All right, here is my update on my quarterly goals!
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Area One: Health
1) Work out five times a week for 30 minute or more (71.4%). Yoga twice a week. Something else three times a week.
October: 25/31 (80.6%) days of working out 30 minutes or more, 10 yoga, 14 strength/cardio
November: 25/30 (83.3%) days of working out 30 minutes or more, 12 yoga, 18 strength/cardio
December: 22/31 (71%) days of working out 30 minutes or more, 7 yoga, 16 strength/cardio
Entire quarter: 72/92 (78.3%) days of working out 30 minutes or more, 29 yoga (2.2/week), 48 strength/cardio (3.7/week)
Entire year: 291/365 (79.75%) days of working out 30 minutes or more, 122 (2.26/week) yoga, 176 (3.26/week) strength/cardio
Conclusion: I did a great job at meeting my exercise goals. I'm quite proud of myself.
2) Drink at least sixteen ounces of water before lunch and at least sixteen ounces of water after lunch.
October: 12/31 (38.7%) in the morning, 25/31 (80.6%) days after lunch
November: 15/30 (50%) in the morning, 26/30 (86.7%) days after lunch
December: 18/31 (58%) in the morning, 30/31 (96.8%) days after lunch
Conclusion: This water thing needs some work.
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Area Two: Professional
1) Get a new job.
*huge sigh*
2) Hire a new director for the community center.
Our new ED accepted a job in early November. Yay! She starts today.
Conclusion: 50% isn't bad? Oh, heavens. I'm tired of my job situation and I really don't want to talk about it.
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Area Three: Communication
1) Continue to post on my blog at least three times a week.
October: 16 posts
November: 46 posts (LOL! NaBloPoMo is real)
December: 48 posts (more than November!)
2) Continue to write to K/D/M once a month.
October: Everyone got Halloween cards AND postcards from my Columbus trip.
November: Everyone got a Thanksgiving Day card.
December: Everyone got a Christmas card.
3) Keep a list of snail mail I send and books I read.
October: Book list here. I sent 20 Halloween cards, including to all my nieces and nephews, one condolence card, and five postcards from my trip to Columbus, for a total of twenty-six pieces of snail mail.
November: Book list here. I sent 17 Thanksgiving cards, including to all my nieces and nephews, and four birthday cards, for a total of twenty-one pieces of snail mail.
December: Book list here. I sent 82 Christmas cards via snail mail, hand-delivered four in my neighborhood, one thank you card, one birthday card, and three boxes of gifts.
4) Text T/T/M once a week.
October: Missed one person twice (ouch!), but the other two met the goal
November: I did it!
December: I did it!
Conclusion: I crushed these communication goals.
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Area Four: Post-Pandemic Reentry
1) Visit a new park/nature preserve/outdoor space once a quarter.
October: I went to a park and conservatory in Columbus during my trip there.
November: Nowhere new.
December: It wasn't new, but we did go to the Rotary Gardens to see the lights.
2) Have people over to our house at least once - for a game night, dinner, or just a hang out.
October: We hosted people for a Sunday afternoon of Mexican train dominoes.
November: No one other than me and Dr. BB entered our house. LOL.
December: We had two people over!
Conclusions: This was fine, I guess. I just see people doing things like normal, like eating at restaurants, going to movie theaters, and shopping in stores without masks, and I wonder if I'm the only one who sees we're still in the middle of a pandemic. We haven't had COVID or really been sick since this whole thing started and I'm a tiny worried that our immune systems are not going to handle anything well if we start taking off our masks. I don't know. I am starting to really feel like an agoraphobic, misanthropic hermit. This is really the area where I should place emphasis for next year's goals.
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Area Five: Miscellaneous
1) Keep track of mileage walked with the dog.
October: We did a total of 51.23 miles this month. There were a couple of weekends when I was out of town, so I didn't walk her at all for a few days. There were still lingering firecrackers, so evening walks were a big sporadic. However, this is a respectable 1.65 miles a day and I like it.
|
Number of Walks |
Number of Days |
|
0 |
3 |
|
1 |
5 |
|
2 |
11 |
|
3 |
12 |
|
Number of Walks |
Number of Days |
|
0 | 0 |
|
1 |
1 |
|
2 |
8 |
|
3 |
21 |
December: We did a total of 66.51 miles this month, which is an average of 2.15 miles a day. This was a weird month because there were a number of days when Hannah didn't want to go out (rain, severe cold), but there were also days when we walked almost four miles. We went to the dog park a couple of times and we are definitely going in the right direction!
Number of Walks | Number of Days |
0 | 2 |
| 1 | 2 |
2 | 13 |
3 | 14 |
Conclusion: Hannah's feeling better, the fireworks have stopped, and she's so much happier these days!
2) Create a document for Dr. BB in the event of my untimely death. Inspired by Suzanne's post.
Ha ha ha. No.
3) Brush the cat and dog's teeth daily.
October: 19/31 (61.3%) for Hannah, 20/31 2(64.5%) for Zelda - After the first week in October, I switched to brushing their teeth after breakfast instead of doing it at night. This was pretty successful and I'm optimistic that we can continue this.
November: I missed Zelda once this month, but Hannah every day. We started doing it in the morning and I'm much more likely to do it in the morning and they're more agreeable in the morning, too. Switching to mornings has been quite useful in changing this habit.
December: I missed each one once a month, but I think it's officially part of our morning routine now.
4) Cover two flower beds over the winter with black plastic or cardboard so we can start those beds fresh next year.
