Tag: goals

Ever the procrastinator?

Well, I have four days remaining in a 100-day challenge to go 100 miles of cardio activity. It could be swimming, running, walking, cycling, rollerblading, etc. in any combination, just so long as it is 100 miles achieved in 100 days.

I started out strong, and was determined to have all my miles be from running. But then I had that fall that one ridiculous Friday evening, and my running (and general walking for a while at first) plans were ruined. I had hoped that I would be able to start running much sooner than I was able, but the bruised bones really pushed that back for me. I can run mostly okay now, but have to be careful with the cold weather, as it makes the pain show itself in my knee.

However, that all being said, I had accepted conceptually that I would not be able to run my whole hundred, based on my body’s situation after that fall. I had begun walking with my mom on occasion, and counted that toward my hundred. But my subconscious somehow missed the part where I needed actually to start these other cardio activities of my own. I kept just thinking I would do the whole thing running, when I was able to run again, and the only walking I did was once a week, give or take, with my mom. I wasn’t able to start running for real until just a few weeks ago… at which point I wasn’t anywhere near half of the way on those hundred miles. Even as of this week, I wasn’t half way through the hundred.

So, despite my efforts to be ahead of the game here, I ended up doing the bulk of effort right at the end of the whole thing.

But it has been nice, actually. I rode my bicycle around, looking at Christmas lights last night for an hour and a half-ish in the cold, and it was lovely. And I got ten plus miles out of that ride. The other night and tonight, I hung out with my mom at the office where she works, and I used the elliptical-type machine to get some run-walks in not out in the cold. And, this morning, my dad called me and invited me to go to a casual spin class with him at the Y, so I could get some more bicycle mileage in without having to ride outside in the cold.(Actually, I’m not sure how that will be, masks and digital class and all, but it will be nice to be doing it with my dad, and that’s the point of tomorrow’s plan anyway.)

So, fingers crossed that I manage this all appropriately in the next couple days, and I am able to turn in my sheet for the challenge, fully completed!

Post-a-day 2020

Yess!

I have made it back to an approximate 20% body fat measurement. That is a huge celebration of satisfaction for me. I have been without a gym, essentially, for half a year now. Going from an average of four or five days a week of intense workouts and weight training at the gym to home workouts with almost no weights, and then to no gym to give workouts and support at all has been a lot this year for me. I definitely did not maintain my same fitness level from before the changes, and I had still been in a sort of recovery period from the adventures of traveling in culture and foods and not-much-exercise in Japan and The Philippines. So, I wasn’t even in my best condition when everything started closing. I was probably around 18% or 19% body fat then.

I have always struggled with doing things on my own – thus the gym membership, and the workout buddy who signed up with me, at my behest. So, the workout situation has been nowhere near where I have wanted it to be in the past six months, during which time I have had to manage it all on my own, alone. I have been slowly working toward following the diet I truly want to follow and being as active and as fit as I truly want to be. Part of those have been working toward being autonomous in, well, all of them. Interesting how I hadn’t quite ever put words and solid thoughts to that idea until just now, but those words ring as true. So, I have been focusing on a very slow process of adjusting my daily life to be closer and closer to that life I want to be leading. I have no one other than myself for leaning, so balance and thought and true consideration and evaluation are all key in this.

I had worked my way down to an approximate 16% body fat, back a year ago in October/November. Keep in mind that, though this is a rather low number for the average woman, for my body’s makeup, it is actually still an entirely safe and healthy percentage. Much lower would be unnecessary, though. However, even at that 16% body fat, I still had areas of gathered fat on which I was working to release, mostly in my hips and legs. Also, to get myself even to that point was a very, very intense yet extremely gratifying journey, for which I am entirely grateful. I had never really believed that I could be at that level of fitness in my life, and definitely not at this age. Now that I have been there, I have experienced the real ness of such a possibility for me. And I want to have myself back in that space and living. However, this time will be through the breakthrough of autonomy for my own exercise and fitness. That way, I am ready and able to maintain it going forward, no matter if a gym closes or I move houses or towns or countries – I can always be at the level of fitness that I and my body want me to be, such that I can best serve the world while I am in it in this body and life.

