Happy New Year

Well, it's finally midnight here in central time...as jason pointed out to me, he gets "a whole hour longer" in 2007 than me. Until next New Year's, anyway. Unless he comes here for New Year's next year...in which case, I guess, he does in fact have an hour more than me in the year. lucky.

anyway, I think you should all be very impressed that I made it all the way to midnight. I was actually seriously considering going to sleep after talking to my eastern-time-boyfriend, but Veronica Mars kept me up. That's right. I finished two seasons on DVD and just wasn't ready to wait a year for the next season...so I started downloading. Did you know you can download TV episodes on iTunes? Dang. That's cool. Anyway...I'm enjoying the show. And so I'm still awake to hear and even see the fireworks random people around town are shooting off from their backyards with their own personal firework rocket launcher things. It's crazy. Real fireworks, coming from about three neighborhoods over...in every direction. Wow.

Everyone's listing their resolutions or things they want to do or whatever. I used to make my New Year's Resolutions into handy little acronyms so they'd be easy to remember. But then, at some point...maybe last year...I stopped making them. I don't do the resolution thing anymore. (warning: cynicism ahead...) I know that this week my gym is going to get more crowded, and it will last about until Valentine's day and then drop off. I know the Starbucks will probably have a shorter line for a few days. I know the library, which is undergoing some reorganization, will be full for a couple of weeks (when it's open, anyway, which is not a lot in january because of said reorganization).

(warning two: shameless bragging ahead...) Anyway, I have begun making it a habit of beginning my new year, and my new habits, at the beginning of Advent. It's been a couple of years...ever since the first time I had a youth group "New Year's Party" on the first sunday of Advent. so...my "new self" has been in progress since about Thanksgiving. But really before that too--because I don't want to be one of those Valentine's Day casualties, so I started making a habit of going to the gym, for instance, 5 days a week, back in November. And I have noticed that, along with that, I eat better. I don't crave the sugar, the candy, the cookies, the brownies, the Dr. Pepper, etc, in quite the same way. In fact, I bake and take the stuff to church and don't eat it. I made chocolate chip cookies a couple of weeks ago and am still working my way through the second half of the one cookie I tried to eat. And everyone else said they were really good.

Ice cream is still my main weakness.

Anyway...here are some things I would like to try to do this year:
* paint pottery once a month
* read a novel a week. (well...I don't have to finish the novel every week, just I want to have at least one novel going every week.)
* maybe get a library card....
* get into a work rhythm that allows me to get everything done and also set reasonable boundaries.
* make friends in Crystal Lake

that's it...no clever acronym yet though.

Anyway...Happy New Year! may it be better than last year.
And for those still waiting for the ball to drop...here's a little postcard from the future. nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah...I got here first. ;-) just kidding.

and happy sleeping to all of you.