Review and Remember- The Long Read

"The greatest accomplishment is not in never falling, but in rising again after you fall."

-Vince Lombardi

It's amazing what meeting old friends, catching up with current ones, and making new additions will do to jog memories. This has been on my mind for the last week and I felt I had to do a 2007 In Review blog to sum it up in words. When it's running around in your head like a chicken with it's head cut off, screaming at you to let it out, you have to wonder... can headless chicken thoughts scream with no... head?

Two thousand and six was a year that could have started off better. While I won't go into messy personal details with you brilliant readers here, I will say that in the upheaval of losing your footing in your home and family environment and having to break away from things you once looked to for comfort and a sense of stability will shake up your year like very little else. What does 2006 have to do with 2007 you ask? It's important to know the downfall before you can appreciate the importance of the rise.

With a posse of good friends around me I made it through the rough times in 2006. I owe a lot to them all. When life took a dramatic turn with moving out, I had friends to stay with and friends to support me. When I came out that summer, I lost the closeness of a best friend but also gained a deeper level of friendship with another. With job after job I built an ever-expanding group of friends around me and found the kind of love I was missing in previous relationships. When I was alone for the holidays because of a bizarre turn of events, I had a best friend there to drag me over and keep me company through a rough holiday. With the start of 2007, I had to surrender that friend to California, and with the start of 2008, I will surrender another one to that state. Friends have been the base I have built from in 2007.

At the start of 2007 I made the decision to get on with my life and to make a big change- I moved to Denver, CO. With no steady job for the first four months I made it by, again with the help of friends. With the start of the year mostly past I finally came out to the rest of my family and worked at getting it firmly behind me. I moved on. While parts of those first six months were lonely and depressing, the summer brought the change I needed. With a job securely under my arm and a coffee-driven social life I got my first real apartment and celebrated my 22nd birthday. Colorado just kept on getting better.

With the looming date of the release of the Deathly Hallows on us in July I started my newest and most engrossing hobby. A few tips and multiple redoes I started knitting a Harry Potter-themed scarf for the big night. I never did wear it that night, but I did continue knitting. Since then I've started I don't know how many projects and increased my stash. I've learned new techniques and bought an ungodly amount of books. I've also started a group at the former job spot, Barnes and Noble, devoted to knitting that just keeps growing and getting more fun. I think it's safe to say that this will be one part of 2007 I will carry with me for a while into the future.

Now I have to say that other than the knitting group and my semi-social life during the Fall months and going into Winter I didn't do much. It was the rest I needed for sure. I did find time to take up poker, take a deeper interest in my spiritual side, start consulting online with my own tarot business, visit a couple new clubs, read a couple books, and start up my old romance with blogging again. Nothing world-changing, but there is hope for this new year.

My 2008 ended with a Christmas with friends and a slamming party on New Year's Eve. Quite a way to go! Now it's time to turn my attentions to all the big plans for the next 365 days.

Some of my big ambitions for the current year are to develop a sense of the issues I will be voting on with the presidential election and also to get a hold on my local government to keep on top of things that are important to me.

Also to get involved with work in Africa, a subject that was jogged into curiosity by a random acquaintance at my favorite bar, JR's. There are a lot of areas that need attention and as an American, I am excited at the opportunity to share what I can with another person or group of people who may not have everything that I do. It's something I will devote more time to this year.

Weight loss is one that always ends up on my beginning of the year list every year it seems for the last three. I have somewhat of an idea of how much I need to lose but I will make like my mother and never actually step on a scale. No, instead, I will be checking myself out in the mirror every morning and comparing it to my "before" picture until I look like I want to. That's when the "after" picture will be taken and progress will continue from there. What's my goal? One hundred and eighty pounds, all muscle, and the confidence to hang out at the pool shirtless and not be self-conscious. What a good friend of mine always called the LGN diet- Look Good Naked diet. This will be accomplished by a mix of healthy eating, dancing, weightlifting, and good 'ol positive thinking. We may throw some Bikram yoga in there too.

