Song of Blood and Stone, by L. Penelope

Posted on January 14, 2019 by Thistle

The barrier between a magic land and a non-magic land is breaking. War threatens. Out in a remote cabin on the non-magical side, Jasminda is unaware of the impending danger. Her entire family has passed away before her, and she struggles to keep her home in the face of her country’s prejudice, as she is half-magical from a mixed-race family. Jack is trying to escape from the magical army he infiltrated as a spy, and stumbles upon Jasminda while gravely injured. She tries to heal him and help him on his mission, but as always missions aren’t clear-cut and may do more damage than good in the process.

This is the book I should have started 2019 with! This was fantastic!! Everything about it was good – the writing, the conflicts, the characters, the pace, the integrated world-building, the folktales that began every chapter. I’m not sure how I stumbled upon this book but I will now sing its praises to everyone. I cannot wait for the next volume in the series. Things I particularly loved:

– There are a lot of “twists” that are obviously coming, but the characters aren’t surprised by them and often figure out what’s going on pretty quickly. Twists and revelations are often in books, but it’s rare to see characters figure them out almost immediately rather than having to stumble along in ignorance forever and be intensely surprised when they’re revealed.

– None of the characters were wholly good or evil. Everyone had reasons behind what they did, whether those actions were good or bad.

– Multiple political viewpoints were addressed, with valid reasonings (if not always compassionate reasonings) behind each of them. People didn’t always act rationally, and sometimes they found strength and compassion through growth while others found only greater hatefulness and spite.

– Deeply-rooted personal and societal prejudices were not easily overcome, and in some cases not overcome at all. Folks who held nothing against people different from them still easily used derogatory slang, not thinking their words hurt or meant anything bad. Folks who discovered that their long-held belief systems were based on a lie didn’t change, but created new belief systems to accommodate their old thoughts. Nothing systematic can be overcome even at the advent of miracles, and this book doesn’t pretend otherwise.

– (mild spoiler) Jasminda isn’t a “chosen one.” She ends up the center of things by pure circumstance and family heritage, and in the end, her magic is weak and unable to help much in the ultimate conflict/crisis. Other, stronger magical folk have to step forward, and Jasminda has only her personal strength, determination, and grit to rely on. In a book that pits the magical against the non-magical, it was wonderful to see a woman with magic rely on her non-magic strengths to succeed.

I loved so much more than these but I don’t want to create a novel here in this post. I do want to note one small thing regarding the book’s label. I’ve seen a lot of people mark the book as young adult on Goodreads, but this is not YA. Jasminda may be nineteen, but there are a lot of adult topics and adult scenes written out. This comes with a potential trigger warning as well –  there is attempted rape in this novel. However, if these things aren’t problems for you, I highly recommend getting ahold of Song of Blood and Stone.

Posted in 2019, Adult, Prose | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Sunday Coffee – A Bizarre Experience

Posted on January 13, 2019 by Thistle

Y’all probably remember me saying on multiple occasions that when I read a book too fast, I feel really sick afterwards. I don’t suppose I’ve ever really elaborated on what “sick” means, because it’s not just a blah feeling. I feel literally sick, with symptoms similar to a head cold (swollen throat, stuffy nose, headache, sinus swelling, etc). This is a very mild version of something I experienced often in adolescence and my early twenties. I’ll give three examples of the worst times:

Early high school, the day before a swim meet, I played Super Mario all afternoon at a cousins’ house. My family didn’t have video games at home, so this was unfamiliar. I spent so many hours doing it that I began to get sick. That night, I dreamed of the video game in black and white all night (I only ever dream b&w when I’m ill) and the next morning I had the stomach flu and had to miss my swim meet. No one else in the family was sick or got sick afterwards, and the symptoms disappeared as soon as the video game kept racing through my head.

Sophomore year in high school, a friend gave me a cassette of U2’s Zooropa to listen to and copy. I listened to it on my walkman to see if I liked it, then used my dad’s reel-to-reel cassette recorder to transfer onto a blank tape. It was an old machine with only normal speed, so I listened to the album a second time as it recorded. Then I had to listen a third time to make sure it copied correctly. The album was vivid in both lyrics and music, and about halfway through the third listen, my ears and throat began to hurt. I got a fever, and my dad took me to Urgent Care. I’d developed ear infections in both ears and strep throat. I hadn’t been exposed to anyone with either.

