falling off the wagon

(I'm terribly behind on mostly everything in my life right now thanks to some large, last-minute work projects that have been owning me for the last few weeks. This entire post is about the month of February. Please close your browser now if you have no desire to live in the past with me.)

The last half of February was not good for me and my resolutions.

Food
Work sucked, which led to lots of late nights and weekends spent in the good ol' office, which led to not having the energy to cook... or even go to the grocery store, really. Plus, my fridge was acting up for a while, so I was hesitant to put anything in there that could spoil. All month, I think I cooked a total of three things, and two of them were probably cheese omelettes. Healthy, huh?

(Side note... I've eaten three Cadbury Eggs today. I walked into my office this morning to find two boxes sitting on top of my desk - a present from a coworker for whom I'd done a favor last week. He knows they're just about my favorite candy, and he wanted to give me something I'd enjoy... and I'm totally appreciative of his thoughtfulness... but I don't think he realized the enormity of the mistake he'd made. Now I'm on a sugar high, my fingers are sticky, and I kinda feel like I might throw up.)

Reading
Early into last month, I decided to temporarily give up on Great Expectations. For the second time since 9th grade. I made it much further this time, though - a little over halfway. But........ I'd been reading it since January 1st and "officially" gave up around February 10. That's depressing. What's more is that GE had started to make me think of reading as a chore instead of something I loved and looked forward to doing.

So just when I made the painful decision to put it aside but keep it on the top of the pile, I realized that February's book for Reading Dangerously is The Bluest Eye, which I've been looking forward to rereading since I first found this challenge at Andi's place in December. I figured if anyone could rekindle my passion for reading, it would definitely be Toni Morrisson. Sorry, Chuck.

But what's this? I can't find my copy anywhere? Oh, that's right, I loaned it to a friend a few months ago... a friend who moved away and with whom I'm now required to schedule visits months in advance. So instead of picking up another book to replace The Bluest Eye for February, I ended up not reading anything. Unless you count last month's issue of Shape... which I don't.

Money
I've had some emergencies come up in the last month that have exhausted the paltry savings I had to begin with, and it's been hard to get back on track since then. But I'm not going to let it get me down - emergency funds are the exact reason I wanted to have a savings account to begin with, so I'm treating this as a test. It worked. Now I'll start over.

Fingernails
For a while, I was doing really great. I could drum my fingers on the table AND ACTUALLY HEAR MY LITTLE NAILS CLICKING BACK AT ME. Then I had a minor freakout over something stupid and bit them all off. Then I decided to get back on the wagon and start over. Then I freaked out about some other stupid thing and chewed my cuticles. They've been in a perpetually bitten-down state since then. As soon as I see some white growth, I work like mad to nibble it off. I really am twisted.

Writing
This is the only one I've been doing really well with, and I owe most of it to the x365 challenge. Just making my list of people (I have over 200 now!) was really inspirational and helped me remember a couple incidents from my past that made for some entertaining writing. It's been a good pre-bedtime activity, and just making time to be in front of the computer for a non-work-related writing task every night has helped get me into a routine - it's easy to write my x365 story for the day and segue right into another story from a previous night.

Also, I've been making an effort to blog more consistently (although my track record for the last week has been awful). I used to go for months without posting, and I really think it had something to do with the fact that I was just bored with my blog. I was reading all these stories on other sites about people dating, getting married, having babies, adopting puppies, changing careers, and it was so easy to get discouraged with my own lack of entertaining writing. But somewhere along the road I decided that I would just need to make do with what I have, and if what I have isn't marriage or babies, puppies or awesome jobs, then that was just fine. I'd write about what I did have: an overactive imagination, several neuroses, obsessive compulsive tendencies, and frizzy hair.

