Thing 68: Done!!!

Apologies apologies, once again, blah blah blah, same old story, etc etc.

But look at the title of this post! I come with interesting news!

Less than two years into my 1001 days I have read 101 books! Fabulous, what?

That makes 23 things done, and so many still left to do. I became resigned to the fact that I wouldn't get them all done some time ago, but am still determined to get a lot more of them completed in the next year, just as I am to eventually pick up the pace with this blog and get it somewhere near a regular thing again.

See you in the New Year?

Things Completed

In my all, "being lax on blogging because I'm doing engagement and wedding related stuff" I have neglected to mention that I have recently completed two more of my 101 things.

Thing number 12
I filled my Terramundi finally! In case you don't know, a Terramundi is kind of a piggybank. And after just under two years I filled it up with one pound and two pound coins.

Thing number 70
Finally watched 30 films, and so will keep an ongoing list of the films that I'm watching.

Sorry I'm not more chatty with the post, just got so much to do today! More soon, I promise.

Once again, time slips

Sorry to anyone who continues to check this blog! I have been lax of late, since my return from Japan, not because I have not been doing anything towards my 101/1001, but because I have been doing so much else besides as well that it has been difficult to update this blog. I need to build some time into my day/week in order to do this more. In fact, I have some half-written posts about the end of my US Road Trip that I should finish soon, and lots and lots of pictures from that trip to upload to Flickr too.

Why has it been taking me a long time to write? Well...

...I got engaged!!! So my time has been invested instead in thinking about engagement party planning, wedding planning, life planning, work planning - lots of planning! It's all good, and sooner or later I will establish some rhythm to my life - at the moment there is not so much rhythm to my days, hours and weeks as there is freeform happiness.

Life is very good, and I hope to continue sharing that in the near future. 'Til then, take care, and do check back.

Oh, hello!

It's been nearly a month since I wrote on here, and so much has happened, as I'm sure you can guess from my last posts. I went back to Japan! So I have a lot to tell you about regarding that, details of the trip, the wedding that I went to, the culinary delights (and others) that I tried, and so on and so forth. I had a really great time, and am still feeling slightly tired from it all.

I still have to finish writing about my time in America, which I think I need to do soon in order to make sure that I get everything down. I want to have finished writing about both trips before Nanowrimo starts, and October and November are going to be quite busy with work as well. Busy busy busy!

In the last few weeks I've read a couple of books and seen four films as well - and just like that I am within a stone's throw of completing two of my goals - to read 101 books and see 30 films at the cinema. I now have only seven more books to read and one more film to see at the cinema! I want to read those seven other books before the end of the year (which sounds immediately doable, but remember that I won't be reading anything during Nanowrimo, and I have a stack of magazines that I subscribe to I need to read), and it's entirely possible that I will go to see that final film some time in the next week or so.

(not that it will be the last film that I see until I am thirty! You know what I mean)

Anyways, this post is an update and a prelude: in the next few days I am hoping that there will be a deluge of posts that will hit this blog. That's what I am planning for anyway. So, you'll hear all about my trip very soon I hope!

Thing 65: Done!!!

It's only in completing this goal that I realise just how straightforward it was, I mean, 101 pictures is not very much, right? But consider: before this I would only ever take my camera with me on a holiday. I would never think to take it on a night out, and I certainly wouldn't think to take it out with me during the day time, what would the point of that be?

Now my camera is part of my mental checklist, part of the kit that I try to remember to have with me when I am going out. It doesn't mean that it is always in my bag or my pocket, but I am getting better. And I'm really excited about sharing photos with people! I'm not sure that I would ever get so far along as to have a super-fantastic amazing camera, but I think that I will be taking photos more and more as time goes on. Perhaps for my next 101 things my goal will be to take 1001 pictures and share them on Flickr?

Enough about the future, I still have to try and accomplish as many of these 101 things as I can. For now, I hope that you enjoy my photos over on Flickr, my photostream can be seen by clicking here.

That makes 19 things done!

Update

There are several of the goals on my list that I'm actively working towards, or at least have stuff getting ready in the wings. A big one of these is my Japan trip, but I'll write about that separately soon - now I'm just going to concentrate on a few others.

Thing 9: Address Book
I bought an address book a while ago, and have slowly been populating it with names and contact details; I dropped the ball before I went away by accidentally deleting someone's address when they sent it to me and not writing it in the book, so I don't think I have the right to claim number 9 as completed yet. But soon.

