It occurs to me that I never gave the 2017 resolutions recap. Here it is!
Diet
If you'll recall, my plan was to track what I eat in order to figure out how much I eat in a year so I would know what I need to plant to grow it myself. I made a really good start with this, but with multiple moves and food sharing with housemates it was too hard to keep track. I might re-start this plan in 2018 but we'll see.
Exercise
My exercise goals were to be able to do a handstand, a cartwheel, a split, 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. I still can't do the handstand, splits, or pull-ups, but I've reached all the other goals.
I debated and ultimately wound up deciding against doing a 5K color run because as exciting as crossing the finish line sounds to me, it turns out that running just isn't my thing.
I was curious about the circus classes , rock climbing, kickboxing, and Krav Maga. I wound up taking "Survey of Circus" at Esh Circus Arts in Somerville. I'd love to take another circus class at some point, but now I don't live near there anymore. After I moved here, I started taking kickboxing and Krav Maga at a local studio and I'm really enjoying both.
Finances
I am proud to announce that I'm credit card debt free, my car is paid off, and I'm on my way towards paying off my current student loans before I need to take out loans for nursing school. I have not managed to put money into retirement because I've been throwing anything extra into debt. I fizzled out on using Digit for no particular reason. I did, however, keep up with my charity donations. I should really start posting about the charities I pick again.
Focus More on Spirituality
I did a really good job with this goal overall. I continued to do my daily gratitudes and finally got into the habit of saying grace before meals. Although I did pray more frequently, I wasn't successful at the morning and bedtime prayers. I finally found a new local church and I need to get into a more regular routine with going.
One thing I'm really proud of myself for this year is following through with both my "Become Love" motto and the "Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary?" criteria regarding my speech. I've been in several extremely difficult interpersonal situations this past year and I'm overall satisfied with how I conducted myself. I behaved well, even in the face of lies and slander directed at me by people I'd trusted.
This Year's To-Do List
If you'll recall, these were the smaller things that didn't seem large enough to be proper resolutions.
Here are the ones I managed to do:
* Get a professional massage.
* Go on a date.
* Swim in the ocean.
* Make video recordings of me reading kids' books and send them to Wolfie.
* Go dancing.
* Fly a kite.
* Take the kid housemates sledding.
* Take my grandmother out to lunch.
And here are the ones I started but didn't finish:
* Make a will - I have this written up but need to make it official.
* Self-publish my kids' book - I've switched who is illustrating this for me.
* Make a junk statue with Tea.
* Go camping and roast s'mores - I set up MULTIPLE camping trips, all of which failed to happen. I did, however, roast s'mores around a friend's backyard firepit.
* Play a violin duet with Primo - we picked a song but I wound up moving out so this didn't happen.
* Bike around Martha's Vineyard - this was a planned trip with Cupcake that they canceled.
And here are the ones I didn't do:
* Make a junk statue with Tea.
* Organize all of my photos.
* Go sailing.
* Take my dad kayaking.
* Become an ambassador for the Boston Children's Museum.
* Go apple picking and then make a pie.
* Go on a whale watch.
Affichage des articles dont le libellé est Finances. Afficher tous les articles
Affichage des articles dont le libellé est Finances. Afficher tous les articles
dimanche 11 février 2018
vendredi 3 mars 2017
New Years Resolutions Update
Diet and Exercise
February's first charity was the Wôpanâak Language Reclamation Project. This project is really amazing. I learned about it because I have a friend in the tribe who works for them as a teacher trainee.
Story time: When I was a kid my family visited the Wompanoag tribe of Aquinnah on a family vacation to Martha's Vineyard. Before that I'd been your typical clueless white kid who dressed as an "Indian" for Halloween and assumed the cowboys killed them all off long ago. I remember being surprised when I met and played with a group of Wompanoag kids my age who weren't at all like the stereotypes. After that I read everything I could about their tribe and was really upset to learn I was being lied to in my history classes at school. Fast forward to 2006. I worked at a community-based acute psychiatric treatment facility for kids and this friend was one of my coworkers. We stayed Facebook friends after I left and eventually she got a job with this project.
Ok. So what exactly does the Wôpanâak Language Reclamation Project do? Their goal is to return fluency to the Wompanoag nation so they teach people the language. They have adult classes, kids classes, an immersion program for grades K-6, and a 3-week summer program for kids ages 5-15. Their classes are only open to tribal members and their families and they're completely free.
My other donation this month is to a place I've already talked about on here - Wolf Hollow aka the North American Wolf Foundation. You can read more about them on their website and you can see my visit to them in this blog post.
Diet is going smoothly and on Sunday Bone and I start our class at Esh Circus Arts!
 |
| Picture of a green dumbbell and two pieces of broccoli arranged in the shape of a dumbbell. |
Finances
I'm still diligently sticking to my financial plan. I paid off a credit card! Only two credit cards to go and the total is under $5,000. Lest you think I'm flagrantly irresponsible, I feel I should let you know that one of those cards is composed entirely of medical debt and the other is composed entirely of divorce debt. Life lessons? Be careful who you marry and live somewhere with cheap universal health care.
What else? I just filed my taxes and I've also donated to two more places in keeping with my every other week donation schedule.
What else? I just filed my taxes and I've also donated to two more places in keeping with my every other week donation schedule.
February's first charity was the Wôpanâak Language Reclamation Project. This project is really amazing. I learned about it because I have a friend in the tribe who works for them as a teacher trainee.
 |
| Map of Martha's Vineyard with Wôpanâak language place names. |
Story time: When I was a kid my family visited the Wompanoag tribe of Aquinnah on a family vacation to Martha's Vineyard. Before that I'd been your typical clueless white kid who dressed as an "Indian" for Halloween and assumed the cowboys killed them all off long ago. I remember being surprised when I met and played with a group of Wompanoag kids my age who weren't at all like the stereotypes. After that I read everything I could about their tribe and was really upset to learn I was being lied to in my history classes at school. Fast forward to 2006. I worked at a community-based acute psychiatric treatment facility for kids and this friend was one of my coworkers. We stayed Facebook friends after I left and eventually she got a job with this project.
Ok. So what exactly does the Wôpanâak Language Reclamation Project do? Their goal is to return fluency to the Wompanoag nation so they teach people the language. They have adult classes, kids classes, an immersion program for grades K-6, and a 3-week summer program for kids ages 5-15. Their classes are only open to tribal members and their families and they're completely free.
 |
| Howling wolves. |
My other donation this month is to a place I've already talked about on here - Wolf Hollow aka the North American Wolf Foundation. You can read more about them on their website and you can see my visit to them in this blog post.
Spirituality
I'm keeping up with my prayers, gratitudes, and church attendance. I've also gotten a bit better at shutting down negative gossip around me and resisting the urge to do it myself. It's an ongoing struggle, though. Frankly Jesus' idea of loving your neighbor is harder than it seems because not all of our neighbors are easy to love! I'm sure there are plenty of people who think that about me as well, though, and I'm trying which I suppose counts for something.
To-Do List
This month I made a will. I just have to get enough money to make it official.
 |
| Picture of a pair of glasses sitting on top of a last will and testament. |
jeudi 2 février 2017
Resolutions - One Month In
Well it's February second. Today I accompanied Cupcake to divorce court. Here's a picture of our accidentally coordinated outfits:
That's not what I want to post about, however. Instead, because we're one month in, I figure now is a great time to update about my New Years Resolutions. Here we go…
The charity I donated to before that was to United We Dream, which is the largest immigrant youth-led organization in the nation. Their mission is "to organize and advocate for the dignity and fair treatment immigrant youth and families, regardless of immigration status." This donation was in response to the anti-immigrant policies the government has started rolling out.
 |
| Me and cupcake. I'm wearing a light purple button down with a grey sweater over it. My outfit coordinates with Cupcake's eye makeup. |
That's not what I want to post about, however. Instead, because we're one month in, I figure now is a great time to update about my New Years Resolutions. Here we go…
Diet
Tracking my food has been easy and really interesting so far. I'm saving the list for the end of the year reveal, but I'll say that I've added a category titled "Laziness" for food I could and should have made myself and that "Chocolate" is its own category. One problem I failed to anticipate was how often I feed other people. Adding this in means that the totals for what I eat will probably be slightly inflated but I'm keeping it in there because I'm looking less for how much I consume and more for an accurate gauge of how much food I would actually need to plant for the year and that will include feeding house guests. In this same spirit, I'm not including food I eat while visiting friends because I wouldn't be planting food for that.
Exercise
I'm signing up for one of this session's classes at Esh Circus Arts with Bone. Registration opens on Valentine's Day. I've also been working out sporadically at the gym at my work since it's free and exercising outside is too cold.
 |
| Picture of a fat white woman doing circus tricks. |
Finances
Things are going swimmingly. My most recent charity donation was to CAIR Massachusetts aka the MA chapter of the Council on American Islamic Relations. They're America's largest Muslim civil rights organization. I decided to donate to them because I feel sickened by the anti-Muslim sentiments of my government and I wanted to do something to help Muslim Americans.
 |
| Photograph of a woman using an american flag as a head scarf. |
The charity I donated to before that was to United We Dream, which is the largest immigrant youth-led organization in the nation. Their mission is "to organize and advocate for the dignity and fair treatment immigrant youth and families, regardless of immigration status." This donation was in response to the anti-immigrant policies the government has started rolling out.
