How did I fail this year? Let me count the ways…

The 2024 resolutions:

• ACCOMPLISHED: Blog daily. I’m pretty sure I’ll accomplish this one for the next several years at least.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Walk/run at least 5,000 miles. I did (am doing?) at least 1,000 miles more than that.
• ACCOMPLISHED?: Run at least five (official) marathons. I think I did this? I actually didn’t really keep track of the marathons I signed up for. But I definitely ran  more than five unofficial marathons, so…
• ACCOMPLISHED: Run at least one (official) ultramarathon. Minimum distance: 60 km. The Calgary (virtual) Ultramarathon! I did this in…April? *checks* Yup. April 21.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Run a sub-4-hour marathon. I did this like right at the start of the year, haha. I don’t know what drugs I was on, but I booked it like all hell and ran it in like 3:55-something. I know that’s not very fast at all compared to people who can, y’know, run run, but it’s fast for me.
• FAILED: Do something with my 2020 NaNo story. Hopefully more than just another draft. I just did another draft.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Do some non-writing creative stuff. I picked up watercoloring! And I watercolored quite a bit.
• FAILED: Buy fewer frivolous/unnecessary things. HAHAHAHA NOPE shopping = what I do when I’m stressed. And this year was Stress Party 2024.
• FAILED: Take at least two French classes in my progression towards the certificate. I only did one class in Winter. I’ve learned that trying to take a class in Fall is setting everything up for failure, because Fall semester is ALWAYS insanely busy.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Get the DAMN BLOGS POSTED. I ACTUALLY DID THIS HOLY SHIT
• FAILED: Limit my “down time” screen time. I reiterate: Stress Party 2024. Sometimes obscenely long TikTok binges were the only thing keeping me from jumping into traffic.

ALRIGHT, so let’s set some for 2025.

• Blog daily.
• Walk/run at least…let’s say 6,500 miles. Surely that’s do-able, huh?
• Run at least five (official) marathons and actually KEEP TRACK OF THEM THIS TIME.
• Do something with my 2020 NaNo story that is more than another draft. I really take the next step with that thing and I’m sick of being afraid to take that step.
• Finish and print all my old blog archives. I think I have up through Year 15 formatted and printed, so I need to get the rest of those done. I hate not having physical copies of all of those blog posts. Those represent my life, man.
• Take at least one French class in my progression towards the certificate. Hopefully in this upcoming semester, because we all know it isn’t happening in Fall.
• Do a 50-mile run. My record right now is 60 k (37 miles); surely I can add 13 miles to that, right? Even if I just have to ping back and forth for 13 hours on that street at the bottom of our hill?
• Do some sort of writing that’s NOT an edit of my 2020 NaNo story. I’ve actually been wanting to try writing a story by hand (like, not typing it out but writing it in a notebook). So let’s say that. Write a story by hand.
• Be more careful with my money. Last year ended up being REALLY bad for this. I need to do better. Especially in terms of buying new clothes. I DO NOT NEED ANY MORE CLOTHES.
• Be more careful with “mindless” screentime. I’m not going to say screentime in general because I do a lot of productive stuff on my computer and don’t want to limit that (also, I feel like I’m the one person on this planet who does not get eye strain/eye fatigue from staring at a computer screen for like 7 hours straight). But I want to spend less time on Twitter, TikTok, and YouTube (unless YouTube is just on in the background when I’m doing other stuff). I’m not quite sure how I’ll measure and keep track of this just yet, but it’s definitely something worth watching.

That’s all I can think of for now, but if I come up with any more, they’ll be added here!

Yes, we are. So it’s time for some res-res-resolutions!!!!

(I had sugar before this, so beware)

Let’s review the 2023 resolutions and see what a disaster life has been this year, shall we?

• ACCOMPLISHED: Blog daily. As always. Done. As always.
• FAILED: Post all backlogged blogs. Yeah, they’re still in the Word document. There are like 340 pages now, hahaha. I’m really going to try to get them posted in the next few weeks, though.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Walk/run 5,000+ miles. Yup! A blog on this will come soon.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Run a marathon. I finally did it, yo! I’ve actually run…15 of them? 16? Something like that now.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Complete another complete draft of my 2020 NaNoWriMo. Yes! I completed a new draft in May and I’m almost done with an edit of that draft. I should hopefully have another one by the end of the year.
• FAILED: Write more in general. I did not. I just worked on my 2020 NaNo.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Draw. Technically I drew something this year. It was just one thing, but hey, you make a vague resolution, you can meet it in a vague way.

Let’s see what we can do in 2024.

