I had my first counselling session yesterday. The counsellor was exactly what I expected from our phone call last week: an older woman (early 50s I’d say), kind of straightforward, and a little bit “eccentric cat lady”. I did not predict her extensive giraffe collection or the plants that have clearly taken over her home but that’s ok (because I love plants and I happened to notice she has some succulents I may request clippings of…if that doesn’t cross the counsellor-client barrier). I don’t have strong feelings about her in one way or another so I’ll see her again before I decide if I want to continue with her.

What I took away from the session is to give Brother #1 space but always send him love (which I can do without actually interacting with him). I have to also let my parents speak for themselves when Brother #1 is being disrespectful, instead of jumping in and trying to protect my parents. I also have to stop trying to save him from what might be the path he has to go through before coming around: I’m so afraid that if he turns away from us he’ll hit rock bottom and be too proud to reach out for help but maybe that’s what has to happen for him to see that we truly love him and only want the best for him. The counsellor was for me, not him, so I have to focus on what I have to do.

Christmas is here and surprise surprise I’m not ready. I’m really trying not to stress about it because first of all, I hate all the hoopla about gifts. I find gift-giving is more stress than it’s worth most of the time, and the worst part is that I get stressed about other people’s gift-giving! For example, I ran into my mom at the store this week: I had no idea she was at that mall or in that particular store. She was there buying a gift for her friend whose birthday is on Christmas Eve. My mom had picked a calendar and a book and was ready to pay for them. I proceeded to scrutinize her choices and wonder aloud if her friend would like these offerings. My mom was not at all bothered: she said that she picked what she wanted for her friend and if her friend didn’t like them she could exchange the gifts for something else. I love my mom’s approach to gift-giving: once she’s decided what she wants to get for someone and buys it, she doesn’t spend an extra second agonizing over whether or not the person will like the gift (though she does sometimes stress over Christmas gifts for immediate family members though!).

I’m not as secure as she is, sadly, and that’s why I’ve tried to eliminate gift-giving and receiving opportunities from my life as much as possible. Anyone who gives me a gift this year will receive an expression of appreciation and likely nothing more. I’ve always hated that “you-gave-me-a-gift-so-I-feel-obliged-to-give-you-a-gift” feeling that is so prevalent in today’s society. I figure if someone gives me a gift and they’re irate that all they received from me was a thank you, then a) their heart wasn’t in the right place when giving the gift in the first place and b) they won’t give me a gift next year, so gift-related awkwardness is gone.

And isn’t it just like me to showcase two sweet ornaments that I received from my friend Gen at my Christmas fête in an entry about my Scrooge-like approach to gift-giving? My point is once shopping for a gift progresses to a stressful affair due to not being able to figure out what to buy, then it’s not cool.

I am almost 32.5 years old and I think the last half of my 32nd year will end up being significant with regard to becoming the person I want to be while accepting myself for who I am. I’ve made strides already (loving my body more and more each day!) but I have more to do. I want my life to reflect my belief system (in God, Christianity) and I want to have a deep-down sense that I am living my life the way it’s supposed to be. For me, that’ll mean connecting to God, and part of that involves listening to my inner voice and acting on my beliefs. Finding a church I feel more connected to last year, and tuning in to Oprah’s Lifeclass series have been helpful to me so far.

My practical game plan involves daily homework in the sense of praying and reading my bible, asking myself questions about what I want in various areas of my life, and DOING stuff to make this happen. In the past I have had trouble DOING, but no more! My life is a gift and my time on earth is limited. Every time I think of that I’m inspired to act. I haven’t been making the best use of the time I’ve been given, so in my “baby steps” fashion, I’m doing small things. I finally sent an email to the dealership I bought my car from, an email that I’ve had drafted for weeks but had trouble sending because I was nervous about how the salesman I dealt with would react if he’s asked about what I said about him. I have other baby steps to take, like calling my tv cable provider to let them know that I haven’t received a service I’ve paying for since I last called them about this, back in April or May, and I plan to do that today. There are lots of other little things that might read as a simple to do list to some, but the fact that I’ve put off doing them for so long and for no valid (well no longer valid reason) reason means I’ve given them way more power in my life than they should have and to be honest I don’t need any little things dragging me down.

