Things That Make Me Happy -- #4: Stargazing

Every Friday I'll be posting about one thing that makes me happy in order to complete goal #82: Identify 100 things that make me happy.

Today's topic is: Stargazing

(WALL-E ©Disney/Pixar)

When I was a kid I wanted to be an astronaut. True, I also wanted to be a firefighter, a teacher, a cop, a secretary, a paleontologist, an ice skater, and Alexi Lalas. But nothing has kept me as fascinated or as in awe as the stars have. Some of my happiest moments have been spent looking up at the night sky, wondering at the beauty of the universe and marveling at the awesomeness of science.

My grandfather took my sister and I to go look at Hale-Bopp in '97 and I can remember being ridiculously excited as I peered through the binoculars at the trail of the comet. Much later, when I was in college, he and I went deep into the country and pulled over to the side of the road to try and catch a meteor shower. Even though we didn't see any meteors, the sheer magnitude of stars in the sky was breathtaking.

It isn't just stars or comets that fueled my passion for looking at the sky. In high school my family took my friend Kristy to Beaver Meadow's observatory so that we could all use a telescope to see Saturn and Uranus. It's humbling to know that there are objects orbiting around our sun that are so large that your own puny planet could fit inside of them...several times.

The universe is staggering and staggeringly beautiful. Wherever I am, whether it's in the middle of a light-polluted city or standing in a field in the middle of nowhere, I like to look up at the stars and see how many I can find/identify. It's a peaceful sort of feeling and an exciting one. I don't need a religion or any other outdated mode of explaining the world to appreciate what I'm seeing. I think it's even more impressive that the universe had no creator and that natural, scientific processes are responsible for the beauty around us.
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Woah, one full week of posts. Can I do it again next week? Only time will tell. :)

-J

Weight Loss Goal: Lose 20 lbs by August

I'm overweight. Obese, actually. I weight around 220 lbs when I should weigh somewhere around 120 lbs. Honestly that seems a little low even though I'm under 5 feet tall. My eventual goal weight is the same as it's been for a long time: 135 lbs. But I'm going to do it in steps.

Right now the plan is to try to lose in 20 lb increments. I'm giving myself until August to lose the first 20. It's doable and I'm not going to use any fad diets or anything like that to do it. Instead, I'm making lifestyle changes. I'm cutting out fast food. I'm going to eat 3 meals a day instead of 1 or 2. I'm going to start exercising. And I'm even going to quit smoking.

My weight has been an issue since I was in middle school. In fifth grade I was a skinny twig of a thing and then sixth grade rolled around and I started gaining. Some of that was puberty, but some of it was the fact that I was being bullied a lot and I started to eat my feelings. That trend would continue for a long time. I don't know what my heaviest weight was, but I'm guessing it was somewhere around 230. Then college came.

I didn't gain the "freshman 15". In fact, I lost about 20 lbs my first year of college. I attribute it to not snacking and being more active. I was walking to and from class. I didn't have a car, so I was walking to get places. I lost even more the summer before my junior year because I was working a really active job where I was on my feet for seven hours at a time. I didn't look amazing or anything (I was still hovering around 190), but it felt good to see a number below 200. But the job went away, my habits changed, and the weight came back.

And it's stayed there ever since. I stopped walking as much as I used to when I got a car. I haven't been snacking or anything, but I have been eating LOTS of fast food, drinking sugary beverages, and being idle for most of the day. I'm actually surprised that I haven't been gaining weight, but that may be attributable to the fact that I smoke, I live on the third floor of a building with no elevator, and I'm trudging up and down the stairs for a cigarette once every hour or so.

Regardless, I'm making changes now that I'm hoping will have a positive impact on my life. I've eaten breakfast for the last three days (yogurt and granola or a bowl of cereal and a banana), my lunches have been healthy, and I haven't been eating out at all this week (except for Tuesday, but there's a long story as to why). Don and I have been making dinner at home all week and have already planned out our grocery list for next week. We're going to start getting up at 5 am next week so that we can get an hour of exercise in before showering/eating breakfast/preparing lunch/going to work. And the last cigarette I will (hopefully) ever smoke will be crushed under my shoe on Sunday night.

I may try this and fail. I may slide back into bad habits. But it takes 21 days to break a bad habit and I'm hoping that the same is true for starting new, healthy habits. I have Don to kick me in the ass if I start straying back off the path to healthy me and I have this blog to help keep me honest about how I'm doing.

Hopefully by August I'll be 20 lbs thinner and well on the way to becoming something new and better.

