Ever Bethany

Today was the last day of the Belvidere Christmas rush.

I feel myself going down like a tree. (At 9:30!)
I've enjoyed actually *having* holiday things to go to, having new friends from work and so-on, but I think I've been shortchanged on sleep, introvert time, and water like whoa for a while now.

Tomorrow I will probably be a little selfish, or maybe Monday I will, though the family's all home, and SPIN. Start a new knitting project just for me, now the sweater for my god-daughter is drying.
(It's not getting to her by Christmas. Which is fine, her parents aren't together anymore, and I'm pretty sure her birthday last month was a private war gift-off. It may be better as a follow-up to all the toys, at some remove.)

I got some poems sent out today.

I'm just feeling sick about Duotrope taking their public search away starting in January, which is NOT HELPFUL in psyching myself up to look for markets, but c'est la vie, dou shiyo mo nai yo, what can you do about such things?

I made this falling-star Calcifer yarn, and it pleases me:


Porthaven Marshes

It has bamboo streaks like the multicolored star-trails in the anime, which you can see better in some of the photos at the shop listing there. This photo is a bit rosy, it's  quite dark, really, except for the light parts...

I cut (half) of a lock of hair off this morning to poke into a dye-bath, just to test it out.

I am pretty sure the dye bath is not strong enough for conclusive evidence, and I will have to buy twice as much blue KoolAid for the next batch (and in fact, I may buy more and redo this roving, too).

However. I thought you all should be forewarned.


{I am also dyeing one of the silk hankies* that I've left in that hallowed spot of the stash for "things too nice to use" for too long. I am tres excite about this! I hope it takes.)

Today I managed to do everything, except write, which is next.

I'm not always writing what I *want* to be, right now (my novel is fighting, I think because I'm boring it) but at least getting to do something. Okay, not always writing what I THINK I should be. Not the same, eh?

I'm not doing good posting about my second round with The Artist's Way, because I already *talked* about that here, and I am stupidly averse to repeating myself. But I am at least rereading and refocusing with it, and feeling better all the time.

I put lemon oil on my temples for an essential oils video, and was reading the bit where she talks about artists needing to withdraw, and I said, "Feh with this, I'm going to go spin some TOP yarn" and put on my earphones and zoned out so hard I took them off later feeling like I'd napped or cried, rather than just sat and done fiber work.

I also read this poem/story today, and thought it was incredible:

Spark by Steve Taose, in Jabberwocky Magazine.

...I also, on my to-do list, got to read a great story by Ken Liu he's entering into a contest on the Codex Forum, which I can critique as a non-combatant participant. :gloat: It'll probably be MONTHS or even next year before you can read it. But I will take pity and let you know about it when that happens.


I am having growing-pains with this TOP yarn, not sure of myself because I'm not happy with the motley look of my past several, and am trying to find a way to make it look dynamic, and am holding myself to a certain standard.
But.
I think I'm going to figure it out.

Today I went for a driver's license exam. To my own surprise (there was some hairy second-guessing on that park-on-a-hill maneuver) I passed!

At the tag agency I also registered to vote.

I have done neither before, and I turn 26 this year. I don't know if I am doing these things because I care more, or I care less, but I feel pretty good about it right now.

Not feeling so good about barre chords on the guitar. I was puzzled about this callous developing on my left index finger's middle knuckle until I went to practice today and realized the "B" was totally responsible...

On the other OTHER hand:


My next yarn (this is only half of it, the other side is a lurid Irish green :D) is going just swimmingly.

I mean, aside from the moments of internal cursing because I'm spinning silk on its own in sections, and that stuff is slippery as a baby otter. Look at it sideways and it comes apart...

I just remembered it's not just Protect the Boss and City Hunter I haven't finished yet, because they got too serious to spin to. I haven't finished Secret Garden or Runaway Plan B, either.

(Though of the last three really good ones, Runaway Plan B is the easiest to slip into, and I've watched it the most steadily.)


Man. Have I finished *anything* this year? I'm sending out poems that aren't properly revised...I have tons of short stories I'm picking at...

Oh yes. A yarn. I finished one of those.



Seaglass In Her Hair, my first yarn with beads...

I bought beads to start using in making yarn. This learning process will no doubt be painful and frustrating, but then I will have stuff in my shop that looks like this:



heh. I wish. This is "Ring of Fly Agarics" by WeirdAndTwisted, whom I adore.


