Jan. 13th, 2007

grinninfoole: (Default)
I have been looking back at 2006 while looking ahead to 2007.  We shall see where this year takes me.

First, looking back:  I completed  some of my resolutions for last year, and started others.  (click here if you'd care to see for yourself http://grinninfoole.livejournal.com/2006/01/04/) ; I have completed the primary goal of getting a job that pays adequately, working full time at Modern Myths.  After the disappointment of not getting the upcoming full-time position, Lefty and I talked about the financial particulars of how I get paid, and we have worked out an arrangement wherein I am off the books as an hourly employee, and now get guaranteed payments as an owner.  In practical terms, this means that, for about the same cost to the store, I get paid more than $1.50 more hour, which will cover the mortgage and a bit more, which I think will be adequate.  It's not a solution for the rest of my days, but this will be the first time in my life I have earned my own keep, so I claim victory and depart the field.

I have also accomplished the contingent goals of marriage and home-ownership.  The other goals are more open-ended: I didn't exercise every day last year, but I did exercise some days.  I didn't play much with Feisty, but we did get her a playmate.  I didn't write a book, but I did start writing one.  So, while I sat down to write this feeling like a failure, on reflection I see that I was actually quite successful last year.  Hurray!  And damn this self-criticism!

So, for 2007:

1) Finish my book (first draft, at least).  I have started writing a novel, probably a fantasy novel, though in heart it feels more like SF. The world needs it like a hole in the head, but I'm doing it anyway.

2) Keep exercising.

3) Stop falling back on damaging behavior when I feel upset, like eating lots of sugar and dairy.

4) Read 50 books this year.

I'd like to learn Spanish, but I don't know when I'd make the time for it, now that I'm working full-time and writing.  I list this here not as a goal, but an aspiration.  I shan't give up on this.

This goals list seems thin as I look it over.  I must give it more thought.

Books!

Jan. 13th, 2007 04:35 pm
grinninfoole: (Default)
In 2006, I read some books, many of them at work.  I don't recall them all, but here's a list of the one's that I do:

The Translator by John Crowley. 
The Dark Tower book 7, the Dark Tower by Stephen King.
Fun Home by Alison Bechdel
Blankets by Craig Thompson
Why We Buy by Paco Underhill
Call of the Mall also by Underhill
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
Kill the Dead by Tanith Lee (wow, she's good.)
The Gift of Fear by Gavin DeBecker
A Feast For Crows by George R. R. Martin
Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut (read to me by Millari)
Brian Bendis's run on Daredevil


For 2007, I have so far read:

Eragon by Christopher Paolini (well, I skimmed it really, but that's all the book deserves.  It's not actually bad, but it is juvenile and derivative, and would not have been published by anyone other than his parents.  Let us hope that he continues to grow as an author, and years from now looks back on it with mild embarassment.)

Artesia and Artesia Afield by Mark Smylie (graphic novels).  The first two parts of the Book of Dooms, what promises to be a sprawling fantasy epic.  Avoid it if that phrase gives you hives, but if it doesn't, definitely check it out.  Smylie has a lush illustrative style, a complex and carefully considered imaginary world, and a good visual imagination for depicting magic and gods and spirits spread over a sweeping battlefield.  Artesia is a young mercenary captain and sorcerer who may have outlived her usefulness to her king.  In part two, she leads an army to join in a major war that has begun to the south.  This series is bloody, sexy, erotic, shocking, novel, and really good.  Smylie is, in part, writing military fiction about armies in conflict and units maneuvering.  This could be, and often is, dull and confusing in prose novels, but Smylie is doing a COMIC, so we can see what the hell is going on, and that makes it much clearer and more engaging.

So, that's three down, forty seven to go.

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