When you aren’t looking for meanings of daisies, roses, tulips and daffodils, it’s even more difficult to find information as well, I might add.

For example:

Amaryllis Belladonna

This is the Amaryllis flower. Which is my absolute favorite flower. I’ve loved it for quite some time, though it’s taken me quite a few years to figure out the name of it. They’re sometimes called “march lilies” in South Africa, and another pair of common names are “naked lilies” or “naked ladies”.

I’ve always wanted to try and grow amaryllis, but unfortunately I have an atrocious luck with growing flowers or plants. I happen to kill pretty much everything I try to grow. So I’m afraid to even attempt to grow one in a pot, which it seems that it would be possible to attempt. I think for now I’ll refrain from attempting to grow them, and perhaps start with something I would be less attached to, if it were to die.

But, as for flower meanings, amaryllis can stand for:

• Pride
• Worth beyond beauty
• Drama
• Pastoral poetry

So pretty much – it has multiple meanings. Which is fine, but not really helpful.

I’m thinking though, I like the second one, “worth beyond beauty” best of all. Though, to be honest, “pride” would also describe me rather well on another front. I just figure, I don’t really like flower meanings, or flower language, so I don’t use it. I prefer to just like the few flowers that I like, and enjoy them for how pretty that they are.

Related articles

• Amaryllis (pepperphillips.com)
• The Astounding Amaryllis (beautifulgardener.wordpress.com)

I mean, the wording on the spells is what bothers me. Or rather, since most of these people don’t post the actual spell, but just say what they want from the spell, and their intent, that’s what scares and freaks me out. Because most of these people have a pretty frightening idea of their intent for what they want to do. Regardless of spell wording specifically, if they choose not to share the exact word-choice for their spell, there is the problem of their intent for the spell that they are going to write and perform. And most of these people seem to not realize that their intent has a major problem for it.

The intent for most of these spells seems to be pretty direct.

It’s always, “I want person X to fall in love with me.” Or, “I want person X to marry me.”

That isn’t exactly comforting. I mean…think about the choice of language there. Directing the spell at a specific person is problematic, in all honesty. At least, from my perspective it is. Because once you say, “I want specific individual to have specific feelings for me”, you take away all their individual choice in the matter. It is no longer their mind and heart that get to choose how they feel about you as a person, but your spell that has them feeling a certain way.

So, say I cast a spell, asking that my friend V falls in love with me, and he does. Awesome for me, right? Actually, no. Not really a good idea at all, if you think about it. I mean, V falling in love with me might have been a timing coincidence. But if I’m performing a spell, I had damned well better believe in it, right? So, I believe it worked. Well then, how do I ever know, ever be sure that V isn’t just in love with me because I cast a spell for V to fall in love with me? The truth is, I never can be certain that the spell wasn’t a part of it. I would always have to wonder. And, if I ever told V what I had done, I risk losing him. Who wouldn’t feel betrayed to know that their feelings might have been manipulated so directly?

Now, asking for love to come my way, that is to me, very different.

If I ask for a love that is correct for both parties involved, then I feel more confident asking for that. However, I still think there are too many variables. It is still problematic. I mean…there are potentially dependents involved more than just the 2 people who are going to fall in love. What if I have a pet (I always will, I know this), and the other person is extremely allergic to cats? There is a third party that is incompatible. That is a problem. Minor to some, perhaps to this potential partner’s views, but major to mine, because I will not live without a pet cat in my life, that is just a given for me.

And in general, I just find that casting spells for love, for husbands or boyfriends or significant others to be too much. There are too many variables that can go wrong. There are too many ways to step on toes and cause problems. Not to mention, there are too many land-mines per say with the word-choices and wordings that can blow up in one’s face with how a spell must be cast. I suspect that I may be overly cautious here. But I would rather be far too cautious than have something blow up in my face for mistakenly casting a spell that I cannot control or did not mean to cast by accidental language choice.

I just have never understood why so many people on Tumblr are so obsessed with wanting to learn these spells. Or why so many cast them, and then wait anxiously for results. I mean, I have no mundane luck with finding dates, and I doubt that any supernatural or spiritual push will help me. But, I certainly do not want to accidentally screw up mundane chances with spiritual workings. And yet, so many people on Tumblr seem intent on pushing through with these types of spells like it is child’s play and there are no consequences.

