Why am I so obviously insane...

I’m not dead…I swear it. I feel kiiiinda like a zombie though. Please know that I haven’t forgotten you and I haven’t left the blogging world again, I just find it hard to find a spare few minutes to write thoughts down at all. Which is sad.


Quick blog related update: um, I’m at 181.3 as of this morning Yep, lowest weight since…who even knows when (like I really had a scale those 5-6 years I was steadily gaining a hundred pounds). The scale numbers are steadily if not quickly going down and the running is improving ever so slightly. I’ve been insisting to everyone in my life that I have NOT been losing weight lately and now I have to stop doing that because it's not true anymore!! I’m totally confident about my birthday weight goal too which is great! To be honest the weight loss is the only part of my life that I really feel like is going well right now. I know that’s not really true…but I think maybe I’m just lacking perspective.

I have been having a really rough time. I kind of have two jobs, most of you know one of my jobs is working in property management for a fitness company…well in a past life I was an editor of sorts and that job is complicated at best. I still do work from time to time for this publishing company. Maybe 90% of the time the whole company is just my dad, by himself, taking orders and all that, he doesn’t put out new material anymore really and it’s just kind of plugging along. But when things get complicated, like this giant project we’ve had lately, I have to help out.

So between work-work being really complicated, editing-work being extremely time consuming, birthday party planning being crazy and about ten other things I’m lost. I’ve retreated into my OCD in a really bad way. I’ve found a new obsession, and I spend all of my time thinking about it, reading about it, and just…in general being obsessed.

There’s something so unnerving about knowing that you’re crazy. In some ways it’s terrifying and in some ways it’s calming. I know what needs to be done – I need to stop fixating on something so frivolous. But in the moment…when I feel panicked it’s so comforting to retreat into my own little world. It’s just a weird dynamic I guess. The whole thing is making me have all these disjointed and grandiose thoughts. I’ve contemplated this ten day meditation course, just up and leaving my life for ten days to be a part of it, and I’ve contemplated becoming a pescetarian. Is that how you spell it? What I mean to say is that I would be giving up all meat, except fish.

My brain is all over the place. I was pretty convinced I could sit here and write something to you all that didn’t sound crazy. I’m not 100% sure I succeeded. But I adore all of you, I haven’t been keeping up on your blogs, and I’m sorry. I’ll get back from this obsession and be a part of the real world. I hope it’s soon.

And I ran, I ran so far awaaaaaay...

Lovely and wonderful readers, I'm sorry I haven't been around all week.  I have been doing...not well, not bad.  Running every day (even if some days it's less than half a mile), but it's hard to keep my calorie deficit where I want it.  It's like, I burn a few hundred more calories and I feel like I want to eat about eight hundred extra.  It's awful!!

The running, however, is going all right.  I am slow, not in the way that everyone says "oh I'm so slow" but in the way that I am actually slower running than walking.  I'm not opposed to being slow in general, but I'm annoyed at not seeing an improvement.  I finished week 1 of couch to 5k, meaning I've REALLY gone out to run three times.  And it may sound dumb but I'm sitting here annoyed that I haven't improved at all.  I know I know, running three times isn't exactly a huge amount of training (or even a habit, really).  Still, it would have been cool if after the last time I had made it even a tenth of a mile farther in the same amount of time.

Beyond running I haven't been up to anything but party planning.  I got my mask ordered, got together a bunch of other things and in true OCD fashion I made a wonderful and extremely detailed to do list for myself.  On the weight loss front, a big nothing has changed since the last time I posted - so disappointing!!

I wish I had a better update for you.  Something interesting to say, perhaps.  I'm swamped at work and the stress follows me home.  Nothing very serious, just a lot of little things.  But enough that I'm struggling to keep up with life right now much less blogging.  I'll try!  I miss you all when I'm gone :) hope you are all having wonderful weeks!!

ps, I gave up on giving up coffee - however I am keeping it down to 2 cups per week!  And...trying to save them for the weekend too, it's going pretty well!

Running. *shudder*

186.9.  Another pound lost and another reward (this one was a white board).  I reeeeeally need to take these in to my office and enjoy them!