Travel will make a come back this year with a trip in the summer to California for Gay Pride in one of three cities- San Francisco, LA, or San Diego. The end destination will be decided the closer we get to making the trip. The year will also top off with a much needed trip to NYC with my best friend after she returns from studying abroad in Europe. The details on that trip are a bit more vague. All we know now is it's on!

With a new computer in hand I plan to snag myself a free lance career in the Graphic Design business. I've taken a huge break for the last year and a half since losing my baby to an overused graphics card. With the mind (hard drive) of my former love installed into the body of a stunning new beauty, I will be a happy man ready to take on the world. Yes, I have a love affair with technology. Bite me!

So you can see it's a big year ahead with an okay year behind and hell of a lot of potential on the plate. The mindset now is to seize the moment and so the day. It's all in your positive spin on thoughts through the day. The time to live is now. Don't hold back while you wait for your dreams to happen, reserving energy given to you now for this minute for some day in the future. Let it out and let it go. Celebrate life like only you know how. Embrace love, and love will explode out of you into the lives of those around you. Make each friendship a jewel you polish daily until those you love shine as bright as the stars in your eyes. Embrace who you are and you will embrace diversity in others. Stoke the fire of passion in your soul and you will birth a beautiful frenzy of creativity.

Slap me 'cus I've gone wild!!! Lol.

With that, I move on to the New Year. Good luck to all of you.

Getting Political off the Brain

I don't get into politics in general as they usually just make me so agitated, but this piece was dropped in my lap and hit so close with me I had to put it out there. I promise you won't hear anymore until ranting fever hits again. For my sake you won't here anymore for a while. lol

The Nobodies!

So I've decided to profile that devious little group self-dubbed "The Nobodies" so you all can get a feel for how dangerous these lovely ladies are! I'm assuming I have included everyone below, but I might have missed someone. The Nobodies are the regulars that are consistenly at Barnes knitting up a storm. Who knows, maybe they will form their own faction and rise up to take over the knitting world! Horrors be upon us!!!

Bernadette - Speaks her mind without regret! Killer knitting needles!

Val - Cracks nuts faster than you can blink. All men beware!

Jan - Quick wit and a gentle persona. We have yet to uncover this beauty's dastardly plan...

Kim - A mother and master of all she sets her mind to! Nothing gets by this one!

Keep your eyes peeled and running shoes ready. They meet for secret conclaves weekly and have infiltrated the local Barnes and Noble. They are not to be trusted!

This will most likely be the last transmission of confidential information I ever pass on so...

Farewell!

I don't know what it is about having a camera and blogging, but I don't seem to be as motivated to do the latter unless I have pictures to show you all. I started a scarf for Val, red with black eye lash, for Christmas because she didn't think she could finish it in time. It's coming along beautifully. It's a simple seed stitch done on 17's with a double strand feed. That'd be the red and black yarn, that double feed there. lol

Other than that, I am still working on my argyle scarf in black and green that I, again, still do not have pictures of. It's slow in coming but looks so amazing. Not as forgiving for mistakes though. I had to rip out two rows to redo the third row because I messed the purling and stitching sequence up. Looked like crap!

In other news, we have had quite a bit of snow in the last week and the landscape is amazing. We may have snow for Christmas! Forget the fact that I won't be sticking with my original plans (job hunting, grrrr) and will be pushing back my trip up to Cheyenne, and this year might actually be better than last year. I keep searching for the mystical Christmas cheer that seems to be a bit more elusive this year. Ah, tumultuous life. Now before I get dramatic...

The knitting group is continuing splendidly! We have new peeps and have now hit a high of 9 regulars. Well, that's if you count that bitchy little group The Nobodies who won't let it drop that I mentioned that "nobody had come to knitting group" while putting it in the contexed that we were the somebodies and I was speaking from a group perspective. Sigh, women. I'm probably shooting myself in the foot with that since all my known readers are women, but that's the beautiful thing about daringly going where women assume no man would ever go. Haaaaa! I have balls! Lol

We had a party at Val's house last week that, oddly enough, turned into a knitting group party since our other friends never showed. It was a simple party, just a bunch of nuts hanging around in the same bowl for the evening. We potlucked and then sat around chatting on into the evening. Like most hardcore knitters, we pulled out the knitting that everyone inevitably has on hand and continued our coffee and cookies in the living room. Below is a montage of our candidly snapped pictures. Lookin' forward to the next ho-down!