• Blog daily. Ye olde standard.
• Walk/run at least 5,000 miles. I’ll hopefully do more than this, but this is always a good baseline goal.
• Run at least five (official) marathons. I plan on doing more than five marathon distances, but let’s try signing up for at least five official marathon events. They can be virtual.
• Run at least one (official) ultramarathon. Minimum distance: 60 km. This can be virtual.
• Run a sub-4-hour marathon. I know that’s a low bar, but I’m slow.
• Do something with my 2020 NaNo story. Hopefully more than just another draft. I’d like to take the next steps in getting this story out into the ether.
• Do some non-writing creative stuff. I realized earlier that while I have been doing “creative stuff” in the form of writing, I haven’t done much in any other way. I’d love to be able to do some drawing or painting or something this year, so let’s put it in stone in the form of a resolution. Let’s say…three drawings/paintings minimum.
• Buy fewer frivolous/unnecessary things. Basically, I want to be more careful with my money. More conscientious of my spending. This is a hard one to quantify, so let’s say (as at least something to track) I can only buy a “frivolous treat object” once every two months.
• Take at least two French classes in my progression towards the certificate. This one is pretty self-explanatory.
• Get the DAMN BLOGS POSTED
• Limit my “down time” screen time. I’m good at losing way too much time to Twitter and/or TikTok. I don’t want to completely remove these sites from my use, but I do want to limit my time on them. So let’s say…I can have three 15-minute intervals of “down time” screen time over the course of the day.

I’ll add more if I think of more!

As I’m sure you all remember, December 27th is the day of the New Year’s Resolutions. So let’s check out last year’s and make some new ones, eh?

A review of the 2022 resolutions:

• ACCOMPLISHED: The blogs. They’re still being written daily, but they’re currently sitting in a 236-page Word document instead of being posted on WordPress. Because I’m lazy as all hell.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Walk at least…let’s do 5,000, why not. You’ll get a more in-depth review of this on January 1st, but it has been accomplished!
• ACCOMPLISHED: Run three times weekly whenever possible. Yup! I only missed this when absolutely necessary.
• FAILED: Complete a new draft of my 2020 NaNoWriMo. I worked on this a little bit, but I was way too busy to do a completely new draft this year.
• FAILED: Win NaNoWriMo 2022. Didn’t even do it this year. I’m a loser!
• FAILED: Run a marathon. I’m still not there yet. But I’m working on it!
• ACCOMPLISHED: Continue to get blogs in a physical format. It’s a slow slog, but it’s happening!
• FAILED: I MUST WORK OUT MY ARMS! APPARENTLY NOT!

Peh. Let’s see if we can do better in 2023 with the following:

• Blog daily. As always.
• Post all backlogged blogs. It’s getting out of hand, yo!
• Walk/run 5,000+ miles. This is becoming pretty standard, too.
• Run a marathon. The fact that I’m actually training for one is a good start, I think
• Complete another complete draft of my 2020 NaNoWriMo. This is, of course, a carry-over from this year. But I need to do it.
• Write more in general. I’m not saying I’ll do NaNoWriMo 2023 because who knows how busy the fall will be, but I should be writing more. That’s the only way you get better at it, after all.
• Draw. That’s it. That’s the resolution.

ONWARD!

Hello, ladies and gents. It’s tradition that I do my New Year’s Resolutions on December 27.

It is December 27.

SO LET’S DO IT

A review of the 2021 resolutions:

• ACCOMPLISHED: The blogs, as usual. Always, always.
• FAILED: Try to be more consistent with actually posting my blogs. HA. I keep making this resolution and never succeed. Says something about me, huh?
• ACCOMPLISHED: Walk at least 4,800 miles. YUP! There will be a blog on this soon.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Run twice weekly whenever possible. Yup! I actually started doing three times a week when I could, and I plan to continue this.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Keep working on my 2020 NaNoWriMo. I did! I actually have a complete (or like 99% complete) draft now. I’m going to leave it alone for a while but then come back to it.
• FAILED: Run a marathon. Nope. Still haven’t gotten my miles there.
• FAILED: Win NaNoWriMo 2021. Nope. Was still working on 2020.
• SORT OF ACCOMPLISHED: Do stuff with my writing. I’ve been working on my 2020 NaNo, does that count?
• SORT OF ACCOMPLISHED: Try once again to get my blogs in a physical format. I got a few more of these done. Still not at completion, though.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Revamp my “200 Books” list and keep reading fiction. I did this back in February!
• FAILED: Respond to all the blog comments I’ve gotten over the past several years. Ha.
• FAILED: Work out my arms. HA!

