I know it's been a long time since I posted, and part of that was the Christmas wind-down, but not long after that, Eleanor the laptop actually crashed on me and had to spend some time in repair. The brightside is that $200 later, it's in fine working order, I didn't have to reinstall a single thing, and I actually have a bigger hard drive than what I started with! I also immediately went and uploaded my writing to two independent file storage sites so I can access my writing even without Eleanor.

Christmas was pretty awesome - I got cash from the grandparents, as usual, but I also got an iPod case from Shannon and Season 2 of Castle on DVD from Lauren. My parents, however, went on eBay and got me a vintage 2nd edition copy of a Little Golden Book my mom used to read to us when we were kids. Since I collect antique books, this was actually an awesome gift. Now all I need to find is the 1980s reprint, since that was the one we actually owned, and I'll have the Katie the Kitten exacta. (How weird does that sound?) Considering that Katie the Kitten isn't in print anymore, this would be awesome.

Speaking of Christmas, even though I said I was almost Christmas-ed out, I managed to paint six ornaments for a pastor friend, who just adopted a little girl. I made one personalized ornament for each member of the family, and on the bottom, where I signed and dated them, I included a heart (since I always sign stuff with a heart) and numbered each in their birth order. They turned out so adorable - I'm so proud of them, and so far I know Joel is jazzed. Then I painted an ornament for a member of the MST3K discussion board I'm on, and he offered to trade me three episode DVDs for it. Last year was my first artistic commission, and this was the first time I've ever been compensated for one of my ornaments. I'm kind of excited about that.

New Year's was cool - I got invited to go to the church's singles event, which was my first singles anything. I'd heard rumors that the group was mostly re-single people, and as a 26-year-old I kind of would rather hang out with people my age than 40-something divorcees. But the improv troupe they brought in was kind of cool, and the stand-ups (Christian stand-ups with real LA credentials!) were hilarious. Then we rang in 2011 with noisemakers and the Cha-Cha Slide. That was interesting... Everybody was nice, and there seemed to be some people my age there - I think I'll keep going and see what happens. I mean, if I can't get a job, maybe I can get a boyfriend, right? :P

In royalty news, the Crown Princess of Denmark had her twins on Saturday - one boy and one girl. In Denmark, nobody knows a child's name until the mother speaks it at the christening, which isn't for about three months. So being an onomastic (one who likes names and what they mean) I get to play the guessing game until about March/April. Until then, some people are calling them Elvis and Shirley, after a joke Crown Prince Frederik made about naming the boy Elvis (since the twins share a birthday with Elvis Presley), and Shirley Bassey, another singer with a January 8th birthday, but I'm calling them Lilleprinsen ("Little Prince") and Lillepigen ("Little Girl"), after the nicknames the Danish press gave their older siblings Prince Christian and Princess Isabella. Regardless, it's a far sight happier news than what really covered the airwaves over the weekend. Also, I found a Swarovski crystal ring that resembles a certain famous British royal engagement ring at the mall and splurged on it for myself. It was only $25, so that's not too bad, and it has two more "diamonds" around the edge than Catherine's, so there. I love wearing it. It's so sparkly.

Finally, I am including a meme I snagged from apple_pathways , which means you finally get to hear my voice!

( Here's the meme: )

Mood bored Music Always Something There to Remind Me - Naked Eyes Tags: books, christmas, getting artsy, holidays, laptop, memes, mst3k, princess things/royal watching, update

My sisters love the movie Despicable Me. I haven't seen it, though I do like what bits of it I have seen. When I first heard the plot - Steve Carell's character wants to steal the moon - I joked that Carmen Sandiego had done it first (though now I can't remember if she ever actually accomplished it. I know she got thwarted in the cartoon, but maybe her henchmen succeeded in the computer game and/or game show). Now that I've seen parts of it (sisters were watching it while I ran around and had stuff to do), I totally have a backstory in my head that the whole moon-stealing plot was spearheaded by a mysterious woman in a red coat and fedora, and Gru is really Steve Carell's character's first name, and his last name is Some. (All Carmen Sandiego henchmen have to have criminally bad puns as names. It's one of the fundamental, immutable laws of the entire Carmen universe. Like gravity. Some of the ACME staff have bad puns as names, too, but I didn't play those games growing up.) This mysterious woman doesn't mind that Gru has adopted three orphans - she was once an orphan, too - but she still expects Gru to give 110% to the organization. Next stop, the Great Wall of China. (Oh, and Dr. Nefario only goes by his last initial - S.)

Now that I hear there are plans for a Despicable Me sequel, I would actually see that movie in theaters if they were to write this mysterious woman into the script/evil syndicate infrastructure. I just need to figure out who to address the letters to.

