TygrThink: Welcome to 2010. Now Go Home.

I was going to be so good. I had plans to blog about my birthday (I'm 46). I was going to expostulate about how weird it was to go from "closer to 40", to "closer to 50".

You all know how I talk too much. Suffice it to say, it's weird to realize rather suddenly I'm now 46, which means I'm closer to 50 than to 40. Yup. As if the gray hairs, the trick knees, the swollen ankles, the impending menopause weren't enough. Those are all symptoms. They can be reasoned away or ignored.

Numbers, now. Cold hard numbers...

Okay, so there was that. Then I was going to blog about the New Year.

Hah. As if everybody and their parakeet named Fidel hasn't already said everything there is to say about the New Year.

And let's face it, there are people much more eloquent than I, who, when they DID say something about the New Year, gave a better insight than I could have done.

Here's two of them.

#1) Where was I in 2008 when this guy Matt was making this video? Well, I was being a good little corporate drone, stuck in a cubicle where I couldn't see the real world, feverishly devoting myself to the success of other people. I found this literally five minutes ago, and you know what? This is it. This is me in a nutshell. This is my personal viewpoint, my world philosophy, my raison d'être

(And apologies in advance - the window is going to be a bit too big for the space available for it.)

(And if you take a look at Matt's website, and more specifically, his video page, you'll see he's posted a whole bunch of videos people made in response to his video, mostly of the "people dancing around someplace in the world" type. Maybe it's just my unrealistically optimistic view of the world, but I find this oddly comforting. The world is full of people who find worth and value in pointless dance, recorded without consideration of dignity or consequence. "Dance as if no one's watching".)

Secondly, and this was the reason I was trawling around YouTube in any case, may I present Neil Gaiman's New Year's benediction for 2010.

Most of that stuff I'm lucky enough to have. I've got the someone who thinks I'm wonderful, I've got the people to love and to like, who love and like me in return. I've created art, and I flatter myself it didn't exist before I created it. I don't know how wise I am, but I'm almost always kind. Now, if I can just surprise myself this year...

I will add my resolutions from my Facebook posting of December 31st at 11:14pm - not that they're going to be kept, or not kept. Think of them more as guidelines, something rather to be strived at than cast in stone. It's better that way - who needs another source of guilt, which is an excuse unto itself to flake out?

My New Year's resolutions? Let's see... #1) Relax. About everything. The Universe has got it covered. #2) Move more slowly, with more organization so that panic and unpreparedness do not sabotage me. #3) Lose weight. Again. More. #4) ? Write. Writewritewritewrite. Sell. Sellsellsell! Write and sell. Everything else is subject to change. Happy New Year's, y'all! Blessings be, happiness, health, strength and well-being...

I hate to admit how nice it was to get back to normal. Isn't that weird? We spend so much time gearing up to the hype of the holidays, and then it's over and we're disappointed. Not me. Not this year. 2009 was hard. I lost some things and gained some things, but mostly it felt like loss.
I'm just a plain, everyday story-teller, eating my bagel and drinking my coffee and thinking about writing the kinds of things I'd like to read. I can't help but feel I'm going to get published and be happy in a normal, small kind of way, and that's going to be okay. I'll be perfectly content with that.

2010 feels different in that kind of way.

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In the "Neither Here Nor There" category, I present "Hell", or Lisa Frank Online.

Wikipedia, bless its little cotton socks, gives us the rundown on Lisa Frank...

This was just so horrifying, for reasons I can't even quite put into words. My almost 9-yr-old daughter would probably love this stuff - I don't know for sure. I don't think she's seen it yet. In any case, it's the kind of thing that recalls to mind the famous words of Burt Reynolds: "Wow. Looks like Walt Disney threw up."

Be warned, mankind, else this be your fate. 'N shit.

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One more video found, again a Neil Gaiman offering. Here's my absolute favorite poem of all time: "Instructions"