The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
The new Boeing 787 Dreamliner* can carry about 250 passengers. This blog was viewed about 1,700 times in 2012. If it were a Dreamliner, it would take about 7 trips to carry that many people.
Of course right now the stats helper monkeys would have to be towing the Dreamliner along the runway since they’ve been grounded!
Click here to view the Wordle I made using the Virtues Project cards I randomly selected throughout 2012. The size of the writing reflects which cards I pulled most frequently. No surprises there I would say. Or if you just click on the image you can embiggen it. (Hmmm, I wonder when embiggen will make it either into the dictionary or the list of words to be banished such as "world-class" and "spoiler alert"?) Lifelong learning is a theme which kept coming up over and over again through the year so I added it as an "extra" virtue although it's not in the original hundred virtues in the project. For this year I've also added Sisterhood, Self-Care, and Consolidation (in the sense of keeping one's affairs in order and generally being organized) What's special about the Virtues Project is that it's part of a global initiative "to inspire the practice of virtues in everyday life by helping people of all cultures to discover the transformative power of these universal gifts of character." As such the quotations are drawn from every faith tradition. The virtues are all positive and the cards themselves stress the importance of balance and common sense, i.e. truthfulness does not mean being hurtfully blunt, generosity does not mean giving away the grocery money. I've been continually amazed at how often the virtue I randomly choose for the day is exactly on point! Of course there are various other sets of cards out there, so I'm curious, do you use cards and if so which ones? What have you learned? do share, please! Wordle takes a bit of patience to get started but once you do it's great fun! I've used it in the past to create text on fabric through Spoonflower.
In a recent post about process I asked:
Am I just more of a verbal person than a visual one?
My career has dealt with the written word: translating, editing, writing, researching — things that were always encouraged, that came naturally without a lot of struggle. Certainly no one ever urged me to go to art school, nor did I think of it for myself.
My birth family placed great store on social activism, awareness of issues and politics. Although with a different perspective, so does Grandpa X, who was watching the news on TV when we first met.
My visual approach to life has made me look like a total airhead on a number of occasions.
When I was out with my father, I saw a line of clothes drying, stretched along a roof line between two chimneys. To me this was a very impressive image in itself, my father just said “How difficult it must be to raise children in those circumstances.”
Grandpa X and I were watching CNN one day and an interview with a turbaned Iraqi cleric came on. I immediately blurted out “I’ve already seen this the other day, I remember that wall!” (The wall in question was worn stucco with amazing weathering on it.)
But now I’m resolved not to feel inadequate because of this tendency. It’s just who I am, and really not to be taken as proof that I’m someone that doesn’t give a bleep.
Yes, it’s a town eat town world in the Hungry City Chronicles by Philip Reeve
Just finished Mortal Engines and can’t wait to read Predator’s Gold and any others he may have written.
Although this is likely to be shelved in the Young Adult section of the library it’s a thought provoking book with plausible characters and some laugh out loud humour too.
Coincidentally Philip Reeve was born in my hometown of Brighton, apropos of absolutely nothing! And Brighton does not figure in Mortal Engines, although I think the Royal Pavilion would make a perfect town-topper! You just have to read the book to find out.
We’re used to art in public places, 
like this mosaic in the Lonsdale Quay Market in North Vancouver, which was made by young people in an arts apprenticeship program.
Poetry in public places is less familiar. So I wanted to share this by Victoria’s Poet Laureate Linda Rogers.
They are a custom made cover for the free-flloating stainless steel globe sculpture at Government and Fisgard Streets, coincidentally next to Satin Moon. In past winters, the globe was removed because of the damage of freezing; this is a much more elegant and eloquent solution!
Today’s feels more like an illustration. I used the ruling pen but tried not to get any large blotches where I didn’t want them. This was somewhat inspired by illustrations in a children’s book, Freight Train by Donald Crews published in 1978 by Greenwillow Books, but I will have to look at the illustrations to be more confident about showing more than just the smokestack! When the drawing was finished I realized it could be mistaken for a hat.
First off, I love what I do for a living! Would I sometimes like less deadlines and more money? Yes, but wouldn’t we all? I enjoy editing people’s work so that others will want to read it, and it makes sense and reflects well upon the speaker or writer. There’s plenty of variety, some drama, and the challenge of researching terms of art and acronyms.
Still, it’s satisfying to come to the end of this year’s deadline-driven assignments and know that everything is submitted and dealt with. Plus I’ve been juggling next year’s calendar with its meeting dates since October so it’s a relief to have one less large piece of cardboard to handle every day.
the host is Miz B at 