When I was pregnant with Morrigan, Jason and I needed to replace our old computer. We did a lot of research to try to get the best product for our needs and for cost-effectiveness. I knew nothing about computers and hardware at the time, so my research lasted roughly 15 hours straight. I’d gone too far and I knew it too late. I had a fever and aches all over and spent the next day in bed with some kind of sinus infection/cold that disappeared as soon as all the specs and images from my research stopped racing through my mind.

Over the years, I’ve learned (mostly) to stop before whatever sensory information I’m taking in becomes too much and makes me physically ill. The read-certain-books-too-quickly-or-too-long is one time when I tend to fail at that. I don’t binge-watch TV or spend too much time on one activity or another. Even during events like Readathon (after making myself VERY sick the first time), I’ll break up the time with non-book activities and switching media often. Despite people telling me that those illnesses were purely coincidence and happenstance, the physical consequences of taking in too much information in a short time period, or spending far too long with a single focus, have been consistent for me since adolescence. I usually know my limits and try to respect them.

However, I’ve never, ever met another human being who also experiences this. I’ve never even heard of anyone experiencing it. Until this week. While reading Aspergirls – which I admit, I abandoned 75% of the way through after it began pushing the “vitamins are better than medicine for mental illness” myth – the author related a story. While she was visiting historic sites in Boston, she took in too much in one day. She says:

I had taken in too many things for my brain to process. I had unnecessary images and sounds in my head that needed releasing. As I tried to sleep, these pictures played in my mind like a kaleidoscope, each one appearing and then morphing into the next. … While it was happening, my temperature shot up to a fever. My body was frantically working to “rid” itself of this invasion as if it were a virus.

I admit it: I cried. Actually, reading that was extremely distressing and I’ve yet to pinpoint exactly why. But in spite of my distress, there was also a sense of reassurance that my experiences aren’t just imagined or coincidence or “in my head.” Someone else in the world has a body that reacts the same way as mine to too-much-stimuli. It wasn’t something I ever thought I’d find, and it was really strange to suddenly stumble on those experiences in someone else after decades of feeling isolated in this respect.

Posted in Book Talk, Wellness | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

City of Broken Magic, by Mirah Bolender (audio)

Posted on January 11, 2019 by Thistle

Once long ago, a weapon was created to use against magic. Inevitably, it backfired, and infestations of hungry monsters spread across kingdoms, popping up anywhere they could take root. Only Sweepers are qualified to destroy these infestations, and the job is dangerous. In the city of Amicae, there are few Sweepers – just Clae and his apprentice of three months, Laura – because in Amicae, people believe government propaganda that claims their city is immune to infestations. Unfortunately, when no one pays attention and no one believes, a city can become a breeding ground for massive infestation.

This was my first book of 2019, and I have very mixed feelings about it. Let me get the negatives out of the way first. One is just a small thing and has to do with the book cover and description. The cover contains the line, “If it’s magic, which wire do you cut?” which implies there will be something related to disarming bombs, but there are no wires or disarming bombs or anything of the sort in this book. It’s misleading, and the book description (back of book, Goodreads) is also misleading. Plus, the book description contains a major spoiler for something that happens in the last 50 pages of the book. So avoid the official book description if you dislike spoilers!

The other negative was a bigger issue for me. There was a whole lot of expository world-building almost up to the end of the book. Sometimes the action would stop for a paragraph or two of exposition to describe some part of the world (like the money system), and sometimes it took the form of explaining history and backstory and magic to people who didn’t know (an apprentice, a foreigner, a reporter, someone who didn’t know what Sweepers actually did, etc). The explanatory sections kept cutting into the story and the transitions between action and stop-action-to-explain were sometimes awkward. World-building is hard when it comes to entirely made up locations with their own magic systems, governments, history, cultures, food, religion, and so on, but a lot of world-building can be built into the story more naturally, and some of it can simply be cut. The reader doesn’t need to know the denomination of all the coins or the varying kinds of religions in the city when neither have any bearing on the characters or story. You expect some of this kind of exposition in the beginning of a fantasy novel, but by page 350? It got tiresome.

