I Blog, Therefore I Am

Oh, hay.  Still alive over here.  The second half of 2011 was so very.  That's the best way to describe it.  Take any adjective and just put 'very' in front of it, and that was our year.  Very busy.  Very overwhelming.  Very fun.  We bested our personal moving frequency record and moved twice in four months.  Thankfully, the second move was a mere cross-town move, and hopefully it was the move to end all moves.  We. Bought.  A house. 

That's right, no more listening to our neighbors flush the toilet, sing, or get it on.  No more smelling their cigarette smoke, no more watching them come and go with large amounts of fast food immediately before and after hearing them get it on.  Clearly there's more to home-ownership than avoiding your neighbors (because if anything, home-ownership has brought us into some awkward proximity with some of our new neighbors), but seriously.  It's the best.  Also, we have not one but three bathrooms.  I never want to share a bathroom again for as long as I live.

But now that the whirlwind of new job starting/house hunting/mortgage applying/house buying/moving/unpacking/decorating/wedding attending/Christmas vacationing is behind us, I'm looking forward to settling back into a routine and hopefully being a little more active on the internets.

I also have a few goals for the new year.  Gotta make it count!  After all, if the totally appropriate and not at all creepy card one of our neighbors (who we have not yet met) taped to our front door is correct, we have just 355 days left to live.  Assuming I remember to post this today, January 2nd, and also assuming I can correctly do math and subtract from 366.  Because if the year has to end, at least the Mayans did us a solid and predicted the Apocalypse in a leap year so we'd get an extra day.  Also, this card thanked us for being their 'best neighbors'.  Did I mention we haven't met them?  Because we haven't, but I'd really like to high-five them before the restraining order takes effect. 

Now, by goals, I really mean the kind of goals that mesh with 80's child rearing style.  The kind that says, 'Shoot for the moon, because if you miss you'll land among the stars' and where everyone gets a participation trophy and the losing team still gets ice cream, and the fat kid in gym class (me) still gets an E for effort.  The word 'resolution' just sounds so legalistic and foreboding and certain.  'Goals' has a shiny, happy ring of unaccountability to it.

Without further adieu, here are my 2012 Pre-Mayan Apocalypse World Collapse Ruin and Doom Life Goals

1.  No hangovers.  Seriously.  I seem to have 1 or 2 episodes every year where things just get really out of control and it isn't cute.  I once projectile vomited with such force that I burst a capillary under my eye.  This is because, and I mean this in the least racist, most sincere way possible, the 1/16th or 32nd of my ancestry that is Native American has manifested itself in my liver.   I have a mortifying inability to metabolize alcohol.  I don't drink that frequently, and I usually try to keep it to a glass or two of wine, which is okay.  But anything more than that and I'm doing rain dances and applying war paint.  Okay, that might seem a little offensive, but get off my back, guys, I just said I was Native American, so I'm really just taking ownership of the stereotypes.

2.  Cook new recipes.  This would be a good time to apologize to Andy for cooking a pretty constant rotation of the same 10-15 dinners (that might even be an overly-generous estimate).  I should also apologize for the time I made vegetarian burritos that were so spicy they hurt him, and for the time I cooked such spicy food so consistently that he is convinced it gave him an ulcer.  But I regret nothing.  I make healthy, fiber-rich meals full of antioxidant-laden spices.  I don't hear any complaints from my digestive system (in fact, Christmas vacation, full of rich comfort foods, cheese, and nary a single bean, made my intestines cry.  And not a cute cry with big ol' sparkly tears, but the ugly cry where you just open your grimacing, contorted maw and wail, but no tears fall.  Sorry, too detailed a metaphor?).  But I digress.  It would be nice to branch out, but I work until 5, at which time I am ready to cry from hunger and exhaustion.  It's so easy to go on auto-pilot and cook something I've already made 25 times instead of trying to decipher a new recipe using the 2 remaining brain cells that my body hasn't burned for fuel.  It will require a little bit more planning, and maybe a mid-afternoon snack, but I'm game for it.  And hey, does anyone want to give me a pat on the back for actually cooking real food instead of microwaving something out of a package?  No?  No takers?  Now I'm embarrassed, you guys. 

