A Year in Review

It really has been over a year since I've written here. On one hand I can hardly believe it's been that long, but on the other it seems like it's been eons. I've really missed writing here. I've often thought about picking it back up. I'll give Lucy the credit for giving me the nudge I needed to come back here. So here's a quick summary of what's happened since last I wrote:

• I spent much of last spring thinking about buying a house, touring properties, and wringing my mental hands over the particulars.
• I decided not to buy a house at this time.
• I wrote my third November Novel.
• I caught up with a friend from high school who I'd not seen in 5 years.
• I've been part of the excitement of surrounding the impending nuptials of my one time roommate Steve and my friend Stephanie. In fact I just picked up my bridesmaid dress from the alteration place on Friday. Just about 3 weeks to go!
• I started internet dating. This deserves a whole post (or several) of its own.
• I endured a terrible year of work though the bane of existence finally got himself fired, so things have improved.
• I baked many truffles for xmas.
• Julia and I have finalized our plans for our trip to Australia in May. Again, this needs a whole post of its own!
• My middle sister moved in and is now my roommate. Things are going okay. She got me watching the Big Bang Theory.
• I've become addicted to the Big Bang Theory (see above).
• I gained back a bit of the weight I lost. :( I'm still down 30 pounds from 2 years ago, so I guess that's not terrible. There's been so much stress in my life in the last year that dieting has really been tough for me. I really wanted to have lost a lot more weight before this wedding and the big Australia trip, but it is what it is.
• I took myself off to Emerald Isle in the Outer Banks for my Summer Holiday for the second year in a row and had a delightful time. Much of which was spent reading the fifth Song of Ice and Fire book.
• I made some realizations about myself and did some deep soul searching that resulted in me making some changes in my life. I realize now that writing about it would have been immensely helpful at the time.
• Lamented the Year Without Winter or Year of the Long Spring; either way you look at it the weather has been total fucknuts lately.
• Discovered some cool new music.
• Added to my ever growing coin collection.
• Made some new friends.

Etc. You get the idea. I'll expound on some of these things in the next few posts. I think I may make my next post a picture post (lazy for me, informative for you). And I promise to try to be more regular in posting.

Laters

I'm back!

Zomgwtfbbqawesome.

I didn't mean to take such a long break from here, but craploads of crap have been going on.

As I mentioned in my post from several eons ago, I started on a new weight loss plan the first of the year. It's a really great, simple plan: diet and exercise. And it's working. I weighed myself today, and I've lost 30 pounds. 30 pounds in just under 3 months! That's the most I've ever lost, I've gone past my low weight from 4 years ago, and I've lost over 10% of my body weight (which I've been told can greatly improve your health). I'm not doing anything crazy either. No bizarre eating restrictions or starving myself. I can eat up to 1800 calories a day, although most days I only eat about 1500. I won't lie, it was hard at first. I was pretty much hungry all day every day for two weeks. It took another week for me to start feeling full from the amount of food I was eating, but it has totally worked! Now I have no problem eating this amount. Essentially, I've done all of the hard work of the diet. In the past I'd tried gradually stepping down how much I was eating (which is probably what you're supposed to do). Eff that noise. You end up being hungry for months on end and then give up. Go big or go home I say. I had a few crazy weeks at the beginning, and now everything is copacetic. I'm not hungry all the time and I keep losing weight. It's like goddamn magic.


I also painted this painting. It's some quick art I made up for one of my friend's band's album cover. There's some text that got added after. The name of the album (Through a Birdless Sky) goes in the upper right corner and the band name ('tis) down in the lower right. Btw, that's not the corner of the paper that is folded back, it's just painted to look like it is. Cool, no?







The biggest thing going on right now is that I'm looking at buying a house. It's kind of funny considering I just sort of decided to do it on a whim. One day I was just sitting there and the thought occurred to me that this was a good time to buy a house (what with interest rates & housing prices being low due to the crapful economy), and I was in a position where I could not only afford a house, but benefit from doing so (i.e. build equity & possibly have a mortgage that is cheaper than my rent). I went today and got pre-approved for a loan. It's not a huge amount, it's just me applying as I am solidly single & I'm not exactly rolling in dough. I do, however, have a good credit rating/history, and because of the economy there's plenty of sweet hook-ups for first time home-buyers. I've looked at a few houses here in BG, but I've accepted that it's very unlikely I'll find anything I can afford in town that isn't a complete disaster area. BG home prices haven't fallen as much as other areas, so I'm looking @ one of the smaller towns in the area, or perhaps out in the country. More details to come as things develop!

In somewhat related news I've acquired a roommate for next year, well, Aug to May anyway (in a college town that's how the lease years run). He's agreed to be my housemate instead if I purchase a house. In fact he's visibly more excited than I am sometimes, I think dorm & apartment life has been wearing thin for him. He's a bit like a big puppy, easily excitable, likes attention, and wants to be liked by/be friends with everyone, so I have a bit a fun trolling him @ work. The whole reason I chose to take on a roommate, I do like having a whole place to myself after all, was that it neatly (and nearly completely) will provide me with extra cash for the big trip to Australia that Julia and I are planning for next year.

We're looking at May 2012 for out big Australia trip. Nothing has been set yet, just lots of ideas being thrown into the idea hat. Later this spring we're going to go back to the travel agency and start getting things sorted.

April 2012 is when my friends Steve (former roommate) & Stephanie are getting married. It's all been very exciting and disgustingly cute. Her parents are paying for most of the wedding, so it's going to be super fabulous. And I'll give her some respect because she's really on the ball, they've already booked the place and a bunch of other stuff. She has a whole binder full of stuff. I'm going to be a bridesmaid, so I'm excited about getting to dress up and drink free booze. Though I'm glad that there's no plans on going dress shopping until late summer. If I got something now I have a feeling it wouldn't fit in a year.

So that's what's going on. If anybody still reads this, how are you? :)

Wooooooooo! What's up?

Dude.

Things are pretty awesome right now. I'm doing clean-up for the party I just had at my apartment. Nothing crazy, just some people from work and associated significant others and roommates. We had some booze and plenty of laughs. Now I'm just rounding up the empty beer bottles and dishes and glasses and munching out some chips and buffalo chicken dip. I wore one of my favorite shirts and my two new necklaces. Also, I'm watching stand up comedy. I love stand up comedy. And the last one, Bill Burr was pretty good, and now Louis C.K. is on and he's hilarious. Also, kinda buzzed still from drinking and I'm having another while I clean, so I'm laughing and rather enjoying myself.

What was I saying...

Oh, yeah. I'm supposed to blog at least once a week. That was one of my New Year's Resolutions. So I'm doing it. Buzzed, tipsy, very mildly drunk. Awesome. Because you know what? I'm in an awesome mood. Things are going swimmingly. I started on my eating healthy for the rest of my life plan (not diet, 'cause that implies going off the diet someday) a week ago. I have lost 7 pounds in the first week. Wooo! I'm sure that'll drop off after the first couple weeks. Of course, with the party I've not done so well today. As bad as it may be, I saved all my calories (save a few) for the purpose of drinking and eating some junk food. Ah well, you only get one life.

I think that the couple of months I've spent mentally building myself up to go on this eating plan have really paid off. My resolve has been freakin' awesome. Sure, I've been tempted. Portion shock is a bitch. And much of the week I've spent being hungry, but the hunger is a bit like the pain of getting a tattoo. Yeah, it's not exactly pleasant, but the result is going to be kick ass.

So, other resolution: blogging honestly. Okay, what should I talk about here?

Dunno. I'm gonna go eat some more chips and giggle @ comedians on tv. Laters.

Happy New Year

Time for some resolutions!

I am resolving to blog more often, at least once a week. I also resolve to be more open and honest in my blogging, not that I've lied to you dear reader, but rather just not been very deep or meaningful. And definitely not emotional, but then I keep my emotions mostly to myself in real life; I play my cards close to the vest. I'm trying to work on that too.

