I have a confession: my brain has been scattered to the sixteen winds lately.

I’ve been doing NaNoWriMo, which has been a blast, but I am unbelievably far behind. This is actually rather typical. I can recall at least two years where I had 20k left in the last week and still managed to finish before midnight on the last day. This month is looking to be similar.

I have been privately attempting to strengthen my flabby, fragile poetry muscle by taking on a friend’s challenge: 100 poems in 100 days. I even raised the bar a notch and found specific prompts to use for each poem. I am far behind on this, as well, but – like NaNoWriMo – I will probably get a surge of inspiration (or just stubbornness) towards the end and finish reasonably on time.

I have been moving. Oh, glorious moving! J and I are the proud new renters of half a duplex – two bedrooms, one bathroom, and one hefty kitchen with enough room for a for-two dining room table. I alone have enough junk to populate a two-bedroom apartment, and J has enough for half a small house, so getting all of our collective stuff moved and unpacked has been an adventure. To my shock, I am actually just about done, barring some pictures that need put up and some knicknacks that need distributed among the places where cats don’t go. I even got all our furniture, books, and DVDs arranged. J, on the other hand, has laid waste to a large portion of the living room and Spare Oom with stuff he has yet to sort and settle. But he put up light-killing curtains, so I forgive him. Still, moving and unpacking have been an enormous time-sink.

(It’s been truly wonderful to have a kitchen to ourselves again, though. I am no chef, but I like being able to have some homemade meals on occasion. I made mediterranean shrimp pasta! J made seafood pizza! There will be chicken stirfry soon!)

I have been job-hunting. Having come to the frustrating and saddening conclusion that communication between myself and my bosses was no longer salvageable, and my abilities did not mesh with their expectations and needs, I cut the cord. I took a few days to busy myself with moving stuff and NaNoWriMo, then leapt into job-hunting again with what might resemble fervor if you tilt your head, close one eye, and squint the other. I’m still incredibly tempted to get a job at the local Trader Joe’s, but I’m being responsible^TM and looking for something with a higher salary first. (Even though our lovely duplex is so affordable that I could pay all my bills and my part of the rent and utilities with a minimum-wage job. I’m trying to forget that fact…)

See, I am not a person who lives to work. I work to live; I spend my energy and time doing what I love. If I can do something I enjoy at work, great! I’ll throw all my passion and enthusiasm into it and happily so – I’ve been known to voluntarily work unpaid overtime just to do right by a company. If I can’t find a passion at my job, I don’t really mind – I’ll find happiness wherever it sprouts, including at a “base-level” job. I surprise people with company loyalty because, unless things are really unpleasant on an interpersonal level, I’m happy to stay at one place and do what I can. And, as a jack-of-all-trades, I don’t mind working outside of my “field,” if one considers professional geekery web and graphic work my field. Honestly, the more I can enjoy myself and have energy for my own pursuits – like this crazy writing gig – the happier I am at any given job, whether I’m the marketing director or a cashier.

And, lastly, I have been doing some personal digging – self-observation and constructive analysis to work towards improving who I am, what I’m doing, and where I’m going. This time of year, during the sun’s descent before the longest night at winter solstice, is always a period of introspection and truths for me. While this is hardly the place to detail such personal work, it deserves mention as something I’ve given my energy and time to and one of the major things occupying my life.

This has been a lengthy and somewhat rambling explanation for why I’ve not been posting regularly. I will probably cook up some posts and back-date them later, just to fill in the gaps, but for now, bear with me – November is a scarce month for more than one reason!

You’ve heard about the daze of my life – what have you been up to recently?

Related posts:

1. Plugging In & Out
2. A Departure From The Norm
3. NaNoWriMo 2009!