Photos
I haven't been too shabby with this one, either. I've gone through all the pictures on my laptop and sent away for prints. Next step will be to get some awesome photo albums and organize. I think I'll also write labels and quick summaries on the back of all or most of them, just in case I get so senile one day that I don't remember the names of my hott college friends. I think my next project in the way of photography will be making sure to bring my camera out with me more often when I visit friends and family.
--

Here's to a more productive March (now that we're like halfway through it) and climbing back on the wagon for good. Except for St. Patrick's Day. As any good Irish lass would do, I'm giving myself a get-out-of-jail-free card for all days surrounding the blessed event. Because even though I've never made corned beef, nothing's going to stop me from enjoying my mom's. And what's corn beef without a couple pints of Guinness? Nothing. That's what.

resolution check in

I have not been doing very well with my resolutions. This is why I never make them - instead of ending up better off, I fail and get angry at myself. But I think that maybe it's time for me to get angry at myself. If the alternative is remaining forever in the place I'm at right now... then some anger isn't much of a deterrent.

Money

Although I haven't yet filled out the paperwork to open an additional savings account, I have been watching my spending pretty well. I started to work out a monthly budget spreadsheet, but I got frustrated with Excel and quit. Guess I should take that whole bit about being "proficient in Microsoft Office technology" off my resume.

I also had a very enlightening conversation with my brother, Smarty Pants Future Huge Salary Accountant. He informed me that I'd be much better off opening a CD, which apparently will give me a much higher interest rate. I know nothing about this kind of stuff... clearly, since I'm 25 and just recently opened my first savings account. But after listening to his advice and feeling incredibly stupid in the eyes of my little brother, I decided that a savings account is the way for me to go right now. I'm just looking for an "emergency fund" - not necessarily another way to make money.

Fingernails

This is probably the area at which I'm failing the most miserably. Work has been more stressful than usual lately (which also explains my lack of posts for more than a week - sorry 'bout that), and my poor fingers are the bearers of my weary load. Tonight I'm pulling out all the stops, though. I'm gonna shellack 'em up with this new O.P.I. strengthener stuff I found... apparently it'll make my nails the envy of all the nails in the world. So sayeth the bottle, anyway.

[aside: in looking up how to spell "shellack," Google was nice enough to point me here. Check out the example for number 5.]

I promise that my hands aren't always so grotesque looking. It's really hard to take a picture of your right hand when you're right handed.

Photos

Miserable. All I've done in the way of organizing my photos is rearrange the frames sitting on top of my entertainment console. The rest of my photos are still sitting in My Documents on my laptop, just waiting for a motherboard crash.

Food

I'm actually doing really well with this one. I've been making dinner every night (except for last... particularly awful day entitles me to one Arby's Beef-n-Cheddar - SHUT UP YES IT DOES) and having the leftovers for lunch the next day. And you know what I found out? I'm a damn good cook!

I made chicken with vegetables and wild rice in a super-awesome herb sauce, made sans recipe... which used to scare the beejeesus out of me. But I had to use a bunch of vegetables before they went bad, and I had some chicken in the freezer, which resulted in me falling madly in love with my slow-cooker. Who knew you could throw some raw things in a pot before work and come home 9 hours later to the wonderful aroma of what would turn out to be a most delicious meal?!

Here's lemon rice soup, also sans recipe... because apparently there's egg in lemon rice soup. I hate eggs. The only way I'll eat them is if they're smothered in cheesy-omeletty-goodness. So I just made up my own recipe minus eggs and other weird things like kale, which I've heard is traditionally used in lemon rice soup. I used a Lipton Rice packet, though, because I didn't have any white rice and it was too cold to go out. It was delicious - nom nom nom.



Writing

Miserable. Aside from this blog - which I've neglected for over a week, although I think I should still get points for keeping up with the sites on my blogroll, thank-you-very-much - I've not written a single thing that could even be construed as creative. Press releases, profiles, newsletters, and magazine article rewrites (because apparently I suck at my job, too) be damned - I'm still determined to write something creative and worthwhile before I die.

[aside: speaking of... I just heard that Heath Ledger died. I thought he was a great actor - First Knight was awesome, and Brokeback Mountain is one of my favorite movies of all time. And I was really looking forward to seeing him in the new Batman. Oh - and he was gorgeous. Another Hollywood-type lost to an overdose. Sigh.]

