The Naughty Aughties

Today is the first day of fall [for a while I tried to make "autumn" happen, but I've come to accept that it's not going to happen - it's better off as the name of some pretentious girl]. I love the fall as it means many positive things for me the best of which is that less heat and humidity means less migraines and knee pain. Due to my love of school fall always seemed a good time for reinvention of self - it's back to school and you can go back as a different kind of girl, thoroughly changed by the misadventures of youth and summer [a toxic combination, to be sure]. And even though I'm no longer back to school, I still like this idea very much.

Today also marks 101 days until the end of the year. I was mistakenly informed by the ever-reliable CBC Radio [usually the only thing they screw up is the sports reports - not that it matters as hippies don't really like sports anyway] that today marked 100 days until the end of the year, but they were wrong. I counted. I like having the extra day to think things over - takes some of the pressure off. And, it's not just 100 days until the end of the year - it's 100 days until the end of the decade! So long to the naughty aughties [don't ever use the word aught around people who are not super old - they have no idea what you're talking about - thankfully most people that know me are used to be sounding like an old time-y prospector or carnival barker]. As always, I'm a fan of pointless dates and occasions. Also, I really think that one can undergo quite a transformation in 100 days, given proper motivation. On the radio they mentioned things like doing 100 pushups each day for 100 days or changing your diet [vegan/vegetarian for 100 days or local food eating for 100 days] or maybe - *gasp* *horror* - giving up television for 100 days or building towards something that would happen on New Years Eve over the next 100 days.

Intriguing ideas all, but I'm going with something different. As most everyone knows, I am a crafty veteran of the whole "thing a day" business. While I do have more ideas for new things, most of them are quite grand in scale and I'm lacking in the type of finances they would require. What I'm not lacking in is an active imagination. A couple of things first...I've noticed that I feel remarkably uplifted and in general "better" when I do something creative. Whether this is creating a collage, doing some creative writing [le blog no longer counts as writing] or cooking or baking something new and interesting. While it might be difficult to get started on any of these projects, once underway the positivity begins to flow. And yes, they are all projects...I really like this term...David Lynch calls things projects and if it's good enough for him, it works for me. It gives me a sense of importance that I find necessary. I'm determined to make something useful out of a decade that has mostly been quite naughty to me.

So, here goes - tomorrow I will be launching my new 100 day project - for the next 100 days I will contribute to a creative work each day. I will not necessarily finish one project per day [ending with 100 creative works is a bit much for my tiny apartment to handle], but I will work on one each day and I will provide [hopefully] brief daily updates on this blog right here. I'm not looking to reinvent the wheel here - but I do need some motivation to keep my creative juices flowing. Some ideas for projects include: cooking/baking new things, making collages, working with watercolours, making earrings and other jewellry, working on my graphic novel, working on my regular novel, working on my collection of short stories, getting out my old manual camera and doing some photography the old fashioned way...and etc. If anyone has any other ideas, I would appreciate them. I will end this with a call to arms - fellow bloggers [and non-blogging readers] - please join me on this 100 Day Project of Projects!