Category: daily

End of year meme for my recollection and edification.

1. What did you do in 2013 that you’d never done before?

Rode the CalTrain, tailgated, attended a box game at the SF Giants’ stadium. (I had previously attended box games at A’s games… I’m spoiled, haha)

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year??

I made ZERO new year’s resolutions as usual but I do have one for 2014, and that is DRAW MORE (or at all, really). I find that trying to make THIS YEAR YOUR YEAR can only lead to failure, but having a mindset that you’re not getting any younger and you may as well start today with whatever it is you want to do is far more beneficial. Hence my current 23.4 lb weight loss (as of 12/30/13!) which I never would have done without just doing it and going for on September 2.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth??

Nope! This is year has been one of the first baby-free years in awhile! Though one of my co-workers had a baby and he is pretty much the cutest baby I have ever laid eyes on, for reals.

4. Did anyone close to you die?

My cousin R died in February and that was a bummer. He was really instrumental in helping me learn more digital art skills by getting me Bryce 3D years and years ago. I really appreciate that.

5. What countries did you visit?

The United States of America!

6. What would you like to have in 2014 that you lacked in 2013?

Money, time, more friends, pants. Evaluating the friends thing… I have managed to make a couple of new friends this year and that’s been really nice. I have felt rather isolated with my closest friends being far away so to have some local friends finally… it means a lot.

7. What dates from 2013 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

July 5th- my birthday, had a fun time at Havana in WC and September 2nd, the day I started hardcore on my health stuff. It happened to be the first day I used MyFitnessPal and the first day of Level 2 of the 30 Day Shred, which is hard. The last Saturday in July when we went to the baseball game in the Tony Bennett Suite at AT&T park, was pretty fun! I’ve become spoiled with some of our work perks, and box games is one of those things! Hopefully we have some more opportunities this upcoming summer. 🙂

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

– LOSING TWENTY-THREE POUNDS IN 4 MONTHS
– Shaving about 4-6 minutes off our time at the Lafayette Reservoir
– Adding a number of healthy options to my cooking repetoire
– Saying “YES” to more things.
– Having two new legit friends.

9. What was your biggest failure?

Well, that whole “dating” thing. And I do still have tendencies to overreact hysterically when presented with too much information all at once.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

Yes, I was sick A LOT this year – for almost two months total if you count the 32 days I had the flu in January/February, my bout with food poisoning in Reno, and two more weeks of a cold in October and then two MORE weeks of congestion in December. It has been unpleasant in that department.

11. What was the best thing you bought?

My tablet and my running shoes. Actually I got myself both of those for my birthday, and they have really served me well since.

12. Where did most of your money go?

Bills bills bills, nail polish. My Disneyland trip was a wee bit more expensive than planned, lol.

13. What did you get really excited about?

My birthday, LA/Disney trip in October. Tailgating at one of the Battle of the Bay games in May (A’s vs. Giants, our homegrown teams! Was really fun!)

14. What song will always remind you of 2013?

Daft Punk’s Get Lucky. There was an incident that involved dancing at a bar.

15. Compared to this time last year, are you:?

– happier or sadder? Happier, I think! So so stressed out, but happier.
– thinner or fatter? THINNER!! FOR ONCE IN MY LIIIIIFE
– richer or poorer? RICHER (woooooo!!)

Hmmmm… this year was better to me than recent previous years, I think.

16. What do you wish you’d done more of??

Traveling, for sure, but I just didn’t have the time/money/energy. I’m over Disney for now so at least I can focus on other potential trips in the next 18 months – Texas, Florida, Germany maybe.

17. What do you wish you’d done less of??

Being anti-social. But I try to go to most of the work functions and try to go to most things I’m invited to. Had to bail on two recent things because I was too tired/sick and that was a bummer because they sounded like they were fun (though one did end up with someone puking in the backseat of a car…)

18. How did you spend Christmas?

At my house for Christmas Eve with my mom’s side of the family. At my parents’ house in the morning for Christmas Day with just us and then my uncle’s house for the afternoon with my dad’s side of the family.

19. What was your favorite TV program?

Orphan Black – probably the best acted and tightly plotted show of the year.
Game of Thrones – I finally fell for Game of Thrones after something like 14 episodes (had to justify my HBO subscription, you know), and season 3 was killer… literally… heh (Red Wedding!). Now that I like the show and actually know which character is which, I’d like to go back and watch from the beginning, I think I would like it a lot more.
Nashville – what can I say, I love a good nighttime soap, and Nashville is extremely soapy.
Supernatural – always and forever in my heart, Winchester Bros.