Spirituality
I've restarted my daily gratitude sharing with Feather. I've also gotten back in the habit of regular prayer and church attendance.
 |
| Blue text on a yellow background that says "Become Love." |
I'm working hard on my "become love" motto. It's harder than you would think to stop judging other people. For me the judging isn't about how other people look but about how they act. The biggest problem for me are that I get incredibly frustrated by people who I feel aren't working hard enough to improve themselves and their life situations. The problem is that a lot of the time these people aren't just "lazy" they're struggling with mental illness or some other problem that is impeding their ability to do better than they are doing. Given that other people's lives are really none of my business anyway, I think I could be a lot kinder than I am about this.
Also, as I've been working my speech with the true/kind/necessary rule, I've noticed that I have a couple of friends in particular who seem to bond by complaining about people they dislike and it's hard for me to redirect the conversation and avoid getting sucked in. I need to figure out what to do about this.
To-Do List
So far I've knocked one off my to-do list: get a professional massage.
lundi 2 janvier 2017
2017 New Years Resolutions!
I've already figured out a bunch of resolutions for this year and I'm pretty excited about them. I've broken them down by category (in alphabetical order)...
Diet
I met all of my dietary goals last year and now they're a way of life so I'll be continuing them. This year's food-related project is not about changing what I eat but tracking what I eat for a very interesting purpose.
I read this neat article written by a survivalist about stocking up enough of an emergency food supply to last you for a year. His list is based on someone needing 2,200 calories a day (803,000 calories a year) and contains grains, beans, shortening, powdered milk, sugar, honey, potato flakes, salt, multivitamins, and herbs/spices. I'd probably be cranky about the lack of variety if I had to live off his survival foods, but in a pinch it seems like it'd work.
At any rate, that list got me thinking about how much food a person eats in a year. I have a goal of eventually growing the bulk of my own food. To do that I'll first have to know which foods I eat in a year and how much of them I eat so that I know what to plant in my garden. So this year my food goal is to track all of my food intake. To make it easier on myself, I'm going to record all the food I buy as the last step of each grocery shopping trip. Then at the end of the year I'll subtract out any foods I haven't eaten to get to my final total. Neat, huh?
Exercise
My exercise goals for this year are a continuation of last years goals. I want to be able to do a handstand, a cartwheel, a split, 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. I'm considering whether I want to do a 5K color run this spring. And I also want to check out Esh Circus Arts, Rock Climbing, Kickboxing, and Krav Maga - but one at a time, because they're expensive.
Finances
I'm going to keep up Tea's and my "I am a money magnet!" motto. I will to continue to pay off my debt. I will debit 10% of my income every two weeks to my Roth IRA at Vanguard. I'll build my rainy day fund with 5% per paycheck until I have $10,000 in the account and will finally automate this and then do the CD laddering I talked about. I'll keep using Digit, since it's been working well for me. And I'll go back to doing my $20/week charity donations.
Focus More on Spirituality
I want to re-focus on my spirituality this year. Especially since I have an adorable goddaughter to guide! This resolution has four parts to it:
The first part is to restart my daily gratitudes. My friend Feather and I used to text each other daily with three things that we were grateful for and it really helped us both to change our focus towards recognizing how blessed we both are and being thankful for that. I'm getting back into that habit this year.
The second part is to pray more frequently. I'm going to go back to saying grace before meals and praying before bed every day. I find that daily prayer really helps me let go of the petty stuff and realign my focus on what matters. I'm also going to start saying David's prayer in the mornings when I get up. Someone in a comment thread online was talking about it and it seemed like a great idea to me. Here's the prayer:
"Create in me a clean heart, O God;
restore within me a sense of being brand new.
Do not throw me far away from Your presence,
and do not remove Your Holy Spirit from me."
- Psalm 51:10:11
The third part is to go to church regularly. I was doing this for a while but it fell off when I moved to my current living space because of the commute. I did look around a bit for a church to attend here but I didn't find one that felt like the perfect fit. This year I'm just going to go anyway. No community is perfect, and I can't let my own perfectionism be a reason to never go to church.
The fourth and most important part of this resolution is to stick more closely to my spiritual motto. My spiritual motto for years now has been "Become Love." I made it my motto after attending a church service years ago where the priest called us to become love like Jesus is love. Something in that homily really struck a cord with me and ever since then I've carried a piece of paper with my motto on it inside my wallet to help me remember the service and my commitment to be more Christ-like in my daily life. This year I want to do more to put it into action. Both in more concrete ways - like with charity donations, activism, and volunteer actions - and in more abstract ways like the way I treat others and how I think about myself and other people.
To give an example: I'm someone who processes things best with someone else to bounce ideas off. The downside of this is that when I'm having problems with another person and I try to process that with a friend, I feel that I often stray more towards negativity than productive conversation. So I want to take more care in how I speak about others by keeping in mind the Arabian proverb: "The words of the tongue should have three gatekeepers: Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary?" Things like this should go a long way towards helping me become the kind of man I want to be.
This Year's To-Do List
These are smaller things that aren't big enough to be proper resolutions so they're going in a to-do list instead. Here we go:
* Make a will.
* Self-publish my kids' book.
* Take my grandmother out to lunch.
* Make a junk statue with Tea.
* Get a professional massage.
* Go on a date.
* Organize all of my photos.
* Go camping and roast s'mores.
* Swim in the ocean.
* Go sailing.
* Take my dad kayaking.
* Become an ambassador for the Boston Children's Museum.
* Play a violin duet with Primo.
* Make video recordings of me reading kids' books and send them to Wolfie.
* Bike around Martha's Vineyard.
* Take the kid housemates sledding.
* Go apple picking and then make a pie.
* Go dancing.
* Go on a whale watch.
* Fly a kite.
I may add to this category as I go along, but for now that's it. Yay for New Years!
Diet
I met all of my dietary goals last year and now they're a way of life so I'll be continuing them. This year's food-related project is not about changing what I eat but tracking what I eat for a very interesting purpose.
I read this neat article written by a survivalist about stocking up enough of an emergency food supply to last you for a year. His list is based on someone needing 2,200 calories a day (803,000 calories a year) and contains grains, beans, shortening, powdered milk, sugar, honey, potato flakes, salt, multivitamins, and herbs/spices. I'd probably be cranky about the lack of variety if I had to live off his survival foods, but in a pinch it seems like it'd work.
 |
| Picture of a garden with text saying "How much should you plant in your garden to provide a year's worth of food?" |
At any rate, that list got me thinking about how much food a person eats in a year. I have a goal of eventually growing the bulk of my own food. To do that I'll first have to know which foods I eat in a year and how much of them I eat so that I know what to plant in my garden. So this year my food goal is to track all of my food intake. To make it easier on myself, I'm going to record all the food I buy as the last step of each grocery shopping trip. Then at the end of the year I'll subtract out any foods I haven't eaten to get to my final total. Neat, huh?
Exercise
My exercise goals for this year are a continuation of last years goals. I want to be able to do a handstand, a cartwheel, a split, 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. I'm considering whether I want to do a 5K color run this spring. And I also want to check out Esh Circus Arts, Rock Climbing, Kickboxing, and Krav Maga - but one at a time, because they're expensive.
 |
| Rocky (from the movie) looking triumphant aka my exercise inspiration. |
Finances
I'm going to keep up Tea's and my "I am a money magnet!" motto. I will to continue to pay off my debt. I will debit 10% of my income every two weeks to my Roth IRA at Vanguard. I'll build my rainy day fund with 5% per paycheck until I have $10,000 in the account and will finally automate this and then do the CD laddering I talked about. I'll keep using Digit, since it's been working well for me. And I'll go back to doing my $20/week charity donations.
 |
| Photograph of $1 bills with scrabble tiles that spell "MONEY" on top of them. |
Focus More on Spirituality
I want to re-focus on my spirituality this year. Especially since I have an adorable goddaughter to guide! This resolution has four parts to it:
The first part is to restart my daily gratitudes. My friend Feather and I used to text each other daily with three things that we were grateful for and it really helped us both to change our focus towards recognizing how blessed we both are and being thankful for that. I'm getting back into that habit this year.
 |
| Man praying. |
The second part is to pray more frequently. I'm going to go back to saying grace before meals and praying before bed every day. I find that daily prayer really helps me let go of the petty stuff and realign my focus on what matters. I'm also going to start saying David's prayer in the mornings when I get up. Someone in a comment thread online was talking about it and it seemed like a great idea to me. Here's the prayer:
"Create in me a clean heart, O God;
restore within me a sense of being brand new.
Do not throw me far away from Your presence,
and do not remove Your Holy Spirit from me."
