Annual Attempted Self-Improvement-Palooza

Yeesh, time flies!

I had actually forgotten that I'd made any resolutions for last year - thanks, sieve-for-a-brain! - but I managed to do OK, OK here defined as 'achieving my usual 2-out-of-3-ain't-bad success rate'.

I cocked up a few times but my punctuality is better - success!

I did not manage to detach myself from the internet to the degree I'd have liked - dang!

I did do a comic for every day of last year - extra success! - and have decided to keep it up because it's fun :-)

So the attempt to be less internet addicted rolls on as a non-resolution task and here I am, faced with a brand new year.

Hrrrmmm...

What to resolve...?
 OK, here we go.

• Resolution The First: Start Getting Into Gardening Properly
  I have gotten excited about gardening before here, here, here and here but despite my noble intentions I've mostly been doing maintenance fiddling rather than planting anything new or learning anything particularly advanced in the gardening skill set.
  So this year I'm going to buy some plants and then do my level best to keep them alive.
  As I'm doing this resolving in summer this means that there's some things I won't be able to plant until winter/spring but if I manage to plant anything at all I'm going to count that as a success.
  Even if it's a collection of herbs and a tomato plant in a pot grown on my balcony at the flat.
  
• Resolution The Second: Read A Book A Week
  I started recording what I was reading in 2009 and depending on what I was up to that year I got through a varying number of books.
  28 in 2009 (I started keeping the journal in June).
  73 in 2010 (By far the most successful year).
  34 in 2011 (Hey, woah, what happened there...?)
  21 in 2012 (WHAT!?)
  So yes, this year I want to ratchet the reading back up again.
  New stories, new knowledge, new writers to admire, more inspiration.
  I'm going to aim for 52 books, with the loose goal of a book a week and if I manage more than that then I'll just get to be smug about it.
  
• Resolution The Third: Start Sewing
  Remember The Very Hungry Caterpillar fabric I bought?
  This year it is becoming quilts.
  It is becoming at least three quilts and then depending on how obsessed I am with quilting by that stage I'll either make the rest of the material* up into quilts for later** or put the material aside to make the quilts when the time is right.
  I want to try making clothes as well. I've put myself off in the past by imagining getting the measurements wrong and making clothes that don't fit or just cocking up and ruining the material.
  I look at lovely material and hate the idea of screwing it up by cutting it out wrong or ruining it somehow but I'll never learn if I don't squash that aversion down and just let myself make some mistakes.
  

* I bought so much material. 2 m of each of the... maybe 7 patterns?

** Later = when people have babies

Once More Unto The Breach

After a year off from resolutions, which was spent improving my life in other ways in any case, I'm ready to commit myself to a bit of resolving once more.

I am resolution ready.

• Resolution the First: Punctuality
  My problem isn't technically punctuality. It's optimism.
  If I know it takes 10 minutes to drive somewhere, I'll leave 10 minutes before I need to get there.
  And then if I miss a form of public transport, hit some bad traffic or can't find a park or am unfamiliar with the area, I'm late.
  I've been reigning this particular personal failing in quite strongly in the last few years but I'm making a special project of it this year.
  If I leave half an hour before I need to leave to get somewhere, the worst thing that happens is that I get there half an hour earlier than I need to and I need to entertain myself for a while which is not a problem.
  The best thing is that if things go completely bonkers wrong I'll probably still have a chance at getting there on time or a lot closer to on time than if I keep assuming the best case scenario for every trip.
  This is a bit more general than the resolutions I usually put myself down for but considering how much of a person's life can be affected by how well they organise themselves, I'm making it a priority.
  
  
• Resolution the Second: Ease Up On Social Media/The Internets
  Recently I've been spending what I consider an excessive amount of time dicking around on the internet.
  Some general surfing but a lot of checking in on my various social networking type sites or favourite websites to see if anything has happened. Usually not a lot has and what has could have been checked later. I'm spending time on this that I could be spending on actually achieving things.
  I'm not sure yet whether I'm going to assign myself a specific amount of time or time of the day for internet access or how I'm going to approach this but I'm definitely cutting right down.
  I slipped off the 'stop taking your laptop to work' wagon at the start of this year for a few reasons but I'm climbing back onto it.
  And I'm not going to flick the darn thing back on the moment I get back home either.
  I'm treating it as an extension of my efforts not to have unnecessary noise going on about me all the time, except in this case it's visual noise.
  Putting off doing things of my own or doing them really slowly because I'm checking up on what everybody else is doing is silly and beginning to cheese me off which means my enjoyment of the art/writing/interactions I like is being lessened.
  No more of that.
  