Thing 12: Fill Terramundi
The piggybank, which I've been filling with one and two pound coins is really heavy now, and getting quite full. I'm not sure how much there will be in there when it is done, but it feels good to have been casually saving this money by putting the odd pound in every few days.

Thing 44: Sci-fi Convention
I don't think I mentioned before I went away, but I booked tickets to go to the SFX Weekender in February next year! Very excited about this!

Thing 45: Ico
After the memory card failed I did start to replay this, but then got sidetracked with working on the Career Skills Workshop in June, and of course I then went to the USA. I'll have to get back on to this soon. But now that I think about it, soon might not be until after I get back from Japan.

Thing 65: Flickr
I've been uploading pictures from my USA Road Trip to Flickr, and consequently that brings the total number of pictures that I've uploaded to Flickr to a total of 94. It won't be too long before I upload more pictures that have been taken since I started my 101 things, and so I don't think it will be too long before this goal is achieved.

Thing 95: BookCrossing
I signed up with BookCrossing a while ago, but never got around to leaving books anywhere! I have lots and lots of books in my own personal collection, so there's no reason why this can't be done some time soon. Perhaps I can combine this with thing 101, spending a lazy afternoon in a bookshop with friends...

Thing 99: Done!!!

Quite a simple one this, but the occasion never really presents itself, you know? And I forgot to report it a week ago! But anyway, on Saturday 29th August 2009, while enjoying a day out at Lyme Park I completed Thing 99 on my list of 101 things, namely to have a picnic.

And it was lovely, even if it was a bit windy.

So that makes a total of 18 so far, with a few more nearing completion! Time to pick up the pace, but I can and I will. Just over halfway through the 1001 days, but I've never felt so energised and ready to do stuff as I have lately. So just watch this space!

Thing 76 Done!!!

This morning I finished reading Bone by Jeff Smith, which I've been working my way through for the last month since getting the complete collection in one volume. With planning and preparing for my road trip I don't have the time to say too much about it now, other than to say that I thought it was utterly brilliant from start to finish. I really believe that the work as a whole is on a par with The Lord of the Rings.

The road trip begins on Monday; I'll be making notes and taking lots of pictures as I'm going across the USA, but not sure if I'll be on email or internet very much. In case I don't get back on here until the middle of August when I'm back, I hope that your summer is great and happy and full of good weather.

16 out of 101 things done... Time to pick up the pace!

Three Weeks!!!

I don't really know why it has been three weeks since I've posted; have entered a bit of a holding pattern I guess. Planning for the USA trip is going well, and the trip is only 40 days away!!! Crazy stuff.

I've not been able to make the progress I wanted on some of the other things I was thinking about doing in May. I thought that June was going to be really quiet as well, but have now got a pretty big project to work on as a Course Manager for a Career Skills Workshop which is at the end of June. Lots of prep over the next four weeks. Am beginning to realise that this is a huge job, and there's plenty to do right now. Problem is that it is heavily contingent on me being given information, and the information is not forthcoming at the mo...

Stress! But oh well. Things are moving on... As they always are. Am thinking of starting a new blog just to post little bits and pieces of writing on. I like that I write about my 101 things here, but want to write about other things too.

Anyways. Am going to post more in the next few days. My belated thoughts on Star Trek and some haiku I think. Maybe other things too!

One Year On

It's crazy to think it, it really is, but a year ago today is when I started this mad journey of doing 101 things in 1001 days. A year??? Where does the time go? I met a friend on Monday who had been off travelling the world for nine months, and it was amazing to me that it had been that length of time.

So what have I done? Well, as one of my updates yesterday mentioned I've done 14 out of my 101 things. Not bad. Some of the others are being worked on constantly (haiku, flash fiction - although I need to pick up the pace on churning the latter out) and others are being worked on and planned (Flickr, travel plans), but I think that I need to get some more things done before I go away to the USA in a few months time.

In fact, I'm thinking now that I will make it my aim to have completed a total of 20 things on my list by the end of May. What things could I do, what jumps out from the list?

45. Replay and complete Ico.
62. Confirm the number of stacked 4-tangles.
67. Sell five things on eBay.
84. Get my back waxed.
95. Release five books into the wild with BookCrossing.
101. Spend a lazy afternoon in a bookshop/café, drinking tea, reading books and hanging out with friends.

