Is tired because she... [startover]

Fell behind in Notcottery...shameful.

Wants to be [insert endless list] when she grows up.

Tries to find patterns where they may not be?

Wants to be productive while she sleeps.

Is always amazed at where she is.

Loves the trouser theme.

Is amazed it's not a recipe... are you?

Visualizes most of what she thinks of...and wishes she could record it.

Can't help but rearrange the living room. Fitting right angles in a right-angled-pentagon is odd.

Would sleep in the hammock if two didn't roll. Besides, the tempurpedic is heaven.

Is optimistic because...she will be.

Laughs [with or without:] at jokes. Ok...laughs.

Can do anything {I, she} want(s) to do.

Is a design junkie (when she has time)...time?

Is forever a student.

Is happy.

I'm in love with outdoor kitchens. And this month's edition of Garden Design is full of outdoor entertaining info. I wish it were a 300 page edition...I'd read it all. I'd love to have a full outdoor kitchen, dining room table, and a big outdoor fireplace to relax around. Ahhhhhhhh... Check out Lynx Professional Grills and Kalamazoo Outdoor Gourmet.

I wish I had an entire week of todays. It was gorgeous. My outdoor adventure began with a little veggie garden brainstorming. Then I rearranged the deck furniture, moved the grill off the side patio to a corner of the deck, bagged some leaves, mowed and mulched both parts of the back yard, cleaned out my iris' and green onions, cut back what-I-think-is-a-blackberry plant, filled the outside ring of the firepit with a mix of lava rock and pea gravel, and started to replace the two front yard landscape light transformers with one 300w transformer. I need to run two new uplights and the last 18 tiered lights. I think I finally decided where to build my veggie garden. Right off the side patio is a small section of yard that gets a good amount of morning and afternoon sun. I'm thinking a 6' x 4' raised bed built out of bricks that match the existing landscape bricks. Jalapenos, cayennes, and habaneros -- yes. Onions, garlic, herbs -- yes. I'd really like to grow some tomatoes, but I've had absolutely no luck with them. Hopefully our neighbor will leave plenty of fresh tomatoes on our doorstep this year. Yums! I just hope we have more beautiful weather over the next couple of weekends to build my garden. I've been in serious slacker mode with growing edibles for the last couple of years. It's time to get back to work...or play in my case.

What does it all mean to me? I have no fscking clue and I have no time or desire to read about it right now. Business Intelligence, Project v Program v Portfolio Management, Application Lifecycle Management (ok, I know what that is), Six Sigma, ITIL, COBIT, TOGAF, SEMBA, ETC, ESC, BSC, wat?. It's all up there where I'm not looking. I was momentarily distracted (yes, multiple times) by a stack of post-its in the corner of the room. Omg other than the fluorescent pink, orange, blue, and yellow, there was a dark green! Oh man I kept telling myself, "once this is over, I have to go check it out. I bet you'd have to use the opaque pens for those...hmmmmmm..." It's a red room...a very red room. And the projector screen isn't centered with the ceiling tiles!!! It's so distracting. Do all these people seriously understand this stuff!? Post-its. What time is it? Oh hell no I'm not going to the happy hour. I can drink at home...which is precisely what I asked for when I walked in the door. Give me a stout drink, bish! Ok, maybe not like that, but I did get one. 14 projects and I can't get anything done. Turn it off. Your home. Zzzzzzzzz...

Sleeping in sheets made from Beechwood is absofrigginlutely amazing. Screw cotton! Maybe that's why I don't want to get out of bed in the morning.

I went to the post office yesterday. I seriously don't remember the last time I did. I saw something that made me smile and laugh even after I drove away. A couple in front of me had an arm-load of envelopes. While the man was addressing certified label after certified label, the woman was decorating one of her packages...she made a big bow out of folded priority mail labels. Oh it was absolute awesomeness. I actually thought to myself, "high-five, silly lady!" What made me laugh was the look on the postman's face. He had that kind of shame-on-you look that usually goes with a slow head shake. I'm not sure if the woman noticed as she kept looking at her creation, repositioning it on the scale, and smiling contently. Thinking about it makes me laugh all over again. I keep laughing, which I'm sure has something to do with the wine in my glass. Omg my glass is empty!!!

How about another random thought while I wait to fill my glass. Friday afternoon after I got home from work, I made a bee line to the hammock. I love that thing. I'm sure I was seconds from passing out when the neighbors put the parrots out in the backyard. No squawking...just a ton of loud clicking from their chew toys. Enough clicking to keep me awake. Darn parrots. But I'm sure they were enjoying the weather as much as I was.

One more glass before bed. It's red. I usually don't drink red wine but I'm making myself try something new. One glass and I felt more of a buzz than both my cranberry-peach vodkas from last night. Two and I have the giggles. Three? Tee hee hee I'm feelin goooood and taking forever to finish this. Gonna quit while I'm still thinking about it.

"Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined."
-- Henry David Thoreau

"Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked, in which you can walk with love and reverence."
-- Henry David Thoreau

When I was a wee little girl, I wanted to be a cheerleader, a teacher, a veterinarian. When I was a teenager, I wanted to be a marine biologist and a couple other things I've since forgot. I think I've always wanted to be a forest ranger. I wanted to live in the woods. I wanted to live where it snowed. I wanted a house to work on. I want to live some place where the moon and stars light up the night. I want to hear the breeze in the pines, smell the earth, hear and see the wildlife, feel the warmth of the sun and the cool of the shade. I want to get lost in the beauty of nature. I want to give back. I want to make a difference, regardless of how small it may seem. ...and I want others to do the same.

Boston.com's 2008 year in pictures part 1, part 2, and part 3. A good portion of these pictures are incomprehensible to me. I don't understand the hardships people go through as day-to-day life and I don't think I ever truly will. To be as disconnected as I am from world events is entirely too easy. I know that I consciously and unconsciously choose ignorance by not reading or listening to current news or reading about history as much as I should. I have the desire to learn...I just don't seem to take advantage of it very often in some areas.

"Going to the woods is going home, for I suppose we came from the woods originally." -- John Muir
(read it)

"In the wilderness, I find something more dear and connate than in the streets or villages. ... In the woods, we return to reason and faith." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson
(read it)

"I would not have every man, nor every part of a man, cultivated any more than I would have every acre of earth cultivated." -- Henry David Thoreau
(read it)

"Our lives need the relief of such a background, where the pine flourishes and the jay still screams." -- Henry David Thoreau
(read it)

I want a digital SLR...And I'd actually like to take some photography classes to go with it. Would be nice if they counted towards my art degree. Hmmmmmmm... "Someday I'll finish," she says. But four hour night classes twice a week are not in my immediate future. I've thought many times about enrolling and actually finishing the degree. The studio classes would be amazing and cathartic and I'd actually feel the creative bug again. That would mean heading to class directly after work and getting home just in time to go to bed. How did I used to manage it? I don't think I ever questioned it then. I was glad to be done with high school and absolutely excited to be in college studying what I love. Now I know why people always said finish it now else you never will. It's all a matter of perspective, I guess.

Untouched sketch pads...blank canvases...dull pencils...full tubes of paint... and an out-of-focus inspiration barely the color of an old, faded, washed out dish cloth. "You need to find it," Mr. Brinks would say. Where did the reds, yellows, and blues go? There there. I see them every now and then. I'll find it as soon as I really look.

"Spring 2008," they say. The possibility of getting a new TDI is just around the corner. Platinum grey, please?

Getting my current TDI chip UPsolute-tuned through Kraut-Burner tomorrow. Yay. I'm very excited.

According to UPsolute: