As I have less time and less public stuff to put on a website, I will most likely be retiring this blog and keeping it simple (and free) at my new Tumblr: prettybigwheel.tumblr.com.  I will keep my dot-com but in the next few months, provided I do like Tumblr, I’ll move it there.  So, if you are also on it, add me!  It’s time to reconnect with society.

As I noted a few weeks ago, one of my New Year’s Resolutions is to “read books for pleasure regularly again.”  This is because I haven’t enjoyed reading in several years, which is a real shame because reading was once one of my favorite things to do.  It made me become an English major, which I now realize was one of the best and worst decisions I made.

Best because think of all the things that wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t — I wouldn’t have come to appreciate Irish literature, gone to Ireland, blah blah blah WE ALL KNOW THIS STORY.  But the worst because it ruined one of those things about me.  I was a book person.  I knew books.  It was like a thing I had.  A hobby.  And by making it my major, it became my work.  And no one, not even someone who loves their work, wants to keep doing work when it’s over.  So when college was over, that was it.  No books for me, unless they contained the words Expecto Patronum.  (Which they did, because I totally reread HP7, and I totally got my boyfriend to read it too, and it was AMAZING.)  (Yeah, Harry kinda ruined reading for me too, because nothing will ever be as good.)

But I’m trying very hard to get back into new books.  I’ve read a few over the last few months (slowly, quite slowly).  Now that I’m not an English major, and my work doesn’t revolve around METAPHOR and AUTHOR INTENT and TRAGIC FLAWS, I’m free to admit that: I don’t care for literature!  I like fun books!  I like young adult fiction, with all its yearning and angst!  I like science fiction, with all its dinosaurs and technological back-firings!  I do not like war, outrageously non-linear story lines, or dialogue that sounds nothing like talking.  I still do not like poetry, or prose that’s practically poetry.  Instead, I like laughs and tears!  I like page turners!  I like looking forward to hearing a story, rather than dreading sloughing through more thick words that tell me nothing about the character and everything about how awesome the author thinks he is.

So, I’ve discovered GoodReads.com.  It’s a vast improvement on the old AllConsuming, which I used.  You can update your past, current, and future reading lists, make recommendations to friends, get recommendations based on your favorites, and more.  It would be really cool if some of my friends were on, like a mini book club meeting, except we don’t have to read the same things — we can all just read what we want, when we want, and enjoy it immensely.  Come read with me!

I have been in a great mood lately!  Even though today, the mildest day so far this winter, I got pissed on by Irish clouds who decided to roll in and ruin my sunny outdoor lunch.  ”Murrhhh!!” was the sound I made.

2010 was a successful year!  So successful that I don’t want to write about it, because there’s no need to reflect on happiness in word when you can just do it in person, but then again, I pay for this thing every month.  So let’s try this reflection thing again.  Last year’s resolutions:

1. Graduate magna cum laude. Ding-a-ling! Summa cum laude, suckas.
2. Apply for working holiday visa and get it accepted, post haste. Ding! The only hard part about it was saving up enough money; the rest wasn’t as stressful as it seemed at the time.
3. Get a career-relevant job in Ireland. Ding! Writing and editing for a technology shopping website.  A nice happy medium between English and the Internet.
4. Get a nice apartment that feels like my own. Ding! I can’t stop saying “I love our apartment!” every time I’m pottering around it.  I’m going to miss the Christmas tree in about a week.
5. Pick up a new hobby that I feel passionately about, that I want to tell everyone about.  Alternatively, become an expert on something. Ehhh. I don’t know what to do with my spare time!!!
6. Make new girl friends. So-so. I made one or two new friends, but for the most part I’m still not a girl’s girl.  Most of the time I’m just fine with that.
7. Never stop putting money into savings, no matter how small. Ding!
8. Make more money than I spend. Ding-a-ling! Most of the time.
9. Visit at least two new countries. Ding-a-ling! Italy in March, Belgium in September, and Spain (continental Spain, that is) in September.
10. Reconnect with some European friends, in person.  Call more often, too. So-so. Not too many people left in Ireland except the Irish folks, who I don’t see too often.  Have been chatting more with other European friends though.  Hopefully will get to see them.
11. Spoil Someone everyday. Ding! At every turn I get.

As for this year’s, the list will continue to grow as I think about it.  There are some repeated attempts from the last year.  Here:

1. Pick up a new hobby that I feel passionately about, that I want to tell everyone about.  Alternatively, become an expert on something. (Round 2)
2. Visit at least two new countries.
3. Visit at least one new continent.
4. Apply for the next most appropriate visa and get it accepted.
5. Give more presents out of the blue, for just-because reasons.
6. Make new girl friends.
7. Read books for pleasure regularly again.
8. Write this website again.
9. Visit new pubs and write about them.  (I both want and don’t want to do this.  I want to go to there, but the effort of writing about them for a limited audience is a mind-numbing thought.  We’ll see how it goes.)
10. Visit all the OPW heritage sites in Ireland.

Since graduating from college, I have had no interest in reading, writing, or basically exercising my degree in any kind of recreational way.

It’s an all day rain-rain-pour-athon for the first time in weeks today, but that’s okay.  Because I’m in my warm apartment, in a man’s sweatshirt, wearing pretty clothes underneath.  I’ve just opened a Momma Griffin care package chock full of brand new Sephora products, corn muffin mix, and York peppermint patties.  That’s the stuff.

(I KNOW, I haven’t updated in months.  It feels weird.  After a while of not updating, it’s too intimidating to play catch-up.  Anyway, you haven’t been missing much.  I’m going to making this a private blog in the not-too-distant future.  But first I’m going to continue smelling my philosophy-happy face.