New Years

New Years was low-key this year, i.e., no humorous familial intoxication. We went to my parents' house, per tradition; it was just us, plus sil Erin and Erin's friend Ashley. My mil stopped by for a while with Amiah, but Amiah gets really crazy if she stays up too late, so her bedtime was well before midnight.

Amiah brought over this Justin Bieber tour bus that she got for Christmas; I have to say that they didn't make toys like that when I was a kid! The amount of detail was pretty extraordinary, and you can plug an iPod into it to play (presumably Justin Bieber) music. And, okay, y'all can make fun of me ... but I watched the whole Justin Bieber movie with her too. >.< Hey, it gives my mil some much-needed grown-up time. That's my excuse.

I was never a fangirl of any boy singers or boy bands when I was younger. New Kids on the Block failed to romance me--although I remember dancing wildly with my sister to a tape our mom bought for us at the Price Club (she was probably trying to help us become cool, but that waren't happening!)--and by the time Backstreet Boys, N'Sync, et al came around, I was getting a little long in the tooth, although I did go with my very fangirly little sis-in-law Erin to see the Backstreet Boys in concert once. I remember telling a customer at The Piece that I was going, and she said, "Oh, how sweet of you to take your little sister--good luck putting up with the music!" and feeling embarrassed to tell her that Erin bought the tickets for me for my birthday! Ha! We definitely went more for Erin than for me, but we had fun and still talk about that concert.

After midnight, we watched Bridesmaids, since my mom makes anyone who drinks spend the night ... so yeah, we all had to spend the night.

Today is the last day of winter break. :( Tomorrow is back to the darlings. I have no idea what to expect from that; they were wild after Thanksgiving break, and this one was almost three times as long. I was thinking back to two years ago, when I took some time off around the holidays when I was still at the WAU, and I still remember the despair I felt at having to go back. It's nice to not have to despair about going back to work. I'm mostly not looking forward to having to get up early, and I was hoping to get a lot more planning done over winter break than I have.

Shameless Self-Promotion! "The Poet's Creed" Illumination and Namo Mandos Character Biography

It's been so long since I've had something to creative share that I've almost forgotten how to do it! First, the SWG's fabulous biography writer heartofoshun took the month off for the holidays, so I got to step into her very-hard-to-fill shoes. I've authored character biographies before, but they've always been emergency OMG-less-than-a-day's-notice! affairs. (In fact, I'd written about Námo before, so this one is building on that early and very inadequate version.) It was nice to get to spend the time on this one and run down some avenues of inquiry that I wouldn't have had time to pursue otherwise. The bio is loooong--I guess I figured that if I hardly ever get to do this, then I better make it count--but I hope it is useful and maybe a little bit interesting to other nerds who like thinking about these things. Námo Mandos's biography can be found on the SWG here.

Because newsletters like to grab my life by the scruff of the neck and thresh it violently from side to side, I was also responsible for the Barony of Bright Hills' newsletter this month (long story ... I was supposed to step down as deputy three years ago and didn't and this is what I get), and of course, it was also due on the first of the month. (It was also a day late--ha!) Anyway, despite pleading with some other artistic types for help with cover art, I didn't get any replies and had an almost-finished illumination of my own. So I finished that and used it. The upside to having spent almost all of my waking moments for the past day working on newsletters is that I actually got an illumination finished.

( The Poet's Creed )