Ommmmm September 14, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Healthy Living.1 comment so far
I found the best book Monday night: MegaYoga, for curvy women! Megan Garcia, the yoga instructor, does traditional poses with modifications for those of us who have bellies and boobs that get in the way. 
I can finally do Child’s Pose without feeling like I’m suffocating!
I’ve done yoga the last three days, about 30 minutes each day. Since I have two mats, I brought one into work, along with a change of clothes. The microfilm room is out of the way enough to use, so I’ve been practicing on my dinner break. It’s amazing how peaceful and relaxed I feel afterward.
I copied all the pose pages in the book so I can combine them into different routines without flipping back and forth. It also makes it easier to change things up a bit. Now to bring the other mat in from my trunk to my apartment so I can practise first thing in the morning.
I think… September 7, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Work madness.add a comment
… I was better off with my leaking brain. The reporter I’m crunching data for had a great idea for the analysis, but it means pulling another piece of information. Not so bad, but that means downloading a file for every single school in the state. Then I have to re-save the file with a unique name. I’m up to the Ks for downloading and the first half of the Cs for renaming. I was hoping to be done by Sunday, but I’m not counting on it.
On the plus side, the project I’m writing for is humming along and I have the bulk of my writing done – well before my Wednesday deadline. I hope to finish the drafting tomorrow and be able to use next week for polishing and refining.
Leaking brain August 27, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Arts and Crafts, Music, Work madness.1 comment so far
Not literally, of course, but I’ve been using regression analysis to adjust data (with some help from Aleta on the analysis) all afternoon. None of the Excel formulas are especially tough – almost all are pretty simple – but trying to remember the logic behind them so I can tell if I’m messing up is starting to fry my brain.
But I’m getting a lot done, so I can’t complain.
In other news, I got accepted into a journalism leadership training program that requires a pretty stiff application process and I got a scholarship that covers most of my costs. (Without the scholarship, I wouldn’t be able to go, so that’s almost the more important part of that news.) It’s in less than two months, and I should be getting my homework in the next week or two, which needs to be turned in two weeks before the week-long session starts. I’m psyched, and my mentor was turning cartwheels.
As we roll into fall, choir has kicked into high gear for our fall concert. We still haven’t started Christmas yet, which concerns me a bit. But we’re also doing easier stuff this year because of the fall concert. Tomorrow we’re having a vocal workshop with a college voice professor. I’m looking forward to that, since I’ve never had any formal voice training.
I’m also gearing up for the holidays by spending a fair amount of time on crafts. Yesterday I was working on cross-stich for a Christmas present, and today I’m knitting a birthday present. I’ve also been contemplating Christmas card designs. Instead of a variety this year, I’m going to stick with a few designs I can make in quantity, to save both time and money.
I even managed some cleaning the last couple of days, though I still have a long way to go. There are two or three projects that will take a chunk of time, but also account for most of the chaos in my apartment. I’m going to try and tackle those in the next two weeks. Then I can concentrate on the smaller ones.
I also need to start running again, or at least walking. That’s on tap to start this week.
This and That July 2, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Music, Writing.add a comment
• I’ve been spending time the last couple of days ripping RealAudio files of liturgical music to MP3 format so iTunes can load theminto my library. I’ve got 125 of the rougly 550 files I downloaded done, and my library actually exceeds 4G of space, something I never thought would happen. I haven’t listened to any of the files, and I’m sure I’ll end up disabling some of them either because they’re repeats of songs I already have (I think I’m up to five versions of Amazing Grace so far) or because I don’t like them. I wasn’t listening as I downloaded, so I’m sure some are moldy oldies. I did get a nice version of Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus,” so I’m psyched about that.
• Since I’m only on-call today, I’ve been trying to catch up on my writing. I got almost 1,300 words written at the coffee shop, but I need about 4,000 to get completely caught up. I’m still a little short. Fortunately I’m off tomorrow and don’t have choir. I’m also off Tuesday, but I’ll be scooping slush all afternoon and evening at the park. At least I’m experienced. At any rate, if I can manage 2,500 words each of the three days, I’ll be more than caught up. The good news is that River is coming well, and I’m getting quite a lot of it written.
