Left Out of the Shoe Fetish, This is My Vengence

I did not get tagged for the shoe Meme.
I did not get tagged for the shoe Meme.

Fine, I understand, I haven't been there for you recently, so did not get tagged for the shoe meme. All perfectly understandable.

Instead, since I did not get tagged for the shoe meme, I will offer my own shoe meme.

Two pics, five pairs of shoes.
Which one do I where the most?
Which ones do I love the most?
Which ones do I work in (when I have a job)?
Which ones are very much NOT me?
And, the challenge, which ones show who I want to be most?

My personality via my shoes... I kinda like this. Plus, it's more fun to make you all guess, than to give away the answers. :)

hmm, except that the computer isn't giving me my pics... gotta work on that.





Ah, that's better.



Quick descriptions since the pics aren't that great. White skater-style sneakers, very comfy. And black medium heeled slip-ons with a square toe, not so comfy, but not bad if you aren't on your feet all day.







Left to right. Black mid-calf suede boots with mid-level heel, heavy, but very comfortable and warm. Black pleather high heeled boots, knee height, with pointy toes and pointy heels. And lastly, $2 Wal-Mart flip-flops, made of some kind of foam, in a pink flower pattern.

Good luck contestants, I look forward to hearing your opinions on which of these pairs of shoes is which.

Shamanism Revealed

During a recent chat conversation with Brian aka Flufy, we got on to discussing religion and he revealed that he felt himself msot connected to the shamanistic religious perspective. We all know I'm a freak for information, especially what most people would consider trivia. So I said, "I don't know enough about shamanism, you must send me books to read about it!". And he did. So, once I've finished the political fantasy I'm in the midst of, I shall be delving into the world of shamanism. I have become curious about it because while the 80s and 90s saw a dramatic increase in interest in Wicca and other Euro-Asian pagan religions, the current decade seems to be turning the tide even further away from Judo-Christian faiths by leaning into learning about tribal religions such as shamanism. I may have to loan him Ishmael, since it is a book that discusses our civilizations run from mother earth into the arms of commerce. But for now I will learn about shamanism by reading "Shamanism as a Spiritual Practice for Daily Life" and "Urban Shaman: A Handbook for Personal and Planetary Transformation Based on the Hawaiian Way of the Adventurer". They both look very interesting and I look forward to learning something new about a religion that I have never really explored.

Misery Loves Company

I'm up in the middle of the night again. I don't think I'm sick, just not well. I think I'm suffering caffeine withdrawal to the extreme. My head, neck, and face ache, and I'm slightly nauseous, kinda like a migraine, but less so. All I've wanted to do all day is sleep. Yet, now that it's time for bed I doze off to bad dreams, and wake up, and can't get back to sleep. If it is just withdrawal it should end by tomorrow, usually doesn't last more than 24 hours.

Uh-oh, I"m caught, my typing must ahve woken him up. Time to go toss and turn some more. Night.

You were lost and gone forever, dreadful sorry, Clementine

With the loss of my motherboard, and having to switch to using Mina's computer for the duration, I'm afraid I've also lost all of my bookmarks. Just today I finally popped in on a few of my favorite bloggers and re-bookmarked their pages. It may take a while to get everyone's blogs back on my list. Feel free to leave me a comment so I can track back to your page and mark it. I'm sad that I've missed so much, and shall try to catch up soon.

pics

True Dreaming

I had an eye-opening dream the other night.

In my dream, I came home from my trip to Dad's and Aaron said he had a surprise for me, he had rearranged the office so we would have more space. He was very proud of himself for coming up with a creative solution to the cramped office space. Yet, before he even opened the door to show me, I was formulating all these reasons in my head why it wouldn't work and had to be put back the way it was before. Then he opened the door and showed me and I was right, it was completely unsuitable because he had turned the office into a deck, with walls around it, but only the half that his computer desk was in had a roof, my side was open air. And my desk was very far away from his so that if we watched a movie on his computer I'd have to get up and go sit over at his comp to see it, plus he added big cushy chairs in front of his comp, while my chair was the same stiff office chair as always.
I felt very uncomfortable that things had been changed. I felt like even though he tried to do something nice for me, all he ended up doing was making me uncomfortable and improving his own situation.
It was weird. I woke up thinking that it was so typical of me to have someone do something nice for me and it just making me uncomfortable, and how I was always so stubborn and had such a hard time with change, unless it was my idea to make the change. I was disappointed in myself for already having come up with several reasons it wouldn't do, before he even opened the door.

It was a very true dream, and very frustrating to know it was true, and not know how to change that part of me that has such a difficult time with change and accepting a good deed done for my sake.

Carpenter Extraordinnaire

Last week I went back out to Dad's house.
I am very proud of myself and yet very concerned as well. I'm proud because with a little insider knowledge from my dad and my nephew who have both done some carpentry (I think) I, framed out and hung a new door. :) I am very impressed with myself since this sort of carpentry goes far beyond the type of remodeling I am used to doing. I measured thrice and cut once, just to be sure. I single-handedly contrived to do a double-header door frame, and did it so that it even matched the picture in the DIY handbook I used as a reference. Taijha did all the cutting of wood, because I still have a healthy fear of power tools, and would prefer to keep all my digits in place. We also built and stained from our own mental design a brand new cedar deck outside the new door. My sister and my dad put in one the new energy efficient windows too. Angie was very proud of her new window too. We don't often get to do this sort of thing, so when we do, we are always a bit startled to see what we are capable of.
I will post a pic of the door and deck soon, although I took the pic before they were completely finished.

I am concerned however. I am concerned by the fact that my dad was having such a difficult time focussing on the problem in front of him (putting in the door) and working out a solution to how it should be done. He kept looking at it and not being able to follow his own calculations, getting halfway through figuring out how long to cut a board and then promptly forgetting what measurements he started with. Even more disturbing was cleaning out the attic, which needed to be done so that he could work on the wiring. It wouldn't seem disturbing to most people to see him clearing things out and throwing them away, you'd have to know him to understand why it's a frightening sight. My dad never throws anything away, he's constantly raiding garage sales for more junk to horde. He always buys things with a concept in his head that someday he'll use them for something, it's all part of this great unknown future plan of his that even he hasn't figured out yet. So the crap piles up in corners waiting for that future date when it will be used for something greater. To see him weed through it all and just toss boxes of stuff out to the trash, is like watching a stamp or coin collector throw away a box of their collectibles that they haven't sorted out yet. Even worse, it makes me think that; if he's getting rid of this stuff, then it means he no longer has an unknown future plan for it all. And maybe, that means he just doesn't have any future plans. Maybe he's stopped planning for the future and realized it's already here, and decided that this is it and there won't be a far-distant and yet unrealized future in which he will use this stuff. If that didn't make any sense to you then I will be more direct: maybe he's not expecting to be here in the future at all.
This is what has me so concerned.
It is highly circumspect and un-Dad-like behaviour to throw out his accumulated crap. But, on to more lightweight news. I highly suggest that Zilla read "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" by Lynn Truss. My sister loaned it to me, and I enjoyed it, and suspect that Zilla will as well since I know of her penchant for good punctuation. It is a book about punctuation, told in a very humorous and very British fashion.