(Another Year)

So this is me: I'm 32 years old, I just got home from work, and I really want a cup of the qimen tea I got at Jungle Jim's on our Christmas sojourn.  But it's after four, and caffeine after four means I stay up way too late.  One of my goals for this year is to use the elliptical in the living room, and so I'm sitting here with a glass of milk and the sandwich bag of chocolate/pecan/butterscotch confection that was in our holiday gift basket while trying to pacify the cat with his string toy so he'll stop whining and my husband can nap before we go out to dinner.

There's stuff I want to do this year.  I've got goals at work, too (like finishing my self-evaluation for my reappointment portfolio by January 18), but this is stuff to do for me.  Like always, some of this will get done, and some won't, but making a list reminds me that there's stuff I want to work on.

• Use the elliptical.  I've apparently hit the tipping point of weight gain where I've started some pretty serious snoring.  Given that I've had stress-related heart palpitations in the past, and sleep apnea can screw around with the heart, I figure I really need to work on the twenty-some pounds I've put on over the past seven years.  I don't think I need to do much, just actually do some regular exercise, since I'm pretty sure it was the magical 25 metabolism shift and a sit-down job that's been doing it.  (Plus I'm apparently waking up my husband several times a night. >.>)
• Blog more.  This is a perennial goal that works better in the summer when I have more time, but I've got some stuff that I've been thinking about that I might write down.
• 52 books.  I want to do a book a week.  Since there 721 books on my to-read list in Goodreads (some of which may get weeded, but for now), that's... 14  years worth of reading.  Yeah.  Maybe I should edit some of my husband's (133) Star Trek books out of that list.  (Yes, honey, you have 133 Star Trek books in print.  Plus four duplicates.)
• Read the NRSV.  I read the entirety of the Old Testament the summer after first grade, when they gave us a copy of a Bible at church.  It was the "Good News" edition, and at some point I realized just how much the language in it had been edited.  Probably still skipping the genealogies, though.
• Drink more milk.  See the heart-related stuff under the elliptical entry.  I've been doing okay with substituting tea for the diet soda, cutting out carbonation to see how it affects my teeth, but my non-caffeine options at home mostly have been herbal tea and the low-sugar Gatorade, and the latter has really way too much sodium, which can screw up my vertigo.  I used to drink a lot of milk and don't have a problem going back to it; I just have to make a conscious decision to switch until it's a habit again.
• Revise the series.  I started writing a series in 8th grade, and while I finished the first drafts of five of the books, I haven't done much with it since high school.  I still like the concept, but it needs to be reworked, probably condensed, and cleaned up.  I think I can pare it down to a trilogy.

Really not too bad a list.  I'm impatient for it to be spring again so I can be digging in my garden.