Thing-a-day.com

I failed to update yesterday.  I had decided to work on my cross-stitch yesterday, and took pictures of how far done it was when I started.  Then I worked for awhile, and suddenly discovered I needed to take out most of the stitches I’d put in.  I didn’t end up posting because my forward progress was extant, but not truly visible in photos.

Today’s thing was inspired when I started typing up short descriptions of two paintings, and I discovered that I wasn’t going to be able to do “short”.  So, I wandered back to twickster’s word lists, grabbed a list that I hadn’t yet used, revised the first descriptions to short and boring, and they wrote another piece that was the real thing I needed to say.  Again, it’s long and on my writing blog.

What amuses me most, though, is that I didn’t end up typing even as much as I’d originally planned for the second painting.  That just means I have more to do later, and I’m okay with that.

This was another exploration based on twickster’s word list, and seeing what came out of my mind.  It’s partially rooted in my reinforcement of friendship last night, but I didn’t truly touch on that, and I expected to.  I guess our words sometimes have other things to say than we expect.

Again, because it’s long, I’ve posted it to my writing blog.

Today I cemented and I reinforced.

Today I cemented a new friendship with a woman at my work, though she may be transfered soon. I hope not, and I know she hopes not as well, but it’s a possibility. Still better to make the friendship now, and hope it weathers the move if she is transfered than to hold in back within ourselves in the hopes of avoiding a new pain or even a mere frustration.

Today I reinforced a long-standing friendship with one of those conversations that unexpectedly takes hours and feels like moments. Secrets are commented on, laughter is shared and joy is spread. We both walk away saying, “I’m so glad I have my friend”. We both know that there’s not a damn thing we wouldn’t do for each other, and not a thing we can’t really talk about. The conversation ends with us both on the verge of passing out, exhausted but ever so much lighter.

Today my thing was friendship, and I am very glad I had the chance to do this thing, in more than one variation. I hope everyone out there is lucky enough to cement and reinforce for themselves soon.

Today was a slow day. My roommate had a small party last night, and so today was the recovery and cleaning after that. Plus she took her puppy away for most of the day, so I had one of those lovely days to myself. I cleaned and sang badly along with my iPod. I putzed around online. I returned something to Amazon so I never have to deal with them again. I tried some lovely dessert wine at Whole Foods, and ended up buying a bottle for my boyfriend’s visit in a week. I didn’t get breakfast at Panera as planned, because it was a zoo in there. That’s okay, it’s probably better that I keep my pennies as much as possible. I also bought some eggs at Whole Foods, but I haven’t used any yet.

Trying to figure out dinner tonight, I decided to on an old fall back. Not in terms of the food, but in terms of the plan. Cooking for one can be a real challenge, and so I’ve often resorted to making a side dish as my main food, and then scrounging around for anything else if I’m still hungry. So, since I’d already planned to make Red Chile Carrots Cointreau for thing-a-day, I figured I’m make dinner and do my thing at the same time.

Again, I photographed most of the process, but I’ve only posted a photo of the final product in pan. Food photography is incredibly hard.

And, just for the record (to make up for my missed day), I not only photographed the puppy yesterday, I also did the unthinkable (for me) and experimented with my best ever recipe. I think a lot of people have that one recipe they make for all the pot-lucks or get-togethers, and it always garners rave reviews. Usually, we’re not interested in modifying it after that point (or at all, depending on how we got it), because what if it sucks? Well, I took the plunge, and instead of making my usual pumpkin bread I made pumpkin muffins with a sweetened cream cheese filling and a dark chocolate icing/frosting.

Out of this world. One of my roommate’s co-workers took three of them home with him after I went to bed, and the ones I left out had been decimated to a lonely five muffins. Which, between the roommate and I, are gone now. Sometimes it’s good to experiment with the tried and true, I think.

Sometimes, animals are too cute to resist. Other times they drive us up a wall.

Luckily for me, today has largely been one of the former times. And when I saw my roommate’s puppy in the snow, the camera had to come out.

The nice thing about all of this is that, it can be a snapshot, but I’m always trying to apply what I learned in my single photography class, and make all my shots better. So I took a lot of photos today, not just because the pup was cute, but because I wanted to see if I could improve on my shooting. And I have to say that I am very pleased with this image.

