Liralen's Adventures Through Life

Good wishes to all who are reading this for your Winter holiday, whatever it is. I'm sitting here by my Christmas tree with the presents under it and the stockings up and the cookie and milk that Jet set up on the hearth, out of the way of the actual fireplace so that Santa won't trip over it. It's good to see family traditions being upheld. The several inches of powdery perfect Colorado snow outside doesn't hurt the ambiance either. I have a mug of hot chocolate and a nearly empty fridge as John and I are prepping for an adventure. We'll be driving a whole van of instruments for the Silver Creek High School Marching Band to Florida for them to use at the Outback Bowl's half time show. Luckily, another set of parents are going to be driving the van back, so we don't have to make the 2000 mile trip twice in a week... I am grateful. Jet is now sixteen and will pretty much be taking care of himself until the night before his band heads for the airpor...

My trips for BigBadCon are always filled with feasts: feasts of the body, mind, and creative spirit. The Chef Chu's feast was one of those, with friends that I haven't seen for a long time, with food that I cannot get in the Boulder County area. The dishes were of Peking duck, sea bass steamed with ginger and scallions, dry cooked string beans, pea sprouts with garlic, and tangerine beef along with the favorites of snow white chicken, pot stickers, and cream cheese crab wontons fried deep and crisp. But best of all it was with people I haven't seen for a year, and have talked to just about a often, people I used to game with all the time and whom really feed my creative juices: Trip, Earl, Cat, Carl, Chrisber, Christy, and their Teo. It was fun to tell them stories of Jet, who is now taller than I am and driving. *laughs* They'd last seen him when he was tiny, still holdable in arms, stealing glasses, and crawling about playing with tableclothes that hung over the ...

And going to BigBadCon at the end of this week. I'm a little sad that I had to miss the last of Isabel's visit to our home to get here, but I think I really needed some time away to evaluate and think about things. My art show had gone quite well, at Mimi's studio. There are photos of my show space on Flickr, and John and I helped Mimi and Paul clean out a beautiful little breezeway that had amazing light for the display space. It was small, and the paintings were pretty crowded in there, but people got to see them, which was the whole point of it all. There was even a very nice little table/desk where I could put all my painting materials so that I could demonstrate how it worked or allow others to try out the ink, brushes, and paper. I had an outlet so I could bring a water boiler and make herbal teas and it was amazingly nice because the weather during the show was really rainy for Colorado, days of rain, which is really unusual. But it meant that a lot of people...

I feel a little like I'm slipping sideways instead of moving forward or back. I'm still gaming, but in different venues than just TF2. I'm now playing Terraria, Civ V, CS:GO, Overwatch, Payday 2, and, most of all, Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege, mostly because I get to play with Jet, and he and his friends really like playing with me, no matter how good or bad I might be. I'm helpful, I cheer them on, and I usually do something smart in a game where there are so very many ways to die by being stupid. Still, I've decided that I'm out of competitive, and that's been a good decision all around. I am painting, spinning, and even dyeing again. There have been some fun things in the past few months, and the bees are still doing quite well. There are mites, but I think I'll just treat them this fall and it might help with next year. I've been getting through a huge volunteer work load for the Longmont Studio Tour, and a lot of it has been for the m...

Today was one of those days.... I was added back onto the roster of my old 6's team, I got my bee allergy shot, I helped plan a siege defense, I got to play Rainbow Siege Six for the first time with my son and his friend, I had a last minute dental appointment with my periodontist that was nearly foiled by my GPS, and I might have a mild eye infection as well. But I got Dairy Queen and good gaming. I think I'm a little tired.

I had a salad today. There are some things that I miss when I'm on the road, and in particular, oddly enough, is the food that I can get at home. A salad with half a slice of crumbled bacon, half a perfectly hard boiled egg with a moist yolk, bits of Stilton, apple, candied pecans, creamy blue cheese dressing, and a whole bowlful of young spring greens that were on sale at the local super market for only 2.79, less than a quarter of what such a salad would cost at any of the restaurants. Or a soft boiled egg with a few droplets of soy sauce on the yolk with a slice of toast, buttered and slathered with quince jelly from the quince tree in our neighbor's backyard... It's good to be home.

There was very intermittent internet in Winnemucca, NV. So I'm catching up today. It's funny sitting nearly halfway across the country, still thinking about the water from Crater Lake...