Day 03 - A Song That Makes You Happy

Day 01. Your favorite song
Day 02. Your least favorite song

Day 03. A song that makes you happy




Day 04. A song that makes you sad
Day 05. A song that reminds you of someone
Day 06. A song that reminds you of somewhere
Day 07. A song that reminds you of a certain event
Day 08. A song that you know all the words to
Day 09. A song that you can dance to
Day 10. A song that makes you fall asleep
Day 11. A song from your favorite band
Day 12. A song from a band you hate
Day 13. A song that is a guilty pleasure
Day 14. A song that no one would expect you to love
Day 15. A song that describes you
Day 16. A song that you used to love but now hate
Day 17. A song that you hear often on the radio
Day 18. A song that you wish you heard on the radio
Day 19. A song from your favorite album
Day 20. A song that you listen to when you’re angry
Day 21. A song that you listen to when you’re happy
Day 22. A song that you listen to when you’re sad
Day 23. A song that you want to play at your wedding
Day 24. A song that you want to play at your funeral
Day 25. A song that makes you laugh
Day 26. A song that you can play on an instrument
Day 27. A song that you wish you could play
Day 28. A song that makes you feel guilty
Day 29. A song from your childhood
Day 30. Your favorite song at this time last year

Day 02 - Your Least Favorite Song

Day 01. Your favorite song

Day 02. Your least favorite song

Day 03. A song that makes you happy
Day 04. A song that makes you sad
Day 05. A song that reminds you of someone
Day 06. A song that reminds you of somewhere
Day 07. A song that reminds you of a certain event
Day 08. A song that you know all the words to
Day 09. A song that you can dance to
Day 10. A song that makes you fall asleep  
Day 11. A song from your favorite band 
Day 12. A song from a band you hate
Day 13. A song that is a guilty pleasure
Day 14. A song that no one would expect you to love
Day 15. A song that describes you
Day 16. A song that you used to love but now hate
Day 17. A song that you hear often on the radio
Day 18. A song that you wish you heard on the radio
Day 19. A song from your favorite album
Day 20. A song that you listen to when you’re angry
Day 21. A song that you listen to when you’re happy
Day 22. A song that you listen to when you’re sad
Day 23. A song that you want to play at your wedding
Day 24. A song that you want to play at your funeral
Day 25. A song that makes you laugh
Day 26. A song that you can play on an instrument
Day 27. A song that you wish you could play
Day 28. A song that makes you feel guilty
Day 29. A song from your childhood
Day 30. Your favorite song at this time last year

Ouch!!

Ouch #1

The weather here this week is not all that promising for getting outside and walking.  Rain is in the forecast for most of this week and it's both bumming me out and making me glad.  It's forcing me to take a little bit of a break, which I don't ever seem to allow myself.  But it's keeping me from doing something active, which I'm not happy about.  Just hearing myself say that still sounds funny.  Me, the biggest slouch in the world, now can't cope when I can't get out and move my body.  After having a big bowl of pudding for dinner tonight, I decided I should do something, so I dusted off the EA Sports Active for the Wii and got to business.  I've done it two or three times since being in the new house, but since it's been nice out, I've been doing my exercise outside.  Tonight, however, I was humiliated by a stupid video game.  It handed me my ass on a silver platter.  I can't remember the last time I hurt like I do right this second.  It reminds me that as much as I think I'm in shape, I'm in no shape whatsoever.  I shouldn't be drenched in sweat after 20 minutes of lunges, resistance training and stretches.  I have a feeling I'm going to hurt tomorrow.  But hopefully not too much to keep me from doing my sit ups.  Day three and I haven't given up yet.  One set in the morning, one set in the evening.  I'm starting to feel where my stomach and the surrounding muscles are and where that line ends and the belly blubber begins.  

Ouch #2

The last pair of walking shoes I had weren't the best pair.  Turns out they were just a tiny bit too small for my right foot to do the kind of walking I like to do outside.  After a little while I noticed that I had a cut or a blister or something underneath the big toe nail on that foot.  And it started getting bigger as time went on, to the point that almost half the toe nail had turned black.  I bought new shoes and the toe stopped turning black, it just wasn't turning back to it's rightful color.  Over time, as the nail continued to grow, the black part of the nail kept moving higher and higher.  I thought it would grow out of the toe and everything would be fine.  Recently I noticed that a good portion of the nail appears to be dead and doesn't look like it's fully attached to my toe.  I really did a number on my poor toe.  I'm fearing I'm going to lose the whole nail before the healthy part grows enough to take the place of the dead part.  Meh.  And just to gross you out, here is a picture of the toe.