I've made a start on 45 and 62, and got a certain way with both of them. I've also realised that I have totally not kept up to date with letter writing! By the end of May I will try to get back on track with that, so that on average I will have sent one a month. Which is not great if I am honest, I should have kept up with that, but c'est la vie, we learn, we grow, we adapt.

And that's what this 1001 day project is all about. Looking at the list now, I wonder if - in some places - it is a little too ambitious. There are things that I am beginning to think might be impossible to get done within the time left.

(a short animated film? Really???)

By the end of it all though I will have become a different person. I'll be changed. Hopefully I'll have got some good habits!

I'm certain that I'll be ready to start another list of 101 things, or some other great creative project.

Thing 93 Complete!

ACROSS
1. All-out, intense (12)
7. Woman's undergarment (4)
8. Physical effort (8)
9. Stimulant (6)
10. Tennis bat (6)
11. Attempt (3)
12. Whale food (5)
14. Rocky projection (5)
16. Upper limb (3)
18. French brandy (6)
20. Enthusiastic (6)
22. Plant scientist (8)
23. Hideaway (4)
24. Tiny scurrying animal (6-6)

DOWN
1. Coal-miner (7)
2. Himalayan kingdom (5)
3. Excuse (6)
4. Speculative idea (6)
5. News item (7)
6. Run away and marry (5)
13. Ancestry (7)
15. Earth's attractive force (7)
16. Sharpness (6)
17. Call to duty (6)
19. Aroma (5)
21. Subordinate to (5)

It always seems to happen when I try to fill in a crossword that there is one answer that I just can't get. Well, that's if I get that far. Sometimes I just stare after the first half dozen answers are filled in... Which is why I decided that this would be a good challenge for my 101 things. I've tried about twenty so far, maybe more, and was beginning to think that this might be something where effort alone was not going to win the day, I needed a bit of luck.

I had two pieces of luck today: one was that this crossword started me off with a good few answers; the second was that the final clue I needed to answer was "9. Stimulant (6)" and I had "_I_L_P". This in itself was not lucky, but the fact that the only word I could think of that would fit that was "FILLIP" was a bit fortuitous. And it was right! I have no idea where I saw that word, possibly in some classic novel.

In any case, another one down! I can switch focus to another one of my goals, onwards and upwards!

Vegetarian Month I Final Update

My first month of vegetarianism is over; it was pretty good all in all; I don't think that I used it to its full potential all in all, I should have looked at more different recipes than I did, but it did feel good to have a change.

I did miss eating meat and fish, but I didn't crave it at all - except on one occasion when my family were having bacon - and now that I'm back eating meat and fish I don't feel any great compulsion to eat it. I had a nice trout fillet on Sunday and some cottage pie yesterday, but think I will be eating less meat and fish from now on.

The best thing that came out of the month was my discovering homemade soup. So simple, so tasty and I just loved making and eating it. I'll be doing that more often.

April might be veggie month II, not decided yet. Veggie month III will probably be next February. Stay tuned for soup recipes!

Vegetarian Month I Update 3

Only a few days left to go; I'm not going to rush back into eating meat with a big steak on Sunday - I'll probably have a piece of fish or something - but I am looking forward to eating meat and fish again. I didn't do this out of any big moral imperative, but rather to try and eat differently, possibly more healthily; this has also meant that I have cooked a lot more over the last month, and while my family might claim that I have been quite limited in the range of foods that I have eaten, at the same time I feel quite good for having tried a range of recipes with them. Things definitely got better for me when I started to follow recipes as well, rather than just make them up as I went along (as I have noted previously).

I'll take next February as one of my two remaining vegetarian months I think, and try to have this April as my other one. Somewhere amongst all this I'll do my thirty days of five-a-day as well - probably; at the moment I'm looking into the whole five-a-day thing due to something a friend told me about the health benefits of following that being a myth (not that I want to excuse myself from eating five-a-day, but if there is no benefit I would rather add something else to the list).

Vegetarian Month I Update 2

So. I found it increasingly difficult to stick to five-a-day (which I know, I know, I shouldn't really, given that I am not eating meat this month) but have found it easier this last week eating as a vegetarian. This is primarily because I started looking for and following recipes, rather than just saying, "Hmm, a big flat mushroom baked in the oven with some red onion? Yeah, that's kind of like a burger!" when clearly, clearly, it is not.

