Fanart: Gobo and Luri Fraggle

I'm awful at drawing Fraggles. I try to doodle them in class, and they come out looking nightmarish, particularly when I try to draw any members of the Fraggle Five--Gobo, Mokey, Wembley, Boober, and Red. Well--alright, so I can sometimes draw a decent Boober. And once, I even made a somewhat-acceptable Wembley. But no matter how many times I've tried to draw Gobo, he somehow always ends up looking like he's part-dinosaur, or some completely different Fraggle in Gobo's shirt, or some other similar disaster. Oh, I can usually draw a decent random, anonymous Fraggle... but specific Fraggles don't work too well.

But I started working on this new Fraggle fan-fiction that involves a new Fraggle, and I wanted to get a clear mental picture of what this Fraggle looked like, so I picked up my colored pencils to see what I could do. My little Luri Fraggle turned out so well that I decided to try to draw Gobo next to her. And believe it or not, he's actually recognizable as Gobo! I was so excited that I just had to share. I'll spare you the horror of seeing all my doodles, but here is a fairly acceptable drawing that I'm kind of proud of!

Thanksgiving and still alive

You know, Imaginary Reader, it's funny... I was so sure that when I started school, I'd have a regular schedule, and I'd start posting on a regular basis. At LEAST once a week, if not every day.

Yeah, so much for that.

See, I sort of promised myself that I wouldn't post any drama on this blog--you know, wouldn't use it to vent or to bash anybody. And the school year started with a whole huge boatload of drama. Drama up the wazoo. And by the time the drama calmed down, I was stressed and pressed for time, and this blog was just NOWHERE on the priority list. School comes first, after all. And then there's Hillel, of course. And I do love my family--they are CERTAINLY a priority, not that there's much I can do with my family when I'm at school. And for a while there, I was even working, so that's certainly a time commitment... Anyway, you get the idea. I haven't had much time or energy and I've been swimming in stress.

But now it's Thanksgiving break, and I still have plenty of schoolwork to keep me busy all week and family to visit in between. That's what I've been doing all week; if I haven't been visiting family, I've been doing homework. And I should really probably be doing homework now. But I'm tired, and quite frankly, I've had enough. It's Thanksgiving. For once... it's nice to relax.

So while there's still a little bit of Thanksgiving left, I'll say what I'm thankful for.

I'm thankful for a chance to relax today. I'm thankful for the wonderful family I have--thankful for how supportive they are, thankful that we love each other, and thankful that we don't have to PRETEND to like each other at gatherings like today. We're genuinely happy to get together.

I'm thankful for my Hillel board. I'm thankful for their good ideas, for their hard work and dedication, and for how supportive they are.

I'm thankful for my friends, two in particular--Ryan, over on The Muppet Mindset, and Rachel, one of my board members. Both of them have been with me through all sorts of stuff and supported me so much... (You may have noticed I've been saying that a lot. I've needed a lot of support lately. I'm fortunate enough to be able to find that support everywhere I turn.) I'm also thankful for Rachel's roommates, who have absolutely no objection to me randomly invading their apartment to watch Fraggle Rock, vent to Rachel, and do homework. Or pretend to do homework. Or stand in the kitchen and watch them clean up or make food. Or whatever else I may need to do in attempt to maintain some semblance of sanity.

I'm thankful for my professors, who actually care about us students and really want to teach us and help us learn and grow and become successful. It makes all the difference. And it helps that they actually know what they're talking about, too.

And I'm thankful for the Muppets, for Fraggle Rock, and for Sesame Street. I'm thankful for all the joy and hope they bring into the world. I've said that Fraggle Rock is all that's keeping me sane this semester... and really, it's not much of an exaggeration. But mostly, I'm thankful for the magic. Yes, Muppets, Fraggle Rock, and Sesame Street are all magical, and I'm incredibly grateful for that.

And I'd say that summarizes most of what I'm thankful for this Thanksgiving... and it also happens to summarize most of my life. So I guess I'm not doing too bad.

And the clock just changed, so it's no longer Thanksgiving and is now Black Friday. Best wishes to those of you crazy and/or brave enough to head for the stores.

Freshly Baked Cookies

There is nothing in the world like a chocolate chip cookie fresh out of the oven.

As I'm sure many middle-class kids do, I have many a beloved childhood memory of baking chocolate chip cookies with my mom. In my case, it also involves my big sisters, some kids my mom babysat, and a set of matching aprons with the biggest one reading "I bring home the dough" and the smallest one reading "I EAT the cookies!" Those memories also involve the fact that my mom's chocolate chip cookies were the absolute best in the world.

Then came eighth grade, when I baked some chocolate chip cookies for my uncle. Weeks later, my mom went to my aunt and uncle's house and was surprised to find the cookies not only still in existence--they never last more than a few days in our house--but still perfectly delicious when dunked in a little coffee. She decided I had surpassed her cookie-baking skill, and who was I to argue? From then on, when cookies needed to be baked, it fell to me to bake them.

Fast-forward to the end of this past semester of college, when I started baking cookies to bring home every time I came home from school. I bought a lovely cookie jar just for the cause, and my cookies became an expected, much-appreciated treat, and of course I gave a repeat performance in honor of my big sister coming in from California and my future-brother-in-law coming in from Pennsylvania. (They came in at the same time. This was only one round of cookie-baking.)

Well, last week, Daddy had a little accident on the motorcycle (and by "a little accident," I mean "half a second away from catastrophic," but that's for another post) and fractured his left shoulder blade. Now he can't work, he's in a lot of pain, and he's crawling the walls with boredom. The obvious solution? Bake cookies, of course.

The magic started just as I was adding the flour. Mom came downstairs, gasped, and grinned to see what I was doing. Then, of course, she picked out a little finger-full of dough to eat.

Moments later, the chocolate chips were in, and suddenly the beater and spatula were no longer needed. "Dad, which one do you wanna lick?" He chose neither, thinking I would still need the spatula, and he grabbed a spoon. Mom picked out some more dough with the knife I'd used to level off flour and sugar. I got to lick the beater. And Dad grabbed another spoon. "Don't even bother cooking it. We'll just eat it like it is," Mom teased.

But mere moments after I took the first batch out of the oven, Dad was off the couch.

"Oh, you've got some done already?"

"Yup. Fresh out of the oven."

"That's when they're best. When they're nice and mushy..." He picked up a cookie and took a nice, chocolatey bite. "Mmm... MMM..." I didn't have to see his face to know how much he was enjoying that cookie.

So once I had the next batch in the oven, I took one of the fresh cookies upstairs to where Mom was doing some ironing. "I brought you a present," I said. The look on her face alone was priceless, but I watched her eat the cookie, every "Mmm..." almost exactly the same as Dad's. (They've been married almost 33 years, so yeah, they've grown a little similar.)

A few minutes later, I finally had a fresh-out-of-the-oven cookie. And you know what? As wonderful as that cookie was, I enjoyed seeing my parents enjoy their cookies more than I enjoyed my own cookie. And just now, when my brother-in-law walked in the door and I greeted him with the announcement that there were fresh cookies, he absolutely lit up, which made me light up.

My Children's Literature professor pointed out several examples in children's books where food = love. I know that will all the eating disorders and obesity problems in the country, that's a dangerous equation. But the difference these cookies made today? If writing doesn't work out, I might consider opening a bakery. When simple sweets light up a person's face... Well, there's something to be said for giving someone a bite of happiness, isn't there?