I'll just quit now while I'm ahead.

Bustin' in a Movie Groove!

The Golden Compass is out in a week! Here is one fan that cannot wait! I was in such a nerdy mood I went and found out who was chosen as my daemon in the parallel universe of the Golden Compass. Her name is Athenestia. You can see her personal webspace here.

I include her portrait link here so you all can take a quick click and help decide which form she will take on permanently. Right now, she is a biased form of how I view myself and cannot take mature form until she understands how the rest of the world views me. So play along with my little fantasy and give a quick looksee at the survey and we'll see what she turns into.

Athenestia's Page

Little Bastard Kitty!

Bad Pussy

Winter Kiss

It's very quiet outside right now.

The snow fell tonight all quiet and soft, covering the last few leaves that have fallen in the last week. I stepped outside to enjoy the peacefulness and feel the calm night air. Bit crisp, but that is what you would call the kiss of the Snow Queen. Icy and bright, it stirs up the sensation of being really alive, aware of your surroundings and open to the calming message of the nighttime.

I'll sleep well tonight. Tomorrow the mantle of pure whiteness will probably melt away back into the green carpet of grass that is still hanging on in spite of it being the middle of November. There is something so very magical about waking up to a white world with a cup of hot chocolate in hand and some quiet classical music playing beside the fireplace.

Enjoy it while you can. That fragile, crystaline creation is fleeting as a dream.

The Quickie

Boy how I wish that title was what it implies at first glance. Sigh. Strange here, checking in from the ranks of the unlucky to leave all a snippet of my life in the last two weeks. After reviewing the material for this one, I don't think it will be as short as it was going to be originally.


Since posting last, we've celebrated both the commercial holiday of Halloween and the ancient and resurrected festival of Samhein. Halloween went off without a hitch and gave me reason to succumb to my love of pumpkin carving. The mass lobotomy of the collected Jacks resulted in four fun and funky pumpkins that drug out the comments in spades from each of our trick-or-treaters. Ahhh, a little bragging-ego-booster there for me. I am quite proud of my handiwork. Samhein was quiet and private and consisted mostly of a time of releasing to the universe all the old baggage from the year before. Good for the soul, good for the body. It is amazing how much you can keep inside and not realize without some self examination. A good detox is always good for the body and soul.






With the end of October a new wave of knitting books surfaced at the local Barnes Ignoble and my find was scouted and acquired with much rejoicing. I reviewed this book in an earlier post without realizing that it wasn't out yet. Duh. I finally have the Son of Stitch n Bitch and I've already started my first project. It's a double knit scarf with a diamond pattern in black and lime green. I don't have pictures yet because of the lousy camera that I have, but when I do there will be an update. It's challenging, but loads of fun. Very left brained.



Couple of weeks ago we had Maggie Sefton down from Ft. Collins for a quiet... uhhh, not that quiet... night of knitting and chatting about life and books. She spilled the good news on new books, publishers, and her own LYS. We've decided, after a generous invitation, to take a field trip up to see our favorite author in her natural setting. The date for that is not set yet, but it will be sometime after the first of next year. I'll be raving about that again in the future, just you wait!


Knitting Knuts! With the ever expanding size of our knitting group, we've decided it would be a grand plan to start our own knitting blog with multiple authors in order to showcase events, current reads, and other big news bytes everyone should know about. There will also be plenty of room for random knitting rants and humor to spice it up. You can see the starter page for our new blog here. Knitting Knuts is the current working title. There will also eventually be an email list to join.


And that wraps most of this entry up. I'm working on incorporating an mp3 widget into the sidebar for some entertaining music for you all to listen to while perusing the archives. I'm all about the entertainment of my readers. Hopefully that is why you all keep coming back to read. Lol. Don't make me have to result to "naughty" tactics. I may just be desperate enough.

