Ten Month Check In!

October's been a mixed bag.  The good habits I've been working all year to integrate into my everyday life - regular exercise, drinking lots of water, eating healthier food, staying on top of housework, and regularly taking time for small indulgences for myself - all of those got left by the side of one road or another this month.  In a way, it was depressing to see how quickly the wilderness crept back in to my little clearing.

But it's not all been gloom despair and agony on me. So let's look at what's been going on and formulate a plan for November, ummkay?

Different months are made for different things.  October was the month made for writing.  The month started with the annual regional popular culture conference, which was held in the graceful and somewhat quirky city of Savannah this year.  Last time I was there, I was strapped into a walking boot due to an Achilles' tendon injury, so I didn't see too much - and FryDaddy and I made up for that this go-round!  Our papers were well-received, we both learned some new things and we met some very nice new scholar-friends.  So, an all-around success.  For this trip, we had the best of intentions and (yay for us) we stayed within a rather strict budget (didn't go Tasmanian Devil at the deeply discounted book tables) and we walked a lot, but no - we didn't eat the way we should have.  But Walls BBQ is a must.  A must, do you hear?  (Seriously, I'm in favor of any 5 booth eatery where I can't get my pound cake because "I'm sorry, ma'am, it's still in the oven.")

This isn't right?

We got home from that and it was back into the throes of work.  (It should be mentioned that this was my fall break and, enjoyable as conferences can be, you don't rest all that much.)  In addition to my work load of five sizable classes, we were in the final stages of completing the Wanna Cook? draft, including the "bits & pieces" such as the acknowledgements and the source list.  As we're drafting those parts, other parts are coming from Our Intrepid Editor for revisions, and then we also started getting bits from our copy editor for the final fine-tuning.  It gets confusing to turn around that much that fast!  And there was Halloween candy.  And a spa day with Barefoot to celebrate (we both had milestones recently that were best marked with cushy robes and gigantic out-of-season strawberries).

In the last week, I've started making a real effort to get back to my established good habits.  I'm not there yet, but I have a plan.  In the meantime, the book is very nearly finished on our end of things (and hey - we've got a publicist!  I'm not sure what to make of that.) and the past months of good habits meant the house isn't in total disarray.  It's picked up (aside from one "hot spot" on the kitchen counter), but needs a good clean.  We got off-budget this month, but not to the point of using credit cards, so that can easily be corrected this next month.  And I can start carrying a water bottle and using the walking track again.  And FryDaddy and I are inking in some "couple time" that wild mammoths couldn't interrupt.

And I did not go mad.

I'm telling you - that's more of an accomplishment than it may sound.  In the past, I was so tightly locked into the shackles of perfectionism that if I didn't get everything crossed off my list ("Drink 70 oz. of water, check.  Walk at least 30 minutes, check.  Eat 5 fruit/veg, check" and so on), the day was a failure and I was a Bad Person.  To be able to look at the dirty kitchen floor and say, "I'll Swiffer it after work Wednesday" is a HUGE step!

Much work to do, true. But it's worth acknowledging that much work has been done.

Onward!

Nine Month Check In!

A few new things to report.  September's been an interesting month, with the Wanna Cook? book project entering overdrive for the final push - by the next check-in, the entire book will have been drafted and the final bits will have been turned in for editing.  Breaking Bad wraps up its broadcast run this Sunday and next week, I have a paper to present on Saul Goodman and legal ethics at a conference (said paper is still - ahem - in a state that can most kindly be described as "rough draft" form.  Saturday's a busy, busy day!).  FryDaddy is also presenting and we both have school/work obligations.  As you can imagine, that's a lot of plates to spin.

This is the very reason why routines matter so much.  By now, housework has (mostly) gotten to a groove - laundry and dishes are caught up and the house is reasonably free of dirt (although pet fur is a constant accent to our decor) and that's a comfort in the busy, busy days that have been September and that will continue for another two weeks or so.  I scaled a few things back this month - I realized I was overdoing it and then beating myself up for not hitting every goal, every day.  A "star" day right now is exercise 30 minutes total (doesn't have to be in one fell swoop at 6:45 in the morning), drink 70 oz. of water, eat 5 servings of fruit/vegetables, limit the junk food (twice a week and only reasonable portions then), and do something positive for my overall mindset (I've discovered short guided meditations just before bed to help my crazywhirly brain settle and unwind from the day).  That's enough, I figure.  I'm a little less stressed, even though I'm in the midst of a very stressful period, so I'm marking this down as a win.

The big change this past month is that FryDaddy and I got serious about a very taboo area - finances.  Like many Americans, we have credit-card debt and were working from a budget that was more of a glorified checkbook balance than an actual plan.  We'd gotten tired of the stress associated with constantly being on a shoestring and we knew that we ought to be doing better - our income is decent and, while I still have a big chunk of debt from law school (and he'll soon have grad school loans to pay - but not undergrad, thankyouthankyouthankyou Mom Squared), we don't have car payments and our mortgage is quite reasonable - but it took us a while to commit to change.

Now we have.  We're just at the beginning, but already, I see a difference.  We've got a budget that tells our money where to go, instead of wondering helplessly where it went.  Any change in the budget (like when I forgot to include a couple of items and when we underestimated the amount we'd need for grocery money) requires us both to sign off on re-jiggering the columns, which still have to zero out so every dollar is accounted for.  We've committed to not using credit and throwing every extra dollar that comes into our paws at our debt.  It won't be short, and it won't be easy, but it's going to be SOOO worth it!  I hesitated to bring this up here (while nearly every American has debt, it's not something I find easy to talk about), but the point of these monthly check-ins is to be honest and accountable and, for me, debt is a dirty little secret.  It feels great to have a plan, instead of just drifting along, hoping that I get lucky with Powerball or some fairy dust hits my retirement account.  (For those interested, we're using the Dave Ramsey "Money Makeover" system.)  Again, it's not a quick fix, but we didn't get into this mess overnight, so it stands to reason that it'll take a while to sort out.  Journeys start with the first step, right?

Right.