Today’s song is “What Are You Doing New Years?”

Last night the guys all went out and I worked on my collection of goals for 2010. #2 son and I ordered a pizza while it was just the two of us here. Since Wii Fit measures weight in tenths of a pound, I can therefore tell you that eating pizza immediately caused me to gain half a pound.

But I have a good plan for my health this year, including exercise and eating right and sleeping and taking care of my back and stuff like that. I also plan to return some creativity to my daily life, with making things (the pictures today comprise my entire Finished Objects list for the year 2009, I’m sad to say) and keeping my home as it should be for  humans, not computers.

That’s all for personal goals.

I had simple business goals last year. I had averaged 15 billable hours a week in 2008, and wanted to increase that to 20. I didn’t keep very good track this year, I’m afraid, but when I managed to Toggl consistently, I saw a fairly consistent 30 billable hours a week. I’d like to keep that up.

I want to decrease unbillable time, and to shift what unbillable time I have more toward learning and less toward scope creep and phone meetings.
 
One of my business goals last year was to get all my business systems in place, and I didn’t. I’m closer; I incorporated, I have at least some of my accounting data inputted into my software, I have some things down to routine well enough that I can delegate them to my daughters and give good estimates for them, I invoice people pretty consistently. I have a CPA to take my tax stuff to, and he doesn’t seem too horrified by what I’ve been doing.

I’m hoping to get all those systems in place early in this year.

Another of my business goals last year was to get on top of all my software. However, as the Art Teacher says, “Our software is hard and complicated and it changes all the time. Get used to it.” So I’m happy that I passed my html certification, and fine with the fact that I have a whole new crop of software to learn this year.

I think it likely that I’ll have some more surprises this year.

But, while last year had some challenges, it also had some very nice points. Business is good, my youngest had a great first semester at the college of his choice (where we could never have sent him when I worked at the store), I spent a week in Kansas City and a couple of weeks in L.A.. both of which were very like vacations.
So I’m entering the new year with a great deal of optimism.

Yesterday I had a marvelous package from my old school friend in L.A., filled with goodies from Trader Joe’s, including a grapefruit-scented body wash which promises to create feelings of optimism.

Granted that I’m already feeling optimistic, and have done my yoga and strength workouts this morning, I still intend to go shower with grapefruit mousse. I think I will then be ready for today’s cool projects.

I’m writing a law firm’s website and continuing with arts center lessons on immigration, and I need to do a report for the Chocolatier to send to his European partners.

But I plan to take tomorrow off.

I’m not sleeping well. I keep waking up, looking at the clock to see that it’s too early to get up, and trying to get back to sleep. Today I gave up and got up early to polish up my business plan and send it to my SCORE counselor. Of course, I was also able to chat with one of my IT guys, who hadn’t yet gone to bed. Being a computer guy means you’re never alone.

I’ve also been continuing to consume Christmas cookies and candy, though I have prepared chicken and vegetables and rice every evening. Does making low calorie but boring meals increase the likelihood of eating cookies before bed to the point at which it would make more sense to go ahead and serve sauces at dinner?

Still having fun with Wii Fit, too. In just a minute here I’m going to go do today’s workout. Starting to work first was probably an error, but I won’t compound it by continuing. I just have lots to do — I got two new assignments and an inquiry yesterday.

My business plan was supposed to have a marketing plan component, but I haven’t yet had time to do any marketing. I just wrote that I had a plan if things ever slowed down enough to need one.

However, I did stop working last night at a reasonable time and did some knitting and reading. I’m back to working on Salt Peanuts from Interweave Knits. There seems to be something seriously wrong with the pattern. I’ve linked to the blog posts of the Keyboard Biologist. She says the front s require “a very high level of integration” and suggests that there might be errors. I’m feeling the same way. In fact, I skipped the whole short row bit and just knitted it to look like the schematic.

Anyone have exciting New Year’s Eve plans? We’re expecting more snow, so I have an excuse for just hanging out at home, which is what I’ve been doing every year for most of this century. Sigh.

