2011

Oh, hi there!

Oh, yeah.  I have a blog.  Things over the holidays were busy and I just felt like I couldn't start a post or I'd sit in my office and waste away the days.  Anyway, for a brief update of what we did over the holidays, see my mom's post about it.  There are even pictures in another of her posts.

2011

I have many goals for 2011, but I wouldn't call any of them resolutions. That said, I have set some specific goals for myself regarding tidiness, dog walking, computer time, and general productivity around the house.  I have to think through a few more things, but I'm sure I'll be unable to resist blogging the minutia of it all as time goes on.  For now - given I'm trying to limit my time at the computer - I shall leave it at that.

A FB status update by a friend noted she had the feeling 2011 is going to be a great year. For whatever reason, I've had the same feeling in the past few days. I have never before thought that at the beginning of the year. Here's to believing in feelings! 

Productivity

Over the past 2 days, I've done the following:

• Cleaned the whole house (except for one guest room)
• Done at least 12 loads of laundry
• Created my own woman cave (aka the craft room) in the basement
• Moved all craft-related supplies into the craft room
• Kept the rooms which were tidied at the beginning of my tidying frenzy tidy whilst tidying the other rooms - clear? 
• Walked Turtle up the trail; walked Eddie on a shorter walk (that was yesterday - I plan to do the same today)
• Cleaned Avery's room and closet completely
• Found a place for all Christmas presents

I needed a nap on both days, but I don't feel nearly as guilty taking a nap in the midst of productivity as I do when I do it in the midst of sloth.

Eddie

Through a lucky coincidence, I had to buy a different brand of dog food for the dogs.  We immediately noticed that there were far fewer turds laying around the house for picking up.  Over the past few weeks, there have been maybe four accidents to pick up.  Considering I'd been cleaning up to four per DAY before that, I'll take four over the course of a few weeks!

Eddie is hanging in here.  He wants to play with Turtle and bounds around the house at times.  He goes through a whole day refusing his pain medication, but will then ask for it the next day.  Though it's painful to watch him walk because he's so very wobbly, I don't think he's actually in much pain.  I thought for sure he'd be gone by now, but we got to have one last Christmas with him.

I got a reminder of the old days on New Year's Eve.  Fireworks were going off and Eddie's a big ol' fraidy cat when it comes to loud noises like that.  For whatever reason, he always comes to me, not D, when he needs "protection."  He's always done this.  One time, back in Denver, D and I took him to the vet together.  The vet was giving him a shot or something like that.  Eddie leaped into my lap for protection and glared at D and the vet.  Anyway, back to the present, New Year's Eve Eddie comes to me for comfort.  He ambled his big body onto the chair with me and snuggled on in.  It was like the old days.

I've never been good with aging animals.  It embarrasses me to admit it, but I don't do well when they start to smell more and shed more and poop inappropriate places.  I don't have the nurturing thing in me for older animals.  However, I'm going to do my best to remember the days before all the annoying older-traits so I can be more kind and loving with Eddie during his last months.  Though, at this rate, he might just be here next Christmas. 

Long enough

OK, this post feels long enough.  I should pull myself away from the computer.  See, I sat down and now several hours have just oozed away from me.  Yesterday in the same amount of time, I created a whole woman cave for myself.  Damn technology - why must I love you so?!

I have much to update people on, not the least of which is my new love of embossing.  And my new sewing machine!  Oh dear people, I fear 2011 might be the Year of the Craft at Casa de TiVo.  This is scary because, you see, I don't actually LIKE crafty things.  I just, it seems, enjoy DOING those things.  Get ready to receive a lot of junk in the mail, people!  You're welcome.

92%, baby!

I did it! I exceeded my goal of 90% of days with dog walks or daycare for 2006! Here's the last post of my stats:

• Days w/ walks as of 12/31/06: 334
• Overall percentage: 92%
• Total miles walked: 500.0

Yes, I walked an estimated 500 miles with the dogs. I noticed a few days ago that I would be 1 mile short of exactly 500 miles if I took my usual 1.4 mile routes, so that is part of the reason we went to Forest Park - so I could add an extra mile to our total for the year.

