Author: Melanie

Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn’t learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick, and if we did get sick, at least we didn’t die; so let us all be thankful.
— Buddha

1. Being (almost) not sick anymore

2. Going to the gym even when you don’t feel like it, just because you know it’s the right thing to do

3. Getting control over your finances

Are you happy about anything in particular today?

In 101 in 1001 news, the recipe binder (#29) is finished!  It’s all nicely organized by main dishes (subdivided by protein), sides/soups, crock pot meals, desserts (subdivided by type), breakfast foods, drinks, and sauces, and it makes me feel great now that everything’s easily accessible!  99 more to go!

I have often heard people speak of true love, but for me, it was more of a sense of what was right, like the right amount of cinnamon, or the right amount of wine.  And as far as other things I have heard, to say that I was his is not at all a phrase I find accurate, though I might say I was devoted to him,  And I did not know if I would be with [him] when we were 12 and 15, or 54 and 57, but I knew that I should be.
— from A Still Small Voice, by John Reed

Yesterday was David’s 3oth birthday.  I wanted to post something yesterday, but with all of the birthday activity, and being sick, I didn’t get a chance to.  Today, I’m home sick from work, so I thought I’d take advantage of the free time and tell you a little something about him.

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A year ago, David and I sat on a bench at the Navy Memorial, trying to talk our way through the very complicated beginning of our relationship.  It was a Friday after work, the day before his birthday; I had taken him to lunch earlier since I wasn’t expecting to be able to see him again until Monday.  I had written him a letter telling him 10 things he didn’t know about me and baked him cookies, which I left on his desk before he got in to work.  He loved both the letter and the cookies.

We were talking about how the beginning works, when everything’s so complicated.  He was afraid of making a big change; I was afraid of never getting to be with him.  We knew that this was a chance we had to take, or risk wondering about it for the rest of our lives, but the first step was very scary.  Around and around we went, each of us fighting the other, trying to make our way to common ground.

Eventually, the talking stopped and we just looked at each other, searching each other’s eyes, wondering if we were thinking the same thing.  I decided to risk it, and leaned in.  He stopped me.

“Wait,” he said.  “I want to tell you before I kiss you.”

“What?” I asked, hoping I was right about what was next.

“I love you,” he said.

I smiled with tears in my eyes.  “I love you, too.”  I said.

And that was that.  We’ve been together ever since.

It hasn’t always been a walk in the park, obviously, but even when it was so hard a couple of months ago, there wasn’t anywhere else I wanted to be.  David is my other half in so many ways; even after a year, he’s still the first person I want to tell things to, the first person I want to do anything with, the only person I can imagine waking up to every day and coming home to every night, the person who believes in me when I don’t believe in myself, the one who supports me and encourages me and helps me up when I stumble, the one who seems to understand me the way no one else can.  His are the arms I want around me when the world feels like too much; his are the arms I burrow into each night as I fall asleep, knowing there isn’t a single place on earth I’d rather be.

I love the way, if I’m walking behind him, he absentmindedly reaches his hand back for me to take, because he wants me next to him.  I love the way he comes up and kisses me out of the blue for no reason.  I love that we casually say, “When we get married . . .”  or “When we have kids . . .” like it’s a foregone conclusion, with no doubt that it will ever come to pass.  I love that he takes such good care of the tomatoes, even though he won’t eat them.  I love that he acts as my ears without either of us even realizing it.  I love the way he brushes me off every morning when I tell him how handsome he looks (“You say that every day”) because I know he’s secretly pleased to hear it.  I love the tilt of his head when he’s about to say something sweet to me, and the way he secretly touches my leg under the table when we’re out to dinner.  I love that every time we drive somewhere more than an hour away, we have to be sure we find a Sheetz so that he can get a vanilla cappucino.

He’s so smart, and he makes me laugh every day.  He makes me a better person in so many ways, and I know that I’m lucky to have found him.  I hope I get to write one of these every year.

“You better cut the pizza into four slices, because I’m not hungry enough to eat six.”
— Yogi Berra

1. Pizza from our favorite little place around the corner

2. Good TV on DVD to entertain us during the summer when there’s only crap on TV (downstairs we’re just about at the end of the 4th season of The Sopranos, and upstairs we’re about halfway through the 6th season of The West Wing)

3. The raise that kicks in on my next paycheck that I forgot I was due for – an easy way to get started on numbers 58-60 of 101 in 1001 – paying off credit cards and my car!