  
• Resolution the Third: Draw One Comic For Every Day
  I keep intending to start drawing more little comics but without a solid plan I don't really sit down to do so.
  This year I'm going to try do a comic for every day. Probably not ON every day because there are plenty of things that might get in the way of that.
  But yes, for every day.
  365 comics.
  My current comic skills are a bit basic but hopefully a year of practise will help me improve and work out what sort of style I'd like to develop.
  I'd love to be able to draw like Lucy Knisley but considering all the art school she attended and all the practise she's had or all the not-sucking-at-making-herself-draw that she's in possession of, that ambition will probably be a long time coming.
  Just putting pencil to paper every day or every couple of days will be a good start.
  And once I've got myself organised I'll start posting them here or somewhere linked to here as a record.
  As my one solid specific-thing-that-you-do-a-specific-number-of-times resolution for this year I expect to focus most of my usual 'argh, am I accomplishing things!?' resolution angst on this - my brain's way of messing me about and keeping things interesting instead of doing anything useful like helping - but on the upside that means I can draw angsty comics about drawing comics and everybody loves that, right?
  Right?

Resolution Dissolution

Ah, once again my friends we find ourselves here.

New arbitrary chopping of time into bite-size-chunks assessment of things done or undone time.

And once again I've managed 2 out of 3 of my resolutions.

I watched a swag of lovely new movies and I donated some blood.

Unfortunately it wasn't as much blood as I was intending to donate - as my body is somewhat possessive of the red stuff and threatened to take my consciousness away if we continued - but I tried.

I didn't get around to crochet because, oddly enough, I got distracted by knitting. I found a sad, abandoned unfinished scarf I had begun somewhere in my early teens and began adding rows to it*.

So here we sit at the start of a new year and I'm racking my brain for some new resolutions and I am coming up with bubkis.

There are plenty of things I want to do** but none that I want to resolve to do.

Nothing seems big enough or focused enough or specific enough.

So I figure... stuff it!

I'll probably set myself little challenges and goals throughout the year but if I can't come up with any big projects, I'm not going to force myself to manufacture some now because that would just feel artificial and would get annoying pretty quickly.

This year I'm just going to do... things.

I'm kinda looking forward to it.



*I also aggravatingly began adding stitches because I was holding the yarn wrong at the end of the needle but I think I've stopped myself from doing that now...

**Draw more often, keep up with the knitting, continue with my Italian, cooks some new things

Tangled Up In Plaid

Well, not necessarily plaid but hopefully some sort of patterning. Once I get going.

Remember my wild and cray-zay New Year's Resolutions?

Remember the one about learning to crochet?

Well, I'm edging closer!

After having bought a beginners' guide months ago and then forgetting to go back to the store for the yarn* or hooks I have joined Ravelry to get extra inspired with patterns and the like and will soon begin trawling YouTube for lovely little 'how to' videos so I know what all the short-hand in the patterns means.

I also now need to learn how to knit because the internet has patterns for Jayne Cobb's hat...

... and I want one.

Because it's Jayne Cobb's hat and he's the hero of Canton don't cha know!

I want one so badly I can almost taste it!**

I expect my first project will be an almost unbearably sad-lookin' scarf that I'll not want to wear but we've all got to start somewhere and my fumble-fingers will have to learn discipline in cruddy scarf boot camp before they get a shot at crocheting little squiddies or vampires or knitting bad-ass space cowboy beanies.
You have to earn a hat like that and seeing as I was born too early to join the Browncoats in their struggle or have a hand in the liberation of Canton, I'll have to earn it the other way - through arts and crafts!



*well, cotton yarn substitute... stupid allergy to wool.

**it tastes fluffy

Crawling Out Of The Comfort Zone

I avoid certain movies like the plague.

War movies because they're always emotionally crushing and visually jarring.

