Abacaxi Mamão

Posting the first line from the first post of each month of 2006, that is. I thought it would be fun. And because I'm on vacation, am feeling particularly narcissistic, and have nothing better to do (yay for nothing better to do! yay for vacation!), I'm also including the first line of the last post from each month, since some of those seem to be more interesting.

January:

1st: My first post in 2006 is about 2005. What does that say about me? I'm not sure.
last: This article from Friday's New York Times states that "Income Gap in New York Is Called Nation's Highest." It's sad, but not surprising. Read it and weep.

February:

1st: I want to share this link to the history of the Kenyan Jewish community, based in Nairobi. It's interesting.
last: Chayyei Sarah has posted something interesting on her blog in response to an article in the London Jewish Chronicle about Orthodox bloggers.

March:

1st: I'm about halfway done with the promised post about "A Tale of Two Men Who Spoke in Shul and Incurred ALG's Considerable Wrath," but the act of putting it down as written words is pissing me off so much that it's going to take a little longer until it's presentable.
last: I think I might need to not post for awhile...like a few days or something. Work, life, family stuff all keeping me busy through the weekend. In the meantime, so you don't get too bored at work...

April:

1st: I am so rarely rendered speechless that it takes something truly wonderful or truly horrendous for it to happen. [This is a post that I would really rather not revisit, since it's so sad. Far and away the most tragic thing to happen to me personally in 2006. Only three things of any real consequence happened to me in 2006, and this is one of them.]
last: Moxie wrote a post to use as a forum for discussing the "public and societal expectations of marriage, of feminine beauty and masculine strength."

May:

1st: Please keep the comments coming on my last post! I'm finding them interesting.
last: Check out dictionary.com's Word of the Day for today!

June:

1st: Asyndeton is a great word! It won't come up much in conversation, but if it does, boy, will it be useful! [I cheated. This is the third post in June. The first two were just direct quotes from other people, so I felt justified in not posting them.]
last: Funny. And true. I don't drink too much soda, though, so this doesn't really affect me.

July:

1st: Last year, I wrote this. I've gotten over being embarrassed about tooting my own horn on my birthday.
last: I wrote this a few weeks ago, but I thought it was particularly apt for the erev Shabbat before Tisha B'Av, as it deals with both Shabbat and fasting, at least somewhat.

August:

1st: Lord knows that there is plenty to talk and think about this Tisha B'Av. Here are two good places to start.
last: If you missed yours today, try these links from Cat (who has her own humanoid cutie).

September:

1st: I feel the urge to write about teshuva (repentance), but I have been thinking about it so much that I haven't had time to write about it!
last: ...you have a dream about the Rema (Rav Moshe Isserles). This is definitely the first time that I have had a dream in which either a rishon or an acharon has been mentioned.

October:

1st: Via Shanna at Devarim, a recent postcard sent to PostSecret... This is actually the first Mishna and the first Gemara that I learned, in seventh grade. Learning Mishna, Gemara, and a lot of other stuff opened more doors to disbelief than one might assume.
last: If I had $25 to blow, this would be fun. On the other hand, here is a very good reason to boycott chocolate from countries where forced child labor (i.e., child slavery) is rampant. [Good news! I found fair trade hechshered chocolate when I was at the Hazon food conference! May blog about this at some later point. You can have your chocolate and eat it, too!]

November:

1st: Read "The modern world killed off the nap" from the Toronto Star. [Hat tip to Nafka Mina.]
last: Read it here. Then read the comments. Interesting. Especially about the weight control.

December:

1st: It's been years since I was last called upon to do this. Actually, less than two years. But, still, I'm rusty. I used to be able to do this in my sleep! How the mighty have fallen...
last: One last 2006 blog post, just under the wire... I just finished reading It's Called a Breakup Because It's Broken: The Smart Girl's Breakup Buddy, by Greg Behrendt & Amiira Ruotola-Behrendt, and I want to highly recommend it to anyone who has either recently broken up with someone, or not-so-recently broken up with someone but is having trouble "getting over it."

In conclusion, it turns out that this blog is either a lot more boring than I thought it was, or my first sentences could use some serious improvement. On the other hand, I do this mostly for fun, and it's mostly been fun, so maybe nothing needs to change. I struggle, sometimes, with the tension between posting things that other people have written vs. saving this blog just for my own (original) writing. I am afraid that if I only blogged when I had something of consequence to say, then I would blog infrequently, get out of the habit entirely, and find myself with fewer interesting things to say. For now, at least, I shall keep to my current mix of the holy, the mundane, the silly, the inspired, and the insipid.

Labels: meta