So Much To Learn, So Little Time

No Ashley, I'm just fine - the title doesn't mean anything. 

Now that I've gotten THAT out of the way, what am I up to lately?  Remember the sweater I was making?  Still stuck at about 14" - need to work on that.

Remember how I was making my husband's lunch every day?  I've flagged a bit, but I'm still doing it, although I'm very undisciplined at continuity and follow through.  I can come up with great plans, I can save my own life - but sticking to those plans is tedious after a while and that's where being a grownup comes in (something I've never really mastered well).

For instance - I planted a veggie garden this past October.  I even made a map of what I planted, but I didn't plan on it serving the purpose of pointing out to me the several items that didn't grow at all.  The seeds never sprouted.  In fact, the only thing that grew - for a little while - was string beans.  I was able to harvest a few bowlfuls of them and then the whole plant withered and died.  The peas came up, made a few flowers and then disappeared.  The little plants turned yellow and then brown and then went belly up, as the saying goes.  The corn?  It was coming along - I could even see little tiny baby corns (so cute!!), but the night critters ate them all up and all I found in the morning was corn debris.  Period.  Carrots?  They've grown and prospered.  My husband even had some tucked into his lunch one day - little baby carrots home grown.  Onions?  Never showed up.  Tomatoes?  Two kinds?  Never even saw the light of day.  Seeds just sat there and gave up the ghost.

I'm not sure what happened.  Perhaps I should have sprouted everything on the porch and THEN replanted it in the raised beds.  Perhaps I should have built some sort of chicken wire cover over the beds so that birds and critters couldn't trample everything, but then how would I have gotten in myself to pick things, weed, etc.? 

I'd love to have 2 chickens to lay eggs, but I know they'd get sick and I would freak because I can't stand animals to be in pain and I can't help them.  Or worse - they'd get eaten by something and I'd find the feathers.  We do have a hawk that eats pidgeons, doves and the other day even a grackle (I can tell by the feathers left behind).

As far as my Downton Abbey fixation, I'm still reading books about the Edwardian English aristocracy, Americans marrying into the Edwardian English aristocracy and the downfall of the English aristocracy.  These people had lots of money, but the social rules they had to follow took all the fun out of it, in my mind.  I don't envy them.

I'm forever trying to master photography.  I can take nice pictures because I have a great camera and a decent eye for composition.  Plus flowers are easy subjects.  But what I'm trying to understand is the manual basics of the Exposure Triangle.  I bought a Photography textbook and it has helped a great deal.  Now all I have to do is keep my camera settings on "Manual" so I learn by practice.  Next up - Photoshop layers.  I have never understood layers and it is an intrinsic part of Photoshop and Photoshop Elements.  You can do great things, but you have to understand layers, so I have a book just about layers in photo software.  I have so many books to read I need to stop sleeping and stay up nights so I can catch up - at least I feel sometimes like sleeping is a WASTE!

Oh - and Bible study?  The most important part of my life?  My faith?  I still have not even begun to get up early every day and open the Bible.  I have software.  I have numerous Bible related books, concordances and commentaries.  I get up early.  I sit in my chair.  Neko jumps in my lap and wants to be petted.  Next is Squeebles.  He looks up at me from the floor and reaches up a paw to tap my arm - "Mommy, can I come up now?"  And up he jumps to make biscuits on my belly and then I roll him over for some belly rubs.  In between, my eyes inadvertently close and I dose off for a few minutes, open my eyes and check the time on my computer screen.  I have....a half hour, then 15 minutes, then 5, then I stand up, stretch and get ready for the day.  Today I actually opened the Bible and read a few Psalms, which is the only part of the Bible other than Proverbs that I can actually comprehend at 5:30AM.  And so, at 56 years of age, I continue the attempt to have a morning Bible study each day......sigh.