Before we even begin, allow me to clarify, should anyone mistakenly imagine that I suddenly went all conventional. This is NOT a year-in-review type of post. I am not nearly that organized. Also, there are plenty of them around right now, you don’t need me to sum crap up for you. In fact, go over there to the Important Women category and click on just about any of those links, most have really good (and extremely clever) book listings, with like numbers and creative titles and everything. I don’t have anything even close. I have OCD.
Two topics in my life that I obsess over to the extreme, are books and food. Food and books. I am not wired anywhere near normal when it comes to these. I have a major mind-fuck about eating and not-eating, dieting and not-dieting, my weight and how that reflects on who I am. It’s deeply embedded and I struggle with releasing it on a daily, no, more like hourly, basis.
I have these odd and compulsively peculiar habits surrounding my books. I don’t buy many, except for gifts. Mostly I stalk the library website late at night and request items that have been recommended by people I like. Craig Ferguson is just one example (the rest of you know who you are). He often has authours on his show, and I jot down their names, then later I log in and put that on the list. But only, and this is a great big honkin’ BUT, only if I have read everything that writer has already written. It’s a disorder, I am fully aware of that fact. It’s one I can live with. Unlike the mess that is my brain where food is concerned. THAT shit needs to be dealt with.
The reason this has come up today has nothing to do with it being a new year or month. It has everything to do with what my daughter and husband brought home. With Daniel’s new days off, and with Empress now being only half employed (when the booth closed, she lost her job too, but she has another part-time gig), they tend to have a bit of free time on their hands. They had a Play Day this weekend. So they went to a grocery outlet. And a dollar store. And gawd knows where else.
Here is one of the choice selections they bought. It is an artichoke tapenade -go read the ingredients on the label…. I’ll wait. Okay? Did you SEE this stuff?! It’s killer good, amazingly tasty, super biter, and way strange! I love it! I ate half the freaking jar last night. While I was reading.
I just finished the latest book by Carl Hiaasen. He’s a genius. I adore his stuff. It makes me Laugh Out Loud and frequently physically cheer. Practically with pom poms. I got through all the Lani Diane Rich books by our own Lovely Lucy. (The Fortune Quilt was my favorite, there will be no secret as to why, for any of you who have read this one. And if you haven’t, what the hell are you waiting for?!) Another one I read in past few weeks is the newest by Janet Evanovich. Very fun, but now I have to wait for her to write the next one. I believe I have read every book written by Charlaine Harris at this point. Also recently completed the new Jenny Crusie, and the first one by Paula Wall (yes Kelly I finally got to The Rock Orchard, you were right, it was GREAT!), along with the John Edward one I told you about yesterday, and the newest by Sylvia Browne.
There have been probably a hundred more this past year, but I can’t tell you all of them. My “system” has fallen apart. I used to have a journal (like Becky‘s) and then I asked Dan to make me a data file here on the dinosaur desk top. He followed my instructions, to the best of his abilities (and belive me, those directions were exacting) but it didn’t do precisely what I needed it to. So I haven’t kept it up. Hence, I have no record of what I’ve been reading (other than the scraps and slips of papers in a huge messy pile over here next to me).
My point (and I did have one) was that I eat when I read. That needs to stop. I don’t have emotional eating problems, or boredom eating problems (we’ve discussed how I do NOT get bored). I just have reading eating problems. There was an article in the paper this morning (yes my news is continuing to appear as it should, and their website continues to suck, so I had to google around for this link, but it is totally worth reading) that talked about how our brains fool us with dopamine and this process keeps us in the rut of bad habits. We reward ourselves in not-good ways, our brain remembers this, and makes us keep doing it.
Now that I know my scrambled head is going all trickster on me, I plan on addressing this issue directly. Keep your fingers crossed, it’s gonna be one of those complicated lessons. The kind that can’t be learned over night. I’ll get back to you with the results.
Have I mentioned how many sweaters my Beloved has made for our grand-dogs? Well, it’s a bunch. He perfects a pattern, then he does it again. Lately he finished one for Max, that I generously donated the yarn for. (I bought it thinking he or my mother would make me something out of it, but it’s been in the sewing room for a very long time now, and I figured I could spare a ball or two of cotton for the cause.) 
The name on the wrapper is Key Lime Pie. Okay, so maybe I picked this because of the label. Fine. Still, it looks good don’t you thing? If Indi wants one just like it, we still have some of this yarn (like five more balls). Ha, they could be sweater twins!
Carol and BFB asked about the Dark Moon in yesterday’s comments. I don’t have the patience, nor the brain power right now, to go back and dig through the History Quilt for what I have said about this phase before. (But good question you guys, thanks for paying attention, I nearly missed it, damn I wish my new calendars would get here.) So I will just give you the quick version. The Dark Moon is another name for the New Moon. We call it the Recycle Moon. It is a big black pit of void, from our side of the earth. So we treat it as a bin that can be transitional for our purposes. Toss in whatever you need to get rid of, with the intention of having it come out the other end (at the Full Moon) remade into something positive and helpful. This is a pretty well done website, although it seems to be from the UK, so the times don’t match with ours.
Here’s our card for the day. It’s from Colette’s Wisdom of the Hidden Realms oracle deck. I love the illustration, and the message totally captures what I feel like right now as we wait out this last bit of Mercury’s Shadow Effect, not to mention how well it lines up with where we are in this Dark Moon phase .
“The Ice Queen ~ ideas preserved, nonaction, entitlement.
The Ice Queen has come to block your movement for your highest good. Let your ideas be preserved until later. You can thaw them out and use them at another time when they will serve best.
The realm of the Ice Queen is the place of nonaction, and now is the perfect time to take a look at how far you’ve come and to ask yourself for a reclarification of your highest goals.
Not all your plans can be accomplished at this moment. In fact, putting them on ice allows for the perfect timing later on. Don’t be too hasty in trying to reach your goal. An even better one will present itself if you surrender and spend the winter with the Ice Queen.
Perhaps, too, you are trying to do too many things at once. This is a good occasion to choose only one thing to focus on right now and let the Ice Queen put the others in the deep freeze until a more appropriate time. She will let you know when it is time to let them thaw.”