Things

Nothing but random nattering here.  Just because I have all these thoughts in my head that I haven't had a chance to put down on virtual paper.

* I found out this weekend that the people who bought my old house just broke up. For just a second, when finding out, I felt slightly responsible.  That damn house.

* I've decided to start doing sit ups again.  I'm on day two.

* This picture of myself as a child, as much as I love it, has caused me a lot of anguish since finding it.  I look at the little kid in the picture and I see such innocence, such happiness, such joy and I wonder at what point did he become me.  I wish I had the ability to send myself a message back in time telling him to hold onto it as long as possible and that everything is going to be be fine.  Great even.  Just the thought of losing all those years of heartache and turmoil....  I can't imagine how I would have turned out.

While on the subject of the picture, I asked my mother about the cat in the picture.  I don't remember having a cat when I was a small child, so I didn't know if it was our cat or if we were at a friend's house in the picture.  The cat was ours, but my mother has no recollection of it's name.

* I have my dvr almost completely cleaned out.  I'm down to four recorded shows yet to be watched.  It's taken me a long time to catch up on tv from my Texas vacation.  The biggest hurdle was getting through the last few weeks of As The World Turns.  This weekend I watched the final two weeks of the show.  I mostly enjoyed it.  It was great to see the character of Dr. John Dixon return.  Watching John and Lucinda interact was such a treat for me.  Now that I'm mostly caught up on tv, I can use the time I was using for that and put it into something else I need to do.  Tonight, for instance, I worked on cleaning up my office.  I'm great at letting things pile up on my desk and my table, but horrible at putting them away.  I'm almost there.

* Last weekend I worked on a little art project.  This weekend I worked on hanging said art.  I made these collages and I'm quite happy with how they came out.  I need a couple more frames because I want to make some more for my comics room.

 * My ongoing quest to listen to every song in my iTunes library for the second time is starting to wind down.  I'm down to 5655 songs in that playlist.

* It can be a real pain in the ass to get in touch with me lately.  I think I'm the worst I've ever been at returning phone calls, emails, snail mail and the like.  I really don't know why some people continue to put up with me.  I'll be honest and tell you that some days I really don't know how I have the amazing group of friends that I do have.  I've always managed to surround myself with some pretty incredible people, but it seems like at this point in time, I've got the greatest group of friends, whether online friends, real life friends, online friends who have become real life friends or whatever, that I've ever had in my entire life.  At first I thought that's just what comes with being this age (forty-four for those that don't know), but I see some of my friends who are in the opposite position that I am.  It really makes me realize that I'm one of the luckiest people I know.  I have a job that I (mostly) love.  I have the greatest friends, though they deserve way better than me.  I have an amazing home.  (This part is true.  Most mornings when I descend the staircase, I feel like Krystle Carrington walking down the grand staircase on Dynasty.  Shut up Freddy.)  I have the greatest husband anyone could ask for, even though we both drive each other batshit crazy half the time.  (And by "half", I really mean most of the time!)  I really do have a pretty sweet life.  I need to remember that more often.

* I know too many alcoholics.  Can we have just one social event where alcohol isn't involved?

I Stole This From Bjorn

30 day song meme - 1

Day 01. Your favorite song
Day 02. Your least favorite song
Day 03. A song that makes you happy
Day 04. A song that makes you sad
Day 05. A song that reminds you of someone
Day 06. A song that reminds you of somewhere
Day 07. A song that reminds you of a certain event
Day 08. A song that you know all the words to
Day 09. A song that you can dance to
Day 10. A song that makes you fall asleep Day 11. A song from your favorite band 
Day 12. A song from a band you hate
Day 13. A song that is a guilty pleasure
Day 14. A song that no one would expect you to love
Day 15. A song that describes you
Day 16. A song that you used to love but now hate
Day 17. A song that you hear often on the radio
Day 18. A song that you wish you heard on the radio
Day 19. A song from your favorite album
Day 20. A song that you listen to when you’re angry
Day 21. A song that you listen to when you’re happy
Day 22. A song that you listen to when you’re sad
Day 23. A song that you want to play at your wedding
Day 24. A song that you want to play at your funeral
Day 25. A song that makes you laugh
Day 26. A song that you can play on an instrument
Day 27. A song that you wish you could play
Day 28. A song that makes you feel guilty
Day 29. A song from your childhood
Day 30. Your favorite song at this time last year

Lady GaGa's Got Nothing On Neil's Videos

500!!!

