New Year's Resolutions Part 2

Last year, my New Year’s resolution was to be nice to Xtian for the whole year. Well that lasted I think an hour…maybe less…for no real reason really, maybe because I just cannot help myself. After a discussion this weekend about my blog, I decided to take a look back and read all my entries and it seems that even online I manage to be a total shit to the love of my life. Le sigh, le sigh.

Truth be told, despite the fact that he travels constantly and works even more (I work like a crazy person too so this is a bit of an unfair statement) Xtian treats me like a doll. He spoils me rotten, goes out of his way to give me everything I want even if it means he doesn’t and when I talk to any of his friends, work colleagues, et cetera they all tell me that he spends all of his time talking about how wonderful I am. So how do I act? Like a total jerk. I feel a little like one of those rotten children who kick their dotting parents in the shins as the parents proceed to tell you how adorable their child is.

So with all of this I will revisit my new year’s resolutions and modify them to state that one of the main focuses this year will be to be nice to Xtian. I am officially starting today and I think I have done pretty well so far. Because he does deserve an equally doting girlfriend...one that does not kick him in the shins as I have been known to do...oops.

2008 New Year’s Resolutions

I work pretty much non-stop from November until the second week of January. As such I don’t really count any of the holidays nor make New Year’s resolutions until all the madness is done.

So after countless hours on my feet, numerous expensed breakfastes, lunches and dinners (and let’s face it cocktails) and a serious lack of sleep I am ready to hang up my tradeshow badges and officially start 2008.

What better way to kick the new year off then with new year’s resolutions? The drum roll please.

In 2008 I will:

1. While at home, spend less time on computer and more time socializing with the rents.
2. Given the gift purchase of a Nike+ system, I will officially become a “runner” knees willing (see impressionable).
3. Become more positive at work because as an account lead I need to set an example for my colleagues. Speaking of work, I need to get promoted or else.
4. Lose 20 lbs and get my parents to lose 20 lbs apiece.
5. Take up yoga again because I have missed it so.
6. Become more focused in all areas of my life with a special emphasis on health and work.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!

I'm Back

There is this great line in the book and ensuing move “About a Boy”* that I often think about when analyzing my own life. While explaining one of his many random philosophies on life the main character ‘Will’ states: “you have to mean things to help people… Me, I didn't mean anything, about anything, to anyone. I knew that guaranteed me a long, depression-free life.” I often feel that way…not necessarily about helping people (just tell me whom to cut a check to and I will) but about other things in life…like doing my nails, volunteering for the holiday committee, saving money, going out with acquaintances and blogs.

I am all gun-ho in the start – almost to an obsessive point – and then I just don’t deliver, finish, show-up, et cetera. It is not for lack of intent because I am full of that, and I want to mean so many things to so many people, but in the end I just it is just don’t really do the things I set out to do. I guess I don’t really mean anything.

Take this blog for example. It started because I am highly impressionable and my friend D sent me her blog that I began to read religiously. Then via her blog I found another blog that like D’s I also read religiously. So inspired I started this blog but after 4 posts I stoped my quick love affair with it and sadly it has been weeks since my last post. Yet I spend my free moments blogging in my head (okay I do this all the time with or without the blog, I journal in my head about random things) yet don’t commit to paper or screen.

Well this is about to change folks, in the words of Elton John “This Bitch is Back” and my New Year’s resolution is to blog more about the randomness that is my life so rejoice dear readers.

*Total side note – I have a random obsession with this book and the character Will. Maybe it is because I am obsessed with Nick Hornby and all of his main characters? Or perhaps because, sans the trust fund account, I was very “Will” at one point in my life? Who knows, but I thought I should mention that’s all.

When God Shuts a Door

He reminds you that TMZ is just a click away and you can remind yourself that in reality, your life could be worse...much worse. So as a reminder to all of you young impressionable girls out there...use a condom.

From TMZ:

"Jamie Lynn Spears, 16, has confirmed to OK! Magazine that she is pregnant. Oh. My. God. A source tells us the interview, which hits stands tomorrow, is six pages and is on the record with Jamie Lynn and her mother. She tells the mag that the father is Casey Aldridge, who she has been dating for some time and first met at church. Brit's younger sister, star of Nick's "Zoey 101," says she's keeping the baby. Sources tell us that she has not yet told her older sister. Well, she knows now."

Best part of this story hands down is "first met at church" which proves my point that most people go to church to hook-up. W-O-W WOW. For Moma Spears I seriously hope this is a joke.

Blame It on the Rain

How is it that I can be strong at work and in academics but completely lose my shit when it comes to my personal life? I guess it is because I have been coddled my entire life. By my parents, my sister, my boyfriends…even my friends to an extent. So what am I supposed to do now that I have to be the strong one in the family…in the relationship? I feel a little like a what I imagine a fish out of water would feel like, frantically grasping for air, not knowing if it will be able to make it or not.

