101 Things in 1001 Days

Thing 6b - Complete!

2018-05-25T23:55:01Z

06b. Get engagement ring fixed

Date Completed: 22 September 2017

I stopped wearing this well over a year ago because I'd started worrying it might fall apart. One of the posts was sheared off and two gems were loose, plus there was a scratch in the main stone. But they did a fantastic job fixing it, and it's lovely again. :)

Thing 77b - complete!

2018-05-25T23:52:41Z

77b. Tour Ben Lomond

Completed: 7 October 2017

Ben Lomond was a lot more interesting than I'd expected because it had been a field hospital during the Civil War and is dressed up like that now, complete with sounds and scents. Definitely worth visiting, but be prepared. That gangrene smell is something else.

Thing 7b - complete!

2018-05-25T23:49:32Z

07b. Get T. Rowe Price stuff sorted

Date Completed: 8 May 2018

I got a new job at the beginning of April, and a month later I rolled my 401K accounts from two previous jobs into the current one, so I'm all set. For now. Heh.

Thing 70b - Complete!

2018-05-25T23:26:24Z

70b. Attend a local festival or fair

Date Completed: 7 October 2017

When I first picked out this Thing, the idea was that I'd attend a local festival that I hadn't attended before. However, I didn't specify, so I decided to count Centreville Day 2017. I hadn't been to one since 2011, and was a bit disappointed to discover that the festival had changed not one whit. Whomp whomp.

Thing 76b - complete!

2018-05-25T23:24:40Z

76b. Start a hyperlocal tourism journal and make five entries

Completed: 22 October 2017

My original idea for this journal was more text-based, with restaurant reviews and stuff like that, but ultimately decided it should be a sketchbook. It's still a work in progress, with some sketches of various landmarks and plans to gluebook over the pages ruined by false starts (of which there have been several). I think it'll end up being something I can be proud of, though its deadline is surprisingly the same as the end of these 1001 days, as I'm closing on a house in Rockville, Maryland, at the end of June. Goodbye, Centreville! Hopefully I'll get all my drawings done before I leave. I think I will. There actually isn't a whole lot here interesting enough to draw.

Thing 47b - Complete!

2018-05-25T23:01:13Z

47b. Read one of Ixy's favorite books

Date Completed: 12 May 2018

Going Postal by Terry Pratchett: Moist von Lipwig, fresh off the scaffolds, is offered a job in lieu of a death sentence for his many swindles: become postmaster. This is no small task: unsent letters have been piling up in the post office for decades, and everyone stopped mailing letters when the "clacks" - a sort of visual telegraph - came to be. With the help of a memorable cast of characters, Moist takes it upon himself to save the post office and return it to its former glory, even if he has to return to his old con-artist ways to do it. The whole thing is very fun and very funny, and you don't even have to be familiar with Discworld to enjoy it. (I read the first Discworld book over a decade ago so I was basically coming into it cold.) Definitely recommended.

Thing 48b - complete!

2018-05-25T22:58:02Z

48b. Read one of Kate's favorite books

Date Completed: 22 December 2017

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell: Cath is a prolific author of Simon Snow fanfic (Simon Snow being the protagonist of the fictional Totally Not Harry Potter series by Gemma T. Leslie) and starting her first year of college. She is, quite simply, completely outside her comfort zone. Her twin sister Wren has decided to try living apart for the first time ever, so Cath is rooming with a stranger named Reagan and, for all intents and purposes, Reagan's maybe-boyfriend Levi. She is taking an upperclass-level writing course taught by an actual novelist, and befriends Nick, who starts as her partner in an assignment and becomes a regular cowriter. Cath is kind of a pile of neuroses to begin with, so all this change on top of the regular family drama she's already dealing with makes her life pretty difficult. But I gotta say, this was a delight to read. I was transported back to college in so many ways, both in general (dorm life, walking everywhere) and more specific (creative writing classes, the dark recesses of the library at night, attending a Harry Potter book launch party). I've never been a big fanfic writer, but there was once a time when writing was almost like breathing, the way it is for Cath. Most importantly, I loved all the characters. I've encountered versions of them in real life many times, and perhaps because of that I felt a deep affection for all of them, even the terrible ones (but in different ways).