20. What were your favorite books of the year?

Magic Rises by Ilona Andrews
Clean Sweep by Ilona Andrews (online serial)
Silver Shark by Ilona Andrews
Married for Christmas by Noelle Adams
Bittersweet by Noelle Adams

I… really like Ilona Andrews – they’re my current favorite author. And I recently discovered Noelle Adams and have been reading through her backlist on my Kindle App. This was a light year for reading for me, aside from blogs and online stuff. Sorry brain, I didn’t really stimulate you much. :/

21. What was your favorite music from this year??

I don’t think I bought a single album this year. Or downloaded any music (I never do, though). I did listen to a lot of radio and enjoyed Imagine Dragons, AWOLNation, Lumineers. Fell hard for Mumford & Sons. Last year’s favorite Of Monsters and Men became way overplayed and if I hear Dirty Paws one more time I’m going to scream.

22. What were your favorite films of the year?

The movies I saw in the theater were:

Hunger Games: Catching Fire
Pacific Rim
Oblivion
Oz: the Great & Powerful
Star Trek: Into Darkness

I loved Pacific Rim – it met all my expectations of robots vs. monsters plus the epic bonus of robot wailing on a monster with an aircraft carrier. BONUS: IDRIS ELBA. I could listen to that man talk all day long.

However, the movie that I liked the most and has stayed with me the most is Cloud Atlas. I actually think it may be one of the greatest movies I’ve ever seen. It came on HBO or something a couple months ago and I was like, ehh, I guess I’ll watch this, and oh man, it turned out I really wish I’d seen it in the theater last year. I’m not even sure what exactly struck me, the intricate story telling, the excellent performances… I may even try to tackle the book it was based on.

23. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

33 – mojitos at Havana, then we hung out at my house and played Cards Against Humanity. It was a good birthday!

24. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Not getting sick every time I turned around, that would have been nice. More $$$. I know, I know, money doesn’t solve your problems, but having more of it would solve some of my $$$ problems, heh.

25. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2013?

Right now it’s “Nothing fits.” And, “Hey, that kind of fits, let’s wear it.” And, “Ooh, maybe I have some pants in the giveaway pile that fit, sorry charity!” I did, and they do.

26. What kept you sane?

Hahaha. I am coming off a pretty stressful month and need to sleep for like days. Honestly, a lot of my really harder workouts were a blessing as they really cleared my mind and made me feel better about life. And did I mention I’ve lost 23 lbs?! 😉

27. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2013?

Two things:

1. If you want to lose weight, what matters is diet and exercise. Damnit. They weren’t kidding. Eat at a calorie deficit and be more active. I’ve had total success with this and while I have a long ways to go still (I’m about a third done, and when I reach my goal I will evaluate if I want to lose more – I suspect it will take me most of 2014 to reach goal, but I’m hoping that a year after I started I’ll be there)

and

2. Being open to people, to feelings, to experiences. Be less afraid to express yourself; your feelings matter.

***

It’s been a year. Hopefully 2014 will be a good one.

Yes that’s right folks, my hoped-for goal to lose 20 pounds by the end of the year HAS BEEN MET. AND EXCEEDED.

SUCK IT NONBELIEVERS! (and by that I mean the me of four months ago.)

There are two things I really would like to talk about regarding this whole thing:

1. Support Systems
2. How you have to do it.

1. Support Systems
To my surprise, my biggest support for all of this has come from my coworkers. I get encouragement and understanding from these people that I didn’t know they were capable of. There are a couple in particular, but in general basically everyone in the office that I’m friends with has noticed the results and has been very encouraging. It’s really been an added bonus and motivation to keep this up. I do spend most of my time with these people, so I’d just like to acknowledge how awesome they’ve been. It’s a little annoying in that my success has become encouragement to other people, which means that as an unexpected role model, I can’t slack off! Phooey! (LOL!)

It’s really nice that people have been noticing my hard work though! I like that.

2. The Process – How you have to do it
It’s pretty annoying to learn that in order for this to work, the old standby call of “diet and exercise!” is actually how it works, and how you will keep it off. And I don’t mean diet in terms of weird crash diet or extreme calorie deficits or cleanses or whatever. I mean it in its actual meaning:

di·et¹

noun

1. 1.

   the kinds of food that a person, animal, or community habitually eats.

   “a vegetarian diet”

Because for me, this is a very huge lifestyle change. I’ve gone from someone who would eat out a couple times a week for lunch and have a lot of convenience foods at home, to someone who brings lunch everyday and pretty much cooks from scratch every meal for the most part (though not spaghetti sauce!).