Hi!

Hello my lovely lovely friends.  I've been off in the world of masquerade masks for a few days.  I literally can't think of anything else.  It's been awful and wonderful at the same time.

I have a lot of new subscribers, and I am so very very pleased.  Hi new followers!!  Introduce yourselves!  If you are brand new you should know I'm planning a masquerade ball, and if you're in the bay area (or not) I would love you to come.  Because I am THAT excited.  You should probably also know that I have OCD and that is why I obsessively talk about it.  I'm trying to keep it to a minimum so that today I can talk about...

Running.

I was going to link back to a blog where I know I very strongly stated I was not a runner but I can't seem to find it.  I don't like to run, I don't get running, I quit c25k on week 1 day 2, and not even after I completed day 2!  However, upon further thought I've decided I'm going to run.  To be a runner.  I said in an earlier blog that I was going to run the Disneyland half marathon, and I'm pretty excited about that goal.  I actually am procrastinating signing myself up, although I know that is going to happen by the end of this weekend.

I have a plan.  A running plan that goes from today until race day.  A plan that will make sure that I can run it in the time allotted or hopefully faster.  I'm scared of this plan.  And embarrassed by it a little bit.  The thing is, I am starting off by trying to run a tenth of a mile away from my house and then back.  When I looked on Google Maps I felt humiliated to myself that I had to PLAN to run that tiny distance.  But when I really truly admit it to myself, I haven't been working out or walking lately.  I am out of shape.  This is the realistic way to go about things.

There are a lot of emotions I have associated with this plan.  The first is like I said, embarrassment.  I may or may not have mentioned that Husbandcake is a runner.  A distance runner in fact.  He considers himself out of shape when he gets out of breath...after a mile.  I consider it a huge accomplishment when I make it up one flight of stairs without wanting to sit down.  He'd never judge me or make me feel bad or slow but I'd just know that he didn't understand where I was coming from.  Another emotion is anger, anger at myself for letting myself get to the point that I don't have the confidence to run less than a quarter mile.  Then there's hope, that I can actually be a runner and imagine all the glorious calories that I'll be burning when I am out there running 5-6 miles at a time.  But I'd be kidding myself if I didn't tell you that the bad feelings took up about 90% of my feelings.

That's not like me.  Sometimes it's like me.  But I haven't snapped out of it, and THAT is not like me.  I try to be very upbeat and happy.  After all, I am about to start a wonderful fitness journey that will end in tutus!  What else could a girly girl want?

For it to be easy...

Yikes.  Really yikes.  That is NOT freaking likely.  The goal for me is to get my time under 2.5 hours.  That is not likely either.  Or maybe it is, maybe I'll be a natural and end up being faster than I think.  I imagine myself barely making it in under the 3.5 hour time limit and it's scary.

I'm scared that I'll fail.  I'm scared that I'll stick with this plan for a week and then forget it.  That I won't actually run the half marathon, that I will be on the sidelines cheering my friends on.  That while I'm cheering them on I'll be eating a corndog or something.  It's weird not to have faith in myself.  After all, I am awesome.  I really am, I have my moments of doubt but I don't fake how much I like me.  That's what makes those moments of doubt so hard.

I've got to snap out of it.  I can't kill myself with doubt before I've even started.  I have to go look at my plan again and get excited.  Yes it's embarrassing to run a block and back because that's as far as I can go, but it's just the first step.  And soon enough I'm sure I'll be posting that I ran those 5 miles without stopping, and we'll all be laughing at how silly I was that first day being worried about failure.

Right?

Coffee and Other Musings

I gave up coffee.  It's awful.  That's an awful way to start a blog post too, but I don't even care.  I'd probably have a better beginning if I'd had my coffee.  Coffee, as far as I know (I don't know, I'm making this sentence up) is not that bad for you.  What is bad about my drinking coffee is that I take it with two splendas and 3 tablespoons of creamer.

In case that doesn't mean anything to you, look at this picture...

See that coffee on the right?  NEEDS MORE CREAM. 

