Thoughts on the Journey

The weather is at the moment far too hot and humid but life is going pretty well. I had a new mattress delivered yesterday and had my first sleep on it last night, which was nice. Its going to take a little getting used to after my very old mattress that dipped so much.

At work, I set up my first display in the Reference area and what's cool is I can see people looking at the books. Also once I explained the idea, one of the pages brought me books and dvds that work for it. I just love the feel of this library and love being more involved. I also chose a book for a romance book club I'll be reading in August, A Marvellous Light, which I loved and have already reread the entire series at least once.

Also something I love about being in Reference which is in the older part of the library is that all the tourists ask me questions. My library is a famous historical town outside of Boston. So I get to explain about the Wyeth paintings and the manuscripts downstairs and our 150th and it feels nice. It reminds me of the area I grew up in outside Philly and the year after college when I interned at a Philly museum. I'm also aware of how the signage is our library isn't great, one of the drawbacks of basically numerous renovations added onto an older building is honestly its confusing and we just don't have good signs. This is one of those things that I'm going to keep gently poking at.

Yesterday, I finally found the local Farmer's Market which was also not signed well at all. Not far from me is a gigantic high school and the market was on the complete other side of it in a covered parking area. I picked up delicious fresh veg, which I've been eating with dinner. Some berries that I think I'm going to make into granita before I head off for a bit. Apparently the bigger market happens on Tuesdays at a park not far from a busy intersection. Not sure when I'll be able to get to it. Sadly the weather was awful just so humid and I'd worn the wrong pants, but part of the day was spent reading in a nicely ACed cafe.

Another quality of life thing that I'm going to try and do before heading off to see family is switch out my old purse for the new Critical Role bag I bought. Technically I don't think its that much smaller but time for a change and I like it

I seem to have gotten into the habit of posting about once a month. I mean to do it more often but words haven't been coming that quickly. Also I'm nearing the end of a bad shark week which has sapped a lot of my energy. But the weather lately has been feeling more fall like which has helped. So I'll go with various things that are going on.

For my shark week, I bought myself a heatable pillow with lavender in it shaped like a uterus and it makes such a difference in my pain levels.

I've been sending out a good bit of my mail and my two nephews in France sent me drawings they did which are now on my fridge. One of the first big trips I'll be planning when its possible is to see them.

My cooking's going fairly well, my local Asian supermarket has had a deal on pork belly and the other time I got it, I think was smaller. This second batch is giving me lots of leftovers, which is good but a lot. So I keep trying to find ways to change it up, I also ended up with a lot more guacamole than I normally have but I think I can make a good dent in both of those tonight.

I finally was able to go back to the dentist and have this major gum cleaning thing, which feels like useful maintenance. Now I need to take that same kind of idea to my poor car that's waiting for me.

Job stuff is a lot of waiting and throwing things out into the void hoping someone answers back.

I did reconnect with the alum group from my NZ university, we actually had a video call that went pretty well. A little disconcerting to realize how many of the men on the call had MBAs and all but I like this alum group.

At the moment, I'm reading this amazing book Sharks in the Time of Saviors which is really good. I have a couple of books due on Monday so I'm planning on doing lots of reading this weekend.

-Wearing a mask means I had to learn a new way to breath as wearing one wakes my asthma up
-Also I want to get another masks that's more cheerful, my current one is blue with some white stripes on it
-Twisting my ankle hurt and while its almost better, I now have something that sets a time limit on my walks
-Frozen phyllo dough is tricky to work with but not impossible
-I miss my librarian work
-I've also missed writing characters being angry, writing this Cassian fic: Someone to punch was very satisfying
-Having a new laptop is great but laptops eat up so much memory
-I really miss browsing in stores or places that aren't pharmacies, grocery or liquor stores
-Being patient worked and I'm writing again

I'm having a wonderful and rather Star Wars' holiday with an Alliance sweater, galaxy necklace and some silly Star Wars' band aids, alongside books and socks, a Christmas staple.

I've also added a new bread recipe to my collection, a sweet filled bread from Smitten Kitchen, that I might try with other fillings.

My Yuletide gift is just what I wanted, an Ivan story about him growing up and figuring things out. Now I will enjoy the delicious fun of diving deep into the archive as its cold outside. My recipient liked their story, which always makes me happy.

Genuinely Self-Absorbed and Deeply Shallow (1575 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Ivan Vorpatril, Alys Vorpatril
Summary:

Or, Three Moments in the Evolution of Ivan Vorpatril, innocent bystander and political non-combatant

I normally love the holiday season but with worrying about my sister and everything that's part of that. It truly took until a few days ago to go, okay, we're all here as a family and there are reasons to celebrate.