-J

Spotlight on Day Zero: Goal #45 -- Learn How to Read Tarot Cards

Every other Wednesday I'll be writing a post about one of my uncompleted goals for the Day Zero Project. Today's goal is:

#45: Learn how to read tarot cards

From How Stuff Works

I identified as Pagan on and off for about six years before I realized that religion as a whole just wasn't for me. I don't miss those days, especially because it never really made me feel, well, anything. Except for stupid. There were loads of times that I felt stupid. The one thing I regret, however, is that I never learned how to read tarot cards.

I don't believe in fortune telling or mysticism or anything like that. I just think it's kind of a useful skill to have. Need a little extra cash? Offer to do readings for people. Does your child's school need volunteers for a fair of some sort? Tell them you'll play the fortune teller. Besides, I have a deck that's never really been used and I'd feel bad just giving it away without at least trying to get something out of it first.

Like several of the other goals on my list, this one is just for fun. It's something I can do when I'm bored and if, as some people suggest, tarot is a way to tap into your subconscious (like a Rorschach test), maybe it'll even be helpful in growing as a person.

-J

Things That Make Me Happy -- #3: Thunderstorms

Every Friday I'll be posting about one thing that makes me happy in order to complete goal #82: Identify 100 things that make me happy.

Today's topic is: Thunderstorms

Okay, first, I had no idea how hard it was going to be to find a video of a thunderstorm. There are a lot out there but none of them are very good. So the video above is of a virtual thunderstorm. Which is a bit lame, but beggars can't be choosers.

I've had an obsession with thunderstorms ever since I was a child. I love all of it--the lightning, the thunder, the wind, the rain. There's just something inherently powerful and alluring about them. I remember nights when my grandmother and I would sit in the living room and watch storms out the window. I remember sitting on the covered porch in my old dorm, listening to the rain pound on the pavement as the wind whipped through the trees.

I can't say that I'm a fan of driving in them, but I can never resist the urge to sit at home and watch them. On my birthday last month, there was a huge thunderstorm in the Rochester area, with torrential downpours and lots of lightning to boot. Don and I watched primarily out of the window, but (being a little bit nuts) I spent a few minutes outside standing in the rain, feeling the wind rush around me. There's nothing quite like that feeling.

Also, if you're ever looking for a good song to listen to during a thunderstorm, I've definitely got a recommendation:

E Nomine's "Mitternacht" goes really well with creepy, stormy nights. Don't believe me? Find the thunderstorm sound clip of your choice and play this at the same time. Fan-freaking-tastic.

-J

I'm Being a Bookworm

Okay, so I know that my posts have been kind of sporadic. Sorry about that. I really do want to update this blog five times a week. I'll try harder. Honest.

In the meantime, I've been a bookworm lately. Reading is one of those things that make me happy, especially when it's an actual book with actual pages. I get that everyone and their uncle has an e-reader but I don't and I don't intend to ever own one (although I'll admit to using my boyfriend's from time to time).

In the last week or so I've been on a non-fiction binge. Specifically books on atheism. I'm an unapologetic and very vocal atheist but for some reason I've never read any books by atheist writers. I read one recently by Greta Christina called Why Are You Atheists So Angry? 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, which got me wanting to read others. Earlier this week I read God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything by the late Christopher Hitchens and I just finished Faith No More: Why People Reject Religion by Phil Zuckerman. I have a few others that I'm planning to read before I move onto a different topic.

These books have only strengthened my own personal convictions. I've tried religion before. I was a Christian growing up, although I left after I just couldn't handle the religion's beliefs about homosexuality (which was the straw that broke the camel's back, really; there are about a million other reasons why I left). My second apostasy came after a short and laughable stint as a Pagan. I've read about other religions, learned about their tenets. But nothing fit. For me, it really comes down to what to what I believe to be the truth: there is no god. It doesn't matter how many people believe in one; that doesn't make it true.

I'm going to try to review the books that I read while I'm doing the Day Zero Project, although I've got some catching up to do as I've already read a few books. We'll see how that goes.

-J

Completed Goal -- #26: Find a New Hobby

I recently completed another goal for the Day Zero Project:

#26: Find a new hobby

My boyfriend, Don, and I got insanely bored a week or so ago and decided to stop down at Millennium Games to pick up a few starter decks for Magic: The Gathering. He had once had an extensive collection of cards but had sold them long before meeting me. I had only played once or twice in high school, but he and I were both looking for something that the two of us could do when we were mind-numbingly bored and no one else was around. Magic seemed to fit the bill.

Being the nerds that we are, we enjoy the fact that we can spend time together AND geek out at the same time. One of the things that I appreciate most about him (and I know the same is true for him) is that I can be myself around him without being judged. In fact, sometimes I think we try to out-nerd each other.