Some people drink coffee black, I drink it white.  And that my friends is a good 100 calories for every small mug of coffee.  Some days half the calories I consume at work are in coffee creamer and that cannot be good.

In better news, I'm at 187.3 this morning.  What does that mean?  It means I'm over 1/4 of the way to my birthday goal!  So that's a small victory right??  I bought a couple of cute frames for my desk - pictures will follow as soon as I get some photos in them!

In even BETTER news, the manipulation of my friends to help me in my diet is working!  I am looking forward to a fabulous night of dress trying-on and dinner at the home of one of my most wonderful friends, Amanda.  A combination of the two things most on my mind, being healthy and my masquerade ball - how can I help but be happy.

Oh my gosh, and in EVEN BETTER news, Husbandcake is home tonight.  Home from a few days in Washington DC, where he was having some kind of training.

It's the little things in life that make you feel good.  What's making everyone else feel good today?

Mini Weigh In

I almost forgot to let you guys know the fabulous news, that this morning I was down to 188.1, meaning 2 new things for my cubicle...hmmmm....whatever shall I get??  Any ideas?

Fat Tax and the End of Settling

Who spent this weekend looking at the prettiest dresses ever??

Oh...it was me!!!

Most people are going to think I'm crazy - and maybe you're right, a little bit.  My wonderful friends and husband are planning a 30th birthday party for me.  I could not be more excited - it's a masquerade ball!!  I just want to invite everyone I've ever met and have a fabulous time (uh - ps, you're ALL invited, provided you want to make the trip out to California).  But in reality what I want most is a beautiful ball gown, so I have been looking all over for ball gowns all weekend.

As I was going through one website in particular, I started finding myself annoyed when I came across this:

(no, I am not crazy enough to be spending nearly that much anyway in case you were wondering)

Please don't misunderstand me - I understand that bigger clothes take more fabric and therefore cost.  Of course I also know that the difference in fabric amounts between a 16 and an 18 is not that much.  On the other hand, a 10 in that huge dress is going to use a LOT more fabric than a size 2.  So how is it fair that only size 18 and up have to pay the amount?  Why don't my skinny friends get a discount?

You'll notice from my title that I have a name for this charge.  I call it a fat tax.  And yes, I think it's unfair.  If you are going to charge based on fabric, charge a different amount for every single size.  Will that kind of suck for everyone?  Maybe.  Would I happily pay a higher price based exactly on what I'm getting?  Definitely.

The random injustice of being told we have to pay more to look nice is so frustrating.  There are even some plus size sites that charge you more over a certain size.  Not to mention that's just when we're able to get something similar to non-plus size clothes.  Most of the time the plus size versions of clothes are crazy - giant weird prints, unflattering cuts, tents!  Even at my store of choice (Old Navy) you get your regular size dresses and then the plus size dresses are lumped in basically with maternity.  Wider straps, less detail.  A lot of fabric to try to hide your shape.  But very, very obviously just a "fat" version of the cute smaller clothes.

For those of us that are on the journey to losing weight, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. And that light is that eventually we'll all find our wonderful normal-size find, that perfect dress or shirt or whatever that makes you feel like jumping up and down and screaming that you lost weight.  For me this came in the form of a dress I wore to a friend's wedding in LA last month.

To get it though, check out this progression of dresses I've worn to various weddings....

This dress...I can't tell you how much I hate it.  There are no words, I just hate it.  and that is the look after hours of alterations, not to mention this dress came in regular sizes with thin straps, a better length and altogether way more wonderful. (and of course cheaper)

 

I'm pretty sure I posted pictures of this dress when i wore it.  It is an ok dress.  It had in addition to the bow under the bust that you can't see in this picture, bows at the shoulder.  It suffered from way-over-detailed syndrome, but I was pretty happy at the time to find a big girls dress that was not black..

This dress...oh my goodness, this dress.  Let me explain...

The thing about the dress I bought in December...is that I bought it at a juniors store.  I bought that dress for $22.50 at Charlotte Russe, and didn't have to alter it.  I'm going to let that statement re-sink in to my own mind.

