It's a Sunny Day Kind of Thing

We have a bit of a standoffish reputation up here in the Pacific Northwest. Everyone avoids eye contact, interpersonal interaction is kept to a minimum. Among a crowd, you can truly feel alone. And it's always in a drizzle.

It's a "thing" up here, the way we are, much like Southerners are hospitable and New Yorkers are short and direct.

But I'll tell you this - when the sun comes out, Seattle is a different place. I'm sitting on my bike in an intersection and people roll up in their cars and just start up conversation. Everyone smiles at each other - it's an "I'm happy to be alive!"smile, or "look how beautiful this is" or I don't know, but appreciating everything life has to offer, so much so you have to connect with other people.

So, I don't think it's us - that we are so different. I think its the rain, and the grey and it just overcomes us, sort of a survival tactic. And as much as we can be ok with it, appreciate the rain, the grey and the wet, it takes it's toll.  Then thankfully, at some point in May, the sun comes out and reminds us.

It's a sunny day kind of thing.

Goals - Closing 2011

As a refresher, here were the goals for 2011.

And now, the final review:


Creativity - B+
I can't say enough how amazing the experience with my 365 project was. A leap of blind faith turned into so much more, in ways I wasn't even quite comfortable thinking about. I missed a few days, and by "a few", in some cases I mean "a lot".

The rest of the creativity stuff...didn't do so well. I did cook a few new things, learn a few new techniques, but not like a year's dedication would have meant. I didn't do much writing, and house redecorating didn't happen either.  The 365 project completely carries this goal, which was something I definitely wanted.

Financial - A
Check. I would give it an A+, but the implied investment side of the goal didn't turn out.

Fitness - A
Half Ironman - CHECK.
PRs - actually, looking back, surprisingly, CHECK. 3 PRs for the year. There was some unstated sub context about RUNNING PRs, and I did PR at Bloomsday and take 4 mins off my time, but this fast running thing really didn't pan out this year much, with the focus on the 70.3 and then bailing on the Seattle Half Mara.

Home Related - F
Yeah, this did not happen. New garbage disposal by necessity. Nothing else. I cleaned out my little cubby in the coffee table a couple times, and did reorganize my camera stuff a number of times. This does not count for much.

Miscellany - ?
How can you grade something you didn't write down? Some cool things for the year: I did more classics reading, including Virginia Woolf, Goethe, Jonathan Swift, Ayn Rand and Oscar Wilde. Maybe that had something to do with taking it off my list of goals, but I think it had more to do with accessibility and cheapness (FREE!) on my Kindle.

Overall:
Not bad - and I'm actually really happy with how well I did on most of this stuff.

Infinite Canvas

Happy Birthday, Mom.

I hope things are bigger and better where you are.

Archiving - 2011 Books

A good year of reading.

In terms of overall standouts, Small Furry Prayer and Within the Frame are the tops, followed closely by American Gods.

Clearly it was a year of photography, and true as well with the reading. Within the Frame, and David duChemin's philosophy in general speak to the kind of photographer I yearn to be, and in terms of sitting down with a beautiful book full of amazing pictures, beautiful thoughts, and great advice to think about (I have never so savored instructions on exactly how to get lost in a new city), it brought everything together, including the language and the photographs to

Troika

It's taken me 5 months to really sit down and write this. Why? I guess a lot of reasons. When I finished the race, I wasn't sure what to make of it, and then it took me a while to come to terms with that and make something of not being sure what to make of it, if that makes any sense at all.

7 months of training.

365 2011 Reflection

I am staring at my blinking cursor because I have so much to say, and don't know where to start.

Still don't.

Let's try this...

January 1, 2011

January 1, 2011: I'm in the dark. I have the lights off and am trying to take pictures of the Christmas lights so they look "cool and fuzzy". Later, I will find out this is called "bokeh". I have messed with my fancy camera somewhat, but don't know what else to do. It's not doing what I want. The lights aren't fuzzy enough. What is wrong with me that I can't do what everyone else can do? I'm frustrated.