• I got the Mac equivalent of FrontPage (iWeb) and have started redesigning my Web site. It won’t be done for several weeks, but I think it will much better, as well as easier to update. Mac programs just tend to be better at design-type stuff.
• Last weekend, I spent four days helping Aleta paint and do other projects at her house, and it looks really good! She picked perfect colors for both her and the space, and I can’t wait to see what it looks like once the new floors are in. (Hopefully before my next visit up!) I also learned how to use a power washer and refined my painting skills. Unlike when my parents had us help paint the outside of the house when I was a teenager, I manged to stay basically paint-free except for where I wiped my hands, and that was done knowing I didn’t care if the clothes got painty. One shirt was so old – my friend Jessa gave it to me for my 16th birthday – that it was falling apart at the seams and was going in the trash at the end of the weekend no matter how clean it stayed.
• The painting project has me considering colors for rooms when I buy a house (18 months to 2 years), so I stopped at Lowe’s yesterday and picked up all sorts of paint chips and suggested color combinations. They have different brands than Home Depot, so I got different ones than up at Aleta’s. On initial glance, I got about a dozen that are worth considering for various rooms. Once I have time to try my own combinations – hopefully tomorrow – I should have a few more possibilities.
A bit behind June 18, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Writing.add a comment
Well, my glorious hope of writing 500 words a day in each uni, plus my book, is not going well. I’m about 200 words behind where I need to be for the week so far, though I have managed to do some writing in each universe.
I’m going to finish up today’s IE segment while waiting for Sports Editor to get around to meeting with me, then head off to the ball game. I’ll probably take a notebook with me so I can write while the game progresses. Like any baseball game, there’s lots of dead time. With any luck, I’ll get enough done in the other three areas to meet the 500/4 challenge I gave myself for a day.
I’m also off tomorrow, so I’ll head up to choir early and do some writing. They took the three-hour meters out downtown, so I can hit the coffee shop before 2 p.m. without having to move my car.
So far:
MM: 565
TH: 507
IE: 748
Exeter: 0
I just can’t turn down a challenge June 14, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Arts and Crafts, Fanfiction, Personal Finance, Running, The Guys, Trixie, Trixie Friends.2 comments
This one’s a doozy, too. I just signed up to write at least 500 words a day for 30 days. They have to be fanfiction, which means any writing toward my book doesn’t count (nor does writing for work).
So now I have to find two hours each morning to run (slog), about 30 minutes each day to write fanfiction, at least that much time to write my book, plus find time to clean my apartment. Can somebody invent a 30-hour day?
In other news, I took a break from running over the weekend, which ends tomorrow. I had blisters on the bottoms of both feet from my old orthotics and while they weren’t painful and they weren’t getting worse, they also weren’t getting any better. Since I walk around in bare feet a lot, there was a decent chance I could step on something and pop one. With Mal coming in for the weekend and the associated walking in DC, I figured it was a good time to take a break. The good news is they seem to have finally healed, so I can start running again.
I started designing Christmas cards last night, and I’m going to figure out what I need for each and assemble a mock-up during the weekend. I know I need ribbon, but I’m not sure what else I need that I don’t already have.
For those who don’t read my other blog, my quest to kill my credit card debt by the end of the year is on track. That means come Jan. 1, I can start saving for a house and a new(er) car. The house is top priority, but I’m still going to be putting a decent amount away for the car in case mine starts falling apart. Fortunately, I’m putting so much to debt now that once it can go into savings, the money will start piling up pretty quickly.
As I mentioned before, Mal came to DC over the weekend and I got to meet her, plus see the Jix Chix. Aleta and Mary are the only ones I’d seen lately. We had a blast! My sister’s stuffed animals are now jealous because we got our picture taken with the Swedish Chef at the American History museum in their muppet exhibit.
The good, the bad and the ugly May 31, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Running, The Guys, Work madness.2 comments
Today was one heck of a day. It started when I actually got up at 7 to go running, only to realize it was raining outside. So I waited about an hour to get up, which meant it was almost 9 when I finally headed out. It was nice when I started, but got very hot and muggy by the end of my five-mile run. (Well, slog really. It was a little too slow to be called a run.)
