Yep! That's 40 books for this year (last year I challenged myself with 24 books and managed 43..
I have several books started (but not quite abandoned.. and some I didn't manage to finish before the new year rang in..).. Rather than stacking up all my TBR (to-be-read) books, we'll just take a look at this week's plan:
1."A Strange Wilderness" by Amir D. Aczel **FINISHED**
2."In the Garden of Beasts" by Erik Larson **FINISHED** (8 January)
Hopefully starting Today (most are TBRs for my Stats Class later this month):
4. "TI-84 Plus Graphing Calculator for Dummies"
5. "Statistics Demystified"
6. "Understandable Statistics: 8th Edition" (we'll be using the 11th edition I think)
Pleasure Reading:
7. "Latinos at the Golden Gate" by Tomas F. Summers Sandoval Jr. (FINALLY! This I had to get a copy from the SF Public Library)
I managed to get a lot read during the semester as I read a lot of classwork related titles to round out what I'm learning in school. In the case of maths, I ended up reading some probability books and math histories, which I found helps me 'get' the why if not the how of maths. People need tools, for me reading about something is a complement to showing me how to solve something. Reading "A Strange Wilderness" was a bit of a muddle in many places, but learning about the lives of people and what drove them to find the answers to questions they had (even if it's things that I don't puzzle over) was enjoyable time spent, and totally relatable! I loved Aczel's book "Chance" also.. that one was fun. yes. I said that, (aloud, even!)
For pleasure I like reading history, quasi-history, the occasional mystery or sci-fi/fantasy book, or random things related to things that interest me.. whaling, true-life adventures (think Mallory or Shackleton), a bit of true crime (like "Devil in the White City" or "Empire of Sin") but pleasure reading seems to be harder to come by when school is in session. We'll see how this year goes!
Managing to just squeek through another semester of school has me frustrated, but determined to not let the summer holiday go without getting some reading & study done. Yes, there are many things to look forward to, but time formerly used for school can be used for study:
I. Maths! to read through my old math notes, work through some of my old homework (like flossing, I suppose I will do it but not as often as I profess to.. but will give it an honest go!) I also want to find a book or two on math theory if there's such a thing.. something to help me to understand the history, creation & usage of math formulas.
II. pleasure reading! a few of the random things I want to read or (re-read/finish**)this summer!
01. "Dead Wake" (Erik Larson)
02. "Lathe of Heaven" (Ursula LeGuin) a book long on my 'to read' list...finally! summer!
03. All the Wrong Questions series (Lemony Snicket)
04. "Gold Mountain" (Lisa See)**
05. "Bad Indians" (Deborah Mirandah)**
06. "The Country in the City" (Richard Walker)** [..now that I have my own copy, no excuses!]
07. "Alfred Kroeber: A Personal Configuration" (Theodora Kroeber)
08. "The Bohemians" (Ben Tarnoff)
09. "Wherever There's a Fight" (Elaine Elinson,)
10.
III. Linguistics! Gratefully, I've gotten a list of some intro linguistics books/ authors to run down and read.. while it's for my own pleasure, it's also edification..
Along with some fun events, festivals, and panels, (not to mention D23 Expo in August!) I'm looking forward to the time being restful too. This last semester really wore me out.. and rather than dwell on why it may have done so (I cut out a considerable amount of volunteering and other pleasurable things and still felt I was a day late and a month behind most of the time..) I plan to move on with refreshed vigor.. ie: a new semester means new opportunity!
Free Summer means renewed energy for projects and other things I enjoy.. but especially reading... maybe some walks, parks & better sleep. We'll see!
It's the closing of the year & time to make a new list of stuff that I probably won't accomplish.. but that's the point right?? We try to do better.. sometimes we do... sometimes it's just wishful thinking.
Some previous list items that are #done or almost there:
01. READING. This year I did fantastic with the 'reading at least ..2 books a month' challenge.. I managed 53 (& counting!) I think I'll stick with that same challenge for 2015 since I also know I don't read as many books when school is in session. ;)
a few of the books I plan to read or re-read or currently reading for this next year..
02. "Getting Home more." We are home. We are in Berkeley. so #happycamper right?? ;) SO..
2b: getting back to SoCal to see friends now & again would be good!
03. Walking/Biking/wii fit.. I did better since 2011.. I'm walking every day! I get my 10k+ steps in almost every day.. and I joined the Y a couple months ago & am hitting the pool once in a blue moon.. the next step is to make an appt. with the trainer so I can use the equipment (the rowing machine especially!!) properly!