I did it.  Today I made my goal to walk 500 miles in 2010.  Actually, today I officially hit my goal.  I know I crossed it prior to today, but if I didn't record the miles I walked with my walking app, they didn't count.  I use an iPhone app called iMapMyRide.  It uses GPS to track the number of miles you walk, run, hike or bike ride.  I've been using the app on and off for about two years now.  At first I was just using it occasionally to see how long the walks I take were.  I also used it when I moved to this neighborhood to go walking without getting lost.  A couple of months ago, I found that the app has a website as well.  The site is a little clunky and awkward to navigate, but I started poking around and found there were things there that the app itself doesn't have access to.  It keeps a running tally of your activity, makes calendars showing how long you walked, how many miles, how many calories you've burned, stuff like that.  And then I found there's a place where you can set goals for yourself.  Most of the walking goals are things like Walk A Marathon In 30 Days.  But I found the Walk 500 Miles In 2010 and decided to give it a try.  I was in the neighborhood of 250 miles or so when I found the goal, so I was already half way done without even trying!  Since then, I've made it a point to record every one of my walks.  It's also given me the push I needed to keep on track with my walking.  If there's one thing you need to know about me, it's that I get obsessed over silly goals.  I set them and then let my OCD take over.  Knowing that I had a goal to work towards also made me take my walking up to the next level.  My normal walking pattern would be to go out and walk for about four miles.  Since setting the goal, I refuse to let myself go for less than five.  The last four weekends I've gone above and beyond the duty.  Three of those Sundays I did 10+ mile walks.  Last Sunday I did nearly 11 1/2 in a single outing.  When I got up this morning, I was 7.92 miles from my goal, so I knew I needed to walk 8.  I did nearly 10 1/2.  I'm so proud of myself for doing this.

I was just playing around with Google Maps and was kind of freaked out to realize that 500 miles from my house is the North Carolina border.  Or it's from my house to just past Cleveland.  Or from my house to Detroit, cutting through Canada. Or from my house to the tip of Maine and then into Canada. Or from my house to Ottawa and then back.  Orlando, FL is about 1200 miles from my house.  That might be my goal next year.  There's just not enough time left in 2010 to hit that goal.

Time

I can't figure out how I'm spending my time.  I don't think I've changed my routines or patterns all that much recently, but I feel like I have even less time than ever before.  I've had stuff I've wanted to post here over the last couple of weeks, but time hasn't allowed much opportunity to do that.  And if I don't jot this stuff down when I'm thinking about it, it's gone.  

I'm kind of annoyed that the new television season has officially started for me.  Last night it began with the first episode of Survivor.  I need to learn to make time for what few shows I want to watch.  I'm still trying to catch up with the shows I dvr'd while I was on vacation last month.  One of the most time consuming shows has been As The World Turns.  I've been watching it for more than 25 years.  I've watched it religiously and I've been away from it over the years.  Knowing it was coming to an end, I have tried to make a point of staying with it to say goodbye to these characters I've spent more than half my life with.  The show ends on Friday of this week and I'm caught up to about two weeks ago.  Once that's out of the way, I should be able to catch up on Top Chef then I'm mostly caught up on stuff.  

As for the new tv season, I'm watching Survivor, Modern Family, Top Chef Just Desserts, Project Runway, Amazing Race and that's about it.  I set the dvr for the Apprentice, but I don't know if I can do it.  I haven't heard enough about anything new that's starting to want to tune in.  Is there something I should be watching?

God, this post was really half-assed, wasn't it?

Follow Up

The computer was being a royal pain in the ass to me last night and wouldn't let me add the pictures I wanted to to yesterday's post.  It's still being a little temperamental, but I'm running a few things at the same time, which I shouldn't.  Anyway, here are the pics.