I have to admit that one of the harder things I’ve had to do is cut out a lot of the “fun” eating – meaning, I didn’t have that much crazy food at home or anything, but I definitely have had to cut out eating out A LOT, and I think that is a tough thing to have to decide to do, especially when so many relationships revolve around going out to eat, or meeting up for drinks, or whatever. I’ve even cut out most of my Starbucks consumption (which I had earlier anyway because $$$) and so I’m not even that fun to go grab coffee with anymore! I just have to make different choices and I choose not to eat out so much, and to not have white chocolate mochas. <insert SAD FACE>

I still drink a lot of coffee but I make it at home and add creamer. I like the Safeway/Lucerne brand Italian Sweet Cream and International Delight Salted Caramel Mocha (which is, sadly, limited edition for the holidays). Actually the Lucerne brand makes a lot of really tasty creamers; I also like the Cinnamon Vanilla one.

I measure out my portions and make sure everything is accurate, and more or less obsess about everything I put in my mouth. I have to decide if I really want something. And for the most part, I do really want things, and I don’t feel like I’ve had to give things up. For the nights out that I did go out, I tried to make sure that I had a pretty good idea of where I was going so I could decide in advance what to get. Like when we went for mojitos, I knew I wanted two mojitos and knowing the people I was out with, the revelry would probably devolve into shots, so I would most likely have one – and I was able to stick with it. Another time that was a challenge was the Brazilian steakhouse for my dad’s birthday and then the Italian place the office always goes to for a Christmas lunch. I had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to get and I was able to stick with my plan for the most part. I think it’s totally possible to go out and have fun and not blow 4,000 calories on your day out, but at the same time, I’ve had to distance myself from these kinds of things.

And I lost 5 pounds in December – despite Brazilian steakhouses, office parties, and Italian restaurants because of it. As of right now, I’m down 22 lbs since September 2.

I’m pretty proud of myself.

2014 GOALS

For the new year, nothing’s going to change. I’m going to keep tracking everything in MyFitnessPal, try to eat well, and try to finish Ripped in 30 (I got sick last week and haven’t had any energy to do the videos, though I’ve still been walking every day). I completed Week 3 and now have to start Week 4 (aka “The Mother of All Workouts”. I also have the Jillian Michael’s Six Week Six Pack, and for Christmas I got her Yoga Inferno AND the Body Revolution set! I’m excited about that – and considering how long these videos take me to do, I’m set on workouts for probably anywhere from 6-8 months. Then I’ll start over with the 30 Day Shred and see how far I’ve come! I bet it will be pretty easy so I’ll up my weights.

I also plan on trying out new recipes – I have two new Weight Watchers recipe books, the Chicken one and the 50th Anniversary one. My goal is to try at least one new recipe a month. I think that’s reasonable. Usually if I like something it gets added to my ongoing repertoire. This year I didn’t do too much from cookbooks but I did figure out some lighter recipes and I crockpot chicken once a week now, in addition to turkey burrito filling and I made applesauce, which was fun.

I’ve switched to whole grains for almost everything except tortillas (whole wheat/grain tortillas are disgusting, I don’t care what anybody says) (As a Mexican I’m offended by whole grain tortillas being disgusting) and I’ve even added ground flax to other stuff. I plan to expand my healthy grain horizons and figure out more ways to eat quinoa.

So that’s about what I expect from 2014 – more of the same and also just MORE. I just want to be more hardcore, and hopefully WAY LESS SICK next year – as I’m currently fighting off yet another cold, and for those counting, I’ve actually spent two full months sick in 2013, which has been unpleasant, to say the least. Here’s to not only fitness in 2014, but actual health! Where I’m not coughing! Ack!

What, pray tell, have I been up to lately?

Work, work out, track calories, sleep, read the internet, nail polish, wash rinse repeat.

So I’m trying to remember what I was doing all month besides the above… (Twitter has failed me, aside from documenting how much I love almond milk on like 3 separate occasions, *sigh*.) One weekend we went to the Bay Area Bead Extravaganza at the Oakland Marriott – this is the best bead show of the year in the area, in my opinion. There are two very good ones, this one and the NorCal Bead Expo in the first half of the year. There are others throughout the year but those two are the best and I always look forward to the November one the most. I missed the NorCal show as I was in Reno (Gem Faire was that weekend too – a lot of stuff going on while I was busy having food poisoning in Nevada! LOL) and in fact BABE was the only show I made it to this year! Alas!

