Blog or Perish

I've been reminded by a dear friend ahemcoughcoughRickcough that I started this blog a long, long, LONG time ago and then let it fall by the wayside, as I do so many things. So I thought perhaps an appropriate topic for this post would be to reflect on the things that I've gotten excited about, only to drop them at a future date.

Hot Air Balloon Support Crew: In junior high, we were offered one-off classes to allow us to explore areas outside of the traditional curriculum, and I took a class on hot air ballooning. I don't remember too much about it, except that it was cold, it was dark, and it was quite far away from my house, which meant that Mom had to also get up in the cold, early dawn hours and drive me to a remote location. I don't remember what I did as part of the learning experience, although a ride in a hot air balloon was not part of the day's events. But I remember my enthusiasm for the experience, and I remember thinking that I so totally wanted to do this and do it a lot and be a Hot Air Balloon Enthusiast and that would be so cool. And then I don't remember doing anything more than that. Ahem.

Horses: OK, I loved horses like every pre-pubescent girl did, and I went to Girl Scout Camp and took Horsemanship and Advanced Horsemanship, but in fairness to me -- c'MON -- what girl didn't profess a love for horses at some point in her life, only to turn to her girlfriends/boys/pot/championship TV watching when she tired of shoveling manure and smelling like a barn?

I've got an entire category of Things I've Dropped the Ball On that all fall into the category of crafts. I've never been particularly "crafty" and yet I continue to entertain the notion that I might be able to create something from my own two hands that would be pretty or useful. I am quite good about collecting the materials needed for (insert craft name here), and I'm relatively good about finding a space to store said items. I even typically create a few items in the Craft of the Day category before I drop it like a child drops a broken toy. My attempted crafts include: pressed flowers, weaving, mosaics, and furniture refinishing. My latest venture is (was) sewing.

Some people ahemcoughcoughRickcough might also say that I dropped the ball on training my dog Bandit, but I would beg to differ on that one. Instead, I would make the case that I trained him as much as I was willing to train him, accepted his shortcomings (I'm talking about Bandit here, did I make that clear?), and love him in spite of his poor behavior in certain circumstances. And I'm willing to accept the responsibility that I might have done better in the training category, but I'm willing to sacrifice having an amazingly trained dog in exchange for his unique personality and his belief that he is as damn cool as he thinks he is.