As for my other resolutions, I have some creative projects I want to work on/finish up this year, credit cards to pay down, and weight to lose. I only lost a net of 10 pounds this past year, and I want to lose much more this year. I've been examining my strategy and refining it. New reasons to lose weight (besides the I'm tired of being out of shape and want to be healthy ones) have cropped up, namely that I'm going to be in a wedding in spring of 2012 and will also be going on a big trip and want to look awesome.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I should be sleeping right now. I've got to be at Thanksgiving Dinner in less than three hours and I haven't slept yet. The reason I haven't slept is because I decided to finish my November Novel for NaNoWriMo today. Or rather, yesterday. So in 9 hours I cranked out over 14,800 words to not just hit the requisite 50k words, but to actually finish the thing. It's got an Epilogue and everything. (Although I have to admit it's not all I have for these characters. Nay, I have scads more about them. I have three pages of outline in tiny print, and I used up, let's see...exactly one bullet point of my outline. I think I may have diarrhea of the imagination.) Anyway.

52,931! Boom! I'm done, baby.

The goal is 50k words in 30 days. Crazy right? Well, I'm a firm believer in the saying, which I made up, "If a crazy thing is worth doing, it's worth doing crazier." So last year I did it in 25 days. This year I pulled it off in 22 days, and I didn't even write on all of them. Why? Cuz I'm freakin' crazy. And I think what I put down on paper (metaphorically speaking) was even better than last year's. And that 9 hour sprint was some awesometastic stuff, stuff that surprised even me. There was even a part that made me cry, like full on, tears crying.* Does that make me weird? If so, screw you, don't judge me. It's emotional (and I haven't slept).

Now I can get some other stuff done. What's next? Oh yeah, Thanksgiving dinner, black Friday shopping, and putting up my xmas tree.

Laters.

*Some epically sad violin music helped.

I'm Not Superstitious, Just Extrastitious

Maybe not even that much. Maybe just mildlystitious, stitiously-inclined? At any rate, I am 'stitious enough to recognize an omen when I see one. And I'm certainly perspicacious enough for a week worth of ominous omens to do more than casually ping on my radar. Now, nothing specific mind you, just a series of unsettling dreams, stock omens, and general weirdness. You know how omens are, just things that bode. However, in spite of all of this non-specific boding this week has gone swimmingly. Nothing bad had actually happened; I'm not worried about anything actually happening. Good moods have prevailed in myself and others, and all of my schemes are proceeding nicely.

It's just weird, so I'm just saying.

....

Speaking of dreams, I have a lot of weird ones, so in order for something to really stand out it has to really.....well, stand out. So I will leave you with two words which may just blow your imagination's mind:

Chainsaw Olympics.

I Came. I Rallied. I Restored Sanity.

Well, it has been 2 months since I posted. Crap.

Things have been just sort of the usual day in day out stuff during the last two months. Except for the trip I took to Washington, D.C. for the Daily Show's Rally to Restore Sanity. Which was EPIC. I know that word gets bandied around a lot these days, but this is one of the few, true instances where it is totally applicable. Just me and 225,000 other people chilling out on the National Mall in support of rationality, reason, and sanity. The only thing that wasn't superb was the hour I spent Friday night around 7pm driving in Downtown D.C. traffic. It was dark, bumper to bumper traffic, tons of out-of-towners (including me), roundabouts *shudder*, buses and taxis cutting in and out from everywhere.


The weather was perfect, mid to low 60's, light breeze. Mother Nature, who can pull some radical shit when she feels like it, decided to support sanity, too.

This shot is facing east. The next one is west. They give you a bit of an idea of what being in the middle of a 200k+ crowd looks like. I will also say that this was largest gathering of people I've ever been in AND the mellowest. Everybody was super cool and friendly. People made space for each other and switched spots so no one was blocking anyone and were in general super awesome about everything.

It was also an incredibly diverse crowd. Plenty of young people, but others too. There was a couple behind me in their 60's from the "reddest community ever" in the Smokey Mountains who were asking people for little mini-interviews to record to show folks back home. There was a guy and his wife from Minnesota. A family with a couple young kids (probably 9-12). And not just a variety of ages, but races, religions, and political affiliations (even a few brave republicans), too. Everybody was just mingling and having a good time.


