jaunthie | I am genuinely AWFUL at Christmas cards

Every year, I intend to send out holiday cards in December. It's a lovely tradition. I enjoy getting cards from other people, and reading the letters about how the year has gone, and seeing pictures or funny lines or whatever.

And every year, I don't quite get to it.

Part of this is of course due to the tons of things that happen at the end of the year. December is packed with get-togethers and performances and events. But of course that's not unique to me, and lots of other people manage to get cards and letters out in the mail. So why do I suck at it?

It was finally brought home to me that there is another factor that ALWAYS comes into play for me. Since starting work at the empire, EVERY YEAR has brought MAJOR work deadlines for me in December. Usually mid-to-late December. (There was one year that saw me working Christmas Day because of the insane deadlines, but that's another story.) This year was a little better than most, in that my major deadline was actually right before Thanksgiving, but I still had follow-up work and other critical-work-because-it-had-been-delayed-for-the-deadline work to do right up through the third week in December. While I am sure that the December-is-Deadline-Month is also not unique to me, it does give me some more insight as to why I perpetually never quite get around to the chatty, here's-what-we've-been-up-to cards and letters I map out in my head.

So instead, here is a brief synopsis of some of the highlights (and lowlights) of my 2009, in no particular order. This is by no means comprehensive, but catches at least some of what happened in my world this last year.

Accomplishments for this year:
- finished the first draft of the novel
- learned to knit, and knit my first pair of socks
- devised new photography technique (for me, anyway) and used proofs for same in my photo show
- Walked 5k for charity and raised $$$ for breast cancer research
- went to the gym regularly all year long (yay!)
- added a spin class to the regular gym activity
- participated in the mutual gardening society; added new gardening beds front and back as part of same
- participated in paint-party for solstice parade and helped

fisherbear get out there on the Frankenbike
- made and canned multiple batches of rose-petal jam and fireball sauce
- grew, ate, and donated a lot of veggies
- cured and preserved an insane amount of home-grown garlic
- was in the "thank you" credits of an actual movie (!)
- actually scheduled a vacation to AZ and made it for Dad's b-day; squeezed a metric ton of OJ while there
- totally reorganized and decluttered the upstairs closets
- finally made it to the lavender festival after years of meaning to but not doing so
- went to the Ring cycle (and had four different snazzy opera outfits for same)

Acknowledgements/realizations of the year:
- apparently I am an overachiever (at least in the eyes of many of my family/associates)
- I have a nontrivial addiction to roses
- I am completely garden-mad, particularly at certain times of the year
- I suck at going on vacations unless there's an actual event to provide an excuse for same
- No part of America is any more "American" than any other part, despite what many people try to claim
- I saw WAY MORE live theater/shows this year than movies
- discovered 2 yogurt products that I actually LIKE (and one is still being made; the other is of course discontinued)
- I am too plausible to be anything other than fictional

Notable acquisitions of the year:
- the Imperial Death Star (AKA the new TV and TV service)
- MORE rose bushes
- worm bin and much worm compost therefrom
- properly fitted bras
- two pairs of absolutely rockin' shoes at unbelievable deal prices
- NaNo Winner "Award" (3rd year in a row)
- 2 new friends for M-cat

Notable bad things that happened this year:
- Sudden death of Aunt Fran
- Death of Jacques from cancer
- Death of far too many other acquaintances/relatives of friends/associates
- emergency room scares with Grandma
- recurring and obnoxious foot annoyance that still hasn't gone away
- MS layoffs and general financial crappiness of the economy
- work being exceptionally grindy and crammed (including 2 near-midnight deadline rushes and multiple major last-minute schedule changes)
- weather extremes (snow, snow, snow, snow, record-breaking HEAT and dryness, rain rain rain FREEZE); global climate change really is making the weather stronger and wackier
- furnace breakdown in the middle of the months of record cold last winter
- local vandals of various varieties, including sparkler-bomb in neighbor's yard
- one of two major local newspapers shuttered by non-local parent corporation; remaining local newspaper totally slacking off and sucking since there's no competition anymore
- generally declining quality of media/reporting and standards of fact-checking vs stenography
- failure to find a pound-cake recipe for Grandma that is the equivalent/twin of Entemann's

Five very cool things that happened in 2009:
- MamaBear finding a great condo and moving to live close to us
- discovery of a deep-sea fish with mirrored eyeballs
- British Government postumously apologizes to Alan Turing
- buy-one-get-one-free train ticket coupons
- M falling in immediate like with the two new kitties

You can read about most if not all of these things in the 2009 entries in the blog, if you're curious for more details. Perhaps I will go back and link all of these items to related blog entries - but that's for another day. Right now, it's definitely time to get some sleep.