Certain romantic comedies because they always feel so false and oversimplified.

Horror movies of a certain calibre because my brain doesn't need any more help imagining strange things lurking the in shadows thank you so very much.

And that was all well and good and I felt fairly OK with that.

But then I started avoiding a lot of other movies and when I tried to work out why, I was embarrassed to find that the explanation that popped up in my head was that they were 'too much work'.

"How much work can it be to sit on your ass and watch a movie?" a person would be justified in asking.

I didn't mean 'work' work but emotional and mental work.

I'd been rewatching old movies in a half-arsed way that allowed the familiar scenes and dialogue to wash over and past me whilst I tried to do other things (eg. write, draw, email).

The problem was I was doing those things half-arsed as well.

Instead of devoting two hours to really paying attention to a movie or really paying attention to a piece of writing or drawing, I was spending two hours not really paying attention to either and coming away feeling irritated and not at all like I had accomplished anything.

Instead of multi-tasking I was multi-tanking.

So as recorded in my New Year's Resolutions I have banned myself from watching movies I have already seen and am only watching new movies.
This has led to a sharp decrease in amount of movies actually watched but the associated sharp decrease in hours staring goggle-eyed and useless at a square of moving colours has been a welcome side effect.

And the movies I have watched so far have already made the experience worth it.

Not all have them have been quality but they've been fresh, they've got my brain moving again and I'm being less of a movie and cinema wuss about the 'hard work' movies.

My brain needs more hard work, it has been slacking off for years.

Succeeding To Fail

Well poot.

Turns out it wasn't just my romantically undernourished student ways that made me all woozy when I last tried to give blood, I just need all of my blood at all times :-/

Even as a responsible grown up person who has three proper meals and about 2 litres of water a day, I got halfway through and all of a sudden my temperature went up, my blood pressure went down and it felt like the space between my eyes was filling up with rushing air.

The nurse taking the donation was on to things like a shot, all I had to say was "Um, I'm feeling a little..." and the needle was out, the bandage was on, I had a damp cloth on my head, a cup of water in my hand and was being fanned with a clipboard whilst she reminded me to take deep breaths and asked how I was feeling.
"Some people just shouldn't give blood, love," she told me sympathetically.

It's really annoying because being a fairly healthy and robust person I always figured I'd be able to spare a bit of my life sauce but take any more than is necessary for a blood test and the system goes into emergency procedures.
The needle doesn't hurt, the process doesn't hurt, if it wasn't for the light-headedness it would be a doddle, a walk in the park.

So it looks like I won't be able to become a regular donor which is a real shame but I'm glad I tried. I'd been avoiding going back in case they told me not to come back* - yes I know that's faulty logic - but now that I know it's just the way I function I know I haven't been wasting years of potential contributions.

The day I went in the clinic received 152 donations** which will potentially save about 456 lives, they also took plasma donations which will help people with serious health issues live normal lives instead of being gravely hampered by their conditions.
This is something I want to be a part of, even if I can't give blood I can still give money and hope that others with more vigorous constitutions than mine will give it a go.




*If you have a poor reaction three times in a row you're told that you should probably cross it off your to do list as it just isn't meant to be.

**And my half a donation which I guess will help 1.5 people as well.

In The Vicinity Of My Troth!

It's that time again!

New Year's Resolution time!

Last year I managed 2 out of 3* of my resolutions, so with that modest amount of success under my belt I'm trying to Rodin's The Thinker another three worthwhile goals for 2010.

Here's what I came up with:

• Resolution the First: Watch a Movie a Week that I Have Never Seen Before
  It might sound a bit of an odd resolution but a couple of years ago I fell into the terrible habit of recycling movies and books I'd already experienced and enjoyed instead of seeking out new ones.
  Whilst there's nothing wrong with occasionally re-watching a favourite or a classic they shouldn't make up 80% of your leisure intake.
  It took joining a book club to remind me of that lovely thing called reading that I used to do properly and kick me back into seeking out new and different authors, I'm taking it upon myself to start picking out new movies.
  There are only so many hours in a life and I want new experiences in as many of them as possible.
• Resolution the Second: Learn to Crochet
  I bought this book. Because the little critters are adorable. And I must have them.
  MUST. HAVE. THEM.
  But this involves learning the basics first seeing as I don't think I've ever crocheted in my life**. This is partially because I am allergic to wool, hate synthetics and keep forgetting that there are cotton yarns out there.
• Resolution the Third: Donate Blood
  The only two times I have ever donated blood I was a student, I wasn't eating regular meals, I got incredibly dizzy and marvelled at the sensation of my hearing turning itself off as my body pointed out that I was quite, quite dehydrated. So I haven't donated in something like 6 years which is a disgrace considering how little it inconveniences me and how much it could help other people.