I found it helped too when I decided that it was alright if cards and presents went off after Christmas, the thought matters and then there isn't this horrible stress of oh god, will it get there in time attached. With that in mind, if you would like a holiday card, the ones I have aren't particular to any holiday, then message me your address. If I have your address, then I'll try and send out a card to you.

Since my family lives in two places, we do two celebrations which I love. A smaller one that's me and my parents before tomorrow going up for the bigger one with everyone else. Part of today is going to involve baking, which has been one of the true bright spots of this year for me. Also I have a library part time job after the holidays which will help me build up money for my move. Boston area, folks, I'm going to be up there in January and February as I plan my move next year.

Have a happy holiday everyone and I hope that you're around those you love. I'm glad to know you.

ETA: I forgot to crosspost this somehow as I think LJ was acting up.

Tomorrow I'm going to the memorial of a woman who was basically an adopted aunt. I have all these words I want to say about her and I don't know where to start. I keep looking back at my life and seeing her thumbprints in terms of being thoughtful, loving and teaching.

Today my mom and I made a huge amount of cookies for the reception after her memorial, a potluck because she always loved potlucks. Food made to be shared and with love matters.

She died a week ago and I don't know if I'm ready to not have her somewhere. She's been failing and hurting and she passed in her sleep, but I miss her.

The question for today's snowflake_challenge fits in well with what I'm doing for dinner. For Christmas, I was given the Smitten Kitchen cookbook and the pizza dough recipe from it is currently rising in the oven to be my dinner.

Day 11

In your own space, post a rec for fannish and/or creative resources.

This is probably a perfect question for me since I'm a librarian and I love resources of all types and as I've been doing fact-checking as a part-time job, I've found even more.

A few that I've used and loved:

Walt Whitman archive, all of his poetry including scans of his manuscripts to see how the words changed.

Poetry Foundation, which has free poetry including poems being read aloud, poet's biographies and interviews.

Library of Congress, so many fantastic resources from images to documents.

Metrolyrics and other sites like it. I tend to find my fic titles from songs and sites like this are great for finding the right one.

Stanford's Dime Novel collection, this was part of the inspiration for my Yuletide this year, its also been a resource for RP.

I could happily list even more since I love finding the right resource to answer a question and then learning unexpected elements. This is why I adore reading nonfiction too, I'm always learning and the internet has great resources and a lot of my friends are researchers too. So we tend to be sharing questions and places that we've found answers.

Actually the last three major fics I wrote have a meta element that comes from my being a librarian and historian. I think a big part of the inspiration was that a large part of my fact-checking involved looking at who are the sources for which parts of history and who's missing.

The Outlaw Wade or A Young Lawyer's Journey, my Yuletide that looked at in world dime novels about Ben Wade from 3:10 to Yuma.

Finest Job, my narniaexchange fic where I thought about what elements of King Frank and Queen Helen's rank would survive to the Pevensies.

Got the Details Right, my Marvel Cinematic Universe fic for ineedmyfics where Sam Wilson and Natasha Romanoff watch in universe films about Captain America, which was inspired by another fic.

Christmas Eve is one of my favorite days and holidays of the year, due to how my family is spread out, Christmas Eve has ended up being for my parents and me. We make a delicious dinner, get dressed up and over the course of the evening open our presents. We used to just open one on Christmas Eve and save the rest for Christmas Day but since the day has become more for my brother's family in New Jersey, we do ours on the Eve. Then around midnight, there's Yuletide to read, this year there are two stories waiting for me. I've never had that happen before and I'm so curious to see which fandoms they're in as I requested a lot this year as well as offering the max. I'm happy with how my story turned out, its one in a fandom I've never written before and that I only really discovered this year.

The weather decided to behave like winter which I appreciate, its cold and crisp today which feels perfect. Also I had a great night's sleep after enjoying going to a party of some of my parents' friends who specially invited me. I talked about libraries, school libraries and had a great time, it was a nice reminder that people down here are thinking of me. Then today we walked into town and it was hilarious, we saw a guy dressed as Santa riding a beautiful old fashioned red motorcyle with a sidecare. I wish I could have grabbed a picture but he went by too fast.

Christmas day and Boxing day I'll be up in New Jersey with my brother and his family so won't be tagging as I usually leave my laptop behind. I'll be going some tagging today and probably tomorrow morning but everything else will be slowed.

Be well, my friends, I feel blessed to know all of you.

