Ambitious

I have some ambitious plans for this weekend and am hoping that by putting them here, it will give me some accountability to complete at least HALF of whats on my to do list.

1. Gardening
I know I'm getting a rather late start on this, but yesterday I purchased two tomato plants, one crookneck squash and one zucchini plant.
I'm going to put together a little container garden. Yes, I know the zucchini needs a lot of room, so I may actually put that one in the ground... I'll have to double check exactly big my largest container is (a half wine barrel) and see if that will be large enough.
I'm not sure what suddenly motivated me to try gardening. I've never been successful with plants in the past but I want to grow my own vegetables. Its often hard for me to get to the farmers market downtown on the weekend, and the grocery stores can be so pricey for fresh produce that is often tasteless and bland. And, theres not much that I love more than a homegrown tomato.
IF this experiment goes well, I'm probably going to put together a larger garden for next year. Building a few raised beds wouldn't be too challenging and then I could have a wider variety of produce. I definitely have the room for it, our property is close to half an acre, so if I was REALLY feeling ambitious I could, theoretically, have a more traditional garden in the back portion of the property. However, that would require things like getting a rototiller and a lot of manual labor.

2. PATIO
I SERIOUSLY need to clean up the back patio - primarily the bbq grill. I plan on having a bbq-tastic summer this year.

3. GOAT CHEESE
I'm going to be making my own goat cheese this weekend.
This idea started while brainstorming ways to deal with keeping the weeds and grass in check on our property. My brother had been coming around and mowing our back yard but totally slacked on it the past few months and the next thing we knew, Cooper was getting lost in the jungle that is our back yard. I COULD do it myself, but I can be rather prone to laziness and social obligations on the weekends. We COULD hire a lawn service, but with how large the property is, thats a couple hundred dollars a month. I'm trying to save some money here. My sisters boyfriend COULD come and do it but he's a jackass and you can't rely on him for crap (note, since this brainstorming session he has come over and cleared the jungle). Then I remembered reading how you can rent goats to come and clear overgrown weeds and brush. I looked into it, and with what it would cost to rent two goats for a day you could buy two pygmy goats of your own. I mentioned this to a friend of mine and she pointed out that if I got one that was a milker, I could also make my own goat cheese with the milk she produced. I thought this was a FANTASTIC idea. I LOVE goat cheese.
So, I did a little research and found this. Making goat cheese is SO incredibly easy! Or at least it sounds that way.
So, I was all gung ho on the idea of getting two pygmy goats. Pygmy because they don't get too terribly big (they can use a large dog house as their shelter as opposed to a barn) and that breed is very social and playful. I figured this would be good because Cooper is very social and playful and I know that if I brought a couple goats onto the property, Cooper would at least try to play with them.
Then I REALLY started thinking it over. I would have to get up at the ass crack of dawn every day to milk them, and I HATE mornings. They would have to be milked daily and I know that I couldn't count on anyone to come and milk them if I go away for a weekend, let alone a week in Europe or somewhere.
If I do end up with a larger garden next year, I would have to build a fence to keep them away from it otherwise they would eat all of my gardening efforts. If that happened I would have to invite all of my friends over for a fire roasted goat one night. So, ixnay on the oatgay.
However, the idea of making my own goat cheese stuck with me. Last night I stopped at Whole Paycheck, I mean Whole Foods, and picked up some goat cheese. If this first attempt goes well, I found a rancher up in El Dorado Hills where I could purchase raw goats milk for future batches of goat cheese. Yes, raw goats milk would be unpasteurized, but that just means that its full of probiotics.