So there we go.
Three nice fresh resolutions for a new year.
Fingers crossed.



* I started studying Italian again, did a first aid course but didn't begin learning guitar. I think it's blatant cheating to grant learning guitar a continuance - so even if I do start lesson this year that'll just be 'a good thing' rather than a resolution.
**My memory is terrible, I've done some crochet-like crafts in the past but I can't tell you what they actually were...

Step Back Citizen, I Have A Certificate!

Yay!

But, Ow!

Guess what I spent the last two days doing!

No, not that!

Dirty little internet monkeys.

A first aid course!

At this point you might be wondering two things.
Why Ow?
Why Yay?

Well, Ow because over the course of the two days of classes I managed to give myself what I've dubbed CPR stigmata*.

And Yay, because now I feel like I'll actually be able to do something useful should anyone be hurt.

If you collapse I can roll you onto your side like nobody's business, if you are cut I will apply ten kinds of pressure and bandage you up like Imhotep, and if your heart stops I guess I'll give you CPR but no tongue!

Since the last time I did any first aid training** they have completely changed the timings for CPR and a lot of DOs have become DON'Ts!
My lawyer has advised me not to list any actual medical advice here but I can tell you this.

Blue-ringed octopi are tiny!

Tiny!

The size of a child's fist at most!
Do you know how much time I could have saved as a child if I'd known this?
All the hours wasted running in and out of the water at the beach every time a piece of seaweed touched my leg just in case it was a blue-ringed octopus!

Tiny poisonous sea creatures aside, knowing the basics of what to do during an emergency is both comforting and probably the most practical thing I've added to my skill base in years, I recommend it to you all***.
There is no time, place or stage of societal breakdown where first aid skills will not be useful.
Think about it.
Also stay still, I need to practice my slings.



*A bruise in the centre of each hand from overlapping the two hands and going at that first aid mannequin's solar plexus hammer and tongs.

**Coff 1995-ish.

***Warning: You will temporarily be convinced you are capable of diagnosing and treating people. Sure you're only diagnosing them with dehydration and mini-strokes but you'll still sound like a pompous jackass.

Are You Ready To Contemplate The Possibility Of Having The Capacity To Rock!?

Oh God, Internets! I don't know what to do!
In the interest of keeping my promises to both you and myself about not being such a lazy [expletive deleted] this year I got myself all geared up to move onto a second New Year's Resolution (namely Take Up The Guitar) after having a good three months to get over the shock of having started one of the others (Take Italian Lessons).

So I did what you usually do when you're about to buy or do something in these modern times.
I went to the internets.
It was worse than the WebMD incident!

I found websites telling me that it's best to learn the basics on an acoustic guitar.
I found websites telling me that electric guitar is easier to pick up and you might as well start there if you're intending to rock out later on.
I found websites talking about how to choose your guitar and not get ripped off by the music shop duders.
I found myself looking at the prices of amps and trying to tell the difference between a Telecaster and a Stratocaster.

I can't even reliably identify the order of strings on the damn guitar yet!
What am I doing comparing amps!
I have no idea what I'm doing!

Some of the websites also had sections on drums and I found myself getting wistful about the possibility of dragging a kit up into my flat and then finding out that I have insufficient timing and very cranky neighbours :-b

I know I could just go into a couple of stores and pepper them with questions until I find something that looks about right but my buying behaviour comes in two flavours: impulsive and excruciatingly drawn out.

I don't want to just buy an instrument just because I want to get started and then have to buy a new one shortly after when I figure out that it isn't what I'm looking for.
But I also don't want to get so turned around by the sheer amount of options out there that I never manage to buy anything at all.