The thing is, the story itself was phenomenal. I loved the magic system. I loved learning about infestations. The action was awesome and the pace – excluding exposition – was perfect to keep me racing through without feeling rushed. The opening chapter is one of the best I’ve ever read. (I really can’t express how much I loved it – read a sample!!) I loved the characters and I’m looking forward to seeing what the next book will bring for them. I really want to know what’s going to happen to a specific character (who shall remained unnamed lest there be potential spoilers). All those things were so great that this book would have been an early contender for best-of-the-year if not for that one big negative. That’s what made the book such a mixed experience – all this good stuff that got thinned out by the one persistent irritation. It might not be something that even bothers another reader, but it certainly affected me. I’m definitely planning to read the next book in the series, and I have my fingers crossed that with a sequel, less world-building (thus less expository time-outs) will be required!

Performance: I half-read, half-listened to this book. I had a physical copy out from the library and the audio from Audible (read by Natalie Naudus). Naudus did a great job with the reading, but her pace was at that in-between stage where it was too fast for me to listen to my normal 1.5x speed, but too slow for the 1.25x speed. I kept it on the lower speed, not wanting to miss details, but then ended up stopping and picking up the book instead. The physical book helped me with vocabulary I’d heard but hadn’t seen spelled out, and it was great to have in waiting rooms during multiple appointments for my kids while they were on winter break. Then I’d switch over to the audio for exercise and housework and other activities. I’ve never gone back and forth like this from print to audio. I’ve switched from one to the other before, but never constantly shifting. It was an interesting experience. I’m glad I have the audio copy because I’m definitely going to want to listen to this one a second time.

Posted in 2019, Adult, Prose | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

Wellness Wednesday – The Double-edged Wine Sword

Posted on January 9, 2019 by Thistle

Let me tell y’all a little story. 2009-Manda was at her highest weight ever, and she went in to get blood tests done. Her blood tests were generally bad, but the number we’ll focus on here is HDL, or good cholesterol. Her HDL was very low, at 34 (HDL is supposed to be greater than 39). This was expected, since 2009-Manda was about 100 lbs overweight.

Fast forward to February 2012. Feb-2012-Manda had lost about 70 lbs and was only a couple pounds away from being officially overweight instead of obese. She went in for blood tests, which were generally good – except for her HDL, which was at 34. That’s right. Despite the doctors saying that HDL should go up a point for every six pounds you lose, Feb-2012-Manda had an identical HDL level to 2009-Manda.

(2009, Feb-2012, Dec-2012)

And it gets worse. Fast forward to Dec-2012-Manda, now having lost almost 100 lbs and only a couple pounds shy of a healthy weight. Where is her HDL? 28. Another 30 lbs lost meant a drop of 6 points. Isn’t it meant to go the other way??

(2014)

Now we get to the good news. In December 2014, 2014-Manda (who is the same weight as Dec-2012-Manda) takes another blood test. Suddenly, her HDL has jumped up to 49! Hallelujah! 2015-Manda does even better with 58, despite regaining 40 lbs. 2016- and 2017-Manda stay up high as well, despite regaining 70 lbs from her lowest weight down in the 2014 time period. This new heavier Manda is only 30 lbs down from 2009-Manda, but her HDL looks phenomenal. Why??

I’ll tell you why. Wine. Back in December 2014, when my HDL suddenly jumped to ideal numbers, my doctor asked me if I’d started drinking wine. I was surprised. Indeed, I had started drinking wine. Before 2013, I didn’t drink alcohol at all. I just didn’t like the taste. But a couple times in 2013, I tried out a few wines I liked, and in the fall of 2014, I started attending wine tastings and drinking more regularly. My doctor told me that regularly drinking moderate amounts of red wine often causes an increase in HDL, particularly in women. Who knew? (Well, scientists knew, but I didn’t.)

Personally, I suspected at the time that the increase had more to do with eating a more paleo diet. Not the paleo part itself, but the cutting out of all processed foods and sugar. I didn’t eat a lot of processed foods or sugar to begin with, but the cutting out of all could definitely affect my blood tests, I thought. Only, I didn’t continue with paleo after that fall for unrelated reasons, and yet my HDL stayed high despite regain. Until April 2018.

April-2018-Manda went in for blood tests after cutting out most sugar for about five months. She’d also cut out alcohol for a little over a month before these tests. She was astonished when her HDL dropped to 42. Not too low, but certainly a lot less than she’d been maintaining, and nearly 15 points below where she’d been six months earlier. She was uneasy, but decided to continue to keep away from alcohol because she was actually losing weight since she quit drinking it. But then the catastrophic summer happened, and wine reentered the picture, as well as lots of processed food and eating out and stress. When Oct-2018-Manda took blood tests, she was less than two weeks out from a very indulgent cruise and expected her numbers to be atrocious. Turns out, they were all better than in April – in fact they were the best they’d been in several years – and her HDL popped back into the 50s.