So I headed home, showered, lay in bed with the fan going and made a strawberry soy protein smoothie in a vain attempt to cool down before work.
I got to work, started working on the inside pages of our weekly entertainment section, and discovered that instead of fairly basic pages, the desk guys left me with a two-page non-linear feature. Now, I’ve done stuff like that once or twice before, but I generally have plenty of time to think, plus it’s in a news section where it doesn’t have to be too feature-y to look cool. So I headed out for a walk to chill out. I was smart enough to fill my now-empty smoothie squeeze bottle with cold water first. By the time I got back, I was calmer, but back to being all hot and sweaty. *sigh* Fortunately, EE was back from lunch and promised to help me when he was done with the cover story design. Just knowing that helped, so when I finished everything else, I started playing around, figuring he could help me rip it apart and build it new again better than starting from scratch. By the time he had time, I had pulled together a rough layout that he actually liked. He made some suggestions to police it, mostly regarding evening out the white space, but that was about it.
Meanwhile, my sister and WG have been bickering via e-mail – my e-mail. She sent a comment today I knew would get a great reaction from him, so I called him at home tonight to fill him in and get his response. My end of the conversation was necessarily restricted because I was in the middle of the mostly empty newsroom, but his wasn’t. I had to bite my tongue a few times because the smart-ass response would have either revealed who I was talking to or not been appropriate for work. But it was a funny interlude in the night.
Little else new here, but my annual review should be either Friday or Monday, so expect another post then with either a rant or rejoicing.
She lives! May 23, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Running, Trixie Friends, Work madness.1 comment so far
No, I haven’t died. I’ve just been busy.
Quick hit update:
* My trip to Richmond ended a day early after Aleta got a bug. Not wanting to get germs, I headed home. She was very understanding.
* I did, however, see the Maggie L. Walker house. She was not only the first female bank president, but the first black female bank president. It was a cool tour, and well worth the time. I only went because it was in the area where I parked and was free, but I’m glad I did.
* I ended up taking about a week off from running for various reasons, but actually didn’t lose any ground in terms of distance. I ran 2.5 miles Monday – my first day back – and could easily have done three. After the first mile, I got into a groove.
* Unfortunately, it was also the first really warm day since I’ve been running, so I didn’t think to put sunscreen on even though I wasn’t wearing the hoodie over my tank top. My shoulders are very red right now. *sigh* I’ll remember from now on; it was a painful lesson.
* I came up with the best cover design at work for our annual graduation section, but my boss didn’t decide to use it until it was too late to actually do it. So we’re saving the idea for next year. On the plus side, this means I get at least part of the award for the design contest he was running to come up with a cover.
* Our food section for tomorrow has a recipe for homemade microwave popcorn, which I’m going to have to try.
* I’m getting new running sneakers on Saturday! There’s nothing better than hitting the road in new sneakers – they always feel so comfortable compared to the old ones.
* Unfortunately, my holiday weekend will be spent at the office, including my birthday. But I do have some plans in mind so it won’t be all bad – and working Monday means I can take a four-day weekend next month without using vacation time.
Still running May 10, 2006
Posted by irishmadness in Healthy Living, Running.add a comment
My iPod rocks! I tweaked my running playlist and managed to run for almost 30 minutes today – 2.25 miles total. (.85R/.25W/1.4R) Yes, I actually almost made it 1.5 miles in one stretch. I probably could have, but I ran out of tunes.
I’m going to tweak it again in the morning so the first and second sections aren’t so lopsided. Anyway, I’m thinking I can hit 7 or 8 miles total this week, which puts me easily on track for 10 during the last week of the month. (If, of course, I run the rest of this week.)
I can feel myself getting in shape though. My muscles are rarely sore in the afternoons anymore, and I don’t huff and puff nearly as much. Once I can build up a milage base, I’ll be in good shape, since tired muscles are what’s holding me back now.
Next week’s goal is to keep the same playlist as tomorrow, but try and cover more ground than I did this week. Then I’ll tweak the playlist for the last full week to add in more running time, probably enough to keep me going through June.
This week’s goal: 7 miles total
Next week’s goal: 9 miles total
May goal: 10 miles a week
June goal: 15 miles a week
July goal: Maintain 15 mile weekly total and race in July 4th 5K