A really important part of becoming who I am meant to be is being strong enough to say no to those things that don’t mesh with my vision of who I am. This will mean I have to stop spending so much time on things or people that aren’t propelling me in the direction I want to go. It may sound kind of cold but when I think about people who get things done and who appear to be doing a good job of reaching their potential, they don’t spend so much time on things that are contrary to their belief system or their goals. If you want to get things done you must (at least at times) cut out the distractions and focus on what you’re doing. I’m ready to do this, finally.

The author of one of the prettiest blogs out there, Oh Hello Friend, encouraged those who are willing to join her Twelve before 2012 challenge. She started it because the whole 101 things in 1001 days challenge was too long a time period for her to fully wrap her head around. My 30 by 30 list (just now renamed 30 by 30 something) was poorly constructed I realize, since a lot of the things on the list didn’t have rigid enough boundaries to them to make them easy to gauge completion. This in turn has made me feel like a failure. So by renaming my list I’ve given myself more time, and I will also need to rewrite some of the things on the list to make them easier to measure. I’m also joining the Twelve by 2012 list and pledging to get some things done!

1. buy winter tires for my car
2. increase my mortgage payments (by making an extra payment for the year or seeing if I can have more added to the bi-weekly payments)
3. increase my car payments (by making an extra payment for the year or seeing if I can have more added to the bi-weekly payments)
4. buy a GPS system
5. send out a save the date email or invitations to a Christmas party/gingerbread party/cookie exchange party (can’t decide) at my house Done October 29 via Facebook…the Christmas fête event will be on December 3!
6. email the builder of my house regarding getting touch up paint (I was supposed to follow up on this a year ago…they may not give it to me anymore!) Done October 26…now to wait for the response!
7. find a pretty way to mask the visible electrical cords behind my tv
8. return the three huge cases of water sitting by my doorstep to the store I bought them from Done November 3 thanks to Ves
9. host the regular Friday night gathering with my friends
10. call the church back about the volunteering opportunity that I signed up for
11. hang curtains in the living room and my bedroom (at least)
12. develop a WordPress theme for my GNG blog

My best friends
I have done away with my old definition of best friends, which allowed only one person to occupy that position. I have two best friends (and one almost best friend who is male) and they all bring something different to our friendship. I am happy with that. I have such different relationships with my two female best friends, because they are so different from each other.

Ves knows pretty much everything that’s happening in my life at any given time. I see her at least once a week and she’s always willing to do something at the last minute. She has a good memory (she’s also so very smart that it sickens me), so she’s always asking me to follow up on things I mentioned the last time I saw her. Since I don’t have as good a memory of her life, I used to feel like I was shortchanging her as a friend, but I know I’m not. I’m a good friend to her in a different way than she is to me and that’s fine because we have different needs. Ves is very supportive but she will also call me on things too. She lets be who I am, which is a good thing (others—like my sister—may disagree). Ves’s husband Rich one of my best friends too but our friendship is so much different than mine with Ves or even my other bestie, Jov. I totally blame it on him being a boy: I’m closer to Ves than to him and in most cases I’ll tell her something before telling him. But Rich is there for me too in a lot of ways that Ves is and if I was ever in a bind they are the first people I’d call.

Jov is my other female best friend, and she has been my bestie for the longest time. She does not often do things at the last minute and she’s a more structured person in all aspects of her life. She has been there for me and my family in difficult times as an emotional support. She always makes time for special events in my life. Her family has adopted me as a family member and they’re such a social and friendly bunch. I look up to Jov as an example of a hardworking person who has her priorities straight. Jov can read or sense things about me without seeing me, which is uncanny at times. She always makes me feel like an important part of her life. We don’t see each other more often than monthly or even less frequently than that, but it doesn’t seem to affect our closeness.

