Archives for December 2019

That week felt both so short that it barely happened and about as long as a month.

Monday was still filled with rehearsals for my husband with guests in the house. By then we were all rather exhausted and a little irritated. My mother-in-law had a sever cold and went to the doctor. The boy accompanied her and earlier that morning he and I went to get the special Christmas brats.

I was very determined to run the whole 5K and failed. Again.

Since my husband was so super-busy we decided to get Chinese for lunch. We don’t usually do that anymore because of all the packaging waste but none of us was in a state where we wanted to go to a restaurant with all the noise and commotion:

Christmas Eve was nice and low-key. At this point I hadn’t done any writing in days and that made me rather cranky but otherwise things were alright.

This is what happens when my husband decides not to cook for lunch because we’re doing the special Christmas dinner with his mother:

That was also the day I decided I need to learn brush lettering. Of course.

I had already wrapped all the presents in time, we started making Christmas dinner early enough and things went rather smoothly:

We did open a few presents, my mother sent a package with sweets and ornaments and my sister had books or CDs for all of us. I really love the book I got, „Folk Fashion“ and started reading it right away. Since I’m on a book-buying kick still, it will take me a while to get through, though.

Christmas Day was mostly for lounging about with a little running thrown in. Since my 13K run the week before was pretty much a 13K walk I decided to scale back and re-start the „Bridge to 10K“-program. That involved intervals of running for ten minutes and walking for one.

Well. Turns out I can’t run for ten minutes without pause. After more than ten years of ‚running’. That was a little demoralizing.

So I decided to go even further back and re-start „Couch to 10K“. No, giving up is not an option. Going only for walks isn’t one either. I’ll get there. Eventually.

There was homemade pizza for lunch:

In the afternoon I started thinking about the past year, what happened and what I got done. I couldn’t find any goals for 2019, I guess I didn’t set any because a year is too long anyways. I did write 186,000 words on novels which is pretty good and 53,000 words more than the year before. When I first looked back I totally forgot all the renovation stuff we did. So, all in all a productive year. Not quite as I had wanted it to be, though.

The following day I started reading yet another book about planning and such because I was frantically looking for a method that would work for me and I found „Business Planning for Professional Publishers“ by Leah Cutter. Seems that I finally found someone who is more like me. Huh.

So then I had ideas. Still haven’t finished my thinking about the upcoming year, though. I also found a word tracker I can use for my lofty goal to write 250,000 words in 2020. I am already intimidated by that. Still, now that I have a spreadsheet for it nothing can go wrong. Right?

Thursday mostly vanished into talking with people. A phone call with my mother. Long, convoluted conversations with my husband. Some conflict. (I was so happy about the planning and he thought I wanted him to plan and scheme as well and was angry because he was still in crisis mode after those rehearsals. The boy wanted help with writing thank-you notes.

We did another one of our special holiday meals, goose, red cabbage and dumplings. There was barely any cooking involved, we bought the dumpling dough already made, the cabbage came out of a can and the goos was already seasoned and only had to go into the oven. Weird. But pretty good:

Friday was the first day the shops were open after the holidays so I did all the grocery shopping. Things happened. I did not do the weekly cleaning. We decided we needed comfort food:

I didn’t write any new words that day but bought formatting software and stared at the novel for 50 minutes.

Saturday I re-started the „Couch to 10K“-program. Four minutes of walking followed by thirty seconds of running for a total of 41 minutes:

That was not enough running for me by the way. I’ll probably skip week one and two.

There was fish for lunch:

In the afternoon I finally got some rudimentary cleaning in and almost turned the lights out on time. Only the boy really wanted to talk about phonetics for 90 minutes. It was fascinating, only way too late.

And yesterday I didn’t write yet again but did spend quite a bit of time thinking about the novel. I decided to take a day off from everything. Spent an hour making spaetzle from scratch and my husband cooked the rest. Very, very good:

The boy and I watched ‚Discovery‘ every evening and loved it. He went climbing again on Friday. I’m finally getting more sleep. I finished spinning the yarn for my husband’s sweater, still need to ply the last bit:

I did read quite a few books mostly holiday themed. I don’t think I’ll get to 150 until tomorrow but that’s alright. 146 will be enough.

