Motivationally Challenged

So I’m having a somewhat difficult time getting into The Christmas Card Endeavor this year. Oh, I managed to start playin with pics and throwin together the design for the actual card a few weekends ago… but my momentum has kinda fizzled since then.

I’ve always viewed the creation of my Christmas Card in 5 steps:

1) Going through the cards I received last Christmas and throughout the year to update my addresses
2) Designing the Card
3) Writing the Newsletter
4) Printing the Card and Newsletter (hopefully a much less time consuming proposition now that I have my laserprinter)
5) Throwing everything together and mailing them

So far, I’ve got about 85% of Step #2 completed… and that’s about it. Of course, I still have a little bit of time left before my December 1 deadline, but so far, prospects for my motivational momentum are not high. Doesn’t help that I have been sucked up into a flurry of book buying and reading lately. This past weekend, when I wasn’t running errands, Christmas shopping with Pop, getting ready for Sunday dinner or logging my newest books in the database, I really, really, really tried to sit down and work on my card. But all I wanted to do was sit down and curl up with a book. So, I did. I have no discipline at all.

Pop thinks I should just take a break from them this year. I dunno… I’ve been doing them for 12 years now. At the very least, I’ve always written a newsletter. So… we’ll see what I feel up to in the next few weeks. I hate to force myself, cuz I never want my annual labor of love to become a chore I hate to do.

Bus Snob thinks I’ll get back into the swing of things if I get back to bloggin. I dunno… I seem to be doing that this week, but I’m not noticing a difference in the ol’ motivation department. At least not yet.

Ah well… guess we’ll see.

On a Side Note…

So it seems Pop’s faithful li'l Nissan truck (the one that was already well into middle age when they left San Diego 12 years ago) finally kicked the bucket rather unexpectedly yesterday. So, the folks are thinking up options for a new vehicle very soon. Mom’s none too thrilled to be spending the weekend before Thanksgiving car hunting (especially when they have a guest coming for dinner), but life sometimes fails to acknowledge convenient moments to throw shit at us.

Mom told me this morning that they're thinking of sending the ol' dood to stay with Paulie at the junk yard. You know, providing some sort of familiarity and a poetic destination for both of them since they shared a garage for so long at one time.

Yeah, sounds pretty silly, but sometimes one just needs to be a li'l silly to feel better about things.

We Reap What We Blog

So I know they always say to be careful what you blog about cuz you never know who’s gonna read it. And even without such precautions, I usually try to be as fair in my treatment of most folks in my blog as I am in real life, cuz… well, I tend to be diplomatic that way, anyway. Boring, I know, but it’s that damn curse of seeing too many sides of any situation at any given time. Really sucks in an argument.

But anyway, I have recently discovered that there’s more to be careful about in blogging than being nasty at people. Case in point: After calling up my folks a few weekends back to tell them about the excitement of the snake in my living room, we all decided we’d refrain from sharing such excitement with my grandmother, as she’s absolutely terrified of snakes and such knowledge might make her a tad less inclined to want to visit.

Of course, I wanted to blog about it, cuz it was… well, certainly something worth sharing with whoever wanted to read about it. But that was that, and I forgot all about it.

Until last night, when I get a phone call from Mom, telling me I really oughtta put some disclaimers in my blog. Seems I completely forgot that one of my three regular readers just happens to know Gram… and writes to her regularly. And frequently likes to mention items in my blog as a point of conversation. Which is always nice, and I’m not upset at all… but I’m told Gram just about had a heart attack when she read about it. Oops.

So… note to self: try to remember to include blog disclaimers when attempting to avoid grandparental heart-failure. :)

Potato Chips and Broilers

... don't mix.

Words of wisdom for the week: turns out, popping a potato-chip-encrusted casserole under the broiler to help it brown faster is NOT as brilliant an idea as it would first seem. What it does, in fact, is burst into spectacular flames within 2 minutes.

Good news is: my smoke detector works. Plus, tuna casserole has handy ingredients that are always around, and it doesn't take too long to throw together another batch... though we did eat pretty late. Thankfully, my guests (Mom and Pop) were very patient, and even brought over a fan to help pull the smoke out all the open windows. Though, Pop did complain about being cold. lol

Much like my experience in Iowa, where I belatedly realized that a AAA Membership could come in mighty handy (which I hooked myself up with as soon as I got back home), this experience has convinced me to purchase a fire extinguisher post haste. I kept trying to remember all the rules about what kinds of fires were safe to put out with water. At least it was pretty contained in the oven... plus, once the fire ate through all the oil in the chips, it ran outta steam rather quickly, so I figured it was pretty safe to douse the blackened embers.

I set out my handy dandy ionic air purifier this morning, too, in hopes of combating the wonderful lingering aroma. I highly suspect, however, that I'll have to wash the curtains and all the furniture covers before it's all over. *sigh*

I do never seem to do anything halfway.