- Psalm 51:10:11
The third part is to go to church regularly. I was doing this for a while but it fell off when I moved to my current living space because of the commute. I did look around a bit for a church to attend here but I didn't find one that felt like the perfect fit. This year I'm just going to go anyway. No community is perfect, and I can't let my own perfectionism be a reason to never go to church.
 |
| Photograph of a cross in front of a sunset. |
The fourth and most important part of this resolution is to stick more closely to my spiritual motto. My spiritual motto for years now has been "Become Love." I made it my motto after attending a church service years ago where the priest called us to become love like Jesus is love. Something in that homily really struck a cord with me and ever since then I've carried a piece of paper with my motto on it inside my wallet to help me remember the service and my commitment to be more Christ-like in my daily life. This year I want to do more to put it into action. Both in more concrete ways - like with charity donations, activism, and volunteer actions - and in more abstract ways like the way I treat others and how I think about myself and other people.
 |
| Image of two women in fancy dresses and big hats talking with the text "Before you speak, ask yourself is it True, Kind, Necessary?" superimposed on it. |
To give an example: I'm someone who processes things best with someone else to bounce ideas off. The downside of this is that when I'm having problems with another person and I try to process that with a friend, I feel that I often stray more towards negativity than productive conversation. So I want to take more care in how I speak about others by keeping in mind the Arabian proverb: "The words of the tongue should have three gatekeepers: Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary?" Things like this should go a long way towards helping me become the kind of man I want to be.
This Year's To-Do List
These are smaller things that aren't big enough to be proper resolutions so they're going in a to-do list instead. Here we go:
* Make a will.
* Self-publish my kids' book.
* Take my grandmother out to lunch.
* Make a junk statue with Tea.
* Get a professional massage.
* Go on a date.
* Organize all of my photos.
* Go camping and roast s'mores.
* Swim in the ocean.
* Go sailing.
* Take my dad kayaking.
* Become an ambassador for the Boston Children's Museum.
* Play a violin duet with Primo.
* Make video recordings of me reading kids' books and send them to Wolfie.
* Bike around Martha's Vineyard.
* Take the kid housemates sledding.
* Go apple picking and then make a pie.
* Go dancing.
* Go on a whale watch.
* Fly a kite.
I may add to this category as I go along, but for now that's it. Yay for New Years!
2016 Resolutions Recap
Ok. It's the end of 2016 so I'm going to go over how I did with last year's resolutions in this post.
Diet
I kicked butt at this resolution. My dietary goals were:
* Drink 8+ glasses of water a day
* Take a daily multivitamin
* Stick as closely as possible to the macro- and micro-nutrient breakdowns I set in myfitnesspal
* Avoid soy, MSG, and foods with long lists of unpronounceable ingredients
* Only eat when sitting down at a table with no distractions
* Stop and assess whether I'm actually hungry before eating or getting seconds
* Eat every four(ish) hours on a breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner schedule
* No food after 10pm
I've consistently followed this new eating plan. I do still cheat sometimes on my not eating after 10pm, but I've managed to change what I eat late at night to be less junk and more nutritious food so I'm content with it. Overall, these dietary changes have been great for me. I have more energy and more consistent energy levels throughout the day. I'm not overeating as often because I'm paying attention to what I eat and how hungry or full I feel.
Exercise
I was initially inclined to say this was a wash, but it actually didn't go as badly as I think it did. This year I've tried yoga, ballet, walking, and a couch to 5K program. I've increased the amount of physical movement I make in a day by taking the stairs more, using the car less, etc. I think I may reinstate the rest of my goals this coming year because I didn't reach them yet. Those goals were: be able to do a handstand, a cartwheel, a split, 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. Even though I didn't achieve all of my fitness goals this year, I think I did pretty well at the overall goal of moving more and getting healthier.
Finances
I've done well with my finances. My debt is dwindling, my retirement savings are increasing, and I've donated to a lot of neat charities this year. I also managed to increase my credit score, which is super exciting. I still feel like my finances are frustratingly tight, but since it's obviously working I'm going to keep up with my same plan next year.
Bucket List
I haven't checked anything off my bucket list yet, except for traveling. I've also drafted a will but I need to make it official.
Things to Do Before the End of This Year
I did only one of these. So the rest are getting moved to next year. The one I did was buy two paintings from my friend (her etsy is Spider's Closet).
That's it. Overall, I think I did ok and I'm excited for this year's resolutions.
How about you? Did you have 2016 resolutions? If so how did you do?
Diet
I kicked butt at this resolution. My dietary goals were:
* Drink 8+ glasses of water a day
* Take a daily multivitamin
* Stick as closely as possible to the macro- and micro-nutrient breakdowns I set in myfitnesspal
* Avoid soy, MSG, and foods with long lists of unpronounceable ingredients
* Only eat when sitting down at a table with no distractions
* Stop and assess whether I'm actually hungry before eating or getting seconds
* Eat every four(ish) hours on a breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner schedule
* No food after 10pm
 |
| Rainbow heart made up of fruits and vegetables. |
I've consistently followed this new eating plan. I do still cheat sometimes on my not eating after 10pm, but I've managed to change what I eat late at night to be less junk and more nutritious food so I'm content with it. Overall, these dietary changes have been great for me. I have more energy and more consistent energy levels throughout the day. I'm not overeating as often because I'm paying attention to what I eat and how hungry or full I feel.
Exercise
I was initially inclined to say this was a wash, but it actually didn't go as badly as I think it did. This year I've tried yoga, ballet, walking, and a couch to 5K program. I've increased the amount of physical movement I make in a day by taking the stairs more, using the car less, etc. I think I may reinstate the rest of my goals this coming year because I didn't reach them yet. Those goals were: be able to do a handstand, a cartwheel, a split, 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. Even though I didn't achieve all of my fitness goals this year, I think I did pretty well at the overall goal of moving more and getting healthier.
 |
| Baby lifting weights. |
Finances
I've done well with my finances. My debt is dwindling, my retirement savings are increasing, and I've donated to a lot of neat charities this year. I also managed to increase my credit score, which is super exciting. I still feel like my finances are frustratingly tight, but since it's obviously working I'm going to keep up with my same plan next year.
Bucket List
I haven't checked anything off my bucket list yet, except for traveling. I've also drafted a will but I need to make it official.
 |
| Photo of a sunset with "2016" in shadow in the foreground and the "1" is a woman lifting her arms triumphantly. |
Things to Do Before the End of This Year
I did only one of these. So the rest are getting moved to next year. The one I did was buy two paintings from my friend (her etsy is Spider's Closet).
That's it. Overall, I think I did ok and I'm excited for this year's resolutions.
How about you? Did you have 2016 resolutions? If so how did you do?
vendredi 14 octobre 2016
Goals Post
I have a cold. Blah. In lieu of Fierce Friday (because I'm sick and dressed in my pajamas), I've decided this means it's a good time to update you about my goals.
Books
I'm seven books behind on my goal of reading 116 books this year.
Here's what I've read since my last book update:
Lulu and the Brontosaurus by Judith Viorst
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fforde
The Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde
Something Rotten by Jasper Fforde
First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde
One of our Thursdays is Missing by Jasper Fforde
The Woman Who Died a Lot by Jasper Fforde
On S'y Fera by Zoya Pirzad
Beauty is a Verb: The New Poetry of Disability edited by Jennifer Bartlett
Carry On by Rainbow Rowell
The Bagel: The Surprising History of a Modest Bread by Maria Balinska
Wicked Plants: The Weed That Killed Lincoln's Mother and Other Botanical Atrocities by Amy Stewart
Olives, Lemons & Za'atar: Palestinian Home Cooking from Nazareth to New York by Rawla Bishara and Jumana Bishara
A Green and Ancient Light by Frederic S. Durbin
The Gospel According to Jesus Christ by José Saramago
The Last Witchfinder by James K. Morrow
Lick It!: Creamy Dreamy Vegan Ice Creams Your Mouth Will Love by Cathe Olson
The Vegetable Gardener's Book of Building Projects: 39 Indispensable Projects to Increase the Bounty and Beauty of You Garden by Cindy A. Littlefield
Arab Jazz by Karim Miské
Chocolate and Zucchini: Daily Adventures in a Parisian Kitchen by Clotilde Dusoulier
Garnishing by Francis Talyn Lynch
Chloe's Vegan Italian Kitchen by Chlor Coscarelli
The Castle by Franz Kafka (the graphic novel version adapted by David Zane Mairowitz and illustrated by Jaromir 99)
To Be or Not To Be: A Choosable-Path Adventure by William Shakespeare and Ryan North
Get a Financial Life: Personal Finance in Your Twenties and Thirties by Beth Kobliner
A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
Endgame by Samuel Beckett
I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
Uprooting Racism: How White People Can Work for Racial Justice by Paul Kivel
Diet
To recap, my dietary goals were:
* Drink 8+ glasses of water a day
* Take a daily multivitamin
* Stick as closely as possible to the macro- and micro-nutrient breakdowns I set in myfitnesspal
* Avoid soy, MSG, and foods with long lists of unpronounceable ingredients
* Only eat when sitting down at a table with no distractions
* Stop and assess whether I'm actually hungry before eating or getting seconds
* Eat every four(ish) hours on a breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner schedule
* No food after 10pm
My plan of having a protein shake for breakfast was a great one and it completely fixed the problem I had where I failed to eat breakfast. I've even started keeping some pre-made protein shakes at work for the days when I can't manage to make one before I leave the house. The nighttime binges are a bigger problem. I've stopped eating when I get home from my night job, but not eating at work is more difficult because my boss eats a bunch of junk food every single night - usually chips, nachos, or chocolate. It always gives me the munchies to watch him eating even if I know I'm not really hungry. Worse, since I'm the one who goes out to buy his snacks, I wind up buying a snack for myself while I'm out. Sigh.
