The Greatest Time of Year

Well, the site has been made over for Christmas! I have time to do that now, since my novel is officially complete! That's right! 50,000 words in only 29 days this time! But I've got to move on to other goals before I get a sunburn basking in this triumph.

Lately, I've been volunteering at Rescue Ranch, a rehabilitation/adoption center for abused horses, in tune with goals #5 and #11. That means dodging the hooves of angry stallions and mucking out empty stalls while I jam out to the country station. Seems like a lot of work for only one volunteer hour a week. But I'll get my 125 hours one way or another.

I've also finally gotten a job, although I don't think it really counts for goal #2. I landed a gig babysitting for two grammar school cheerleaders and their six-year-old little sister. I can't really tell you if that's better or worse than volunteering at the horse shelter, but I do know that it at least pays. Goal #3, here we come...

And with Christmas cheer in the air, I'm getting ready to tackle several goals during the holiday season. I plan on volunteering at the retirement home over Christmas break (#4) and baking some holiday treats for my family and friends (#10 & 15). It's also the time of year for hot chocolate at the barn (#16) and stocking stuffers for my equine friends (#17). And as the presents and Christmas cards go out, I should be able to manage Goal #59 and at least some of Goal #18. Plus, all those presents need bows! (#76) It's also the time of year for spontaneous kindness, and I figure over the two week break that I get from school, I can fit in some Random Acts of Kindness (#83) and inspirational post-it notes (#88) and maybe even some more free rice (#95).

Now, I doubt I'll get to all of these in the 20 days left in the Christmas season or even the week or so that I have off following it, but if I at least get to half of them, I'm in pretty good shape for the New Year. And from there, who knows?

NaNoWriMo Ate My Soul

It's official. I now automatically check my word count on anything I'm writing every fifteen minutes. Like clockwork. Even on school essays.

I don't think I can last much longer. My novel, The Duct Tape Conspiracy, has no plot, and I have ten days to write 25,000 more words. FML. But at least my novel is amusing...

"This waiting game, she didn't like it. What was she supposed to do? Twiddle her thumbs and pretend that nothing had happened? But she had just pulled off the greatest heist in duct tape history! Someone, somewhere out to be talking out it.

Caden let out a frustrated huff. 'I need muffins.'"

"I'm so glad that you're singing softly to yourself. It really makes my ears bleed."

"I dressed up as Mayor Ray Nagin and gave a speech promoting the reinstitution of slavery."

"They're called the TIE DYE Police. ...They're way scarier than they sound, I swear."

"I'm not inviting y'all over anymore if Mr. Glitter keeps ending up in the freezer."

Only Americans would think to feed the world via internet

I decided to devote this morning to Goal #95 Donate 100,000 grains of rice to freerice.com. With a little less than 4,000 grains donated since the beginning of the 1,001 days, I'm sorely behind. But there's still time to complete this goal, and learn somethings while I'm at it.

Let's see what I've picked up today...

1,170 grains of rice

And I learned a something--how awesome of a word is tomfoolery! I think I'll have to incorporate that into my NaNo novel.

And I think that it's the first time I've felt alive

"When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return."

If I could have it my way, I'd never leave the back of a horse. There's something about the way they move that's indescribable. But it's sensational. It's almost like flying; it sets your soul free.

I love it when I'm jumping my horse and we're soaring through the air and dancing around the turns. The first time you fly over a fence of any decent height, you'll understand. It's empowering. Suddenly, the ground is no limitation to you. All you have is sky, and adrenaline, and this strange sense of peace. The only boundaries you have left to break is how high and how fast you can go.

And today, when I rode, I pushed these boundaries even further.

I didn't think I'd ever gallop until I moved out of the city. Arenas stuck in the middle of suburbia aren't made for galloping. Besides, everyone here is so hunter-focused that speed like that is rarely called for. But jumper lessons are my time to fly, and today, I was finally able to hand-gallop.

My horse is a jumper at heart. I never thought I'd have to kick him at the canter. But one swift kick and we're changing gears, charging forward like a mighty Crusader. Faster, faster; higher, higher. The jumps are raised, and we're rocketing over them, fences that look like mountains to this wide-eyed hunter. The usual 2'3" morphs into 2'6" and glides into 2'9" and suddenly I'm jumping more than half my height, leaping over oxers and through bounces like a ballerina from The Nutcracker. It was graceful and exhilarating all at once.

