Close to the Vest & Potato Jackets

Twenty years ago, a writer friend told me that she never talked about a story she was working on; not a hint of the story line, characters, nothing. It dissipates it, she said. It's a piece of advice that I most vividly remember adopting immediately. An idea is a ball of energy, right, that floats between your mind, your heart, your pen, or however you express it. And to talk about it pin pricks the ball. It slowly deflates. The energy escapes.

And sometimes I feel that way about the blog. Like, when I get all excited to, let's say, sew aprons for a living, I feel sometimes I prematurely barf it up on the blog and the energy of what seemed like such a good idea in my mind dissipates and slips passed my determination and drive. But maybe I just want to do too many things, maybe I'm "desirous of everything at the same time" as my new favorite quote goes, and my ideas blow in and out like seasonal winds.

Sigh.

In any event, I'm holding my ball of energy close right now. I'm rolling it around in my hands close to the vest, stoking it, keeping it mainly to myself, and when it erupts then I'll think to share. It's not anything big, really. This is more of an experiment if anything. It's the ol' Do-Don't-Tell technique. I'm new to this.

In the meantime -- because I miss you -- here are some pictures from Molly's 2nd Annual Potato Jacket Night. She came up with the brilliant idea to bake a good number of potatoes, make a good variety of toppings, lay them all out and let friends and neighbors create their own potato master piece. Very fun and super yummy.

Baked potatoes and shredded rice cheese.Toppings, salad and sweet potato pie.Molly makes toppings.I made sweet potato pie. The nut topping made of walnuts, almonds and hazelnuts was outrageous.