Personal Digest Saturday: December 28 – January 3

Life news this week:

• Saturday was MY COOKIE PARTY! I had a bunch of friends over to help me dispose of the cookies (six cookie types plus cheesecake). And they were very glad to do it, haha. But I had to spend the morning and early afternoon preparing for it, so I wrapped some small presents, did some laundry, made some drink labels, put away some dishes, cut cheese and fruit, figured out how to use my cool whipped cream frother, and made cider and hot chocolate and put it all out before the friends got here. My friends Ben, Avery, Scott, Meghan, Adam, Jeaux, Dare, Yasmin, and Arthur attended. We played Joking Hazard and ate a bunch of food. Some of the folks left earlyish but some stayed until after midnight just chilling and talking. It was great and I loved seeing everyone! After they left I cleaned up a little but I was too tired to do very much.
  
  
• Sunday I spent the day catching up on the day before's undone work--organizing some photos and doing my blogging since I didn't get to on Saturday. Then I did more laundry and cleaned up the house. BIRDLE CAME BACK! I was so excited. I sent a Polo to my sister about the holiday festivities and ate too many cookies.
  
  
• Monday was back to work, and it was uneventful. I collected timesheets and bothered teaming partners. Also had to take a walk to the post office because people bought a couple of Meg's items. I ate cookies for breakfast! That's fun. Then I made a video for my asexuality channel and wrote my monthly webcomic. I read some of the script for the voice acting part I got. Then washed dishes and charged my Birdle Cam but Birdle did not come back. Sad!
  
  
• Tuesday I had to work, so I bothered people for documents and processed some timesheet stuff. Did some drawing for my webcomic and got it done. Sent Meg an epic Polo. Talked to Tony outside when he came to do my yard. Then started working on my really big end-of-year post which always takes me several hours every year. I really enjoy seeing the accomplishments (and where I fell short). I hadn't already decided what my next resolutions would be so I had to spend some time thinking about it. After I was done with my posts I ate a lot of crap and watched silly videos.
  
  
• Wednesday I had the day off for New Year's Day. I slept in a little, then cleaned up the kitchen and put away stuff from the party and cleaned up a mess I'd made packing up Meg's eBay items. I played DDR and wrote up some goal progress for December. Jeaux came over and took me grocery shopping, and then we ate at Tijuana Flats, came home, and hid from the cold while I read him silly things. Then I practiced my ukulele.
  
  
• Thursday I went back to work and did some backed up work collecting contact info for one of the districts. I also went to a follow-up dentist appointment where they had made me a mouth guard to wear while I sleep so I can avoid grinding my teeth. (I've never had any issues with this to my knowledge, but the dentist said they could see evidence of it, so I believe them.) I tried on the guard and after some adjustments they let me go home. I wrote my webcomic and scanned some photos from an album. Then went to game night with my friends and got about half my drawings done.
  
  
• Friday at work I did my upcoming project reports and some more contact database stuff. Then I did the remainder of my comic drawings and posted it, walked while reading, did a little 20-minute workout, practiced my ukulele, and looked around to see if there were any more voice acting roles I was interested in trying. (Nothing yet.)

New Reviews:

• Meghan Chiasson gave The Invisible Orientation a three-star review on Goodreads.

Health Plan Update:

• Weight stuff: I started getting back on the scale at the start of the year and I gotta say I do not really understand how I can have a GAIN of SEVEN AND A HALF POUNDS within A WEEK?? That's like six percent of my entire body weight. How. Holiday food will do that to ya I guess?? I'm gonna guess actually both the high and the low were kind of a fluke, but I'm sure I did legit go up a bit because of holiday food and I'm honestly not worried about it. I just do want to do better going forward. I recorded a high of 118.0 and a low of 116.8. I don't have a bunch of extra junk food or leftovers lying around this week so I'm expecting I've seen the last of those numbers (even the low one), because jeez.
  
• Nutrition stuff: I've continued to be low on protein because this past week I ate a lot of cookies. I have still managed to have three servings of fruits and vegetables most days, and have felt pretty good about it. I am still regularly taking vitamins.
  
• Activity stuff: I met my walking goal every day this week. My low day was Friday at 10,117 steps, and my high day was Tuesday at 10,439 steps.

Books Read: 

• Finished Reading: Nothing this week.
  
  
• Currently Reading: Dream to Me by Megan Paasch. I'm on page 178.
  

New singing performances:

This week's karaoke song is "True Blue" by Madonna.

 

Stuff drawn:

My monthly writing webcomic, So You Write:

 

#163: misread.

My weekly fantasy webcomic, Negative One:

 

#1025: ivy #320: princess hair.

Videos Made: 

Letters to an Asexual #121 ("there's no reason for aces to come out; it's personal!") is out. In this video, I share an anonymous person's request for advice on how to handle another queer person telling them that there's no reason to EVER come out since sexuality is personal. I share some reflections on why we need to talk about our orientation and what the alternative is.