Not as good as it could have been. Let’s look ahead to 2022:

• The blogs.
• Walk at least…let’s do 5,000, why not.
• Run three times weekly whenever possible.
• Complete a new draft of my 2020 NaNoWriMo.
• Win NaNoWriMo 2022. Maybe I’ll have the draft done by then?
• Run a marathon. I’m going to be able to do it one of these days!
• Continue to get blogs in a physical format.
• I MUST WORK OUT MY ARMS!

Let’s go.

‘Sup, nerds?

So it’s December 27th, which has become the day on which I review my resolutions for the current year, figure out how badly I did at keeping them, and then set up resolutions for next year that will likely be kept just as badly.

READY??????

A review of the 2020 resolutions:

• ACCOMPLISHED: The blogs. Yup. And I actually posted them this year! HOLY CRAP
• ACCOMPLISHED: Walk at least 4,500 miles. I’m actually getting at least 5,000, so that’s pretty cool. A review of my walking miles will come, as always, on January 1st.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Do something with my writing. Finally.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Run a half-marathon. I guess technically this should go in the “sort of accomplished” category since it was a virtual version of the Calgary half-marathon and not an in-person thing, but let’s be honest – that was really the only way to do it this year. So I’m counting it.
• FAILED: Run a marathon. Wasn’t able to get my distances far enough fast enough because I’m a loser.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Win NaNoWriMo 2020. Done! And I’m actually still working on it, which is new for me.
• FAILED: Get my blogs in physical form. I didn’t even touch this project this year. Go me.
• FAILED: Get a body composition analysis. Okay, to be fair, I had one scheduled for the beginning of April, but pandemic.
• FAILED: I’m going to try to be more consistent in posting these blogs, but pffft. I mass-posted twice, that totally doesn’t count.
• FAILED: I’m also going to keep trying to be better for Nate. I’m still the worst. And probably worse than normal because I’m not handling this pandemic very well, let’s just say that.

THAT’S A LOT OF FAILURES I’LL TELL YA WHAT

How about some resolutions for 2021?

• The blogs, as usual.
• Try to be more consistent with actually posting my blogs. No more of this “once every 500 days” nonsense. Maybe…every few months at most?
• Walk at least 4,800 miles. I could probably try for 5,000 again, but who knows what nonsense 2021 will bring and I think 4,800 should be reachable.
• Run twice weekly whenever possible.
• Keep working on my 2020 NaNoWriMo. I’ve somehow managed to keep working on it after November ended this year, which is unheard of for me. But I like the story even though it’s a dumb idea and I have no idea what to do with the ending at this point in time, so let’s keep truckin’.
• Run a marathon. Hopefully this year I’ll be able to get my distance up to that point. It’d be nice to be able to do an in-person marathon, too (preferably the Calgary Marathon), but I seriously doubt we’ll be at that point with COVID come the end of May.
• Win NaNoWriMo 2021. November is always the busiest month of the year, so LET’S THROW A NOVEL IN THERE TOO WHY NOT
• Do stuff with my writing. What? Who knows. That’s part of the fun, I guess.
• Try once again to get my blogs in a physical format. I really need to do this. I fear losing them, which would be losing almost 15 years of daily logs.
• Revamp my “200 Books” list and keep reading fiction. Ever since I’ve gotten Kondle, I’ve had such an urge to read. It’s been quite a few years since I’ve had that urge. I think it’s because I feel like I can get any book I want whenever I want it and I don’t have to be limited to whatever measly selection the U of C library has (for whatever reason, it’s selection seems way worse than UI’s library) or how prepared I am to carry a chonking 600-page book around with me.
• Respond to all the blog comments I’ve gotten over the past several years. I’m really bad at that, sorry.
• Work out my arms. My legs are strong (from walking/running). My back is strong (from hauling tons of nonsense in my backpack when walking). My core is relatively strong (from walking/running/other stuff). My arms? Carrying a gallon of milk up from the car to the condo makes them burn like the center of the sun. I hate strength training so much, but I’d like to get my arms on par with the rest of my body.

I think that’s everything. I’ll add more if I think of anything.

HELLO, PARTY POOPERS!

It’s that time of the year again where I review all of my FREAKING FAILURES and set up some more FREAKING FAILURES for next year.

So without further delay, let’s get to it!