Have made soup twice this last week, relatively low in calories and very satisfying, and have also tried a few veggie delights such as nut roasts and meat free burgers - the latter taste nothing like meat, but oddly have a satisfying burger-ness to them. I'm still not convinced that I would ever want to be vegetarian long term, but it's not bad.

And the good news is that between the 2nd of February and the 14th I lose four pounds! If I can keep that sort of weight loss up over the next two weeks I would be very happy indeed. Hoping to carry over good cooking habits (I would have never thought to make soup from scratch before) into the next few months, combined with more walking and exercise, to try and shift a stone before I go to the USA in the summer. Perhaps April will be my second veggie month.

So. I'm quite happy. Onwards and upwards.

Vegetarian Month I Update

So I have totally failed at getting my five-a-day consistently, due to a couple of days where I just didn't feel much like eating, but I am still on track with my primary goal of eating vegetarian for February. Have been cooking a lot more in the last week, but due to my own stupidity have not made many things which I would honestly like to eat again.

Until today, when I decided to make soup. I looked in the recipe book which my friend had got me for Christmas, and saw two recipes which seemed attractive, one for leek and potato soup and one for a creamy spinach soup. However, I didn't have any leeks for the one, and I had no cream or lima beans for the other. So I decided to try and make a half portion of a fusion of the two, substituting some red and baby white onions for the leeks and adding the spinach.

And you know, it turned out alright. Sure, the soup is a disturbing grey/green colour, but it is tasty. My only complaint with myself is that I didn't trust myself to make something nice, and so in making a half recipe I ended up with only two servings. That's OK though, next time I'll make a larger recipe, enough for half a week at least.

The recipe from the last week which I definitely won't be trying was for a lunch that I made last Thursday. My sister put it best when she said (through tears of laughter), "At one point did you think, 'giant flat mushrooms stuffed with red onion and baked in the oven, served like burgers on batches - that'll be lovely'???"

As my family have pointed out, the key to all of this is preparation, thinking ahead to what I'm going to have (since a. I'm cooking all of my own meals - good practice for living alone - and b. I'm limited by what I eat - not that I am very fussy - and what is available). Tomorrow or Wednesday afternoon I'm going to make a pan of some tomato-y, Quorn mince-y, bean-y chilli that'll last for a couple of days, and for which I can just cook some carbs each day to go with it.

And next week will be soups galore I think (especially since I have three separate appointments at the dentist for fillings, for some reason the three teeth couldn't be done together or even combine a few of them).

I am missing meat and fish a bit, but have had no real temptation to break the "diet". All in all, going well!

Update, Thing 33

As I noted recently, I realised that one of the things that I had listed was a duplicate! This left me with having to find something else cool and creative to do. This last week I've been looking over some old things that I've written (this is as I've been sorting out my room). I found some notes to do with my 2005 NaNoWriMo novel, and this got me thinking.

From 2006 I've written a novel every November that has been a complete story, but in 2005 I came very close. I got those 50,000 words written, but the story wasn't finished. I'll write a little bit some time soon about what the general plot was and the structure. One of my 101 things is to work on the novel from 2006, which I finished, and to redraft it and edit it - and now I think I am going to use my spare challenge (rising from the duplicate) to finish the novel from 2005. And not just finish it, but edit and redraft the parts that I had done. I'm not interested in just finishing the last few chapters unless I go back and work on the whole thing.

So there we go, thing number 33 in my list of 101 things is now:

33. Complete my NaNoWriMo novel from 2005.

That novel was set in Liverpool (more or less); just had a thought, might actually go out some time while I'm working on this - though not this week due to the snow! - and take some pictures in and around the suburbs of Liverpool and in the city, see if I can't get something there to help me with the mood of it.

Am I beginning to think like a proper writer???

Two Years To Go

Well, it's my birthday. Today I turn 28. Happy Birthday to me etc.

In some ways, I think that I was hoping that I would have done more of the things on my list by now, but then some of the things that I've been working on are quite long term. Reading 101 books and the other media things are coming along quite well, and there are a few things that I am sure will come together quite suddenly as this year develops. I am confident that I will have hit 30/101 by the middle of the year, or soon after my US road trip.

Someone has suggested that I could combine four or five of my goals into a single weekend, possibly my weekend in London. I might do this, it sounds like it could be a lot of fun. I could do my weekend in London, deposit my five books for BookCrossing, have a picnic, spend the afternoon in a bookshop... Maybe even take 101 pictures for Flickr.