Yes, this was completed!
I would say you did pretty great. About the pandemic re-entry- it's so interesting to see how different everyone's experience was. Because of the Covid policies in Florida (eye roll) i was off work for eight weeks (in March-April of 2020) but then everything opened up again and I had to go back, because I couldn't continue to collect unemployment. So other than those eight weeks my pandemic life was pretty close to regular life, other than that we wore masks. I can't even remember when we stopped wearing them- now it's not unusual to see someone wearing a mask, but the majority of people don't. I really don't know what the "right" policy would have been- I did get Covid, once, but psychologically maybe it was healthier? I don't know.
ReplyDeleteAnd, wait... ZELDA lets you brush her teeth????? I'm impressed.
1) In retrospect, I wish we'd been forced to do more earlier on. Maybe not quite to Florida levels, but...somewhere in between that and where we are now. I'm really struggling to go out and do things and the fact that we were able to work from home and that my husband has a chronic health condition combined to make us nervous about human interaction. Maybe if we did get COVID or a cold or something, we'll actually loosen up a bit!
DeletePandemic re-entry is tricky. We were trained to avoid risk for so very long and that can take a toll on a person and make it hard to get back to more normal risk metrics. With the vaccines, it does feel like the risk of covid now is similar to the risk of getting the flu in previous winter periods (to be clear - before effective vaccines, covid was NOT equivalent to the flu!! Just want to be 1,000% clear there- I'm talking about equivalency in a post-vaccine/booster world). So that was a mindset change I underwent. I thought about how, pre-covid, I went to restaurants during cold/flu season without thinking twice. So I had to adjust my risk framework because I was missing out on a lot of what I loved and a lot of what my kids would enjoy by trying to limit our risk. But you might not be missing the things you did before that no longer feel safe, so it might be completely fine for you 2 to keep masking and not eating out, etc. Our situation is different since our biggest source of risk is daycare, but it's totally and completely essential. I am still respectful of the pandemic and I mask when I go places like Target, the grocery store, airplanes, etc. But I do think getting covid and being fine in May helped me see that I didn't need to protect myself so stringently, if that makes sense?
ReplyDeleteAll that said, I think you did great on your goals, especially your working out goals!!!
The thing is that we were like this BEFORE the pandemic. We've ALWAYS had a Purell container in our cupholder in our car and hand sanitized before and after entering public spaces. We ALWAYS were a tiny bit creeped out by restaurants and waitstaff with sniffles. And I got a really terrible case of pneumonia when I had the flu that wasn't treated properly, so I've always been a bit nervous of the "it's just like the flu" because I was a healthy twentysomething who landed in the hospital because of the flu. So we were paranoid BEFORE COVID and the pandemic just exacerbated all of it. Even if we go back to our normal, I fear it will seem restrictive to others. On the other hand, we are restricting ourselves more than I think we should, so I need to get back to our normal somehow. *sigh* I just need to get sick again, I think, and that would maybe put me in a better frame of mind about the whole thing, but I don't want to be sick! Maybe I need to get back into therapy.
DeleteI think you did fantastic - some goals are not always completely in our control, but you crushed the workouts and I mean, yes, NaBloPoMo (and obviously December blogging) is REAL! :)
ReplyDeleteWriting a daily blog is so much work! I don't remember it being this hard when I did it before. I definitely respect the folks who've been doing daily blogging for a long time a lot.
DeleteYou did great, friend! Way to go on crushing so many of your goals and coming close in many other areas.
ReplyDeletePandemic re-entry IS hard, especially if you were very cautious BEFORE the pandemic. I have never been too concerned about the flu and other viral stuff, and I wasn't even TOO worried about Covid (for myself) because I knew I was healthy and would likely be okay if I got it. (Obviously, I masked up and try to limit social interactions and did everything I could to NOT get it AND to not pass it on to other people who are immunocompromised or live/work with immunocompromised people.) Plus, Florida was acted like there was no pandemic so it's been a much different experience for me. I hope you are able to take baby steps in 2023 to feel more comfortable in public. It has to be exhausting to continuously worry about this!
I am starting to think that maybe Florida got it right, though. You are Jenny aren't puzzling over whether or not to travel or go to events or eat in restaurants. It seems much more mentally healthy!
DeleteOK, so here's my (really really late) thought... Do you want to get out more because you used to do that and it made you happy? Is it because others are doing it and you think you should too? If it's the first, well, the world is just different now, at least for some of us. I also have this perception that risk remains high - and I also have multiple chronic issues. I wasn't social before (and never ate out much) but the pandemic does seem to have changed me. So I'm wondering if it changed you, too, and this is your new normal? And, if you're really happy living how you are now - i.e. differently than pre-COVID - than maybe you don't need to change?
ReplyDeleteBut if you're not happy doing this, then what's your motivator to change? Do you want to see friends more? Leave your house more?
I want to get out more because I want to live a normal life. If you turn down enough invitations, you stop getting invited and I don't want to completely wreck the social life I worked so hard to create. So, it's not a matter of thinking I *should*, but rather knowing that my mental health is suffering. The numbers right now are relatively low and I need to get over this idea that I'll never get sick again. I don't want this to be my new normal, I guess. But I worry it will be.
DeleteOK, that makes total sense. But for me, at least, it's *hard* to get over that visceral fear we've been living with for nearly 3 years. I know the pandemic changed me - and I like a lot of the changes - but I also struggle with my, well, struggles to get out of the house. It wasn't so hard "before"... sigh.
Delete