Lou-quacious

Friday 5 for November 26: Holiday Music

1. What’s your favorite holiday album?
   Either my two-disc set of Handel’s Messiah, or any album of carols. Puts me properly in the festive mood.
2. What song’s lyrics, title, or theme best expresses the positive aspects of your general mood at this time of year?
   “I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day”. It just makes me feel Christmassy.
3. What song’s lyrics, title, or theme best expresses the not-so-positive aspects of your general mood at this time of year?
   Hmm, I don’t know.
4. What’s your favorite song about a non-December holiday?
   More a season than a holiday, though I associate it with May Day: Summer is a Cumin In
5. What holiday song makes you want to cover your ears and flee?
   Any cheesy Christmas song that I hear over and over and over… there used to be several, but now that I don’t work in a shop and have to hear them on loop all day long, I’m more tolerant of them all ;-)

Mirrored from Enchilada Sunrise.

So, back in March I made some bloggy resolutions about what I intended to do for weekly posting goals.  Obviously, I haven’t kept those up… and then I started feeling like I was in catch-up mode all the time with myself, and oh noes, panic!!  Which is bad, since this blog isn’t supposed to be a duty!  Therefore, I have Made A Decision: I’m giving myself permission to “give up”.  In actual fact what that means is that I’m going to forget about Project 365 this year, since taking the photos already wasn’t working out – maybe I can go again another year, but I’ll see how it goes.  I’m still going to do the Friday 5 whenever I feel like it, but not necessarily every week.  I am going to try to post more about knitting and spinning and things in general.  This way, it’s more of an adjustment of my goals to something more realistic, rather than really giving up.

Another thing that I’ve decided to let go of is taking strict part of the Sock Knitter’s Pentathlon ‘09.  I haven’t been knitting very fast this year, and I’d ended up knitting nothing but those socks and still not finishing them.  It all got a bit too much like hard work!  So even though I love the patterns for the first two socks, and I really like the look of the third one which has recently been released, I’m not going to start #3.  I do intend to finish the first two socks, but not as my most immediate projects.  Instead I’m going to go back to my other knitting works in progress and try to get those finished off.  They’d been pushed back while I was knitting just socks.  That’s meant that I’ve now almost finished the shawl I’ve been making for Emily (I’m casting off at the moment, but that’s deadly boring so I’m just doing a few stitches at a time then putting it down again *g*).  And I’m really looking forward to picking up the projects I’ve been neglecting and making some real progress on them.  Hooray!  I don’t even feel like starting something new, because my old projects are almost like new ones by now.

I’m also thinking about giving in using Coppermine for my photo album software.  Yes, I’ve been using it for years on this site, so it seemed like a more sensible decision to keep using it and integrate it with WP rather than migrate to something else.  But there’s a good photo album plugin for WP, and the integration plugin for Coppermine doesn’t do precisely what I want it to do – it’s a great plugin, and it’s probably perfect for everyone else… but I’m picky!  Also, I do have to do some tweaking of the source code every time it updates because of the way I have my Coppermine set up, and… well, in the long run it might just be easier to change to using something more integrated with WP.  It’ll mean not having to theme Coppermine to match WP, too.  I’m going to ponder it a while more, but I expect I will change over.

Why am I mentioning this, when no-one but me cares?  Because it kind of fits the theme of the rest of this post: I’ve been hanging on to some things that I should have gracefully given in on a while back.  Letting go and making a few small changes will make things easier.  Note to self: change is good, and giving up on something doesn’t necessarily equate to failure.  There we go, that’s my deep personal insight for the day.  Now I shall stop rambling, let go of this post and send it into the big wide world (= hit the publish button)!  TTFN.

Mirrored from Enchilada Sunrise.

Originally published at Enchilada Sunrise. You can comment here or there.

Here we go, my answers for this week’s Friday 5:

1. What is your favourite fizzy, bubbly drink?
   Pepsi!  Or Coca-cola as a second - I don’t like the diet versions (unfortunately!), and I’m not keen on the non-branded ones either.  They just don’t taste the same.  Picky, picky me.


2. What is your favourite deep-fried food?
   Um.  I don’t really eat deep fried food.  Oh, except for crisps I spose.  So, crisps?  And sometimes chips, but not if they’re too greasy.