Here are Kevin and Brian.  I thought it was rather selfish of Brian not to give me his shirt when I asked.  I want that shirt, dammit.  Since he wouldn't, I was forced to order on online this afternoon.  That and a Dalek one, too.  Thanks for spending my fucking money, Brian.

Also, there's a fossil sitting at the booth behind them.  That old man got up, came over to our table when he was leaving and told us that we talked so loud that he couldn't hear himself eat.  Um, he couldn't hear himself eat because it's hard to hear tapioca being gummed and he's 811 years old.  He can't hear to start with.

We're looking adorable.  Because we are.

I think they really just wanted a chance to grab my ass in public without anyone giving them odd looks.   And n toot my own horn, but my legs look so fucking hot!

One of the joys of being back down in that neck of the woods is stopping by the Sonic for a Strawberry Lime Ade.  Delicious!

My Saturday

For reasons I'd rather not go into at the moment, it's been a rather craptastic week.  I've had a lot on my mind and not a lot of it pleasant.  So to say I needed a distraction would be an understatement.  But I got one today and it was fan-fucking-tastic.  Ken and I got in the car today, took a drive down to Hyde Park to eat and meet with friends Kevin and Brian from Danbury, CT.  They make frequent trips to the Poughkeepsie area to do some shopping and Poughkeepsie is about a 90 minute drive from here.  The idea of meeting up for lunch has come up a few times before but never realized... until today.  It's mostly been my fault it hasn't happened before.  I'm like that, as if it's a surprise to anyone.  This is only the second time I've been in the presence of the Danburys.  The first time was two years ago in NYC.  I had a good time with them then, but there were too many people around to be able to spend any quality time.  Today was the complete opposite.  I had such a good time today and look forward to many more visits.

I was going to post a couple of pictures, but my computer is being a total twat right now and it just took me 20 minutes to try to load the first one.  I think I'm going to walk away before this otherwise glorious day becomes soiled. I will post them tomorrow.

Old Pictures

Last Thanksgiving, I asked my mother if I could bring home some of the old photo albums with my childhood pictures to scan to my computer.  It took some searching, but she found some and packed them up for me to take home.  And since last November, they've just been sitting and collecting dust.  Ken had every intention of scanning them for me, but time got away from us with all the house stuff going on and they never got done.  A couple of days before going to Texas, I got a new printer/scanner.  I didn't get a chance to set it up until I got back and the one thing I've been wanting to do is to scan those pictures.  And it took some searching to find where they went.  I could tell you where they were in the old house, but I haven't seen them since we moved in here.  But I found them and got right to scanning.  Here are some of my favorites.

This is one of my favorite class pictures ever.  I can't really recall too many specifics from my childhood, but I distinctly remember this day.  I was wearing my favorite sweater in the picture and it was one of the last times I would do so because it was pretty tight on me then.  But I remember wanting to wear it for my school picture.  And I remember the difficulty I had getting it off late that day.  Memory is a funny thing.  I can remember that, but I couldn't tell you what I had for lunch yesterday.

Another picture of myself I absolutely love.  I remember that sweatshirt, too.  And that beautiful blonde hair. Hell, having any hair!

"It's this big!"

It's my birthday, bitches!

This picture was taken not too shortly after my brother was born, so that puts this as very late 1967 or very early 1968.  Naturally I'm the cutest member of my family!

I look terrified of something.  I can't imagine what though.

I wish I could remember who this kid is, but my memory is shot.  I think it might be Joey from up the street.  Regardless, this picture makes me laugh.  The hints are all there that I was going to turn out to be a big ol' homo.  Look at that pose.  Seriously.

I love this picture, too.  I think I look adorable.  I've got a kitty in my hands and I look so happy.  I don't have any recollection of this cat, though.  Need to ask mom about it.

Me being cute, my brother being unfortunate.

Me being cute, my brother being even more unfortunate.

Ken said this is his favorite picture of me.  He said I looked so happy and my brother looked like he was about to crap his pants.

I noticed something when I was looking back at all these pictures.  While I was never a fat kid, I certainly was never a skinny kid either.  I always had just a few extra pounds on me.  Not too many, but just a couple of extra. I outgrew that in my mid teens, but then my 20s hit and I lost control of my weight.

