practice really does make you better, but not necessarily good

This weekend I once again ventured into the territory of home improvement. I am not good at taping, painting, removing carpet, prying up tack board, removing nails and extraneous materials from trim, cutting underlayment, laying laminate flooring, or renailing trim, but I'm better at it then I was on Thursday.

And yes, I'm sore. But all for a great and great-looking cause.

Oh, and shout out to my brother J. Because of him I did not come into any more contact with power tools than moving them, which is a good thing. And I also was not in charge of measuring, which is good too.

I even managed to snap a few pics of the before and after:

Better in different ways

I tried to better myself yesterday. I attended KitLitCon 2010. I don't actually blog about kit lit very often (who am I kidding, at this point I don't blog very much at all) but I do like kit lit, and more importantly I work in the kit lit biz. And since the convention was nearby, I decided to go. I did learn a lot. But I came up with a few questions too:

*audience? who is the audience? are we speaking to the choir?
*do I want to be a "blogger" or do I blog just for me...and should I then be journalling instead?
*what's with the homogeny in kitlit blogging?
*who has time to follow so many great blogs (and Twitter and Facebook)?

and in completely unrelated news

The Vampire Diaries is better than it has any right to be. My friend Jen told me this; I was skeptical (although I knew it would be good if she said so.) She was absolutely correct about this one. It's based on books that I hear aren't that great. It's on the CW. It's a teen drama. But it is totally gripping and entertaining. Relationships are key, and this show is doing those right. Surprise keeps the plot moving; and this show has no fear. I might be embarrassed to say I was watching this...except it's so good. (Side note: thank goodness they did away with the annoying diary voice overs; but kudos for having a quick shot of the main female character at least writing in hers on disc 3.)

News of the Lonely

My house feels a little lonely tonight, as much as a I love it. I think it is the darkness so early and the fact that I'm too cheap to turn on heat yet...but also maybe I could just use some company.

Just wanted to say that I am now working on house project 3 with 4 in the coming quickly better plan stages. I will post photos...eventually. Let's just say the floors in 1/2 the house look MUCH better--thanks to my bro! Also, for the record, I have officially fixed a toilet for the first time. And ripping up carpet can be tricky.

Sports: Now that the Twins are out :(, go RANGERS!

TV: All the good shows have started again. I'm doing my best to keep up...and sometimes failing. Okay, often failing. But I've managed to keep up with The Good Wife, which has been excellent.

Movie: I watched Lilies of the Field this week (in two parts.) It was a very interesting movie. I didn't know anything about it other than that Sidney Poitier was in it. All I could think was "this movie never would be made today." Also, it has one of my favorite songs in it. Pops into my head all the time whenever I hear or say "Amen." :)

New thing: I'm going to a conference this weekend. I've never been. And I'm sure it will be interesting even though not completely applicable to my daily life. I'm excited to hear some new things. I will have to see how my introverted personality makes it through the experience...I always intend to push outside of the box a little...but I'm never quite as successful in practice as I am in my imagination.

New thing 2: I doing it. Next month. National novel writing month. I'm not sure when I will fit it in, but I'm determined. I have the idea (partially started even); I'm going to try to outline further one of these days and then write, write, write in November.