(2018-Manda & 2019-Manda, 7 of 9 lbs dropped between tests)

Which leads us to Jan-2019-Manda, who had blood tests done only 12 weeks after her last. During the gap, she’d had no alcohol and a loss of almost 10 lbs. But what happened? All her numbers got worse, and her HDL dropped to frickin’ 36. That’s right, folks. It seems that in order to actually lose weight, I must cut out alcohol, but if I cut out alcohol, my HDL drops to way-too-low. I’m more than a little irritated that these two things are mutually exclusive.

But you know what? HDL be damned. When I’m drinking, even a tiny amount, I don’t lose weight, I start getting depressed, and I just don’t feel good. Plus, I’m now on a sleep medicine that has a bad interaction with alcohol, so it’s just not going to happen. My doctors are going to fret over these new low HDL numbers, and I’m going to have to point out that at my lowest pre-alcohol weight, my HDL dropped to 28. Apparently my body is just like this. It’s frustrating, but beyond sabotaging the rest of my health, I have no idea how to make that any better.

ETA: I found my post (on another blog) about my December 2012 HDL results. My reaction: “The reason this is so frustrating and confusing is that I am doing everything that they tell people to do to raise HDL cholesterol. I’m losing weight, I exercise a lot, I don’t eat a lot of processed foods or trans fats, and I eat tons of tuna, nuts, olive oil, avocados, nut butters, fruits, veggies, and all the other things they tell you to eat (except salmon, which I don’t like at all). And yet, my HDL continues to go down!” Sounds familiar, Dec-2012-Manda. I sympathize.

Posted in Wellness | Tagged , | 7 Comments

Nine Perfect Strangers, by Liane Moriarty

Posted on January 7, 2019 by Thistle

Last book of 2018!

Nine people attend a 10-day health and wellness retreat run by a fanatical woman determined to make permanent improvements in all her guests. That’s the general premise of the book, with chapters narrated by each of the nine guests, plus the three primary employees of the retreat. Frances is the main narrator, a 52-year-old romance writer with back pain and heartache. She treats life as one big (mostly-fun) story and enjoys figuring out backstories for all her fellow guests. I’m not going to go through each of the other characters, but they all have interesting stories and perspectives, and their lives collide in what will end up being a very memorable week.

This book was fascinating. I always worry going into Moriarty’s books after that one bad experience, but so far I’ve mostly enjoyed them. This was the same. The book started off rather lighthearted, interesting, and funny, then took a bizarre twist into very very intense. There’s a lot of crazytown going on here, but I won’t say more and possibly reveal spoilers. I was spellbound through the second half of the book, couldn’t put it down. I’m not usually one to gawk slack-jawed at trainwrecks, but I couldn’t look away from this one.

And all the conclusions…you have a lot of guests here and a huge cast of characters, and they all need some wrap-up. It was handled very well, I thought. I felt satisfied, sad, giddy, and appalled by various endings. It felt exactly right, which was just what I needed to end the year’s reading!

Posted in 2018, Adult, Prose | Tagged , | 8 Comments

Sunday Coffee – Entering the New Year

Posted on January 6, 2019 by Thistle

I can’t tell you how much I’ve been looking forward to 2019. You know how you sometimes keep writing the previous year on dates for a month or two into the new year? I’ve been writing “2019” on my dates since October. Heh. And we had a doozy of a new year’s eve to ring in 2019. My brother-in-law got engaged, my kids were all spending the night with friends or grandparents, and Jason and I got a date night to ourselves to snuggle up and watch a movie. I went to bed a few hours earlier than him (because really, you don’t stay up to midnight when you often wake up at 3am with insomnia!) and had a good night of sleep despite fireworks. I woke up to discover I’d hit a weight that I hadn’t seen since last June, and was only three pounds higher than my lowest weight of 2018. Progress!

Back when 2018 began, I bought a bag of river pebbles. For months, I put a pebble in a Ball jar for each happy moment I experienced. When Morrigan brought home the above frolicking-cats bowl for me from Japan, I transferred the pebbles there. The picture above represents all my happy moments in 2018. It was a tough year, but there were many good things. How many? I don’t know. I didn’t count. But the bowl was heavy, and I think that’s really what matters – the weight of those happy moments, comforting and full.