These two women, along with my sister, will be my bridesmaids when that day comes (fingers crossed).

My good friends
I met Allison over six years ago through a friend I have now drifted apart from. Allison’s an exuberant and very real person, and I love the simplicity of our friendship. More than any of my friends she loves talking on the phone so we talk on the phone regularly and when we get together we talk up a storm too. She became a mother last month and it amazed me when I saw her less than 24 hours after she give birth and she was walking around and talking like her usual self. She’s fun and I can talk to her about anything. I never feel like she’s pretending to be anything other than herself.

I have several colleagues that I am close to, but I’ve formed a trio with two in particular, Wendy and Pascale. We hang out together (or in some combination of the three of us) on a regular basis and hash out relationship woes and discuss health and weight and other things. Wendy and I usually talk or text every day, and the three of us usually visit each other in our offices. They’re both great in different ways, but one thing they have in common is they give good advice. Pascale is so comfortable in her own skin and Wendy is very chill and easy going, up for anything. I often feel inferior to both of them because they’re a lot more put together than I am.

My hangout pals
You know how I mentioned that I see Ves once a week? I also see Rich, Eli and Jen at the same time because we have a standing weekly date. Eli is married to Jen and Eli, Rich, Ves and I have been hanging out for a really long time, nearly a decade. I don’t have the same depth of friendship with Eli, maybe because he’s a guy. I can definitely call on him if I need something; he’s helpful like that (but only if you ask). Jen is new to our group and she’s a nice person. I don’t know if we’ll ever have a deep friendship because at the point we met we both had already long-established friendships.

One area where I differ from the boys especially is I think seeing one another once a week is plenty. For example, this past week, Ves was away on a business trip so the boys, Jen and I hung out on Friday night. While hanging out, the guys made plans to hang out on Saturday too but I was supposed to have a meeting so I said I couldn’t make it. Even if I hadn’t had a meeting planned I would have probably told them I’m going to stay home because I don’t get as much “me” time as I’d like, since I spend Sundays at my parents’ place. Over the years I’ve learned that Eli and Rich don’t need as much “me” time as I do.

Other friends
Sheri is my Nigerian friend, though I hate to make it sound like I only became friends with her because we share a culture. Even so, it’s been great to have someone who understands how things work in our culture, what we can and cannot do, and also our close relationships to our parents. We met as a result of my Nigerian blog but Nigerian or not, she’s a great person. She’s a good listener and advice-giver and she’s real.

Nora is a friend that I have drifted away from. Our friendship has changed over the years…although we can relate to each other with regard to upbringing, and even though I was one of her bridesmaids, we aren’t so close anymore. For obvious reasons I won’t get into any more detail here but we usually see each other every other month and very recently I saw some improvements to our friendship, in response, I think, to me stepping back a bit.

Family
My parents are doing alright physically. My dad (who now lives in this city six hours away nicknamed Hammy) has been walking to and from work since May and I think it’s doing him a lot of good. He’s been mentioning ankle pain for a couple of months now and back pain in the last month but he’s on top of figuring out what’s going on. Emotionally I think he could be doing better: the separation from his family is not as easy to deal with. He now has a website, and he believes it’ll his route to financial freedom. Although we disagree on certain elements of what he’s trying to do online, I’ve helped him set up a website and will continue to help him any way I can.

My mom has several health conditions, so I always worry about her. She had surgery on her right hand almost four months ago and although it has healed a lot, it’s not yet at 100%. As a result we’re holding off on the surgery for her left hand. She needs to get out walking, for regular exercise, but she’s too social to ever adopt a solo walking thing, and her work schedule isn’t regular enough unfortunately for her to set a schedule of which days of the week she’ll exercise. I’m hoping my sister will encourage her to go out now and then, before the really cold weather comes. I could do more and make time to go walking with her but I have to admit it’s not something that fills me with excitement. But maybe I could suck it up and stop being so selfish.

