Wrapping up this fine and crazy year in 50 short-to-medium numbered items. If you have OCD or something like that, you might want to read the first 50 short-to-medium numbered items first.

1. I may not be a dog person, but I’m definitely an Arnie person.
2. In every possible figurative sense, my eyes will probably always be bigger than my stomach.
3. Television? What television?
4. The shortest distance between two points is often a half-bottle of chianti.
5. Time crawls when you commit to doing something every day for 30 days.
6. The strongest proof of global warming may just be a visit to my apartment in September.
7. Life is better with regularly scheduled Ladies’ Nights.
8. And TextExpander.
9. Just because you have seen someone over and over on the internet does not mean they are ready to embrace you as an old friend when you finally greet them during a surprise run-in at the coffee shop.
10. Especially when they are four.
11. And you are interfering with their immediate receipt of hot chocolate.
12. Lead by example.
13. Podcasts are easier heard than made.
14. Bank accounts are easier closed than opened.
15. The price of grinding your teeth at night has more than doubled since 1998.
16. There may be a wearout number of viewings for Play Misty for Me, but at 50, I’ve yet to hit it.
17. No matter how evolved I get, from time to time, I will be That Asshole.
18. Designing album covers is every bit as cool as you thought it would be when you were 10.
19. Even if the albums are now only 5″x5″.
20. And will mostly be downloaded anyway.
21. Despite optometrists’ exhortations to the contrary, you do not actually need to buy a new pair of glasses every year.
22. If you want something done, schedule it.
23. You never know where your next job will come from.
24. That goes double if you have a blog.
25. Those classes at the Learning Annex are as educational as you’d expect them to be.
26. That doesn’t mean you won’t learn from them.
27. The Central Coast is even better when seen from the picture window of your own, private rental home.
28. Never say “never.”
29. On the other hand, “no” is a really good thing to say from time to time.
30. If Malcolm Gladwell does not want to be my next boyfriend, Jonathan Coulton will do just fine.
31. Or Bob McBarton, if I can convince him to leave his adorable wife and daughter.
32. Or Dan Savage, if he’d be into batting for the other team.
33. The point where dreams get truly difficult is when they start coming true.
34. You can’t quit (or start) until you’re ready.
35. When it comes to letting my hair go, I’m still a total scrotum.
36. The best birthday presents are the ones that cost nothing and show up unexpectedly.
37. It is way more fun to marry other people than to marry, period.
38. Trying to compose 100-things lists in the WP text editor is like trying to make a pie wearing mittens.
39. She who doth not invoice, doth not get paid.
40. Let it go.
41. Really—just let it go.
42. I’m serious…let it the fuck go, already!!!
43. Boobage is a pain in the ass.
44. People are amazingly good at providing help.
45. Especially when you ask.
46. Sadly, nothing much has changed from a management perspective since Upton Sinclair’s time.
47. Happily, much has changed regarding access to the means of production.
48. The less you make of the holidays, the more fun they are.
49. Even if you own, you’re only renting.
50. When in doubt, put on Django Reinhardt…

Happy new year, one and all!

xxx
c

It may be a while before I post another one of these, so…

2007

• 100 things, Part I

2006

• 100 things, Part I
• 100 things, Part II

2005

• 100 things, Part I
• 100 things, Part II

2004

• 100 things, Part I
• 100 things, Part II

TOPICS: annual 100, List-o-rama!.

Hard to believe this is the fourth installment of listy, round-up goodness. However, time cares not what we believe, continuing to march the hell on, regardless.