Sure, I'll soon be back to my hunter turns and pristine posture, but for just that one hour, I was able to melt away my old reality and create a new one: one who flies without wings, and leaps without fear.

So long, Goal #65. It's been a blast.

Aaaand we're back!

Phew. My computer's been struggling with a virus for the past week, but it seems to be pretty much over it now. Thank goodness.

There's been some progress on a few goals, namely:
#7 Volunteer Hours - Worked a school fair (the stuffed animal booth) and dealt with whiny children for three hours and plastered on a smile for my school's open house for five hours, bumping me up to 85 volunteer hours. Only 40 more hours to go... Good Lord.

#11 Cook with something purchased at the Farmer's Market - I made an incredibly delicious caprese salad with freshly picked tomatoes. Delicious. You have to try it.

#13 Bake a tie-dye cake - I didn't realize this was actually a goal in and of itself when I blogged about this a few weeks ago. Turns out, I crossed off a goal.

And, as there are 15 (I think) days until November, I'm focusing solely on NaNoWriMo now.
Novel: The Duct-Tape Conspiracy
Genre: Adventure/Comedy
Characters: 1 (and counting)
Words: 0
Cups of Coffee Drank: 0
Nervous Breakdowns: 0

Let Your Imagination Rain

To me, October is nothing more than a head start into November. And November is the one month of the year when I am truly free to be myself. November, to me, does not mean the New Moon premier, Thanksgiving, or my sister's birthday (sorry, girl!). November means one thing and one thing only: NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month.

I discovered NaNo a few years ago, and the idea of a month dedicated to writing a novel piqued my interest. I was one of those people who always said, "One day, I will write a book". But I'd never finished any short story, let alone a 50,000 word novella. I was also put off by the "No plot? No problem!" slogan adopted by NaNoWriMo. I thought, What's the point of writing a novel with no plot? The things I had read about NaNo were fairly misleading.

But NaNoWriMo is not some structureless "churn out 50,000 random words" kind of thing. It is very much an event where you will get out of it as much as you put in. November 2008 (yes, last year) was my first time participating in National Novel Writing Month. November 2008 was also the start of the biggest journey of my life.

I put my heart and soul into November last year, and The Circular Path, my complete, coherent, first-ever novel, is the least that I got out of it. I went from an insecure, over-critical, dubious girl with one scene in my head to strong, passionate dreamer who has tapped into a well of creativity. NaNoWriMo taught me who I was, not just as a writer, but as a human being. Through NaNo, I discovered the essence of me: the core of my fears, the heart of my longings, the source of my passions. I began to see the person that I was, the person that I am, and the person that I want to be.

That journey- the journey of disovering me- is far from over. In fact, it's going to restart again, more vigorous than ever, in just 27 days. Just being on the NaNoWriMo homepage fills me with a sense of peace, of pride, of invincibility. It fills me with the sense of being me.

All hail the thirty days and thirty nights of literary abandon.

Blend Up That Rainbow Above You, And Shoot It Through Your Veins

So in my quest for new recipes, I stumbled across a recipe for "Rainbow Cake". Or "Tie Dye Cake". It can go either way. I've tried this recipe out twice now, once for cake and once for cupcakes. The cake was more tie-dyed, but the cupcakes were definitely rainbow. I guess it just depends on how you pour the batter.


The recipe's really simply, but it makes really fun, impressive cakes. And it's definitely a guaranteed way to brighten up someone's day.

This speaks for itself.

And we sing, sing, sing

It was the simply amazing abstract cover art that first drew me to the Silversun Pickups' newest album, Swoon.

I was lost in the mountains of music that make up Barnes & Noble's audio section, listening to CDs at random. A little bit of celtic here, some showtunes there. I even stumbled upon Disney's Wall-E soundtrack. But nothing caught my interest quite like Swoon.

I've never seen a more perfectly named CD. It was love at first listen: they had me hooked at "There's No Secrets This Year". Each audio clip, from "The Royal We" to "Surrounded (Or Spiraling)", was stunning. The music, the lyrics, the vocals-- triumphant!

To paraphrase the band themselves, this album is enough to make you sing, fight, and even cry.

French Phrase of the Week #3

C'est juste un ami.

He's just a friend.