***
Christmas is fast approaching, and I'm nearing the finish line of the Advent-ivity Calendar. Tomorrow should be simple - I've got four hours of temping to do, and then all I have to do is film tomorrow's video. I still have one more gift to make, and another to buy (unless Mom & Dad are buying it, and it's from the whole family), but now that I've made one bracelet, making another shouldn't be too difficult - plus I don't need to gift those until Christmas Eve. I'm hoping to film Christmas Eve and Day's videos at the same time, and then I'll be done. This has been the Martha Stewart-est Christmas I have ever attempted, and while it's been fun, it's driving me up the wall. I'm seriously debating whether to do another 25 activities next year, or try something different. It might depend on what the work situation is like.

At any rate, now I really get why people are frazzled at Christmas. Today I had plans to get stuff done, and then I found out we were meeting my dad's parents tonight for Christmas dinner at Applebee's - and I still had to make Nana's gift! So I struggled with the aforementioned bracelet for at least an hour. Jewelry wire can be finicky. And in the end it was gorgeous, but really long. It fell right off my hand, and Nana could just get her hand through. So I ended up taking the bracelet back home, and I'll remake it after Christmas... Don't get me wrong, I love Christmas. I wouldn't put in this much effort if I didn't. But at this point, this is my favorite Christmas song.

Mood worn out Tags: advent-ivity, christmas, randomness is next to godliness, whatever i'm a temp, yes i'm a youtube addict

Ugh.

I don't think I've talked much about it here, but I've got myself a new project: an advent calendar podcast. Similar to Grant's Advent Calendar, but different in that I've got all sorts of activities planned for the 25 days until Christmas. Today was supposed to be putting up decorations. Except once I found my decorations and got them up (and my room cleaned, seeing as the entire internet was going to see my room), the night slipped away and it was almost midnight - my sort-of unofficial posting deadline. And while I'm filming my post, my camera battery dies. I quickly ran over to grab my iPod touch, hoping to use that camera instead. Except I forgot that it, too, died today. I ended up using my cell phone to take still shots instead.

And then I remembered that I still had laundry in the washer.

So it's drying now, and I have to wait for it, because if I let it sit overnight, all my nice work clothes will get horribly wrinkled. Not that it really matters, because tomorrow's Casual Friday and my last day at Temp Job, but still. And after going to bed at midnight since September, I'm crashing hard at 1:30 am when I used to be able to stay up until 3 or 4 in the morning.

So I'm going to go check on my laundry, and please go take a look at my advent-ivity calendar and make all my trouble tonight worthwhile. :)

The room does look nice, though, and I got to watch MST3K ("Santa Claus") while I decorated and cleaned.

And my laundry's done, so I am so going to bed.

Mood exhausted Tags: advent-ivity, argh, christmas, shameless promotion

Everybody says you can't, right?

So why is it that Christmas can be at the same time "too religious" and "too commercialized to the point of complete disassociation from its religious roots?"

Temp job is having a Christmas holiday party next month, and I was asked to make the box for the employees to drop their RSVPs into. So I did. I wrapped it up and put a big sign on it that said "RSVP to the Christmas Party," because I was asked to make a sign for the Christmas party. I didn't question. I just made it.

Today I find out that - after a week of it being on display for the whole office to see - someone complained about the fact that I wrote "Christmas" instead of "holiday." So I was told that we "couldn't be religious" and asked (at least it was done nicely) to redo the sign (I also ended up ripping the tissue paper the box was wrapped in - grrr), and now it's finally sanitized for mass consumption.

So Christmas is too Christian, and we need to avoid using it. But people of all walks (I've heard this even from atheists) complain that Christmas is so focused on commercial crap that it's gotten away from its Christian/pagan/ancient-break-up-the-mid-winter-monotony roots. So what's the average person to do? I'm not even thinking about religious observances here, just general parties and gift/card exchanges. (Speaking of which, I'm getting on the bandwagon on that, but that doesn't belong in a rant.)

So, I know it's not even Thanksgiving yet, but in the spirit of kind brotherhood and platonic internet-friendship - and more than a little bit of rebellion - even if you look at December 25th as just another Saturday, Merry Christmas.

This message is not endorsed by the employees of Insert Robyn's Current Temp Job Here, or anybody else, really, probably even all the way up the United States Government, to be completely honest (did you see Obama's Christmas tree last year?), but I hope there are some people that agree with me.

(Also on the topic of Christmas, I get to see Trans-Siberian Orchestra on Saturday! It shall be amazing.)

Mood cynical Tags: argh, christmas, seriously?!?, whatever i'm a temp

During my first Christmas on LJ, I posted about 10 things that made my Christmases awesome, and one was Grant's Advent Calendar Podcast. Well, this year, I was inspired by that to make my own advent calendar podcast. Except I didn't want to stock the thing myself, and I couldn't trust my sisters to do it, because they are apathetic like that. So I had the idea to make an advent calendar podcast full of holiday stories, recipes, and craft projects that are all family friendly and awesome.

And thus, Robyn's Advent-ivity Calendar was born.

(Yeah, because advent + activity = advent-ivity... again, so much for not thinking about Christmas until after Thanksgiving. But crafters always have to think ahead to give themselves time to make their stuff, and it's the same with podcasts.)

Here's the teaser, which I just put online today:

Mood sleepy Tags: christmas, getting artsy, shameless promotion

It's an innocuous enough question on its own, right?