I got a new assignment yesterday, and another new one today. I’m about 16% through with the current arts center lessons, but I had hoped to finish them this week. While it is good that I continue to be busy, it looks as though that idea I had of getting all my filing done and closing out my books and so forth is not realistic.

I’m trying, in the whole area of health and wellness, to spend this week working out morning and evening routines that will allow me to get to my 7:30 class dressed like a grown up, eat proper breakfast and lunches, and get enough exercise to keep me from turning into a hopeless tech guy and/or decrepit old lady. I read a survey that said that among all British workers — and I think they have stuff like coal mining over there — tech guys are the least healthy.

I remember last year reading that U.S. tech guys turned out, in a study, to have problems with their backs and eyes, broken body clocks, rotten eating habits, no exercise, and terrible “sleep hygiene” which sounds pretty serious somehow. Not to mention dressing like schlubs and having the grooming of a bunch of terrorists. I resolved then to move away from the tech guy lifestyle into which I was descending. I failed.

So I’m trying again for 2010. It isn’t 2010 yet, but I’m working on a proper schedule with sleeping, meals, dressing, and stuff. This seems to be the right starting point. I’m also working out some clear goals. So far, I’ve been sleeping about 7 hours a night and doing my Wii Fit workout every morning, and yesterday I had reasonably balanced meals. True, I also ate Christmas goodies in front of the TV set, but it is still Christmas, strictly speaking.

If you’re thinking about goals for the new year, check out “Goal Setting for Creatives.” I like the author’s attitude, and I found her book very useful, even though I am one of the Franklin Covey crowd she mentions.

Today’s song is “Once in Royal David’s City,” which is perfect for humming sotto voce while you clean out your files or figure out your New Year’s Resolutions. The words are a little bit soppy, since it was written for small children in 1848 by a clergyman’s wife, but they are about being good, which is a good start for those resolutions and goals. The tune, written the following year, is very pretty indeed. If you’ve got a boy soprano on hand, this is the perfect song for him, and it would be nice on violin or penny whistle, too.

Today’s song is “Brightest and Best of the Sons of the Morning” , a really pretty hymn well-suited to singing around the piano.

I’m not singing around the piano today. I’m plunging into work, with #2 son snoozing away on the daybed in his bedroom which I took over as an office while he was away at school. I have lots of interesting work today, including a five-lesson unit for the arts center and a new project, a forthcoming site for shopmobbing in Chicago, and any Chicagoans who’d like to share their impressions of the shopping scene there will be greatly appreciated.

I started the day with Wii Fit, a fun way to exercise. I’m growing concerned about my health — to the point of making it a high priority in my goals for next year. I don’t want to act like my business is now so settled that it’ll take care of itself, but it does at least seem stable enough that I don’t have to be as obsessive about it as I was last year.

Having taken a long weekend has made me remember that I have other interests in life, and could enjoy having some evenings and perhaps even weekends off. This week is, for me, the week for looking back over the past year and planning for the upcoming one.

It should probably also be the time of year for filing and cleaning up my accounting and stuff like that.

With a side of continuing frivolity, eating of cookies, and playing games.

Good morning! I have to get ready for church, so I will just bring you the song of the day: “Earth Today Rejoices.”

We had a day of sloth yesterday, with books and games and movies and food to keep us amused.

Today we go over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house.

It is the Feast of Stephen, which you may recall from the carol “Good King Wenceslas.” This song, from the middle of the 19th century, tells of the good deeds and miraculously warm feet of the Duke of Bohemia. The sheet music
will come in handy for harmonies around the piano today.

I made quiche and almond pastry this morning, and #2 daughter and I (she may be writing about her adventures at the biochem plant last night at her xanga) held a business meeting to plan for the new year.

Off to do stuff!

Merry Christmas!

We have a white Christmas for the first time since 1975, so we’re not going anywhere today. I am therefore reporting on Christmas Eve festivities for the the relatives we won’t be seeing today.

