Do You Have the Time?

Do you guys all know that object lesson involving rocks, sand, and a jar? Or I've also seen it done with marshmallows, sugar and a jar (yummier that way)? You know the one that's supposed to teach you the importance of prioritizing your time, and if you get the big stuff in the jar first, all the little stuff fits around it?

I hate that object lesson.

Because, unfortunately, time doesn't actually work that way. If I spend 22 minutes writing in my journal, I don't have those 22 minutes to watch a sitcom on Hulu. I can't go back and fill in the cracks of time when I was staring at my journal page deciding what to write with the sitcom. Or say I go to work for eight hours, and of those hours there are 22 minutes that I was doing something other than working. I can't compile those into a sitcom either. You get 24 hours and it passes you in a linear fashion, you don't get to go back an fill in the cracks.

I mention this, because I have not been able to do all the things that I want to do every day, and so I've been thinking about time management a lot lately. Here is a list of things that I would do every day in an ideal world.

• Work out for an hour
• Shower and dress 
• Sit down and eat three meals a day
• Go to work (well, this obviously would only be M-F)
• Write in my journal
• Seriously study the scriptures
• Spend quality time on my knees in prayer
• Visit with friends
• Read
• Watch a TV show
• Practice the piano
• Start practicing the viola again
• Clean my house for 5-15 minutes
• Call a family member
• Find an opportunity to serve someone 
• Sleep for eight hours

And that list doesn't even include all the things I would like to be engaged in that are not daily things, such as finding a guy, planning a menu and preparing food, budgeting and balancing the checkbook, attending Church and church activities, post entertaining things on this blog for your entertainment, and so on.

I've never been able to do all of the things on that list in a single day. Minutes slip by you while you're driving to and from places, they get lost in the walk from the car to the house and all of the coming home rituals (hang keys, take off shoes and coat, stash the purse, etc), they get used on other things like going to the bathroom. And even more than all the minutes that you spend transitioning between activities or whatever, there's the mental fatigue. I don't think I could be "on" enough to stay focused and actively engaged the entire 16 hours I'm awake.

So everything becomes a tradeoff. Do I practice the piano, or do I go to bed on time? Do I call a family member, or do I read a novel?

I think overall, I've figured things out and I lead a pretty balanced life. I look for opportunities to serve others, I schedule time with friends, I get to the gym, and I make sure that I get some down time. And I feel like I make sure that I'm getting the most important (to me) things done. But I can't help but be a little sad about all the things that I just don't have the time to be doing that I'd like to be doing (e.g. I would totally be a way better housekeeper if I didn't also have a full time job). 

So how do you do it? How do you decide which things are the Best Things and which are the Good Things that can get cut off the to do list when time runs out?

My Rating System

So I did a terrible job of recording what I read after about August last year, and that's a shame, since I have to be honest, I read so much sometimes that I often either can't remember what I've read at all or I can't remember many specifics about what I do remember reading, and occasionally, not very often, but occasionally, I can't remember how I felt about something I've read. Maybe some of you are like "Why bother reading if you can't remember anything about it" to whom I say "Do you remember every episode of every TV show or movie you've ever watched?" because reading is my TV time. Basically. I also watch TV and movies, but usually given a choice I'll read.

Anyway. It's a new year and that means that it's a great time to start over with things, and so I'm going to get back in the "record and review what you read" game. I decided that I wanted to be more systematic in how I rate my books, though because I feel like I'm kind of fickle in awarding stars on Goodreads, I don't want to be a fickle person. Therefore and herewith is my new rating rubric:

5 Stars

This is a book that I loved reading, that I'm still talking about, and that I will recommend to and/or buy for friends. Must be both well written and in some way profound.

4 Stars

This is a book that I enjoyed reading, that I may talk about, and that I will recommend. It is well written, but does not have a depth requirement.

3 Stars

This is a book that I liked reading and that I will endorse if you're already reading it, but will not actively recommend.

2 Stars

This is a book that I did not actively dislike reading, but would tell you not to bother reading.

1 Star

This is a book that have an active and specific dislike for.