To bring in the new year, I began a new daily journal (my sixth since I began keeping one August 2013). These are Italian handcrafted journals from Barnes & Noble, with enough pages inside to last a bit more than a year. It just so happened that my last journal ended on December 31st (first time for that!) so I could begin entirely anew on January 1st.

I then started my first book of the year. This is one I’d looked forward to for months now and I was so happy to receive it from the library not long before December ended. I began Tuesday morning, before collecting my children from various sleepovers and taking the family out to see Into the Spider-Verse. It was AWESOME. We all loved it, and we got to come home to dinner and games with a family friend, which capped off the night perfectly. It really was the best way to enter the new year!

PS – I was really sad to watch the poor Seahawks lose to the frickin’ Cowboys of all teams last night. Though I’m really glad I was watching the wrong part of the replay when they showed the gruesome injury so I missed it. That whole bit was heartbreaking and scary.

Posted in Personal | Tagged | 8 Comments

2019 Book Priorities

Posted on January 4, 2019 by Thistle

Every year I make a list of books that I’d like to get to during that year. These consist of books on my TBR or to-investigate list, plus any backlogged Audible queue and books being published throughout the year. The goal is to read or cull all the books on the list. This year, there are 26. I’m really excited about some of these. I definitely anticipate 2019 being a better year in reading than 2018!

  1. Earth – Emile Zola
  2. The Windup Girl – Paolo Bacigalupi
  3. Early Riser – Jasper Fforde
  4. City of Broken Magic – Mirah Bolender
  5. Ghostland – Colin Dickey
  6. Poison Squad – Deborah Blum
  7. Rosmersholm – Henrik Ibsen
  8. City of Ghosts – Victoria Schwab
  9. Love a la Mode – Stephanie Kate Strohm
  10. Becoming – Michelle Obama
  11. The Christmas Hirelings – Mary Elizabeth Braddon
  12. Aspergirls – Rudy Simone
  13. The Girl in Times Square – Paullina Simons
  14. Song of Blood and Stone – L. Penelope
  15. The Kingdom of Copper – SA Chakraborty (Jan)
  16. The Vanishing Stair – Maureen Johnson (Jan)
  17. King of Scars – Leigh Bardugo (Jan)
  18. Children of Virtue and Vengeance – Tomi Adeyemi (March)
  19. The True Queen – Zen Cho (March)
  20. Internment – Samira Ahmed (March)
  21. The Bride Test – Helen Hoang (May)
  22. Better Than the Best Plan – Lauren Morrill (June)
  23. Grave Importance – Vivian Shaw (Aug)
  24. The Dragon Republic – RF Kuang (Aug)
  25. Starsight – Brandon Sanderson (Nov)
  26. The Starless Sea – Erin Morgenstern (Nov)

Have you read any of these? Recommendations or warnings would be welcome!

Posted in Book Talk | Tagged , | 2 Comments

2019 Goals

Posted on January 2, 2019 by Thistle

As discussed in December, I’ve decided to make my individual 2019 goals to all aim toward a specific end: to help me discover the person I am again, and to then become that person. I’ve split these goals into four chunks accordingly.

Health
General aims are to move toward a healthier weight/size; to become fitter, stronger, and more athletic; to improve nutrition; to improve sleep; and to reduce anxiety. I would like my external and internal selves to better align so that I feel more comfortable in my own skin.

  • Weight loss: As you might imagine, weight loss is high on my list. Since my body strongly resists change, my focus will be on eating and exercising in a way that should promote weight loss. Hopefully my body will relent, and if not, at least I’m treating myself right. Any true weight loss this year (not fluctuating in a maintenance range) would be awesome.
  • Work to be able to run a full 5K by year’s end (some of this will depend on if I can lose weight, so this will be a work-in-progress goal to be evaluated by my efforts, not results)
  • Participate in at least one official 5K
  • Average 3.5 fruits/veggies daily (2018 average: 3.1)
  • Average 10k steps per day (2018 average: 9437)
  • Increase total mileage (2018 total: 381 miles)
  • Increase total yoga workouts (2018 total: 181)
  • Complete 1000+ fitness minutes monthly, except in Jun, Jul, and Aug, which will be 750+ mins
  • Work with my doctor to monitor sleep medications for better sleep-management
  • Meditate on at least 50 days

Finances
The goal is to eventually balance our household expenses in a way to zero out debt and start saving again, while being able to live comfortably and help support our children while they transition to adulthood.