'Til next time then.

Halloween Come and Gone

So i really did start a post for Halloween, but this dude ended up bein' way too busy to actually put anything good out. So I sit here at 5am re-writing my original draft. It's odd how many different sounds you hear late at night. And it's odd the places your mind goes when it's just you and the quiet. So peaceful. I'm gonna go back to writing. Needed a bit of a break. AM hours and I'm still not tired. Tired enough to go to sleep anyways.

Tomorrow, or later today, I plan on having some pictures up of Halloween and the finished scarf. Til then.

Racing to Finish

So I told myself I would have a scarf for Halloween and I started one back in September. I finally got the yarn I needed to finish it, and I just haven't picked it up for more than a couple of minutes. Sigh. But, I am resolved to having it done by Halloween night, since I get the sneaky feeling it's gonna be cold like it always is for the night of the living dead. Too many ghosts out is the problem. Darn ghosts.

We had our first snow a week ago, and it's been quite pleasant since. No telling when the weather will drop kick us back into Old Man Winter's grubby fist. One must be prepared though, for anything. So I am going to finish my scarf by Halloween, the gloves (which have two more fingers done! yay) by the first week in November, and the hat to complement my scarf somewherer close to the other two. Quite an excellent goal setting agenda, eh? Yeah, go rag on your own UFO's, punk!

I shall post next on Halloween. Yes, Halloween! It may be my favorite holiday and the start of the new Celtic year, but I shall post my heart out to celebrate. See you all then.

I Am The Dark Knight, Totally!

Which Action Hero Would You Be? v. 2.0 created with QuizFarm.com

You scored as Batman, the Dark Knight As the Dark Knight of Gotham, Batman is a vigilante who deals out his own brand of justice to the criminals and corrupt of the city. He follows his own code and is often misunderstood. He has few friends or allies, but finds comfort in his cause. Batman, the Dark Knight 79% James Bond, Agent 007 71% Captain Jack Sparrow 63% The Terminator 50% Lara Croft 50% El Zorro 50% William Wallace 50% Neo, the "One" 50% Maximus 50% The Amazing Spider-Man 46% Indiana Jones 38%

And He Emerges

Man, I suck! I haven't blogged in a while! How does this happen!? Either way, I have stuff to blog about, so maybe my problem is fixed... for now. Let's get to it.

October has lent itself to the more creative and imaginative side of muah, so I have picked up my drawing again and have set about to knitting up more projects with a cup of hot chocolate and a friend available close by. There is nothing quite able to compare to the utter perfection of a fire, hot chocolate, a book, music, knitting, a friend, a cloudy, cold sky outside a frosty, overly fogged window all viewed from a position of legs draped over the sides of a big overstuffed chair and a mellow buzz in the nogin. Well, that was too descriptive. Pardon the word explosion. It just sits there in my head making so happy I have to slap you all with a visualization. It is similar in perfection like my most commonly expressed combo of chocolate, coffee, and ciggarettes all enjoyed while sitting on a hill overlooking the sunrise-drenched city of Denver all swimming with early morning fog. Utter peacefulness. And it helps when a very large raven glides by to perch on a bench and give you most excellent magickal company. Yes, that actually happened to me. Mmmmmm...

But I didn't take that picture. I'm an idiot that doesn't carry my camera everywhere with me. Doi.

But another blog, another time, and I'll write more on that topic. This entry is to show off the progress I have on my right hand glove. It's got a little improvising (I do it shamelessly) and a lot of frustration wrapped up in that cuff, but now it's just a happy little whirl of fun yar that is taking on its own personality and look. I'm especially impressed with the cammo flair on the back.

But yeah, thats pretty much it for now. Pray that the next time I write is not tied up with the arrival of egg nog, that Ultimately Fabulous Heaven-In-A-Cup Drink of The Gods. If so, someone slap me.

Wait until I put my egg nog down.

Please.

A Shift and The Witches' Ball

Merkwurdig- strange, curious

German (pronounced mehrk-voor-digk)

The Autumnal holiday season is here, everybody.