I rarely feel proud of myself, but on this accomplishment, I'm very proud that I did this. Considering I don't have a job, it's not that impressive; however, with my tendencies for sloth, it very well could have gone the other way. If we ever move to a flat neighborhood, walks everyday will be a complete breeze!

Goal Chunk #4

I've completely fallen off the workout wagon, but no use feeling guilty until Saturday. There is no way I workout today or tomorrow. It's not that I don't have time for the actual workout - finding 1.5 hours for workout and getting dressed afterwards time is easy. It's that I don't have "build up" time. Since I've not implemented strict rules for myself that I must workout before such and such a time, I tend to just waste time at my computer for hours before convincing myself to go. I know I should make rules for myself to make workouts more consistent and thereby save time, but I guess I'm not ready for that step because I am still resisting it. In due time. I will, however, come up with Goal Chunk #4: to workout 50% of the days between 11/11 and 11/22.

Stinky House

My house stinks. It's not for no reason, though. Last night, around 8 PM, I decided to attempt the Maple-Chili Popcorn I was planning to make for the party next Friday. So I cut the recipe down to 1/4 and followed the directions exactly. After it had been in the oven for substantially longer than the recipe indicated, I finally gave up, threw out the un-popped kernels of corn and decided it not worth the effort of figuring out what happened to screw up the recipe.

After all that, I decided I wanted popcorn and we just happened to have Kettle Corn in microwavable bags. So I put it in the microwave for the appropriate amount of time and went over to the living room to watch Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares while waiting. I got so distracted by the TV show that I didn't notice the large amount of smoke pouring out of the microwave. We had to open the patio door and several windows for about 15 minutes before the smoke disappeared, but the odor remained. It was so bad that you couldn't go in the kitchen unless you held your breath. It's amazing how little smoke it takes to make it difficult to breathe. Anyway, I left the fan in the kitchen and the main floor bathroom on all night, but there's still an odor. Oh well, at least I'm out of here for the weekend! (Poor D).

I have failed miserably on my workout goal for Goal Chunk #3. Once I fell behind, that is when I kept thinking, "Well, I've already missed the goal... what is the point?" I am not going to let this discourage me from another goal chunk, however, I'm going to set it at 50%. Hopefully I'll be able to do that and then get slowly work my way back up to 60% and then 75%. 75% seems a good number to shoot for on a regular basis, but I'll be pleased with 50-75%.

It's nasty out right now, but I must still walk the dogs now since I have volunteering later today. At least it's stopped raining. A little damp and gray never hurt anyone (with appropriate clothing).

Dumber

Today is a low motivation day. I couldn't drag myself out of bed (except to feed the dogs, but then I went right back). Part of it is that I woke up with a headache and that is not good. However, at least my back is completely back to normal. I haven't had the pain regardless of how I sit or move in about 4-5 days now. I am fairly convinced that it was the running on the treadmill that just basically pushed something slightly out of alignment. Treadmill/Running = Evil; Elliptical Machine = Good. The bad news is that my lack of getting up early enough to walk the dogs and workout means that I will not be able to workout today, which drops my Goal Chunk #2 percentage from 81.3% to 76.5%. Bummer.

Just read this article on YME about a protest at a university for the deaf and hearing impaired. I know it's wrong, but I couldn't help thinking that this must be a very quiet protest.

I'm scared I'm getting dumber. I have spelled two words that I know how to spell incorrectly in the past couple of weeks (lewd as lude ... and even worse: flour as flower). I think I shall have to start doing crosswords everyday to make my mind work a little more. Probably also a problem is that I have not read a book in a while. I go through reading waves and right now I'm in a trough and have been for quite a while. Perhaps I'll start a book in Vegas this weekend.

Well, I'm off to do my volunteering shortly.

Goal Chunk #3

OK, I have decided what goal chunk #3 will be. I'm lowering my percentage goal to 80% because I'm getting a little burned out and I want to give myself change to re-energize. I'm not going to do an eating goal because I think that just frustrates me and, at this point, it's not really necessary for me to be healthy and that's what this is all about.

Therefore, my next goal chunk will be from 10/17 - 11/2 with goal of working out 80% of the total days. This means I can have three days of no workouts in that time period. I still want to do a 50% cardio, 50% weights split.