I'm probably going to have to ask for help.

There's no trouble finding it. Almost every one of my friends is going out with a dude who owns at least three guitars, some of which have been given names*.
It might be a bit weird going guitar shopping with one of my mates' bed-buddies but they're all nice fellas with the parts of their brains that relate to guitars properly wired and pointed due 'axe' so it's the logical choice.

And then after that I just have to work out how to play the dang thing or gear myself up to take lessons without having flashbacks to my school music lessons.

Oh God, the recorders all tasted of disinfectant...



*The guitars, not the boyfriends. The boyfriends already have names.

Finnigan, Begin Again

It's happening again.
Christmas is past, the New Year is approaching and I am being blinded by the endless possibilities of a fresh annual slate and drawn on by the siren song of 'this time...'.
Is it completely insane to admit that I'm addicted to New Year's Resolutions?

I get the same way about a new year as I do about fresh stationery.
All pristine and new with so much potential.
It could be filled with something interesting and beautiful or the most horrendous scribble.
Just like your year could be full of fresh, fascinating things or just another round of same old, same old.
And if you don't start things off right straight from the get go there's always a temptation to give up and try again next year. When things might be perfect.

This rush of manic wide-eyed enthusiasm and philosophising may be due to the fact that I spent the best part of the last two days sleeping late and then lolling around reading a book by Jeremy Clarkson and eating a block of dark chocolate with lovely crunchy bits of coffee beans throughout.
I generally spend this part of the year sleeping late, lolling around and reading a book of some description.
And now here I am hopped up on two types of caffeine and British sarcasm and making ten point plans on how I'm going to change the world - or at least my little bit of it - for the better and how this time it'll all work out exactly as per spec.

The trouble with these giddy visions of future perfection and adventure is that I am like a kid who has just chugged an entire bottle of red cordial concentrate when it comes to actually taking up these plans.
I am so excited I want to do everything.
All at once.
At the same time.
Perfectly.
And can't prioritise.
And in fairly short order I get frustrated with myself and my failure to learn how to do twelve things at once and integrate them into my habitual daily schedule which I should also have fundamentally altered and have to spend a week watching a mish-mash of Stargate Atlantis, Invader Zim and West Wing or similar until I have calmed down, and then I keep going another week or two until I've gone a bit wrong and wash up convinced I am a transplanetary mercenary politician. With a pet robot.

I know there is little I can do to stop myself from going off on these delusional planning sprees but this year I'm going to try to limit Actual Resolutions to a couple of key items and put Idealised If I Have Time/Become Magic Resolutions to one side to do later or intermittently.

And as few things are more helpful in spurring me into action than the possibility of virtual public embarrassment mine resolutions are as follows:

• Resolution the First: Take Italian Classes
  My Italian has slumped into a mumbling shambling heap and started to slowly disintegrate since I stopped practising so it's time for a little bit of 'you paid for this, you'd better damn learn something' incentive. The glow from my classroom nostalgia and new stationery penchant will last until exactly the first time I am asked to contribute in class or hand in a homework assignment at which point my procrastination nostalgia will try to take over but the hell with me. I am a spoiled brat and will not indulge myself in that behaviour. Much.
• Resolution the Second: Get First Aid Certification
  I've been thinking about this one for ages and if anything ever goes wrong and I'm first on the scene, if I or someone I love is involved in an accident or if - God Forbid - the zombies rise, knowing basic first aid would be very useful.
• Resolution the Third: Take Up The Guitar
  Well, at least try. I haven't really had a crack at any real (as in not electronic or fake assed) musical instruments since music classes stopped being mandatory in high school and always wish I had done. I haven't the rhthym to warrant buying a drum kit (though I would secretly love to), had a mutual break up with keyboards/pianos that was totally mutual in my youth and have wanted to try the guitar but avoided it just in case I was crap at it which is a very mature and clever way to act indeed.

So there we go.
Three goals for 2009.
And by avoiding grandiose proclamations using words like 'fluent', 'life saving genius god-child' or 'virtuoso' I should actually have a chance.

OK.
Good.
That's that done.
Now if you'll excuse me this chocolate isn't going to eat itself and Mr Clarkson has some very intriguing opinions to raise on the nature of, well, just about everything.