3b. Bike. When the weather gets better.. Back on the bike! Be brave! Hit those Berkeley streets & hills!
04. Join some of the Berkeley Path Wanderers walks.. There's a couple coming up on the 1st and the 10th.. The latter will be a Little Free Libraries walk.. so you know that's right up my alley! ;)
05. Passport.. I have a new copy of my birth certificate, so. um.. yeah. Get that thing! I wants to go on a cruise or run off to Canada & see friends one day. ;)
06. Back on Program.. I'm on, I'm off. I got down to about 172 (from 190+ lbs in Feb.) and back up to about 180 this holiday.. so I'll start tracking my food again after the new year.. My ultimate goal is 140 with a plateau of 150.. ;)
NEW STUFF:
07. Each day is a new day. I am going to try & treat each day as a new opportunity to try things again.. Not let people or things get me down for too long.. If someone dissapoints me, I don't want to let it pile up.. Maybe they were having a bad day & took it out on me? Maybe it was me that did something wrong, but no one told me. Who knows? ..I got to not let that tear me down or hurt me. It's a bad habit I have, and it piles up or re-visits me at the wrong times.
08. Along that line.. I can't say I'm going to be Pollyanna.. but I do realize no one loves you when you're down & out. With that in mind.. I'm going to try & not verbalize my misery so much. Not only does no one give a rats, it makes me look like I can't handle my junk & I'm a whiner. I can totally handle it but I'm definitely one of those people that verbalize more than I should.. Honestly, I get over stuff pretty easily.. So if something bugs me one minute or day, I might be over it an hour or a day later. Maybe. ;) So yeah whining about something that I end up letting go of within minutes makes me look pathetic.
09. Clear the clutter. We downsized but didn't downsize our stuff so much. So getting organized is probably the biggest thing that's going to have to happen this next year.. I know it's not all on me.. but I need to be the instigator! ;)
10. Continue to be proactive in learning about & involved in Berkeley & California.. whether it's through my volunteer activities, attending Bancroft Roundtable events, book festivals, readings, other historical society (California, OMCA, BAHA, Berkeley) events.. Keep learning and growing.. and keep reading and looking for more opportunities to gather knowledge.
The Neverminds:
10. Creative Writing class. I've returned to school.. and at some point I'll be taking English 5: Critical Thinking in Reading & Writing course.. so.. yeah. Plus the history classes I'm taking require papers so writing is something I'm doing as part of the coursework. My thought is that I want to key in on how I'm writing & encourage my instructors to hopefully give me feedback whenever possible, (so many of these folks have heavy loads & I don't expect them to have time to really talk to me, let alone give me tips or constructive criticism.. but I can ask right??)
11. No longer looking for bio siblings. People who were looking found who they were looking for. I do want to learn about Native American orphanages of the early half of the 20th Century and how they worked and why they even exisited. Not in a rush.
I'm actually in a pretty happy place in my life. When I look through my list I don't see anything that jumps out at me as difficult or not doable. I think of other things I'd like to do.. like getting out in the parks again to continue my photo tour of Berkeley City parks, or returning to the hills to walk.. these are things I just need to allocate time for. They aren't challenges so much as things I enjoy that I've been putting on the back burner. My main focus recently has been school and the volunteering.. Finding balance between the things I need to do and what I want to do (often these are the same things!) could be proabably be a 12?
Happy New Year!
One of my more successful resolutions.. to read more is getting renewed for another year.
I know New Year Resolutions are a joke. Most of the time they aren't kept or, attempted halfheartedly. I have a new crop of ideas that I hope some will shake themselves out to a positive effort. Some are just things I want to change about myself.. thought processes and bad habits. What it comes down to I think, is de-cluttering. So far I'm not doing so good & I'd like to think it's because I've spent the first part of the new year w/ the never-ending sinus cold. Never-mind that, here's my list I came up w/ on the flight home from Florida late last month:
2011 GOALS
read at least 2 books a month (since 1book a month seemed so easy)
start writing letters (you know, 'snail mail')
take a creative writing class!
go back 'on program' (this I've started on Jan 3rd! enrolling in Weight Watchers revamped program:"points plus" so if I talk about #ww that's what that is).
go 'home' more.. and by 'home' I mean the Bay Area.. When we moved so many years ago, I really did think we'd get back at least once a month like we seemed to do when we would head to Disneyland from Berkeley.. OK, or every other month realistically..I'd be happy if we could get up there maybe 2x a year?? to start?)
get a passport. I finally am curious enough to go on a cruise or if I ever hope to go to Tokyo or anywhere else in the world ever again).
bike, walk, or wii a day! (gotten to a rocky start with the cold but.. so far so good)
register for & DO a "minnie 5K" or whatever you call those things they do at the parks.. walking first then running.