A review of the 2019 resolutions:

• ACCOMPLISHED: The blogs. As always. Not even a hard resolution, but I keep putting it on here ‘cause then I get at least one “ACCOMPLISHED” on my list, haha.
• ACCOMPLISHED: The musics. There are only a few more days left in this Decade of Music project! MADNESS
• FAILED: Get my music organized before the end of the year. I had every intention of doing this and have a few years organized, but I’ve been S U P E R  B U S Y and thus haven’t gotten it all done. Hence my pushing back the Decade of Music review.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Walk 4,000 miles. Done. Easily. I won’t hit 5,000, but I’ll probably be in the 4,800s maybe?
• ACCOMPLISHED: Get back to running 10k distances. I was looking at this resolution list a few months ago and was thinking “hey look, this one’s going to be a failure!” But over the past month or so I’ve picked up running again and just recently started running 10k distances. Hell, I ran 10k today! So that’s coolio.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Win NaNoWriMo 2019. I almost didn’t do NaNo this year, due to – you guessed it – being S U P E R  B U S Y. But I did it, I won it, and I actually want to keep working on the story, even though it’s a craptastic premise.
• FAILED: Get my blogs in physical form. Hahaha. S U P E R  B U S Y.
• FAILED: Write at least 500 words a day, 5 days a week, until my NaNoWriMo 2018 story is done. Then start editing it. NOPE
• SORT OF ACCOMPLISHED: POST THESE GODDAMN BLOGS. As of my writing this list, I haven’t posted my blogs since the end of September. But I posted a whole slog of them earlier this year, I should get credit for that! …Right?
• FAILED: Be. Better. For. Nate. I’m such a bad wife. I try not to be, but I am. It’s rage-inducing.

And now for the 2020 rez list:

• The blogs.
• Walk at least 4,500 miles. This is assuming that I’ll be teaching all year; if I’m not (heaven forbid), let’s say 4,000 miles.
• Do something with my writing. I don’t even freaking care what, really. Just something. I need to be more consistent with it apart from banging out 50,000 words every November. I want to work on one of my old NaNo projects – maybe this year’s, or 2009’s or 2014’s. Or do something with my old short stories. SOMETHING.
• Run a half-marathon. I don’t want to just run half-marathon distances, I want to run in an actual “official” half-marathon race.
• Run a marathon. See above, but replace “half-marathon” with “marathon.”
• Win NaNoWriMo 2020. Let’s keep the streak going!
• Get my blogs in physical form. I really need to do this. I fear losing them more than I fear losing my own life (priorities: I have them)
• Get a body composition analysis. I have no idea what my body fat percentage is, for example, and I’d like to know. I also want to do this near the beginning of the year and then work to improve it (less body fat, more muscle, that kind of thing)
• I’m going to try to be more consistent in posting these blogs, but pffft.
• I’m also going to keep trying to be better for Nate. I really do try, but I’m absolute garbage, so it probably doesn’t even seem like I’m trying half the time. But I am. Sorry, Nate.

Ugh.

I am IN THE ‘SCOW!

And on a completely unrelated note, let’s do some resolutions.

First, a review of the 2018 resolutions:

• ACCOMPLISHED: Blog-a-ma-thon. Did the blogs daily, but failed at posting them with any frequency whatsoever.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Music-a-ma-thon. I only have one more year of this! I’m super excited.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Walk 3,500 miles. It will be quite a bit more than this, but less than last year’s 5,100 miles. More to come on the 31st!
• FAILED: Do at least one of the following: run in the Calgary Marathon or walk 100 miles in a 24-hour period. I kept busting up my leg. Also I suck.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Win NaNoWriMo 2018. I almost quit like five times, but I didn’t.
• FAILED: Write more. HA YEAH RIGHT WITH THIS FREAKING BUSY YEAR I BARELY HAD TIME TO BREATHE
• FAILED: Another resolution that’s PRIVATE! The reason for failing is also PRIVATE!
• FAILED: Be a better wife for Nate. I’m trying, but I’m also garbage, so.

2018 Resolutions:

• The blogs.
• The musics.
• Get my music organized before the end of the year. After going through like twenty* different laptops last year, my music organization tanked. Gotta fix it.
• Walk 4,000 miles. I had it set at 3,500 last year and that was TOO LOW BRO so let’s bump it up again. This is assuming I’m teaching all year. Let’s say 3,500 is the goal if I’m not teaching and have to get a different job. I HOPE THAT WON’T HAPPEN HOLY HELL
• Get back to running 10k distances. I have no doubt from a muscular/cardiovascular standpoint that I can do a 10k. It’s mostly the injury that I’m afraid of re-aggravating. Also that runner’s knee that I gave myself a while back. But maybe both of those concerns won’t even crop up.
• Win NaNoWriMo 2019.
• Get my blogs in physical form. I’m not sure if my Year 1 is still going to get here or if it’s lost in the great Canadian wilderness that is the postal system up here, but I’d like to get it and every other completed year in hard copy form, preferably as soon as possible.
• Write at least 500 words a day, 5 days a week, until my NaNoWriMo 2018 story is done. Then start editing it. I gotta do it, yo.
• POST THESE GODDAMN BLOGS
• Be. Better. For. Nate.

