Belated Friday Goals

My goals for this weekend, some of which are already done:

• Hang calendars (completed this morning at 12:01 am :-)
• Separate work and play areas (will elaborate more about this one in a future blog). This is done.
• South Brevard Christmas Count
• Menu plan
• Make window seat for kitties. (This is done. Here's a pic:)

Pretty productive so far! It helps to have Friday off, so much more can get done in 3 days than 2, and I'll even have Sunday to sleep!

If anyone is reading, share your non-couch goals for the weekend!

New Years Resolutions

In the past, I have always started off the new year with such lofty, but alas, unrealistic resolutions. I will never eat sugar again! I will lose 100 pounds! I will go to the gym every single day! And, when the goals don't survive past New Years Day night, I get all depressed, feel like a loser, and give up. Of course, as discussed before, the issue is that I just set myself up to fail. This year, I will try to be a bit more gentle with myself, and at least more realistic. So, my resolutions this year are:

• Seek out more bee people. Find the short fat awkward people who don't fit in and dance with them. I know they are out there.
  
• Make a little birdhouse in my soul. Continue with this web site and blog. I'm not sure anyone is reading anymore (I haven't gotten much feedback to the blog) but if maybe someday, one person stumbles across it and finds some solace, some sanctuary here, then I'll consider this resolution a success. In fact, as long as I keep the blog up I will.
  
• Believe that life can change and I'm not stuck in vain! This is a tough one for me, especially as I get older and have to face my future with some sense of realism, but without a defeatist attitude. I need to remind myself that I'm too old to be a rock star, but still young enough to maybe play a song on YouTube or maybe even do a coffee house someday.
  
• Make every day the best day ever! Make plans, and even though sometimes things don't always go as planned, remember to make the best of it either way.
  
• Continue making short term goals, and updating them as I cross things off. My current list is:
  
  • Make crabs for the ELC.
    
  • Make interactive map of how the FL land mass has changed for the ELC.
    
  • Toilet train the cats.
    
  • Finish Timmy and start book.
    
  • Get new tattoo.
    
  • Get promotional material (brochures and magnets) for David's business printed and distributed.
    
  • Learn a song on the banjo and post a video to YouTube.
    
  
  
• Continue making long term goals and do all that I can to work towards them. My current long term goals are:
  
  • Appalachian Trail with Joy, Christmas 2010 (at least the part around north GA-North Carolina)
    
  • Summit Kearsage. It's kicked my butt twice so far, I need to show it who's boss.
    
  • See a cock-of-the-rock in its native habitat.
    
  • Sing karaoke. Unashamed, despite having been begged never to go near a microphone again ever (I mean that literally -- my ex posted an MP3 on the internet when we had a band, and someone clicked the link to listen to it and immediately called me, all the way from England, to beg me never to go near a microphone again, ever.)
    
  • Touch Marty Marquis' hair.
    
  • When I was a kid I saw a tv show about a museum in Japan that had a big animatronics collection. I'd really like to find and visit that museum.
    
  • Hike down the Grand Canyon.
    
  • Get the rest of the stamps for my National Park Passport.
    
  • Write a book.
    
  • Sell another photo or other piece of my own artwork (and go to the museum somewhere in Utah that has the first photo that I sold.)
    
  • See a Satanic Leaf Tailed Gecko in its natural habitat (Madagascar)
    
  
  Okay, those are my resolutions. Your mission -- should you choose to accept it -- post a few of yours!

A Taste of Tuesday

A while back, I was trying to make banana bread, but I only had 2 bananas. I looked through the fridge and found some carrots. I thought to myself, "Hey, seen one phallic shaped food, you seen them all" and I replaced the 2 other bananas with 3-4 carrots. It was really yummy. I made some other changes to the recipe over time, replaced the oil with applesauce, brown sugar with Splenda Brown Sugar Blend and threw in a few other things. So now I present to you:

Dee's Phallic Bread

Ingredients:

• Total of 5-6 phallic shaped fruit/veggies. I usually use 2 bananas and 3-4 carrots, but I think zucchini would work well too.
• 1/2 cup Egg Beaters
• Cinnamon, nutmeg to taste
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup Mott's Natural unsweetened Apple sauce
• 1 cup Splenda brown sugar blend or 1 cup brown sugar
• (optional) 1/2 cup Raisins
• (optional) 1/2 cup chopped pecans

Directions: Shred the carrots. Smoosh the bananas with a fork or potato masher. Add everything except the flour to the bananas and mix until smooth. Add the flour and mix until it looks mixed. Spray a glass loaf pan with Pam, and dump the mixture into it. Bake at 350 for about 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. (Time may vary depending on your oven -- it's much better to overcook this than undercook. Test for doneness at the 1 hour mark.)