Post-a-day 2020

Colder season

Okay, so we have officially reached the cold season, now, right? So, I’m being conscientious about lotioning my hands whenever I notice that they are dry during the day, and I have begun sleeping in gloves to give them a deeper treatment of moisture for at least a while overnight. I rub the good stuff lotion into them just before getting in bed for the night, then I slide them into gloves and then get into bed. The gloves keep the lotion on my hands instead of its rubbing off onto the sheets or my legs or pants or whatever during the night. They don’t always stay on all night, but always for at least a few hours – you know, sleep activities and all, pulling off odd items of clothing, socks and gloves in particular.

But it is also cold out now…. which means it is also cold in now. I live in a house built in the 1930s, almost a hundred years ago. It does not have real heating or cooling: window units for cooling, a gas heater on the first floor in the living room, and a plug-in localized heater in my room. I keep the heater st the head of my bed, so it can help warm my face and head, the one part of me not covered up at night.

Put simply, though, it is cold in this house. So, it is entirely normal for me to go to bed within a pair of sweatpants on, instead of just a t-shirt and underwear. If it isn’t all that cold out, the sweatpants find their way off during the night. As it gets colder, I add a pull-over sweatshirt to the mix. Same story as the pants, but the pants come off before the sweatshirt. However, when it is really cold, I also put on socks. The clothing-removal progression then goes socks, pants, sweatshirt. When it is cold like now, of course, they all stay on.

But, remember how I have begun wearing gloves for the sale of moisturizing my hands?

That means that I am now going to bed in a shit and underwear, sweatpants, a sweatshirt (with the hood up), socks, and gloves. In other words, I look more like I’m dressed to go out somewhere than simply go to bed.

And that just really tickles me. 😛 And I love it.

Oh, the simple joys of the cold season… hot beverages, hats, scarves, jackets, boots, and going to bed fully dressed. ;D

Post-a-day 2020

Body versus Brain

I swear: My menstrual cycle makes me feel like it is made to point out to me that I am single in this world designed for my species to partner up. At certain specific points throughout my cycle, my body very clearly reminds me of how desperately it wants me to have a partner already, as though my brain weren’t already on the lookout for that partner all day, every day. 😛

Actually, I don’t actively think about finding a partner most of the time. In a way, I trust God and Fate and the Universe that things will be sorted beautifully in my life, including my partner-in-life situation, and so don’t really spend much time or effort on the matter directly. The other end of that, though, is that I believe everything will work perfectly when I am working perfectly – when I am ready within myself and no longer need but want that partner, he will show up. I am designed to be self-sufficient, but to work perfectly with another, producing more love and beauty in the world than I ever could have produced on my own. I look forward to that with pitter-patters in my heart anticipation. But I no longer spend much time focusing on the finding him portion of that. Instead, I focus most of my attention on improving myself, such that I soon will be ready for him to arrive and for us to work together and create some new magic.

Until that time, however, I think I am stuck with these physical reminders of goosebumps and inner tingles every 14-ish days. 😛

Post-a-day 2020

Pass-where?

For the first time since I was a very small child, I do not have a valid passport for travel.

In a way, it feels utterly odd and out of this world. In another way, I don’t even notice it, because it wouldn’t necessarily do me any good to be valid right now anyway…. which is, in its own way, utterly odd and out of this world.

And, what’s even more weird is that I’m not even sure what I’m going to do about it all. I don’t even know if passports are being processed regularly again yet. Not a clue. And that, in and of itself, is also weird for me and my life.

So, yeah… there’s a lot of weird around passports on my life right now. (It’s extremely doubtful, however, that I am the only one in such a situation right now, though, which is simultaneously comforting and, again, rather weird.) 😛

Post-a-day 2020

Yikes

Okay, I think I have finally learned my lesson on something: Trust myself.

I know enough and have done enough to handle what I am doing in photography. I am much more reliable than any automatic camera settings. Yes, it is convenient not to have to change settings constantly with changing light and angles. But having photos with the right subject in focus is significantly more important to me than having what looks like decent lighting it with a blurred subject. And the latter is what I keep getting every time I doubt myself and say that it will be safer to let the camera use its intelligent automatic setting.

So, I will trust myself to manage all photo settings from here onward. I trust myself. Not the automatic settings.

Thank you, World for this opportunity to remedy the photos that did not represent me and what I truly can create with photography. I am terrified and grateful, both in a wonderfully good way. Thank you.