Now though, I’m living in an apartment (well, will be living in after graduation). I don’t know about house spirits in apartments. I don’t know about experience in that type of situation. Do house spirits work in apartments? That’s something that I don’t know about. I mean…I can see how it might work, but then again, I’m not completely sure. There are situations where I could see having the support and also help of house spirits as being a good thing. But then, working with them, I know that times they can be very temperamental sorts. So I’m not sure that I want to open that kind of relationship, or invite them into my house, without being very certain of the sorts that I’ll be having into my house.

And, since my mom isn’t really a fan of these sorts of things…I need to be a bit careful. I mean, she just thinks that it isn’t really real. She respects my beliefs in paganism, but she’s just not a believer at all. It has to be careful then for me, that I don’t cause a problem for her while I’m doing anything in our apartment.

So house spirits are a bit of an interesting thing for me. I’m still trying to work out the logistics of whether I should deal with them, considering my roommate/mother is not involved with anything to do with witchcraft or paganism. I do want to respect her wishes and boundaries, but I am interested in seeing if house spirits are useful for my practice.

See, I was diagnosed with Bipolar II and OCD quite a few months ago.

OCD is pretty easy to explain, after all, it’s been all over the media so often that if I mention that I have it, no one is terribly surprised. Mine manifests in some unusual ways at times, but I do have some of the usual things. I have issues with patterns, order and organization especially. Organization and neatness are my huge hang-ups, they cause the most problems for me. If I’m not under control, I panic when things are out of order. Particularly, order of books, trinkets, DVDs, and things of those natures are what hit me most often. Kitchen supplies don’t bother me, but food-stuffs are also things that I need to organize. I have another major point to it – namely my compulsion into washing my hands/needing to be clean. I carry hand-sanitizer for use in public, because I know how many people don’t wash their hands in public restrooms, which is just awful. However, I’m working on everything, and with some help from medicine and my shrink I’m getting better. I can control a lot of it up to a point, even if I can’t handle everything. Though, at least being able to understand what I’m doing and how to help myself control it is a bigger help than I would have ever thought even a few years ago.

Bipolar II is more difficult for me to handle and explain to the few people that I’ve explained this to. See, when I first heard about bipolar, I thought that it meant only the more traditional type that has the “manic” episodes (my shrink says that they used to call bipolar “manic depression”). And I’m definitely not manic. It would have been impossible for me to get to my age without someone noticing that in my personality, if it existed. But, that’s not the type of bipolar disorder that I have. Bipolar II is a bit different. For me (personally, and me alone), bipolar II is deep depression periods, and the “high” periods are not manic. The high periods are irritated/annoyed for me. I have excessive energy, sure, but it is not manic in quality or quantity. It’s a more nervous and irritated type of energy, that fills me up and makes it difficult for me to focus or concentrate on anything. My “high” or upper periods are seldom and far separated, usually fairly brief, dispersed between long and very deep depressive episodes. It’s awful to work with for me, and I’ve been on a medication for this for a while now.

The bipolar II was difficult for me to accept though. I have been diagnosed with perhaps 4 different types or degrees of depression over the years, and I’ve been on multiple anti-depressants that all failed within 5-6 months of starting them. It got rather frustrating that everything quit working just suddenly, without warning and for seemingly no reason. I actually gave up on thinking that anything would ever work for me for my depression. But, after speaking with this latest shrink of mine, I’ve begun to realize that I had the unfortunate luck of having 4 different shrinks (prior to this one) misdiagnose me. I don’t blame them, after all, it’s difficult to tell at times with some mental disorders, and my particular manifestation of bipolar II manifests most of the time with symptoms identical to severe dysthymia, a type of chronic depression. Given that most of the time I was in a state that resembled severe depression, it doesn’t fully surprise me that I was falsely diagnosed multiple times.

Now though, in this last year, I’ve begun to work on these diagnoses. The medications are working, they haven’t failed (which for me is a blessing and a miracle that I’m very grateful for), but I cannot skip taking them, or they will quit working. So I’m still cautious, because I have not felt normal like this in my whole life. I feel stable for the first time in my life, which is something I’m going to work hard to keep as a condition in my life. Having a diagnosis that actually fits my symptoms, and finally showing steady improvement and stable phases in my life – those are things I never expected to see in my life.

I’m doing better, far better than I have in my whole life. It’s still new for me to be happy and feel healthy consistently. I sleep regularly and have a normal appetite for the first time in my life. Before I started getting treated for the bipolar II, I had not ever had a length of time where I slept well. My life has changed overall for the better, and I’ve been getting healthier.

