
I hope they don't just throw my survey away because it has so much writing on it, outside of the "Please tell us anything else you think we should know" box. I have extremely neat handwriting, Democratic Party interns, you can handle it!

A Joyous Imbolc to all - may good things grow from here.

I fail at weekend productivity, mostly.  Although with the assistance of Fabric-Stash Enabler Mom, I did acquire some smokin' awesome additions to my stash (and the things I actually needed for my current project) during a trek through Houston's southeastern neighborhood fabric stores.  We should learn that in most cases, we will find fun novelty fabrics at the chains, but for quality color/value cottons, going directly to The Painted Pony would save some time and money.  ;)
The only thing we didn't find was the Hoffman Challenge fabric. It's on some of the online retailers, but not yet in stores around here. We'll wait a bit and check back.

We also went to the uber-awesome catfish joint and scored a party platter overflowing with hushpuppies. WIN.

I did not actually get the fabric washed, although that's probably good as now it has bonus cat hair to wash off, too. Apparently my quilting table is Zephyr's new favorite nap spot.

Suffered through the Sunday blahs and Sunday night insomnia, which really made for a grand morning today.  Ugh.  Did manage to get my iTunes playlists transferred to Sofia at last, and got rid of most of the repetitive entries in the Library. Also acquired hotel accomodations for both ApolloCon and WorldCon. w00t!

Did some art, including laying in colors for the commission portrait for llnm. Finally. It'll take several more color layers to get it done, and I'm not sure that I'm happy with the chosen palette, but the nice thing about digital is that I have a great amount of control over individual colors. Did not do any writing.  Did a lot of reading, both of the fanfic and regular variety. I finished Skulduggery Pleasant (hey! It has a sequel!) and have gotten firmly addicted to The Stepsister Scheme.

Lalala. I think that was it. I got the feeling there was some kind of nation-wide sports event going on, but it never really got onto my radar. I will probably catch up on the cool movie trailers over the course of the next few days.

So, er, yeah. I'm still here, still doing stuff, getting behind on the writing but all caught up on the art at last. Looking forward to traveling at the end of the month although I will need to stock up on Airborne for the trip. Egads, it looks cold up there.
Thanksgiving was a festival of drinking, eating, movies, games, cleaning, sorting, drawing, reading, and lazing about. There was also some unfortunate GI distress, which has prompted me to make an appointment to discuss the pharmaceutical option with my doctor. Ever since he ran down the typical symptoms, I've been noticing ones that I hadn't really connected with IBS before. Plus I can't eat anything, it seems, without a lot of discomfort.
We're doing the Food Plan again so we didn't actually make Thanksgiving foods at home, and partook of them sparingly at my aunt's. I am trying to be more diligent about the food diary. With sickness came the inevitable holiday depression, although thankfully that didn't last too long. Somehow I have in my head that achieving a certain level of crafty productivity will mean I never feel depressed again. But experience shows that no matter how many works of art I produce, I will still occasionally be sad. Such is life.
Mom and I watched her favorite reality TV program yesterday: Smart People Doing Real Stuff. The NASA Channel had live radio and video feeds from Mission Control and the cockpit as the shuttle landed. It was pretty cool.
Now that all of my anonymous exchange art is turned in for the next month and a half, I hope to do some work that I can post free and clear, as well as participate in various December writing games, and of course I have a quilt to make. Need to print the photos for that. And find the final important design element to print and applique. It's something very specific, but that has many variations, so I will probably be scouring various sources for a good one. (And I'm hoping that part of it, at least, will be a surprise, as it is a gift.)
And here, since it's December: a meme about Christmas.
Hey, I can start playing my Holiday Playlist now! w00t!

( Christmas meme )

The original post: The Omnivore's Hundred

Instructions:
1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating.
(go to the original post for Wikipedia links if you don't know what something is)
4) italicize ones you haven't eaten but WANT TO TRY
5) Leave the ones you haven't tried, but are indifferent about

(You know what would be good on this meme? A designation for something you tried once but will NEVER EAT AGAIN.)

( The Omnivore's Hundred )

People, traditional injera bread is gluten-free. It's made from teff! I <3 teff! Three cheers for teff!

And unlike the NYC restaurants where you have to call ahead, apparently my local joint serves 100% teff injera every day. Hooray!

(When next I am in NYC, though, I can call ahead to Ghenet and request gluten-free injera for the following night.)