To be able to shop at a normal size store is wonderful.  To be able to shop at a juniors size store is amazing.  I remember when the standard for a great dress was "minimal alteration, not black" - who wants to live like that?  Shouldn't the standard for a great dress be "feel fabulous, wear exactly what you want" instead?  It was eye opening for me to realize that.  To realize I could feel that great, to realize that I could be that happy with an outfit.

It couldn't have happened for a better wedding either.  Surrounded by Indian women in the. most. beautiful. saris you've ever seen, anything less than the perfect dress would have made sucked all the confidence out of me.  Wait - I am so distracted by how much I love that dress that I forgot my point.

OH!  Here is my point, let's bring it all back around. I am annoyed that people want plus size girls to pay more for clothes that are less wonderful.  I want to FIX it.  The epiphany that we don't have to look at clothes the way we are used to is a powerful one.  Now I get it.  And I want it to be that way for everyone. *end rant.

I just wanted to end on this.  I wish i could wear this every day.  Ok maybe minus the sleeves...

Running Just As Fast As We Can

Yesterday was a complete success.  My calorie deficit was just over 1000.  I forgot to weigh myself this morning but that's ok.  I think I did fabulously.

I meant to take pictures of the fabulous salmon salad and the cheesy muffin things I made last night, but forgot.  It's ok though because they were not at all pretty, but fairly delicious.  Especially the cheesy muffin things.  I wish I had brought one to work to eat right now...

Today I am going to ramble about my fitness goals.  I have one vague goal for this year, and that is this: the Disneyland half marathon in September.  The thing is...it's not my goal per se.  It's Erin's goal (and will be her second half marathon because she's aMAzing) and I'm just tagging along.  I mean my training so far, has been to decide that we should dress up and wear tutus and mouse ears.  I've even looked for tutus online.

This is how in shape I imagine Erin and I will be by September.  Hahaha...

Training-wise I know I need a plan.  I've walked a few 5ks now, one of which I jogged for...I dunno maybe 15-20 feet of it.  Haha :) seriously though I think I will set up a training schedule for how far I can run and how fast.  It will be much like the system I had for riding my bike to the store so long ago.  Or maybe I will re-try the couch to 5k program.  Either way, a little more every day and I'm sure I'll be able to do it in no time!  Well...er...a long time.  But it will be gradual and I think I will be able to do it.

So my own personal fitness goals are important too. But rather than a goal to work towards I think what I want from myself most of all is a commitment.  I want to work out two of every three days.  AND I want to move all day.  Even if it's just bouncing on my exercise ball I want to keep moving.  I need to get back in the habit of using the stairs during the day, using the restroom on the first floor and walking back up...whatever it takes.  I think we all know that every calorie we put into our mouths counts - well in the same way, every calorie we burn counts too!

In other, I meant to post this with my weight loss goals!  It's the first piece of my cubicle remodel....and I didn't even have to do any work for it :)

Don't I know the awesomest people??

 As you could have already guessed the theme of my cube will be pink and sparkly.  Can't wait, gotta get that first pound off!

Noms

Yesterday my calorie deficit was 812.  To get to my goal weight it was supposed to be at least 870.  Oops.  Which led to a not fun weight this morning of 190.4.

While I could easily blame that on the fact that I didn't exercise, that wasn't the problem.  It was my eating.  And it's exactly that, that is inspiring me to write to you about my eating goals today!

I have two eating goals, and the first one is so simple.  Cook.  A little background is that my work schedule changed.  Again.  And I am not getting home until about 6:00.  It is really rough.  I think back to a couple of months ago when I was home at 3:45 and I'm just...sad.  I feel like I don't have the right amount of time to get things done.  But guess what - it's time to suck it up.  Boo hoo, other people don't get home until 6:00 and THEY don't go out to dinner every single night or have their husbands cook for them.  So I will not do that either.  It makes me feel like a slacker when all I do is work and relax, and I can't fall into that trap so I have to stop now.

To help me with cooking though, I'm tricking a couple of friends into being healthy with me.  I guess it's not a trick as they'll probably see this when I post it.

