Drunken Owls and Other Delights

It's been a bit of a busy weekend here, partly because of the chaos of last minute holiday shopping (and a bit of personal frustration) at the day job, and also a planned drive up north to have lunch and trade presents with the in-laws, but somehow I still managed to get a fair bit of writing work done regardless. I suppose that's a good sign that I was able to handle it all without the encroaching stress or anxiety that comes with having a full social schedule!

Some things (like this entry) come a bit later than usual, but digging in my heels and powering through seems to be the best course of action for me. I've written and scheduled the last writing-blog entry, I'm still on top of the daily words, and I've got the next couple of days off where I can write the final music-blog entry, work on Theadia, and also get a serious amount of house errands done as well.

Alas, I will be working both New Year's Eve AND New Year's Day, but from past experience it shouldn't be too painful. Nowhere near the chaos of Thanksgiving and Christmas Eves. Here's to hoping they're both regular shifts!

PG&E seems to be suffering all kinds of power grid failures lately, though, and that is extremely concerning, and I've just received another warning about it a few minutes ago. We've already had the power go out twice already, so I'd rather not have it happen again, thankyewverymuch.

So yeah, I'm going to post this now in hopes that the new year is decidedly less chaotic. I'll definitely be here on Wednesday! See you then!

Outside Lands tickets for this year have been procured!  They're expensive af, but it's definitely worth it. We'll watch a few dozen bands over the course of a long weekend (and quite often we'll discover ones we hadn't heard previously!), and the food and drink are always fantastic (and local!) so it's definitely worth it.  We missed the last few due to various reasons, but this time we planned everything out so we can make it again this year. Looking forward to it!

Our friend and former roommate B has been staying with us all week (she's been going to the Gaming Developer's Conference & Expo here in the city), so it's been fun catching up with her and showing her around.  We're planning on bringing her to some of our favorite places on Saturday before she flies back east.  Here's to hoping the weather is good because I *always* bring our visiting friends and family to Twin Peaks to check out the amazing views!

Writingwise, I seem to have restarted my long-simmering Walk In Silence project.  Yes, *that* one, the one that just won't die, heh.  One of the possible updates to this that I've been thinking of was to add (gasp!) a parallel track about the pop music of the time. This is a bit of a tricky project as it's about music fandom, but it's most emphatically *not* about going to shows, insider stories, or local scenes. It's simply about being an obsessive music fan.  And how to make that interesting when all the action is essentially me sitting on my ass staring at a radio?  That's a good question. I realized the best way to do this, at least in my mind, is to show how commercial pop and rock radio and college radio played off each other in the 80s before things started blending together and becoming the commercial alt-rock of the 90s.

Also writingwise: Slowly making my way through the second chapter of Diwa and Kaffi, and building up the glossary I'll need to build up in the back.  It's an interesting mix, because there are a few alien words here and there that I made up, but there's also a handful of Tagalog phrases as well.  My plan for the latter is to make a list of these and then work with a Tagalog speaker (read: about half of my Day Job coworkers, some of whom I'm sure will be happy to assist) to ensure I'm using it all correctly.

Exercise: Oof. Yeah, I've been lazy the last few weeks, and I'm not proud of it. Then again, with B here visiting, we *did* do a bit of walking in the neighborhood on Sunday, so there's that. I also have to go into Concord TWICE next week, so that puts the kibosh on two days.  I figure April will be when I get back into the groove again.

And that's all for now...back to work for me!