Reading

I pretty much suck at this, too... but not for lack of trying. That's the theme of this entire blog post. I'm still trying to make my way through Great Expectations for The Challenge, but it's not really going according to plan. The last couple weeks of work have seen a strange influx of large proofreading projects, making my eyes refuse to focus by the time I get home. It's all I can do to follow SoapNet's 90210 reruns, let alone muster up the courage to read a text that drives me insane. Did I mention that? This book still makes me crazy, just like it did in 9th grade. On the plus side, though, I'm about halfway through... which is tons further than I made it in high school. I have less than 10 days to finish before next month's book. I'm trying to believe... but I don't think I want to know the truth.

And there you have it, friends. My awful progress thus far. And I was so pumped up about 2008. So far, the year has given me nothing but an ulcer, some gray hair, and several very large migraines. Chin up, I guess, huh?

my year of reading dangerously

I saw this reading challenge on Andi's blog, and I immediately fell in love with it. What a fantastic idea, to challenge yourself to read the things that you normally wouldn't give a second glance.

january - great expectations, by charles dickens
february - the bluest eye, by toni morrison
march - cat's eye, by margaret atwood
april - transformations, by anne sexton
may - other voices, other rooms, by truman capote
june - lolita, by vladimir nabokov
july - the chocolate war, by robert cormier
august - maus i and ii, by art spiegelman
september - the secret lives of people in love, by simon van booy
october - the human stain, by philip roth
november - classic short stories, tba
december - the grapes of wrath, by john steinbeck

A couple of the books on this list - such as The Bluest Eye, The Chocolate War, and The Grapes of Wrath - I've already read, but I think I'll reread them, since part of the fun in reading a book is discussing it with others, and I haven't had that opportunity in what feels like forever. Other books - like Lolita - have been on my reading wish list for ages, and now I have a reason to attack. And still, some - I'm talking to you, Great Expectations - terrify me... we had to read GE in AP English in high school, and it was the only book I couldn't finish. I hated it. I'm glad this book is in the first month, though... better to get it out of the way early. I'll probably end up loving it (I hope, I hope!), but it scares the bejeezus out of me just the same.

It's a little strange to have an entire year of reading plotted out when the ball has barely dropped in Times Square... but it's sort of refreshing, too. Lately, I've been averaging finishing about one book a month, and that's just sad. There was a time not too long ago in which I would routinely finish a book every week. I even had a pattern - I'd start a book on Monday, finish on Friday, use the weekend for reading newspapers and magazines, and then start a new one on Monday.

Nerdy? Yes. Fulfilling? Absolutely.

Realistically, with my work schedule as it's been lately, I probably can't go back to that standard. But I can try. Of course, fulfilling this challenge requires me to break my personal Book Buying Ban self-instituted in November... but what the hell. Those B&N gift cards I got for Christmas aren't going to last forever!

can't hardly wait, for 2008 - it's gonna be good, it's gonna be great

I was so excited to bid a not-too-fond farewell to 2007 and welcome 2008 with open arms. I just have a feeling this is going to be a big year for me. 2007 wasn't all bad (just mostly)... but 2008 is going to be awesome.

I've fallen into this kind of nasty rut lately in which I simply wait for things to happen to me instead of making them happen for myself. I don't usually make resolutions because I know I don't have a shot in hell at keeping them. This is the year that I'm going to climb out of that rut, make a promise to myself to get some shit done, and actually go out on a limb and make a resolution or two. Actually, five.

1. Make a point of saving more money each month.

I don't want Suze Orman to have a heart attack - especially since I'm enjoying her book Women & Money so much - but for a long time, I didn't have a savings account. I just let all my funds sit in my checking account... which, admittedly, isn't much. I opened a savings recently and set aside a measley amount of my bi-monthly paycheck to be automatically deposited. By January 31, I'm going to open another account at a different bank - one with a better interest rate - and set aside a bigger chunk of my check to be deposited.

