Seven Things: Some Stuff

the rain witch, 2024

01 - I've been slacking in my commenting and I am very sorry to my fellow bloggers. But I have no excuses. I simply didn't have much will to do it. So I did a lot of drive-by blogging - I read, I thought about what I read and I left without leaving any words. Maybe there are no words even though I'm a wordy person. But I did finish replying to comments on my blog, at least, I was caught up two weeks ago. I don't like to slack on replying to comments on my blog. I just think it's a good thing to do if for readers even I'm often two weeks late in replying.

02 - I'm doing the April A-Z Challenge because I like the challenge or maybe I like torturing myself by speed-writing posts but whatever reason, I'm up for it though I have no post prepared even though the challenge starts tomorrow. As usual, I will post random nonsense that may or may not entertain people a little with some not too-long fiction. More about the A-Z Challenge here.

03 - Apparently, I am a horrible student now. I'm currently trying to learn to use Affinity apps so that in the future, I can switch to using them instead of Adobe apps. I guess I have not much patience for learning new apps. It's going real slow just learning one app. But what the heck, I'm going to learn them even if I lose all my patience. My first piece is above - the rain witch. This is hand-drawn and digitally colored in Affinity Photo. Not quite sure what the idea was but I like it. I may redo it later. More about Affinity apps here.

04 - Two books I read recently:
• To Dye For: A Paranormal Mortician Murder Mystery (The Mortician Murders Book 1) by Greta Boris > link – I like it but not enough to continue the series. The main character seems to have a paranormal power so when she touches dead bodies, it make her feel something-something but it's not specific enough to understand completely but she seems to know that person didn't die naturally. But she didn't explore that power, didn't care for it, didn't even want to think about it so it's like a side thing that readers are to ignore for no reason. Why call this 'A Paranormal Mortician Murder Mystery' when the paranormal is ignored? But the main character seems likable but a bit uninteresting when compared to her grandmother and the old folks around her. And the murder mystery was just okay.

• Eat, Pray, Hex (Crescent Moon Mysteries Book 1) by Tara Lush > link – I really like the main character's cat was named Freddie Purrcury and her power of touching objects and getting memories but honestly, that's really the only good thing about her character. Every few instances, she talks about having hot flashes, like there's no other symptoms, well, there's mentions of having chin hair which is probably supposed to be amusing but I find it embarrassing. The repeating of the main character selling the hotel she had inherited and going back home is just annoying because we know there is zero chance of her doing it. But I'm mostly annoyed by the way the main character drooled over the hot professor. This isn't a romance but you know when she meets him, there will be romance. I didn't enjoy the mental drooling over the guy. I get it, women/men can drool over each other but for goodness sake, keep the drooling to a minimum in a mystery. Between the mental drooling and the hot flashes, this character is a reborn teenager and that's not something I like in a character. I also like the idea of putting cooking recipes on your tombstones. The murder mystery is kind of brief and kind of unimportant and easily solved and the ghosts, well, two ghosts, aren't fun, just overly sentimental and rude. I'm not continuing the series. I just don't think I can stand any more mental drooling and hot flashes but mostly I just don't like the main character..

05 - I finished posting the 18 posts for Retro(spect) Minute and I don't think I'll do this next year. I like going through my archive files and seeing what I had posted but it's a lot of work trying to pick out posts and finding the image/photo that went with it as my files weren't so organized back then. Looking back on these posts, it made me think I might have been more creative back then. I'm not saying I haven't been creative but I seem to be doing less creatively speaking.
    I did post a #13 retro minute post with some ramblings and questions but then I switched it with another. I just decided it wasn't the right post for this series. Anyway, just think of it as another February leap post where it appeared only on the 29th and then disappeared.

Cat illustration by Nyangsongi

06 - Jigsaw puzzle I had finished: Pintoo Cat Museum 1000 piece, illustrated by Nyangsongi > link
This was a good puzzle but a bit difficult as there are so many grass pieces. I don't think I'll purchase another again as the puzzles are made of plastic and I have too much plastic in my life. The pieces came in five, clear plastic sealed bags which I thought was a bit much and the box is a bit flimsy compared to most puzzle boxes but still useable. The pieces are tiny compared to other 1000 piece puzzles and the overall size of the whole puzzle is small also. The pieces fits well but some of them are such tight fit that you might mistake them for the wrong piece. The puzzle sticks together very well and it was printed with a extra white border so you can frame it. But they are a lot harder to take apart but at least, they are easier to store. I really like the illustration - it's the reason I brought it but the rubber ducky creeps me out a little but the cats are adorable.  If you don't know, this is a representation of a famous painting, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte by Georges Seurat.

07 - Music I have been listening to:

• Fuse by Everything But The Girl –  I've been listening to Fuse again and I almost loved this album. When I first listened to it a while back, I didn't really like it much. The cover at left isn't the original cover but it's something I made up. When I don't like a music album cover, I make my own, this is the good side of digital music but it's just ashamed they don't come with digital booklets because I really like seeing the lyrics and looking them up on the web is not the same. (Listen on youtube here.)

• We grew this way by Sammi Cheng – This is in Cantonese and I used google to translate the song titles and I watched the music videos. I really like this fast-paced album (only the title track is a slow one) and it's a hopeful album so if you feel down, you can listen to it and get cheered up. (Listen on youtube here.)

What are you up to these days? Anything you like to talk about?