On this fine day in October...

...it is time for take off. NaBloWriMo is starting today, and I look upon the task of writing blog posts for every day of October with a mixture of glee and dread. I find myself having much of the same problem as I did this time a year ago. I don't really have anything in particular to say. And that makes for lousy bloggery (I'm not fishing for compliments; I really mean it. It is the sad fate of many a blog when it eventually winds down to only posts along the lines of "I have nothing to blog about today, so I'll blog about that" and then "I have nothing to blog about today either, but let me post this picture of my cat" [I'm planning on joining Wordless Wednesday next week... No cats as of yet, though] and eventually "Oops, it's been three months since my last post. I am not dead. But I just don't have anything to blog about. Add me on Facebook, though!". We've all seen blogs like that). 


So instead of taking that route I thought I'd write down the first three things that pops into my head, and let that be today's post (and hope for better days ahead). 


1) Dear Cruella. You don't like cortado. Yeah, the coffee. Every time you are feeling brave in a coffee shop that's what you ask for, and every time it's a big, awful failure. You walk away disappointed in every way - of its size (eeny tiny small! Sometimes size does matter), of its taste (how can it be too coffee-y and not enough coffee-y at the same time?) and of the fact that you keep repeating this mistake. Every other coffee variety there is = fine. Cortado = not. 




2) I once had a semi-regular feature on this blog called "currently reading/listening to" (it's true - look it up in the topic cloud in the sidebar). I'm not entirely sure why I didn't keep it up, but it probably was a combination of not reading enough books (I felt terribly self-conscious whenever I didn't get around to finish a book before my next update - not unlike how I feel whenever I update my Goodreads status only to see all the books where I've made no progress whatsoever in the longest time...); listening mainly to Spotify where I generally end up mindlessly going through random playlists; and perhaps most importantly: I didn't really have anything to say about what I was reading or listening to. Okay, you're having a Bob Dylan week. So what? 

Well, today that is different. I have been reading a lot of nonsense lately, page turners intended to offer a certain escapism in my constant combat with thesis-ness. Running low on supply of that genre, however, I picked up Aryn Kyle's The God of Animals, a book I originally bought in my very first visit to a bookstore in the US. There I pulled it out of a shelf at random - going for gut feeling and nothing else. I kind of liked the cover, but I can't really recall if that was the only decisive factor (I suspect there might have been a "take 3, pay for 2" deal in play... This might have been my number three). Anyway, I never got around to read it, and thus it came unread back with me a year ago. It didn't even make it among the small selection of books that fitted into my tiny (why do I always feel the need to signify size by usage of font sizes? o_0) Also, am I using the word tiny too much?) apartment when I moved this spring. 


Last time I visited my parents, however, I rediscovered the book, and decided to give it a go. From the very start two things struck me: a) this book reminded me strikingly of "To Kill A Mockingbird"; and b) I was about to read a horse book for the first time in fifteen years. 


Yes. It's a horse book. Not one of the mass-produced "romance-meets-mystery-meets-pretty-animal" things for young girls - though this book can be read by young girls (I don't recall it being in the YA section in the bookstore, though, but then again, I was pretty jetlagged and high on my first visit to a US Starbucks...). 


I'm not sure how much more I should say about this book - reviews isn't really my thing - but let me at least say that I didn't put it down when I left the house the other day. Which explains why I nearly got myself killed by a car that morning... 


And for the record (no pun intended), I am listening to Wes Montgomery's "Whisper Not" right now. But there isn't all that much more to say about that... 




3) Awards! I got some lovely awards! First of all, the Versatile Blogger award. I keep getting this one, and I love it, because I feel it is one of the few blog awards I really get why people want to give me. I'm not a category blogger (which, incidentally, might be the cause of today's problem - if I'd been a "mommy blogger" I'd know I was supposed to write about my kid all the time (but then I would probably have to actually have a kid first... So that is sort of out of the question). If I had been a food blogger, I would write recipes (but then I'd have to follow recipes. Which I don't. Ever). Instead I am left with whatever pops into my head at any given time, and sometimes that is naught. (Which reminds me of the saying "If a messy desk equals a messy mind, what does an empty desk mean?" - not that I'm in danger of EVER having an empty desk. I am lucky to find the space to plop down my laptop most days - in between towers of books, instant coffee, packs of gum, post-its, [unused] tea bags, hand moisturizer, pens and hair clips - and my laptop is tiny [there we go again... ])


(Fortunately, even when my mind if blank, I have enough digressions in there to fill up a parenthesis or two)

Well. The awards. The Versatile Award was given to me by Debbie of words 'n' whimsy. Debbie claims she's a newbie since she hasn't been around the blogosphere all that long, but I'd rather say she's a fast learner, because her blog is great. Go visit her to find out for yourself. I won't be passing this award on this time, since I've already done that in the past, but I'd still like to thank Debbie properly :) 


As for the other award, I have definitely not gotten it before. You see, it's brand new. Leigh, of That's Write (and she usually is!), made the "Strangely Irresistable" aka "Yo Gabba Gabba" award. Thank you, Leigh, I love it! The only rule for this award is to give it on to three bloggers who are - surprise, surprise - irresistible! I know a bunch of those, but the first three that popped into my mind are... *drumroll*


Georgina Dollface. This is one of the places I visit even on days I don't have time to visit blogs. Georgina masters the difficult art of being both organized and creative at once. On a scale from one to funny, she is hilarious with a side of thoughtful. 


Nonamedufus. I am fairly certain that deep down he knows how funny he is. But just in case: he is one of the funniest bloggers there is. Now you all know. 


Finally, and appropriately considering that today is the first day of NaBloWriMo, Heather (who is NotHannah - I will never tire of typing that, tee hee) is pretty darn irresistible too. In a way she reminds me of myself in that she appears to write on whatever subject that pops into her mind - from her kidoodles to her garden to her writing to Hell-Mart (makes me giggle every time). Unlike me, however, Heather always mixes her humourous musings with a foundation of seriousness. She bravely tackles difficult topics, and I always feel that I am a little wiser whenever I've read one of her posts. 


So there. You guys are irresistible! 


And I guess for a tiny post about nothing, this became rather   l  o  n  g   (and about a lot).