2. Stop biting my fingernails.

Every so often, I get the urge to have long, beautiful nails, so I vow to stop biting mine. I use the smelly, tacky clear polish with the taste so horrendous that you barely want to use your hands for eating, lest your tastebuds happen along even a miniscule trace of the horrid stuff... and it works. For about two weeks. For two weeks, I'll drum my fingernails and revel in the sharp tap-tap-tap-tap on the desk and listen intently to the new sound of my fingers striking the keyboard. Then I'll get bored or stressed and bite them off, nevermind the icky taste. I don't stop there, though. I bite my cuticles and the skin beside and under my nails, so that more often than not, my fingers are nothing but painful, gnawed stumps of flesh. A person can only have so many Bandaids on her fingers before people start to look at her differently.

3. Organize my photos of family and friends.

For Christmas my sophomore year at SJC, my parents bought me a digital camera. Since then, I - probably like many other people - have neglected to print out the photos I've taken. I leave them in a folder on my computer and look at them once or twice a year, if I'm lucky. This year, I want to print out all the photos I've taken over the years and organize them into albums... and if I'm feeling really ambitious, I'd like to explore something like mypublisher.com for special events. 2007 was the loneliest year of my life, and I can't bank on my living situation to make a miraculous change anytime soon... so instead of missing the people I love, I'm going to make it so that I can be reminded of them everyday.

4. Eat healthier foods.

I know this is on everyone's list, so I'll be brief. Especially in the last year or so, I've gotten a lot worse about eating healthy foods. I live in a town where there's not much going on social-wise, so I work late a lot of the time. When you're getting home after 8:00 each night, it's a lot easier to pick up something for dinner rather than go home and cook. I'm not going to make an outrageous claim about never eating-out ever again, but when I do, I'm going to try to be a lot more conscious of my choice from the menu and limit the meals I pick up. I really enjoy cooking - I want to make an effort to do it more often.

5. Write my own stuff more often.

Having a job that consists of writing original copy for the majority of my day, every day, does something to drain the writing spirit in someone who used to think she might like to write for a living. Well, that's not entirely true. Plenty of people are full-time writers for their jobs and still manage to write and publish their own stories easily. I'm just not one of them. The sad thing is that I can count on one hand every creative thing I've written since I graduated from college over two years ago. This coming from a girl who used to stay up all night, skip class, and not go to the bathroom all day just to finish a story or poem. I want to see if I can get back just a piece of my former dedication.


I have some other things in the works that I can't talk about yet - things that I'm just bursting at the seams to discuss - and others that are getting lost in my mind because all I can do is focus on the larger, more secret-y things. So I'm going to try to dedicate more posts to some of those not-as-immediate-but-still-very-important things on the backburner. At least until I can stop being a secret squirrel. :)

It's a dangerous time for a heart on a wire.

Dear Friend,

We need to have a serious talk. You cannot keep coming to me every time you need to be fixed. You need to understand that seeing you breaks my heart, and helping you justify your every action and emotion is exhausting.

You also need to remember that you're not the only one who needs mending from time to time. I've tried to come to you in the past when I've felt broken, but you have an easy way of shelving my pain and moving back to your own wounds.

I love you and would do anything for you, and that's why I've played this game for as long as I have. But something's got to change before one of us endures damage that cannot be repaired by the other.

Becky


Do not assume that she who seeks to comfort you now lives untroubled among the simple and quiet words that sometimes do you good. Her life may also have much sadness and difficulty that remain far beyond yours. Were it otherwise, she would never have been able to find these words.

"One of these days, you're going to have to call one of these motherfuckers up and let them have it,"

said a friend of mine today in response to a little problem I was having.

Before I responded to the person giving me said problem, I relayed the story to a few friends to gauge their reactions. After hearing everyone's various advice, I decided to handle the situation in my own way.... a very un-Becky method of problem solving.

After hitting "send" on the e-mail I wrote explaining my actions in an uncharacteristic, non-pushover way, I was swept with a sense of accomplishment. A year ago - even several months ago - a confrontation like the one I had today (albeit via e-mail) would have left me in tears and upset for several days. But today, evidently a different woman than yesterday or last week, I concentrated and solved the problem myself. It was a good feeling - a grown-up feeling.

May 2, 2006 -- Proved that you can handle an awkward situation without allowing your emotions to come into play.