Also, I am bound and determined to appear as a "kodana" dandy-loli for fabricalchemist 's wedding, and so have consigned myself to admitting that I will never dress normal again. The truth is I kind of dress ninja-secretly as a loli-boy all the time, anyhow.

I mean, seriously.



And that's about it? Except I'm tired.

And 'cept that jade_sabre_301  is watching k-drama now? BWAHAHAHA, the world is OVER, kiddos.

I've already posted this next-best-thing to everywhere

but

I will be publishing a poem in Polu Texni! It's called "Emerge Ravenous".

And when I sent a bio to her in my response e-mail (trying to learn my lesson from having to be asked both times I've published in Chizine) she wanted a piece on my fiber art, too.

Just sent a description of the draft I merrily sketched out yesterday, and it sounds good to her! (Methinks this would could as my first proposal?)


So. Perfect time to get a couple rejections while editors catch up on their holiday reading, with renewed verve to send them right back out again!

I'm having a poetry identity-crisis, which is not helped by the fact that one of the main instigators is now giving me mixed signals. 0_O

Is it okay for me to use complete sentences because that's my style, or are you going to rant at me again? MAKE UP YOUR MIND.

...anyway. BUT my spinster skill is currently behaving and we now have this:



Eboshi Robes
is yet another Mononoke themed yarn, but was never meant to be Ashitaka, so see, it's DIFFERENT. I've been wanting to do her for a while, and this one did not disappoint. I ended up throwing in more bright stuff, off the cuff, as I was blending up portions, and I'm really glad I did.

This looks a little more particolored, but in person, the bright parts make the dark foundation just pop more.

My brother commented that this looked like a Toothless yarn to him [foreshadowing]
because this next one is even moreso. I just did it based on colors that would look good with this orange ply I have orphaned from Tatara Nightfall, but as I added a blue strand, and threw in some highlights of lighter blue and purple, I realized it was turning into colors just like his mottled black-blue skin. Even if it doesn't end up looking much like Toothless once plied, it's going to be pretty.

There is no teal for the orange and brown to run amok on.  -_-

Farm Life: Staring at the gross-looking thing the dog is chewing to be sure it's a dead thing it's SUPPOSED to have. This morning, luckily, it was just a really dirty bone. (My favorite scene for imagery remains one for horror-value in the Aolon project, that came straight out of my backyard...)

Love, War, Books: I'm really happy to announce that Archivalist is talking to me again, we met last night over the much-abused notebook I've mutilated removing traces of earlier drafts and foolishness. We're back together now.

I Am A Yarnie: And I've been updating my yarn blog a bit more lately! Working on chronicling the color-crushes that emerge into patterns when I look at my Favorites page on Etsy, presenting it as a Lookbook for fiber, etc. If you were ever curious about the kind of abstract correlations I come up with as far as palettes in fiber go, this is a good way to see like I do.

I R Srius Writur: a friend is starting a new blog on literature and the objects we associate with them, as a prelude to starting her own shop of literature related jewelry. She asked me for a contribution, and I said YES of course. I spoke on The Hobbit, and despite one glaring grammatical mishap, think it's not too shabby. Neither is her lovely blog, The Pretty Librarian. I have always admired her style, and am glad to have a way to hear from her about it regularly!
She linked to my post from her Facebook with the comment, "from a real published writer!" Which cracks me up like an Easter Egg...



Next on my Agenda of Evil: to combat the rejections that poured in yesterday with fresh submissions, continue this Misty Mountains spinning, in hopes the sunshine will one day return, and see a bit more of this new, darker Archivalists story...

Anyone want a dead field-mouse?

There's one stewing in a rusty can, out there, and I want the can.
If there are no takers I will get a brother-person to chuck it and start a deplaguing project...

***



ASHITAKA SOJOURN

Quite handsome, am I right? He's completely available.

I got a small break yesterday, when the sun came out at just the right time, after it was overcast all day.

Between punching a hole in my foot with a screw, a coldthing that makes me feel draggy, and other small annoyances magnified by just not feeling too happy, I was starting to have that feeling the world was out to get me and it wasn't worth even being surprised.

But I got the shots I wanted, my parents have decided to come back early so when I work tomorrow I don't have to spaz out, and rereading Vigil has given me the juice to get on with it.

And this morning, though I found a dead mouse or rat floating in the can I want to use for decoration, I also found our old mailbox by the trash, to be claimed for my Okie variant shabby-chic lawn improvement project!

Photos to follow, my-pace.