New Year, Blah Blah Bullshit

Close your eyes and think back a hot minute.  It’s New Year’s Eve, and we were young.  Hopeful.  So full of ambitions and ideas.  December 31 me was a dumb bitch is what I’m saying.  I was looking back on my list I made, and I think I still have a ways to go.  Accountability is everything, so let’s go through the failures together, shall we?

1. Lose ten pounds: It’s not that I haven’t been giving it my all, but it’s not that I have been, either.  I’ve cut down on food for the most part.  I eat more salads.  Um…with food.  Normal food.  I eat a burger and have a salad with it is what I’m saying.  I’m down a whopping three pounds, but progress is progress.
2. Keep to writing and cleaning schedule: For the most part, this has gone well.  I have an item a day in each spot, but I have a tendency to skip a day and double up the next to make up for it.  I gotta stick to it when it’s there.  Otherwise I stress.  Stress is not the goal here.
3. Take a day every couple of weeks to do absolutely nothing: I’ve been scheduling one day a month to do just that.  It probably sounds stupid as hell, but doing nothing is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.  I can’t argue that it’s been good for me, though.  I always come back the next day ready to go.
4. Go on more dates: This has not happened nearly all that much in the traditional sense.  We just haven’t had the funds to go out on random dinner dates.  HOWEVER: we have spent more time at home cooking together and watching movies together, which is more than what we’ve done in the past where we would spend almost all our free time in separate rooms doing our own thing.  Just tonight we watched the last Harry Potter movie and had some magical snacks and laughed our asses off.  It was a good time.  So I guess what I’m trying to say is while we haven’t gone out on dates, we’ve done what we could with what we have.  Check in the win column, I think.
5. Do more social networking for writing and less for personal: This I have embraced whole-heartedly.  I have queues set up both here and on Facebook (which you can follow me here).  Instagram has a nice mix of both (link right here).  I also set up an account on Booksie, and have already started networking with other authors.  This has worked for both my *potential* writing career and my personal life, since social media has always been a source of drama that I don’t want to deal with.  So far, so good!
6. Be more involved with family and keep track of birthdays: This is a win/lose so far this year, and not from lack of trying (excuses, excuses).  The win is I have been out to my parents’ house more these past few months than I have all last year and probably the year before combined.  Once every month or so, my mother, my sister, and myself get together and have a dinner/movie date, and every time has been great.  Most often we watch something scary, and my sister (who is older than me by a decade, I might add) cowers behind a blanket and squeezes my hand until I swear the bones are going to break.  It.  Is.  A.  Blast.  Family bonding at its finest!   Now, where I have failed with this is birthdays.  Ready yourself, because here comes the excuses.  My mother is my go-to for when birthdays are.  I have a planner, she tells me that month who’s birthdays are when (we have a huge family, okay?), I write them down, and then come birthday time, people get a phone call and a gift.  I did great.  For one birthday.  One.  Come next few, and no one tells me, as if I’ve known these kids my entire life and should know what day they came into this world!  Such bullshit.  😉  Just kidding.  But seriously, I need to get better on that stuff.  I’ve gotten two gifts after the fact, and nothing looks worse than a great big “Hey sorry I missed your day but here’s a thing maybe you’ll like please love me still?”  Pffttt
7. Pay off credit cards and car loan:  God.  Damn.  It.  I had it paid off, okay?  I had my credit card paid up and had a zero balance.  For a week.  A week!  And then comes vacation planning for the year, which was NOT cheap, and then parts on my car turned obsolete, and then my car had to go to the shop to put those parts on, and then fuckin…asdfghjkl; Game Grumps were all like “Oh, we gunna go on tour and there’s some VIP tickets out there” and how exactly am I supposed to say no to that???  Long story short: Credit card balance now very much exists.  I’m hoping within the next three months I can get it gone again.  If I put everything toward it.  Hoo-boy.
8. Go out of town to see friends more often just because: This is another thing that has not happened, and not from lack of want.  You know that whole shpeel about the credit cards?  It’s largely due to that.  But a besties friend trip for next year is in the works, and I do plan on heading to see people twice this year, so???
9. Take Jax (old grumpo) to good doggo classes: Not yet, but still in the works.  The lady I plan to go through has classes every month.  When it gets warmer outside, I plan on taking the time to get him on his best behavior.  Er…to teach me how to act with him and not let him be the boss, I guess.  I think it’s moreso good people classes.  Food for thought.
10. Take doggos for more walks:  It’s happening kind of?  Weather where I live has not been cooperating, and that’s not just an excuse this time.  The littlest one can’t do cold.  He refuses to move anywhere but toward the door to go back inside.  But we are finally out of winter and into spring, so here soon, it’ll be nothing but pavement and poop bags.
11. Declutter digital and physical files:  I’ve been a pro at this.  My email is spectacular, and I’ve taken a little bit of time every few weeks to go through old papers.  I plan on going through the entire filing cabinet when I can switch it out for a new one that isn’t broken.  Which I’ll get after my credit card is paid off.  Ugh finances are so lame.
12. Locate my self-esteem: Still searching.  I am supposed to get my hair done later this week, so maybe after that it’ll pop out and say SURPRISE!  But so far…eh.  I still need to work on that.

So there you have it.  I’m about…eh…fifty fifty.  Progress is progress. 

Those of you who do the whole New Year New Me bull, how’s it going so far?  You crushing those goals?  Those goals crushing you?  Or are you just floating by doing your best, such as yours truly?