That same weekend the 4th bore of the Caldecott Tunnel opened. For those of us in the Bay Area, this was pretty exciting! Historically there have just been three tunnels (at least in my lifetime) and the middle tunnel was reversed back and forth (east/west) depending on the time of day/flow of traffic. So the fact that both directions of 24 now have two tunnels?? EXCITING! I’ve been stuck in terrible traffic on the way to Oakland during the lane switch way too many times to count, and now that should be alleviated.  Anyway, it is a delightful tunnel, and I’m still pretty stoked that it’s open!

Thanksgiving was a very nice, low-key weekend. We had the main event at my parents’ house and my aunt and grandmother attended in addition to my sister and parents. I brought my famous “Corn Pudding Thing” and we had a delicious feast. My aunt brought her salami and cream cheese roll ups that we all spaz about because they’re so good, and let me tell you, I’ve been eating so healthy/clean lately that when I put one of those in my mouth, it was as if angels were singing a glorious tune. I have never had a more delicious salami roll up in my life.

I didn’t leave the house on Black Friday but I did order some nail polishes off the internets! Saturday I headed into the dark abyss of THE MALL because I wanted to look for jeans – all my current ones are too big (a problem that is the opposite of my usual! haha) but I struck out. I only had the energy to look at two or three stores though – jeans shopping really takes it out on you! So then I stopped at the Nail Polish Guy’s store and they were running a 3-for-$20 sale and I picked up a couple of blingy Morgan Taylors and an Essie I’d had my eye on. Since I’m a regular at the store (I try to stop in every six weeks or so) I’ve gotten to know the people who work there, and NPG’s wife totally hooked me up with some great free samples of hair care! Since it’s a beauty supply store, they have other stuff besides nail products. They have also started carrying Kerastase and I’m super stoked about that, because I had to order my last bottle since I can’t find it locally. Yay! On Sunday my dad and I went to the reservoir and then later in the afternoon we went over to my uncle’s house for a small birthday celebration for the December birthdays (my dad, uncle, and grandma). My uncle had grown a mustache for Movember and hadn’t shaved it off yet.

Abby and I went to see Catching Fire and it was pretty good. I haven’t read the Hunger Games books, but from what I know about them, the movies seem like they’re pretty close to the source material.

So far in December I have just been really busy at work, as the “communications liaison” for a manager who is out on leave, and we have been having a lot of parties and events. It’s been a weird mix of stress and fun! We had our big Christmas party the first week of December, where we shut down one of the restaurants in downtown WC and partay for hours. They had really good sliders (Angus beef patties with cheese on Hawaiian rolls) and the clam chowder there is TDF. I didn’t really waste my time with anything else and I totally had three sliders, not gonna lie! LOL

Last week we had a couple lunches brought in and then Friday night we had happy hour with one of our vendors at Havana, which is where I went for my birthday (because we go here with the vendor every year and it’s good!) and I had two mojitos and managed to get my paws on 1.5 crab cakes – they are SO GOOD here, I really just need to come down and order a mojito and a plate of crab cakes just for myself some time.

This weekend my plans for Saturday fell through since my cousin was sick, and I wound up not even leaving the house! Which was nice. I didn’t even get stir-crazy which does happen now and then. I will confess I spent a considerable amount of time downloading free books onto my Kindle app.

Sunday was the reservoir with my dad like usual. We’ve shaved off about three minutes from the walk thanks in part to my extensive working out and are able to walk it under 55 minutes now – previously we were doing anything from 58-62 minutes. Anyway, so that’s pretty cool!

Later in the evening my parents and I joined my grandma and aunt at my grandma’s church for an evening of Christmas music. It was very nice but I would have enjoyed myself more if I hadn’t spent the entire time worrying about whether or not I had turned the stove off (…I had. Sigh.). This church has several different choirs and they are pretty accomplished for “just” being church choirs. There’s the little kid choir, the high school choir, and the adult choir. I found it impressive that the little kids had memorized all their songs and were well behaved! Also adorable.

The adult choir performed “Carol of the Bells” which is one of my all-time favorites. Back when I was in concert choir, lo those twenty (!!!) years ago, we sang it, and to this day, I still only know the alto part.

This church also has a handbell choir, which is very fun to listen to, too!

Next weekend I will probably go to my mom’s church for the last Sunday of Advent, and that will be a grand total of four (4) times I set foot in church this year (I also went at Easter and went with my Grandma to another music concert at her church) and I didn’t get hit by lightning once.

HOBBIT UPDATE: I finally saw the first Hobbit movie and it was boring.