  • Strictly stick to a monthly budget to pay off as much credit card debt as possible, preferably all but at very minimum 50%
  • Continue to work weekly with our budget and find places to streamline/reduce
  • Balance budget-management with small splurges (dates, gifts, etc) to avoid an all-or-nothing mentality that will likely backfire
  • Help our kids apply for various forms of financial aid and scholarships
  • Shore up our (falling apart) deck and fences to help them last longer before needing replacement

Home
I would like to once again feel safe, loved, and comfortable in my own home, and additionally I’d like to connect more with friends, extended family, and my community.

  • Have one date night/day outside the house monthly
  • Do something special for our 20th anniversary in December
  • Host one social gathering quarterly at my house (excluding birthday parties or writing groups)
  • Have one group night or day out quarterly
  • Attend Siclovia, a local street festival that occurs twice-yearly
  • Visit 12 new-to-me locations in San Antonio
  • Finish xeriscaping our front yard

Purpose
Most of what I’ve lost over the last few years include my interests, future purpose/intentions, and long-term goals. I’d like to recover those this year, and test to see if some old interests are still valid.

  • Learn one new skill/lesson/hobby etc monthly (physical or intellectual). Can continue learning from previous months if more extensive. Note: This must be more than a passing TED Talk or article read on a subject. The goal is to discover ongoing interests and hobbies, particularly ones that might lead to a career after my kids leave home.
  • Watch as much of my movie backlist as possible
  • Read six classics, plays, or books of poetry
  • Edit Maldralith, one of my manuscripts
  • Complete monthly writing-related goals
  • Unless circumstances interfere, participate in NaNoWriMo
  • Explore options for returning to school

That’s a lot, but these are the things I really want to do this year. It’s a big year for me, turning 40, seeing my first son graduate high school then go off to college, Jason’s and my 20th anniversary, and a particular personal anniversary (30 years) on August 4th. It’s a big year, and I want it to be a great year as well. So aim big, right?

Do you have goals/resolutions for 2019? I’d love to hear them! Goal-making is one of my favorite activities ever!

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2018 in Review

Posted on December 31, 2018 by Thistle

This was a difficult year for me. I really thought it was going to be a good one, and things did start by going really well. But so much fell apart. Two members of my family passed away, plus three friends, plus one of my teenage idols (Dolores O’Riordan). My house was under at least partial construction 75% of the year, and full construction for a third. We had to replace both our cars. The grief and stress tore apart my health and my intentions to get things done in 2018. Our money situation spiraled dangerously out of control. I got really, really sick for most of the year. And I completely lost sight of my focus and goals.

But it wasn’t all bad. My children in particular reached great milestones this year. Morrigan did so well on the SATs and his AP tests, earned a place on a trip to our sister city in Japan, got into his first choice college, decided to apply for the Air Force, and voted for the first time. Ambrose learned to drive and got his license, the first one in our family to do so, in addition to being inducted into the National Art Honor Society at school, doing a fantastic job on the PSAT, and earning money over the summer as an apprentice to our contractor. Laurence had his first girlfriend, acted in the spring play, attended an extra summer class to get ahead when he started high school this fall, also did fantastic on his PSAT, and became obsessed with football to a highly knowledgeable degree.

I thought I’d do a quick recap of some aspects of my year. Books have their own wrap-up, of course. But books honestly weren’t a big part of the year. I had the lowest reading number I’ve had since I began blogging (49 books) and my focus stayed mostly on other things.

Movies
I probably I saw more movies this year than the last decade combined! In theatre, I saw Darkest Hour, The Post, A Wrinkle in Time, Book Club, The Neverending Story, Adrift, The Incredibles 2, Crazy Rich Asians, A Simple Favor, The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, Fantastic Beasts: Crimes of Grindelwald, and Mary Poppins Returns. At home (recent releases only), I saw Forever My Girl, Murder on the Orient Express, The Greatest Showman, Coco, Leave No Trace, and Little Women. My favorite of the year, by far, was The Greatest Showman, which I wish I’d seen in theatre. I became obsessed with the soundtrack in particular. It was the only thing I listened to for months and it still makes me feel alive and joyous every time I hear it – a particular achievement during this awful year!!