How could I sleep with all the loudness coming from that chair?

I love this shirt and wish I still had it.

I love this picture so much.  My dad, my brother and me.  Oh, and that lamp.  I remember that lamp.  It's scary to know that my parents had no taste as far back as then.

I wish I could remember the thoughts going through my mind to make me make that face.

Can anyone say A Christmas Story?

And Tina makes three.

These were the kids I used to hang out with when I was young.  Brian was my best friend during these years. He's back row center.  I miss him and still think about him often.  He passed away in the early 80s after a traffic accident.

I remember being chosen to be in this picture vividly.  We kept having to retake the picture because my teacher, Mr. Nettles, thought it looked too posed.  I think this was probably the third or fourth shot.  I was so proud that my picture got to be in the paper.  And a little annoyed that they spelled my last name incorrectly.

Happy Labor Day!!

I Love This

Slacking

I've been doing a piss poor job trying to keep this blog up to date.  I just haven't had the time and I feel pretty crappy about it.  I should actually be in bed right now, but I thought I'd try to put some words down here first.  I don't make any promises that anything here will be interesting or coherent, but I do promise to put some words down on this virtual paper.

I love milestones and I love tracking and celebrating them.  They could be stupid milestones or really important ones.  As long as they're interesting to me, I'm all about them.  So it surprises me that I missed a big one of my own recently.  Nearly three years ago I gave up soda in an effort to jump start my weight loss.  I had plateaued and couldn't get myself to budge.  I dropped soda from my diet to see if that would help.  It did.  I planned on stopping for a month, but a month became two months, two months became 100 days and so on and so forth.  Each time I reached a milestone, I promised myself a soda as a reward, but then I was afraid to break my streak.  I've been counting down the days until I was 1000 days soda-free.  And then I slept through that goal.  I just checked and I'm 1070 days soda-sober.  How could I miss that milestone?  Really?  I need to be on my toes for my next one.  At the end of this month it will be 3 years.  I know I'm going to break that streak sooner or later.  I'm hoping for later.

And speaking of weight, I'm still fighting the fat I brought home from Austin.  It's been weeks and weeks and weeks now and I still can't get rid of it.  I've been walking like a madman in hopes of jump starting my metabolism, I've been watching what I'm eating and I'm seeing no progress.  I need to stop stressing about it and let my body do what my body needs to do.  I will say that I feel like I'm in the best shape I've been in in a long time.  I've been going into walking overdrive and my legs look fantastic.  And remember, I'm very hard on myself and especially hyper-critical of myself, so for me to say something good about myself, you know I really have to believe it!  Just looking in the mirror, it seems that almost all of me is lean.  And then there is my belly.  :-)

As for walking like a madman, this morning I clocked 8 miles and it felt good.  Yesterday morning I walked 10 in just over two hours.  And it felt AMAZING!  I thought my sciatic nerve would have hired someone to shoot me for these two walks, but so far, it's been pretty quiet.  Not silent, but pretty quiet.

Work has been something else since I've been back from vacation.  My workload is easily tripled and I'm fighting to keep caught up.  A bunch of my jobs have fallen by the wayside so that I can concentrate on the part that has exploded.  It's really easy work, but the volume is out of control.  I have a back up who is supposed to do my job when I'm not there (Key words - supposed to).  He really doesn't have a job and you'd think that since he doesn't have anything to do that he'd offer a hand.  But no.  It gets in the way of reading sports scores.  We can't have that.

I've been looking forward to this three day weekend to decompress.  It's Sunday night right now and I still haven't had a chance.  Friday night is my usual decompression night and Ken invited the neighbors out to dinner and then back here to hang out.  So Friday night was out.  Saturday night we had plans to go visit a friend who just moved into a new place.  Saturday was out.  Today we ran errands all afternoon.  Today was a scratch.  I made it clear to Ken that I'm not speaking to him tomorrow.  I'm not speaking to anyone tomorrow.  I'm taking the day for myself.  I need it.  I still have some chores I need to do (that I had hoped would be done already), but otherwise I'm planning on sleeping in (at least until Lucy jumps on my full bladder because she wants me up to feed her) and dicking the day away.  Maybe I'll post here.  Maybe I won't.

Kim Wilde Is Back!!!