Snow Days, Reader Problems, and Our Anniversary

Yesterday, I had a legitimate snow day off work. At the time, it seemed pretty cool, other than the fact that it snowed all day and we were stuck at home. I managed to get some work done from home, but going in today (after a four hour delay to recover and shovel out of the white stuff) was rough. That day off threw me for a loop, messed with my deadlines, and gave me a stack of work that needed immediate attention. So yeah, great in theory, not so great in practice.

Having said that, having the day off did give me the chance to completely devour Cress like I wanted to, and devour I did. Was it good? Heck yeah, it was good. I’m so contrary though. I wanted to read it all in one sitting, and then I did, and now I wish I would have made it last longer because I loved it so much. In hindsight, I should have stretched the fun out over a few days. But every time I told myself to do that, I couldn’t put it down. Reader problems, man. Also, now I have to wait for the fourth book, but at least I’ll have an excuse to re-read the series before that one comes out (like I really need an excuse. Whatever. I do what I want!).

Today was our four-year wedding anniversary. Go Team Us! We didn’t do anything celebratory other than get dinner at Subway, but to be honest, we never need a reason to do things together. We don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day either. However, as may have become apparent for anyone who’s read this blog long enough, we often randomly decide we need to have a nice dinner out together, or we’ll go walking together, or we’ll take a trip together….the theme is that we do a lot together for no other reason than we have a blast, and I’m completely okay with that.

We made it to the gym, which was a challenge because I really didn’t want to go. My back has been sore for a few days, and the cold makes me want to hibernate. I’m always glad afterwards, though. I started an audiobook to listen to when I walk and when I’m taking it easy at the gym (thanks, Humble Bundle). I’ll do a review when I’m done, but it’s making me a little uncomfortable. It’s creepy, yet I almost think it’s supposed to also be slightly romantic? I’m intrigued.

I’ve also decided to go ahead and start revising an older writing project, one that is actually one of my favorites. I send the first draft for an alpha reading and will start doing active revisions once the feedback is in. Trying not to do too much stuff at once since I don’t want to burn out on revising, but it feels good to move these projects along.

Other things accomplished today: watched some Coursera videos, started organizing and packing the back room, and finished my grocery list.

Now time for some well deserved sleep.

A.

February Goals and Progress with Revision

This past weekend was spent doing almost nothing. I think I was still fighting an infection because the stomach pain from the sickness I had last week didn’t go away, so I wasn’t feeling up to doing anything besides sitting around and reading and watching cute movies on Netflix. The highlight of the weekend (or lowlight as it were) was probably a bad haircut, though realizing it as a bad haircut was kind of a delayed reaction. Either way, I’ll be rocking the headbands for the next few weeks. My hair grows fast, though.

My stomach pains seem to have gone away. I’m avoiding soda and carbonation until I know for sure, but today was good. I was even able to walk on my breaks and get a workout in at the gym before we headed home. We’re waiting for a big snowstorm to hit. The city of Manhattan and the university and all the schools are already closed for tomorrow. My place of work is still open, however. If it’s not too bad in the morning, I’ll probably still go in. Current projects are much easier on my dual monitors. But if it’s bad in the morning, I’m prepared to work from home.

Since we’re into a new month, I’ve been trying to come up with some good goals for February. My writing goals included putting together the second draft of my novel and sending it to my beta readers, a goal which I accomplished tonight. I’ve set the deadline for the end of this month, which means March will be more revision and formatting. But now, other than the small bit of anxiety I’m getting with actually putting my work out there with the intention of maybe publishing it, I can rest for a few weeks and focus on some other things.

Seriously…even if this book doesn’t happen and even if everyone who reads it hates it, I’m going to feel good about the fact that I’ve gotten this far.

The two main goals for this month are going to be to finish my current/newest knitting project and to recommit to three days a week at the gym. Though I’ve been active (with the exception of last week, which turned into a seven day rest to heal from my illness), I haven’t been putting in the gym time, which is fine, except I’m paying for the membership. Since this might go away soon, depending on the job and money situation, I feel I should take advantage while I have it. Once the weather gets warmer, I’m going to be putting my goal focus into walking and running goals, so might as well take advantage of the gym while the weather dictates.

I may come up with some other goals later. My brain is all over the place right now.