4. PHOTOSHOP
Four weeks ago a couple of my friends got married and I photographed their wedding. At first, I just started working on the photos slowly because, they're going to be in Ireland on their honeymoon for three weeks? Pshaw! I've got plenty of time! No reason to rush!
Then I started having all sorts of dental complications and was on either valium and/or vicodin and/or white wine each night. Now, I'm confident enough to work my photoshop magic with a glass or two of white wine, but I am not going to work on a friends wedding photos while hopped up on vicodin and/or valium. Next thing I knew, they were home. Now I've got to haul ass to get the photos done.
ALSO, last weekend I belatedly took some photos of one of my younger cousins for her Senior Portraits. The kid graduated high school early a few months ago but wouldn't coordinate with me for when we could get them done. Every time she wanted to get together it was a weekday when I was working and she only wanted to spend the weekends with her boyfriend. We finally got together last Sunday and now I need to go through those photos.

5. THIN OUT MY BOOKSHELVES
I seriously have too many books. Its a sickness, really. I keep every single book that I buy, with the exception of the ones I loan out and don't get back. THEN whenever anyones getting rid of books I always take a healthy portion of them. As a result, I've got books everywhere. I figure that I'll take some to a used book store and try to sell them and the ones that they don't take I'll donate to the library or goodwill or someplace.

6. FLIRT WITH THE BUTCHER
Last weekend I decided to stop into my local butcher and support the local businesses. Can I just say that the guy working the front counter was super cute?
Now, I'm BAD a picking up on when a guy is flirting with me. My natural thought and reaction is that he's just friendly.
When I went to the butchers, I had my cousin with me (we had just finished her portraits) and when we walked out I said "WOW. He was cute." Cousin said "He totally was! AND he was totally smiling and flirting with you!"
So, I think I need to go back this weekend.


Hopefully I'll be able to get at least half of this done.

A Belated Happy New Year

2008 was a good year.

I was able to visit London for a week in April and then in August some friends and I went camping in Fort Bragg.
That was the extent of my travel for 2008. It may not have been as extensive as 2007 when I visited Oregon, Germany, France, Salt Lake City, and Italy, but it was just as enjoyable. My fair skin and curly hair agree with the misty climates of the British Isles and the Northern California coastal regions. My demeanor also agrees with pints of Guinness in an authentic pub and cocktails around campfires -- both with good friends, of course.

Now, for the big question... What are my New Years resolutions?
This is a tricky one. I was considering not doing any resolutions at all because a year can sometimes seem like a long time and I've got the attention span of an oh look! Something shiny!
Truth be told, typically at the beginning of the year I will come up with resolutions, and within just a couple of weeks I've completely forgotten what they were.
I've decided that this year I"m not going to come up with resolutions for the year. Instead, I am going to have an "action plan" (by the way, I hate that phrase -- SO corporate employee improvement oriented. If you can think of a better term, please let me know) for each week. I will have things to accomplish during the week that are aimed at more long term goals... baby steps towards the bigger picture.
This weeks baby steps:
1. Go for a walk - simple enough, right? I plan on doing the 3-day, 60 mile, breast cancer walk next fall. I'd better start working towards it. This Saturday is the perfect opportunity, some friends are part of a running/walking training group and they're getting up Saturday to go running/walking along the American River at the butt crack of dawn. Also known as 8:30 am. I typically sleep in until about 10, if not later, on the weekends. This will probably be physically painful for me.
2. Work on my ongoing computer issues - a temporary resolution may be right around the corner! Not the resolution I'd like, but possibly something to get me by for a bit.
3. Get back on track with Weight Watchers. Around Halloween at some point I stopped journaling and keeping track of points and everything but have continued to loosely (very loosely) follow the plan and have been up and down since then. Since I'm paying monthly fees for this program I should be using it properly, right?
4. Resurrect my travel blog. I started 2008 pretty well on that thing, at least for the first two months, then things just kind of petered off. I'm going to be getting it back on track for 2009 though. I've already uploaded some photos from my London trip.
5. Take 5 usable photographs. I'd like to elaborate on this.... but can't yet. Top secret project in the works.

Thats pretty much it on this weeks task list. I'll let you know how they work out.

On a side note:
OH. MY. GOD. I want this and I am not ashamed to admit it. Okay, maybe I am just a little bit ashamed. But only a little.