Fortunate

Déjà vu gave us a knowing look as B and I realized we do this most years: head out on New Year’s Day around 5:30 P.M. ready to shop and walk around at stores that close around 5:30 P.M. Food was the next order of business so I looked up the closest UNO’s because we had this really tasty healthy pizza there the other day. Google said it was Permanently Closed. We then spotted a restaurant that we hadn’t been to in a while, but at a new location. A giant banner announced “Coming Soon! Now Hiring.”

We pressed on.

Down the road a Chinese restaurant we’d never seen before sported three-foot high lettering announcing GRAND OPENING, your traditional-oval Open neon, and a truck out front announcing the same for good measure. This place was most definitely open. We ordered meals we’d never ordered before in the spirit of new, ate nearly all of them and chatted whilst drinking tea afterward. Our waiter delivered two fortune cookies and the bill. I tore the cellophane wrapper and cracked open the cookie to learn that my fortune was...nonexistent. I smiled thinking my fortune is up to me, as it is for each of us.

Happy New Year.

I Wish

Ten days into this new year I’m going to do it. I resolve to make that resolution/wish list.

I resolve/wish to:
1. Focus (There are things I think I should do. So I’ve got to pick a thing, focus and do it.)
2. Get Adobe Certified - in anything (That’s one of the things I think I should do.)
3. Make time spent on the computer more productive
4. Tour a real, medieval castle, preferably with a moat (I’d put a moat around my house if it were allowed. They are just cool.)
5. Go to New York with my friend V
6. Surf again
7. Hike to Machu Picchu
8. Get paid for this clean living (My health care plan offers $500 cash back for doing healthy things.)
9. Go to Hawaii again
10. Visit Venice
11. Be better
12. Be better to my houseplants
13. Move on and forward
14. Snowboard in Utah or Colorado
15. Go on a insanely inexpensive trip to an incredible locale
16. Read more design books
17. Melt glass into beads that I am absolutely pleased with
18. Add something new and interesting to my hobby of doing new and interesting things
19. Get great new glasses to give my eyes a break from contacts
20. Take advantage of Lynda.com
21. Knit a pair of socks
22. Print this list and post it in plain sight

01-02-2010

Last New Year’s Eve Rick and I were in New York City having dinner at a French restaurant with friends. This year we watched the Food Network all evening, ate plates piled high with carrots, celery, clementines, thin-sliced peppered salame and white cheddar cheese with chipotle peppers and cranberries throughout. This after a gourmet dinner of Cream of Wheat. We like Cream of Wheat and are notoriously lazy about having a New Year’s Eve plan. At midnight we called friends and family, sleeping or not. Those who get woken up by calls from people like me will be delighted to learn I got payback when my brother called early the next morning to send well-wishes. We spent 01-01-10 lazing around, happy that we were, went out for Chinese and then watched Julie & Julia (where we enjoyed watching French food being cooked).

Was last year a much more exciting start to the New Year? Yes, but I was still just as happy as it started off exactly the same way as it has for the last seventeen years - with my favorite person by my side who is the bread to my low-fat butter.*

*That’ll make more sense when you see the movie.

Happy New Year's Eve!

Hello Friends, Family and Random Folk Who Happen By.
As 2007 ends in just hours, do you have big plans for tonight or fantastical resolutions for the new year? Do tell!

Me, I'm resolving to have no resolutions. That way I can't fail, right? Okay, I have SOME goals I guess, but resolve means "to make a firm decision about" and these are more just thoughts, ideas and hope-I-get-to's. I do like lists so without further ado...
1. Do Randolph Arts and Crafts Show in June
2. Go to Hawaii
3. Go surfing (in Hawaii)
4. Snowboard on a "real" mountain
5. Lift more
6. Run a half or full marathon
7. Be more grateful
8. Don't let P.I.T.A.s get to me
9. Read, read, read as always
10. Attain Design Certifications
11. Try to get off this computer more since I'm on one all day
12. And as always, be inspired by one of my favorite groupings of words ever:

Desiderata
By Max Ehrmann

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible, without surrender,
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons;
they are vexatious to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain or bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs,
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love,
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

No less than the trees and the stars (I just LOVE that)...Happy New Year to each of you.