In praise of hoarding and procastination (sort of)

I am not a fan of the thought that one should get rid of anything not used or worn in the past year. The past week, I have been reminded of why I dislike that rule:

I own a bunch of small upholstery samples from the mid-1990's. I used a couple of the samples to decorate a t-shirt several years ago. This week, I used one of the samples to make a pin/brooch. And in between all that time, the samples have just sat in a drawer (in space that I did not particularly need for something else).

Last week, I noticed that another pair of my jeans was developing holes, which was bad news because I have the hardest time finding pants (more specifically, modest pants for a person not blessed with long legs -- it seems that they shorten the rise when they shorten the legs). I made a half-joking threat to myself that I would just switch over to skirts, rather than go through the agony of another search for pants.

Now, I wear skirts in the summer, but I have resisted wear skirts in the winter. I have bad childhood memories of being in a cavernous church wearing Mary Janes and kneesocks (that were always falling down) or tights (that were always developing holes as I played before and after service) and how awfully numb my feet were.

I started thinking over how women of the 19th and early 20th century kept warm in their skirts. I also considered how I could use the clothes I already had.

I already own a collection of leggings and long underwear (that I had been wearing under pants), a long poly/cotton slip (purchased several years ago at Goodwill), and some skirts that were a little oversize and came almost to my ankles. Well, you guessed it, the leggings and the slip fit quite well under the skirts.

Then I got to thinking about the fact that I had cleaned out my closet a little a few weeks before, but I couldn't remember if we had ever donated the clothes to the shop, which is about 30 miles away. A little digging around located the bag, and yes, there were three skirts in the bag (one of which had lost its elastic, but I think I can repair it; one which probably won't work at all; and one that should work nicely if I remember to take small strides as there is not a lot of leeway for walking).

So, because of keeping things around, I was blessed with new jewelry and a new way to wear old clothes. (There is a time, of course, to bless other people with things and circumstances when one needs to get rid of the old in order to make room for now. Moderation in all things, though.)

Pandora Radio

I'm listening to Pandora Radio right now. Pandora lets you pick a favorite singer or song, and then finds and plays similar music/artists.

I do have to be a little cautious in my picks; if you pick a Christian artist, you will not necessarily keep on having Christian artists. However, I only recall one time that I was offended by something that played (you can always click thumbs down if you don't like what starts playing and it will go on to another song).

It is a nice way to find new artists for free! (Ads do play at times.)

Pixia and PhotoScape

Pixia looks like a promising program, but I can't make it open tif files. Since most of my files are tifs, that's kind of a deal breaker.

PhotoScape has a rather unique interface. Once you get used to it, you can find quite a lot to work with. The page section allows you to combine pictures into collages (even though I am not a scrapbooker, I can see how this would work well for folks who are). The print section gives you the ability to put multiple pictures on one page, which could save money on paper.

The viewer section lets you see thumbnails of the pictures in your folders. The editor section is where things get really interesting, with quite a few special effects under filter. (The "make a box" was a favorite, although I can not think of any practical use for it. Water painting turned out better than most of the painting effects that I have seen.)

The cropping and rotating tools work well. There are quite a few fun possibilities involving text balloons, adding cartoons, etc., but I have not worked to any great extent with these.

I have not found any tools that allow one to erase flaws or retouch (mole removal does some, but not enough for my purposes), so I assume you'll need another program to handle that.

PhotoScape and Pixia are free.

Paint.Net - one thing I've figured out

That the equivalent command to "Free Rotate" on some other programs is under "Levels" then "Rotate/Zoom." You need to set "Twist Angle" and "Twist Rotate" to zero, then change the "Angle" as you need.

Mourning

My very favorite grocery store just closed. Waah!