Exercise
I've slacked a bit on taking the stairs all the time. It's just so much easier to be lazy.
I tried ballet, yoga, and a couch to 5K program that showed me I dislike running. I may still do a 5K color run this spring, but we'll see. My other goals seem kind of out of reach at the moment. Remember, they were: be able to do a handstand, a cartwheel, a split, 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. Once I have a bit more money I'm planning to go to Esh Circus Arts, Rock Climbing, Kickboxing, and Krav Maga. Though I'll obviously have to pick one at a time because they're expensive. For now I've joined the YMCA with my housemates which should at least help with the out-of-reach feeling goals.
Finances
As for finances, it's going decently but could be going better. I'm still chanting Tea's and my money motto - "I am a money magnet!" I'm on track with paying off everything, and am debiting about 10% of my income every two weeks to my Roth IRA at Vanguard. I've given up on my rainy day fund plan (5% per paycheck until I have $10,000 in the account) because I keep having rainy days. I know I was going automate this and then do CD laddering, but I'm not sure I can spare enough for regular deductions right now.
To force myself to save something, I decided to try using Digit, which works via an app and the texting feature on your phone. The way it works is that it tracks your spending patterns and then every few days it'll move a few dollars from your checking account to your Digit account. The idea is that it has its own internal calculations to figure out when and how much you can afford to save and it debits it bit by bit so you don't have to think about it. Then every three months it gives you a (very tiny) bonus of 5 cents for every $100 based on your average balance over those three months. Digit is free to use, has bank level security, is FDIC insured up to $250,000, and will cover your overdraft fees if they miscalculate and overdraft your account. I know a few people who have it and like it, so I figured it was worth checking out.
I temporarily suspended my $20/week charity donations because I'm broke. I need to get back to that because I think it's important and as a side benefit it made me feel really happy every time I donated.
Bucket List
If you'll recall, my bucket list was:
Become a Parent
Publish my Kids' book
Volunteer as an Educational Advocate
Help Youth Aging Out of Foster Care
Travel
I've added a couple more. They are:
Get Boudoir Photos of Myself
Write a Will
Learn Basic Auto Repair
Take a Glider Flight
Learn to Shoot a Gun
Learn Archery
Send my family on a nice trip using my timeshare.
Things to Do Before the End of This Year
Buy art. I'm going to buy a few pieces of art from my friend. Her etsy name is Spider's Closet.
Take my grandmother out. My grandmother is amazing and I don't spend nearly enough time with her so before the end of the year I want to make sure I take her out somewhere nice.
Make a junk statue. There's a bike trail I know of where people have made statues out of old junk and Tea and I have talked about making one of our own to add to the collection.
Get a professional massage. I've never had one before and I think it'd be a nice thing to try.
Go on a date. My divorce was two years ago. It's time to get back on the proverbial horse. While I haven't been entirely abstinent this whole time, I haven't felt ready to date until more recently. Time to start going out again.
Organize all of my photos. This needs to happen. I haven't organized anything post college. My photos are either online or sitting in bins. Which is annoying. Plus I think organizing all of the photos from when I was married will be a huge relief since I won't have them lying about anymore. Ideally I'd like to get caught up and then just order photo books of my photos every month/year/whatever.
THAT'S IT!!!!
All of my goals. I'm not doing too bad. How are you doing on your goals?
Books
I'm seven books behind on my goal of reading 116 books this year.
 |
| Man reading while sitting on the floor of a library. |
Here's what I've read since my last book update:
Lulu and the Brontosaurus by Judith Viorst
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fforde
The Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde
Something Rotten by Jasper Fforde
First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde
One of our Thursdays is Missing by Jasper Fforde
The Woman Who Died a Lot by Jasper Fforde
On S'y Fera by Zoya Pirzad
Beauty is a Verb: The New Poetry of Disability edited by Jennifer Bartlett
Carry On by Rainbow Rowell
The Bagel: The Surprising History of a Modest Bread by Maria Balinska
Wicked Plants: The Weed That Killed Lincoln's Mother and Other Botanical Atrocities by Amy Stewart
Olives, Lemons & Za'atar: Palestinian Home Cooking from Nazareth to New York by Rawla Bishara and Jumana Bishara
A Green and Ancient Light by Frederic S. Durbin
The Gospel According to Jesus Christ by José Saramago
The Last Witchfinder by James K. Morrow
Lick It!: Creamy Dreamy Vegan Ice Creams Your Mouth Will Love by Cathe Olson
The Vegetable Gardener's Book of Building Projects: 39 Indispensable Projects to Increase the Bounty and Beauty of You Garden by Cindy A. Littlefield
Arab Jazz by Karim Miské
Chocolate and Zucchini: Daily Adventures in a Parisian Kitchen by Clotilde Dusoulier
Garnishing by Francis Talyn Lynch
Chloe's Vegan Italian Kitchen by Chlor Coscarelli
The Castle by Franz Kafka (the graphic novel version adapted by David Zane Mairowitz and illustrated by Jaromir 99)
To Be or Not To Be: A Choosable-Path Adventure by William Shakespeare and Ryan North
Get a Financial Life: Personal Finance in Your Twenties and Thirties by Beth Kobliner
A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
Endgame by Samuel Beckett
I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
Uprooting Racism: How White People Can Work for Racial Justice by Paul Kivel
Diet
To recap, my dietary goals were:
* Drink 8+ glasses of water a day
* Take a daily multivitamin
* Stick as closely as possible to the macro- and micro-nutrient breakdowns I set in myfitnesspal
* Avoid soy, MSG, and foods with long lists of unpronounceable ingredients
* Only eat when sitting down at a table with no distractions
* Stop and assess whether I'm actually hungry before eating or getting seconds
* Eat every four(ish) hours on a breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner schedule
* No food after 10pm
 |
| Picture of vegetables in the shape of a heart. |
My plan of having a protein shake for breakfast was a great one and it completely fixed the problem I had where I failed to eat breakfast. I've even started keeping some pre-made protein shakes at work for the days when I can't manage to make one before I leave the house. The nighttime binges are a bigger problem. I've stopped eating when I get home from my night job, but not eating at work is more difficult because my boss eats a bunch of junk food every single night - usually chips, nachos, or chocolate. It always gives me the munchies to watch him eating even if I know I'm not really hungry. Worse, since I'm the one who goes out to buy his snacks, I wind up buying a snack for myself while I'm out. Sigh.
Exercise
I've slacked a bit on taking the stairs all the time. It's just so much easier to be lazy.
 |
| Line drawing of a man walking up stairs looking exhausted. |
I tried ballet, yoga, and a couch to 5K program that showed me I dislike running. I may still do a 5K color run this spring, but we'll see. My other goals seem kind of out of reach at the moment. Remember, they were: be able to do a handstand, a cartwheel, a split, 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. Once I have a bit more money I'm planning to go to Esh Circus Arts, Rock Climbing, Kickboxing, and Krav Maga. Though I'll obviously have to pick one at a time because they're expensive. For now I've joined the YMCA with my housemates which should at least help with the out-of-reach feeling goals.
Finances
As for finances, it's going decently but could be going better. I'm still chanting Tea's and my money motto - "I am a money magnet!" I'm on track with paying off everything, and am debiting about 10% of my income every two weeks to my Roth IRA at Vanguard. I've given up on my rainy day fund plan (5% per paycheck until I have $10,000 in the account) because I keep having rainy days. I know I was going automate this and then do CD laddering, but I'm not sure I can spare enough for regular deductions right now.
To force myself to save something, I decided to try using Digit, which works via an app and the texting feature on your phone. The way it works is that it tracks your spending patterns and then every few days it'll move a few dollars from your checking account to your Digit account. The idea is that it has its own internal calculations to figure out when and how much you can afford to save and it debits it bit by bit so you don't have to think about it. Then every three months it gives you a (very tiny) bonus of 5 cents for every $100 based on your average balance over those three months. Digit is free to use, has bank level security, is FDIC insured up to $250,000, and will cover your overdraft fees if they miscalculate and overdraft your account. I know a few people who have it and like it, so I figured it was worth checking out.
 |
| Plant growing out of a coin jar. |
I temporarily suspended my $20/week charity donations because I'm broke. I need to get back to that because I think it's important and as a side benefit it made me feel really happy every time I donated.
