Red Notebook? More like Red Binder!

Hi folks!  In case you haven't met me, I'm Emer.  Rhymes with lemur, femur, beamer, screamer, steamer.  I am a co-worker and proud partner in awesome of Graceless.  She helped dye the back of my hair red on my 30th birthday in January in solidarity of this project (gee, I should've returned the favor on her birthday).

I was delighted to arrive home from a day of snowboarding (and falling) to see a package in my mail.  I mean, who doesn't get excited to receive things in the mail that aren't advert fliers or credit card offers?

Don't Forget to Appreciate Awesome

How awesome is it that a group of people, some of whom don't know each other, can come together to work on a fabuous project like this one? The conglomeration of creativity from all these individuals is a pretty amazing thing. When I received the notebook, my thoughts ran to how we so often miss the awesomeness in everyday life in the midst of our busy schedules. These musings inspired my contribution to the notebook as I sat on a lawn near my workplace on a beautiful, unusually warm early spring day.

To those conspirators who are still waiting to participate, have fun, use your imagination, and revel in the awesomeness.

Back in Action

Email I just sent to all the conspirators who have yet to do their part with the notebook:

You may have noticed that the Red Notebook Conspiracy ground to a halt for about a month, but that's all over now, because the notebook is now in the wily hands of the best derby wife in all of derbydom.

Let's not dwell on the notebook's lengthy pause and just focus on the fact that now you have three objectives:
1. Have fun
2. Decrease world suck in some way
3. Get the notebook to Ben by May 5 -- it has to go to Arizona and to two places in New York, but if everyone between Rehab and Ben takes less than 5 days (including mail time to the next person), then we should be able to do this

Go forth and make magic, lovelies. (Just be kinda quick about it, if you can.)

Notebook?

Where is it? The person last in possession is not talking...to me, at least. I thought that maybe there was a lesson in patience aimed for Graceless created by the U.S. Postal Service, but now I'm beginning to think that the lesson forming is mine.

I knew what I was going to put in the notebook within 24 hours after being invited as a co-conspirator. I have it all prepared and just need to plop it strategically inside. Biding my time has been difficult. The anticipation has heightened since I heard it was on its way to me...last Friday. Sigh. I do not want to give my wife a heart attack, but it might be gone. If the notebook has not resurfaced by mid-week next, I am buying an new one and starting the chain all over. Perhaps I was always meant to be number one...

Love you, wife! Keep breathing! See you tomorrow.

Received today. One of the enclosures was not actually enclosed, which makes me wonder whether it really goes with the notebook, or whether it was a gift from my predecessor to me. Hard to tell. :)

Anyway, I should've taken a picture before I figured out how to open it. Oh well, maybe I'll redo the vestments to stage that picture before I'm done. Not sure if it breaks the rules to post that here. Probably not, since Tara can't see inside. Also, she asked me to bring it to Portland this weekend if I still have it.

I'm feeling a little time pressure because if I don't hand it off by saturday, I've got it until at least tuesday, and that's really kinda hogging it more than I should if we want to stay on (the new) schedule. On the other hand, that means it could take a little overnight trip with me.

You know what? It needs to make the trip. Some of y'all who are later in the list between me and #23 will have to turn it around faster than average to make up for my screwy schedule. Sorry about that. Start planning your awesomeness now. :)

Not my idea, but perfect for the red notebook

When I first started talking about this notebook, people kept saying they didn't know what to do. And the few people who have received the notebook have mentioned that they weren't sure what they should do...until they did it.*

Most people who know me know that I hate old people (and emoticons and foam soap). I also hate Valentine's Day and all the other holidays completely invented by card companies. I am not a fan of the City of Lewiston, because we appear to be magnetically charged in opposites and physically repel each other (that is, I get lost every time I go there). And I hate getting up early.

But.

Next Tuesday, I will get up an hour early so I can leave work an hour early and go to Lewiston with two co-workers to deliver roses and handmade valentines to some old people in a nursing home there.

Operation Flowers was not my idea, but I loved it the second my co-worker Danielle mentioned it. Partly because it reminded me how much fun it was to hand flowers to random strangers while filming the Bad Bad World video, but also because it just seemed like something unusually decent to do. Something to make the world suck less. It sounded like a red notebook project.

And so, I wanted to mention it, in case anyone gets stuck along the way and needs some inspiration.




* I have no idea what anyone has done outside of the little vague explanations here in this blog. It's driving me a little bananas, since I know I won't be seeing the final results for some time. Patience sucks.

Coincidentally, there's this going on....

http://www.arthousecoop.com/projects/sketchbookproject