Web Miscellany: Compilation #63

Hello there! I hope that you are and your loved ones are staying safe and healthy. My boyfriend came out of quarantine after sixteen days and two hospital visits and, thankfully, is on the road to recovery. I am so grateful that he is okay and simultaneously terrified to go out in public because: a) we still don’t know where he picked it up and, b) people are behaving irresponsibility and going anywhere feels like too great of a risk. My in-laws are still socializing, so I won’t be attending Christmas this year, which will be strange (and, yet, strangely okay). All the gifts that I was planning to buy and make this year are still just plans, so we’ll see what magic I can stir up in the coming week. Speaking of which, do you have any gifts you’re especially excited to give or receive this year?

I recently learned that Phoenix has had the second largest influx of people since the start of the pandemic (after Austin), which explains the insane real estate market lately (our home value increased by 43% in 2020) and makes me even more eager to move somewhere more rural and rainy. We’re full — go home!

Since vacations had to be cancelled, I have been taking random days off to use up my paid time off, but still had an abundance left over. Thus, I have the next seventeen days free. I can’t begin to fathom what I’ll do with all the free time, especially since it’s not really safe to go anywhere. If you have any suggestions, I’m all ears. If all goes as planned, I’ll work on some sewing projects, try some new recipes, and maybe give this blog a little TLC.

I hope you have a productive and stress-free weekend. Here are a few links from around the web. Feel free to share anything interesting you’ve stumbled upon in the comments.

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1. “Recognizing that people’s reactions don’t belong to you is the only sane way to create. If people enjoy what you’ve created, terrific. If people ignore what you’ve created, too bad. If people misunderstand what you’ve created, don’t sweat it. And what if people absolutely hate what you’ve created? What if people attack you with savage vitriol, and insult your intelligence, and malign your motives, and drag your good name through the mud? Just smile sweetly and suggest – as politely as you possibly can – that they go make their own fucking art. Then stubbornly continue making yours.” — Elizabeth Gilbert
2. Unravel Your Year 2021 from Susannah Conway, a free workbook of exercises I’ve been doing annually for about a decade and keep coming back. My word of the year for 2020 was REPLENISH.
3. How to keep your front-loading washer moisture-free! No more mildewy towels, hopefully.
4. A doctor on 9 things that could go wrong with the new vaccines. I work in an industry tangent to clinical trials, so we’ve been having internal discussions about what we don’t and what we don’t. It’s fascinating regardless of how you feel about the vaccines.
5. A sweet a lighthearted story of a lonely girl and and the fairy that came to live in her tree during the pandemic.
6. 8 Ways to Encourage a Meaningful New Year by Courtney Carver. I really appreciate the reminder that small actions still matter.
7. A place to write from Seth Godin: “And a huge advantage of having a daily blog is that the software is always open, waiting for you to write something.”
8. News is the Last Thing We Need Right Now from David at Raptitude. Also, a friendly reminder that propaganda against the American people has been legal since the passing the Smith-Mundt Modernization Act of 2012. Please think critically about anything you see on television or online, and research the things that matter to you. On a similar tangent, the social web is doing exactly what it was built for and Facebook is a Doomsday Machine.
9. “We tend to measure performance by what happens when things are going well. Yet how people, organizations, companies, leaders, and other things do on their best day isn’t all that instructive. To find the truth, we need to look at what happens on the worst day.” You’re Only as Good as Your Worst Day from Farnam Street. I have many unproductive days, so I’ve recently been trying to determine how my worst days can still add value.
10. I’ve likely shared this several times before, but I simply love this spoken word piece and return to it often.