'walk' the cornfield. I know this sounds lame but getting my butt over there to walk the track just hasn't happened yet.
organize the loft: We aren't hoarders I swear! but one of the bummer things about lofts is the lack of storage. Yesterday I actually priced a storage place to put all the stuff we want to keep but not have you know, 'out'..
re-write my manuscripts: I liked doing NaNoWriMo last year despite not getting to the 50k word minimum, but it did force me to sit down and write a few hours a day. More of that would be good.
Find lost siblings. One of the oddball things of the last year or so is that my biological older sister 'found' me on Facebook. So I found out I have half-siblings from my biological father's previous marriage. I joined Ancestry (which is fun!) and so I'm working on that some. It's not good for finding living people so much, but for doing my family trees, it's interesting. I want to find these half-siblings mostly for my biological sister.. If I can find at least one person this year that'd be good. Right? =)
convert our old videos: both VHS and those mini VCR and Hi-8 tapes of home movies we made at Disney World on our various vacations... Besides the convenience of stream-lining it all, the older they get, the more they degrade.
That last one is harder than it sounds.. I think at some point it's going to take a hardware upgrade (plus I don't know if I have what I need yet to do the conversions).
I think I would add to the list of 'goals' for this year:
visit my dear friend Joe in Eureka. I haven't seen him since he moved up there & I miss him bunches. It'll just be very difficult to get out there w/ out a car.
Find another place to have my afternoon tea and hang out..since Banquette closed New Year's Day..
See more movies! I have about 8 movies I want to go see right now.. and no, they're not all Disney!)
get my macbook looked at The tracking pad has been sticking & it's frustrating.
We'll see how I do. Go ahead and laugh. I already am.
I realize it's been about 2 months since I posted last.. (and then it was personal posts) I honestly haven't felt like I had anything to post about. Not much going on.. for me anyway,(haven't really attended anything lately).
MORE RESOLUTIONS!
1. Since the new year I went back on Weight Watchers, so I've not been out to eat much.. I started the year at 223lbs and as of today.. I'm about 215lbs.. My goal is to lose about 100lbs by May 2011.. in time for the 10th wedding anniversary.. Although I admitted to a friend yesterday that if I get to 130-150 I'll be happy with that I'm sure.
I was pretty content at 170lbs but I know that isn't ideal for me. ;P
Veggie Dog at Weeneez (one of the things I can eat on Weight Watchers)
2. BOOKS! Last year I did pretty good at the "reading more" thing. In general I did read more.. THIS YEAR I'm putting myself up for a very doable challenge: READ AT LEAST ONE BOOK A MONTH.
So far I'm doing pretty good! Right now I'm reading The Last Dickens by Mathew Pearl (we'll see if I finish as the book is due this Thursday.. and I can't renew).
Recent titles (listed in most recent first):
-Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Theif (meh but the movie is coming out soon)
-(DK New Orleans City Guide)
-(Lonely Planet New Orleans City Guide)
-Why New Orleans Matters by Tom Piazza (great book!!)
-LA Noir* by John Buntin (*still reading.. will resume when done w/ library book)
Besides getting back to LA NOIR I want to read Lolita (I love Vladamir Nabokov and have read this book at least 3x over the years) for the Metropolis Books book club meeting for this month.
3. walk/riding my bike.. we'll see how this one goes this year.. Didn't do much riding last year (and not much walking at all) because I wasn't feeling up to going out and being seen in public as overweight as I've gotten.. and this all started when I had gained about 20lbs back.. and then I went over the 200lbs mark.. so you KNOW I wasn't going out then.. LOL so we'll see..
4. Blogging more? Like I said I've not had the heart to blog.. or look around the neighborhood for 'ideas' or stories.. part of me doesn't give a crap. There's people doing it better than me.. and some doing it MUCH MUCH better than me.. so why bother?? I sometimes think I'm so OVER the whole blogging thing. OTOH.. I've gotten pretty lazy.. LOL So this will be a BIG "we'll see" ;P
I guess if I can get off my butt and do more than the Wii Fit Plus.. maybe I'd see something around town to blog about.
