Argh - No Sweatshirt This Year *sigh* and Sochi

This Orangutan in Salt Lake City has accurately predicted the winner
of the Super Bowl since 2006. He chose the Seattle Seahawks helmet
without hesitation and he was correct, one more time! Where's my bookie? 

Well, two teams arrived at Met Stadium to play a game, but only one team actually played and it wasn't mine. I love a tightly contested game where every point is hard-fought. If my Broncos had lost under those conditions, I would have been just fine with it. But they didn't. They rolled over and played dead. Seattle is a great defensive team and they were hungry to win. They played a brilliant game and deserved the win. So congratulations to the Seattle Seahawks - well played. Thank goodness there were some really fun commercials to keep my interest levels up during the game.

I loved the Cheerios commercial. Dad is talking to his daughter and lines up
three Cheerios to demonstrate their little family. He then adds a fourth telling
her that she will soon have a little brother. She then adds a fifth "And a puppy".
Dad caves, of course. It has also made some ripples because it features a
biracial couple. I just loved it because of the loving relationship is portrayed.
Want to see for yourself? Just follow the link. 

I've been working on getting my fics updated on my various archives, having fallen seriously behind on that aspect of my writing. I use archives at Fairie and AO3 for all of my fic, and Many Paths To Tread and Silmarillion Writers Guild for my fics that meet their criteria. Over the past week I updated "A King is Born" and "Aspects of Nerdanel 1 - Fractured Stone" to the archives they meshed with. I'll continue trying to catch up as I begin getting immersed in the beginning of the Olympics at Sochi later this week.

The skating arena is one of the fantastic buildings gathered in Olympic
park for the Sochi Olympics. I look at this and think back on another
winter olympics - Sarajevo. Those buildings are destroyed by war
now. I only hope a similar fate won't be in Sochi's future. 

I love the Olympics, which shouldn't really come as a surprise since you know I love sports, but Sochi has me on edge. I'm not super worried about security. There may be problems, but any event pulling in lots of people these days has the same risk. No, I'm upset about Russia's LGBT laws. The inability of Russia to acknowledge the legitimacy of non-traditional relationships, and criminalize those who refuse to turn their backs on who they truly are disturbs me a great deal.

Many athletes and attendees at the Games will also be
pushing Russia to change its position on GLBT rights. 

I'll be using my Rainbow Sochi avatar for the Olympics - not exclusively, there are still other reasons to use avatars and I don't use any avatar exclusively. This is an opportunity for all of us who care about gender equality and freedom to love without fear can make our personal statement for gay rights.

This pic might be a little heavy for some people, but so are the anti-gay laws
in Russia right now. 

Stepping off my platform now :-) I hope you have a wonderful week ahead of you and wish you a happy Monday.

I'm Dreaming of a Blue and Orange Weekend

OK, so the words "I'm Dreaming of a Blue and Orange Weekend" don't flow quite as neatly as "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas", but white isn't my team's colors and it's Super Bowl on Sunday. My refrigerator is stuffed, DH went grocery shopping yesterday and bought a bunch of stuff. Every corner holds something else wondrous to munch. We'll have chicken dogs, sloppy joes, cheese and crackers, breakfast bowls of eggwhites and sausage, and nachos. I don't think we'll be starving - LOL. Now I only need my Denver Broncos to be victorious!

No matter who wins, it will be a fun game to watch. But...I bleed Blue and Orange,
so I'm cheering for my Denver Broncos.

I'm into the final edit of a story that I've had a lot of fun with, but another one that had started with such promise will need a shift to really get claws into the premise. Fortunately I have some time for the second one, so I can rework it. I hope to get to that on Sunday at some point of time while watching my team play in the big game.

Doc Martin and Louisa. If you haven't watched the show, I recommend it.
We always end up laughing on our Friday nights because we watch the Doc.

DH and I were watching "Doc Martin" last night. It's one of our favorite British import shows because it's so quirky, yet really loving. Last night Martin and his love, Louisa, were supposed to get married and a question came up which got me thinking, because it's very true. In any relationship between two people, the question is not whether they'll make you happy, rather the question is whether you'll make THEM happy. When you can seriously think about that question and answer it in the affirmative, then you have a good shot at making a successful lifelong relationship.

This is a great spread of Superbowl snacks. I see hot dogs and burgers,
wings and dip, and lots of chips and salsa with a cake for dessert. Yummy!

So as I enter into a weekend of overindulgence and football hope, I hope that all of you make others happy over this beginning of February and beginning of the Year of the Horse. If this past week seemed a bit gloomy or emotionally stressed, try to take a few minutes to think about how that can change and improve over the next week. Just work it one step at a time; what is practice can become habit with time and awareness. Happy Broncos Weekend!

Picture Blog of Jewelry and Horoscopes

It's Friday and poor DH spent more than seven hours snow shoveling and pulling snow from the roofs yesterday (we got dumped on with a 4" snowfall from 6:00 until 11:00 am. It was crazy fast snowfall that whipped through here like lightning but left lots of cleanup behind. Because he worked so hard and it's a Friday (and I'm feeling lazy) I'm doing a photo blog today.