And so, without further ado…

1. Money might spend itself, but it does not reconcile itself in the QuickBooks.
2. Goals, on the other hand, neither make nor complete themselves.
3. No matter how public you go with them.
4. There is life after land lines.
5. CFLs do not suck nearly as hard as they did five years ago.
6. But they still kinda-sorta suck.
7. Bread + beer - activity = belly.
8. Fortunately, underwear stretches.
9. For someone who claims an ambivalence towards blood relatives, I feel awfully proud that five of my boy-cousins made hanging out with me a priority.
10. There is still no family like family of choice.
11. Even if they happen to be related by blood.
12. Nerds rule.
13. No, seriously—they rule.
14. Whoever said “Life sucks and then you die” was only half-right.
15. Thank christ.
16. Or whomever.
17. Information designers are hot.
18. Portland kicks L.A.’s ass.
19. Seattle doesn’t, but Seattle coffee kicks all coffee’s ass.
20. The real cost of acquiring stuff is the time spent divesting oneself of it.
21. That thing I tell myself, about being able to go back to copywriting? Total lie.
22. When in doubt, do a salute.
23. Or rearrange the furniture.
24. Cheese can tell you a lot about a person.
25. Telling stories is my favorite thing.
26. Helping other people tell stories runs a close second.
27. There is no such thing as too much music.
28. Or books.
29. Facebook is the AOL of social media.
30. Twitter, on the other hand, is the tits.
31. Perimenopause is a lot like having PMS 365 days a year.
32. Atheism makes an excellent hillbilly repellent in a pinch.
33. This design business thing isn’t for everyone.
34. And by “everyone,” I mean me.
35. The Wall Street Journal publishes an entire newspaper every day.
36. And by “every day,” I mean every fucking day.
37. I miss SxSW when I don’t go.
38. Mid-century L.A. apartments were not built for global warming.
39. Neither were mid-century women.
40. The Marines are the second-toughest job you’ll ever love.
41. President of your Toastmasters club being first.
42. We all have a type.
43. Rick’s hamburgers are as good as they say.
44. If you build it, they will come.
45. Dental insurance in 2007 is but a walking shadow.
46. Not to mention a walking shadow, a poor player strutting & fretting and a tale told by an idjit.
47. There really and truly are no shortcuts.
48. There is nothing like fan mail.
49. I can live without everything but truth.
50. Even the lamb sandwich at Cafe du Village.

Can’t wait for Part II? Have I got your number, brother:

2006

• 100 things, Part I
• 100 things, Part II

2005

• 100 things, Part I
• 100 things, Part II

2004

• 100 things, Part I
• 100 things, Part II

TOPICS: annual 100, List-o-rama!.

In what has become sort of a tradition here at communicatrix, we bring you the year in reverse…or perverse…or something like that. Because after all, what is the point of having a whole, entire year if you can’t heave it up at the end and enjoy it again from the beginning?

1. I could live happily elsewhere.
2. I probably won’t anytime soon.
3. Deadwood is the best cocksucking sonofabitch show ever.
4. Coaching works.
5. Lawns are overrated.
6. The bargain matinée at the Century City 15 rules.
7. If you want people to become really alarmed on your behalf, tell them you’re planning to shave your head.
8. I love the acorn squash at Houston’s with a fervor that borders on the unnatural.
9. Good coffee mugs are as hard to find as good handbags and unicorns.
10. I enjoy looking anyway.
11. All of those people who said I would outgrow my lust for high heeled footwear were right.
12. Damn them.
13. Rolos will be the television of 2007.
14. If forced to come up with an earthly description of heaven, I’d pick flashlights, a slow shutter and good company on a starlit deck.
15. A well-cooked pot roast runs a close second.
16. Especially when it is cooked for you, with love, on a chilly Sunday evening.
17. Toastmasters is the shit.
18. UPS is apparently an acronym for Unflaggingly Poor Shipping.
19. There may be something to this whole networking thing.
20. Ditto conferences.
21. I have a little problem recognizing the obvious.
22. When playing games with children under 12, you have to let them win occasionally.
23. Even if you don’t want to.
24. Which I never do.
25. Noise is to me as dust was to Julianne Moore in that Todd Haynes movie.
26. It is worth it to pay the extra freight for heavy card stock.
27. Those cherry Larabars are really, really good.
28. Eventually, if you eat enough of them, they taste like soylent green.
29. I absolutely, positively love getting up in front of a bunch of people and talking.
30. Acting, not so much.
31. Just because you paid a crapload of money for a couch is no reason to keep it around.
32. Alison Bechdel is a genius.
33. My jealous streak, while lying dormant for years at a time, is capable of erupting at a moment’s notice.
34. Fortunately, it now scares the bejeezus out of me.
35. My parking luck will never catch up to my used leather jacket luck.
36. I like the idea of being a gardener better than the actual gardening.
37. My significant others will always be somewhat horrified by the rest of the club.
38. Being disorganized is my spiritual governor the way Crohn’s is my physical one.
39. Starbucks sucks.
40. Its suckage increases in direct proportion to the distance between it and other coffee alternatives.
41. This makes it suckier beyond suckiest suckiness.
42. Forget the hounds—release the fleas.
43. With the right partner, sex actually gets better after the 18-month mark.
44. This gives me hitherto unimaginable hope for the future.
45. If things continue in the current direction, I may drive less than 6,000 miles next year.
46. The Wall Street Journal is a surprisingly engaging read.
47. You can still recycle VHS tapes.
48. I don’t look quite as butch with short hair as I thought I would.
49. The BF looks even better with long hair than I thought he would.
50. Fucker.

