Another Commitment

Back in September I decided that I must lose a bit of weight over the next few months. I say a bit, but you know I mean a LOT!

I can lose weight quickly, if I really try, especially if I walk a lot. However, when I do that it ends up giving me lots of trouble with my back. When I walk I first lose around my hips and waist, and I guess that causes a re-distribution of weight that effects my scoliosis, bad discs, and the nerves that are already damaged down there.

But if I lose slowly, it doesn't pain me as much. Since slower is the way to go, anyway, I set myself a simple, reachable goal of 2 pounds in the month of October. I know that doesn't seem like much, but I figured if I reached it, I would be encouraged and more likely to keep it off and keep taking it off in future months.

I began October at 1*5.8. Yesterday morning when I weighed I was 1*3.4. So I reached my goal, plus 4 extra ounces. Yay, me!

My goal for November is to lose another 2 pounds.

First Day

Okay, so this is my official NaBloPoMo for today, although I don't really have much to say. Eler Beth did MUCH better with her first post of the month.

Of course I can excuse myself by saying that I was trying very hard to get 1,667 words written for NaNoWriMo, and that took priority. I made it to just under 1,300. Close enough! There were also other things to do today, like teach school, clean, cook, do laundry, and run errands.

So how am I going to make time to write? I'm going to try to set aside 90 minutes each morning just for writing. And I'm going to MAKE myself write before I check Facebook or email. Thomas leaves for work at 6 a.m., so between that time and 7:30 I should be able to get some good writing in. Then it's breakfast and morning routines, and then school. The only problem is that many mornings Eler Beth is already up at 6 a.m. This morning she got up at 5!!! (But I love it the challenge!)

Okay, so that's it for today. I'll try to be a bit more interesting tomorrow. I have all kinds of subjects to write about running about in my head, but I'm too sleepy to write about them tonight. Until tomorrow, then!

NaBloPoMo

I decided I would do NaBloPoMo again this year, as well as NaNoWriMo, mostly because Eler Beth decided she would do it. I figured if I did a blog post every day, first thing in the morning, then wrote on my NaNo for an hour or so, that would be a good way to start the day.

Is anyone else doing either NaNo or NaBlo this year? It's not yet too late to sign up!

Holy NaNo, Batman!

According to my sidebar counter, NaNoWriMo starts in 9 hours!!!

I'm getting all quivery inside! :)

It Never Hurts To Repeat Yourself....

In honor of my niece Sheila's starting a blog here at Blogger, and because she is the first and ONLY member of my family other than Thomas and the kids that I am (knowingly) sharing my blog with, I have decided to re-post an entry I did my very first year of blogging in 2005. This is a post that is in my Dusty Pages Archives blog, and features possibly her first attempt at diplomacy.

Dated Wednesday, October 19, 2005:

And that reminds me.........

Well, Sunday I redeemed myself by making homemade vegetable soup and cornbread, and as I sat down here to decide what I was going to write, the vegetable soup reminded me of a "soup" story. This story was written down by the family "historian/scribe", my sister Barbara, years ago, and I'm sure she did a better job than I'm going to do, but I'll give it a shot -- because it's a cute story.

I was about 10 years old, and it was a cold, snowy, blustery day. My nieces and nephew and I had been playing outside and were very happy to come in to my Mom's nice warm kitchen, smelling deliciously of her homemade vegetable soup. We gathered around the kitchen table, bowls of soup in front of us, my mom and four of my sisters ladling soup into their own bowls, pouring cups of coffee and talking away.

Suddenly in the middle of their conversation, my three-year-old niece, Evonne, piped up with, "Pidah in my tsoup!" The conversation continued, so she tried again, "Pidah in my tsoup!"

"What's she saying?"

"I don't know; sounds like she's saying there's a spider in her soup!"

"Well, there is! There is a spider in her soup!"

No one knew how the spider came to be in her soup, but the soup was disposed of, a fresh bowl was given her, and talk turned inevitably to such topics as -- places in the earth where spiders might be eaten -- times of famine in which perhaps we might be happy to have spiders to eat, etc. My seven-year-old nephew, Bill, always a picky eater anyway, stated, "Well, I wouldn't eat it!"

My seven-year-old niece, Sheila, (definitely her mother's daughter!), tried a compromise. "Well, if you cut its head off...."

Bill: "I still wouldn't eat it!"

Sheila: "Well, if you cut its legs off...."

Bill: "I still wouldn't eat it!"

Sheila: "Well, if you drained all the blood out!"

Bill: "I STILL wouldn't eat it!"

At which point Sheila's mother, my sister Dennice, offered reassuringly, "That's okay, Sheila. Sometimes no matter how you prepare something, the men won't eat it!"

I hope everyone enjoyed that, and Sheila, if you are reading this, I hope you don't mind! :)

{{Singing}} "Brush Up Your Shakespeare...."

I have been very bad about keeping up with my reading of Shakespeare for the past two months. I just really haven't been in the mood. I want to read all his works within 12 months, just to say that I read them all in one year's time, but it's hard to make myself read something I'm not in the mood for.

I shall persevere however.

Here is my updated LIST, if anyone is interested. I've recently read "Romeo and Juliet" (not ever a favorite by ANY means!!!), mainly because I figured it was a good one to use to introduce Eler Beth to The Bard, "King John" (a bit weak, but still Shakespeare), the Sonnets (again, because it fit in with Eler Beth's poetry unit we're doing), and two of my very favorite comedies, "Much Ado About Nothing" and "Twelfth Night". We read them, and then we watched the movies.

Has anyone else kept up with your Shakespeare lately?

Can anyone tell me (without googling) what the titular quote is from?

NaNoWriMo Just Around the Corner

Have decided I'm going to do NaNoWriMo again this year. I have an idea out of which I think I can get 50,000 words. My only problem will be not getting started on it until November 1!!