As with any hobby or activity, it's about moderation. I'm not going to go out and spend hundreds of dollars on cards, nor are he and I going to spend thousands of hours playing. It's just something fun and relatively inexpensive (as opposed to, say, bungee jumping every weekend or starting a collection of Faberge eggs) that we can do together.

So, two goals down, 99 to go.

-J

Things That Make Me Happy -- #2: Car Karaoke

Every Friday I'll be posting about one thing that makes me happy in order to complete goal #82: Identify 100 things that make me happy.

Today's topic is: Car karaoke

I've been singing since I was a toddler. Apparently my mother once walked into the room to find me in my playpen rocking out to "Do Wah Diddy." I haven't stopped rocking since. Music is a huge part of my life (in addition to singing in playpens I also play the viola) and never fails to make me feel better--no matter how much my day has sucked. Nowhere is this more the case than in my car. When I'm out driving somewhere (or, even, just aimlessly wandering back roads in order to de-stress), I'm either doing one of two things: listening to NPR or blasting music and singing my head off.

If you ever pass me on the road you're likely to hear one of these songs blaring from my open window as I sing along:

1) "Allo Paris" by Mano Solo (Yes, I can sing/speak French.)

2) "Bohemian Rhapsody" by Queen

3) "Demon Kitty Rag" by Katzenjammer

4) "Henrietta" by The Fratellis

5) "Dilli Düdük" by Tarkan (And I can sing in Turkish. I just wish I could speak it.)

-J

Completed Goal -- #85: Clean Out My E-mail Inboxes

Yesterday I completed one goal on my Day Zero list:

#85: Clean out my e-mail inboxes

I had two that I specifically wanted to clean out--my work e-mail and my personal e-mail. The personal e-mail took all of about twenty seconds. My work e-mail, however, took me a good hour or so. I had about 5,500 unread e-mails (not to mention the gazillion e-mails that I had read but never deleted) to contend with. In fact, I hadn't cleaned that inbox out since the fall of 2010! But now it's a clean slate with nothing in it and it feels so nice. If I can keep it that way it'll be a miracle, but at least it's empty for the present moment.

This also means that I can put $10 in savings for completing a task. When I have $10, that is. Or, you know, a place in which to save it.

-J

What Are Friends For?

Shameless plugs, of course. And here is my shameless plug:

Go check out Running Between the Raindrops. It's the personal/Day Zero blog for my greatest and most accomplished friend in the world. Seriously, she's funny, insightful, ridiculously intelligent, and deserves a lot more readers than she currently has. (Although, don't we all?)

-J

Things That Make Me Happy -- #1: British Comedy

Every Friday I'll be posting about one thing that makes me happy in order to complete goal #82: Identify 100 things that make me happy.

Today's topic is: British comedy

Via markandrewholmes.com

Growing up, I was a big PBS kid. In addition to Sesame Street, Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego?, and Reading Rainbow, I also used to watch Britcoms with my grandparents. Ever since then I've preferred them over American television shows. The humor is better, the social commentary is more biting and prescient, and the shows are of a higher quality all around. Today, nothing makes me laugh harder or make me feel better than a good Britcom. Here are a few of my favorites (in no particular order):

1) As Time Goes By

Via BBC

As Time Goes By follows the story of Jean (the ever-fabulous Judi Dench) and Lionel (Geoffrey Palmer), former lovers who reunite decades after they first met. A funny, romantic, and brilliant love story, I grew up watching this with my grandparents. The humor is a huge selling point, but it's really the characters and their interactions that made this one of my favorite Britcoms. Jean and Lionel are really sweet together and the working relationship between the somewhat-uptight Lionel and the mildly-annoying-but-eager-to-please Alistair is hilarious.

2) Monty Python's Flying Circus

Via Wikipedia

I discovered Monty Python my freshman year of high school, but it wasn't until college that I actually watched Flying Circus. While the fourth season is, frankly, awful, the first three seasons of this show are incredible. Whether they're learning how to defend themselves against fresh fruit, having an argument, or just taking a walk, Monty Python's humor is smart, surreal, and, often, sexy (nudge, nudge, wink, wink).





3) Black Books

Via Channel 4

This show is actually brand-spanking new to me. As in, I discovered it earlier this week. Black Books follows the strange day-to-day adventures of Bernard Black (Dylan Moran), a misanthropic drunk of bookseller; his hapless shop assistant, Manny (Bill Bailey); and their friend Fran (Tamsin Greig), a woman who can hold her liquor about as well as she can hold onto a man (sorry, love, but it's true). The show is hysterical, which is all thanks to snappy dialogue, an ingenious cast, and the wacky situations that the brilliant writers (Moran among them) put these strangely lovable characters into.