I love my parents’ love for each other. They genuinely care about each other and treat each other so well. They embody the “in sickness and in health” and “for better and for worse” elements of their wedding vows.

My sister is working on leaving her truly dead-end job. She works in a doctor’s office as a receptionist and doesn’t have benefits at her work place. With the exception of the one day she takes off to go camping with my friends and I, her time off is when the doctor takes her own holidays, which are frequent but still…it would be nice if she could decide could take holidays when she wants. To be fair, her boss probably wouldn’t say no, but it’s kind of understood that my sister will as much as possible make her schedule jive with her boss’s. My sister had a job interview at the end of September for a casual/temporary job with the government and we’re all hoping it’s the kick in the pants she needs to get out there and into dedicated job hunting. It’s hard to believe she’s 30 years old now. She’s no longer a kid and she needs to start making decisions about her life, rather than waiting for my parents and I to guide her. This very issue has been a constant source of fights between her and I over the years. She is “talking to” a guy long distance and he’s hoping to come visit so they can make sure they are a good match. She’s a huge music buff and recently loaned me her Adele cd.

Brother #1 will turn 25 years old this month. I can’t believe this adorable kid with this perfect skin has grown into a huge guy with that same perfect skin. He’s always been difficult personality-wise but I’m hoping that he’s mellowing with age, and every now and again I see hints of this. I think a lot of his problem relates to his high beer consumption but he claims I’m mistaken. He and I clash on a regular basis: he’s rude and extremely disrespectful to my parents and the rest of the family, and I can’t deal with that. Since I do believe in God and his ability to change lives, I just have to remember to pray for him. I think he’ll be finished his degree next year so then hopefully he can get a good job (he often complains that he’s not making enough money). He’s very passionate about beer and he even makes his own beer which I think is pretty neat. He puts up pictures and descriptions of his beer-making on Facebook, and I’ve told him to start a blog but he claims that wouldn’t be a good way for him to share his experience. Maybe one day he’ll go that route. He’s very secretive about his relationships: he brings these girls around but claims they aren’t his girlfriend. He dislikes spending time with my siblings and I, but we keep asking him to, so that he doesn’t feel excluded.

Brother #2, nicknamed Boy Wonder by my sister, seems to land on his feet no matter what. He’s 23, gets fabulous jobs (right now he’s working part time for the government and also working for the public relations team at his university). He’s social, friendly, and likes to put people in a good mood. He and I fight every now and again but he’s used to charming a smile back on my face, after making a humble apology. Let’s just say he has people skills. He’s girl crazy. I want him to finish his degree before getting caught up in a relationship but I don’t think he’ll heed my advice. He spends money like every day is his last. His attitude towards money turns me off because he will struggle to find money to pay for school (and consider asking my parents for a loan), yet he can afford to pay far too much for clothing or food, and his regular trips to visit friends in various places in our province. I’ve forbidden him from asking my parents for a loan. Despite all this my sister and I feel very strongly that he’s going places.

What a contrast in brothers!

I see my family at least once a week, usually on Sundays after church and on Saturdays too. I’ll sometimes pop in in the middle of the week as well, and lucky me: there’s usually a delicious dinner cooking.

I’d say our family goals are to find ways to pay for some renovations on my parents’ home and also to pay off the rest of the mortgage. If my dad didn’t have a mortgage hanging around his neck, he’d move back to our city and take his time finding a job since his retirement income would probably give them enough to live decently for a while. My dad also desperately wants my mom to stop working in her department store job that has her on her feet eight hours a day, five days a week. I know we can reach these goals if we work together, as cheesy as it sounds. Given how hard my parents work, how well they manage money and how much they have done for me, it would be my honour to contribute in some way to helping them reach the family goals.

Right now, life is pretty good. Over the next week or so, I’m going to provide updates on various aspects of my life.

