Body: My right hip and knee keep feeling like they're about to fail, but nothing actually hurts. I can live with that as long as I don't have to do too much walking.

Stress Level: 1

Book Review: Everyday Foods in War Time by Mary Swartz Rose. An interesting look at what sort of nutrition advice the experts were giving homemakers during WWI. The government was asking people to reduce their intake of meat, wheat, sugar, and fat; and this book was written to help women figure out how to make healthy and satisfying meals while still keeping those ingredients to a minimum. It's clearly written and most of the broad advice about how to eat a balanced diet is still useful, but it's incomplete by today's standards. I hadn't realized that they still only knew about a couple of the vitamins that late. The recipes at the back look interesting, and I may actually try a couple of them. Rating: 6 out of 10. If you ignore the detailed advice and just look at the recipes and big picture suggestions it might go as high as 7 out of 10. Not loanable through the Kindle, but since it's a freebie that doesn't really matter.

Reading: I started Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain. I didn't get very far in, but so far it's pretty good.

Hearing: Musical pinball. My iPod is going from Glam Rock to Frank Sinatra to Doo-wop to Folk to The Grateful Dead to Santana to CPR to Arlo Guthrie to Broadway.

Etsy Find: 6 "_____ More" buttons

Project Follow-up: We tried someplace new for dinner last night. Mr. Aisan has wonderful sushi and very good tempura. The stuff Jaime and Jenn ordered looked good too.

Tonight's Project: I'm getting out of work at 3:30 and hitting the road for a weekend downstate with friends.

Randomness: Look at the above sentence and see if you can figure out which word in it makes me think I've been living in New York for too long.


Get your own valentinr

in the very first block of programming, on Friday evening, you want to attend more than half of the panels.

Now if we can just get into the Westin...

One of the things I'd like to do in 2011 is see a show on Broadway. Somebody told me about Broadway.com, where they list all the shows that are currently playing, and I think some that are upcoming.

There are a bunch of classics that I'd definitely enjoy seeing, but nothing that I'd call a "must see." This is... kind of disappointing.

I spoke to my supervisor, and made the changes I posted about here.

I also made it very clear to him how annoyed I am by this plan, and why it screws up my plans for most of the next year.

(In rough order of likelihood.)

- See a show on Broadway
- go to an actual beach (that is, one where the water and sand were there before humans got involved. Grafton does not count. I can't tell if Taconic does.)
- Go to a couple of non-camping SCA events
- Take voice lessons
- Go to Readercon
- Go to Lunacon
- Visit the family in Michigan (this is less likely than the cons because I'd need to take at least 3 or 4 days off work for it to be worth the drive)
- go to Cedar Point
- Go back to school. (I'm actually looking into a couple of different "University Without Walls" type programs. They seem like a better fit for me than traditional programs.)
- lose some weight
- get a different job
- buy a house (this is much more likely to happen in 2012, but we might have enough saved by late 2011)

I notice these are mostly travel related.

Because I still have no idea if I'll be able to get a room in the hotel that's actually hosting Arisia I've decided to reserve a room in a different hotel as a fallback.

Looking at Google's map of the immediate area, it looks like The Seaport Hotel is in easy walking distance of the Westin. It's $55 more a night, but hopefully I'll get into the Westin after all and won't have to spend it.

I'll make the reservation when I get home tonight, because I have no interest in typing my credit card number into my work computer.

I requested Friday Jan 14 and Monday Jan 17 off for Arisia. Tom & I still need to actually buy our memberships, and I'm still waiting hear back from the hotel about whether we'll have a room or not.

But, Arisia! My favorite con. :)

(Note: I still need to get a better picture of my con bag. This one really isn't adequate for an icon.)

Body: I didn't have any foot pain at all yesterday, and none today until I'd been wandering around the apartment barefoot after getting out of the shower. So, I'll be sticking with the stompy boots for another day or two.

Stress Level: 4

Etsy Find: Speakeasy Vanilla Perfume oil. Bourbon vanilla, creamy vanilla, amber, frankincense, white musk, and a tiny bit of bay rum. Doesn't that sound like it would smell amazing?

Project Follow-up: I got the cover for the futon. If anyone local wants to buy a futon, I can't recommend Futon Galleria highly enough. The website is awful, but the store is great. The owner is knowledgeable, and nice. When we went in to look around he answered every question Tom & I asked, and otherwise left us alone to browse. When we went back, he remembered us, and was just as nice after he had our money as before. The other errands mostly didn't happen, but that's OK.

Tonight's Project: The usual Thursday night dinner with the gang, with a twist: tonight we're eating at somebody's house, not a restaurant.

Randomness: If you could take everyone you love on vacation together, where would you go? Assume money and vacation time are all taken care of. I'd take everyone to The Sleeping Bear Dunes. I'd find a good hotel (for the folks who prefer that) near a good campground that could deal with both people camping SCA style and more traditionally. There'd be loads of time at beaches, lots of exploring cute little tourist towns, at least one outing to the wineries on Old Mission Peninsula, and whatever else we could think of that sounded fun.

Body: The pain in my left ankle is not only still there, but it's spread down to my toes and up my calf. It feels like one big charlie horse. When I get home this evening I'm going to try wrapping it in the heating pad for a while and see if that helps. At least nothing else hurts, which is a pleasant surprise after this weekend.

Stress Level: 3

Book Review: I finished The Habitation of the Blessed last night. Wonderful book. 9 out of 10, and the only reason it isn't a perfect score is because you need to have at least a tiny bit of familiarity with the source material to get the most out of it.

Etsy Find: Adorable little dragon earrings!.

Project Follow-up: Busy, fun weekend. Tom & I spent Thanksgiving day with 11th_letter, ioldanach, nounsandverbs, purpura, and the rest of their household and guests. There was way too much amazing food, and lots of top quality hanging out. Friday was a lazy morning, and then a second Thanksgiving dinner (this one with Mom & the kids) in the late afternoon. Saturday I got up way too early for a day off, picked my brother Jon up from Mom's house, and went to NYC. We didn't really do anything particular while we were there, but mostly just wandered around and people watched. I did take him to The Strand for the first time, which was pretty cool. We ended up going home a little earlier than expected because my legs were toast. When I got home Tom and a visiting friend were in the middle of making Chicken Tikka Masala and Samosas from scratch. So yummy. They had also gotten and set up our new couch (actually a futon). Sunday was spent in pretty much a vegetative state, recovering from the entire weekend. Overall, it was a great few days.

Tonight's Project: Moving my craft supplies/books from their current home to a new bookshelf. Hopefully, this one will be able to support the weight. I may also take pictures of some stuff so that I can add things to my etsy shop. I have a few finished projects that have been waiting to go up for a while and I have some supplies I'm never going to get around to using that I need to de-stash.

Randomness: Just as a public service, I'm going to remind people that if you buy me yarn (or any other craft supply), you get first dibs on what I make with it.

I'm going to be more or less AFK all weekend. I'll respond to email that seems urgent, but anything else will probably wait until Sunday evening or Monday morning.

See you all later!