What are you happy about today?

California is beautiful to look at, but you can’t be a part of it like you can in Michigan.
— Gov. Jennifer Granholm

Our weekend in Michigan was low-key, relaxing, and wonderful.  The Eagle Court ceremony was really nice, but seeing all the teenage boys made me glad I’m not a teenager anymore.  I had forgotten how awkward the teen years can be.

The weather was gorgeous, and we kept driving by all of these adorable little houses, many of which were for sale, and I imagined that I might actually like to live there one day.  Then David reminded me that winter in Michigan is a lot like winter in Buffalo, with which I have a passing familiarity, and that idea was promptly set aside.  Still, I love to imagine where our life together might take us, and you never know where you’ll end up.

I really enjoyed spending time with David’s family; they are lovely people, truly.  And we hung out with his friends and barbequed Saturday night, and while I mostly read once the activities turned to Rock Band, that was fine by me, because he was having a good time with people he doesn’t get to see very often.  It made me happy that he was happy.

Oh, also, I got an adorable new bag at Meijer for under $5!  It’s perfect!

That’s not a great picture, but it’s purple and gray, and I love it!  It holds everything I need with plenty of room to spare and it’s totally comfortable to carry.  Yay!

Also, in 101 in 1001 news, I’m pleased to announce I’ve accomplished my first task, #16: Yelp! Fat Matt’s.  See my review here!  Only 100 more to go!  I think the next thing to tackle is the letter to myself (#95) and putting my recipes into a binder (#29).

“Go everywhere,” he said at last, in a low, kind voice; “do everything; get everything out of life.  Be happy – be triumphant.”
— Osmond, in The Portrait of a Lady, by Henry James

Jane and Mo have both done this, as well as plenty of other people on the internets, and I’ve been thinking about this for some time now.  There are lots of things I want to do that I keep putting off for one reason or another, and since I’m feeling better, I thought I might start tackling some of them.  Plus, I love lists, and this is, like, the mother of all lists.

The idea, if you haven’t already figured it out, is to come up with 101 things you want to accomplish in the next 1001 days.  And then do them.  I’m posting this here as a regular post, but I’ll add it as a page tab across the top, so you can follow along with me, if you like.  Here goes nothing:

Start date: August 1, 2009

End date: April 28, 2012

Creative

1. Find a way to sing again – in public

2. Work my way through one quarter of  “No One Cares What You Had for Lunch: 100 Ideas for Your Blog” (0/25)

3. Start keeping a personal journal again (without the pressure of feeling like I need to “recap” everything that’s happened since I last kept one, which is the reason I haven’t started doing it before now)