4) Waiting for God

Via GPB

Tom (Graham Crowden), who often seems a few sausages short of an English breakfast, and Diana (Stephanie Cole), who hates everything and everyone, are living in a retirement village run by a complete nincompoop and his too-cheerful assistant. The two form an odd friendship/romantic relationship that allows them to survive the absurdity of life while they wait for the end of it all. Insanely funny and featuring two of the greatest characters ever to suffer inside an old folks' home, Waiting for God is one of those shows that makes you wish American television would realize that actors don't need to be young and "hip" to bring in an audience.

5) Russell Howard's Good News

Via Funri

I know there are going to be people out there who are thinking, "Wait, really? There are way better topical news shows out there." My response is, "Yeah, don't care. I love this guy." Known to many as a former panelist on Mock the Week (which is also one of my favorites, but I'm limiting myself to five), Russell Howard's very own show on the telly combines his childish humor with news of the week and internet clips. Why I find this to be an effective way to run a show is beyond me, but I think it's hilarious. I think a huge part of it is that he points out the genuine stupidity of the human race while still reminding us that there are great people out there doing amazing things (the "Mystery Guest" and "It's Not All Doom and Gloom" segments of his show). Plus, and I feel really shallow saying this, I can't help but think he's the most ridiculously adorable thing in the world.


What are some of your favorite Britcoms? Share them in the comments section.

-J

Spotlight on Day Zero: Goal #76 -- Get rid of all the stuff I don't need

Every other Wednesday I'll be writing a post about one of my uncompleted goals for the Day Zero Project. Today's goal is:

#76: Get rid of all the stuff I don't need

In the last two and a half decades I have managed to accumulate a lot of crap. Books, clothes, mementos, knick-knacks, materials for hobbies, furniture--you get the idea. For the last seven years, I've been able to keep most of that stuff stored at my grandparents' house, which meant that the amount of stuff I had in my dorm room or apartment was only mildly horrific. Now that my grandmother and grandfather are, sadly, both gone, all of those boxes and bins are currently residing in one half of my room. The other half is covered with piles of clothes and clutter.

Now, I'm an inherently lazy person. And a huge procrastinator. I've been wanting to get rid of all of this junk for ages and yet it's still here, mocking me. With my lease up at the end of July and the three of us moving into separate places, I've only got a few months in which to declutter everything, leaving only the bare essentials and a few things that I couldn't live without.

The momentous task before me is not insurmountable but it feels pretty damn close. If I wanted the entire internet to judge me I'd post pictures of all of the things that have taken over my life because it would drive home the fact that there are department stores that have less items than I do. I know that I just need to get going and do it, but how do you decide what's worthy of keeping and what isn't? Are the playbills from shows that I've been involved in any less important than my high school yearbooks? Which books should be kept and which should be donated? And what about all of the things that have been given to me over the years? How do I decide which gifts are worthy of a place in my life and which ones aren't?

A few months ago I read a book called The Joy of Less: A Minimalist Living Guide by Francine Jay. You'll notice that it's also listed as my current read on GoodReads. The book, which explains "how to declutter, organize, and simplify your life," caught my eye when it first came into the library where I work. I'm not one for self-help books or Feng Shui or any of that. I was just looking for a little push in the right direction towards getting all of that junk out of my apartment. The book is a straightforward read that attempts to cultivate a minimalist mindset while giving you tips on what to keep, what to store, what to donate, and what to throw out. I'm rereading it now because my goal is to have #76 completed by the end of June and it wouldn't hurt to go over what Jay suggests again.

In addition to Jay's book, I've also been looking online for articles about getting rid of crap you don't need and I came across an article from UpgradeReality: "Lessons from Tyler Durden & Ben Stiller--Stop Your Possessions From Owning You." I'm a huge fan of Fight Club (both the book and the movie) and I find Durden's perspective on "stuff" to be refreshing (even if I don't agree with his methods for ridding you of your possessions). We really aren't what we own, especially since I don't even use most of what I own. Attributing importance to a pair of pants or a keyring or a desk is ludicrous.

Courtesy of best-movie-quotes

Even more importantly, though, is the fact that I want to move across the country sometime in the next year. With the amount of stuff that I have right now, I'd need a cargo plane to shift it all out west. By culling my possessions, I can ensure that I'm mobile. And, using methods discussed in Jay's book, I can make sure that I don't ever end up having too much junk ever again.

Of course, reading about getting rid of my stuff and actually getting rid of my stuff are two different things. That's why I've made it one of my Day Zero goals. Hopefully by this time in July I can sincerely say that I've lightened the burden of my possessions and can check that goal off of my list.

-J