And there you go.

New Year!

Here's the run down on how I have spent the first week of 2013.

Tuesday, 1 Jan: Rang in the new year by folding laundry and watching the new Star Trek movie, wake up yoga session, saw Life of Pi and had lunch with Reed, read for a bit and then had dinner and saw Les Miserables with Tim. Good day.

Wednesday, 2 Jan: Had my first real day at the free medical clinic I'm volunteering at. It's been a bit of a hassle trying to get everything in order, but I very much enjoyed finally starting to make a contribution.

Thursday, 3 Jan: Ballet. Love.

Friday, 4 Jan: Nothing. I know this is lame, but everything felt so busy all week that an evening of nothing was quite welcome.

Saturday, 5 Jan: Bought cruise tickets. I need to get out of the cold, but I'm trying to save my leave for the awesome UK trip Loo and I will be taking this summer, so a weekend cruise to the Bahamas seemed like an excellent choice. Super excited!

Sunday, 6 Jan: Obviously, today hasn't really happened yet, but I plan to spend it cooking up meals for the week and attending church (which doesn't start until 2pm. So late!)

Anyway, I've heard from a lot of people lately that they don't believe in New Years resolutions, and that's fine. I kind of love them though, with the caveat that I prefer to call them goals and not resolutions. I know that seems like a nitpicky thing, but I feel like goals better expresses what I mean. Anyway, I looked back on my resolutions for the last few years so see what my track record was, and I'm pleased to report that it's about 50%. My trend is meet one goal 100%, meet another goal about 50%, and pretty much just not meet a third goal. Which isn't bad, I think.

Last year I tried to do a yearly theme, and that pretty much just didn't work out for me at all. I was insufficiently mindful of the theme -- especially when my life started exploding around April/May -- and so it didn't really do me any good. I accomplished some good things that were related to the themes that I had settled on, e.g. I was probably the most consistent about gymming last year than I have ever been, but it wasn't because I was mindful of it.

So I've spent the last few weeks pondering and praying about how I wanted to approach 2013. I realized that I needed to think in terms of who I wanted to be along with thinking about what I wanted to do, and I've settled on three things that I want to do this year that will help me become the person I want to be.

1.) I want to be a person who communicates with God, so I will strive daily to pray mindfully.
2.) I want to be a person who recognizes and catalogs the blessings in her life, so I will journal daily.
3.) I want to be a good housekeeper, so I will spend at least 5 minutes a day cleaning my house.

There are other things I'm working on and doing, but those are the ones that I want to be most mindful of and the ones that I want to focus on all year. I feel like my life will definitely be enriched by meeting at least one of those 100%, as is my wont

Have you made goals for the new year? What are they?

I Celebrated Christmas By...

Seeing the Messiah at the National Cathedral with Annie & Joe

Singing with new friends at their annual Christmas Sing-a-long Party

Listening to the Christmas program at the Potomac Ward

Checking out the Festival of Lights at the Washington DC Temple

Eating delicious food at the Relief Society Christmas Dinner

Making cinnamon rolls for our Work Holiday Party

Going to The Hobbit with the Moore's (not strictly Christmas)

Making eight varieties of cookies for Christmas presents
 

Grabbing breakfast at La Madeleine with Tim

 Wearing Christmas Jammies from Aunt and Uncle in New York with Annie

A Little Christmas Cheer

I've been doing lots of Christmas related things lately that I'll be telling you about soon, but nothing has gotten me more in the Christmas spirit than this:

Somebody left this stocking full of super random stuff (this list includes socks, Santa PEZ, fart noise putty, play-doh, and stickers) on my doorknob last night. I seriously have no idea who it was, but I LOVED it. So thanks, Elves or Santa or whomever! It totally made my night! And you saved me from a trip to my pity pot (note to self: don't watch romantic comedies when you are sick and nearing the one year anniversary of a tough break-up). Because, seriously, fart noise putty.

Don't Worry, I Still Exist

So, 2012 has kind of been the Great Undocumented Year. But that's probably fine because on the whole 2012 was not the greatest year of all time. That's not to say that is didn't have its bright spots, but on the whole, not the greatest. Fingers crossed on 2013, though. And toes.