Cats
We unexpectedly adopted two cats, Jojo and Atticus, bringing our household cat number up to five. Things haven’t been easy. The two factions (the three former cats vs the two newer cats) tend to catfight, literally. But Jojo in particular has made great strides from a traumatized terrified kitten to a mostly-loving, relatively-calm cat. And while the strain of having five of them is overwhelming at times, I adore all of them and am happy to have them in my life.

Health
I had a really rough year in health as well: a major change in medication, the loss/distortion of my sense of smell, an early entrance into perimenopause, and no progress toward rooting out the cause of my severe insomnia disorder despite many tests. Then there was of course the four months of construction through the summer that derailed and undid the progress I’d made in losing weight over the spring. It’s been a hard year, but I have to admit that in terms of taking care of myself, I’ve done far better than I would have expected given all that’s happened. I averaged 3.1 servings of fruits and vegetables daily (this is hard for me), had a step count average of 9440, and consistently cut my sugar, processed food, and eating out throughout the year. My health numbers (cholesterol, insulin, etc) have all improved as well. I exercised on 249 days (68% of the year), for a total of 221 hours (over 9 full days!). I walked/jogged 381 miles. I practiced yoga 181 times. The best part of this is that I’m back to a consistent fitness regimen, which will help tremendously in the coming year. Now let’s just hope for better health in all the other parts of my life and body in 2019!!

Goals
Quick recap of my 2018 goals. If I tally up general percentages on all of these (including zeroes), I’m left with about three-quarters completion this year. Given that the year was one unexpected catastrophe after another, I think I did as well as I was able.

Goals I completed this year: participated in a 5K; got four professional massages; walked 300+ miles; sold our WI house; paid off our credit card (even if this was later undone); finished my afghan; used/gave away my yarn surplus; avoided social media stress; went to five new-to-me places/events in town; visited the Cat Cafe; visited the local meat market; saw a movie in theatre; tried out a new TV show

Goals I didn’t complete this year: any meaningful weight loss; look for a therapist; visit the zoo; attend a Paint Your Pet night

Partial completion, plus goals that were optional: 750 fitness minutes per month (reached every month except June and August); consistent yoga (every month except through summer/construction); better nutrition (changed per what was happening); work to make the house/yard more comfortable (started but interrupted by construction); volunteer (optional, none); write (optional, a minimal amount)

Other
There were some lovely things to remember and celebrate from 2018, which I tried to record in each of my monthly wrap-ups.  The positives may not outweigh the overwhelming negatives of the year – really, not having a livable house situation for four months straight is just AWFUL, not to mention losing TWO family members back to back – but I still want to remember the things that made this year bearable.

Looking back over the year more closely:

January: Lots of illness in the family, but we also sold our WI house and (briefly) got out of credit card debt. Also, lots of yoga (and Yoga With Cats at the Cat Cafe).

February: Overwhelmingly sad with the death of my grandmother. Read my favorite book of the year, watched a lot of Olympics. We adopted Jojo.

March: Made great improvements in my health and started really losing weight for the first time in years. Replaced our roof with eventual catastrophic results.

April: Continued to do well in weight loss. We brought home and adopted Atticus, who immediately bonded with Jojo. Xeriscaping began on our front yard.

May: A hard month, as usual, where I spent a big portion of the month mourning and binge-watching TV. I discovered Lularoe.

June: Construction insanity revealed, as well as my uncle’s cancer. Entered months of no kitchen, no exercise, no time for anything but construction. Due to stress, I went a bit crazy with Lularoe.

July: Continued with construction insanity, plus my uncle passed away. Morrigan went to Japan.

August: Band camp. Construction finally finished up at the end of the month. School began again.

September: House exploded again, creating more construction nightmares. Jason’s car exploded. Jason and I went on our cruise.

October: Morrigan dominated the month with all his excellent milestones and achievements. Plus Halloween.

November: Full holiday mode and lots of time spent with extended family. The announcement of my sister’s third pregnancy. Actual fall weather.

December: Christmas. Anniversary. Football. Renewed determination in my health and wellness journey. Illness. Insane nutcrackers. More Christmas.

That about wraps the year up. I hope you all had a much better year than I did. Please send me all the good wishes that 2019 will be an awesome one. I need an awesome year. It’s been too long. And to you, happy new year, I send you all the good wishes too! Let’s make this next year awesome for all of us!

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Sunday Coffee – December in Review

Posted on December 30, 2018 by Thistle

Normally I’d wait until early January to do my final monthly wrap-up of 2018, but it feels better to get it done within the year and have as little as possible lingering come January 1st (I still have one book review to post). I’ll just update this post with the last two days of December info if anything changes.