It’s past my bedtime and work is likely to still happen tomorrow, so I’d better get a shower and get some sleep.

Side note: Cress releases tomorrow! I can’t wait! I’d be tempted to stay up until midnight to download it, but that will lead to starting it, which will lead to staying up all night reading it, which means nothing would get done tomorrow, and I need to be functional.

A.

 

 

Cold Mornings and Long Walks

Last night was bitter cold. So was this morning and this evening. I have a hard time doing anything when it’s this cold. There are moments when it physically hurts me to be in it. Granted, that’s probably my fault for not wearing enough layers, but still…the cold doesn’t agree with me.

No post last night because the night got away from me. Once we got home from work, I put in some time on an editing project for awhile. Somehow I dragged my butt back out of the house to go to knit night down at The Wicked Stitch. I finished part of a knitting project and got to visit with my friend V, who is a writer and a knitter as well, so we talked about our current fiction projects. Well, she’s a writer. I’m not sure if I can call myself a writer, but I think I get a few weeks of grace after Nanowrimo, right?

Because of our chat, I was in the mood to do some revising, so I got caught up in that at home later on, and by the time I even thought about opening a blog post, I was exhausted. So that was that.

Today was busy but productive. It’s definitely been one of those weeks. It wasn’t bad, though. The current excitement is the upcoming holiday party at work. Some years I’m kind of bah humbug about the whole thing. I didn’t even go last year. But this year, I think it’s going to be really fun, and my current plan is to totally get my dance on. The awesome thing is that I think I’ll have the stamina this year. I’m debating letting Jon skip out though. Once the dinner is over, the poor guy will probably just end up sitting there all night doing nothing while I shake a tail feather. At least that’s how it plays out in my head.

We went to the gym after work. Today it felt like a huge accomplishment because the cold makes us both want to come home and do nothing. But I knew if I did that, I’d feel crabby all evening, so we pushed ourselves to go. I walked the treadmill for almost sixty minutes again. I came up just three minutes short, though I probably could have made it. But Jon was done and I was hungry and I was just waiting for my zombie mission to end. I found out you can do the missions with no distance or step tracking, so you still get the supplies and the story, but you don’t have to hold the phone. Which is good for the treadmill, because I haven’t yet found my balance on that thing yet.

At home, I did some knitting, watched “Once Bitten” (one of my favorite movies), and putzed around on the computer. All around, pretty low key. Now to do some Pinning, then shower, then head to bed. Tomorrow’s Friday! Hanging with Forsh after work, but then I’m not sure what the weekend is going to bring. We have tentative plans, but they’re all up in the air right now. Just going to roll with it and see what happens.

A.

The Difference a Year Makes

This is going to be a short post because not a lot happened today, and I’m really tired.

The highlight of the day was that we upped our walk from thirty minutes to an hour. I may have mentioned this plan in last night’s post. After our walk last night, Jon mentioned that maybe we were ready to push ourselves a bit more. Because we’re not focusing on speed, our next jump was to increase our endurance. Rather than pick a future time to start this and not have it ever happen, I said I was going to do it tonight, so I set my zombie mission for an hour, and we hit the rec center after doing some grocery shopping.

I didn’t do any zombie chases, because I wanted to pace myself to walk the full hour. I made it two laps around the track and another partial lap around the parking lot. I didn’t stop to rest, I just kept my pace steady the whole time. By the end of the hour, I was hurting a bit. My hips and one side of my lower back were a little sore, and my feet felt raw and tender. But I did it!  My zombie mission ended at about thirty six minutes, but I finished out at sixty minutes and five seconds of walking (once the mission is complete, the music still plays and the program still has you pick up supplies. At the very end, I scored a bottle of whisky…in the game, not in real life).

January 2013: couldn’t walk for five minutes without needing to take a break.

December 2013: sixty minutes of walking with no break with plans to do it again soon.

It’s definitely been a good year.

Other than that, the day was busy at work. I almost didn’t even take a lunch break, but Forsh came to my rescue again and brought me some Subway. This was good since I was at that edge of hunger where I was getting downright crabby. Later, I worked on some projects, including….wait for it…starting the revision of one of this year’s Nanowrimo novels. If I can keep that up, I might even be able to let people read it soon.

I’m extremely tired, so I’m calling it a night here. Gotta be up and ready for another day.

A.