I have busily been adding the blogs I want to keep up with to Google Reader, which I just thought of today. For someone who enjoys the Net so much, I am woefully ignorant about some of its features. Anyhoo, this new (for me) tool means I will now actually be current with what's going on at all of these pages! Hooray!

FINALLY getting around to completing the meme that Sphinx Ink included me in. Here's the SIX RANDOM THINGS ABOUT ME meme:

The Rules:

1. Link to the person who tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Write six random things about yourself.
4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.
5. Let each person know they’ve been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

My six random things:
1. I have an anxiety disorder. This makes life a thrill-every-minute rollercoaster, only without the fun bits.

2. When I was a preteen I would roller disco through my grandmother's house. Got pretty good at it, too; but to be fair, a 5'5" beanpole probably doesn't need to be rollerskating through narrow labyrinthine hallways.

3. My love of small furry creatures began with a stray kitten that used to wait for me to pet him every morning before nursery school. My mom would scoop me up and rush back inside to wash my hands. While she was unlocking the car, I would, of course, pet the kitten again.

4. Small, benign acts of silliness make me very happy :)

5. My first pet was a goldfish that kept jumping out of its tank. I never figured out why. We treated the water very carefully as instructed by the pet store owner. I have been scarred for life by the experience of trying to catch a wriggly fish and put it back and have not wanted a pet fish since.

6. A few Christmases ago, my Mom and I broke into a spontaneous dance routine during a Muzak rendition of Jingle Bell Rock in the TJ Maxx department store. No one noticed.

I'll have to break the rules here, because everyone I know well enough to tag for this meme has already been tagged. But if you're reading this and feel the urge to continue the meme, let me know when you've done so!

I'm trying to be creative, I really am. But I'm also being bombarded with other people's worries about the economy and admonitions that we should be spending as little and saving as much as possible. I'm getting married during the worst financial period in recent history, listening to Oprah recordings where people are talking about how much they have to give up and their struggles to save money. The dissonance here is eating away at me, and my wedding-anxiety dreams are getting worse. I don't have any credit card debt--I pay the balance at the end of every month and often use online checking instead--but I'm reexamining every little happiness I allow myself, every book I consider buying, every edible treat, trying to see where I can cut things down without making life seem like it's not worth living and still be able to afford the big event next year.

It feels like I'm the only one in my household that's aware of this on a personal level, the only one who's carrying this anxiety. If I mention it, it gets dismissed. But I can't help feeling that the roof is about to fall in and I'm directly beneath it.

I've decided to recapture my creativity. To that end, I've started working with the 3D artwork software I bought some time ago and have not used since I got frustrated with the somewhat steep learning curve. I've also gone back to my most recent manuscript--not an easy task since, in my zeal to use the online word processor I found, I erased about 65% of the chapter I was working on. And then found that I had somehow removed that part from the original I've got on my desktop as well. Note to self: Don't get rid of ANYTHING until you're successfully working with a publisher on the finished manuscript! :(

I've also been invited to participate in a meme, which I shall do as soon as I think of some things people don't know about me. I'm a pitifully open book.

Feel free to feed the turtles in my sidebar. It's soothing :)

Go ahead. Poke the penguin >:)

I finally decided to start keeping a journal. After researching journal keeping a bit, I also decided that I would do well with a visual technique rather than sticking to words alone. I got some lovely digital collage sheets from Etsy.com and started looking into books about art journal techniques.

Unfortunately, I found a number of good books. And then I realized that I have no supplies. And THEN , Shauna Roberts interviewed Jade Lee on her website, and I ended up wanting all of one of Jade's series as well. AND I'm SUPPOSED to be saving to pay for a wedding! And when will I do all of this, even though I want to, very badly, and I think it would be good for my thinking processes? I think a LOT of things would be good for me that I turn out not to follow up on. But I really, really like this idea. Can someone please arrange it to rain money and time? Thursdays are a good day for me, and I always have an umbrella handy....