Goals
More on these during tomorrow’s 2018 wrap-up.

Health
Staying healthy is hard around Christmas with all the family get-togethers and sweet treats and traditions. Weight loss was not expected this month. I did enjoy analyzing data to get an idea of what I could better do to lose. And I did do my best to follow my analysis and keep healthy despite all the Christmas stuff. Exercised on 28 days, for a total of 21 hours, including 18 yoga and 43 miles. I tracked my food every day, even through Christmas, and stayed mindful about what I was eating. And hey, I did actually manage to lose a little weight – 4.6 lbs!!! – and get the scale trending downward! It’s even better knowing that I maintained that loss all the way through my family’s multiple Christmas parties, then started right down again once they were over. Yay! I’m also happy to be ending 2018 slightly lighter than where I began it. I believe that’s the first time I’ve done that since 2013. It may only be by a few pounds, but it’s a change in the right direction!

(foggy morning walk in mid-December)

In other health issues, I had my brain MRI, which came out normal. My doctor concluded I probably have chronic sinusitis and gave me a three-week round of heavy-duty antibiotics that I’m in the middle of taking. If that doesn’t make a difference, I’m supposed to see an ENT next. I also got on Lunesta for sleep, which works really well, but now I’m arguing with my insurance company, who thinks I should only get 15 pills every 25 days. Sigh. Cold and flu season started here this month as well, which knocked out just about everyone in the family, some of us more than once. I’m so immunocompromised that I actually got the flu even though I had the flu shot. Figures. I hope 2019 will bring a clean bill of health after this antibiotic, and I won’t be sick most of the year like in 2018!!

Books
After months of book-slump, I actually got excited about reading again this month! I read several books I loved, with my favorite probably being Nine Perfect Strangers (review forthcoming).

Highlights of December
Christmas and my anniversary are of course the top highlights of my month. The rest are primarily related to Christmas traditions, but there are others of course. LOTS of highlights this month!!

  • getting my new Vivosport!
  • Empty Faces was so fun and creepy this month!
  • St. Nick’s day celebration with the boys
  • watching Pee-Wee’s Christmas Special with the boys and discovering that Morrigan’s girlfriend loved this silly show growing up
  • Morrigan passed the Air Force qualifying fitness test, so he can apply for a major ROTC scholarship for college
  • my boys moving the nutcrackers all around the Christmas tree and house like little Elves on the Shelves (even after the cats broke off two of their heads…they kept moving around…then they stole all the presents on Christmas morning!! –> )
  • Ambrose got an awesome 1370 on his PSAT, and Laurence as a freshman scored a fantastic 1056 (scores go up to 1520)
  • a candy-making party at my cousin’s house
  • a wonderful 5K with my friend Stephanie to help kids with disabilities
  • our traditional sugar-cookie making/decorating party
  • an early Christmas swap with my siblings since one of my sisters wouldn’t be here on Christmas proper
  • seeing TSO with Stephanie and her family
  • Laurence’s letter to Santa, which cracked us all up
  • the actual two days of Christmas: Christmas eve celebration with my extended family on my dad’s side, then Christmas eve at home, then Christmas morning at home, then Christmas morning at my mom’s house, then Christmas afternoon/evening at my dad’s house… (two days of parties!)
  • sitting around an outdoor fire pit with my dad and siblings (twice)
  • Christmas gifts from my lovely family and friends: beautiful cat bookends, retractible colored pens, liquid mirror markers, a window perch for the cats (ha!), Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, The Prince and the Dressmaker, a Mistborn allomantic table necklace, an elephant essential oil necklace, a hand-drawn Turkish bismillah for our bedroom wall, Lady Audley’s Secret, Superfight (a game), lots of fun socks, a Greatest Showman coffee mug, the Greatest Showman Reimagined album, and some gift cards that (naturally) I’ve already spent
  • the Seahawks got into the playoffs!
  • my brother-in-law got engaged!

(one part of my extended fam)

Forthcoming in 2019
There is of course a lot coming in 2019 and I’m not going to discuss it all here. Mostly I just want to say that I plan to switch my monthly wrap-up to a quarterly format. I really like looking back at my highlights of each month, but I think my other categories would be better discussed at a wider interval. Trial and error, I suppose. We’ll see how it goes in the new year.

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