I'm bouncing all over with my pics today, but who can resist true
love? This little Tim Burton contribution will remind you that
Valentine's day is fast approaching. 

Happy New Year! Today begins the Year of the Horse, the fifth time in
my life this year has come around. It is my personal year and I'm
delighted, since I adore horses. I hope the Year of the Horse is a
good one for all of my friends. 

I got word this morning that Valeri Tomofeev has died. A Russian-trained jeweler, he
made some of the most exquisite plique-a-jour enamel work I've ever seen.
Take a look at his website and drool. We've lost a real treasure. 

Plique-a-jour is magical and one of my favorite enamel techniques. When
done well, it looks like small pieces of stained glass put together, but
instead of cutting sheet glass to make the item, you are making small metal
cells and filling them with powdered enamel which you then melt under
very high heat. If I am ever able to actually retire, I look forward to being
able to work on my enamel work again. 

And because we are saying good-bye to the Year of the Snake, a lovely
golden snake embellished with precious stones for all of you to enjoy. 

Have a great New Year, and take a larger look at Chinese Astrology here. Curious about your own sign and forecast? You can plug your numbers in here for your personal Chinese horoscope.

Catching Up is Hard To Do

I used to be up-to-date, posting my stories to Fairie and AO3 and my general stuff as soon as they were ready. I actually keep a spreadsheet database to keep me current on what I've posted where. I looked at it yesterday and was appalled. I'm WAY behind on my archive posting. So, for those of you who read my drabbles and longer stories on Tolkien Weekly and LOTR Community Challenge posts, you'll be seeing duplicatees of these posted on Fairie, MPTT, SWG and AO3 over the next few weeks as I bring last year back up to date. Sheesh! I dont usually fall this far behind! Everything got rather wonky when my father-by-marriage passed and my "free time" got overtaken, but this bad??? I apologize.

I know I also promised to get my general fic out there more, so I will take my latest LOTR Community Challenge story, "Return to Moria" and post that to my general journal under a cut. Don't bother reading it again if you already have - unless you want to read a fun story. But I had promised to put my work more 'out there' and this is part of that promise.

Is this Denver's year for another Super Bowl win? Win or lose, I'll be
watching and cheering my team on. I want a new Champions sweatshirt. My
last one is from Superbowl 32. 

On a different note, yesterday saw a lot get done, but not everything on my list. Still, by the end of the day I was pretty happy with what I had accomplished. We have Super Bowl this Sunday (Go Broncos!) and I'll leave the menu up to DH. I'm perfectly content munching my way through the day, but he may want more. I'm broke right now, so additional food expenses are out until next week. It's on him to get what he might want to eat. Seems fair, at any rate :-)

It's going to be hard for the other contenders to beat this commercial
entry. The cowboy and dog is a great commercial. 

Watched "The Best Super Bowl Commercials" special last night. Of course, it's not just the game that I watch for, the commercials are equally entertaining - and sometimes more entertaining - than the game. The ones I miss, I catch up with the next day on-line. There are always some really good ones presented, the best coming from Budwiser Beer, Doritos, and Pepsi & Coca Cola products. Over the past few years, Doritos has been asking amateurs to submit commercials to them for inclusion in their roster. Five excellent finalists were viewed last night, and I have to say I'm torn between the Ostrich and the Cowboy Kid on Dog offerings. Both were really excellent. The others were good too, but it's hard to beat kids and animals.

Now that the teams have been chosen, it's time to get to work!

So as we re-enter another day of snow (sigh), I hope all of you have a truly fabulous Thursday. I'll be happily watching Tim Gunn's "Under the Gunn" tonight to watch him try and teach the mentors how to actually mentor, and continuing to update stories into my archives. Happy, happy...

Day Off Thoughts

It's my day off today and it's a heat wave - instead of -12 F, it's -5 F and it's supposed to actually get above zero today. Whoo hoo! It's hard to comprehend a day above zero these days, which tells me that I'm really meant to be a hermit in the wintertime. But I need to run some errands, and I need groceries, so I'll have to venture out for a while today.

I enjoyed participating in the Snowflake Challenge and got enough
positive feedback that I will try and be brave once more. I may regret
this, but I'm willing to try putting my fiction out in a more open way again.

I promised people in the Snowflake Challenge that I would become braver and put more of my stories out there in my personal journal instead of just in selected community postings as well as post them more often to the archives. That's one of my goals today since I have two completed drabble series that need to be uploaded as well as one story. So I plan to work on that, beta for Iris, and scan some project articles I found as I was throwing away extra copies of some of the magazines the store carries. I might even bring the portable heater down to the computer room and warm it up a bit more. It might be a rollicking -5 F, but it's still darned cold.

The Toho Design Challenge provided the beads you see above. These were
the only beads that could be used in the project. I'm 70% finished with mine, and
I love the way it's turning out, but then life got in the way. 