I do still have rough times though. This last month was a bit difficult. My OCD flared up, and I was having some trouble with anxieties stemming from that. So I took a break to bring myself back onto an even keel. I want to stay healthy, and that means taking a break when it is necessary. This last month it was, and so I stepped back from blogging so that I could focus on myself and ensure that I was taking care of myself to the best of my abilities.

Vet gave us good news, which was a huge relief.

The lump on her side might be a tumor. We have to keep an eye on it. If it keeps growing in size over the next 6 months, we have to take her back in. Or if she chews at it, scratches at it, or otherwise shows signs of distress. But, as long as she seems fine, the vet said it is most likely a cosmetic cyst that they won’t mess with, as it is very small, and it isn’t worth the problems to go in and try to remove it. Medically, unless it’s causing Rose trouble, it is actually safer, if it is benign, to leave it alone.

Other good news – she hasn’t lost any weight, which is something to look out for with other cats her age. She’s still just over 6 lbs, and feisty. No change in moods or behaviors, which is great for her age too. But best news, her teeth. Himalayan cats, or cats with Himalayan blood like my fur-baby, usually have bad teeth over the age of 10. Himalayan cats teeth tend to be really bad the older they get, don’t know why, but the vet said so. So he was surprised at the fact she has all of hers, and they’re in pretty much perfect shape, considering we don’t take her to the groomer constantly. But, she’s got perfect little fangs, my little kitty.

All of this means, I get vet-approved permission to spoil my little baby now. He said that since Rose isn’t a “young” cat anymore, we can go ahead and give her canned food more often. At the moment we give her a specific brand, 1 flavor (my cat is a picky little brat, she only likes this 1 type, 1 brand. She hates all other types of canned food, even all the seafood types but this one salmon & whitefish type that we buy) as a special treat, if she’s well behaved. Or rather, that’s what my mom does. I kind of give it to her randomly, whenever I feel like it. So, I gave her a cup of it today after the vet, because we always give her a “special treat” after taking her there or the groomer — she hates both. But, since the vet said we can feed her canned food more often, I get to officially spoil her now. — Mom is not so delighted with this prospect I think, because I’m the one who is going to spoil the cat delightedly, because I’m not living in the apartment full-time yet. But…she totally gets to deal with it, because she loves the kitty as much as I do, and she’ll go along with it and spoil Rose too.

Now that I’m not worrying that my baby kitty is sick and going to die from some unknown lump anymore, I’m feeling much better. I’m calmer again and not freaking out. It does feel better to be calm, to know that my little fur-baby is safe and sound. Now, she’ll be around to play with me, curl up in my lap and purr for quite a long time. The family joke is that she’ll live to 30 to spite my mom (which should give us 15 more years of delightful kitty company)!

I do have the interesting little dichotomy between my “pagan” practices and my “witchcraft” practices. I suppose that stems from some other parts of my personality and mentality, that I like order and function in my life, as I’ve already pointed out. So things work best for me when cleanly ordered and organized in ways that are convenient for myself. The more conveniently organized to my standards, the clearer I find everything to be. I wrote my last functionalism piece in dealing with mostly my daily life. It was not really anything much to do with my practices. That post was a bit more groundwork than anything else.

This time I want to focus on the more specific term that everyone keeps searching for, and on more pertinent examples that seem to draw people to my blog. I like relevance. And it seems people are interested in what I have to say, at least partially here, so I’ll share my personal opinions here.

Functionalism has far more to do with paganism/polytheism for me than it does with witchcraft. I am more fond of functionalism in things that do not require of experimentation. Polytheism for me has more functionalism to do with it than witchcraft does, because there isn’t as much experimentation to be done. There is some, absolutely no denying that fact, but it seems to me, rationally, that there is less experimentation there than in witchcraft practices. Perhaps that is personal bias or ideology, but that is how it has always seemed to me.

Since functionalism is to me based in being rational and functional, what is functional in its place, I don’t like basing anything in my life on this kind of relational thing that can’t actually be determined thus. I mean…experimental relations, such as witchcraft is for me, cannot be totally functional. There will be misfires, things that do not totally go as they should the first time, that go out of place…so it’s not functional, not fully. Therefore, for me, witchcraft is not functional, not as part of my “functionalism” as such. Because things are going to be off at the start, and therefore I cannot see there being, for my practices “functionalism in witchcraft”. It won’t exist, because witchcraft has too many unknowns, too many things that will change and warp, that are dependent upon other factors. That isn’t functional to place within a set and defined system, and therefore cannot then be totally part of any system.