I think I have my domain name picked out. Obviously not going to say what it is just now! But I think that this will be the name that I use when start my webcomic. Things are chugging along in the background for this too, lots of ideas that I am trying to think through. I have to start drawing and sketching - I'm not under any illusion that the possible success of a webcomic would rest on my ability to create art - but I would need to do something so that I appear semi-serious about it!

Been writing a lot more in recent weeks, and since setting up a writers group with other people who did NaNoWriMo in November I've had a lot more drive to write things: especially pieces of flash fiction, and I'm really looking forward to Script Frenzy in a couple of months. I have a killer idea I think, well, it seems good at the moment. I have to do a little bit of research to do, but mainly just in terms of population sizes and geography for a certain part of the world in a certain time period. A couple of accurate period details wouldn't go amiss either.

Depending on how work goes over the next few months I also hope to fit in a couple of the video game replays. I'll possibly also try and squeeze in Gregory Horror Show, a game which I played for an hour and loved and then skipped to play something else. Killer7 will be replayed soon as well, I'm feeling in the mood for something surreally brilliant. Like Resident Evil 4 I think that will be a strictly day time only playing situation...

There are lots of other things from the list that I could write about, but that's all I'm going to say for now.

It is my birthday after all.

Last Year, This Year

2008 was a big turning point for me. Deciding to do 101/1001 was one of the best things I've decided to do, and since starting it I haven't regretted doing it. Halfway through the year I read "Yes Man" by Danny Wallace, and that started to change my perspective on how I approach things, being open to chances.

I've not said yes to everything that's come my way over the last six months, but I've said yes to more than I think I would have before. A friend took a look at the blog I've been keeping a few days ago and said, "You've been doing this for eight months and you've only crossed off nine things on the list??? How are you going to get the 92 in the next two years???"

With a bit of work, a bit of luck and a bit of fun...

Ten Things I Will Definitely Have Achieved In 2009
1). 12. Fill Terramundi
2). 15. Write 101 haiku
3). 19. Complete a ScriptFrenzy
4). 26. Make my Christmas cards one year
5). 41. Visit five US states
6). 64. Buy a domain name
7). 75. Re-read "Calvin & Hobbes"
8). 78. Re-read Scott McCloud's books on comics
9). 89. See a Shakespeare play
10). 95. Release five books into the wild with BookCrossing

Ten Things I Hope To Have Done/Completed In 2009
1). 1. Read entire Bible
2). 20. Enter the SFX Pulp Idol competition
3). 36. Create a webcomic
4). 42. Spend a long weekend in London (including a West End show)
5). 62. Confirm the number of stacked 4-tangles
6). 67. Sell five things on eBay
7). 73. Re-read "The Sandman"
8). 87. Buy a Nintendo Wii or Xbox 360
9). 91. Attend a live opera
10). 100. Send a Valentine

Five Things I Might Do In 2009
1). 2. Keep a diary regularly for at least six months
2). 31. Learn to juggle three balls
3). 34. Bake a cake for a present
4). 93. Complete a crossword (seriously, I've never been able to complete a crossword)
5). Various: replay about six of the games!

I got about three quarters of the way through Shadow of the Colossus a few weeks back, and then preparing for Christmas, work and Nanowrimo intervened... I wonder if I can finish it on New Year's Day, start the year off with a bang? Let's see.

Say yes.

I'm Alive!

This has been a manic, manic week. Writing every day over on Cognitive Blindspot along with the other things going on in my life has meant that writing reviews and keeping things up to date over here has fallen by the wayside a little. Now the weekend is nearly here, and in order to take a little break before the next phase in my life begins I think I'll try to get a few posts under my belt on here over the weekend.

Hope all is well in your neck of the woods, wherever that may be!

The Dark Knight Redux

I'm meeting my mum and sister at FACT in about an hour to go and see The Dark Knight again.

Can I count that as one of my thirty films a second time or is that, as my brain is telling me, a little bit cheeky?

I know I did a whole "three months" post a few days ago, but I think tomorrow (so long as my counter is right) it will be 101 days since I started. I'm thinking of going through the list and tweaking some of my things, especially the one about reading "Cerberus" - I might change that to reading all of "The Invisibles" or all of "Transmetropolitan". It would be good to read one of those all the way through I think.

For now I will keep the one about growing a beard in the style of Gregory House...