I haven’t posted the last couple of days, mainly because what I finally got out on day five was just too incredibly personal to share with anyone.  So I managed some poetry, but it’s set aside for now.  Yesterday, however, I did drop the ball.  I was planning to make baked oatmeal, but I got into a long conversation with my mother (her day off is Wednesdays), and generally one thing after another came, and suddenly it was time to leave for work.  The closest I came to being creative yesterday was picking out some crochet books from the library.  I don’t have yarn, though, so I may not get very far with it.

However, today I made the baked oatmeal!  No photos, because I didn’t think of it, but a new recipe for me to make.  And since I love baking, it seemed like a great choice.

I decided to halve the recipe, because I don’t need a 13″ x 9″ pan full of baked oatmeal.  This is the only instruction I didn’t follow.  And this turned out to be a good thing, because this recipe is no good.  It’s not actively bad, it’s just incredibly boring and bland.  It did smell good near the end of the bake time, but it took far too long for that yummy smell to happen.   I was worried about that, but since there came that smell, I thought it would be okay.

Wrong answer!  This is a thumbs down recipe, and I won’t be making it again.  It’s as if it’s attempting to be oatmeal cake, but healthy.  It’s unfortunate, but true.  Blech.  Hope that a disappointing thing still counts for the day.

So, I’ve enjoyed reading twickster’s word lists and especially enjoyed using them to create something new.  She’s put up four lists so far, and today marks my third use of her list.  At this rate, I’ll do nothing but write for thing a day, using her lists as a jumping off point.

I rather like today’s piece better than yesterday’s.  I hope others agree.

Today’s entry would not have been too long to just post here, but I think for the sake of consistency, I’m going to again direct people to my writing blog for my writing posts.

I’m not really fond of this one, I think.  Either I was too tired when I sat down to work on it, or something, but it didn’t coalesce into what I was looking for.  Not that I could say for certain what that was.  I guess it’s a “I’ll know it when I see it” situation.

I had intended to post a photo I took very early in the day for today’s thing.  But I cannot figure out how to make the computer speak to the camera.  Maybe some other time.

I haven’t figured out all of my photo stuff yet, so I can’t share the photos. But I did make pumpkin bread, pumpkin muffins and took photos of most of the process. I make pumpkin bread fairly regularly, but this was my first crack at muffins. My thought was that the photos would be the real creative attempt, but I think it all was.

I’m also going to go out this evening, and maybe take some more photos. Wish me luck!

My intention with joining thing a day was to improve my writing and my cooking, and to give me an excuse to bake more.  Of the three, writing has the highest priority, so what better way to inaugurate my month of thing a day than with a writing exercise?

With that in mind, I decided to take the word list posted by a previous thing a day-er, twickster, and see if I could work those ten words into something.  I wasn’t sure what.  My mind jumped immediately to poetry, but when I sat down to type, stream of consciousness prose came tumbling out.  I was still able, however, to work in those words.  I think even with only occasional awkwardness.

However, it’s long.  So I decided rather than clutter up the thing a day front page with the writing itself, I will direct people to my writing blog.

Thus my thing a day entry is posted here, and I hope everyone enjoys it.  It’s about a puppy and snow, and the start of my adaptation to winter.

Well, I’m committed.  I’m going to make one thing a day, despite the fact that I’m at least half convinced I can’t do it.

I have a couple people egging me on.  My friend J is going to give me 10 words a day in February, and I’ll try to create useful writing out of this.  Of course, her vocabulary is scarily more large than mine.   I’m going to tell myself it’s a learning experience.

My plan is pretty simple.  I’m going to bake, I’m going to cook, and I’m going to write.  I may also knit or crochet, but I need a teacher for those.  I did crochet a little once before, and I’d like to do it again, but I will need a refresher course.  I’ve never knitted.  I also plan to give myself a little leeway to do whatever.

So, for now, there will be 5-10 days of baking, 5-10 of cooking, and an unknown number of storytelling.  All else is up for grabs.

I miss my friend E.  I’ve lost touch with her, and would love to have her to show me how to use all these seed beads.  But they are also effective currency for me later in life, so I am not disappointed.

As for A, who started this whole thing, there are no words.  She’s an ambitious soul, and good for a kick in the butt when needed.  How did I end up here again?  She got me considering it and J threw in her weight supporting A (as well as being impressed with A).

I’m a sucker for pressure and feedback.  What can I say?