A little preview of what my lucky guests might get tonight...

I'm experimenting on them with new recipes and I am going to trick them and possibly others into making this a weekly or bi-weekly thing, where we eat healthy food and cook instead of going out.  I really need this in my life.

My other eating goal is to PLAN.  I've already started the plan today.  I set alarms on my phone, to remind me to eat at good intervals.  Yesterday I didn't plan, had consumed only 300 calories (over 1/3 of that was coffee creamer!!) and got home starving and unable to think straight.  So I did what any complete idiot would do - I ordered fried rice and ate WAY too much of it!

To help with planning on a larger scale I bought a weekly calendar that will get stuck to my refrigerator where I can plan out my menus for the week.  If I have ideas and know what I'm cooking, I can get things out of the freezer or whatnot and never be stuck wondering what to eat.  Let's hope they have fast shipping and I can get started right away!

Hmmm, plan and cook.  Those goals are so simple they just might work...at least I hope they do!  What a boring post :) but super important.

What are your eating healthy tricks?  I have only a few that have REALLY helped me.  Weighing and logging my food are the biggest ones - my kitchen scale is almost as awesome as my Bodybugg, and it keeps me from overeating every time I use it.  The other thing I do is go small.  Small bowls (think rice bowl size), I even have small utensils.  I eat ice cream with a demitasse spoon - and all I take now is a teensy scoop!  It makes everything seem grander than it really is and makes small amounts of food last longer so I get that full feeling before I'm able to eat too much!

What a delicious eating trick!  Makes me want tiny amounts of ice cream right now!

Oh, hello scale - f*** you too.

So...not feeling as emotional as I was yesterday.  Or maybe it's just a very different emotion.  I'm angry!!!  Rawr!

 I had to peruse my old posts to find that on October 25 I weighed 184.4 pounds. I don't weigh that now. I hadn't stepped on the scale since I think Christmas morning, and then I was at 185.9. This morning? 190.1..

(that is me.  I did not draw it, but I saw the mirror and I looked like angry domo-girl after weighing myself)
 
I went back up into the 190s :( the sad face is the only thing I can think to let you know that it made my morning feel unhappy-like,.  I know, I know.  I will get over it.  All of it - the sad, the weight, the disappointment.  I will get past it.  I will be 184.4 pounds again.  And then I'll weigh less than that, I have faith.  This morning though...well, as I said, rawr.  It's a mental hurdle to see that 9 on the scale.

Let's try to move on (I'm not good at moving on so be prepared for me to come right back to this topic).  I meant to talk about goals today.  While my resolutions are vague at best, I really want to have something tangible to work towards.  And as this is first and foremost a weight loss blog I'm going to start with my weight goals and maybe over the next couple of days talk about fitness and eating and all the stuff that goes along with it.

When I started this blogging journey I was at 216 pounds.  Having already lost 31 pounds in the year and I half before blogging, I wasn't working towards anything in particular but had decided on a weight goal of 120.  Immediately I was chastised!!  I guess 120 was too low...at least since it's so far away.  I settled on 150 but I don't like that goal anymore.  At 150 pounds I will still be overweight (I'm 5'5") - only by about a tenth of a pound but overweight nonetheless.  And as weights go up and down on a daily basis...I'm settling on a magic goal of 148.  Safely normal-weight, and once I've been there for a month or two I can re-evaluate where I want to be. For now though - 148 is IT.

Meanwhile I do have a separate short term goal of 179.9 lbs as I am VERY EAGER to get out of the obese category.  I'm so close, although...twice as far as I was in October apparently.  I know I can do it though, and I'm going to try to knock it out fast.  I am banking on a lot of that weight going away quickly...hoping that it will jump down once I start drinking water, eating better food and flushing some of the ick out of my system. 

I actually am setting a goal date, something I haven't had a lot of success with but it's so important to me.  I'd like to be 179.9 by my 30th birthday.  I want to enter my 30s not being obese.  There I said it.  Now that is no short order - my birthday is in February and this would mean losing almost 2 pounds per week.  But I am confident that I can do it if I really, really try.