The trees have mostly shifted to their Fall attire and the nights have gotten most pleasantly cold. I find it easier to imagine the dances the fauns perform for the moon in the countryside around me as I sit contemplating some magickal endeavour by candlelight. The Moon pops up over the horizon full and bursting with harvesty energy and the Farmer's Market sends out the tempting smells of roasted peppers and ripe apples in the god-awful early morning hours. Lol. It's time to pull out the ever fabulous and fashionable scarves you have knitted up in the previous months and go for a stroll over the carpets of oranges and reds outside your door. And pack along a hat with that too. Pointed or no, Halloween is less than a month away! Gotta get ready.

With the seasonal shift comes the onslaught of colds typical of the cold months. Due to stress in need of a good boot out of my system, I've had a couple of near bouts with sickness usually accompanied by massive headaches and a desire to rip my guts out. Today being one of them. Anybody comes up with a miracle cure or an Elixir of Life, tell me, ay? Uuuuugh.

We had our first Knitting Group night of the month Monday with our usual faithfuls and a few oldies. Quite a few people ended up coming and there are more to come here soon. I managed to wrangle a few out of the Mystery Book Club with Valerie's help. Lol. Actually, she did most of the wrangling, I just showed up and used my manly charm to rope the ladies in. LOL. Yes, I'm full of myself, but only when I want to be. Anyway, here are some of the pictures from the night. It was one of our best.

Let's get the fashion show going! Bernadette finished her fluffy white scarf, her first, and put on a small one-chair fashion show for us. Hott!

Some of the girls did some hand spinning...

Some worked on projects for others...

A couple took it easy...

And some modeled their goods. Minds out of the gutter!! Now!

We also got visited by my sista! Well, my adopted sister, but who cares, really? Anna is in the midst of a crochet project. 'T will look tre fab when finished.




Up and coming so very soon is the Witches' Ball. A night of dancing, magick, celebration, and costumes galore! All the details for the ball can be found here. I plan on attending this year, my first, with the lovely Anna. (Details for a costume are developing in my head as we speak) There will be vendors, belly dancers, costume contests, tarot readings, the works! Everyone is invited. All the details you need to know up front are as follows:

When- Saturday, October 27th, 2007, from 7 pm until midnight
Where- Highlands Masonic Center, 3550 Federal Boulevard Denver, CO (at 35th and Federal - West Entrance)
Tickets- Adults $13, Couples $25, Children 6 to 12 $6, Children under 6 are free.

Wear your finest costumery!
(costumes optional)

Presented by Living Goddess LLC

Tickets can be gathered at the local metaphysical stores in Denver. A full list is given on LG's page.

And keep a watch out for the witches!

I hear they are out and about above us!

Might As Well...

I'm A Goner

This was once the blog that told of my doomed abilities at fending off the zombie apocalypse. Sigh.

Images of a Party

Our first official night went off fabulously, all. It was a night of The Faithful with the great addition of Sheila from the bookfloor working on her snazzy sock creation. Pray, I am short on time today, so I shall leave you with a fleeting view of such revelry you shall long for such wondrous good times.




It began with a fierce round of Magic: The Gathering in which Jan was beaten (but you didn't hear this from me, he he he) by Ryan, and then moved on to conquer me with her brilliant artifact deck. Which worked, by the way. I learned a few things, yes I did. In the backround was Valerie, knitting her beautiful wrap and secretly planning her strategy for our match next Monday, goblins and wizards. Hmmmm...



Then we all got back down to the business of knitting our separate projects. The table was soon cluttered with pumpkin spice mochas, mango tea, scones, straight up coffee, yarn of every color and style, books we couldn't help but devour with our eyes, and all the chatter that comes with knitting fiends and their conclaves. It was our first Third Monday, and next week will be our Off Monday. See everyone there. Bring your knitting, your books, and most importantly your stories of your crazy week.

Cheerio.

Great Tidings of Increased Blogging

A new job is on the move. This will be my second job on top of the Barnies and Noblies full time position that I hold. And second job means more money! And more money means Halloween extravaganza and a fixed computer. Yes, my darling, soon you shall function fully and beautifully once again!