Bucket List
If you'll recall, my bucket list was:
Become a Parent
Publish my Kids' book
Volunteer as an Educational Advocate
Help Youth Aging Out of Foster Care
Travel
 |
| Photo of a blue bucket on the beach. Bucket says "bucket list." |
I've added a couple more. They are:
Get Boudoir Photos of Myself
Write a Will
Learn Basic Auto Repair
Take a Glider Flight
Learn to Shoot a Gun
Learn Archery
Send my family on a nice trip using my timeshare.
Things to Do Before the End of This Year
 |
| Patch that says "Buy Art." |
Buy art. I'm going to buy a few pieces of art from my friend. Her etsy name is Spider's Closet.
 |
| Elderly woman and adult man. |
Take my grandmother out. My grandmother is amazing and I don't spend nearly enough time with her so before the end of the year I want to make sure I take her out somewhere nice.
 |
| Junk statue of a monkey. |
Make a junk statue. There's a bike trail I know of where people have made statues out of old junk and Tea and I have talked about making one of our own to add to the collection.
 |
| Man getting a massage. |
Get a professional massage. I've never had one before and I think it'd be a nice thing to try.
 |
| Two men on a date drinking beers. |
Go on a date. My divorce was two years ago. It's time to get back on the proverbial horse. While I haven't been entirely abstinent this whole time, I haven't felt ready to date until more recently. Time to start going out again.
 |
| A pile of photographs. |
Organize all of my photos. This needs to happen. I haven't organized anything post college. My photos are either online or sitting in bins. Which is annoying. Plus I think organizing all of the photos from when I was married will be a huge relief since I won't have them lying about anymore. Ideally I'd like to get caught up and then just order photo books of my photos every month/year/whatever.
THAT'S IT!!!!
All of my goals. I'm not doing too bad. How are you doing on your goals?
mercredi 1 juin 2016
Goals Update
I don't have anything particularly exciting planned for today, so I figure it's about time to update about goals! Here goes...
Books
I'm working on my goal of reading 116 books this year and I'm still on track.
Here's a list of the books I've read since my last book update:
Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms by Paul Stamets
Gregor and the Curse of the Warmbloods by Suzanne Collins
The Joy of Pi by David Blatner
Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards
Fables Volume 10: The Good Prince by Bill Willingham
Fables Volume 11: War and Pieces by Bill Willingham
Our Black Year: One Family's Quest to Buy Black in America's Racially Divided Economy by Maggie Anderson
Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
Hollow City by Ransom Riggs
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind
Wuthering Bites by Sarah Gray
Specials by Scott Westerfeld
Extras by Scott Westerfeld
We Are Market Basket: The Story of an Unlikely Grassroots Movement that Saved a Beloved Business by Daniel Korschun
Blindspot by Jane Kamensky
El Deafo by Cece Bell
Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor
Boy, Snow, Bird by Helen Oyeyemi
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
Les Soleils des Indépendances by Ahmadou Kourouma
Un Papillon dans la Cité by Gisèle Pineau
Les Hommes qui Marchent by Malika Mokeddem
Mean Little Deaf Queer by Terry Galloway
Mirror Mirror by Gregory Maguire
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire
Diet
In case you forgot, my dietary goals were:
* Drink 8+ glasses of water a day
* Take a daily multivitamin
* Stick as closely as possible to the macro- and micro-nutrient breakdowns I set in myfitnesspal
* Avoid soy, MSG, and foods with long lists of unpronounceable ingredients
* Only eat when sitting down at a table with no distractions
* Stop and assess whether I'm actually hungry before eating or getting seconds
* Eat every four(ish) hours on a breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner schedule
* No food after 10pm
I've got the water drinking, multivitamin taking, and soy/MSG/unpronounceable food avoiding down pat. I've also been really good about eating at the table. The biggest problems I've had are with meal timing and nutrient breakdowns. My work schedule is weird and includes both morning and night shifts, which makes eating on a regular schedule difficult. Sometimes I fail to eat breakfast because I'm just not hungry yet, and I frequently wind up eating random crap when I get home from my night job because my dinner was seven hours before so I'm starving by the time I get home. So starting this week my new strategy is to have a protein shake for breakfast every day. It's fast, it's easy, and I can grab it and take it with me. On days where I have more time and energy I can blend tasty healthy things into my shake and on days when I'm dragging myself along I can just stir my protein powder in some water and call it a day. And my new strategy for avoiding the nighttime binges is to bring a small healthy snack with me to work at night. I'm hoping this will tide me over until I get home and I can just go to bed instead of eating. I think that both of these strategies will help me avoid feeling overly hungry so I'll be able to make more intelligent choices about what I'm eating - aka sticking to the myfitnesspal goals - since it's really hard to plan a meal when you're too hungry to think of anything but shoving food in your face. And if I'm not too hungry to think, I'll have an easier time sitting down for a leisurely meal where I check in with my body as I eat.
Exercise
I've done an awesome job of keeping up with the structural changes. I take the stairs whenever I can, I walk all over the place, and I take public transit whenever possible instead of using the car.
My specific goals have proved harder. I've stayed more active than before, a lot of which is due to the help of my swolemate. But most of that activity has been in the form of walking around more or running about with kids rather than any of the exercise goals I had. That said, I did take ballet as planned and found I really like it! But it's almost over.
I think the next goal I'll focus on is yoga. It turns out there is a yoga studio near my friends' house in France that looks really good so my plan is to try out yoga on my trip. My other goals were: do a handstand, a cartwheel, and a split; run a 5K; and do 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. I did start doing the couch to 5K program but I slacked off when finals hit and frankly I think this experiment may have shown me that I truly dislike running. I'm considering abandoning the 5K goal because the point of exercise is to have fun and get health - not to torture myself. As for the gymnastics - I found a place nearby called Esh Circus Arts. It looks amazingly fun and the studio is named after my cat! Well, not really but I can pretend. So I want to check it out. Fortunately so does Joy. And she wants to check out the kickboxing studio too! Hopefully when I get back from France we can try both of those things out. Now all I need is a rock climbing buddy. I actually do have a friend who climbs, but he's really in shape and really good at it so I feel (needlessly) intimidated. I know he'd be willing to go with me and he's probably the least judgmental person ever but I'm still embarrassed about the idea since I'm convinced I'll be bad at it.
Finances
And last but not least, my financial update. Nothing much to report. I'm still chanting my money motto ("I am a money magnet!") to myself and I think it's very slowly beginning to work. I'm on track with my car, credit card debt, medical debt, timeshare, and student loans. I'm still happy with my decision to switch my Roth IRA to Vanguard. I'm less thrilled with it debiting 5% of my income every two weeks when I get my paycheck, since I'm feeling the money crunch. I'm not sure how I'll increase it to 10% like I plan to do in September. At any rate, I'm sure my elderly self will be thanking me later. Still not doing so hot with the rainy day fund. My goal is to contribute 5% per paycheck so I eventually have $10,000 in there. But I keep wiping it out. Ugh. I'm hoping this will get easier in September when I'm back to full time work. At any rate, I still need to automate this and stick it somewhere less accessible so I can do the whole CD laddering thing.
In a bit of financial posting that deserves its own paragraph, I'm still really happy about my $20/week charity donations. I've gotten into a rhythm where I donate somewhere every other week so I can give $40 each time. I'm hoping to increase that to $50 every other week soon. Last update I had given to Roxbury Youth Orchestra (an inexpensive learning orchestra for inner-city youth), Second Chance Animal Shelter (a nonprofit no-kill animal shelter that also does low-cost spaying/neutering, and subsidized veterinary care), Youth On Fire (a drop-in center for homeless and street-involved youth ages 14-24), and Trans Lifeline (a nonprofit crisis hotline for trans people). Now I've added to the list: The Network/La Red (a survivor-led social justice organization working to end partner abuse in LGBT, BDSM, and poly communities with organizing, education, and support services), Daily Table (which I posted about here), IMPACT Boston (gives self-defense classes to women, children, people with disabilities, abuse survivors, and LGBTQ people, plus they collaborate with schools and organizations to do abuse prevention programs), and Mass LEAP (aka Massachusetts Literary Education and Performance Collective which puts on youth slam poetry festivals and works in schools to promote and support youth slam and spoken word poetry).
Bucket List
You'll notice that I haven't updated on my bucket list. That's because no progress has been made. All those goals are HUGE and I'm nowhere near done with any of them. Also, I've been focused on other things. I do plan to get to them, though.