However, polytheism for me can be functional.

In my view, the gods and spirits have various purposes that are unique and necessary within the system to their own. They might overlap at times, and sometimes might seem to contradict. Still, the purposes are set, and they fit within the system. Polytheism is easier to put within the framework of structuralism, which is my way of seeing the world. Things might sometimes clash within the system, but mostly they stay in their usual places. Functionalism in polytheism means, for me, that things have their place and purpose, that they sit where they ought and remain comfortably out of where they ought not. So, if something is certainly not a home spirit, it will not ever be a home spirit, whereas, if it is a god of prosperity, it will act in such a way that goes along that path.

Witchcraft however, is different, because unexpected events can unfold. One might do magic or a spell for one purpose, and unusual results can show up. Or also, as I think, it can show up in unintentional side-effects of sorts. Not always, but since experimentation is essential, things will crop up at times, and unintentional will happen on at least rare occasions.

So functionalism is not, for me, possible, in witchcraft. Experimentation makes it almost impossible in my worldview.

Related articles

• Functionalism? (witchsjourney.wordpress.com)

But, even if they are “pretty” bugs/insects/whatever the technical term is, I don’t like them. I never have. Butterflies remind me of moths, and moths remind me of mothballs, and mothballs remind me of dust, and dust collects in webs, and webs are spider webs. And word-associations of any kind with insects lead me inevitably to spiders. Ugh.

Sorry, that got me off-track. Now back on topic again.

Glasswing Butterfly

I remember reading somewhere, when I began researching mythology and folklore creatures, that in eastern Europe they thought something different about souls than in western Europe. I was reading about vampires in folklore, and the forms they could take. Of course, I had been reading Dracula by Bram Stoker, and Dracula, the great vampire of the night, took the form of a bat, a wolf, a mist in the night. And Stoker did do research into superstition and folklore of different regions of Europe when writing his book. I mean, the garlic, the iron stakes, the cutting off the heads of the dead…that isn’t all hokum that he made up off the top of his head. Nor are the times of day of power, or the strengths of the vampire, Dracula. The mythology and powers, the legends of the vampire that he attributes to Dracula, his brides, and the vampire lore within Dracula are all rather correct, so Stoker did do at least some research into traditional stereotypes of the time before he put pen to paper, metaphorically speaking.

But I remember reading somewhere that in eastern Europe they believed that it was a different form that “vampires” took in eastern Europe. I believe that it was an article or a book I was reading, said that vampires could take the form of a butterfly in Slavic regions/cultures & folklore, because of something to do with wandering human souls after death. And legends in different regions of Europe differed quite vastly, depending on where one came from. The problem is, I was 7 when I read Dracula, and at 7 I took no real interest in writing down the books or articles names or authors that I was reading all this stuff from. Because, it was all just curiosity. I wasn’t really interested in all the background information about the superstitions, just that there had been research, or even interesting superstitions and cultural traditions that had given Stoker his ideas was interesting enough for me.

So now, 10+ years later, I’m not sure if I’m making up this whole butterflies as an imagining of the dead soul thing or not. Because I can’t find anything academic to confirm my remembering of the reading or not.

But, it always has stuck for me. And so now, years later, I can’t help but imagine that butterflies are souls. Not that every physical butterfly is a soul, that would be beyond insane in my worldview. But…it’s kind of a symbolic thing for me. I can see butterflies as human souls symbolically, more so than I can really see a wolf or a bat as being one after death. I can’t really explain why, there’s no genuine reason, or explainable edge as to why, it just seems to make more sense to me, and it has ever since I read Dracula. Which also sounds awful. Because then it sounds like I say that I think butterflies can represent the human soul because I remember reading it while researching the fictional novel written by Stoker, and it came up that way. And of course, it has some potential ties to vampire folklore. So all the mystical woo-woo factor comes out for that too.

None of that really matters to me.

See, I don’t believe in vampires as such. Never have. Sure, when I was little, I wanted Dracula to be real, because I really wanted my favorite novel to be true (what kid doesn’t? I wanted Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings to be true too). I wanted Harker, van Helsing, Seward, Mina, Quincey and the lot of them to have “rid” the world of his evil. Though that’s an issue in and of itself depending on how you read the Victorian-era novel, but that’s really another blog post. In any case, I never really believed that vampires truly existed.