Post-a-day 2020

Fitness vs Fatness

Am I at the focus, or is something else the A-liner? Fitness or Fatness? Lately, I have not been at the center – my health and well-being, this body that carries my soul, my spirit, in this lifetime. Lately, my tongue’s and memory’s desires have been the center of my food. It is no wonder I have had much more fatness than fitness in my life lately.

I have been wanting it more and more, but have yet to turn the tides fully over the past several months… I wonder what has been missing for me to do that… is it a question of self-worth in the midst of having to create self-motivation to create the time and the energy and effort for fitness all on my own? I think I have always reached out somehow when I have gotten to a point in fitness/fatness at which I do not want to be any longer. But turning to the groups is not exactly an option right now where I live, and also how I live (aka I can’t afford to spend the money on the one place where I could do the group fitness right now). But I also do not genuinely want to reach out this time. I want to resolve whatever this has been within me that I continue to have stop me from fitting myself (as I like to say in my head… or, also, fitnessing myself). And so, I will not join that gym. Right now, I’m a bit too tired to function effectively enough to work through all of this, but I intend to continue this conversation with myself tomorrow, and to search for and find those uncomfortable parts that I have allowed to run me for these past several years.

At that, goodnight! 😉

Post-a-day 2020

Huzzah!

Well, the food and the film were a total success. AND I loved them both, and also the company.

I made fried wild rice, butternut squash noodle lo mein, and orange chicken (optional) and veggies – Chinese take-out, but homemade and paleo. The fried rice could have even been enough for any of us for the whole meal, but I wanted a spread. However, I am always very delighted and even a touch proud of myself for making the eggs the right way for the fried rice. It still blows my mind whenever I think about how to do it, and I am yet again grateful for my acrobat friend for showing me how to do it back on the train that one day. **gratitude**

Anyway, the food was amazing and bourgie, and we all loved it and managed no photos, despite the fact that it all was beautiful food. Everything was colorful and lovely to see, but also delicious to smell and eat.

And then we all really enjoyed the film. Sure, there were parts all over the place that were poorly done (e.g. animation, sequencing, transitions…), but it overall was really great, the setting was bea-utiful, and the music was very nicely managed. Also, the accents were all quite reassuring – yes, the primary audience is an American English one, but that doesn’t mean the characters have to sound like they live here. I am glad they had genuine Chinese-based accents, and names were still pronounced properly, even though everyone was speaking English. Just because the language spoken is changed doesn’t mean the culture has to disappear. Good job, Disney. We all enjoyed it tonight, and we all are grateful for your efforts. Thank you.

P.S. Links to the recipes for the lo mein and the orange chicken sauces I made 😉

Post-a-day 2020

December 6th

I asked my mom the other night if she thought Heilige Nikolaus (Saint Nicholas) would leave presents in my shoes if I set them outside my bedroom/studio door in the house where I currently am living (Not a great idea to leave anything completely outside overnight in this neighborhood, you see. It could be okay, but it isn’t amazing odds.), or if he probably only visited the suburbs (where people can leave shoes outside overnight safely). She told me that he probably only uses people’s permanent addresses.

And so, when I arrived to my mom’s house this morning – in the suburbs and the location of my permanent address – I was delighted to find atop her new blanket my croc-like shoes that always remain at her house, filled with delights. There also was a pair of traditional Dutch wooden clogs, also filled with goodies.

Note: When I first arrived, I set a few things on the sofa, plugged in a camera charger for the photo session I would do shortly for someone, and wandered to the kitchen for something or other. As I did all this, my mom asked me if I saw her new table. I turned back and looked toward the fireplace, opposite the sofa, and saw a small table decorated with a new winter blanket and covered with the shoes etc.

I’ve been clear to my mom several times over recent months that I would like, at last, to have a sewing machine of my own. I do not often have gift requests or wishes for my birthday or for Christmas, but a sewing machine and all of its necessities is something that I really need help managing – I do not know enough about brands or specifics or technologies even to guess appropriately what machine to get myself, or in what price range, let alone all the pins and wheels of everything one uses with sewing machines. I think it can all be in the mid-hundreds of dollars for a decent quality everything, but I am not one to know which ones are the decent ones yet. Thus the request for a Christmas present from my mother, a woman who has made clothes (and more) her entire life.