Books
I'm working on my goal of reading 116 books this year and I'm still on track.
 |
| A woman inside a ginormous book reading at night. |
Here's a list of the books I've read since my last book update:
Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms by Paul Stamets
Gregor and the Curse of the Warmbloods by Suzanne Collins
The Joy of Pi by David Blatner
Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards
Fables Volume 10: The Good Prince by Bill Willingham
Fables Volume 11: War and Pieces by Bill Willingham
Our Black Year: One Family's Quest to Buy Black in America's Racially Divided Economy by Maggie Anderson
Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
Hollow City by Ransom Riggs
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind
Wuthering Bites by Sarah Gray
Specials by Scott Westerfeld
Extras by Scott Westerfeld
We Are Market Basket: The Story of an Unlikely Grassroots Movement that Saved a Beloved Business by Daniel Korschun
Blindspot by Jane Kamensky
El Deafo by Cece Bell
Akata Witch by Nnedi Okorafor
Boy, Snow, Bird by Helen Oyeyemi
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
Les Soleils des Indépendances by Ahmadou Kourouma
Un Papillon dans la Cité by Gisèle Pineau
Les Hommes qui Marchent by Malika Mokeddem
Mean Little Deaf Queer by Terry Galloway
Mirror Mirror by Gregory Maguire
Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire
Diet
In case you forgot, my dietary goals were:
* Drink 8+ glasses of water a day
* Take a daily multivitamin
* Stick as closely as possible to the macro- and micro-nutrient breakdowns I set in myfitnesspal
* Avoid soy, MSG, and foods with long lists of unpronounceable ingredients
* Only eat when sitting down at a table with no distractions
* Stop and assess whether I'm actually hungry before eating or getting seconds
* Eat every four(ish) hours on a breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner schedule
* No food after 10pm
 |
| Chart of the dietary breakdown for vegetarians in the form of a plate. |
I've got the water drinking, multivitamin taking, and soy/MSG/unpronounceable food avoiding down pat. I've also been really good about eating at the table. The biggest problems I've had are with meal timing and nutrient breakdowns. My work schedule is weird and includes both morning and night shifts, which makes eating on a regular schedule difficult. Sometimes I fail to eat breakfast because I'm just not hungry yet, and I frequently wind up eating random crap when I get home from my night job because my dinner was seven hours before so I'm starving by the time I get home. So starting this week my new strategy is to have a protein shake for breakfast every day. It's fast, it's easy, and I can grab it and take it with me. On days where I have more time and energy I can blend tasty healthy things into my shake and on days when I'm dragging myself along I can just stir my protein powder in some water and call it a day. And my new strategy for avoiding the nighttime binges is to bring a small healthy snack with me to work at night. I'm hoping this will tide me over until I get home and I can just go to bed instead of eating. I think that both of these strategies will help me avoid feeling overly hungry so I'll be able to make more intelligent choices about what I'm eating - aka sticking to the myfitnesspal goals - since it's really hard to plan a meal when you're too hungry to think of anything but shoving food in your face. And if I'm not too hungry to think, I'll have an easier time sitting down for a leisurely meal where I check in with my body as I eat.
Exercise
I've done an awesome job of keeping up with the structural changes. I take the stairs whenever I can, I walk all over the place, and I take public transit whenever possible instead of using the car.
My specific goals have proved harder. I've stayed more active than before, a lot of which is due to the help of my swolemate. But most of that activity has been in the form of walking around more or running about with kids rather than any of the exercise goals I had. That said, I did take ballet as planned and found I really like it! But it's almost over.
 |
| A large asian man dancing ballet. |
I think the next goal I'll focus on is yoga. It turns out there is a yoga studio near my friends' house in France that looks really good so my plan is to try out yoga on my trip. My other goals were: do a handstand, a cartwheel, and a split; run a 5K; and do 25 pull ups, 50 pushups, 200 situps, and 200 squats. I did start doing the couch to 5K program but I slacked off when finals hit and frankly I think this experiment may have shown me that I truly dislike running. I'm considering abandoning the 5K goal because the point of exercise is to have fun and get health - not to torture myself. As for the gymnastics - I found a place nearby called Esh Circus Arts. It looks amazingly fun and the studio is named after my cat! Well, not really but I can pretend. So I want to check it out. Fortunately so does Joy. And she wants to check out the kickboxing studio too! Hopefully when I get back from France we can try both of those things out. Now all I need is a rock climbing buddy. I actually do have a friend who climbs, but he's really in shape and really good at it so I feel (needlessly) intimidated. I know he'd be willing to go with me and he's probably the least judgmental person ever but I'm still embarrassed about the idea since I'm convinced I'll be bad at it.
Finances
And last but not least, my financial update. Nothing much to report. I'm still chanting my money motto ("I am a money magnet!") to myself and I think it's very slowly beginning to work. I'm on track with my car, credit card debt, medical debt, timeshare, and student loans. I'm still happy with my decision to switch my Roth IRA to Vanguard. I'm less thrilled with it debiting 5% of my income every two weeks when I get my paycheck, since I'm feeling the money crunch. I'm not sure how I'll increase it to 10% like I plan to do in September. At any rate, I'm sure my elderly self will be thanking me later. Still not doing so hot with the rainy day fund. My goal is to contribute 5% per paycheck so I eventually have $10,000 in there. But I keep wiping it out. Ugh. I'm hoping this will get easier in September when I'm back to full time work. At any rate, I still need to automate this and stick it somewhere less accessible so I can do the whole CD laddering thing.
 |
| Picture of a roll of money. |
In a bit of financial posting that deserves its own paragraph, I'm still really happy about my $20/week charity donations. I've gotten into a rhythm where I donate somewhere every other week so I can give $40 each time. I'm hoping to increase that to $50 every other week soon. Last update I had given to Roxbury Youth Orchestra (an inexpensive learning orchestra for inner-city youth), Second Chance Animal Shelter (a nonprofit no-kill animal shelter that also does low-cost spaying/neutering, and subsidized veterinary care), Youth On Fire (a drop-in center for homeless and street-involved youth ages 14-24), and Trans Lifeline (a nonprofit crisis hotline for trans people). Now I've added to the list: The Network/La Red (a survivor-led social justice organization working to end partner abuse in LGBT, BDSM, and poly communities with organizing, education, and support services), Daily Table (which I posted about here), IMPACT Boston (gives self-defense classes to women, children, people with disabilities, abuse survivors, and LGBTQ people, plus they collaborate with schools and organizations to do abuse prevention programs), and Mass LEAP (aka Massachusetts Literary Education and Performance Collective which puts on youth slam poetry festivals and works in schools to promote and support youth slam and spoken word poetry).
Bucket List
You'll notice that I haven't updated on my bucket list. That's because no progress has been made. All those goals are HUGE and I'm nowhere near done with any of them. Also, I've been focused on other things. I do plan to get to them, though.
 |
| Drawing of a bucket with a yellow background. The bucket says "Bucket List" on it in red letters. |
lundi 25 avril 2016
Daily Table
Ok. My most recent charity donation was to Daily Table in Dorchester and I decided it was worth making a post about them. (Maybe I'll post about the other organizations too?) At any rate, you can read a recent article about Daily Table here called "Waste Not, Want Not: Combating Food Insecurity in Boston" by Nolan Gawron.
Let me just say - I absolutely LOVE their model of combatting food insecurity.
Food pantries and soup kitchens are a godsend and I'm so glad they exist. I have used them in the past and so have many of my friends, some of whom are on food assistance currently. That said, these places can feel humiliating or embarrassing to visit. Grocery stores can often be really expensive if you're looking for healthier options like produce. And although many farmer's markets now take EBT and some offer discounts for it (huzzah!) they can still be a bit pricey. This is a huge reason why many poor people wind up eating crappy fast food so often - it's fast, cheap, filling, and not stigmatizing.
So what are you supposed to do if you're broke, possibly on food assistance, and struggling to afford healthy food within your budget? It's a problem faced by about 14.5% of US households. It's also exactly the problem that Daily Table is trying to address.
They offer groceries that are priced to compete with fast food, in a store environment that is dignified rather than embarrassing for shoppers. The Daily Table sources their groceries by "recovering" food from supermarkets, growers, and food distributors who have a surplus that was going to go to waste. As a country, the US wastes about 40% of the food we produce so food waste is a huge problem that's also tragic when we've got so many people who are hungry. So basically Daily Table is solving both hunger AND food waste all in one go! It's a model for solving food insecurity while preserving people's dignity and it is economically sustainable and good for the planet since it's recovering otherwise wasted resources and putting them to good use. How awesome is that?!
And as an aside: I have friends who are low income and who have gone to Daily Table to buy groceries. If you follow my lead and decide to support them, you'll be helping my friends afford to eat.
 |
| Picture of the Daily Table storefront. |
Let me just say - I absolutely LOVE their model of combatting food insecurity.
Food pantries and soup kitchens are a godsend and I'm so glad they exist. I have used them in the past and so have many of my friends, some of whom are on food assistance currently. That said, these places can feel humiliating or embarrassing to visit. Grocery stores can often be really expensive if you're looking for healthier options like produce. And although many farmer's markets now take EBT and some offer discounts for it (huzzah!) they can still be a bit pricey. This is a huge reason why many poor people wind up eating crappy fast food so often - it's fast, cheap, filling, and not stigmatizing.
