I really did mean it about the no resolutions thing. I don't like the idea of doing something out for a year. Either I want to try it out for a few months or I want to change my lifestyle. A year seems like too much or not enough. However, I do have a friend who did one new thing every day last year and it was fun to hear about! I thought I'd post what things I'm working on about myself right now and look at them at the end of the year to see how well I've done, but I don't feel like that today, either. So, that's not happening.

The holidays were nice. It was fun to see the family and eat fun stuff. It was relaxing, but I think I may have overdone it a little, because it's taking me a while to get traction again.  I'm slowly but surely getting back into my groove, though. I do think part of why it's harder to work out lately is to do with the cold making my asthma worse. Hopefully, it's not because I managed to get totally out of shape in two weeks. . .

My job's gotten busier and more interesting. Love when that happens! :D Also, I have more opportunities for programming, which is fun and exciting.

Miss M and her family took me out to a 3D movie a couple weeks ago! It was so fun! I haven't seen a 3D movie in a while, either. Speaking of. . . they lent us some movies we haven't watched yet. . .maybe that's something I could do today before she and I get together again on Monday. Oh, have I mentioned how much I love getting almost every holiday off? I haven't had a job that did that. . . um, ever, actually! This is pretty sweet.

New Year's Resolutions

Last year, a few friends had a New Year's Resolutions thread. My contribution was that I don't Do resolutions because I want to be continuously improving and a year limit seems pointless. I gave a short list of things I wanted to improve generally. Now that I sit back and look at the year, I'm glad I can say I did what I said I would and kept it up all year! :D

My Not Resolutions were to lose weight, get healthier and get paid to program.

I lost the weight in January and kept most of it off all year (I'm a bit heavier now than I was in January, but not much and a little of that is muscle).

Healthier? Well, I have taken up CrossFit on Monday, Wednesday and Friday and I go running, take a spin class or use elliptical machines on Tuesday and Thursday. I may also start up an evening dance class with a CrossFit friend on Tuesdays. I work out 5 days most weeks and I'm more active on weekends.

I eat better, too. J's been really helpful with this. When we're in a group of friends and I'm inclined to let my diet go, he tries to stay on his and thereby helps make it easier for me keep mine.

Getting paid to program. . . Well, I write javascript that runs in the background of my spreadsheets. Most of my job functions can at least be started by just filling in my spreadsheets and sometimes pushing a button afterward. I also wrote a little program to help some of our technicians and even though it was pretty simple, it was fun for me and saved them a bunch of time!

I owe Jason thanks for helping me find the gadget I ended up programming and being there for me in case I needed help working through it the first time. I was able to do it on my own at work when they wanted the program tweaked and when I needed to set it up on a couple different computer set ups! Mission accomplished. Now, to come up with my Not Resolutions for 2013. . .

Written Dec 30, 2012

Goodbye to 2012

(Not a lot of words I can capitalize in that title. . . It looks funny. . . Anyway. . .)

Boy, this year went by lightening fast. Didn't I just get that job? The one I started in February. . . 10 months ago. . . Guess not! Here are some of my highlights from 2012.

1. The family grew and promised to grow even more.

• I gained 2 siblings—and because one of them has a daughter, 1 niece, too!
• 4 Future additions to the family were announced:
• My stepbrother and new sister in law are adding a girl to their family soon (February?)
• J's sister and our brother in law are adding twin boys to their family in April
• My little brother (John) and his wife are expecting a boy in June
• Gained 1 cousin (through marriage)
• And 1 Uncle because one of my aunts announced that she'll be getting married in January

2. One of my brothers was living with us until recently, when he moved out! He's paying rent and not living with family anymore! He's got a job he likes (in walking distance) and seems to be making some good strides. He also seems more confident. It's good to see.

3. We took a road-trip and got to see lots of family and friends over the course of two weeks! We went to a family reunion on J's side of the family and then moved our way through the other places our family lives. It was nice to have some time with nearly everyone and so many people were kind enough to put us up: thank you! 

4. I got a job and have had a blast getting to work with this young and vibrant team. It's like a start up company inside a big company, but in a good way.

5. We got a new car! Our old favorite got too expensive to fix up so we got a Prius, which we love! It's been so much fun. 

