C'est moi! (or at least a reasonable facsimile)
Okay, I confess. The computer's been more or less fixed for a few weeks now. I've been lurking, just dropping a few comments here and there. I suppose it's been a combination of my usual post-holiday hibernation and the conviction that if I didn't get the computer set up exactly the way I wanted it before I started posting, I'd never get it just right. Well, so much for that idea; I still need to load a couple of things, and the computer's already started acting flaky. But on the plus side, I kept a detailed log of everything I've done to it, and next time I'll be able to reconstruct my preferred working environment much faster, and in a slightly more logical order. Yay for that.
So. Let's see if I remember how to do an LJ cut:
--Christmas was more subdued than usual, but very pleasant. I think most of the gifts I gave went over well (mind you, I still have a few more things to mail off; I guess they'll be St. Patrick's Day gifts). I had a nice breakfast & unwrapping with Mom and Dad, a quiet afternoon, and exchanged gifts with the nieflings in the evening. I gave mostly books and CDs this year. I received some wonderfully geeky books, some kitchen things which made me feel all chefly, a new set of sheets, a new stereo (which was quite a shock!), and a hippopotamus golf game (you know, putt the ball into the hippo's mouth). Thus in the gifts department I made out like a bandit, and feel a bit guilty. And I forgot to bake the hippo cookies. :( But we made up for the quiet Christmas with a movie & pizza night the next week.
--I infer from posts by others on my flist over the years that it's considered acceptable to share the following good news: I've received my first fic awards nominations! Pas de Deux and Apparition are both up for this year's Numb3rs Awards. I'm very pleased, particularly as the possibility hadn't even occurred to me. Advantages of getting into a small fandom early, I guess. :)
--I also want to congratulate my flisters izhilzha and feliciakw for their nominations in the Numb3rs awards, too!
--It's interesting how small things make you happy. Mum and Dad got me a giant Mylar balloon for Valentine's day. It's very cheery. :) Another small thing that made me happy recently was when bibliohippo read to me last week from The Space Child's Mother Goose. The poems have so much more life when read aloud. And clean sheets always make me happy, isn't that odd? But life is full of small things, innit? And when the big things come along, I'm often too tired to enjoy them. So, yay for small happinesses!
--My doctor, the one that I adore, has taken a new job in California. She was really looking forward to it when I saw her last week, so I'm glad for her, though I'll miss her. But she found me a replacement before she left, someone she thinks I'll like, so I think I'll be all right.
--And hey, I don't think I've mentioned: after the homecare service finally got through switching around my caregivers, I wound up with a primary caregiver that I really like. She takes very good care of me, and we spend most of our time laughing. The alternate caregiver is, well, taking me longer to adjust to. But overall, having help come in is not quite the soul-destroying experience I expected it to be. ;-) And it eases the burden on Mum and Dad considerably.
--I've signed up for both the Multi-Fandom Lyric Wheel ficathon and RemixRedux. The assignments I got were... I would have to say good assignments. Not perfect (in the sense of, 'Oh dear, I do not want to disappoint this person, now I'm nervous'), but very good (in the sense of, 'What good stuff to work with!'). Although I think in both cases I shall have to stretch myself to come up with something to satisfy the recipients. I have the Lyric Wheel story about half roughed out, and I shall worry about RemixRedux afterward--I find remixing less daunting somehow, and the primary difficulty will likely be that they've upped the required wordcount to 1000. Those are the only two ficathons I'm planning on joining this year, though, as I've more than enough stories started to keep me busy. I shall probably do some more drabble requests, though, as I find those helpful during dry spells.
Well, that's all for now. I shall be doing some belated year-end posts; those of you living in real time may feel free to ignore them. :)