I do have a plan to get there...but I'll share that with you along with my eating and exercise goals.  First we will talk about the fun part of weight loss goals: rewards.  This being my birthday time of year, and less than 6 weeks away from my favorite and the most sparkly of all holidays I am going to go into reward OVERDRIVE.  Yeah you heard me.  And I'm getting a reward for every. single. pound. until I am no longer obese.

Now they're not huge rewards, some of them are very very small in fact.  My coworker just "remodeled" her cubicle at work and everything just looks so cute!!  So me being the copycat that I so obviously am, I am taking some time to remodel my own and for every pound I lose I'm going to allow myself to get one thing for my cubicle up to 10.  Anything from a frame to a lamp to a pen.  And just think with all the wonderful Valentine's Day things out there I am going to go into girly heaven.

Well, THAT certainly made me feel a bit more happy about having gained this weight - it's going to be fun getting rid of it!!

Unrelated to the rest of my post but I'm curious and being a lover of all things celebratory...what is your favorite holiday??  I can't help but love Valentine's Day.  It feels like the whole world is celebrating my birthday with me, decorating for me, it couldn't be more perfect!!

Love, Loss and Root Beer Barrels

Hello again my friends.  I wanted to get back into blogging about my everyday life again right away.  But every time I tried to write about how I've been health wise I find that I can't avoid this.  And what is the point of talking about my everyday life if I'm leaving out the most important things?

Last Monday, my jichan (grandfather) passed away.  The particulars aren't...particularly important.  He lived a long and very full life.  He was a wonderful person.  There isn't enough time in the world for me to say all I want to say about him.  I said in my last post that we weren't an overly emotional as a family and I meant it, but he still managed to make me feel like I was loved in a way I understood.  I have this really random memory from when I was a little kid (maybe 5 or 6?) and he was babysitting me and my sister.  We were across the street playing when I suddenly got sick in the neighbors' driveway.  In a second he was there...he must have been watching from the window.  He carried me home and asked if I was okay.  He took care of me.  When my dad got home, the first thing he asked me was if I'd gone back over to clean up after myself at the neighbors' house.  That's not to be down on my dad, because I know (now) that he cared and his brain just works differently.  But I mean...when you're growing up and something so small as a request to clean your room can make you think your parents hate you - my jichan was someone who always loved me.  For an overly emotional kid he was a safe haven.

There were no regrets with him either.  Not a one.  While a big speech about how much I love him would have just been weird for both of us, I hope I showed him.  I tried my hardest on birthdays, fathers days and Christmases to make him presents from the heart.  Whenever I could I would hand make his gift.  For his 90th birthday I gave him an afghan that was...oh my gosh by far the most labor intensive (but nicest) thing I've ever made.  It was little fish that all fit together to make a larger blanket, and I hope he loved it as much as I loved making it, and I hope he understood every silly and important emotion that I put into it.  I really do think he knew, and I knew he loved me, and what else matters.  I was so lucky to have been able to spend a bit of time with him the day before he passed.  There was nothing I ever would have done differently.

But it's been really difficult.  I spent a few days putting on a smile, because life went on - at least that's what it seemed like for everyone else.  I didn't really get how life was going on, but it did.  I found myself wanting to buy things.  Mostly candy-related things...I can't tell you how much chocolate I had, cookies and candy.  My love of candy came from him.  As long as I could remember he kept hard candies in the ashtray of his car, and I remember always happily unwrapping one when I was lucky enough to be going someplace with him.  The thing about life going on though is that it really doesn't make unpleasant things go away.  You have to stop and deal with things and for me it was rough.  Whenever it was just me and Husbandcake I was beyond a wreck.  I never stopped eating.  Not once.  There was always more candy.  There was always another box of Christmas cookies to be opened.  I would eat while I was crying.  I knew I was trying to eat away my sadness and even that didn't stop it.