We were hearing a lot about the terrible blizzard yesterday, so I was in church worrying about #2 daughter driving down from the Midwest and #1 daughter driving from Colorado to the state where she lives, but everyone arrived safely.

#2 daughter arrived just in time for the second church service. We sat together in the congregation — rare for us. I went up to do my music, and she sang descants from the middle of the church so that people had to turn around to see who it was back there. It was a nice service with lots of music. We had “Ave Maria” on the sax and one of the teenagers sang “In the Bleak Midwinter.” The Baritone sang “O Holy Night” and he and I and a couple of other folks did a quartet (the only piece that didn’t get applause. Our church not only claps during services, which is weird, but they also withhold applause when they’re not impressed) and then I sang “Born on a New Day” a cappella because the piano player had left early in fear of the weather.

#2 daughter collected her hugs and greetings, and  then she and I got home just as the snow began falling in earnest.

We had a feast prepared by the boys. They felt that lettuce, tomato, and onion for the sandwiches — oh, and pickles — were sufficient vegetable, but we did have some fruit. We probably won’t get beriberi.

We also had a lot of sweets, as you can see.

We ate and opened presents. While there were a number of popular gifts, the main thrill of the evening was Beatles Rock Band for the Wii. #2 son had brought everyone T shirts from the intermural Ultimate Frisbee team he’s on, the Ultimate Flying Squirrels, which featured an illustration of a Ninja Squirrel. Four different colors — we’re saving #1 daughter’s for her.

The kids therefore put on their  Ts and made themselves into the  Ultimate Flying Squirrels, a Beatles Cover Band, and played Rock Band.

I joined in on the vocals. I have the advantage of knowing the songs, but still got a 91% — #2 son got 100% on one of the songs.

There’s a drum set and a guitar as well as the vocal microphone, and there are also screaming fans. This is a fun game.

My husband gave up and went to bed after a while, but the kids and I stayed up to watch one of the DVDs — I think everyone got a DVD from someone.

This morning, they checked out their stockings. I made sausage biscuits for them, but they plunged immediately into the further adventures of the Ultimate Flying Squirrels.

We are snowed in, because our state shuts down entirely if we get three inches of snow, but as you can see we are well provisioned. We have enough games, movies, books, and snacks to last till the spring thaw.

Merry Christmas!

Here’s how it looks chez fibermom on the day before Christmas. 

I got up at my usual time, but did not start working. Instead, I ran to the grocery before any else got there and bought more wrapping paper and more eggs. I had run out of these two things, so I had no choice.

I came back then and did some more baking.

I probably had a choice on this. Last night on the way to rehearsal I made my usual cookie parcels for the organist and choir leader, and it seemed as though I might be short on cookies.
We can’t let that happen, can we?

This morning, when I pulled all the containers out of the freezer, I found that I was actually pretty well stocked, but by then I’d already made a couple more kinds: Conga Bars and Turtle Bars.

You see them here in a sort of quilt arrangement with Apricot Almond. Bars. I don’t usually make bar cookies at Christmas, because they don’t pack as well and sometimes aren’t as pretty, but they are very good. The basic system for bar cookies is to make a shortbread cookie of some kind (almond and butterscotch, in these cases, but any kind is good). Then you mix up three eggs, about a cup of sugar (choose your type of sugar or syrup according to the flavors you’re using), and butter if you feel lavish. That’s the basic plan, but now you add things. For Turtle Bars, you want melted chocolate and brown sugar. Conga Bars have chocolate chips, chopped pecans, and coconut. For Apricot Almond Bars, you have to chop and cook dried apricots and give them a hit of almond extract and a bit of brandy or Cointreau. Stir these things into the eggs and pour all that onto the cookie layer. Then put chopped nuts on top — walnuts, pecans, and almonds respectively for these bars.

I think I felt as thought here wouldn’t be sufficient cookies because I made them in a disorganized way,  didn’t make a list, and forgot whatall I’d made.

The presents were also sort of like that. I had a plan for if I ended up making enough money to spend my usual amount, and an alternate plan in case I didn’t. However, things were suspenseful for so long that I think I may have done both.