3. What is your favourite hot beverage?
   Hot lemon squash.  Weird, I know, but I don’t drink tea or coffee, and although I do like hot chocolate I only have it as the occasional cold-weather treat.  It’s too thick / sweet for a regular drink for me.


4. What is your favourite really messy food?
   Depends what you call messy!  Spag bol, maybe?  Or maybe tortilla chips and dip because you’re bound to get dip on you at some point.


5. What is your favourite recipe for a blended or mixed beverage?
   Not really sure what this means!  Like a cocktail?  Or a smoothie?  If we’re talking alcoholic beverages, I like Archers, vodka and orange juice.  If not, then banana smoothies are probably my favourite.  The recipe for that when I make my own is one banana (chopped up into smallish pieces), either (a) a scoop of vanilla ice cream, or (b) a tablespoon or so of natural yoghurt (depends what I have), and about half a pint of milk… or maybe more than that, I’m not sure!  I generally go by ‘feel’.  Then I whizz it all together with the whizzing device.  Add a bit more milk if need be to taste, whizz again, etc.  Serve with a sprinkle of cinnamon. Nom!

In other news, an actual knitting post should be coming soon!  I’ve just cast on for the second SKP09 pattern, which is a pair of entrelac socks.  There’s a new challenge right there - I’m just about to start the actual entrelac part and it’s all very exciting.  And nerve wracking!  Photos will be forthcoming… assuming I can make it all work.

Friday 5 for March 13: Its Cold!

1. Whats your favorite frozen heat-and-eat food?
   Hmmm... that's actually really hard. There's this place that does some really nice frozen ready-meals... I like most of theirs, but particularly the duck in orange sauce. Nom!
   


2. How sensitive are you to cool temperatures?
   I do feel the cold pretty easily, especially if I'm sitting still at the computer all day!
   


3. How many ice-cube trays are there in your freezer?
   None. I have one ice-cube tray, but it's in a kitchen drawer. I do have a couple of ice-cube bags in the freezer, though. And some frozen blue plastic penguins.
   


4. What aspect of your life seems to be frozen in place?
   Hah. My mental health. :-/
   


5. Whats your favorite blanket like?
   I spose this means 'favourite blanket for snuggling under on the sofa when it's cold'... in which case I'll say one of my fleece blankets because they're light but warm and good for keeping me cosy. But really the blanket of mine that I love best is the wool tartan one that I got in Edinburgh and kept in my car when I still had that. I don't use it so much now cos I don't want it to get covered in cat hair!
   

Friday 5 for March 20: Quarterly Progress Check

1. Would you say 2009 so far is meeting expectation, exceeding expectations, or failing to meet expectations?
   So far, 2009 has been fairly not-happening for me. Which is the fault of how I've been rather than the year itself. When I've been well enough to engage with life, there have been good things going on, so I'd say it's technically exceeding expectations, since mine are so low right now anyway!
   


2. What letter grade would you give yourself for your performance at work or school?
   Not that I've been to either, but for my performance in life so far this year: a big, fat F for FAIL.
   


3. On a scale from 1 to 10, how happy have you been with the weather so far in 2009?
   Other than a couple of periods of wtf (giant! hail! the other night!!), I think it's been OK. My brain is like a sieve though, so I might be forgetting. It is still the winter (or has it edged into spring now?) so of course it's not all sunshine and roses, but that's as it should be. I'll give it an 8.
   


4. Which of the Motion Picture Association of America's film ratings would you give your social life so far in 2009?
   Almost entirely a "G" - family time, knitting and spinning groups, hanging out with Ally and baby H, and perhaps a "PG" during that weekend that Char came to visit and we discovered that Robert Downey Jnr in Ironman is the best thing evah, etc. It's been quiet.
   


5. 2009's parents are on the phone and want to know how 2009 can improve its performance. What have been 2009's areas of strength and what are its areas for growth in the second quarter?
   Uh, Um. Business speak, send help, cannot cope! (Off to Mordor) Alright, not really. Areas of strength have been opportunities for learning new skills (spinning). I guess areas for growth will be getting my brain back in gear? That's definitely something that needs doing.