As for the Halloween extravaganza, I have big plans for an industrial vampyre costume. Similar to Lestat's (left) look in Queen of the Damned. Well, plus a shirt. I'm not that sexy... yet. I need money for the not-so-expensive fangs I'm buying from Vampfangs, and some chunky silver jewlrey I need for my fingers and ear along with the cross I want for my neck. I think I'll get that from Hot Topic or some other gothic site, or, even better, some little out-of-the-way shop. And that whole cross-of-burning-holy-death thing is such a fable! Well, the whole vamp thing is a fable, but the cross thing has no metaphysical basis. Makes a good story though. I'll get into that the closer we get to Halloween and I start exploring the different folklore and fantasy around my favorite holiday. But the clothes I plan on raiding from the local thrift store since goth/industrial are so damn expensive anymore! Damn goth wannabes! You're not goth, you're just emo with a goth fetish! Arrgh! Okay, I'm done. To each their own.


Yay, Halloween!

Fire and Flight

Sticking with the post-parent rebellion I'm currently enjoying, I went and got my tattoo started this week. It was oh so much fun! It was supposed to be incredibly painful and sore, but I sat through the whole session just fine and today I don't even really remember that it's there. Until I smell it. It's got that A+D stuff on it and it smells like a wet dog at times. Uhhg. But it's not bad. I'm completely pleased with it. It needs a bit of touch up, which will happen in a couple of weeks with the fill-in, and the tips need to be extended just a bit to make it a bit more symmetrical, but not bad at all. I had it done by my friend Molly who just finished her apprenticeship to another awesome guy and is now fully able to professionally tattoo and charge you for it! She does awesome work, so check her out if you are thinkin' of getting a piece done.



The symbolism of the tattoo is one that I've been working on since I was seventeen. It has the Celtic symbol for inner strength and also triplicity of being as is the popular idea today. That also ties in with my Celtic heritage that, while muddied considerably, still is pretty strong for me. The curling fire represents emergence and passion, 'cus who don't love passion! Seriously though, passion is important in any artists life and I draw on mine continuously. The tattoo also has a yin yang element that of course represents balance and duality. That's a no brainer for me. The fire unfurls to represent wings which carry four meanings- the phoenix, which is one of my favorite mythical and metaphysical creatures and also ties in with the fire; flight, when I dream, my dreams are of flying and are usually remembered for a long time after waking and they also are my favorites; freedom, also felt in my dreams while flying, but something I have also come into realization of as my inheritance as a human being in the last few years; and Air, which is the element of my zodiac sign Gemini. So appropriate, too, if you know me at all.

And that's about all for this post. On a side note, Fall is finally here. It swept in on first fallen leaves rustling in the wind. The first day this week was a perfect cold, grey day with just enough sullen beauty in the sky and earth to be appropriately chilling. In the old pagan beliefs and many other earth born people's today it signified the slow fading of the Old God as he made his decent into the Underworld. The Dark Mother began her reign over the land and winter settled in, blanketing the ground until the God was reborn and emerged from the Goddess' womb to cover the Earth with new beginnings. Sigh. I love all the old stories.

Take that eHarmony!

I was going to post my thought on this, but this article sums it up well enough in it's first half. All you ever wanted to know about the scandalous eHarmony and its reasons for not allowing same sex couples a chance on its site.

Pretty f'ed up if you ask me.

Oh, and I love the guy's incredulous look. Reminds me of times not so long ago when I dared. Yup, same look. Lol!

Officially Official

What does the word "official" mean to you?

To all the knitters at the Mondays@7 group, it means that we now are officially sanctioned (oooooo!) by Barnies and Noblies and acquire all the perks theretofor... allowed us. Lol. We will be meeting "officially" (we defy them to keep us from meeting every damned Monday night, ha!) the first and third Mondays of the month, at seven pm, in the south-east corner of the store with a wonderful spread of the mountains visible out the windows behind us. A few expressed their dissatisfaction with our new locale, but I'm quite happy with it.

So there.