House and home
I have a beautiful home that is still cluttered with (mostly) paper products. My walls are still bare and unpainted (by me). I bought a new couch and loveseat but I spend most of my time on the secondhand one-seater that doesn’t really match the other seats in height or scale. I bought a storage bench and I think I found a perfect spot for it under my living room window. I still don’t have curtains covering any window in the house, though I have bought curtain rods for two of the four sets of windows.

I bought a beautiful lamp in August but I have yet to set it up. Maybe today.

I don’t cook or entertain as much as I thought I would, and with dreams of a husband and children less out of reach than in the past, I will either never be a great cook or entertainer, or I’ll acquire those skills in the future, since I seem to manage my time better when I have a full plate. My kitchen, though generous in size and storage space is also cluttered. I have a toaster oven, slow cooker and baking pans that need to be put into regular rotation. I bought a patio set for my balcony that I never fully set up. Since it hasn’t been used outside I thought I could use it in my kitchen, but the space I should set it up in is cluttered. My craft nook remains relatively untouched and I haven’t added to my stockpile of crafting products in a long while. Although I enjoy washing dishes, I tend to let them accumulate for at least a few days before hand-washing them.

I love to vacuum, but I don’t do it as often as I should. To me, once a week seems reasonable, given that I don’t have a roommate, children, or pets. I have two flights of carpeted stairs that are a pain to vacuum, even though I bought a lighter weight vacuum for that purpose. Anyway, I currently vacuum maybe once a month. If my floors weren’t so cluttered I’d vacuum more often. And on the topic of floor cleaning, I have not mopped my house with anything more than a swiffer wet jet since I moved in two and a half years ago. I don’t enjoy mopping.

My bedroom was neat and tidy for a while but my clothing has reclaimed its rightful place at the foot of my bed and the floor. Dirty clothing makes it to the laundry room 80% of the time. I am blessed with two full bathrooms so I rotate which one I use for showering every year or so. I’m currently using the one in the other bedroom and its bathtub received a good cleaning last weekend. I will not share how long it had been waiting to be cleaned. The toilet bowls get cleaned at least weekly. I need to change the shower head in the bathroom I’m currently using to the water-efficient one. I smuggled a wrench from my parents’ house for this very task last week. Maybe I’ll actually do what needs to be done after this entry. The second bedroom has some storage boxes that need emptying but I have been lazy in that regard.

After receiving a jade plant from a colleague when I visited her house, I remember my love of succulents and I went on a quest to acquire some. I have six varieties in addition to the jade plant, and my little heart wants more. The mother of one of my best friends owns a flower shop and when I was there last weekend I noticed a number of varieties of succulents that I did not have. I wonder if she’ll give me clippings, or tell me where I can find more (for free). My desire for succulents led me to discover a society for succulents and cacti in my city. I emailed them but they never wrote back.

My home constantly calls to me. I am always happy spending time here, watching episodes of Private Practice (I only managed to finish Season 2 by the time my Zip.ca account ran out) or watching home design shows or Grey’s Anatomy. I have no problem staying home and just hanging out, but I do sometimes feel the need to get out for a moment. I can’t believe I’ve been truly living alone for about two years (if we take out those months where I spent weekends at my parents’ place). I’m so glad that I had the opportunity to do this, to be truly the head of my own household, to learn how to cook or concoct meals and to just be. It’s going to be hard to invite someone else into this space of mine on a permanent basis, but at least I’ll have memories of this time, some captured on this blog.

Compare it to my hair back in October (click to make bigger, then weep with me):

The timing of my disgruntled “Woe is me my hair is ugly” Facebook post was not the best: days before I had made the following image my profile picture, so at least one commenter found my hair whine a bit hypocritical.

