The word of 2020

Drej and I had this conversation earlier, while she was telling me about the month spent outdoors, on a Christmas fair. (I wanted to register fairs as one of my future occupations, but the General said he rather has me inside and for himself than outside and freezing. He doesn't get the appeal :D ). I doodled with an old photo of her, learning the ropes of the watercolour photoshop action, and of course, because she's hot, she got a ton of Likes when she put it up as a profile pic. Simultaneously an editor of a local photo magazine posted a long bitter rant about what shit pics on Facebook get Likes while the quality stuff - like his - gets so little. A lot of responses he got were, hey, man, listen, this is Facebook, not a National gallery - we Like mostly the photos of people we know and like. 

        I remember the time when suspecting such a rant was about me would break my heart. Because I would really want to be featured in such a prominent magazine and the opinion of the editor would mean the world to me. It wouldn't have occurred to me that these role models I aspire the respect and approval of are bitter old fucks who hardly ever got any respect of their own, dreaded the talented young competition, hated the better Liked and resented the taste of the general public who will vote a thousand times Yes on a hot ass and tits in the least original lighting, than their artistic view of the political now. Or some shit like that. 

        They would have shunned me and I would think it was me. 

      Creativity - and until you get this, you will suffer loneliness and defeat - is like a religion. It is between you and the Gods. Not the church/gallery, not the psalms/reviews, not the preachers/editors and critics. It is you, sitting down, to create and ten years later to create a lot better and 25 years later to create a legacy. If you want to sell and be famous and recognized, that is an entirely different strategy, you can learn that as well, or hire someone game-savvy. But you are not creating to impress or compete or compare with drunk old farts. They need never know the poetry under your fingertips you are tuning in in secret. It's not about them. It is about pulling on 

BIG GIRL PANTS.

I really should at least try to watch the latest Star Wars, shouldn't I ? 

I feel like I'm having a grown-up date with 2020

... pulling up my big girl pants.

January plans - finish Kasia, make a strategic plan for the rest, come up with five new product ideas

and in the book, send the guys off to a losing war. They need to die. That book needs to end. And never stop bleeding. No pressure.

And so the hunting season is over. I won't see the huntsman for another 11 months, but at least until now the dreams have subsided. Funny, innit, what pure and noble men my brain pursues - had he been the type to cheat on his beloved wife and thus present me with an opening, I would never in a thousand years favor him so. Such is my complex for knights of infinite resignation. And get this. He's a Sagittarius. An archer. Of course he is. The only sign more stubborn than Aries. 

Today's hunt began atop a ridge and going southwards, to the station G and I used on Thursday (I wasn't dressed for that station and having sex in a frozen wooden tower only makes you warm for about five minutes. Mental note to always carry warm tea, always, everywhere.) It was a heck of a terrain, way down and way up and over thorn and through an impossible cobweb of very young beech trees. It was long, too. I got lost twice, but nobody bothered to call for me, so I just wandered around and played in the swampy gorge. Supposedly the General could see me the whole last while, even phoning me to pause me when others circled a boar (utterly unsuccessfully - we had a feast later, but feasted on a domesticated piglet. What irony is that. I didn't eat it, I just ate cookies.) and at some point I climbed back out of the gorge to look for him, but got distracted by a pretty clearing and wandered in the wrong direction. He said he waved his signal flag at me. No idea. Either I am getting fucked for sight or I just wanted to be alone. 

On the minus side, my second favorite mug is cracking and starting to leak. I think I should give it a Viking funeral. 

Two more days to make the target sale - I mean the yearly target I set for myself. ALMOST. But I am not complaining, for a thorough freaking amateur, this could have gone a lot worse. I just need to invest some strategy in it.

  I set: 50 reviews, 160 sales, 211 times shop favorited

I met: 59 reviews, 159 sales, 234 times shop favorited

...

  Shall we set something for 2020? Mm? Let's set something wild.

300 reviews, 500 sales and a 1000 times shop favorited? I'll let you know? :D :D

Been f***ing around with these new 'watercolour' presets I purchased, trying to figure them out, testing to come up with some new promo model....

Families are a small pack of the worst possible people, all of whom look and sound exactly like you and whose murder is less punishable than a random killing, because psychologists understand.

So proud of the General, he was Batman today ...

Crazy busy - making photos, cards, listings, promotions and above all - because I told G that I will fucking saw him in half if on a DAY before holidays he gives me a credit card and sends me to the shopping mall to 'deal with it (presents)' - he gave me the card today and I actually did fairly well. Met a nephew - the fun one - who helped with suggestions, and Tinka, and I bought some good food for later. Even saved a quarter of the given budget. Go me!

     In the meanwhile, the General was Batman - he saw a no-good man just outside the window in the building entrance opposite, doing very unseemly things with his privates, and he called the police and then helped to chase the sick old man down. There's a kindergarten in our street for fuck's sakes! I do feel bad  - what kind of a sicko must you be to resist the urge to play with yourself in the middle of winter in the middle of the street in the middle of the day. Imagine focusing on the holidays and getting a call from the cops that your father or uncle has been arrested for indecent exposure in the city. The cops actually called G back to tell him thank you and that they got the guy. I could tell G was a little shaken by the whole thing. His brain is so pure, he cannot fathom the damage that could be done if a young mother with a kid from the daycare walked right into the sight. Needless to say we skipped sex today. It just felt icky.

So guess what happens when we suit up, gear up, gun up and get corn to go boar hunting?

The wheel gets torn off the car in a shallow dirt road puddle.
I am not even joking. 

Back from Prague. My brain is full. I think I have an idea of what I want to try for 2020, I am just waiting for my balls to drop.

New driftwood thingies on Etsy

It is no wonder people fear confrontation. I mean, not fear as one fears being hit by a bus, or the dog getting poisoned by crazy neighbours, but being put in a shitty situation by overwhelming, entitled people who are not used to being told no, thank you. There are only two possible outcomes. If you are me. One: you do what you are told to do and you feel miserable and frustrated and are in a situation where you are going to waste time and money accommodating someone. Two: you don't do what you are told and you are forever subjected to emotional blackmailing, rudeness, threats and overall negative energy from them for the rest of all times. 

      Of course, I am choosing two, I am no-one's bitch and far too old to be told to do something I don't want to do. The problem is, I haven't the option to just CBA. I do feel both of them, heavily. When I really don't want to be. I am minding entirely my own business out here, living detached, quiet, politically correct existence, and this gives some people an odd idea that I am pliable. Because we are friendly and we mow the communal lawn and shovel the snow off the parking lot a few times per winter. That for some reason I OWE people something when they ask it of me. If it were up to me, I would just shut myself further in and weather the dirty looks until finally, we move. General is more negotiatory in nature. But not because he is the sort of a person to try and accommodate everybody. Heck no. It is his most cruel mental weapon. After the negotiation people not only feel like their arguments have been proven porous, but he thus has the ammo to claim there WAS a negotiation and albeit he was willing to come to a middle ground, no middle ground was reached. 

Either way. I look forward to a day we have NO neighbors. None. For miles and eons.