What about when the person asking the question is your mom?

Mom, I love you, but you know that I don't have money to spend on gifts. You know what I was planning on doing instead: good old-fashioned manual labor (I mean, when was the last time I offered to do anything like that?). This should not have been a surprise to you tonight, and to be honest, I didn't appreciate that slow nod. Again, I wish I could do more, but you heard the words "Great Depression Christmas" straight from me.

And on top of that, you taught me that a) it was rude and unladylike to ask for/expect presents, and b) that it's okay to spend gift money on yourself. How many times did that birthday/Christmas money go to groceries or bills? Probably more than we girls know, but you always seemed to compartmentalize that money and spend it on new clothes or something.

So why is it that you chimed in right after Grandpa asked me what I was going to do with the money he gave me?

Mood irritated Music Shattered Dreams - Johnny Hates Jazz Tags: christmas, parental units, seriously?!?, things i can't say on facebook

Never got much higher than 40 degrees today. In fact it's 40 right now. Hopefully this hard freeze/cold snap of DOOM will be over tonight so tomorrow will be a little more bearable. *checks weather.com* Never mind. The nighttime lows for the next two nights are still predicted to be below freezing. Thank goodness the highs are predicted to get up into the 50s the rest of the week. Boo about the possibility of rain, though - my Newgen girls are coming over Friday night, and we were going to drive down to see a local house with Christmas lights cued to music - lightazmic.com if you want to see them too.

Finished the ornaments a few days ago, and delivered them yesterday. The high school ministry admin loved them so much. I'm really glad that she's happy with them.

Lost out on another job today. I was covering the phones for Mom at church this morning, and got called up by the office manager. She told me that they had decided to hire the person they had brought in to temp the position (admin to the missions pastor). I had kind of figured that they wouldn't go with me, and that they'd hire Katie instead, seeing as she's already been trained to an extent. Mary told me that I was fairly overqualified (a story I seem to be hearing a lot of lately), but she knew some people who she thought might be interested in me, and she asked for permission to give them my resume. Like I'm going to say no!

So the Christmas season continues undaunted, but I feel kind of left out. I don't want to think about what I want for Christmas, because I don't know how I'm going to do Christmas for anybody else. It sounds kind of lame, but the opposite sounds selfish. Maybe I can make scones for some people; butter is kind of expensive, but I know that Grandma likes them, and maybe I can wash the windows for Mom and Dad... provided it gets warm enough to do it soon. It'll have to be Christmas Great Depression style, because that's about all I can afford to do. Dear God, I want a job for Christmas. (Nope, I never really believed in Santa when I was little. It helps that people in costumes scared the living daylights out of me when I was a kid. If I couldn't see their face, nothing doing.)

After an near-to-all-nighter, I managed to finish the first batch of ornaments last weekend. So yesterday I sat down and cranked out six from the second batch, which are now hanging in the garage after getting paint penned today. Now that I'm making masking tape stencils for everything, and I found a wider brush for painting the crosses, I'm getting the acrylic phase done much quicker. I ended up combining the two paints for a better look: acrylic as a primer, because it sticks to the glass better, and paint pen on the top because it covers better.

The fumes aren't bothering me as much any more, which is good... unless of course they've killed the fume-detecting part of my brain, which would be bad. Either way I'm not coughing as much anymore, which means that it was probably more remnants of that cold instead of the paint.

So, anyway, that's the extent of the ornament update for now. It's been nice to spread them all out, because like right now, I get whole days where I don't even want to look at orange paint. Burnout, thy name is Robyn.

Mood content Music Back to the 80s - Aqua Tags: christmas, getting artsy, holidays, update

If I die some time in the next three weeks, tell my mama I died like a man.

Or something like that.

So I started painting ornaments yesterday, but the paint I was using (acrylic; it's worked on the ornaments I've painted in the past) wasn't turning out so good... so I went to Michael's for a paint pen. The paint pen works amazingly (it needs a few coats on the darker ornaments - blue, purple - or maybe a primer of some kind), but the fumes are killing me. And with me getting over a cold, I'm already having coughing issues.

So I've got 4 hanging in the garage on my makeshift yarn clotheslines waiting for the paint to fully dry so I can move on to the next coat/step.

Joel loves the ornament design! He said that while it might have been sketchy before, now it's official that I am awesome. :P

I now have 36 ornaments sitting on my floor waiting for paint. However, I need to figure out where I'm going to hang them to dry before I do anything with the ornaments directly. In order to do what I've thought of, I need to find this mythical ball of yarn that is hanging out somewhere in the house. Mom said "on the bookshelf," but we have a lot of bookshelves in this house and in the garage (fairly odd for a family that doesn't read a lot, save me and Mom).

Update: Mom showed me where the yarn was, and I got it hung pretty fast. Now to actually get started on these ornaments. I have three packages of 12 to do, and a week to do each one (until I get to the end, when I only have to do 6. Perfect timing for Thanksgiving weekend). I think I'll crank up the tunes and practice...