I believe the above but I really needed to feel sorry for myself for one Facebook status post. I find myself unable to speak up when I’m unhappy with my haircut. Because I’m always asked to take my glasses off during my cuts, I tend to close my eyes through most of the process. My eyesight is so bad that I can’t actually see what my hair looks like in the mirror in front of me anyway; all I see are blurred shapes. I opened my eyes momentarily last Saturday and saw a long piece of hair on my chest. I immediately told the hairdresser that the piece on my chest was “kind of long” and she told me not to worry, that she was keeping the length. She then turned to her two assistants and said, over my head, that it’s important to “reassure the client”. I should have spoken up and said I wasn’t reassured but I didn’t. I then put my glasses on and my hairstylist said “Uh oh, the glasses are on” yet she continued to hack at my hair.

I’ve had almost a week with my cut and it’s not that bad; I’m more disgruntled that I asked for a trim and didn’t get what I asked for. I was already dealing with shorter hair after removing the braids I had done in Nigeria, so I was in “grow mode”. The process is just delayed a bit. I will need to get a good flat iron because I cannot put the hair in a bun on a bad hair day, which is a regular occurrence for me. That scares me because I’m very low maintenance.

The other thing that annoyed me was my mental anguish over not leaving a tip. I was panicking internally at the thought, wondering “what will she think of me?”, even though I believe a tip is a reward for good work. This particular hairstylist charges higher rates than my previous stylists so clearly she isn’t low-balling her fees and relying on her tips to get a good salary. So why did I feel so bad? Why did I feel a twinge of guilt when I left the tip at $0.00? Why did I have a hard time meeting her eyes as I waited for the transaction to go through, when some people actually refuse to pay for a haircut they hate, or make such a scene that the hairstylist tells them the cut is “on the house”? The whole tipping thing annoys me: I’d rather just pay a fair price and not feel obligated to tip, even if the service I get is mediocre. This stylist has never blown me away (though I believe she has hair cutting skills) yet I tip her every time (except this last time).

I’m going to try another salon next time (in 8-10 weeks), one that’s a little closer to me. The stylist’s rates are $10 lower too…I just hope the experience is good. I intend to start my appointment with this tale of woe: I’ll let her know what happened during my last hair appointment and hopefully that’ll cause her to proceed with caution. Hope all goes well!

What was your worst hair mishap?

I’ve had an eye infection for over a week now. My eyes are red and when I when I try to open them in the morning I realize that my eye mucus production has been quite prolific overnight. It’s gross but one day I’ll want to know what was going on in my life near the end of April 2011 and since this is my first such eye infection, I thought I’d record it for posterity.

I have decided to file my 2010 taxes on time, which means they must be filed in the next three days…or so I thought until I heard on the television that May 2, 2011 is the official deadline. Can you see me furiously working on filing it at the very last minute? What is wrong with me? There was an article in the newspaper over the weekend about how it’s better to file on time and make adjustments later than to not file at all. The article also said that after 12 months of not filing taxes, you can be accused of tax evasion. That was scary to read and I was stressed by it, but not stressed enough to march my folder of slips to the nearest accountant. I ask you: what is wrong with me? Procrastination has done nothing for me but encourage laziness.

I have to travel for work next week; I’ll be gone for two days. I will have to speak French for almost the entire time and that worries me. I don’t enjoy speaking French to people whose French is far better than my own; my preference is to sprinkle English conversations with dashes of French, to the chagrin of some of my closest friends (who have the audacity to audibly groan when I do so).

This year is going by too fast. I feel overwhelmed.

Ok, I’ve finally found a solution to my desire to share some tales about the fella I fancy but not on this blog. I have sent the link to a brand new blog to readers who have expressed interest in knowing more. If you would like to have a link to this blog, let me know in the comments and I’ll send you the link. To those who got to read one lonely entry back in January and then didn’t hear anything more, I would like you to know that I spent the afternoon and some of the evening preparing scheduled entries that will appear once a week starting this coming Monday (at 8:00am EST, Monday mornings) up to and including May 2, 2011.

Ahhh.