So I don’t really connect vampires with butterfly-transformation. I connect perhaps butterflies as a potential symbol of the human soul, and perhaps that connects due to an initial reading of Dracula and critiques of Stoker’s research or whatever. Something just kind of stuck in my head back then, telling me that it was correct, that I was right to have the association. It’s stuck with me, and it’s always been right and correct for me to view things this way. I suppose that’s my UPG on butterflies and souls. Because it’s totally unverifiable and I know that it isn’t really a normal thing to have as a connection, but it’s always been stuck in my head, that little voice that tells me I’m right to see it this way.

Always fun when something I dislike (bugs/butterflies) gets attached to something I happen to like (souls).

Rose – March 2013

This is my “baby”.

We (and by we, I mean my parents) bought her when I was 7, back in 1998. Her birthday is July 22. We actually got her just a few months after my dad lost his pet, our Chow-Chow, to old age (he was 10, almost 11). Me and my sister had been begging for a kitten for months and months, and my mom finally convinced my dad to let us get the cat. Of course, we promised our parents we’d feed her, clean the litter box, etc etc. But, at 7 and 5, we weren’t all too good at helping out with that stuff. Though we were really good at feeding her treats and spoiling her.

Rose is a Himalayan-Manx. So she’s got the no-tail feature of the Manx breed, but the features of the Himalayan. Her fur is three inches long and very silky. She’s so soft and silky, it’s absolutely unbelievable. This photo doesn’t really do her any justice to just how gorgeous she is. She has the markings of a Siamese though (the Himalayan is a Siamese-Persian cross). So she’s a Blue Point, technically. She’s not quite so sharply featured as a pure-bred Siamese would be, but she also doesn’t have the smushed in face of a Persian — much to my sister’s disappointment and my delight. She’s got gorgeous blue eyes though. They’re a stunning sapphire color that can look lighter at times, or darker.

My baby is also very tiny. She’s only 6 pounds. Which is hilarious if I could find a photo to show how big she is in comparison to another, more “normal”-sized cat (i.e. 10-12ish lbs). Her fur though, which she has an impressive ability to fluff out to great defensive capability, makes her look like a 20-pound cat when she’s upset or angry. The vet says she’s healthy though, and not in any danger. So she’s a tiny little 6-lb fluff-ball of a cat.

Rose – June 2009

She always comes and greets me at the door. And if I don’t put my stuff down and immediately pick her up on getting home, she’ll headbutt me in the shin until I pick her up and give her attention. And when I’m at home, she sleeps in bed with me, curled up at my side, purring and with her nose burrowed into my neck. She’s absolutely the most affectionate cat I know, and just so cute and loving.

She’s my 15-year-old (almost 16) baby, that I adore. She sleeps in my lap when I read, and just generally makes my life more pleasant.

I edited the image to remove the phone number that was above the message, to protect the kid who was involved. Because this wasn’t his fault either. And I’m not going to get some other kid in trouble or bothered, when he wasn’t involved either. That isn’t my style in the slightest.

Now, I have 1 friend whose name starts with a K, he’s definitely not interested in me. He’s highly interested in another girl, which I know for certain. I’ve been trying to help him get out on a date with her around her very busy nursing-class schedule. So there’s no issue there. All in all, I was highly confused when I got back on campus today and saw this on my whiteboard, because I don’t know any guys whose names start with K that might have been interested in me. I wasn’t sure if I should text the guy on the other end of the number, because I really wasn’t sure I wanted to deal with this.

My name is written at the top of my whiteboard, so it would be a guy writing, I knew that much. And, my door has a paper name tag with my name on it as well. So it’s pretty clear who lives in my apartment. All in all, obvious who I am. But….Emily is a very popular name for university-aged women, and usually if anyone is talking to me, it’s because they think I’m one of the other Emily’s around campus. There is at least 1 other Emily on my floor of my apartment-building, in my wing alone, and I don’t know about the other half of the building, because I don’t go down that wing at all. So I was pretty sure that whoever this “K___” was, they were probably interested in another Emily. That’s just how this stuff always goes.

