Goals Update 2

Bit late on this update, but I ran out of time over the weekend. I'll be busy this weekend too, so I guess I need to get this in now. Apologies in advance if parts are incoherent - I'm typing this and playing White Knight Chronicles at the same time....

1. Go back for my bachelor's degree. I have the FAFSA about halfway finished, and I've also started applications for a couple of different schools. I need to pick probably three schools for sure that I'm going to apply to, and get my applications in. I might consider another school or two, but I have to think if I really want to apply to even more schools and get stuck with more application fees. I'm aiming to be done with all the paperwork by the end of this month, whatever I decide.

2. Design and get my second tattoo. Haven't put much thought into this one honestly.

3. Photography, part 1. I started Project 365 on Monday. So far I've taken pictures every day but I still have nowhere to post them. I'm not sure if I'm going to post anywhere. I might figure something out and then post my backlog from the beginning, or I might just keep them to myself. Haven't decided yet...

4. Photography, part 2. Decided for sure on the site I'm going to use to make a photography book, and figured out some pricing. I have two sizes of books I am debating between, but probably won't pick one until I start sorting through photos and see what I have. Once I get some of the pictures figured out it'll be easier to decide what layout and size I need to go with.

5. Photography, part 3. I've started organizing my massive amount of pictures and folders. It's going to be a long process I think, but once I finally get through it, it should be easy enough to maintain. Once I get everything sorted I can go through the RAW files. I'm still researching hard drives as well. I'm going to come up with a few different options, and then keep an eye out for good deals on any of them.

6. WriYe. I've been hitting at least 1400 words per day, which is my minimum to hit 500,000 in a year. Most days I go at least a little bit over, so I'm slowly catching up. I'm only a few thousand words behind right now, so it's no big deal to me. I'll make it up eventually.

7. Submit writing. I've started editing some of my stories a bit, but not much work put into this goal yet. I really do need to start looking into where I can submit things, and see if any workshops are being held locally.

8. Write in journal at least once a week. I fail miserably at this one! I have found all of my journals and I know which I'll be writing in, I just need to make the time to do it. I will absolutely write at least twice before my next update.

9. New hobbies. Have done yoga a few times now - there are a number of different programs on demand through my cable. I had a few yoga DVDs that are at my mom's house somewhere. I need to head out and find them, or else buy some new ones. I will more than likely continue with this and start alternating between yoga and Zumba. I'm really enjoying it so far and am glad I got back into it.

10. Miniatures. I'm going to order the paints sometime this week. I'm hoping to have them by the end of next week, so that I can get started next weekend. I won't have time before then to work on anything, so that would be perfect. Between now and then I will have to look up some info on different painting techniques and figure out what to try. (Niall, links??? >_>)

11. Save money. I got my attendance bonus with my last paycheck, and dumped some more money into savings. My tax refund is due in next week, and I'm going to put a fair bit of it into savings as well, which should put me well over two months salary set aside. I'm quite happy with my progress on this - I was hoping to hit two months in March and it's only the beginning of February. I'm not sure what my next step will be. I need a new computer, so I'll probably start putting about half what I normally would into savings, and the rest into a new computer fund. The end goal is to get 3-4 months salary into my savings account, but it's going to take time - most paychecks I can't put that much into savings, the attendance bonus and tax refund were just special occurrences.

12. I want to go see at least 12 different concerts/shows this year. Haven't been to anything since Wicked, but I have a murder mystery coming up at the end of this month, and then Gaelic Storm and Holst in March. :)

13. Donate to charity. It's the beginning of February, which means it's time to find a new charity to donate to. I have a few ideas in mind, so I'll make my decision in the next couple of weeks. I also need to start thinking of more causes I'd be interested in, as otherwise I'm going to run out of ideas in a few months.

14. Read 30,000+ pages. In the month of January, I read 12 books for a total of 3758 pages. In reality though I'm probably closer to 5000 pages - I'm partway through another 5 or 6 books but I won't count those pages until I actually finish. One book was a type I'd never really read before, and I really enjoyed it (11 still to go for that part of the goal). Will probably post a review later.

15. Write 52 new blogs. This is only three, but I do have a list now of about a dozen different entries to write whenever I have the time and feel like writing them. I think I'm also going to start posting some reviews of books, games, shows, etc.

16. Music goal. I still have to listen to most of the music, but I've downloaded about 10 different artists now. Still welcoming more suggestions - I need at least 10 more artists to complete my goal, and I'm probably going to keep adding more even once I cross this one off the list.

17. Watch 100 different movies. Made it through 29 so far. I'm trying to get ahead on this goal early, because I know that I'm going to slow down a lot after the first couple months of the year. So far I'm happy with my progress.

18. Learn more in general. I've decided to combine this with the reading goal I had earlier for nonfiction books. I was thinking about it a few days ago, and I don't want to overwhelm myself with stuff to do. I still have all of my old hobbies, plus work, school (soon enough), and spending time with friends. I don't want to cram what time I have left so full with stuff. I'm going to end up getting bored and finding these goals to be a chore in that case, and that's not what I want. So instead of researching different topics, and reading at least 12 nonfiction books, I'm combining the two to reading at least 12 nonfiction books - each one about a different topic that I'm interested in learning more about. I'll more than likely end up looking up more things on my own but I'm not going to make that a requirement - I'd rather do it because I feel like it.

Right, I don't think that was too horribly incoherent, but who knows. I'm not going to worry about it. It's midnight and somehow I just lost the last four hours of my life to that damned game! At any rate I'm happy how most of these are going so far, and hopefully I'll continue to see this much progress!