And tomorrow it will be the New Year! Fun!

Almost the end of the year. And the decade. The week was slightly exhausting again. I wasn’t the only one either, the students felt like wilting flowers as well.

Writing:

The first few days I was elated because I actually did make my writing a priority and managed 1,400 words most days and 700 on Tuesday. But then I slacked off, didn’t write anything at all on Friday and Saturday and only very few words on Sunday. I’m not happy. Again. 

Exercise:

I only did the bare minimum of running, only three days. 5K on Monday:

5K on Wednesday:

I got lucky because the train was already through when I reached that crossing. Sometimes you have to wait quite a bit.

And 13K on Saturday:

There was a lot of walking on all runs, especially the 13K one. But I did it anyway. On Saturday it was raining as well.
 

Teaching:

Lots of teaching again. The one tryout lesson was canceled. I’m getting used to the longer hours but it is pretty exhausting still. 

Health:

 Everything is fine. There were times when I had a bit of sniffle but it never morphed into anything serious. I didn’t get enough sleep again but the daily naps seem to help with energy levels.

Other stuff:

The boy turned 17! Such a grown-up! We had our traditional cake for breakfast again:

And went out to the new Indian place for lunch:

In the evening the boy and I watched some ‘Star Trek: Discovery‘ and had ice cream and potato chips. That day was rather nice but it also threw me off my routine a bit. I have to say that Wednesday felt like it was Monday and I was just coming out the weekend.

Those celebrations on Tuesday also meant that I couldn’t run my usual errands that day and that made the rest of the week a little more hectic. And then we got notice that my husband’s old band mates would be in town and ready to rehearse for the upcoming concert on Friday. Which in turn threw off the rest of the week. Hence the not-writing.

They are rather nice and rehearsals are going well but instead of the cozy weekend with just the three of us we’ve been having comings and goings. I will be doing some percussion with them but I didn’t rehearse this time, adding a little cowbell and guiro to the whole thing won’t be a big deal. I hope.

The week was so filled with things that I barely managed to get the podcast ready and then I did publish it on time but forgot to tell the world about it. Even though it was right there in my notebook. Oops.

Next week:

So. The upcoming week will be Christmas. Another day of rehearsals today, Christmas dinner with my mother-in-law on Christmas Eve, something extra special to eat on Christmas Day, My brother-in-law and his family coming over to my mother-in-law the day after, then a day of grocery shopping with all the other people in town, and another weekend.

I had plans to finally wrangle the teaching website into submission but that is looking unlikely. I still haven’t written the December newsletter. But I am hoping there will be some peace and quiet and time for things like sewing and website-wrangling.

The boy has to read „Faust“ for school and was slightly desperate because it is hard to understand and so we started reading it together, aloud. I always find that drama works better read aloud because that’s what it is written for. Last time I read that was in 1985. My German teacher refused to read it with us because that was what everybody did, and so I read it on my own, in protest. Of course.

I hope you all have peaceful and relaxing holidays. That you get some time for contemplation and for setting intentions for the upcoming year. I’d like to sit down and look back on the past year and get an inkling on what the next year will likely have in stock. It looks like the first quarter is already packed.

Well, nothing new then.

 That was a really productive week. I like it. And I almost got enough sleep, even.

Writing:

The writing went okay. Somehow I got my determination back and wrote almost every day. On Friday I even did my words in the evening. I focused mostly on doing two pomodoros per day and that usually results in the word count I’d like to achieve. Since I’m about halfway into the story – or maybe a little more – things are flowing better. 

I finally transferred the edits to the Eva Mandel short story into the Scrivener document. Then I converted that to an ebook file and looked at it on my ebook reader. Which showed me that I really need to structure my paragraphs differently. Interesting experience.

I also finished one of my online writing workshops and made progress on another.

Reading:

I’ve been reading quite a bit, even with everything else that was going on. Mostly Christmas stories from the WMG Holiday Spectacular and they keep being extraordinary. I’ve been diving into other holiday stories as well which is rather unusual for me. I’m reading „Christmas in the City“ and am enjoying it a lot. It’s still free, so if you enjoy steamy romance go and have a look. I got it because it has an Elle Kennedy and Sarina Bowen novella in it with two of my favorite characters ever.