3.  Exercise more consistently.  A little blood just trickled out of my ear from the aneurism this cliche caused me to have.  But let's get real.  I've been working out pretty regularly since the spring of 2008.  At first, it was painful.  I was pretty out of shape in terms of endurance and strength.  But after a short time, I could honestly say that I enjoyed exercising.  I get really grouchy when I have to be sedentary for more than a day or two because of random obligations/bad weather and lack of access to exercise facilities/illness.  However, my work schedule makes it really inconvenient to go to the gym during the week.  Our old apartment was right across the street from the gym, so it wasn't a huge ordeal to work out in the morning before work, or to pop over for a quick workout after work.  But now, it's like, ugh, I have to get up, get dressed, and drive all the way across town?  No thanks.  And it's the same story after work, only by that point I'm also in the blind rage of starvation I like to call 'hangry', so my response would be considerably less civil than 'no thanks'.  I often walk to and/or home from work, which is 1.8 miles each way, so that's better than nothing, but I have a hard time counting it as exercise since I'm not sweating or significantly raising my heart rate.  So this goal and goal #2 are kind of in competition with one another because they both require time and energy that I just don't have after working from 8-5, but I'm determined to find a way.

4.  Earn a faculty-level position at work.  I'm really fortunate to have a job with benefits, period.  I also like my job and work with super awesome,  nice, supportive people.  However, the work I'm doing is not what I ultimately had in mind when I was getting my master's degree.  Aside from the obvious financial gains, moving into a higher-level position would be tons more stimulating and fulfilling, and probably more flexible.  In a perfect world, goal #4 would be awesome in itself and also pave the way for goals #2 and #3, but we'll see what happens.

5.  Go to Las Vegas.  Clearly, this needs to happen.  I feel like it will be Jersey Shore, desert edition, but with a lot more money floating around.

6.  Visit the Grand Canyon.  This is obvious.  I can't be living less than a day's drive from the Grand Canyon and not be able to say that I've been there.  We bought an annual National Park passport when we went to Zion and Arches over Thanksgiving, so we might as well visit as many national parks as humanly possible between now and November 2012.

7.  Start riding my bike to work.  This one will have to wait until morning temperatures reach an acceptable level of non-gangrenous-frostbite-inducingness.  Walking to and from work isn't that bad, but icy wind blowing in your face at a high speed?  Sorry Earth, but I like having skin and not frozen leather, thanks.

8.  Get a new kitty. We checked this one off with flying colors this afternoon, but we need to have her tested for the FIV to make sure she isn't going to infect Ajax. To make a long story short (so I have a topic for another post), I found a kitty, and it loved me, but I did the right thing (oh hay karma points) and turned it in to the local Humane Society in case it was someone's lost pet.  No one claimed her so she's totally my new BFF.

9.  Sew curtains.  I finally bought a sewing machine just in time to start and not (yet) finish Andy's main Christmas present (more on that some other time, because I find it hilarious), and my mom gave me a sweet gift card to JoAnn's for Christmas, so, game on.

10.  Blog more.  This one will be easy.  I think if I post at least twice a month I will probably surpass 2011's average.

11.  Paint the master bedroom and office.  A lot of our house was already painted, but the previous owners were still in the process of remodeling some of the rooms, so our bedroom is currently an institutional white.  After so many stark-white apartments that we weren't allowed to paint, I think I need to either go whole hog and pad the walls, or break the cycle and add a little color to my life.

12.  Ski on Utah snow.  I'm really excited about this one.  I think.  I have skied on East Coast snow in the Poconos several times and once in upstate New York, but never often enough to become a proficient skier.  I'm naturally highly risk-averse, so the thought of whizzing down an icy hill with slippery boards strapped to my feet has never sounded like a fun thing to do.  I can shakily navigate the bunny hills, and can sometimes even get off the ski lift without falling, but that's about the extent of my skill/ambition when it comes to skiing.  I am told (repeatedly, ad nauseum) that Utah has the best snow on earth, and that apparently snow can come in powder form and does not always fall from the sky and immediately form an impenetrable icy cement upon contact with other snowflakes.