6. I continued to be a mentor. Part of me feels like a person ought to be Grown Up and Responsible before they do that sort of thing, but Miss M doesn't seem to mind. We have a lot of fun together and she's actually become one of my good friends.

7. I've spoken Spanish a lot this year! Miss M's parents both speak with me and a few of my coworkers, too. I'm now at the point where I can switch into Spanish much more comfortably than I ever have. I still don't switch back and forth very quickly, but I'm getting better. A few weeks ago, Miss M's mom was telling me (in Spanish) that she was concerned at first that we wouldn't be able to communicate much but that I've picked it up quickly and she's been pleased to see it.

8. I've taken up—and maybe fallen in love with—CrossFit. I'm getting much stronger and noticing some muscle definition, which is nice. Little things that used to make me sore and tired don't anymore. That's kind of awesome. 

I wonder what the next year holds!

Written Dec 30, 2012

Word of the Day

A friend at work recently introduced me to The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, which I find more bittersweet than sorrowful. She shared one of her favorite new words from that site. I found it interesting, but more so, I find it interesting the way people think about it. Another friend of hers said that feeling this way all the time would depress him and/or freak him out. She said she has to sometimes consciously not think about it. I think that constantly looking at the world this way is part of why I'm so fascinated by people.


sonder
n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.

Happy Holidays!

I know, I missed Hanukkah this time, but there are still a couple coming up! ;)

Miss M and I made a huge batch of cupcakes recently. I baked 93 cupcakes using chocolate and yellow cake mixes. Then, she and I got together to put fillings in them and chocolate ganache on top. The cupcakes had three kinds of filling: banana, vanilla and "candy cane." I tried a pudding filling idea I saw on Pinterest (have I mentioned how much I love that site? So many great ideas!). You take 1 box of instant pudding mix, add half the required amount of milk and half a container of Cool Whip. Quick and easy! I could use Real whipped cream, but there was too much other stuff to do and not enough time.

Miss M and I hollowed out the middles of the cupcakes, used a resealable sandwich bag with a hole in the corner and filled 'em up. After we topped 'em with ganache, we wrote the letter of the filling on top in white ("V" for "vanilla", "B" for "banana" and "CC" for "candy cane" because C and V look a lot alike when written on top of cupcakes. . . probably. . .). Then, she took them to school, I took them to work, and we both took them to a holiday party for the program we met through. CUPCAKES FOR EVERYONE!

Glow in the Dark 5K!

Here are the pictures of the Glow-in-the-Dark 5K I ran.

Before the race.

After the race.

Do you see how my face is a very different color than my neck is in the after photo? Someone forgot her inhaler on race day. . . This is what I look like when I exercise without my inhaler. Thus instead of seeing how quickly I could run this race, I found out how quickly I could run the race without performance enhancing drugs* Not the same thing. I did an alright job, though. Finished the 5K in 31:57 (nearly 32 min)—so almost exactly 10 min per mile average. I placed 596th out of 2059 people and 286th out of 1368 female racers.

Also, I may have really needed to use the bathroom before we started, which may have been an additional motivator toward the end there! Yay? Afterwards, my friends and I got Slurpees 'cause it was a warm night and we were all roasting. Yay for realsies! :D



* "Performance enhancing" is used here because I can do more and work better/faster when I breathe properly. What a concept!

Written Sept 23, 2012

Today Was Fun!

First, ran some errands and felt a little productive.

Next, Miss M and I looked up stars, their relative sizes and the "life of a star" as well as planets and their relative sizes. This site was particularly useful for planet sizes and this video was great for star comparisons (the music's hokey). We also learned that the two biggest planets in the solar system have ridiculously small days (SUCH fast rotations about their axes!) while the smallest planets have really long days. We also made another zebra cake for a mentor dinner thing we're doing with two (or three) other mentor-mentee pairs.

Then, I went to a late night glow-in-the-dark 5K with some coworker friends! I hope to have at least one picture of this ridiculousness and will post it here with a few more details. For now, just picture it: black spandex, neon green sports bra visible at the top totally-80s-style, neon-ish lipstick, and a magenta tutu sticking out all over the place. It was awesome.