I’m planning to make 2025 a Year of Making, for reasons. (The reasons are that making stuff is good for my mental health.)

Finished reading: Bull Moon Rising by Ruby Dixon 📚

I really enjoyed this, mostly for the fantasy and emotional stuff. Love a nerdy heroine and a bull-headed hero (literally, in this case). The uniquely minotaurish monster romance bits were not the main source of its appeal for me. Definitely a very hot 🔥🔥🔥🔥. Not for the faint of heart.

📚 2024 has been a good year for queer sommelier romances.

🔖 Read The open social web is the future of the internet. Here’s why I’m excited. by Ben Werdmuller.

This is a great articulation of what’s good.

I am very behind on Lower Decks and I kinda need to just hide from the Internet until I catch up.

💬📚📝 “All you can give us is what life is about from your point of view. You are not going to be able to give us the plans to the submarine. Life is not a submarine. There are no plans.” Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

💬📚📝 “The development of relationship creates plot.” Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

I’ve been writing in 750 Words for a few days. I’m feeling motivated to make notes on our travels from 2023. Eventually, maybe I’ll pull some pearls out of there and polish them up to continue my belated travel blog series.

Finished reading: Swordcrossed by Freya Marske 📚

Lovely! 🔥🔥🔥🔥

📺📚📓 Read The Great Experiment: race and authorship in Shonda Rhimes’s Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story by Claudia Calhoun (Adaptation).

This is an eminently readable and beautifully argued journal article.

Finished reading: A Touch of Stone and Snow by Milla Vane 📚

I might love this even more than A Heart of Blood and Ashes. A mild 🔥🔥🔥🔥.

💬📚 “When you make a business, you get to make a little universe where you control all the laws. This is your utopia.” Derek Sivers, Anything You Want: 40 Lessons for a New Kind of Entrepreneur

💬📚 “I’m a student, not a guru.” Derek Sivers, Anything You Want: 40 Lessons for a New Kind of Entrepreneur

🍿 I’ve watched still more made-for-TV holiday movies:

  • Jingle Bell Run
  • Meet Me Next Christmas
  • Hot Frosty

Hot Frosty taught me that no matter how built a dude is, no matter how kind he is, if he’s a himbo, I will not find him attractive.

Finished reading: A Heart of Blood and Ashes by Milla Vane 📚

So, so good. I’m so happy to have found my fantasy romance sweet spot. 🔥🔥🔥🔥

🍿 Watched Christmas on the Ranch.

I like this but he asks her to give up her life in New York and move to his ranch in Ohio before they even kiss. Bold.

Is this still a migraine or am I in the postdrome phase? The Kimberly Hirsh story

I love my job and my family, and yet I find myself resenting that I have to do anything today besides sit around reading A Heart of Blood and Ashes. 📚

Finished reading: The Beast of Blackmoor by Milla Vane 📚

Milla Vane asks, “What if grimdark, but romance?” and I answer, “Yes please!” So great. 🔥🔥🔥🔥

Finished reading: Killer Underwear Invasion! How to Spot Fake News, Disinformation, and Conspiracy Theories by Elise Gravel 📚

This is a great book, aimed at kids. I’m definitely going to order it for our library. I might try to write a full review later.

Chronically ill stationery nerd life: you can’t find the pill sorter you thought was on your nightstand, but at least while you were searching for it, you found your date stamp.

Finished reading: Nobody’s Baby But Mine by Susan Elizabeth Phillips 📚

Most of this book is set in the Smoky Mountains near Asheville and I just kept thinking about all the aftermath of Hurricane Helene up there. This book was published in 1997.

🔥🔥🔥

It took over a week, but my little web lab(yrinth) is live. (Previously mentioned here.)

My word for 2025 is MORE. I want to do more next year. Details forthcoming.

After all that thinking about traveler’s journals and field journals, I think I’m going to end up sticking with an official Bullet Journal or Leuchtterm A5. It’s been 10 years since I started living in a single notebook and it’s really working for me. So some years I buy a second one; that’s okay.