I’ve also been downloading samples like crazy and starting and abandoning Christmas novels. I’m a bit restless in my reading at the moment. One that I really loved was „Christmas for Commitmentphobes“ by Rhoda Baxter. I read another one in that series last year and then went on to read the others as well.

I’ve been hopping from one non-fiction book to the other. I’m reading another book about time management for writers that leaves me unimpressed. Since I already bought it I will go through to the end but I’m skipping most of it at the moment. That doesn’t really mean the book is bad, it’s just that I’ve read so many books about time management that it doesn’t tell me anything new.

Something I found really helpful and useful was Mark Manson’s thing about self-discipline. It is a short ebook that you can get when you subscribe to his newsletter on his site, I think. I can’t find the link anymore. I found it rather illuminating.

Exercise:

No strength training again, that remains hard to schedule but I did run four times. Running feels easier at the moment and while I’m still walking a lot things are going well. Monday with a little snow left:

Wednesday:

Thursday:

All of those runs were 5K. On Saturday I went out for 11K. The wind was strong enough that I was a little afraid to be blown off the bridge. On my way back there were long stretches were the headwind was so strong that even my husband resorted to walking:

Almost in the next town over:

Fortunately all the branches came down before we went out:

Teaching:

 I’m starting to get used to teaching later and that much. I taught another potential new student and will meet her brother this week. While I still want to improve the teaching website it almost seems pointless. I was good and got all the lessons prep done in time. Well, apart from finding a new piece for a student I’ll see today but I’ll do that in the break between two students this afternoon.

Teaching is pretty interesting and challenging at the moment. I have all these singing students, every single one completely different. That week I taught musical, romantic choir music, classic rock and jazz. There were a lot of Christmas songs and „Lady Gaga“. Fun. I do get to sing a lot, play the guitar and piano.

Health:

I didn’t get quite enough sleep but napping continues to be a great idea. Seems I will continue doing it. Despite all the running my knees feel good. I think I am developing habits of movement that help prevent injury. There were a few days where I thought I was getting a cold but then I went out running again and things righted themselves. 

Other stuff:

My new monitor came on Monday. Installment was fast and easy and I really like it. The desk I’m using is not idea but having the bigger screen is helping. I think this will be excellent for revamping the website and the design stuff I want to learn. So getting that monitor was a good idea after all.

On Tuesday my husband and I went to a local furniture store and bought a new sofa for our living room. Basically, we went there on our bikes, waltzed in, looked at three couches and chose one. It took a few more minutes to decide which red fabric we wanted and to finalize the order. Now we only have to wait for eight more weeks.

Afterwards we went to a new to us Indian restaurant that was rather nice, did the grocery shopping together and went back home.

The boy had gone to Munich that day, eating burgers with a friend, getting a library card for the university library and the Bavarian state library and buying himself some climbing shoes. He went all out in socializing that week, going to the climbing gym with a friend on Friday and visiting another friend on Saturday and going to the local Christmas market.

On Saturday I finally pulled out the sewing machine and finished a t-shirt and on Sunday I recorded the podcast.

 

Next week:

This will be the last week before Christmas break. I’m not quite sure how to handle the grocery shopping logistics. There will be one potential new student, all the teaching, hopefully more writing (I think I’m almost at the ‚all is lost‘-moment) and I want to publish the podcast on Friday. I have to wrap all the Christmas presents and put packages into the mail. But the most important thing will be the boy’s 17th birthday. There are plans to have cake for breakfast, have lunch at that new Indian place and spend the evening with ‚Star Trek: Discovery‘ on Netflix while eating junk food.

And then we will have two whole weeks off.

Exhale.

 Another week that just flew by. I had to look at my journal to see what happened. When there is a lot of stuff most of it just falls out of my head. Lots of teaching.

Writing:

I only wrote 3,000 words. If this novel ends up being only 60,000 words – as I would like it to – I would be about halfway through. The writing goes faster, seems I have arrived inside the story. I didn’t write all that much, though, because I was prioritizing sleep.