4. Make 5 more journals and give them away

5. Draw something suitable for framing

6. Blow up and frame a photo I took

7. Blog at least three times a week for 3 months (0/12) (0/3)

Travel

8. Go to 5 states I’ve never been to (0/5)

9. Take a train somewhere far away enough that I have to book a sleeper car

10. Visit a national landmark I’ve never seen before

11. Visit a tourist trap I’ve never seen before (like the World’s Largest Ball of Twine, or something)

12. Spend a weekend in Amish country at a Bed & Breakfast

13. Visit my friend who lives in LA

14. Spend a night at the Wigwam Village Motel in Holbrook, Arizona

15. Ice skate at Rockefeller Center

16. Finally Yelp! Fat Matt’s Rib Shack from our trip to Atlanta (short version: go there)

17. Go back to the Excellent Dumpling House in Chinatown in New York (where they really do serve excellent dumplings)

18. Go to Coney Island (when it’s open this time)

Tourism at Home

19. Take a Duck Boat tour of D.C.

20. Visit the September 11 Pentagon Memorial

21. Take a tour of Old Town with one of the colonial guides

22. Take a Segway tour of D.C. with my mom

23. Go see the dolphin show at the Baltimore Aquarium

24. Go to the National Zoo

25. Go to 5 new museums in D.C. (0/5)

26. Go to Arlington Cemetery

Home

27. Finally finish unpacking the books

28. Try 2 new recipes a month for 6 months (0/12)

29. Put loose recipes into binder

30. Go through boxes of high school and college memorabilia and toss everything that no longer holds meaning (0/2)

31. Host a dinner party

32. Bake something that requires yeast (which scares me)

33. Enter a baked good in a contest

34. Hang curtains in bedroom

35. Bake a cheesecake from scratch

36. Cook meals for lunches at work two weekends a month for 3 months (0/3)

37. Find out what, exactly, chipotle en adobo is, get some, and then make something with it

38. Find dulce de leche and re-attempt Death by Caramel Bars

39. Grow mint so I can learn to make my own mojitos

40. Get caught up on putting photos in albums and printing photos from my camera

41. Buy a scanner

42. Upload old photos

43. Go through photo files and name all photos

44. Buy an apron, maybe from Etsy

45. Find a recipe for beef burgundy and try it out; see if it compares to this

Health & Fitness

46. Lose 40 pounds, 5 pounds at a time (0/40)

47. Journal food intake (i.e., get back on track with Weight Watchers) for 30 days (0/30)

48. Run another 5k

49. Take a kickboxing class

50. Take a dance class

51. Get off my medication

52. Floss every day for 30 days (0/30)

53. Take Pico to the vet three times (more as medically necessary) (0/3)

54. Take my vitamins every day for 30 days (0/30)

55. Work out 5 days a week for one month (0/20)

56. Finally upgrade my processor or get my back-up processor fixed

Financial

57. Establish a savings account and deposit money from every paycheck

58. Create and implement plan to pay off credit card 1

59. Create and implement plan to pay off credit card 2

60. Create and implement plan to pay off car

61. Figure out whether and how to roll over old 401(k)

Recreation

62. Attend an NFL game

63. Go ice skating

64. See games at 3 Major League ballparks I’ve never been to (0/3)

65. Go horseback riding

66. Fly a kite

67. Go to the drive-in

68. Join a bowling league

69. Go to a monster truck show

70. Drag David into a photo booth get a photo strip of pictures of us

71. Bowl a perfect game on Wii Bowling

Enrichment

72. Read Anna Karenina

73. Learn to play Euchre, so I can play with David’s family

74. Learn all the state capitals by heart

75. Take a class at the community college

76. See half of the movies on AFI’s  list of the Top 100 Films of the Last 100 Years that I haven’t seen (0/23)

77. Finish Heart of Darkness, even if it kills me

78. Learn to use 3 new features on my digital camera (0/3)

79. Watch the third Godfather film (I’ve seen the other two, and I need to know if this one’s really as bad as they say)

80. Re-read all 7 Harry Potter books

Community

81. Volunteer with the Girl Scouts

82. Do 10 nice things for strangers and don’t tell anyone about them (0/10)

83. Leave a secret in a Post Secret book at the library or bookstore

84. Write three letters to companies whose products I enjoy (0/3)

85. Write three letters to companies when I have a problem with a product or service (0/3)

86. Send a care package through AnySoldier.com

Personal

87. Ask my grandmother to write down five memories of her own mother for me

88. Have the Princess and Conductor spend an overnight with me in D.C. and take them to do fun stuff

89. Write actual letters to 10 people telling them how much they mean to me (0/10)

90. Go one weekend (from 6pm Friday to 7am Monday) without using the internet (including from my cell phone)

91. Do something special with Aimee in 2011 to celebrate 20 years of friendship

92. Take David on a picnic

93. Continue the Christmas cookie weekend tradition with Karen (0/3)

94. Get a haircut and maintain it with regular (every 6 months) trims (I haven’t had a hair cut in more than a year)

95. Write myself a letter at FutureMe.org to be delivered on the end date of this challenge

96. Find a new job

97. Finally get my diploma and bar certificates framed

98. Send someone flowers for no reason

99. Buy new running shoes

100. Buy new iPod

101. Marry David

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So there you go.  What do you think?  Too ambitious?  Not ambitious enough?  I can’t decide.  A few notes:

• The things that are for 30 days at a time or the like are meant to get me into the habit of doing those things.  I don’t intend to stop flossing at the end of 30 days, or quit taking my vitamins, I just wanted to challenge myself to get back into good habits.

• At the end of the challenge, I will donate $2 to a charity (TBD, probably hearing-loss related) for every goal on this list that I did not complete.  (If I complete them all, I’ll donate $202  to the charity.)