13.  Plant a garden.  An edible one.  I'm thinking garlic, onions, lettuce, kale, tomatoes, and raspberries.  If I could also grow some beans and bananas, and get a goat for milk, I'd never have to go to the store, ever. We'll see how this one goes, since I've managed to kill many a house plant, including cacti.

14.  Send out Christmas cards, and remember to send birthday and holiday cards to close family members.  I mean, I obviously remember immediate family, but it's time to put on the big girl panties and cast the net a little wider.  Also, I have been dying to take a subtly ridiculous Christmas card photo for a long time, but it seems like something really distracting and time consuming is always happening in November and December and I don't get around to it.  This will be the year.  I can feel it.  I might even take one this week just to make sure there are no excuses when November rolls around.  Plus if I end up pregnant by then, I can still be (relatively) skinny for the card.  I kid, I kid.  That better not happen.

15.  Get a DSLR camera (birthday...hint, hint...except more like birthday and Christmas for the next 2 years because those bad boys are not cheap) and start doing photography again.  I am constantly looking at some landscape or close-up detail of something that I think, wow, this would make a great picture if only I could control the depth of field or the light exposure.  But alas.  My point-and-shoot digital camera is pretty good, and it has a panoramic function that I am obsessed with, but it's just not the same.

16.  Get better about keeping in touch with friends and family.  My fingers aren't broken, there's no excuse for me to not pick up the phone and use it.  I need to get over my phone-phobia and stop worrying that I'll be bothering people or that I don't have anything interesting to say.  I mean, both things are probably true, but who cares, right?

17.  Stop apologizing so much and feeling guilty about everything.  I am pretty good at deciding to keep my mouth shut so the first part should be easy, but I actually might not be able to help the guilt.  It's hereditary, just like my uncooperative liver.  Except in this instance, it's only my imaginary fantasy Jewish ancestry.  But I'm NOT going to apologize for that.  Let's mark that down as one point for me, okay?

18.  Volunteer somewhere.  After all this talk about ME, should I maybe think about someone or something else for a change?  I'm thinking either the animal shelter that held our kitty, or a food bank or something. 

19.  Next Christmas, ask people to get me Heifer International gifts instead of actual presents. 

20.  Learn to pack lighter.  This actually goes hand in hand with goal #19, and reveals how that seemingly selfless goal is actually rooted in laziness.  This Christmas, we deliberately flew back to Utah on Southwest because you can check 2 bags for free, and we knew we'd need the the extra space for presents.  We actually had to borrow a full-size suitcase from my mom, which we then filled with our holiday haul.  I blame Andy for receiving a pair of hip waders, which took up 40% of the space in said suitcase.  There may have been some tense moments with a bathroom scale during which we had to carefully redistribute some items so that none of our three suitcases weighed more than 50 pounds.  I also unpacked my suitcase yesterday and realized I didn't wear about 1/3 of the clothes I had taken with me.  In an effort to not apologize, and to not give Andy the satisfaction of saying 'I told you so,' I will justify this outcome by saying it was unexpectedly warm in New Jersey, I did laundry while we were there, and I wore some of the clothes I received for Christmas.

21.  Start using more natural cleaning/hygiene/beauty products.  I do so much other stuff to try to be healthy and feel good, I don't need gross chemicals bringing me down.  I already use Tom's deodorant (in the non-sweaty months...sorry Tom's, but you just don't cut it in the summer) and some various natural cleaning products, but I'd like to incorporate more of these things. The only barrier, really, is the expense, so goal #4 would totally allow this goal to become a reality.

I was going to set some more goals, but I figured 21 was plenty, and it's an appropriate number given that the world is going to end on December 21 anyway.

OH MY GOD, less than a year to (think about) attain(ing) these goals.  Better get busy!