New photos:

The Christmas Album for 2024 now contains cookie party images too, but here are my favorites:

Cookie party Ben

Cookie party Meg and Adam

Me with hot chocolate at my party

Yasmin's famous plating skills

Dare and Yasmin hangin' out

Friends playing Joking Hazard

My cozy hot chocolate

Social media counts:

YouTube subscribers: 5,476 for swankivy (8 new), 680 for JulieSondra (no change), 16 for v & V Vids (no change), 210 for Not-So-Giant Women (no change), 66 for Tides of Time Band (no change). Twitter followers: 802 for swankivy (no change), 3,651 for JulieSondra (lost 7). Facebook: 299 friends for swankivy (no change), 643 likes for JulieSondra (no change), 82 followers for Negative One (no change), 252 followers for So You Write (no change), 100 followers for Not-So-Giant-Women (no change). Tumblr followers: 2,427 (no change). Instagram followers: 281 (no change). Threads followers: 77 (no change). Bluesky Social. Bluesky followers: 264 (2 new).

December Goals Update

We've made it to 2025. Yay! So let's review how I finished out 2024 and how the resolutions shook out.

1. Health Goals: I resolved to drink more water, eat more fruits and veggies, and walk at least 10,000 steps a day.

2. Personal Project Goals: I resolved to get digital photos sorted and collect memorable bits from Facebook for my essays; resolved to work on writing or editing at least one day a week; resolved to relearn ukulele songs I've forgotten and learn new ones, and keep creating my regular webcomic and video content.

3. Reading Goals: I resolved to read at least twice a week.

4. Relationship and Communication Goals: I resolved to document daily life stuff more, keep up with e-mails and online communication, and make time for friends and family.

5. Other Goals: I wanted to prepare and sell my mom's house, watch some TV shows I'd dropped, and not play time-wasting tames.

Progress Update:

HEALTH GOALS:

Summary: Obviously the last week of December involved a lot of TREATS and heavy eating! And during that whole week of celebrating with family and friends and getting through the leftovers, I definitely fell off on having my recommended amount of protein that week. Everything else was pretty good and I got a reading on the scale that was the lowest of the entire year! And I immediately blew it away with tons of cookies, haha. (I do not regret this. I think it's really important to not see food as "decadent" or "indulgent." We need to be able to have treats without weird guilt around it, even though I am trying to make sure I give my body what it needs.) I did manage to get at least three servings of fruits and veggies almost every day, and most days I met or exceeded my water goal. This is my calendar of progress:

PERSONAL PROJECT GOALS:

Summary: The photos project wrapped in 2024 with me successfully getting through all the photos I inherited from Mom's house. I did get them scanned and sorted and to some extent I've got piles started for how to store some loose photos. I found an empty photo album in with my mom's stuff, so I'll use it, and I bought a new photo box to give some miscellaneous ones a home. I still have a bunch of personal photo albums to leaf through to get this last little pocket of pre-digital photos into my inventory (from about 1993 to 1996), and I have some loose photos in the closet that need to be given the same treatment I gave to the loose photos my mom had. I think I got a lot of these when my dad's parents died and I never did anything with them, so now I am motivated. Soon after I finish that, my goal is to incorporate them all into the sorting system I have digitally--but though I had aspirations of being DONE with this by the end of 2024, I did not make as much progress as I wanted to. Sometimes that happens.

Writing goals–wise, I feel like I did okay with both submissions and writing new content--though almost all of it was on short stories and I did not come back to my novel this month. That will change soon! I finished a new short story (which was hella long) and toward the beginning of the month I got more submissions out. I am looking for a literary agent for my fiction again (I still have an agent for my existing work), so I'll continue doing that, and I want to get the short story cleaned up and through beta reading before I start sending it out. I might also start sending out another short story that I finished a while back but it hasn't ever been shown to anyone.

I did not pick up the ukulele goals. I will see what I can do with that next year.

Progress:

READING GOALS: 

Summary: I was only able to carve out time for reading toward the beginning of the month. The hubbub of the holidays took over halfway through the month and I was buckling down on other projects and activities, so that fell off a bit. I think this will fluctuate sometimes and I am okay with this being a medium priority, not a top priority.

Progress:

RELATIONSHIP AND COMMUNICATION GOALS: 

Summary: I have successfully kept my e-mail box clear. Very proud of that. What I have NOT done--pretty catastrophically--is keep up with the documentation I really wanted to do. We'll see if I can do it better in the new year. I have a very small backlog to get through and then I really want to start writing about everyday life again--and though I think a lot of people develop New Year's goals to stop wasting time on social media, I actually want to spend a little MORE time there (just to share updates and be more present in the various places where I have a presence), if only to post fun photos and musings. Nothing too intense.

Progress:

OTHER GOALS:

Summary: I no longer have any dangling obligations for my mother's estate beyond selling a few things I wasn't able to place with new owners. I'll keep trying to do that, and next month I have to figure out taxes and give the right information to my sisters about how we are to claim anything relevant on our forms.

I still need to sand and paint the plaster pillar that is sitting outside.

I made and kept all my health appointments this year. Go me.

I still have a TV show I want to watch but honestly even though it's on the "to-do" list, it is never going to be a priority to watch TV!

I have liked doing this so I am going to continue this method (with some slight changes to the calendars) and continue posting these monthly.