Update: I found this actually works better as muffins, it comes out a little less dense than the bread. I baked them in the aluminum foil muffin papers for about 30 minutes. As with the bread, make sure you test for doneness.

Reminders

I need reminders a lot. I'm not talking about stuff like, "Get cat food" or "Wear clean underpants in case you are in an accident". I need the kind of reminders that keep me going through the day. Some wise person recently suggested to make flash cards with reminders on them, and to keep them around when I need motivation. So I started making a set. Many are song quotes, just because music has always been a motivator for me, but some are from books or just my own little head. Here are my personal daily reminders:

• Be like water, don't bash into the rocks, learn to flow around them. -- paraphrased from the Tao
• Believe that life can change, that you're not stuck in vain. -- The Smashing Pumpkins
• Paint the world anew, find a way to open all the joy in order to alleviate the strain -- Orbital
• I don't think of you at all. -- Ayn Rand, from The Fountainhead (you have to read it in context)
• Anger is an energy. -- PiL
• Hang your hairshirt on the lowest rung, it's a beautiful life. -- REM
• We're part of the fire that is burning, and from the ashes we can build another day. -- The Moody Blues
• Reach the stars, fly a fantasy, Dream a dream and what you see will be, -- Limahl
• Don't dream it, be it. -- Rocky Horror Picture Show
• It's the best day, ever! -- Spongebob Squarepants (we had this song played at our wedding)

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to make your own set of flash cards. Keep them with you. If you fee comfortable sharing, post some here as a reply to this note.

Too cute not to post...

This was just too cute and appropriate not to repost:


see more dog and puppy pictures

Friday Goals

Wow, I can't believe it's Friday already. This week has flown. Busy week, and even busier weekend. Oh well, it keeps me off the couch! Goals for the weekend:

• Attend Audubon meeting
• Do the Cocoa Bird Count
• Wrap and pack all gifts
• Finish holiday cards, get them ready for mailing
• Go on walk to see holiday lights in Viera (this is a DeeMotivation event, RSVP if you want to join us!)

What are your non-couch goals for the weekend? Please share!

A Taste of Tuesday

I am really not into cooking. If the world ended in a firey holocaust tomorrow, I could easily survive barricaded in a 7-11, living on coffee, Slim Jims, and Hostess Zingers. Who am I kidding here -- I don't need a holocaust, I actually HAVE spent weeks living on coffee, Slim Jims and Hostess Zingers. I wish I could say it was during my wild college days, but it was as an adult when I was just too darn lazy to cook anything else! So, to say I'm a lazy cook is an understatement. But, I do have creativity on my side and occasionally this works to my benefit.

For example, David was away last week. As he does most of the cooking now, I was feeling kind of lost and on the verge of heading out to 7-11 for old times sake. But I found a left over bowl of his White-barbeque sauce grilled chicken in the fridge. It was already chopped up, so I took a tiny bit of Smart Balance mayo, some Sargento shredded cheese, and some pecans to make a chicken salad. Bread isn't always lap-band friendly, but David had hit a sale on low-salt Ritz crackers... So I nuked up the chicken salad, and used it for dip with the ritz crackers, and that was my lunch. It was sooo yummy. So, I present to you:

Dee's Chicken Salad

• Left over cooked chicken
• Anything you find in your kitchen that looks like it might taste good (chopped apples, pecans, pumpkin seeds, raisins are all good candidates)
• Something to hold it all together. I use a little Smart Balance mayo, but barbecue sauce, cheeze whiz or Hershey's syrup would also probably work
• Some Sargento shredded cheese

Mix together, microwave until the cheese is melted (about 30-45 seconds), and dip something into it. I suppose if you are into healthy stuff, you could dip carrots or apples. I use crackers or my fingers or in a pinch, cookies.