xxx
c

Can’t wait for more communicatrix listy goodness? Come late to the party? Never fear! Memory lane be here:

100 things/2005, Part I
100 things/2005, Part II
100 things/2004, Part I
100 things/2004, Part II

TOPICS: annual 100, List-o-rama!.

Oh, god. I’ll do anything to put off “Getting To Empty”, won’t I?

1. I really really really like living on my own.
2. I can see the day I’ll be ready to give it up anyway.
3. Despite my good intentions, I probably will not finish the curtains before that happens.
4. Surprise miracles are even better than the ones you wish for.
5. The best way to make peppers is to sauté them in a bunch of olive oil, garlic and onions, a wee bit of red wine, then throw in a crapload of spinach at the end.
6. The best way to cook steaks it to let The BF do it.
7. My sister, Liz, makes the most amazing silver jewelry.
8. My sister, Cathy, is amazing, period.
9. Eddie Conner and my spirit guides were right.
10. I don’t need a lot of stuff, but I need the stuff I have to be nice.
11. The red sofa is too big for my living room.
12. I am not, perhaps, the white tornado, after all.
13. I have a visceral dislike for the color mint green.
14. Vonage is cooler in theory than it is in practice.
15. My jewelry isn’t worth as much as I thought it was.
16. I need more art in my life.
17. If my gut tells me something, I need to pay attention.
18. That goes for literally as well as figuratively, in my case.
19. That colorectal surgeon who withheld results from me, sending me into a tailspin of illness it took me a year and a half to climb out of didn’t realize what he wasn’t doing, and didn’t do it on purpose.
20. I really and truly understand this.
21. I’m ready to forgive him.
22. Everything changes.
23. It is 100% worth it to buy the wireless mouse.
24. For each computer.
25. Including an extra for your boyfriend’s house.
26. It is way harder to design your own logo than it is to design someone else’s.
27. There will always be some version of having to go to your friends’ shows just because they are your friends, even when you have effectively left the building.
28. I have way too many clothes.
29. I have more than enough money, even when I think I don’t.
30. There will never be enough time.
31. Should it come to that, it will be much easier to give up booze than it will coffee.
32. Bloggy crushes are as much fun as show crushes, and very similar in nature.
33. Except for short stretches, I will never be as glamorous as my mother, either of my grandmothers, most of my friends and both of my sisters.
34. I am okay with that.
35. They always have been.
36. You do not know how beautiful life can be until you have added a delete button to your Gmail.
37. The difference between love and attachment is the short step between living and shadow-living.
38. If you buy a forest-green rug from Urban Outfitters and use it as a bedspread, you will wake up every morning with forest-green snot in your nose.
39. Holidays are better for me as an orphan.
40. My eyes will always be bigger than my stomach, so I better get jiggy with the workarounds.
41. Estrofest is at least as transformative as morning pages.
42. Implementing GTD is both easier and harder than I thought it would be.
43. My level of ongoing commitment to something is dictated by delight, shame and money—in that order.
44. I learned more about piano and guitar than I thought I would.
45. The nano was made for the podcast.
46. Despite 43 years of evidence to the contrary, I can get fat.
47. I don’t need presents at Christmas, but I must have them on my birthday.
48. The St. André at Trader Joe’s is not bad, not bad at all.
49. Vodka is good for summer and scotch is good by the fire but my favorite flavor of hootch is bourbon.
50. Writing things down makes all the difference.

