Strategic Serendipity

Resolve

strategicserendipity — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 14:37:34 +0000

I’m not usually one to make New Year’s Resolutions because I feel that if a
change is worthwhile, it’s worth doing immediately rather than waiting for
it. But this year, I am making a few because I think it’ll work well for me
to do so. Overall, most of them will be knitting related. Ultimately, they
can all be reduced down to one key component, though: Follow Through.

I’m horrible with following through with plans or ideas. It’s okay to love
the idea stage and the planning stage, but I feel horrible when I don’t
follow through on some things. To avoid that sinking feeling, I just need
to learn to follow through, not even ALL the time (I have too many ideas for
that), but just most of the time, or even some of the time.

I made a 101 Things to do in 1,001 Days list awhile ago and I’ve made quite
a bit of progress on it just because I want to do the things I listed and
made everything mostly reasonable and achievable. I want to continue
working on those things, but I’ve also got a few to add in the same vein.
And again, if I just Follow Through, they’ll all be easy as pie!

1. Keep the kitchen clean. I’m not going to worry about any other part of
the house, just the kitchen. If the kitchen’s clean, I feel like a lot of
the rest of the house will be easier to maintain as well. My priority is
going to be a clean kitchen for several reasons: it’s easier to bake and
cook in a clean kitchen; it’ll bestow a sense of calm on the household if
the kitchen is not cluttered and does not resemble a disaster area; and
hopefully if the kitchen is clean, others will be better at rinsing their
dishes before setting them in (or near) the sink. Win/win!

2. Keep up with blogging, podcasting, flickring, ravelrying and etsying!
This is going to require more time at my computer at home than I currently
spend (which means cleaning up my computer area so it’s easy to use in short
bursts). But I just need 20 – 30 minutes a day (or every other day), and
that shouldn’t be difficult to maneuver.

3. Plan ahead for birthday and holiday gift knitting. (This is on my 101
Things to do in 1,001 Days list, but it’s worth reiterating.) I’ve already
got some ideas and have started thinking ahead. Just have to Follow Through!

4. Get Healthy! This is clearly something that requires Follow Through instead of just going along as I have in the past. I’m making it happen this year, though. Woo!

Remember Remember

strategicserendipity — Sat, 06 Nov 2010 20:52:37 +0000

I love V for Vendetta, both the graphic novel and the movie. But, I’m partial to storytelling that takes place in a dystopian future, so really, how could I *not* like it? (I have no personal opinions about Guy Fawkes either way, though.)

Three years ago, though, remembering the fifth of November took on a whole new meaning for me when my Grandmother passed away in the wee morning hours. She was young, only 68, but had been diagnosed with lymphoma nine months before.

There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t miss her, of course. Honestly, I try not to remember the anniversary of her passing, because that’s not what’s important. All the days before, when she lived (and I would say to the fullest), is what matters.

It’s just harder when there’s an English nursery rhyme imploring me to remember remember the fifth of November. I don’t need the rhyme, though, because she shall never be forgot.

Great Scott!

strategicserendipity — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 17:14:52 +0000

I was born in 1982, so while I was technically a child of the 80s, most of the pop culture from that decade did not find its way into my sphere until the turn of the century when retro nostalgia kicked in. Sure, I had a few Hypercolor shirts, a pair of low-top canvas shoes that I decorated with puffy paint and every now and then wore a side ponytail. But I didn’t play Pac-Man and we didn’t get a Nintendo until the very late 80s. I watched Jem, but not Transformers or Thundercats often. Maybe that’s how it always is? You don’t realize the culture you’re a part of until 20 years later when it becomes hip again.

I definitely missed out on a lot of movies from the 1980s. My family wasn’t big on movies, not that we didn’t watch them every now and then, but we certainly watched more TV shows than movies. (Except for horror movies. We watched those a lot, even if Halloween was not looming around the corner.) In particular, I had never seen one of the classics from the 80s, Back to the Future.

I played (and beat!) the Nintendo game based on the Parts II and III of the movies and still vividly remember trying to unscramble the names for the objects and make sure I correctly identified each from my inventory.

But I had never seen the movie.

Until this past Monday. AMC Theaters ran two special showings of the original movie and my boyfriend and I went and saw the screening on 10/25. I was surprised at how well the movie stood up to 25 years of new movie innovations and technologies. The opening sequence, which in many older movies is tedious and lame, was fun and interesting. The plot was good and the characters were believe-able. It was a great movie, and I can see why it has become a tried and true classic from the 80s.

Next up, of course, we’ll watch Parts II and III and I’m looking forward to it.

A New Chapter

strategicserendipity — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 18:54:03 +0000

I like to write. I’ve started and abandoned a dozen (or more) different blogs over the past 10 years and have decided that one should be enough. That it will be okay to mix ideas within the blog and that it doesn’t have to be all about one thing or another.

I will post podcast show notes (when I record and post podcasts) and have various updates about the etsy shop (when those are made), but otherwise, I would like to use this as a regular old blog. No specific niche or solely about one thing. Just a smattering assortment of thoughts.