I hope everyone who celebrates Christmas has a wonderful time and for everyone who is doing their best to ignore it, I hope you are happy. I feel blessed

Last night when I went to my book club, I was reminded how in this strange year, I have made some unexpected and good connections. When I told the people at my club that I would be leaving, they were sad and hoped I could come before I left. Since the weather was beautiful, we sat in the backyard of one of the main couples, which was nice. This is a small book club and pretty much the same people have attended so there has been continuity. There was one of those metal fire pits so we ended up making s'mores at the end of the night. It a was a great reminder that while this year hasn't been perfect, its had good in it.

The run up to it was kind of fun as well since I got the time wrong, so I rushed about making delicious cherry cornbread muffins. I need to make them again since they're some of the best muffins I've had in a while with the cornbread texture but very moist. So I made them, thinking I was going to be late, got to the house and there was no one there. The meeting was at 8 but I think meet up still had it listed as 7 so I had my time's wrong. As I was waiting, I went to a favorite cafe where I found a lot of teenagers and their cars hanging out. Now this isn't a huge parking lot but according to the woman in the cafe, this is what kids do. Some of the cars looked like they belonged in The Fast and the Furious, while there were also some beautiful classic cars. Later I noticed that in other parking lots along Woodward, there were more cards. According to my friends at the book club, this is a definite thing in the area and there's a day in August when Woodward itself is shut down just so people can go cruising. Moments like this remind me how much of a car town this is. Next time I spot them, I need to take pictures as there were some gorgeous cars.

Tomorrow I'm going to go see a matinee of Pacific Rim and probably see it again with Rick. I'm in the mood for a good action movie and love del Toro. I need to get to work prepping for moving, get a date from the movers and then give that date to apartment company, who sound like they'll be able to release it pretty quickly. Then I hope to have some time in the east coast to travel, settle and look for a job. I never got that before moving out here, this year has been strange with few moments to go, oh, I feel safe and comfortable where I am.

My writing is going slowly, my Narnia story is started but I need to do even more with it to make it work, but I do have a little time.

FicFriday was pretty quiet this week, I filled a few on my journal and then three on Twitter. All Teen Wolf ones because I love the families on that show.

For @afullmargin

Oooh, always up for family shenanigans!

Allison's family saw the world through trust. Trust to survive, trust to tell, trust to lie to the right people. She made trust.

Stiles learned every police code once his father realized he wanted to know to understand. That way, no matter, he would know.

For @animalmysoul

Something Teen Wolf for #ficfriday?

Stiles knew he should sleep but his father was running late. If he got up then he could hear the scanner, then he would know.

Apparently I have a lot of feelings about Stiles and his dad, I just love their relationship and how Teen Wolf deals with families.

Last night I returned to Michigan to find a snow drift in front of my patio, all the snow from two drives in my complex has been pushed in front of it. This was not what I was hoping for as I had some cumbersome things to bring in and I was hoping to just put them on the porch and get them through my patio door, I ended up doing that but had to go around and do more hauling than I wanted. Though it reminded me how much I like where I've ended up living since someone said hello and told me that the other resident who lived here had complained as well. I've had lots of these small interactions since I moved in and its great, because it makes me feel like I've found a place where people care and watch out for each other. I left a message about it with the complex's office and one good thing came out of it, they finally fixed my loose oven door handle, but I have no idea if anything will change with the snow. My parent's surmise is probably right that they hire someone who just does what's easiest, I live on the corner so plow the snow there.

Today was also a good day as I returned to school and felt comfortable and as if I was coming back to a place that worked. I was able to figure out an issue with the computers, a teacher talked to me about her students doing research for exam week in the library and lots of wonderful little conversations. There are frustrations and issues to sort out, but it all makes me hopeful.

I'm going to try and do my best to take care of myself as well, which means waking up in enough time to make and bring my own tea. Last night I bought some granola bars when I did my brief grocery shop and I'll take some of them with me to eat during the day. I plan on doing leftovers and even frozen meals later on, but small steps that involve eating better are my focus. I'm trying to keep with a general eating, cooking mantra of eat better food, so more cooking, dishes that I can make on the weekend or on my earlier days to have at other times. My big basket of food goodies and equipment from my brother and sister-in-law will help with that, lots of sauces, salts and various tastes to test out. I'm going to do a big stock up at Trader Joe's this week and enjoy making food.

Weirdly or maybe not, I just felt more like I was truly being a professional today with my new jacket and gloves that kept me warm as I went to work. I plan on putting stuff up on my walls and just doing what I need to so that my apartment keeps feeling like mine.

This FicFriday was a nice one and I'm steadily working my way through my gift fics. Here I'm posting the Friday fics so I don't lose track of them.

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