So what are you supposed to do if you're broke, possibly on food assistance, and struggling to afford healthy food within your budget? It's a problem faced by about 14.5% of US households. It's also exactly the problem that Daily Table is trying to address.
 |
| Inside of Daily Table. |
They offer groceries that are priced to compete with fast food, in a store environment that is dignified rather than embarrassing for shoppers. The Daily Table sources their groceries by "recovering" food from supermarkets, growers, and food distributors who have a surplus that was going to go to waste. As a country, the US wastes about 40% of the food we produce so food waste is a huge problem that's also tragic when we've got so many people who are hungry. So basically Daily Table is solving both hunger AND food waste all in one go! It's a model for solving food insecurity while preserving people's dignity and it is economically sustainable and good for the planet since it's recovering otherwise wasted resources and putting them to good use. How awesome is that?!
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| Flow chart showing where Daily Table sources its food. |
And as an aside: I have friends who are low income and who have gone to Daily Table to buy groceries. If you follow my lead and decide to support them, you'll be helping my friends afford to eat.
mardi 5 avril 2016
Financial Update
I figured I'd give you an update on my financial goal progress, and a little nudge to create your own financial goals if you haven't already. I'm feeling a little discouraged, because money feels tight, but I do think I'm making some (very slow) progress. First, a photo of my current motto "I am a money magnet!" I got this motto from my friend Tea who uses it as a personal mantra in her own quest to get rich. It sounded hokey to me at first but I decided it can't hurt to use it.
Save For Retirement
I switched my Roth IRA to Vanguard and I set it up to automatically debit 5% of my income every two weeks when I get my paycheck. Go me! In case you want to know how I came to the decision, I'm going to launch into an explanation now. I started my search by looking around online and on financial blogs at my options. I also polled my Facebook friends to see what they used and whether they liked it. The most popular recommendations seemed to be TIAA-CREF, Fidelity, and Vanguard. I discounted TIAA-CREF because that's where my initial 403b was before I converted it into a Roth IRA at the Royce Funds. I'd felt the fees were too high at TIAA-CREF and the returns weren't that great which is why I'd switched. More people I knew seemed to be using Fidelity than Vanguard, but it seemed my more well-off friends were using Vanguard. Both seemed to be performing well and both had satisfied customers. I did some research and in general it seems like the two are a toss-up in terms of which to choose. Here's what ultimately swayed me:
Vanguard is owned by the shareholders of its mutual funds. This business model is sort of like a credit union (and I LOVE my credit union and think credit unions are amazing). Fidelity is owned by the company's employees and a series of family trusts. Basically, if Vanguard is profitable the profits go to the shareholders, not outside investors, so Vanguard has no incentive for charging any more than necessary. Fidelity's owners actually do better when Fidelity charges its investors more, so it has an incentive to charge whatever the market will bear. From what I can see, this leads to some price differences where Fidelity has higher charges than Vanguard, which ultimately means lower returns for me as an investor.
Set Up A Rainy Day Fund
My goal is to be putting 5% of each paycheck into a rainy day fund, with the eventual goal of having $10,000 in there. Well, I've tried starting this, but I've been contributing erratically. Also I've been putting it in my savings account and I'm clearly too impulsive for that to work because I keep using it. No good. I really need to automate the contributions and figure out a less easily accessible place to stick them so I won't be tempted to use the money. I'm currently thinking an ING savings account might work until there is enough to put into a CD (Certificate of Deposit) since the minimum at both my credit union and my bank is $1,000.
Once I do have enough to buy a CD, I'm thinking about using a technique I just learned about here called "laddering." Basically the idea is that you have a mix of CDs that have different lengths. The longer-term CDs give higher yields but tie up your money for more time. So using a CD laddering technique lets you earn higher yields on some of your money but also have cash on hand in the meantime. So for example you could get a one year, a two year, a three year, a four year, and a five year CD. Each year when one of the CDs matures, you use the cash to buy a five year CD. In four years you've got all five year CDs but they're staggered so that one of them matures each year. Pretty neat, right?
My other thought is that I can figure out a way to save $1,000 each year and put it into a new five-year CD. Then when my first CD has matured, I can start a second round where I put another $1,000 into each CD. In ten years I'll have $10,000 in CDs.
Give to Charity
I've started out with $20/week and eventually want to be giving 10% of my income. So far I've given $40 each to: Roxbury Youth Orchestra (an inexpensive learning orchestra for inner-city youth), Second Chance Animal Shelter (a nonprofit no-kill animal shelter that also does low-cost spaying/neutering, and subsidized veterinary care), Youth On Fire (a drop-in center for homeless and street-involved youth ages 14-24), and Trans Lifeline (a nonprofit crisis hotline for trans people). The next one on my list is The Network/La Red, a survivor-led social justice organization working to end partner abuse in LGBT, BDSM, and poly communities with organizing, education, and support services. So basically I'm really happy about this new goal of giving to charity and I think I picked some seriously amazing organizations. I feel happy whenever I think about the organizations, people, and animals I'm helping.
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| A picture of a man in a business suit holding a large magnet that is attracting money. |
Pay Off Car
On track with this. About 12 months to go.
Eliminate Credit Card Debt
On track with this. Should be paid off by September if I opt not to use my tax refund for it.
Eliminate Medical Debt
This goal is going slowly but steadily. Will probably take another two years.
Pay Off Timeshare
Pay Off Timeshare
Another slow and steady goal. Should take about 5 years max.
Pay Off Student Loans
These are deferred.
These are deferred.
 |
| This is what my debt looks like to me: Cartoon of a large monster eating money. |
Save For Retirement
I switched my Roth IRA to Vanguard and I set it up to automatically debit 5% of my income every two weeks when I get my paycheck. Go me! In case you want to know how I came to the decision, I'm going to launch into an explanation now. I started my search by looking around online and on financial blogs at my options. I also polled my Facebook friends to see what they used and whether they liked it. The most popular recommendations seemed to be TIAA-CREF, Fidelity, and Vanguard. I discounted TIAA-CREF because that's where my initial 403b was before I converted it into a Roth IRA at the Royce Funds. I'd felt the fees were too high at TIAA-CREF and the returns weren't that great which is why I'd switched. More people I knew seemed to be using Fidelity than Vanguard, but it seemed my more well-off friends were using Vanguard. Both seemed to be performing well and both had satisfied customers. I did some research and in general it seems like the two are a toss-up in terms of which to choose. Here's what ultimately swayed me:
Vanguard is owned by the shareholders of its mutual funds. This business model is sort of like a credit union (and I LOVE my credit union and think credit unions are amazing). Fidelity is owned by the company's employees and a series of family trusts. Basically, if Vanguard is profitable the profits go to the shareholders, not outside investors, so Vanguard has no incentive for charging any more than necessary. Fidelity's owners actually do better when Fidelity charges its investors more, so it has an incentive to charge whatever the market will bear. From what I can see, this leads to some price differences where Fidelity has higher charges than Vanguard, which ultimately means lower returns for me as an investor.
 |
| Picture of a golden egg in a nest. The word "ROTH" is written on the egg. |
Set Up A Rainy Day Fund
My goal is to be putting 5% of each paycheck into a rainy day fund, with the eventual goal of having $10,000 in there. Well, I've tried starting this, but I've been contributing erratically. Also I've been putting it in my savings account and I'm clearly too impulsive for that to work because I keep using it. No good. I really need to automate the contributions and figure out a less easily accessible place to stick them so I won't be tempted to use the money. I'm currently thinking an ING savings account might work until there is enough to put into a CD (Certificate of Deposit) since the minimum at both my credit union and my bank is $1,000.
Once I do have enough to buy a CD, I'm thinking about using a technique I just learned about here called "laddering." Basically the idea is that you have a mix of CDs that have different lengths. The longer-term CDs give higher yields but tie up your money for more time. So using a CD laddering technique lets you earn higher yields on some of your money but also have cash on hand in the meantime. So for example you could get a one year, a two year, a three year, a four year, and a five year CD. Each year when one of the CDs matures, you use the cash to buy a five year CD. In four years you've got all five year CDs but they're staggered so that one of them matures each year. Pretty neat, right?
My other thought is that I can figure out a way to save $1,000 each year and put it into a new five-year CD. Then when my first CD has matured, I can start a second round where I put another $1,000 into each CD. In ten years I'll have $10,000 in CDs.
 |
| Graphic explaining CD laddering that I ganked from this website. |
Give to Charity
I've started out with $20/week and eventually want to be giving 10% of my income. So far I've given $40 each to: Roxbury Youth Orchestra (an inexpensive learning orchestra for inner-city youth), Second Chance Animal Shelter (a nonprofit no-kill animal shelter that also does low-cost spaying/neutering, and subsidized veterinary care), Youth On Fire (a drop-in center for homeless and street-involved youth ages 14-24), and Trans Lifeline (a nonprofit crisis hotline for trans people). The next one on my list is The Network/La Red, a survivor-led social justice organization working to end partner abuse in LGBT, BDSM, and poly communities with organizing, education, and support services. So basically I'm really happy about this new goal of giving to charity and I think I picked some seriously amazing organizations. I feel happy whenever I think about the organizations, people, and animals I'm helping.
lundi 29 février 2016
Mint.com
Last week I posted about my financial goals. This week I'm letting you know my favorite (free!) tool to help me achieve them. It's a website and an app called Mint.com.