When I got looking at the shoes and goodies, I was tickled that, aside from the delicious-looking babyfood snack packs – yes, they are amazing, if you get the right ones – there happened to be obvious sewing machine supplies: thread, bobbins, pins, machine sewing needles, etc. “Hmm! Clearly Heilige Nikolaus has a hint of what I’ll be getting!” I laughed, and my mom laughed with me. I went through all the items, delighted that they were here, essentially solidifying the fact that I would be getting a sewing machine of my own at the end of the month. Whether it would be new or just my mom’s (and she would get an upgrade for herself) was still to be determined, but one of my own I very likely would have by the end of the month! (At least, it was more likely this time than any other that I’ve asked for one.)

Just as I was about to leave for the photos, I began to pack up. “But you still haven’t finished,” said my mom. “You didn’t see it all yet.” She wanted me to see it all before I left, I knew, but I hadn’t realized that I’d missed something. I went back to the large clogs in the center, and pulled the bits and pieces of sewing materials out of them, looking for what I had missed up in the toes of the shoes.

But there didn’t seem to be anything else. ‘Is it under?’ I ask. And my mom replies in the affirmative. I pick up the clogs, find nothing, and set them back down. I check the wreaths next to them, and it is the same story. I look over the back of the table and ask if it is the cute new-to-me nativity scene just behind everything. No, it is not.

Without thinking much of it, nor expecting much out of it, I flip up the blanket to see under the table.

And it isn’t a table after all.

It is one of the big cardboard fold-outs for laying out sewing patterns and measuring, and it is sitting perpendicular atop another box. It takes a moment to process that the box is a brand new sewing machine.

Even thinking about it, my eyes are welling up now. It was so unexpected, and so amazing, I started crying when I realized what it all meant. Not only did my mom really find me a sewing machine of my own, but the found me a new one. This is something I have wanted for years, but hadn’t figured out how to make happen yet. I felt that I really was ready for it this year, and my mom showed me today that she agreed.

“I figured you could get started on some of the things you’ve been wanting to do lately, instead of waiting,” she said. 🙂

It is time, my dear. It is time. Sew on, love.

Danke, Heilige Nikolaus, Saint Nicholas!!

And thank you, Mom.

And thank you, God, for all this love and joy today and always.

Post-a-day 2020

Bedsheets

It’s really cold getting into bed right now. Not like we have a long and cold winter here in Houston, but, when we have warm or hot and humid most of the year, the cold really gets to us, whenever it is cold. So, my feet have been struggling with the whole bedtime routine. My hands have, too. I slide into bed to go to sleep, and end up shivering a while, fighting the desire to curl up in a ball (because it would leave me super sore in the morning to sleep that way) due to the cold.

I was just thinking about whether I would want to spend the money on another set of those amazing flannel sheets I’d gotten for Japan (but while on a quick visit home to the US for a wedding), when it occurred to me that, despite the fact that they are for a Queen (possibly full) mattress, they are just sitting st my mom’s house, being not used ever, and there could be some way to have them fit my twin bed here and be used.

I’ll have to look up dimensions, of course, but the thought occurred to me first to turn the fitted sheet perpendicular, and see if the width of a Queen fit the length of my twin, and then just loop the sheet all the way under the bed, and hook it to the same two corners from underneath as the first two corners were fitted… it should be long enough for that, but would it be too long? Then, I wondered about whether the width would be over double my mattress, at which point, I could wrap the fitted sheet around both sides of my mattress (much the same way as the first idea, but not turned perpendicular to the bed first), and hook both fitted top corners to the same corner of my bed from both above and below the mattress. I would have then to tuck in the bottom of the sheet under the mattress, which may or may not stay and which may or may not affect the comfort of the bed.

I shall look this up and see if I can save money and heat and energy by using those sheets that I picked out and that are just sitting at my mom’s house in a box.

P.S. Wow. I looked it up. The queen sheet is not even half as much more width as a twin size. That means that two twin beds pushed together is actually wider than any other bed, including the California King by about five inches. And it is only four inches shorter than a queen mattress (still nine inches shorter than a California King). That means it almost has as much surface area as a California King, despite its being nine inches shorter in length. So, basically, if a twin is not big enough for someone to sleep in terms of width, that person is likely to have trouble ever sharing any bed with another person… man…

Post-a-day 2020