Busier

It's actually been a busier than usual week for me, mostly because I've had various spa-type appointments in an effort to look presentable at C & D's wedding: facial, hair, spray tan. The good news is the last facial on Monday seems to have had a positive effect on my skin. It's far from perfect, however, at least it kind of calmed things down a bit. I couldn't have really expected much more than that given it's state lately.

While watching Oprah yesterday, Matthew McConahey managed to shame me into sending an email to get started on volunteer work. Man, I'm surprised I didn't become a Scientologist back when I thought Tom Cruise was dishy and not whacko - all it takes is one great looking celebrity to get me off my butt after months of sitting around. This particular volunteer position is for a once-a-week administration guru with lots of Excel experience at a non-profit that focuses on ending the abuse and neglect of Oregon's children. Seems like a good fit with my skills, so hopefully it's not already filled when I get there on Tuesday.

I was a bit disappointed with The Biggest Loser last night. I actually knew that only 14 of the 50 were going to make it through the first episode to stay on the ranch, but I thought they'd all get the first 10 days to stay there and then it would be based on who lost the highest percentage of weight for those days. I think a show like that has a higher burden of fairness because these people are not really going on the show to win the money like the people who go on Survivor or The Amazing Race. They're going on to make a positive change in their lives and, for some of them, it's a life and death decision. While I was disappointed with how it was handled, I'll still watch it because I'm always so inspired by their dedication and I love seeing how much progress they make even after they leave the ranch. Last night's woman lost an additional 58 lbs after leaving. Two things make me super happy when watching TV:

1. Seeing poor/semi-poor people get free stuff
2. Seeing overweight people lose weight and feel confident they can continue to do so

I guess I'm also happy whenever I see bad things happen to Paris Hilton ... like when she rejected at the door of a club and then proceeded to cry because she couldn't get in, but that wasn't on TV. That was here.

Finally, I achieved my goal of working out 90% of the days from 8/5 - 9/21. Yippee!! My final stats were as follows:

• Percentage of days w/ workouts: 91.7%
• Total number of calories burned during time period: 23,538
• Total machine miles: 152.1

Goal Chunk #2

I have decided upon my next fitness goal chunk. It will be 9/26 - 10/12 and the goals will be:

1. Workout 90% of the days, which means I can skip one day.
2. Of those 90%, 50% should be weight workouts and 50% should be cardio.
   
3. Track my eating in FitDay for 90% days with a goal of averaging 1400 kcal/day, which means I can skip one day of tracking.

Maybe I'll talk D into setting a goal and tracking his stats for the same time period. More stuff to track...so exciting...I'm all a-tingle.

I only need to cook dinners on Wednesday and Thursday of this week since D is giving a presentation over a dinner tonight and last night we just had left over pasta. Always good to have a break. I might see if I can come up with meals using only stuff we have in the house so I don't have to go to the grocery store this week. That would be the real break - not having to go to the dreaded grocery store.

I did it!

90%, baby! 90%. Nuff said.

New Goal

Since posting my dog walking goal on my blog has worked very well at keeping me motivated, I'm going to post my average calories for the month of July. My goal is 1400 calories per day, which is the amount recommended by the personal trainer I saw 1.5 years ago, to achieve weight loss. I started FitDaying on July 5, so it's not truly for the entire month. I figure this will help me stay more on track in terms of hitting that daily target, but also force me to FitDay each day since I like to maintain lists more than I like to FitDay.

Speaking of lists, I think I have some listing disorder. I love lists. The moment we get home from a movie, I rush to update my blog. Not because I think anyone actually looks at my movie ratings, but because I love having a list of movies. Sometimes I just daydream of lists I could add to my blog. Believe me people, the lists you see are the limited version of what I could do.

Not much going on today. D is working and I'm piddling around the house. We booked a trip to Vegas for his BD in October. We also booked our flights to CO/WY for my brother's wedding in September.

In dog walking news, I bought another carabiner at REI to use as a clip for hanging (empty) poo bags from my belt loops while walking. This makes it so Eddie doesn't have to wear the backpack on hot days and I don't have to actually carry the empty bags. I do have to carry the non-empty ones, but that's only 25% of our walks. I look like a gigantic goober when I'm walking with all my gear, but since when has that stopped me from doing something?