Maybe it is the fact that it is pouring rain outside, or maybe that it is closely approaching xmas. Perhaps it is the fact that my mom is not doing so great these days and that xtian’s dad isn’t either. Or maybe, just maybe, that I have made it a bad habit in the last 29 years of my life to totally live in fear of “what might happen” even though I am not sure what that “might” entails exactly.

Whatever the reason I feel like crap lately. I can’t sleep, I can’t focus properly, heck I can’t really finish a sentence without the sudden urge to bust into tears and my normal network of coddle enablers have bigger fish to fry with their own issues. I feel alone and scared that I have been forced to step-up to the plate, a position I have never felt comfortable being in, and be the strong guiding force I know I really can’t be…not in my personal life anyway.

I want desperately for things to go back to they way they were…to a time when I was young and naïve, when people worried for me and not the other way around. I want to be that self-absorbed little twat I used to be whose main worry in life was a broken nail. The sad harsh reality is that I know that I can’t go back to that…ever…and that at my ripe old age I have to grow up and that my friends is a scary proposition. Sigh.

Up In the Gym Working On the Fitness

Although you could never tell by looking at me I believe I am a fairly active individual. I work out with a personal trainer 2-3 times per week, take boxing classes, do a dance class and a few kickboxing sessions peppered in when I need an ‘easy’ cardio break. So tonight during a “back in the game” fitness session my trainer totally caught me by left field. She asked me what my fitness resolutions are for 2008, and “loosing weight” does not count.

Um, what? What does that even mean? I mean I think for a person of my stature (read: over-worked, under paid, continuously stressed out oh and doubles as a personal assistant to both my rents, xtian and my two nephews) I work out a whole hell of a lot. I gave her some BS about trying to make it through an abs class without looking like an idiot (okay that is a real resolution) but I needed to take some time to think about it. She said her’s was to lose 15 lbs and to totally 100% killer abs (her abs are nice but I think she was Britney abs in the Slave for You era…can’t blame her there).

Any hoot on the drive home I got to thinking about what my “2008 Fitness Resolution” would be, but before I go into that I must take a step back and give myself a pat on the back for my 2007 accomplishments. For these, I have to give MAJOR props to my trainer for being on my ass constantly and to my BFF Vicky B for her continuous support of not allowing me eat Big Macs and encouraging me to go to the gym instead…I heart you!

Accomplishments of 2007:

• After many months of working with a hottie podiatrist, I can now kinda function on my feet without excruciating pain. I no longer walk like a duck (well kinda don’t) and I can workout again…yay.
• I can do about 30-40 push-ups girl style and about 10-15 boy style. When I first started I could do 3…girl style.
• After a long losing battle in countless Pilates classes I can do a roll-up…in fact I can roll-up until the cows come home.
• Although I have always had good cardiovascular fitness, I can now run upstairs to talk to my fav. person at work and not be completely winded…comes in handy if I have gossip IM comes in handy too which is usually what I use. OOPS.
• I have lost about 8-10 lbs….heeeyyyyyy.

Goals of 2008:

• To make it through abs class without looking like an idiot.
• To start to do yoga and/or Pilates again.
• Have nice arms so I can wear beaters all summer long.
• Get the rents on some sort of fitness program.To walk upstairs to gossip with friend…although given some of the sitchus at work it may be better chatting on IM…will have to think this one over.
• To stop flexing my arms and asking if people have tickets to the gun show.

Alright enough with all this fitness talk…it is time for a quesadilla and a glass or five of wine.

A Little Perspective

With the holidays around the corner and most of western civilization spending themselves into oblivion, I could not help but put things into perspective and wonder what is it all for? Will that Wii really make your wildest dreams come true? Will those Choos change your life (I have several pair and my life is still pretty much the same from the shoes I wore when I did not care about labels)? I think an all-around answer is no. I understand how hypocritical this all sounds…especially since I am in the business of selling want…of selling greed…but I think that a reality check should be in order especially during the holidays.

What inspired all of this? My team lunch today and talking to my manager about her “life” if you will. While I will not go into all the details, here is a woman who lost her husband in a very tragic way, who is dealing with a sick child that no over-the-counter medicine will cure, but who seems happy. When one of my teammates asked her how she deals with all the nonsense at work, she said something I will forever remember, “because I am too busy to care about stupid stuff.” Here is a woman who is on top of her game and who lives her life as fully as she can. She tries, rather successfully, to live in the now and check off her list of “things I want to do” that most of us put off for the proverbial “later.” Someone, who in spite of everything, got it right.

I guess dealing with issues always does that doesn’t it? Put things into perspective. It is sad really, but we all do it…I know I certainly do. Nevertheless, I really am at a place where I am “too busy to care about stupid shit” and just need to focus on getting it right.