I’m going to be quite busy in April, May, June and July. One of my blog projects, the Nigerian Blog Awards, will be entering its second year at the end of May and there is quite a bit of setup required. I already know I will be using one or two work days to handle the administrative aspects of running the blog and crying myself to sleep at the mean comments some yokels who’ve never tried to manage such a thing will leave on the blog. Thankfully I have four weeks of vacation this year, and so far none of those weeks are going to be sucked up with a trip to Nigeria.

Speaking of work, I celebrated five years of employment in November, but received my award for the years of service last week. The award night fell on the same night as the surprise retirement party for a colleague who has been employed for what will be 39 years this December. As another colleague mentioned it kind of makes my five years of service look puny! But I was part of the committee that organized the party and my colleagues have been so gracious in commending us for the work we did. It was a great evening, though the lead-up to the event was slightly stressful (you know what group work is like!).

I started swimming lessons last week! After years and years of saying I wanted to learn to swim, one of my best friends and I signed up for lessons together. And I also signed up for Zumba, which is a workout and a half so far…my body ached for days after my first class and I felt completely uncoordinated and inept. Thank God for spring and a desire to move my body…I can assure you I would not have been tempted to move four months ago.

I fell asleep crafting my April Fools’ blog entry, but here it is. I could save it for next year but I’ll probably forget if I try that:

Three long years ago, I ran but mostly walked a 5km, inspired to raise money for the Canadian Diabetes Association, an organization that is close to my heart. This year I decided to sign up for the same race, but it and the 10km were sold out. As a result I’ve signed up to walk and run the half marathon for the same cause, and I have eight weeks to train for this.

Scarier than the training is the $2,500 that I will have to raise. Sure, they give you until the end of July to raise the funds but that is a large chunk of change. I’m hoping I can count on your very generous support. Please click here to support me. Any amount will help!

So, that’s what’s up with me…what’s up with you?

I just wanted to say that I dislike structure and accountability, evidence, perhaps, that I’m not ready to grow up. When I feel that I have to do something, a part of me rebels intrinsically. Work, thankfully, seems to be the exception, and I actually like order at work (my desk, admittedly, says otherwise).

So, don’t be surprised if you never read another monthly progress report on the accomplishment of those goals I had (What? You had only ever seen the one?). The goals have not been forgotten; I’m just in a phase where I’m rebelling against their very existence.

To answer the question left in the comments of the last entry, I have a lot to say on that topic and I’m trying to figure out the best way to share that info. Once I do, you’ll definitely be the recipient of much drama and gushing on my part.

Life is good. I need to provide an update on my goals for February. I naturally rebel against routine I find.

I have a new couch and a loveseat which deserve to be photographed. Once two little issues are taken care of this week, I’ll take a photograph of my stark living space. Almost two years later and it looks like I moved in yesterday.

I am not known for splurging but I am thinking of buying a Dyson vacuum, one that is good for doing stairs since my two bedroom terrace home that doesn’t have a basement or a garage has two full flights of carpeted stairs. I love vacuuming and I’ll love it even more when I get an amazing vacuum, one that really sucks as my friend Matt said on facebook.

Speaking of facebook, I post the most random status updates there. My friends all say they love it but I’m fishing for compliments when I mention my randomness so what else can they say?

I know I mentioned it in my review of 2010 but it bears repeating: my life can easily be divided into two: before smart phone and after. As long as I’m gainfully employed I will not go back to a regular phone. It’s just not possible. That and high-speed internet are staples in my life.

For fun (aka to give myself a heart attack), I should calculate how much I’ve spent on long-distance calls in the last almost four months. I may then need someone to hold me for the rest of the day. Unfortunately it won’t be the person who I’ve spent a Dyson’s worth of cash calling.

I am loving this random post. You don’t come here for a story do you? Do you?

(Insecurity ensues.)

(Just kidding!)

Really, the only thing I’m insecure about right now is related to my weight.

And my university transcript.