fluffy clouds

well as you can see I've been playing with the kewl new blogger. Next action: make my labels show as a fluffy cloud rather than a nasty list.

health kick

R had his annual check up at the doctors and was told his cholesterol is too high, he has some liver enzymes that shouldn't be there and he's put on weight. So basically he needs to drink less, eat better and exercise more. And it's not just him, is it? My eating continues bad, although today I have made myself a lovely fruit smoothie - probably the first time this year I have consumed fruit other than bananas.

I went back to belly dancing this week (C gave me a gorgeous coin belt for Christmas so I had to try it out) and am actually going to try and do 2 hours a week instead of just 1. I have offered to take a friend along to the beginners' class with me, so then I will have to go. Also I am going to go back to aquarobics and re-start pilates. I have to put these in place now as regular habits - if I don't do it now then when I re-start my studies I will think I don't have enough time to exercise too.

Finally getting serious? Dunno. Hope so. OK I know hoping isn't enough. I have my exercise plan drafted out. Now I have to work on the eating. Not just for my physical health but my mental health too, I've been really irritable for the past few weeks (months?) and I know I would feel better if I wasn't consuming so much cr@p.

Next action is weigh myself, find out the worst. Eek.

exceptions to the rule

My motto is "never do today what you can put off till tomorrow", but I make an exception for stationery shopping. I feel about stationery like normal women are supposed to feel about shoes - somewhere out there is the one, the magic item, that will make me organised and productive and beautiful and sexy. Getting into GTD has given me a fantastic excuse for indulging my passion. I have lovely new intrays and files and folders and best off all, brand new today, a lovely box for keeping my 43folders in (thanks to 43folders wiki for the tip - there is no room in my tiny office for another filing cabinet so a box for my folders is great).

The 2 things I like best about GTD are:

1. he tells you how to set up a simple system to organise your stuff. All my systems break down because they are too complicated or things drop through the cracks. I think this new system might work for me, I particularly like the whole tickler file thing, I feel like I might finally be managing my paper.
2. the emphasis on next actions. For someone who prevaricates and panics and procrastinates like I do, focusing on the next thing I have to physically do makes sense. It also chimes in with stuff I worked on during CBT sessions in the past.

The book has a quote which I love, so I have made it into a motivational poster incorporating my spiritual beliefs:

It is easier to act yourself into a better way of feeling than to feel yourself ino a better way of action

O.H. Mowrer

catching up

Christmas was great, it was really nice to spend the day with all of my family, plus we went to visit friends who moved to Brum last year. Owen got totally spoilt with mounds of presents, including Marvin's Mind Blowing Magic. He spent New Year's Eve performing street magic for friends and neighbours.

All back to work and school now boo and also waiting for the course materials to arrive to start my next OU courses. In preparation for which I have signed up to the cult of Getting Things Done. I've read the holy book, I've set up the sacred 43folders and now I'm ready to start cranking those blessed widgets. I'm going for a mainly anologue implementation to start with (square cut folders, A4 paper, post-its), we'll see how it goes.

Eating is double plus ungood right now, bingeing like feck. Next action: read "Overcoming Binge Eating"