Exercise:

I went running three times and it was fun. I continue to take lots and lots of walking breaks. Am okay with that. The weather was cold and mostly gray. This was on my Monday run, rather early because of a doctor’s appointment:

And this was just two days later:

And Saturday:

The boy and I only managed to do bodyweight training once. I had three days of teaching late and on Friday he went climbing with a friend.

Teaching:

Lots of teaching. Met another potential new student and called another one on the phone. I think I have found a pretty good system for lesson prep. For now.

Health:

I did start the week with a thyroid ultrasound. Things are looking okay but it’s always those side remarks that get me. Like, „Well, I guess with that many nodules you’re used to the ultrasound taking ages by now.“ Um, okay? They all seem to be the same size as last year so that’s good.

I felt like I was battling a cold all week but so far I’ve won. With all the singing teaching I often end up with my voice a little strained by the end of the day but I hope that that gets better with training.

I did start taking daily naps a week ago and so far I like it. It’s often hard to squeeze them in but I think they give me a little more energy in the afternoons so probably worth it.

Other stuff:

I ordered all the Christmas presents and most of them have already arrived. I had an epiphany on Monday while reading Eric Barker’s post about the four secrets for having an awesome marriage. My husband kept saying that NaNo makes me cranky and I insisted that it wasn’t but I then realized that with all that pressure I give myself permission to not be as patient and nice as I usually try to be. Which makes everything less pleasant for all of us. (It isn’t my husband alone, I also snapped at the boy.)

So I started prioritizing sleep and writing again and did not allow myself to flip off the handle and, lo and behold, everybody feels better, myself included.

I also continued to read „Time Management for Writers“ and am now getting into the good stuff, the things I didn’t know before about getting both the craft and the business things done.

When thinking about how and when to do the non-writing part of the publishing thing I realized that one reason I’m not making progress might be.a lack of proper tools. So I have ordered a new monitor for my computer. The 13“ laptop screen is rather small and when designing websites and book covers it feels rather cramped. I hope that this new tool will actually make a difference. It might also be a case of procrastination. Only time will tell.

I read „His Royal Highness“ and loved it, very unusual conflict, refreshing read. It gives a nice spin to both the princess and the rich guy trope. Other than that I spent a lot of time reading the stories from my Holiday Spectacular calendar. I get the daily story each evening at around seven and then read it right away most of the time. I also seem to collect holiday themed novels but I’m not actually reading them at the moment. This morning I started „The Flatshare“ instead and am already a quarter in.

I still didn’t feel as rushed last week as the week before, seems my husband might have been right about NaNo stressing me. I did manage to get the podcast published in time, having four days between recording and cutting it was a little weird, though. Next time I might try to record and get it ready on the same day but I couldn’t do that because we went out on Sunday evening.

On my husband’s sweater I made great progress. Until I had the brilliant idea to compare the sweater-in-progress with the one I was modeling this one on:

Yeah, that didn’t work. The gray one is a little too wide but not by that much. And the lesson I learned? If you wing a sweater it might be a good idea to whip out the tape measure now and then and compare the thing you’re knitting to the measurements you took. Especially when the thing you’re working on feels too small.

I have ripped it all back and started again. I have two inches of ribbing on one sleeve and two inches of ribbing on the body. Hmpf. The good thing is that I won’t be needing more yarn soon.

And just yesterday my husband and I finally made plans for the trip we want to take around his birthday in January. We already booked a bed and breakfast and will stay in Salzburg for four days. Hurray! Not knowing where to go was stressing us both out a bit too. I’m really looking forward to that little getaway.

Next week:

Again, there will be quite a bit of teaching. The boy has a thing on Tuesday and a chemistry test on Wednesday. I want to knit a lot. Watch a couple of „Star Trek: Discovery“ episodes which I’m really loving at the moment. I am hoping to write more words, 7,000 would be ideal.I might have to resort to lock my phone and computer before breakfast again.

My new monitor is supposed to get here today. I’m hoping that will make me super-motivated to do all the design stuff. It’s all very exciting, with the new OS I can use my iPad as a graphic tablet and all.

Getting enough sleep would be great, naps and all, and running four times would be wonderful. My husband and I have plans to go grocery shopping together on Tuesday (it’s a date!), then look at couches and go to an all-you-can-eat buffet for lunch. Fun!