Interspersed in the book are selections from Simon Snow - either the original books, fanfic written by Cath and Wren in high school, or from Cath's current work in progress, "Carry On Simon". The similarities to Harry Potter are intentional, of course, but there's enough difference for the passages to be interesting. Cath is a huge fan of Simon Snow - all her posters and t-shirts and most of her other stuff is somehow related - and yet her fandom is never treated like a joke. The reader is never meant to look down on her for it. It's a refreshing change, really. Cath isn't one of those fans who won't hear a word against her beloved characters; as a fanfic author, she loves writing endless "what if" stories, exploring how the world would be if Gemma T. Leslie had made different choices. This novel is, in some ways, a love letter to fandom in general.

In short (ha!), I really, really enjoyed this book. Some of it was nostalgia, I'm sure, but mostly I just liked the characters and their interactions and I wanted to hear more about their lives. I'd love for there to be a sequel about Cath's sophomore year, and one of these days I do plan on picking up Carry On. (Yes, Rowell wrote a full-length version of the Simon Snow book Cath is writing throughout Fangirl.) I don't really consider myself to be a fangirl in general, but I am a fan of Fangirl.

Thing 50b - complete!

2018-05-25T22:54:36Z

50b. Read one of Six's favorite books

Date Completed: 22 December 2017

Rifles for Watie by Harold Keith: Jeff joins the Union Army in Kansas and fights in the Civil War for a few years. Stuff happens, of course, but that's the gist of it. This book took me forever to read. Not because it's long - it isn't, especially - but because it just didn't really hold my interest. I think I've just read too much about The Civil War. I did like reading about the Native American involvement, which is something that doesn't come up much in a lot of the narratives. But I already knew a lot about camp life and battles from that era, and I was not comfortable with the slave characters, who all seemed to love their masters so much. That said, if you want to read and otherwise fairly realistic depiction of the Civil War out in the western territories, this is a decent read. Just be sure to read other stuff to give it the proper context.

Thing 88b - Complete

2017-09-25T23:18:22Z

88b. Go completely unplugged for one weekend

Date Completed: 24 September 2017

Perhaps not completely. Even when I wrote this I anticipated still using electricity, as well as checking email and text messages every so often. Mostly I just axed social media, RSS feeds, video games, and TV. I spent a lot of time reading, combining this with Thing 55b, and did a few other things around the house - cleaning, sorting, writing, etc. It was nice. I did no drawing, but I'm not beating myself up over that because I simply wasn't in the mood. I also wasn't a complete hermit: the hubs and I did some shopping on Saturday and we went to dinner with friends on Sunday. I also did a lot of sleeping. I suspect some of those naps would have been spent mindlessly surfing the internet or playing yet another round of solitaire, so it's not like I was any less productive for it.

In the end, I think this was a good exercise for me, if not a sustainable one long term. There were times when I really wanted to fart around on the internet or check Instagram, but it prevented me from spending long stretches of time doing absolutely nothing on my computer. I need to learn how to do that more often.

Thing 24b - Complete

2017-09-25T23:11:22Z

24b. Ruthless clothing purge: pants

Date Completed: 24 September 2017

Well, that was easy. I tossed all but three pairs of pants not currently in the regular rotation. One of those I could wear now, one I can technically wear but is too snug for work, and one is definitely too small and I didn't even bother trying on but maybe someday. I'm not sure I've ever worn them, to be honest, and maybe they'll be a waste of space but given how much space I just freed up, I'm willing to take that risk.

Thing 55b - Complete

2017-09-25T23:08:24Z

55b. Walk into the library, select one book based on the cover, and spend a weekend reading it

Date Completed: 22 September 2017

Nothing caught my eye on either the Hispanic History Month or Hot Picks shelves, so I wandered over to the new arrivals. It's good that I selected one from there because it kept me from "cheating" and picking up something from my wish list. I ended up choosing Lost Science: Astonishing Tales of Forgotten Genius by Kitty Ferguson. It's a collection of stories about people who made scientific advances but are largely forgotten today, of people who are known but whose own legends have overshadowed their actual accomplishments, or of those who discovered/invented something first but didn't necessarily get credited with it by history. It was good. I actually finished it Sunday night, which wasn't even required.

Thing 32b - Complete

2017-09-25T23:07:25Z

32b. Fill ten pages in general gluebook

Date Completed: 24 September 2017

This was one of those "just do it" kind of Things. I like gluebooking but almost all I do are GST spreads. It felt good to be completely random. It also inspired me to clean out my ephemera box. I set aside the stuff that's too large to fit in any of my current gluebooks, put the teeny stuff in a little box so they're easier to find when I need something to fill a small space, and tossed a bunch of stuff I simply don't like. So it was doubly useful.

