So, we went to Montana.

( Beneath the jump. )


I'm back to more or less functional in time for the holiday, of course. Made peanut brittle tonight; will be making several other kinds of cookies to give out to friends tomorrow. We do the actual running-around-the-valley on Christmas Eve.

Pozole for Christmas Eve dinner — chicken, not pork, so not strictly traditional, but oh, well. I wanted to do tamales for Christmas Day, because my grandmother always did, but Max had a request for something else, so I suppose I will make them on Boxing Day. That's fine by me, considering how much fucking effort I'm going to have to put in to making all the cookies...

We're actually celebrating this year. It's the first time in a couple of years that we have. Christmas is my least-favorite holiday, so last year when he had to go back to Montana, it was like...what's the point? We didn't do a tree or anything, didn't exchange gifts...just. Yeah.

I did make myself pozole last year, because it was like, "I am alone for the holiday and this is my tradition", but nothing much more than that. Hung out with friends the day-of and watched Pride and Prejudice (the 1995 BBC adaptation).

This year, I don't know that we have huge plans. We are exchanging gifts, apparently. I picked up some stuff for Max, and I'm getting the rest of it tomorrow. Nothing fancy — I'm picking up a bottle of The Botanist for him (fancy gin) and some tonic water to go with it, as well as the second Tea and Robot book, since he hasn't read it yet (and was surprised to see it at the bookstore in town this evening, ha). Need to pick up stuff to do stockings for both of us, and...yeah.

My mom sent us a box. I have no idea what's in it, beyond a quilt that she apparently made for Max's mom (and shipped to us, because the original idea was that it was going to be something that we sent to Renee as a Christmas gift...). Suppose I shall find out.

I'm not certain what else there is in the way of news. I am quickly hitting the point where I need to begin looking for a job, not because I'm out of money (I am definitely not, and I have picked up another $15k freelance contract for next year), but because it's like, "ugh I should probably actually...do something...with myself." We'll see.

Oh, I guess the only other note is that I did a tarot reading for a friend yesterday. I haven't read for anyone but myself in a while. Always sort of interesting to see what people take away from what gets dealt and where interpretations differ.

Wait, I lied, there is one other note, which is: I did, in fact, read Middlemarch! I finished it, in fact, after putting it on my list as the only thing I wanted to do this year. Ha.

Uh — takeaways from that, hmm. Nothing much, honestly. I understood the book and the point it was trying to make pretty well (a snapshot of a rural English community prior to the industrialization that followed the 1832 Reform Act), and I did get why it was as long as it was/why the pacing was what it was, I just — well, it was fine, but I didn't really care for most of the characters (alas), and found myself unmoved by their problems. I feel like if I'd read it at a different point, or ironically if I'd been made to study it in school, I might have enjoyed it more, but on its own...I mean...

Honestly I am just annoyed that Lydgate did in fact marry Rosamond when she was so clearly awful for him. At least Dorothea's husband had the decency to die. I find that I'm at odds with the people going, "oh, but Will Ladislaw was so clearly her inferior", like — sure, socially, yes, but the connection and ardor between them was quite clear from the beginning, and unlike Casaubon and others in her social circle, he actually saw her fully, as a person and not an ideal, so.

Anyway.

I can say that I've read it now, and talk intelligently about it, probably, so. :P

Next on the to-read list ought to be The Spear Cuts Through Water but I find myself instead having picked up Bel Canto, since if I'm knocking out "stuff I got specifically told to read years ago", I might as well keep it up...

We'll see how this one goes.

Woke up this morning to a note on Discord from shadaras that someone had asked for permission to post fic they'd written based on the gigantic Regency origfic project.

Blinked, bleary-eyed, and went over to read the comment in question —

So… I started writing a comment several hours ago, and now I've got a 550-word flash fic about El, Mal, an egg, and several extended metaphors. Might you like to be the first to read it?

(I intend to post it publicly afterwards, unless you'd rather I didn't. In that case I'm just happy to have wrestled a small project to completion; ADHD has been making that hard for me lately!)

Immediately went, "!!" and commented back, of course, saying that I'd love to read it and there's no need to get my approval before posting.

They posted it.

It's really lovely.

Just like when I found out that people were writing stuff set on D&D campaigns I was running, it's very flattering and now I want to go "!!" and tell everyone to read it. Tragically, I cannot do so to the friends that I have locally, as, er, they're not fic people and the tags alone would put them off, but — dude, how cool is that?