One of the negative impacts for me when I’m injured is that I quickly become a whiner. My tough routine of skating once or twice a week comes to a screeching halt and I feel sorry for myself on many levels. Luckily this is not a major injury and happened less than two weeks ago. I think I’ll be able to skate on my Sunday session, or at least push around with my friends. On a good note I’ve stayed committed to not boozing it up. But I think the combination of being sidelined from hurting myself and staying in most nights has given me a lot of time to think. Perhaps too much time to think. Last Monday evening I did not write in my blog, and the world kept spinning. So I conclude it doesn’t matter much at all what I write in my blog, as long as I consistently write. With no qualms I’m going to simply write about the game plan for myself I’ve contrived over the past two weeks. Broken record, making promises I can’t keep, and a self-absorbed prick might be some reactions to this drivel, but whatever, I’m okay with that.
I’ll start with patting myself on that back for one small accomplishment. When I decided to take a brake from boozing, I thought I’d be more productive with my routine based goals. I read the mammoth, Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer in less than a three-week period. The night after finishing that book, I started 1776 by David McCullaugh, and read that in less then a week. Basically every night I’m reading an hour or more. So far in my reading log for 2013 I have 20 books read, and 7 of those are from after my decision to stop drinking in early July. I feel amped and motivated to read. On my reading list I got Catch 22 by Joseph Heller, The Winds of War by Herman Wouk, and Almanac of the Dead by Leslie Marmon Silko lined up and hope to read those in a timely fashion. Those are lengthy books. Also for October’s book club I’ll be reading Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy for the second time in my life. I never doubted that I loved reading, but I’m glad that it is again a regular part of my life. With reading the majority of nights, I can take on lengthy novels, and most likely finish them too.
Another goal or issue I’m thinking about is finances. I’m my last post I mentioned the goal of getting rid of my credit card debt by New Years, and getting rid of my student loan debt by my birthday in May. Those are firm dates to work with, and the math is simply how large the monthly payments should be to meet those goals. If the monthly amount paid is too small, I won’t make the self-imposed deadlines. If the payments are too large, then I may charge more and that would throw everything off. I’m definitely spending less without the nights out. But I realized I’m way over spending on take out and dining out. I calculated on Friday I spent at least 23 dollars on food, and it was nothing memorable. So I need to start grocery shopping. As a child I was good at math classes and crappy at everything else in school. Perhaps it’s my inner child that likes to do fuzzy math and crunch out spending plans for myself. I really do like to play with calculations in some sick way.
My dilemma with financing the food I eat also correlates with my general health. I went to the doctor for a follow up this weekend, and weighed in at 200 on the scale, that is heavy for me. So heavy in fact that I’m surprised by it, I thought I stayed steady around 185. Anyway, even if my cell phone weighs 15 pounds, maybe I should really make an effort to improve my diet. I especially should improve my diet if my future holds nagging little stupid injuries like my toe or the ball of my foot. So with all the time in the world that I’ve had recently I thought of a simple diet. First off, my life is better without soda, so that needs to stop pronto. The main problem with soda is sugar, and I should limit sugar as much as possible. I might try to be strict and only allow myself sugar in coffee. I probably have some type of sweet everyday or several times a day. As my sister suggested over ten years ago and it worked then was to cut out fried foods. No fried food means no Popeyes or French fries, and in most cases no potato chips. Cutting out sugar and fried food seems like two small things but it does mean evaluating what you eat, and includes a lot. In addition to that, I’m going to try to eat 3 fruits a day. I’ll have an apple and a banana everyday plus a mystery fruit. Also I’d like to eat a salad once a day or most days. I don’t feel inclined to become a vegetarian, but I’ll try to limit eating meat to once a day or less. Eating meat twice a day or more is just indulgent, and can’t help the gut.
I think that’s enough whining for now. I’m continually setting these goals, which may or not be healthy. Sometimes I wish I could be content with what I’ve done or all that I have around me. But I think it’s good to be able to evaluate one’s own weaknesses and stay motivated to take the steps to progress.
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