May the lessons and gifts of 2005 make your 2006 all the richer.

xxx
c

TOPICS: annual 100, List-o-rama!.

I have been busy gorging myself on movies, sex and certain foods I will have to give up when I resume the diet I must observe to keep the blood from coming out of my ass. Such are the holidays for me.

Of course, the holidays were supposed to be devoted to organizing, blog-moving and other dorky things, but before I could properly set about arranging things for 2006, it was important that I sort out 2005.

And so, without (much) further ado, I give you that which I have learned this year, part the first:

1. Online dating works.
2. The courts don’t always.
3. Tasty Bites makes one type of heat-and-eat Indian food that is SCD-legal.
4. Making your bed every day gives one an odd sense of accomplishment.
5. John Waters gives good theater.
6. Coffee tastes better in the yellow mug.
7. Tea tastes better in the blue one.
8. Given the work is interesting, I’d rather do it than a vacation.
9. Del.icio.us rocks.
10. Ditto Bloglines.
11. Double-secret-probation ditto ELF.
12. When the diet that stopped the blood from shooting out of you
    like a backwards bidet specifies “fanatical adherence”, don’t be an asshole—fanatically adhere.
13. Clogs are a lot like crack, only more expensive and your first taste isn’t free.
14. Sometimes when The BF wants to spend 25 bucks on a doohickey from Dwell magazine, he’s right.
15. After health, my well-being on a given day is most directly tied to how good my hair looks.
16. I cannot begin to describe how rattling that admission is.
17. Amazingly, grocery-store sushi can actually be good.
18. Even more amazingly, so can something with the total asshole name of “engagement chicken”.
19. Tom Leykis and Dr. Laura Schlessinger have more in common than they’d like to admit.
20. I would rather design the postcard for a play than be in one.
21. I’m okay with that.
22. If you are the kind of chick who says “I feel more comfortable around men,” you have yet to become the super-fabulous chick you can ultimately become.
23. Meyer’s Dark tastes nothing like Maker’s Mark, but they are apparently interchangeable in a noisy bar.
24. You cannot, under any circumstances, turn left on a red arrow.
25. If you do, it will cost you $400.
26. If you don’t reply in time because it is your first mover EVER and you are too stupid to read the ticket properly, it will cost you an extra hundred and untold hours in lines at traffic court.
27. A stronger prescription has absolutely zero effect on night vision.
28. The Brits make the best soaps.
29. The Yanks make the best trash.
30. Sometimes 12″ beats 15″.
31. To make a really good SCD-compliant pizza, you need to put the cheese on first.
32. Then the toppings, then the sauce.
33. It still doesn’t taste as good cold.
34. Old boyfriends never die; they just lurk on communicatrix.
35. Sometimes you have to wait to be proved the funniest boy in class, but when you do, your victory will be all the sweeter.
36. Grocery-store sushi kicks ass.
37. You can make a roomful of complete strangers laugh with other people’s slides and videos.
38. People who drive SUVs really are ruder.
39. A bunch of cats playing pop songs from the Middle Ages makes for a mesmerizing show.
40. A bunch of cats howling in Icelandic makes for an even better one.
41. Vegas is one and a half hours too far away to be worth it.
42. Blunnies look better online than they do in person.
43. No matter how many oaths I swear not to, I will always buy more books than I have shelf space for.
44. The clients you think will be difficult can turn out to be your staunchest supporters.
45. The clients you think will be easy will inevitably turn out to be the biggest pain in the keister.
46. Given the option of any fancy entertainment available in one of the most exciting metropolitan areas in the world, I will most likely choose burgers and a movie in the ‘Deener.
47. Just because someone dumps a pile of crap in your lap doesn’t mean you are obligated to keep it.
48. The best movie of the year is less than 90 minutes long and has a kid wiping spooge on school lockers.
49. The Americanos are best at Kings Road and the eggs are best at Lulu’s, but overall best breakfast score goes to Backdoor Bakery.
50. To spare yourself untold private misery and public humiliation, change the default setting on your blog software to “draft.”

xxx
c

TOPICS: annual 100, List-o-rama!.