New Year's Resolutions

It's that time of the year again! This year, I have three big resolutions and for each, I've devised some steps that will hopefully help me follow through with those resolutions.

So without further ado, here they are:

1. Lose 70 pounds, which will get me most of the way towards my ideal weight. Ok, I think everyone resolves to lose weight (I know I do every single year), but here's to hoping this time will be the time it works! To achieve this goal, I will:

• Consistently journal what I eat on Sparkpeople.com. It's hard to lose weight if you don't know what you're eating :)
• Regularly exercise. I plan to start out with 30 minutes of cardio three times a week and gradually increase the time and number of days I work out. I'll start strength training after a few weeks and maybe in the spring, I'll start the C25K again.
• Avoid soda and processed foods as much as possible.
• Eat more vegan foods. I'm not horribly fond of eggs, and dairy products make me break out badly, so this is probably something I should do anyways. Plus, the more vegan I eat, the healthier my food is likely to be.
• Cook 104 new recipes, which is the equivalent of two new recipes a week (on average). I love to cook so I don't really foresee this being a problem.
• No excuses! Thirty minutes of exercise and ignoring some sugar cravings is a small price to pay for around 20 years of extra life.

2. Stay up to speed on my homework! I'm a graduate student but I haven't quite grasped the fact that I need to actually work and not goof off and go out with friends. It's ok to have a break once in a while, but I need to focus on my education first and foremost. Steps to achieve this include:

• Doing a little bit of work for every class everyday.
• I have a planner that allows me to plan my day out hourly. I will make a detailed schedule for my day every morning (and this will include free time, exercising, and cooking) and I will STICK TO IT!!!
• Once I have a topic for my seminar papers, I will read two scholarly sources for each one every week. That's really not a lot of work if I spread it out like that.

3. Lastly, I will focus more on my own creative writing by:

• Writing at least 1000 words a day, five days a week, but I will be aiming more towards the 3000 words a day mark.
• Writing at least one short story each month.
• I will revise the short stories I wrote last year.
• I will finish the last 20,000ish words of my 2008 novel and do one revision of it.
• I will outline and write at least 50,000 words of a second novel (this will be what I use for my Writing the Novel class).
• During November, I will participate in and win NaNoWriMo.

And those are my New Year's Resolutions for 2011!

Supernatural = Procrastination!

Because I have so much free time (yeah right!), I went ahead and bought the first four seasons of Supernatural. Yay! Another thing to keep me away from writing my seminar paper!

I might do reaction blogs to the episode like I've been doing with Merlin (speaking of, I should watch episode 2 tonight after I've given up on my homework).

I like to do what I can to help out the Procastinator's League of America :P

If You Were Gay - A Fanvideo

Best fanvid. Ever.

Too hilarious for words. Just watch (especially if you enjoy Merlin) and laugh your @$$ off :)

Finals Week = Torture!

I'm an awful student, a disgrace to the graduate community, an imposter in a community of intellectuals. Why? Because I haven't even started my final projects for this semester. And they're all due between Friday and Wednesday of next week.

Fml. I keep telling myself I'm not going to procrastinate. That I'll finally be the "good" student I keep telling myself I'll be every New Year's Eve. Does it ever work? Nope.

Instead, I'll be pulling a crappy seminar paper together at the last minute and turning it in, too tired to really care if I do a good job or not and just happy to finally be able to sleep.

What am I going to do next semester when I have three seminar papers to worry about?

Fml.

Student Blogging: Great Idea or Asking for Trouble?

I've been thinking about doing a blog with my composition students next semester. I think it would be a great way for students to post responses to readings (especially since we'll be reading lots of literature) and tentative papers topics or thesis statements that their peers can then comment on. Students could also use it as a way to brainstorm ideas for writing if they're at a loss for ideas. I also think my students (who are from the millenial generation) might be more comfortable with starting conversations and sharing ideas online before bringing their personal views to a face-to-face classroom.

The thing is, I've never tried to do a classwide blog like this before. It could be a potential disaster just waiting to happen. I'm curious as to if anyone has any ideas about this. Have you ever tried it and how did it work for you? What did you have them blog about? Do you have ideas that I could try to incorporate into my own classroom?

Burlesque

I went to see Burlesque over the Thanksgiving holiday. My thoughts?

If you want to see a fantastic, visually exciting film, this is it. If you want to see lots of great singing and dancing, this is it. If you want to see a cliche romance with an appropriate amount of humor, this is it.

If you want to see good, serious acting, go somewhere else.

The actors were clearly chosen because they had the voice to perform the demanding singing roles and the moves to do the dancing and contorting. They weren't chosen for acting.

But really, that's fine. I didn't see the movie for good acting, I saw it because I love to dance and I love to watch people dance. Most likely, I'll buy this when it goes to DVD and watch it in secret when my roommate's gone.

I'll probably dance and sing too.

Merlin Likes Pretty People

This just cracked me up!