But I have been doing things. So, let me tell you about them.

Blackfriar's Theater

One thing that I did was drive down to Staunton, VA to attend a showing of Shakespeare's Cymbaline performed by the American Shakespeare Center at Blackfriar's theater. The theater is a replica of the indoor theater that Shakespeare staged his play on, and they try to stay true to the spirit of Shakespeare's plays by leaving the lights on the whole time and engaging the audience. This helps make the plays make a little more sense, since it turns out that there are a lot of audience asides in Shakespeare's plays. It was extremely well done and I enjoyed myself immensely.

After the play, we went to eat at this cute restaurant called the Depot where we had a lot of stinky cheeses and everything was amazingly delicious. While we were there we noticed a couple of the actors eating there as well. Turns out they noticed us as well, and when they were done they came over to chat with us. Which was exciting, because they had done a great job and gave us a chance to gush at them a little. But actually, they weren't there to chat with us. One of my friends had semi-accidentally taken a flash photo with her phone (she meant to take the photo; she didn't mean for it to be flash. She also speaks English as a second language and very young, so she didn't actually know that it was a bit of a faux pas). The actors had ACTUALLY come over to give us the "no flash photography" lecture. Seriously? Seriously! I mean, I understand the rule, but who made them the flash photo police? I think I would have been more okay with it if they hadn't come over all chummy like they just wanted to say hi to the fans. Unbelievable.

But anyway, it was fun and now I have an awesome story to recount which I can conclude with a derisive "thesbians!" and that's awesome.

African Sweet Potato and Peanut Stew

I got asked to make a meal for one of the families in our ward who had just welcomed a new addition. Cooking for strangers is always hard, since you just never know what they are going to like, and in this case, the meal had to be gluten free. So, I decided to make one of Ed's favorite recipes: African Sweet Potato and Peanut Stew. It seems like a good choice because it was novel, had a nice spice kick without being spicy, and it also freezes well. So I made it and delivered it, and discovered there had been some kind of communications break down along the line, and someone else had already delivered dinner for the night. Oh well, though, like I said, the stew keeps well, and that would just be a few extra days of food they wouldn't have to worry about.

I didn't think much of it until the next day when I was heating up the stew for my lunch (Obviously, I made extras for myself) and discovered that a coworker/friend of mine had ALSO brought African Sweet Potato and Peanut Stew for lunch. What are the odds, right? I'm sure you can tell where this is going. They were the other family who'd brought dinner that night. And they brought the same dish as I did. Seriously, what are the odds? I don't think they were exactly the same, but still, that poor family. They are going to think that's all we know how to make around here!

Game Night(s)

I've been spending a lot of time with these people:

Doing this:

Obviously, that's a picture means "playing board games." The game pictured is actually not one we play often because it's kind of dull, but it works as an abstract representation. Anyway, games are funny because these boys are funny. So even though I'm not very good at games (I invariably come in second to last), I enjoy game nights. Yay!

Thanksgiving

I totally brought my camera to take pictures of Thanksgiving and completely failed to do so. Mine was pretty low key. I ran 5 miles in the morning to prepare for the engorgement, and then spent mid morning to afternoon crafting Thanksgiving dishes like homemade dressing from scratch (starting with cutting and drying the french bread I used), pumpkin pizzas (use savory spiced pumpkin puree as the sauce), and roasted brussels sprouts. Then I took my beautiful food creations over to a friend's house where we proceeded to eat many other crafted from scratch items, plus a beautifully roasted turkey and watch football. And then we had round two the next night because there were definitely not enough of us to eat all of the yumminess that there was.

I wish there were more to tell you, but there doesn't seem to be. I think one of my resolutions for next year might have to be "document my life better" and/or "have more of a life.

Good Weather

I saw about 5x as many people as usual when I was out running this morning.

I guess they agree with me that you absolutely should take advantage of good weather in December to run outdoors.

I also think that I deserve about three gold stars for thinking 51 degrees is good weather.