Happy New Year

I'm back! ... I guess.

The writer's block is over - NOT.  But for a start, let's pretend it's over, and I am just going to write whatever comes into my mind.

First of all, Happy New Year! Here's my wish for you - in the words of Neil Gaiman:

"May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you’re wonderful, and don’t forget to make some art — write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. And I hope, somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself."

Yesterday I could not help but start wondering about the year that was coming to an end. A moment later I could not resist getting a pen and a piece of paper in my hands, and started scribbling whatever that came into my mind regarding the year 2010. These scribblings quickly turned into lists, and in the end I put together a few lists- each differently themed. (You know how much I love writing lists, don't you? There's most definitely no better time for writing lists than at the end the year.) Since my memory works just as well as a 90 year old great grandma's, I'm  pretty sure I left a few things out. But never mind, here is a little bit of recap of last year.

In 2010:

• I completed Project 365 as I took at least one photo per day
• Fell in love with photography, carried my camera with me wherever I went which resulted in pushing the big button about twenty thousand times, but upon being pretty critical with myself I deleted about 2/3 of them, so now I have about 7,700 photos of 2010 that I find worthy of keeping.
• About 8 poems of mine have been published in three issues of two university newspapers, and another one is coming out in this month in a literature-themed special issue of another university newspaper. 
• Bought a beautiful vintage typewriter and made good use of it by making brooches and having a few free-writing sessions.
• Went into business, as I started making brooches, then opened my little shop on Meska, and sold a few items.
• Managed to maintain this very blog (although I still cannot write posts on a regular basis), I also started three other blogs,  Bright Light, Big City is my photoblog, The Fish Flies at Night is a collection of photos and quotes that I find on tumblr and like, and Kapunyitási Pánik is the freshest one, where I write about my experiences regarding quarter-life panic.
• This year I learned to bake - more or less. I made quite a number of cookies, cakes, muffins, and brownies, all with success. (Sooner or later I will write about each and every recipe and pastry.)
• I also learned cooking a number of new meals.
• I read about 40 books (will write about them in detail later)
• Got a part-time job at a language school, taught Hungarian to an English guy, and now I am giving English lessons to a Hungarian girl.

Downside: Although I adore taking photos, 2010 was about nothing but photography. God only knows how many hours I have spent with  taking, deleting, editing, and uploading photos, not to mention the number of hours I spent looking at other people's works. Everything else I do, or used to do before I started taking photos got pushed into the background or was forgotten completely. I cannot remember when was the last year I wrote so little than in 2010. A very few poems, very few pieces of creative writing, and not many more diary entries. I also forgot about another love of mine, films, that is. I used to go to the cinema at least twice a week (often more than that), but this year I saw only a very few movies. I don't think I have been to the cinema more than once or twice a month. There was no watching movies at home either. This must change in 2011, I must must must be more productive and write more. 

All in all,  it was a fine year, most certainly not a bad one, but I would not say that it was a great one either... 

I would give it 7/10, probably.