BRUH LET’S DO IT

*slight exaggeration

So 2016 was an eventful year. BUT WAS IT EVENTFUL ENOUGH??    ? ? ??    ?                   ?

Let’s find out.

2016 resolutions:

• ACCOMPLISHED: Get the thesis done and defended. This went a lot smoother than the 2011 version did.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Blogs: do them daily. Nailed it.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Musics: do them daily. Nailed it.
• FAILED: Win NaNoWriMo 2016. Ha. I’m garbage.
• SORT OF FAILED: Complete and format all my blog archives, in honor of this being my 10th year of blogging. Well, I managed to get all 10 years copied down into Word documents, but the formatting still hasn’t happened. But if Eigenblogger goes up in smoke for some reason, I’ve got backups of everything now.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Walk 2,000 miles. I actually did way more than this. I’ll talk about that on the 1st.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Win another TA award. I actually can’t remember if I won a regular TA award this year (I don’t think I did), but I did win the award for being one of the best TAs in the whole Faculty of Science, so that totally counts, right?
• ACCOMPLISHED: Draw more. This is kind of subjective since I didn’t really specify what “more” was, but I do believe that I’ve done more drawing this year than I did in 2015.
• FAILED: Improve my sign language. Maybe…be able to sign 200 phrases by the end of the year? Hahaha. Nope. But I do remember the few signs I taught myself at the beginning of the year.
• FAILED: Keep writing. Work on Prime, mainly. And maybe a short story or two. And maybe Arborhood. NOPE. My writing’s so crappy that I don’t feel like there’s much of a point anymore.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Get married! YAY!

2017 resolutions:

• The blogs.
• The musics.
• Walk either 4,000 miles (if I’m teaching all year) or 3,000 miles (if I’m not).
• See if I can muscle my way into a more permanent lecturer position at U of C. This is something that’s mostly out of control, but hey, I can try.
• Win NaNoWriMo 2017. For serious this time. It’s been too long.
• Write more in general. Vague resolution is vague, but I guess I could narrow it down to either editing Prime or Arborhood.
• The blog archives. Get ‘em done.
• Along the same line as the previous resolution: figure out some sort of way to get my archives printed and bound. I’d love to have a hard copy of each year, sort of like an Encyclopedia of Eigenblogger thing.
• Be a better wife for Nate. He’s the best husband I could ever ask for and I’m still getting used to this “wife” thing, so I definitely think there’s a lot of room for improvement as far as being as good to him as he is to me.
• STOP BEING GARBAGE.

That’s all that I can think of for now.

Hey, it’s the 29th! Looks like it’s the annual “let’s review the old resolutions and make some new ones” blog post.

2014 resolutions:

• ACCOMPLISHED: Blog daily. Was there ever any doubt?
• ACCOMPLISHED: Continue my 365 Days of Music project. This year was rough because it was probably the worst year for music since I started this, but I still managed.
• FAILED: Continue working on my writing project thingy. Apart from Arborhood, I didn’t get much writing done AT ALL this year. It was quite shameful.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Win NaNoWriMo 2014. YAY! It felt pretty good to do this considering I didn’t even start NaNo last year. And I actually kind of like my story and plan on editing it.
• ACCOMPLISHED: Graduate. I never, ever, ever thought I’d have a math degree, let alone graduate with honors while getting one. Graduation sucked, but we’re not going to get into that here.
• FAILED: Try not to be such a horrible freaking failure at everything I do. Yeah, that didn’t happen.

Those were some crappy resolutions.

2015 resolutions:

• Blog daily, 365 musics, blah, blah, blah.
• Win NaNoWriMo 2015.
• Now that I’m pretty sure next year will be stable as far as where I’ll be and what I’ll be doing, I’mma set a walking goal! Let’s say…1,500 miles. Pretty low, I know, but there’s always Calgary weather to take into account, right?
• WRITE. It doesn’t have to necessarily be new stuff (except for NaNo, of course), but I really need to commit to rewrites of some of my old stuff. Prime is important to me; I don’t want to let it die.
• Post these damn blogs on a more frequent and consistent basis. I’m going to try for once a week, but don’t hate me if this doesn’t happen.
• Kick ass in my grad program. I want to show U of C that I can do stats very, very well. Also, I have no desire to leave Calgary any time soon.

VROOM!