A bit less than a year ago I accepted a beading challenge project and I got fairly far with it, really enjoying the feel of a needle and thread again. But then my father-by-marriage died and my scheduled free time disappeared. So I have an unfinished project that I had promised to turn in. I've been feeling guilty about that and would like to pick it up again. I'm almost caught up with writing projects (except for my o-fic, of course) so I may try to carve a bit of time out to continue working on this.

I'm looking at about six different text reading software programs. I want
to find one that is versatile and that can run on both Win XP and Win 7.

Speaking of o-fic, a wise friend suggested that I read my book aloud to discover where I feel I started moving away from the original plot path to figure out the best way to get things back into the direction I want. I thought that was a marvelous idea, but really didn't want to sit down and read 100,000+ words aloud. HOWEVER, within a couple of weeks, an author whose blog I follow was talking about the very same thing. She used a computer program that reads the files aloud for you in a variety of voices that you can choose. Now this sounded interesting. I've started doing the research on programs that I think may work best for my application and my type of computer system (she uses Apple, I use a PC) and will choose a software program soon. Then I can begin to listen to my book and see whether it is worthwhile or not, where I might have gone wrong, and what I might be able to do to fix it. Lots of work there, but I feel good about it.

This particular picture is from Manitoba, Canada where their normal temp at
this time of the year is -11 F. I guess -5 F suddenly sounds better to me ...

So, as I bundle up and make plans to be at my computer doing various things for most of the day (along with errands, laundry, and other miscellaneous stuff) I will wish each of you a fabulous Hump Day! Be safe, be warm, be happy!

What Positive Thing Will You Do Today?

So, it's a Tuesday - nothing special about the day. It's in the middle of a workweek. It's not a specific day on the calendar like a holiday, a particular phase of the moon, or the beginning or end of a month. It's just a day filled with ordinary tasks performed by ordinary people who are just trying to make a bit of money and make it through until the next day. That means it's up to you to make it special for these nameless and faceless people. So what will you do that will make an impact and put a smile on someone's face for the day?

Smile and the world smiles with you, weep and your tears fall alone.

Here are a few suggestions.

Pay it forward. Go to your local coffee shop and pay for the next person in line. Buy lunch for a friend or pay toward someone's grocery bill.

Visit a friend. You'll both be happier at the end of the day.

Visit an old friend you haven't seen for a while. Take the person down the hall to his/her doctor appointment. Offer to take the neighbor's dog for a walk in the frigid winter weather. Shovel the walks and put salt down for an older couple down the block.

There's something really fun about playing peek-a-boo with a child or baby. 

Make a child smile by playing peek-a-boo. Tell a joke to a five-year-old. String a necklace with a ten-year-old. Teach a young boy how to stand on his hands.

Push the kids higher. 

Push your kids on the playground swings. Play a board game with them. Take out the crayons and see who can draw the scariest monster. Make some grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch.

Ahhhh...coffee. Fancy or plain, coffee gets me going every day.
Yes, I'm totally addicted, and I really don't mind this one. 

Don't forget yourself either. Let yourself have a fancy coffee today. Have your favorite dinner or lunch. Call an old friend that you haven't spoken with for a while. Break out the art supplies and indulge for an hour. Put on the headphones or ear buds and listen to some marvelous music for a while.

Let a child teach you about the important things in life. 

Make it your goal today to put a smile on someone's face. Happy Tuesday...

Pain - The World is Conspiring Against Us Yet Again...

Pain. There are a lot of different kinds of pain - physical, emotional, even psychological. But once again we are experiencing pain here in Minnesota, the pain of crazy cold temperatures. Yesterday was bad, but not horrid. We had to shovel and pull snow off the roofs, but we had that completed by noon and were able to spend the rest of our day comfortably. However, the wind picked up all day and by the time night came around we were back in the negative numbers.

We'll start the photos with a morning sunrise over snow-filled fields.

Currently we are at -13 F (-25 C) with a wind chill of -39 F (-39.44) and we'll be in the deep freeze today and tomorrow. Wednesday will actually be decent and then we'll start our next decent into the cold. Usually I don't have too much problem getting to and from work, but I have my chiropractic appointment this morning and that requires quite a drive out. I'm worried about black ice on my freeway ride to and from his office.

Do you remember the ice house from Doctor Zhivago? I was always
amazed by the extreme winter they had, but here I am, living in a
similar climate.

Black ice is the exhaust of the cars freezing onto the roads as the traffic moves on. It gets really bad at intersections and over bridges and on freeway ramps, but it can cause problems all around. My car is super excellent on ice, so I'm not really too worried about her, but my DH's car is not as good and he has the same trip to make for his own 8:00 am appointment later today. We'll just have to be careful

Fields of snow always look so peaceful. Days like this are perfect to
curl up with a cup of tea or coffee and a good book.

I'm hoping that Dr Pat will be able to help with a very sore shoulder after yesterday's show shoveling. I'm in a bit of pain this morning and pain is no fun. Winter can be a beautiful season, but this winter has been vicious so far. I think I need to remind myself about how stunning winter days can be, so I'm going to do photos of beautiful winter days for today's pics.

Let's end this with a beautiful winter sunset.

Happy Monday to all.