Mint.com is a free - did I mention it's free? - web-based personal financial management tool that uses bank-level encryption. It lets you track your bank, credit card, investment, retirement account, and loan balances and transactions all in one spot. You can use it to make budgets and set financial goals that it will keep track of for you. And, like the myfitnesspal app I told you about a couple of weeks ago, it gives you pretty graphs of everything. Have I mentioned that I love graphs? Just look at this lovely user-friendly website (unfortunately this is not me - I do not have nearly this much money):
What I like about this website/app is that you spend a bit of time setting it up, and then it tracks everything automatically from there. I have all of my credit card bills, student loan, car loan, bank accounts, retirement account, etc. on there and it keeps track of it for me. I set up my budget on there and it tracks it automatically using the info from my banks. It breaks down my spending into an easy-to-interpret pie chart so I can see where I'm going over. And it keeps track of my net worth which is pretty damn motivating since I desperately want that number to get to a million. [Laugh now but just you watch because somehow or other I'm going to be a millionaire before I die.]
Mint.com is a free - did I mention it's free? - web-based personal financial management tool that uses bank-level encryption. It lets you track your bank, credit card, investment, retirement account, and loan balances and transactions all in one spot. You can use it to make budgets and set financial goals that it will keep track of for you. And, like the myfitnesspal app I told you about a couple of weeks ago, it gives you pretty graphs of everything. Have I mentioned that I love graphs? Just look at this lovely user-friendly website (unfortunately this is not me - I do not have nearly this much money):
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| Picture of mint.com with pie graph of spending by category, list of budgets, etc. |
What I like about this website/app is that you spend a bit of time setting it up, and then it tracks everything automatically from there. I have all of my credit card bills, student loan, car loan, bank accounts, retirement account, etc. on there and it keeps track of it for me. I set up my budget on there and it tracks it automatically using the info from my banks. It breaks down my spending into an easy-to-interpret pie chart so I can see where I'm going over. And it keeps track of my net worth which is pretty damn motivating since I desperately want that number to get to a million. [Laugh now but just you watch because somehow or other I'm going to be a millionaire before I die.]
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| Mint uses bar charts to help you stick to the budgets you set. |
A lot of people are freaked out by using something over the internet to track finances. They're afraid someone will hack into their account and steal all of their money. If you're really worried, you also shouldn't do any online banking or make any purchases online because those are equally unsafe. Here's why I'm not worried:
Intuit, mint.com's owner, provides the same security software for each of the banks. If someone were to hack into my mint.com account, they'd have no access to any funds. To access my funds, they'd need to hack into my bank account and mint.com doesn't help with that since it doesn't provide the info they'd need to do access any account. Further, my bank accounts and credit cards require me to answer secret questions if I log in from an unrecognized computer and they send me an email when that happens even if the question is answered correctly, so I'd know right away about any attempted breach in security. Mint does not have this information, so neither would a hacker. Lastly, I'm fairly broke. Perhaps I'd worry about this stuff if I had a ton of money? If that were the case and I was worried, I'd probably just put the bulk of my savings and investments in places not linked to mint and track them manually so I could continue to use mint to track my credit cards and monthly spending.
Soon? I will be like this man:
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| Laughing man in suit and glasses holding money. |
Dearest blog readers - do any of you use mint.com? Do you use something else instead? Do you have a budget? How are you keeping track of your money?
mardi 23 février 2016
Financial Goals
I just finished posting about my fitness goals, and since I've already talked about finances on this blog I figured I should share my financial goals. Here they are:
Pay Off Car
At my current rate of repayment, I should be done with this goal in 16 months.
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| Car made of money. |
Pay Off Timeshare
This may have been a financial mistake - time will tell. At any rate, I need to pay the thing off.
Eliminate Credit Card Debt |
| Cartoon of people on a tiny island surrounded by sharks saying "Could be worse - we could be surrounded by timeshare salesmen…" |
I'm pretty sure my tax refund will be enough to finish this goal.
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| Person cutting up credit cards. |
Eliminate Medical Debt
This goal is going to take me a while. About $4,000 of my medical debt is in the form of a loan from a friend, who I'm slowly repaying with dog walking and other random work. The other $3,000 is owed to a bank and it's at a 4.5% interest rate.
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| Stethoscope on top of money. |
Pay Off Student Loans
My student loans are currently deferred because I'm in school. I'll probably continue deferring them while I focus on paying off my other debt and going to school for nursing. I've got under $9,000 left, which is a big improvement from how much I had when I graduated!
My student loans are currently deferred because I'm in school. I'll probably continue deferring them while I focus on paying off my other debt and going to school for nursing. I've got under $9,000 left, which is a big improvement from how much I had when I graduated!
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| College graduate shackled to large weight labeled "loans." |
Save For Retirement
I have a Roth IRA, but I want to switch institutions because my current one is underperforming. Ideally I'm hoping to find somewhere good performance and solid ethics. Once I do that, I'll start putting more money in. I don't have the option of payroll deductions so I calculated out 5% of my income and my plan is to have that much money automatically transfer every two weeks when I get my paycheck. Once my credit card is paid off I'll up the amount to 10% of my income since I won't be making credit card payments.
Set Up A Rainy Day Fund
My goal is to be putting 5% of each paycheck into a rainy day fund, with the eventual goal of having $10,000 in there. I have to figure out where to put this money, though, so it makes more interest than my bank account. Maybe in a money market or savings bonds? It has to be somewhere I can cash it quickly if I need it for an emergency.
Give to Charity
I'd like to start out with putting aside $20/week to give to charity. My eventual goal is to increase that to at least 10% of my income. I grew up in a Christian family and I still love the idea of giving back 10% of your income to God. However, I can't in good conscience give money to the Church because I won't help finance their anti-gay, anti-trans, and anti-woman agendas. The point of tithing is to put God first and give your financial support to God's work. Because of that, I feel confident that I can tithe by giving to charities that align with my values. I'm calling it my alternatithe. Get it? Anyway, I plan to work up to 10% once I get the debt situation under better control, ideally by the end of this year.
What Motivates Me?
I have a Roth IRA, but I want to switch institutions because my current one is underperforming. Ideally I'm hoping to find somewhere good performance and solid ethics. Once I do that, I'll start putting more money in. I don't have the option of payroll deductions so I calculated out 5% of my income and my plan is to have that much money automatically transfer every two weeks when I get my paycheck. Once my credit card is paid off I'll up the amount to 10% of my income since I won't be making credit card payments.
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| Old woman making the devil horns hand gesture. |
My goal is to be putting 5% of each paycheck into a rainy day fund, with the eventual goal of having $10,000 in there. I have to figure out where to put this money, though, so it makes more interest than my bank account. Maybe in a money market or savings bonds? It has to be somewhere I can cash it quickly if I need it for an emergency.
 |
| Person under an umbrella made of money. |
Give to Charity
I'd like to start out with putting aside $20/week to give to charity. My eventual goal is to increase that to at least 10% of my income. I grew up in a Christian family and I still love the idea of giving back 10% of your income to God. However, I can't in good conscience give money to the Church because I won't help finance their anti-gay, anti-trans, and anti-woman agendas. The point of tithing is to put God first and give your financial support to God's work. Because of that, I feel confident that I can tithe by giving to charities that align with my values. I'm calling it my alternatithe. Get it? Anyway, I plan to work up to 10% once I get the debt situation under better control, ideally by the end of this year.
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| Person holding a jar of pennies that says "charity." |
What Motivates Me?
Why do I have financial goals? Lots of reasons. The most obvious one being that I want to be in charge of my life and I can't do that when I'm living paycheck to paycheck with creditors breathing down my neck. The most personal one, though, is that I want to have kids.
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| Chameleon (I think?) and its baby. |
When my husband left I thought my dream of a family had just walked out the door with him. A couple of years and a lot of therapy (and some meds) later, I no longer feel that way. I still want to be a parent, though, and that means preparing myself to become a single parent. As I mentioned on here already, I just sterilized myself. Before I did that I did gamete banking in case I want to have a biological kid. The likelihood of that happening is rather slim since I'd need a donor and a surrogate and a buttload of money for the medical procedures, but I figured it couldn't hurt to keep the option open. That said, I've always been more excited about (open) adoption. Adoption gave me the world's most kickass brother, plus his siblings and aunt and uncle. It gave me an awesome younger cousin. I have friends who were adopted and friends who chose adoption for their children and friends who are adoptive parents. I think it's an awesome way to build a family. But whichever way I choose to make a family, I want as much financial stability as possible before I take on a kid (or two, or three) as a single parent. Hence all the financial planning.
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| Baby wrapped up in money. |
What are your financial goals? What dreams would you like to accomplish that could benefit from more stable finances?
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