NEW ORLEANS.. New Orleans is taking a big chunk of my thoughts these past couple months. People who actually know me (to some degree that is) know I used to call New Orleans home. I lived there off & on from 1991 to March 1999. I felt like I was hitting a plateau in some regards.. and took up my mom's suggestion to give Florida a try.. so I transferred my job to Sarasota and tried it for a year.. The previous December I had started posting on #radp (usenet) and met my future husband, Sean, through a monthly Disney chat.. I moved to Berkeley March 2000. We married in May of the following year.
I think at this point in time, had I not met Sean, I would have ended up back in New Orleans. I love my mom but Sarasota just isn't my bag. For me it was a lot like Indianapolis (with a major weather substitution) Throughout the years growing up, it was full of family and holidays, but I wasn't doing much else. It's not to say there's nothing to do in Sarasota, as an adult, I just wasn't getting out and doing it..
New Orleans is the sort of place where almost every weekend there's a festival, and so many holidays and parades.. It's an incredibly easy place to make a niche for yourself, to make friends and find things to do and see.. It's full of life and flavor.. and so much emotion.. My worst days made good memories. How many places can say that that??*
*Please note, I moved March of 1999.. Long before Katrina.. So my rule about living in New Orleans definitely has some serious exceptions. Katrina being a MAJOR one.
So.. I was OK for a while.. Settling in with Sean.. growing a life together. However, even in Berkeley I wanted us to go 'back' to New Orleans.. He's never been. Me, I wanted to see my friends and walk my old haunts and show him "my home".. Despite New Orleans negatives, there were many positives.. and I was very comfortable and happy there.
We came close in 2002.. I got the travel books to encourage his interest (he never really looked at them) and as it was we ended up visiting Philadelphia (as well Hershey, PA and Baltimore, MD) so I could visit my "Honorary Uncle" and "Honorary Tante".. I am so happy we did that.. I don't regret it one bit.. The only thing to note is that it put New Orleans on the back-burner.. for many years, despite me bugging him to go.
After Katrina I thought I was going to go nuts not going.. It wasn't a time to do touristy stuff.. I wanted to go and put myself to work.. Being married, you can't just get up and leave your spouse to go do your own thing.. Maybe you can, but it wasn't something I thought I could do at the time. It was heart-breaking.
People crap or carp about Katrina.. I don't think some folks can imagine the permanent mark that Katrina has made on the city and its people. So much of the land still devastated, and a good portion of its population scattered to the four winds: to this day many places and people have never recovered from this.
I won't go on here because my post isn't about that.. and I honestly don't want to hear the junk people still put out. No one is asking for your pity.. I don't give a crap that you don't care. I do.. and that's what matters to me. New Orleans has come back, in large part because there's enough people who do care.
I don't know what New Orleans is like today.. I imagine it the same in many places, and in many more places, things have closed or been wiped off the map.. The skyline is changing.. Different people live there now.. several of them are friends of mine, and some.. never moved back.
Last December the spouse made a comment to some NOLa friends of ours.. that with the Disney exhibit there at the NOMA (New Orleans Museum of Art) he'd have an 'extra' reason to come to New Orleans.. This after I hassled him last October to go.. (didn't work obviously).. This time I put it to him.. and decided, if he doesn't go, I will.
So.. VERY LONG STORY.. not short.. some 11 years later.. I'm going back to my other home, New Orleans.. next month. My best pal Rebecca will be in town with her son, and so we'll meet up as well some other friends.. I'll take Sean around the Quarter and Uptown, and we'll do the D-Day Museum as well the Art Museum and possibly Blaine Kern's Mardi Gras World (he wasn't interested in Mardi Gras or Jazz Fest this trip.. nor are we wasting time with swamp tours, nor plantations this time around). It's mainly a hang out with friends and get Sean acquainted with New Orleans.. If he falls in love with the city like I did the first time I stepped foot there, that's a bonus, but I'm not holding my breath. The guy has a subdued nature, (unless the CAL Bears are playing).
I wasn't sure if I should post about the trip here.. I meant this blog to be about living Downtown LA.. I've re-started using the "I-5 Nomads" blog for our frequent adventures (many Disney related..) last Fall.. but that seems like a more appropriate place.. So we'll see.
Anyway.. I'm rambling at this point and it's been very TMI.. So, that's what I'm up to.. or NOT up to, I guess. Hope yours is a GREAT new year! Here's to more Downtown LA blogging.. by everyone, not just me.