I think it’s also sort of uneven. My kids were brought up not to be concerned about that, and they’re also conscious I think of the enormous unevenness of their current costs — #2 son’s tuition is more than double #1 son’s tuition, and the girls are self-supporting. However, my own mother worried about this and always apologized at Christmas for any possible appearance of favoritism, and I think I’ve been doing that myself this year.

My kids are being indulgent about it.

They’re also being bossy. Are your kids as bossy as mine?

Today’s song is “O Magnum Mysterium,” a song in Latin about the great mystery of the non-human animals being allowed to be present at the birth of Jesus.

I like Christmas carols about things like that — what the angels might have smelled like, or how amazing it is that animals got to hang out with the Song of God — things that I wouldn’t normally think about at all. Thought-provokingness may not be what you look for in a carol, but why not?

Both Victoria and Lauridsen have done tunes of amazing beauty for this lyric.

Tonight I will be at the church for an excessive amount of time (four hours), but I do get to sing “All My Heart This Night Rejoices,” “Born on a New Day,” Moonlight on the Manger,” and “Bring a Torch, Jeanette Isabella” with “People Look East,” so I guess it’s worth it.

Merry Christmas!

Today’s song is the lilting Irish carol, “Don Oiche Ud ImBeithil.” The words are pretty in English or in Irish, and it’s a calming tune.

Which might be what we need right now. I got my contracts signed and found my classroom for next term, and took #2 son out to do some final small errands. We took lunch to #1 son, who was working all alone in the ice cream parlor, and he expressed dismay at our having gone Christmas shopping without him, even if we actually had just bought things like cables and blank CDs.

We therefore agreed to wait for him before going to any interesting place, and I will therefor be going out to a bookstore this morning.

Even so, I got quite a bit of work done, though not all of it. I also got two new assignments from the arts center and a couple of little things from regular clients. This morning I arose to another little thing and also a “Justify Your Existence” notice from one of my regulars. I want to finish early today and take off a few days.

So off I go to try to get enough done to make that possible.

“Christmas for Cowboys” is some kind of special genre: Christmas cowboy songs. Lyrics and guitar tab. If you don’t like classical music, or pop music, or folk music, or you want something really different to sing, or perhaps you plan to go to a party tonight and get drunk enough to sing stupid songs, then this song might save you from “Percy the Puny Poinsettia.” John Denver recorded it.

I tried to get the choirlet to sing this with me around the piano, because I got the words to this and many more holiday peculiarities at a yard sale last summer in the form of a Reader’s Digest Christmas Song Book. They wouldn’t cooperate. These ladies will wear bobbly antennae on their heads in public, give each other risque birthday cards, will sing “Oscillating Fan,” and have never yet shown any signs of excessively refined taste, yet they turned up their noses at this song. What can I say? It’s still the song of the day.

If you simply can’t stand it, I offer you an alternate: “The Wind Through the Olive Trees,” This song is simple, elegant, and reverent. Is it as much fun to sing as “Christmas for Cowboys”? Depends on your mood.

Honestly, I’m not in a great mood today, because I have to drive to the Next County to sign my contract for spring. I don’t really have the time, I hate driving on the freeway (though it’s good for me to do so now and again, isn’t it?), and I have Amazon Vine at 2:00.

Also, my husband is in his annual car-buying mood. I don’t know why, but every year or so at Christmas time he decides that he wants to buy a new car. We haven’t finished paying off the cars we have, not to mention tuition (and I still haven’t gathered the funds to get my dental work done) so I don’t even want to hear about it. But he offered to go with me today so he could visit his favorite car lot, which is in the Next County. So I may have a quarrel and sulking (him if I win, me if he wins) in the forecast for today, as well.

I finished the fourth unit for the Arts Center yesterday, picked up another small job which I hope to complete today, and got a bit ahead on the blogs. I hope to get to the point today at which I can stop working tomorrow about noon and not start up again till after Christmas.