Well, I finally texted the guy, sent him this photo, but the non-edited one, with his phone number included and asked him why he posted it on my door. He didn’t even know who I was. Or what Uni I was at. So we chatted a bit, to figure out what the hell was going on. Turns all out – one of his buddies at my Uni was pulling a prank. They put his number on a random door, as a joke. The joke being, getting some random girl to call up their buddy at some other college in our city to randomly get a laugh out of the whole lot of them. But this guy had no clue what res hall I was in, who I was, or what I was talking about. And he said it wasn’t his writing. But, when he told me who wrote the message, I had to do some quick Facebook profile checking. I don’t know the kid who did it per say. Actually, I’ve had the asshole in 1 class, a 1-month term, military ethics class, this last January. An Army ROTC kid at my Uni, this punk is an ass, used to getting whatever he wants. He’s a total tool, and I’m actually quite pissed off that he did this to me. But, since I know he has no clue where I live, or what my last name or initial is, I know that he didn’t deliberately pick my door out. He randomly picked a door and just coincidentally happened to get my door, it’s just his luck that I happen to know who the hell he is, which is just awesome (sarcasm).

Which is, I guess, American college-male humor, to pull these kind of stunts on each other. I suppose, is normal-reaction just supposed to be, “laugh it off funny”. But, I have some things in my past that make it worse than that for me.

See, in high school I had some pretty awful relationships with 2 of my ex-boyfriends. There are details I don’t really feel comfortable putting out online. Suffice just that I’ve got some very deep scars on emotional trust with men. I don’t really believe when any man says that I can “trust [them]“.

Then there’s the kinds of things that I’ve dealt with by the average male American of any age on the streets in the U.S. just as as female on a daily basis. I get whistled at, hit on in the most vile ways, screamed at when I ignore the comments and leers on a weekly basis. I carry several ways to defend myself on a daily basis. I don’t walk alone at night without having my phone in my hand, or at least one thing that can be used as a weapon. I never walk anywhere where it is dark or without light if I don’t know what the place looks like beforehand (i.e. without having been there or seen it in the daylight before). And I don’t trust to walk alone with any of my male friends, unless I have a weapon, or something I can use as a weapon on hand, so that I can defend myself.  I’ve been spat at for telling a man to get lost for trying to grab my arm and trying to kiss me.

In Germany I was nearly assaulted by an American when I refused to go on a date with him. The only thing that stopped him was the appearance of the German police (gods bless them, by the way, the German police were always friendly to me).

And I could go on, but this is just a short run of stuff.

And this was not the first time I’ve had someone go and pull this kind of stunt on me. I’ve had it happen once before, someone pulling this kind of phone number stunt before. Americans have a particular glee in pulling this kind of shit. It probably wouldn’t hit me nearly so hard, if I didn’t already have deep-seated trust issues. But since I do, I seriously was shaking in anger when this happened. I didn’t really think this guy would be interested in me, not this time. They never are interested in me. I hate crap like this.

I was so angry, I seriously contemplated cursing the SOB that laid out this prank. Once I had a few minutes to calm down, I would not do it. I mean…this isn’t worth that at all. But in the moment, I wanted to. I mean…I have a lot of anger about all this stuff built up. But in the heat of the moment, I considered it. It just pissed me off. Cursing him wouldn’t help me at all, and it wouldn’t make me feel better. I realized that, so I just am letting it go. I’m not really going to feel better by doing that, so I’m just going to ignore this kind of stuff in the future. I can’t really get drawn into this kind of college bullshit.

But when all this kind of stuff does is bring up memories of every other trust that I’ve had that gets broken, well it does make anger and hurt rise up. I know I can trust friends to friendship, and I do have some good male friends. But, I just can’t trust any males to potential relationships. This kind of stuff just reminds me of all the stuff that happens and why I can’t trust anyone who shows or pretends to show any potential interest in me as potential dating interest.

Officially I registered this blog 1 January 2012. But…since I didn’t post anything until March, that’s what I’m counting as my “anniversary” for the blog (because I feel like it). It’s technically the 2nd of March, for this. But since my first substantial post was this one, I’m going to go ahead and celebrate today, instead. It’s been a year, which is a pretty good accomplishment. I usually up and bail on tasks pretty quickly. So making a year is a pretty good initial thing for me. So I’m really grateful for those of you who follow me and my sometimes off-topic ramblings…or even the barely tenuously connected stuff that I fit together here. I’m glad that anyone has found my journey to be of use in reading (or perhaps just of use to laugh at me flailing around, I’m fine with that too).

Still, I’m going to keep blogging and sharing my flailing about. And I hope that you stick around and still find my posts of some interest, amusement or use. Thank you for sticking around and reading!

Emily