I love audiobooks. They rock my world. I love books and sometimes nothing can replace the feeling you get while turning the page of a new (or used) book. But audiobooks lend themselves to many situations regular books do not. My commute each morning and evening (which amounts to 1.5 hours a day), doing the dishes and other domestic chores, knitting and crafting. I feel like I can make the most out of my day when I listen to an audiobook while driving or cleaning. I’ve got a subscription at audible.com and while we’ve recently cut back on frivolous expenses, that is something I won’t give up. An audiobook, especially a long one which can run 40 hours, for $15 is most certainly a better value than a movie ticket, which will only last 2 hours if you’re lucky. Listening to an audiobook on my way home from work helps me decompress far better than just listening to the radio where my mind will wander and stay at work, even though I clocked out half an hour ago.

At the end of July I started listening to The Dark Tower series by Stephen King. I had listened to books 1 – 4 and most of 5 previously, but I had only read the regular hardback book of books 6 and 7. I was excited to relive Roland’s adventures and listened to the books pretty diligently for the next several weeks. I listened to one book in between, but it was only 7 hours, so it flew by. The Dark Tower series as a whole amounted to 132 hours and 45 minutes of aural amazement. I finished the series this past Sunday, 10/17. I loved every single second of it.

I started another audiobook an hour or so after I had finished The Dark Tower series. (I was at work doing a data entry project and listening to audiobooks makes those go by much quicker – it helps me maintain my focus.) I decided on Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See. I had previously listened to Shanghai Girls by the same author and loved it. I thought I’d love Snow Flower and the Secret Fan just as much.

And I did, sort of. It was a great story and well-told. It starts out with an old Chinese woman setting out her memoirs before she passes on. She was born in the late 1800s and talks about her life in her milk days and daughter days and her hairpinning days and so on and so forth. She becomes “old sames” with a girl in a neighboring village which improves the narrator’s life as it gives her more status. Of course, so did her golden lilies, which is the euphemism used to refer to bound feet.

I’ve heard of Chinese foot-binding before and have always been appalled by it. Shanghai Girls talks about it a little bit, but from a distance because the main characters themselves do not have bound feet, but their mother does. Hearing it talked about from the perspective of someone who had her feet bound and 20 years later bound her own daughter’s feet was mind-boggling. The social norms were so different and everyone felt powerless to do anything about them. The traditions they had made up the order by which these people lived, regardless of how it made them feel or if they wanted to follow them. I know all countries have horrible traditions that frequently people hate following but do anyway. Having grown up in a relatively free-thinking society, though, the book has left an impression on me that I cannot shake.

Not only the images of the foot-binding where toes and arch bones break under the weight of a 7-year-old girl and the ideal bound foot will be only 7 cm (I suggest getting out your ruler and comparing this with your own foot) from the heel to the tip of the big toe, but the feelings of worthlessness espoused by the narrator because she was a woman. That her only worth would ever come from giving birth to sons. After 11 hours listening to this story where women are devalued, beaten and maimed as a general rule it left me in a bizarre headspace I’m still trying to break free from. If it was all horrible images, it might not have affected me so much. But there were beautiful images too. The narrator and her old same embroidering shoes for their soon-to-be husbands, making clothes for themselves and writing in delicate, secretive strokes of Nushu on their secret fan.

It was a good book, but I think it might have been easier for me post-ending if I had read it instead of listening to it. If you ever want to feel grateful for your feet, I wholeheartedly recommend this book.

Cleaning Pennies

strategicserendipity — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 21:45:08 +0000

In Episode 1, I discussed cleaning pennies with a technique I discovered through Penny Collector.

Unfortunately I didn’t think to take pictures when I started so you could see how tarnished the pennies were to begin with, but here are the pictures I did take.

After coating the pennies with ketchup, I let them sit for awhile. Several hours, in fact because we went to breakfast and did some shopping before I rinsed them off. I was really impressed with how clean the pennies were after rinsing the ketchup off. I was disappointed to see that the ketchup had tarnished the elongated pennies I had, though. These were post-1982 pennies, and they obviously didn’t work the same.

The pennies were fairly dull after just the ketchup, but Penny Collector had a solution for that as well: use a baking soda and water paste. I made the paste and prepared to use it on the pennies.

I rubbed the paste on (and it should be a thick paste as suggested by the site – the grit helps make it shine, I think) and didn’t notice anything at first. After rinsing the pennies, though, it was clearly a big difference. Since it worked so well, I decided to try out the baking soda paste on the now tarnished elongated post-1982 coins.

Much to my relief, it worked like a charm!

If I didn’t know any better, I would never guess that these pennies were minted in 1982 or earlier. I can’t wait to get them pressed!

On Your Mark, Get Set… Go!

strategicserendipity — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 16:14:05 +0000

Thank you for listening to my first ever podcast! Here are the show notes.

Introduction:
Craftgrrl on Livejournal
Craftster.org

I’ve been working on:

Socks for Kyle (Ravelry link)

Shrug for me, from Interweave Knits (Summer 2005)

80s Outfit
Wedding flags (No pictures or links for now since these are still a surprise for the bride)

I’m looking forward to:
Making Roman Blinds for the house
Pressing pennies in Memphis
80s prom party
April Weddings

Neat things to explore:
Pressing pennies

Awesome Media:
Alice in Wonderland
LOST
The Official LOST Audio and Video Podcasts
My Life in France by Julia Child

Other mentions:
Knit Misadventures, Episode 28 “I put ketchup on my knitting needles”

Please feel free to leave any feedback here on the blog or get in touch through any of these ways:
Email
Strerendipity on Twitter
Langwidere on Ravelry
Langwidere on Flickr

Once again, thank you very much for listening!