Speaking of having a good time, there were tons of special guests. Including The Mythbusters! They came and nerded it up with some "experiments" using the "largest sample size ever." The coolest one was when they had everybody jump up & down at the same time and had actual seismologists w/seismographs record the shock wave (not very much, but still cool).





Speaking of nerding it up. R2-D2!

There were a shit-ton of other guests. I forget them all but a few were: Ozzy, Kat Stevens, Jeff Tweedy & Mavis Staples, Sam Waterson (who read Colbert's Poem, hilarious!), Don Nevello "Father Guido Sarducci", Tony Bennet who sang "America the Beautiful", and a zillion more.

I also really loved the song Colbert and Stewart sang "The Greatest, Strongest Country in the World." It was a wonderful bit of comedy. And kudos to Jon Stewart for singing in front of tens of thousands of people when you know you're not the greatest. Colbert might not have any shame when he's in character, so I think nothing fazes him. And Stewart's "keynote" speech was really, really good. That doesn't do it justice of course, suffice to say it was eloquent, sincere, funny, and to the point, all at once.

Then there were the signs! A snapped photos of a few of my favorites.

"Blessed are the Cheese-makers"
A Life of Brian shout-out, woot!








Not pictured, but awesome:
"The Civil War was an inside job"
"Hyperbole is literally destroying America"
"Muslims killed Dumbledore"
"Donde esta el bano?"
"That's what she said"
"Down with this sort of thing"
A giant Mario invincibility star
"You found me!" held up by a girl dressed as Waldo




And here's one more. One of the best ones I saw all day. It made me laugh, and I knew I had to get a photo to show you guys, especially Mark. ;)











After the Rally I spent the rest of the day wandering up and down the Mall. The museums were thronged (and close to closing), so I chose to take in the outdoor stuff instead.

The Smithsonian's Sculpture Garden was cool. I particularly like this geometric sculpture (and it was huge!). It has a sort of Escher-esque feel to me.










The Washington Monument. Didn't go up inside, you have to get up pretty early in the morning to get tickets for that. Still, check out my sweet photog skillz (namely, being in the right place at the right time...).
















Even after the Rally finished up, most of the people were still hanging out on the Mall. I've been to touristy places before, but this was the coolest because all the Rally people were so mellow and laid back. It was like a get-together in somebody's backyard, a 100k person get together in the country's sweet-ass back yard.

The Lincoln Memorial was the place to be. All the cool kids go there and hang out, just chilling on the steps.

If there was only one thing I could take away from this, it would be the incredible sense of camaraderie that was present that day. Well, the whole weekend really. Driving in and out of D.C. on the interstate fellow Rally-goers would honk and wave to each other (perfect strangers) when they saw each others' signs. I really wish we could experience more of that camaraderie in our daily lives. I don't think it's a conscious thing that we don't, just that we're all so busy with our lives. We get caught up in our tv shows, facebook, all of our gadgets, trying to make ends meet, trying to get ahead in life, trying to do right by our kids and spouses, that our lives become like bubbles. We're so focused on our own, tiny sphere of influence that we just don't have the time to bond with other people in any kind of significant way. For example, I barely know any of my neighbors. When I was kid we knew all of our neighbors and most of the people up and down the street. It's nice when we can get our bubbles together, join them up, and make something of the moment.

This is another one of those moments where I'm not sure if my metaphors are brilliant or retarded. I like to think retardedly brilliant, so now I present:

Random bridge over the Potomac, from the rear of the Lincoln Memorial.












Say hello to my gigantic marble friend.

I like that they actually refer to the memorial as a "temple." There is definitely a sense of reverence there.









The Vietnam Memorial.

Nothing will impress upon you the sheer number of soldiers who lost their lives in that war like seeing all of the names chiseled, in none too large a font, on that immense stretch of black stone.








Now THAT is a signature.




(Oh, Herbie Hancock, you silly thing.)








Then, to top off this most perfect of days, the evening decided to be really pretty.













My last photo came out perfect. So I won't ruin it with a caption. Laters.