Keep Moving On

So a few months ago I made that blog post with several goals for myself this year.

Some of them stuck, others not so much. (Shocker.)

I am continuing to build my knowledge base in my career field. My skills with Javascript have improved from the beginning of this year, thanks to online courses and reading. Having a magazine subscription helps as well, and helps keep me up-to-date with what’s going on along with online blogs.

Drawing more = doodle here and there. Not perfect, but it keeps my creative brain going. I don’t want to burn myself out, so I’m okay with this.

I see so many other women doing so well with their reading resolution! Me… Not so much. I have been reading a lot of career related stuff, but outside of that, not so much. I do need to get on the bandwagon and finish the Mistborn series. Just have to get myself to sit down and make time.

Catching up on Kingdom Hearts is slowly happening. Currently stuck on a boss battle that after a few times every time I get on, I have to get away from the TV to avoid throwing the controller.

This year, so far, we’ve definitely been better about keeping things in town. Besides a few weeks ago, when we took my three-year-old niece out to a children’s museum, we’ve kept things in town.

Fun time with the niece

My niece and I after getting to touch a electrically charged ball. Can you tell we’re related?

This past weekend, we ended up racing the local, inaugural St. Patrick’s Day 2 mile race (after getting a 8 mile run in). It was a great time; fun and fast course, and got to see a lot of our runner friends finish. I finished second overall female with a time of 13:35. Next year I’ll have to give it a shot with fresh legs. Afterwards, we celebrated the Irish way; drinking beer with friends!

I’ve even gotten a membership to Orange Theory Fitness to help motivate me to actually cross train. More on this after a few more classes, but it’s helped keep me grounded AND, after two classes, I feel much stronger.

How have your goals stuck thus far in 2018?

Goals for 2018

Inspired by my friend Brian, instead of naming some resolutions this year, I’m going to set a few goals that I can *hopefully* keep myself accountable for. So let’s dive right in!

Blog More. This is the main goal for this year. I keep telling myself I’m going to write a post for the blog, but have a bad habit of not falling through. This post is a great example! I’ve been meaning to write these goals down for two weeks and despite having ample time I just hadn’t done it. I’m going to keep this goal conservative and make just one post a month. If I do more than that great, but there will be at least one a month. And two in one month doesn’t cancel out the next month either.

No unfinished video games. The last few years I always seem to have a game or two on the shelf unopened when it comes to an end. Life does keep me pretty busy, but completing the 4-5 games I buy every year shouldn’t be hard. So the goal here is to complete the 3 games I currently have sitting on the shelf, plus any new ones I buy. The goal is to complete one game every two months. That might be cutting it close, but I think it will get me there.

House Renovations. In 2017, I managed to get the basement finished, and it’s worked out really well. Now we have two places to hang out and play games, which is nice when Alyssa’s friends come over. This year I want to re-do the upstairs bathroom (currently trapped in the 1960s) and the back and front porches. The bathroom is the bigger of the two projects so I’m going to start with that one first. I’m going to give myself until the end of May to complete it, and then spend the summer/fall working on the porches which really just need a fresh coat of paint.

Keep getting faster at running. I set a whole bunch of running personal records last year, and want to keep that going. I’m not doing another a marathon, as two years in a row is enough for me, so that one isn’t manageable but everything else is on the table. In particular I’d really like to take a few more minutes off my half marathon, which is probably also going to be the hardest. I managed a 1 hour and 59 minute finish last year and it was pretty tough. It also felt really good, so that should give me some serious motivation. I’m going to set my goal for the half at 1 hour and 55 minutes, but I’ll settle for anything under my current time.

That’s all the goals I’m going to set as that list should keep me occupied for most of 2018. They should also generate plenty of things for me to blog about! Exciting!

Here’s to a great year!

Another “Nothing Planned Saturday”

Sometimes you have those weekends where you have plans. Music festival, beer fest, comic cons… And then you have those weekends, where beside one or two smaller things, you have nothing planned. What do you do? Besides training runs, here’s how my weekend turned out:

Splatoon

Splatoon
Don’t know what it is about online multiplayer games and shooting things, but I love it. Even more so that I’m a squid that can swim through ink and hit people with paintballs and paint rollers like a ninja. I have been told I have an addiction with this game, and it didn’t help that this weekend was Splatoon’s Art vs Science Splatfest. Sorry Billy Nye, but I pick Art class over Science any day.

Spoiler alert: Art won.

Mistborn - Hero of Ages

The Hero of Ages (Mistborn)
After settling down from our move, I was finally able to make it to the library and picked up Hero of Ages, the final book in Vin’s story from Brandon Sanderson. So far I’ve made it to chapter three and have already read through some events that make me fall in love Sanderson’s writing even more. With it being the last book with Vin, I already know there will be plenty of feels to the end of this story.

How I Met Your Mother

How I Met Your Mother
How I Met Your Mother has been an on and off series for me. There are times where I sit down and watch four-five episodes, and then I can go several months without watching it again. Despite that, the characters in this show all have their own quirks and characteristics that make you feel an attachment toward each of them. There’s also some great life lessons included as well.

“If you’re not scared, you’re not taking a chance. If you’re not taking a chance, then what the hell are you doing?”

Ode to Paper Mario 64

Like a leaf in the wind
Oh how you float through the air
Paper Mario

Paper Mario

After playing through part of the game on the N64 growing up (I had a pretty short attention span growing up), I was very excited to see that I could finish Paper Mario on the Wii U via eShop. Both the art and the RPG style hooked me in.

Paper Mario - Kooper

The storyline is pretty interesting as well. Its simplistic; end goal is to save Peach and the kingdom from Bowser. I enjoy playing as Mario as he travels through different lands with various partners he picks up on the way (my favorite so far has been Kooper) to find all of the Star Spirits to overpower Bowser and his godmoding star wand. It’s also cool how you switch from Mario to Peach throughout the story and play spy to help Mario figure out where he needs to go next.

Paper Mario - Bowser & PeachCreeper.

With the amount of fun I’ve been having playing this game, I am a bit surprised there’s not much merchandise out there to buy. Thank God for Etsy, where I can look at things I want (and cannot afford.)

Paper Mario - MerchandiseBag | Star Keychain | Mario Keychain

Once I have completed this game, my eyes will be peeled for the sequel Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. Here’s to hoping that one is downloadable as well.