In Which I Blather About An Assortment Of Things I Find Interesting

This past weekend was the yearly "400 Mile Yard Sale" in this area, when people hold yard sales all up and down Hwy 68, which is a few miles from here. J and I didn't go to many of them, but we did stop at a couple. Plus we stopped at Blue Licks State Park where there was a small craft fair/flea market area set up. Despite trying to be virtuous regarding money, I couldn't resist this hand-made glass pendant: I have no idea whatsoever what I'll do with it, but isn't it pretty? And it was pretty darn inexpensive for hand-made art glass. I don't know how well it shows up in the photo, but the fish-y shapes are silver. Even if all I do is hang it in a window, it makes me smile. It's about an inch and a half across. My artistic output for the weekend was to finish a couple of small collage pieces I'd committed to making for some art-swaps. One is for a swap called "Anonymous Secrets" and is inspired by the PostSecret website. I'm not going to post a photo of that one here because, you know....not so SECRET if I post a photo on my blog, yes? The other one is called "Famous Quotes". Here is the piece I did for that swap. You should be able to read the text, but if not (it is a bit reduced in size so it'll fit better on the page), it says "In the real world as in dreams, nothing is quite what it seems." --- "Book of Counted Sorrows", Dean Koontz. It's all digital collage, as I'm TRYING, with somewhat mixed success, to learn to become marginally competent at Photoshop!! Speaking of Mr. Koontz, I haven't done any book reviews lately and I don't think I'm up for doing any full reviews now, but I wanted to mention the three books I've finished in the past week or two and tell you briefly what I thought of them. "Monday Mourning" by Kathy Reichs --- I didn't love it, but I liked it. I've been thinking back over her books in this series and find that, for some reason, I don't like the ones that take place in Montreal as much as the other ones. And that's odd, because I'd like to visit Montreal sometime. But it just seems to me that her stories set there move at a slower pace than the ones set in North Carolina. Maybe it's just me. So, yeah...not my favorite of hers, but not bad. I'd give it a B-. "Velocity" by Dean Koontz --- I adore Dean Koontz's books. I think his worst books are still better than many writers' best books. That being said, this one also wasn't one of my favorites. It's pretty dark and the ones I like best are where he has darkness mixed with humor. I love the contrast of the two. I'd give this one a B- too. "Dead as a Doornail" by Charlaine Harris --- the latest in the Sookie Stackhouse series. Fun! I liked this one a lot. I'm a teensy bit tired of the thing where it seems like every hunky supernatural male Sookie runs across is lusting after her, and I would've liked to have seen a bit more of Eric, but still...fun read. This one gets an A- from me. Virtue Report I'll get the confession out of the way right up front. I ate a small piece of cake for dessert at lunch yesterday. It was cinnamon coffee cake and it was delish. I was ragingly PMS-y and I'm sorry, but no one, no matter how virtuous, should have to go through perimenopausal PMS without sugar. So I ate cake at a restaurant so I could have just one small piece and walk away and there would be no more of it at home to call my name. I walked. I drank lots of water. I ate healthy the rest of the day. Other than the Incident Of the Fabulously Sugar-Flour-and-Fat-Laden Nearly-Orgasmic Cinnamon Cake I was virtuous as all get out. Now if I can just get through today. Today I am still ragingly hormonal and I would gladly, CHEERFULLY, hit someone over the head with a stick to get another piece of cake. Bugger.