Thing 14b - Complete

2017-09-25T23:06:17Z

14b. Clean out left side of closet - shelves

Date Completed: 24 September 2017

The stationery bin was kind of a mess. Most of the work was pairing cards with envelopes and wondering where the heck all the matching envelopes went and where all these non-matching envelopes came from.

Thing 40b - lagging behind

2017-09-21T12:49:08Z

40b. Post, on average, one comic a month

Current Progress: 18/33 (55%)

I need to step up production if I'm going to finish this Thing.

17. Sleeping
18. Wise Words from Kori Michele

Things 11b, 18b, and 60b - Complete!

2017-09-21T12:44:08Z

11b. Clean car inside and out
18b. Fill desk drawers
60b. Renew passport

I did all of these things many moons ago but I don't remember when so I'm setting them to today. Yay!

Thing 72b - Retconning to Completeness

2017-09-21T12:41:46Z

72b. Go on a group bike ride with NoVa Casual Bike Riding Group

I ended up quitting this group because I could never make any of their rides and they were starting to enforce the Meetup.com fees (which make total sense if you actually attend the meetups, which I did not). HOWEVER, I've decided to change this out and mark it completed because I did something actually a whole lot more awesome: completed the Culpeper Gran Fondo, a 50k non-timed bike ride. So here's my little bit of revisionist history, now reflected in my list:

72b. Complete the Culpeper Gran Fondo

Completed: 5 August 2017

Ta da! ;)

Thing 74b - Complete!

2017-09-21T12:40:22Z

74b. Go to a flea market

Date Completed: 17 January 2016

I completely forgot about this Thing, then when I was browsing my list I thought, "Hey wait a second..." and looked back in my GST logs and discovered that I'd actually visited Collectable Treasures back in January of last year. So yay!

Thing 84b - Complete!

2017-09-21T12:36:44Z

84b. Do a link rot check on writing prompt websites list

Completed: 8 September 2017

I was gonna actually write. Needed some inspiration. Remembered I have an entire page of writing prompt links. Ended up doing a link rot check instead. Yay productivity!

Thing 61b - Complete

2017-07-04T13:51:40Z

61b. Take advantage of BoA free museum weekend

Completed: 2 July 2017

Like many things in my life, I did this entirely on a whim and drove up to the Delaware Museum of Natural History for an afternoon. Not worth the trip - it's small and doesn't really have a whole lot of stuff, really. But I was in need of a nice long drive, and that fit the bill. And I got a Thing out of it, so win-win.

Thing 69b - Complete

2017-06-30T22:20:12Z

69b. Attend 5 plays

Completed: 4 May 2017

I got an opportunity to attend the final dress rehearsal of Private Lives, a Noel Coward play put on by the Reston Community Players. It was funny and kind of dark and very British, and I enjoyed it immensely.

Thing 79b - complete

2017-06-30T22:15:16Z

79b. Visit Dinosaur Land

Completed: 29 May 2017

I've been wanting to go to Dinosaur Land ever since I first discovered it. It was everything I thought it would be. Pictures here.

Thing 40b - a couple more

2017-06-30T22:12:17Z

40b. Post, on average, one comic a month

Current progress: 16/33 (48%)

15. Temperature
16. Volume

Thing 9b - Complete

2017-06-30T22:07:42Z

9b. Go to the gym every day for a month

Completed: 31 March 2017

This was mostly to see if I could do it. And hey, turns out I can. I don't think going to the gym every day is a very good idea for me. The lack of rest days meant I phoned it in too often, and the large chunk of time required ended up eating into my sleep so I was tired all the time. But I did it and I'm proud of myself for that.

Thing 94b - Complete

2017-06-30T22:03:38Z

94b. Say "yes" to something I would not normally do

Date Complete: 12 November 2016

My friend invited me on a spa weekend in Berkeley Springs, West Virginia. I'd never had a massage or a facial or even seen the inside of a spa, so I went along with her and a few other ladies (some of whom I'd met before and some I hadn't). In short, definitely out of my comfort zone. But very nice. (Well, until I was bitten by some insect that caused itchy red blotches to sprout all over my body, but other than that, quite the lovely weekend.)

Thing 65b - Complete

2017-06-30T22:01:52Z

65b. Visit Colonial Williamsburg

Completed: 14 October 2016

Had a lovely time with some friends. Even made a GST Spread from it.