Let's be clear - I wasn't the picture of healthy living before he passed.  I had already been eating VERY poorly and not exercising at all.  After his memorial service I took a deep breath and realized that it had to end.  I couldn't eat my problems away, and I knew that I was going to have to get back to a sustainable life.  And that's what I've spent the past couple of days doing.  Coming to terms with not having any more grandparents.  Coming to terms with someone so important to me being gone.  Realizing that he was more important to me than I ever knew.  Moving forward wanting to learn from all of his positive traits.

I know he wouldn't want me to wallow in a sugar filled pit of despair.  There's no doubt of that.  I went with a wonderful friend of mine last night and focused all of my unhappy feelings into this:

If you know me in real life you will know how out of character it was.  I hate pain.  I am not a tattoo type person.  But even the day that he passed, I had this feeling that I wanted him to be with me always in some grand gesture type way.  I am sure my parents will think I'm crazy (I don't think they quite believed I was actually going to do it), and quite a few of you will too.  But it felt right to me and if anything was ever worthy of being immortalized even symbolically it was this.  The fish is because he was a fisherman, he loved fishing and I hope he would have liked it.

I miss him.  And after writing all that...sorry, I'm too drained to come up with anything more poignant :)

New Year, New Resolutions...

Hi.  Every time I come back here I feel a bit...shamefaced.  I had this whole plan to start really blogging again once the new year started, once the craziness of the holidays and family time had died down.  I was a bit thrown this week, and it hasn't worked out how I wanted it to.  Nothing this past week has gone the way I wanted it to.

Still, it's the new year.  I made it!  There is so much I wanted to tell all of you, but instead of dwelling on the serious and sad things that have been happening I wanted to tell you about my resolutions.  To understand how important they are you should understand how important the new year is to me.  I get out an entire year's worth of superstitious nonsense all in two days - December 31 and January 1.  I am very much helped along by some wonderful Japanese traditions of cooking and feasting and family.

The new year is a time for new beginnings, and it's so important.  I know a lot of people out there will say that if something is important you can start at any time, but I think that a lot of us do a LOT better with that extra nudge.  I needed that nudge.  I need to come back to you all...it is harming me to be away from this world and my healthy lifestyle.

The new year is a time to be with people you care about and to set the standard for your year ahead.  I rang in 2011 for the first time in many many years with just myself and Husbandcake.  It was nice, relaxed...I missed hosting our annual Pajama New Year party, but I loved every moment of the two of us.  I also really love spending New Years Day with my family, and although our normal routine was interrupted (a whole other post) I was happy to have the day with the awesome people in my family.

The new year is an excuse to dream about who you want to be and what you want your life to be.  I've looked ahead and had huge dreams.  My resolutions are always so important to me.  They're well thought out, even when they're silly and I've never broken one.  But this year one wasn't enough for me.  So here goes...my new year's resolutions:

1. Care more - I lost someone last week who made me feel cared for.  I have realized throughout the week that I have family who cares more than they show (we are not big emotional gesture people), and friends that care more than I could imagine.  I want to live up to the amazing standard these people have set for me.  Mushy, yes...but true.

2. Be healthy - I've never resolved to lose weight.  And I won't now.  But I want to commit myself to being healthy, eating healthy foods, having a healthy lifestyle.  I want to run the Disneyland half marathon in September, for which I will begin training as soon as my foot stops feeling tender (got a tattoo today!)...so maybe in a couple of days.

3. Be me - I lost me.  I didn't hand-make any of my Christmas presents.  I haven't been cooking.  My house is a disaster.  And all these things made my loss feel so much worse...I felt like I lost my way, wasn't even looking for it and someone punched me in the face.  I want to feel like myself again.  Maybe I'm not the same person I was last January.  I'm smaller (yay!), I'm a little older, so who knows.  But I don't want to wallow back into nobodyness again.

4.  Blog - Maybe not every day.  Maybe I can't keep that up anymore.  But I'd like to give myself the chance every day, and not desert my blog just because I keep forgetting and get lazy.  It makes me happier, it makes me healthier, so I want to do it.

There we go.  I know it's a lot.  I know that this is a random and weird post.  I have a ton more to say, but today I am drained and can't say much more than that.  Just know that I will be back tomorrow :) and I missed you!!