if energy is a tank that we can fill and empty, then these are the ways I can manipulate it

The other day at Costco I saw a yoga workout DVD and I was like "this actually looks kind of good!" and then I asked Adam to talk me out of it, because um, impulse buy. He was like "how long is the workout?" and then "okay, if you use it for an hour then it'll be worth it." So in order to follow up on that I did one of the "workouts." I like to think of it more as stretching and relaxing because workout sounds so exhausting. There was a guided relaxation at the end and it helped me feel so energized! Then I was reading this post about things that make us feel drained vs. things that energize us, and I thought it would be good for me to think about it (drains aren't necessarily bad or anything, they just need some balance).

Things that drain my energy:

-reading Twitter drama is actually kind of stressful, even though I find it highly entertaining sometimes

-thinking about chores I have to do and not doing them or making a plan to do them

-when I feel like everyone on Facebook is doing fun things except me (my theory is that many people just post when they are doing something awesome, so you are comparing your normal life to many people's most awesome moments of the day/month/year, which duh, isn't going to be as awesome).

-doing kanji reviews and failing a lot of them

-not knowing what to cook

-thinking about having to drive somewhere (I know this is pathetic)

-worrying about what other people think about how I don't care what they think (some obvious problems there)

-cub scouts

Things that energize me:

-Doing yoga in the morning, I guess?

-dance parties with myself (need more of this in my life)

-going outside

-sleeping (duh)

-playing certain games for under an hour can get my adrenaline going, but it's like, stressful at the same time? and most of the time I play games it's more to zone out because I'm tired.

-meditating and taking some time in the day to identify thoughts that drain me (above) and then self-talking myself into not spazing about things

-learning fun facts/studying something, marked by some sort of accomplishment like finishing a book

-actually organizing things and tidying makes me feel productive, but most of the time I don't like doing it U_U

-planning to do something and then doing it! Nothing like good plans. This includes making a planned dinner, going on planned errands, or writing a blog post. Maybe I'm getting "feeling good about myself" confused with "energized"? Oh well, I'm just brainstorming here.

-feeling happy for someone on Facebook, or feeling validated when I read about how I have Mormon feminist friends

So yeah, I should plan more and worry less and Twitter less, and hang out with people who think exactly the same as I do! >_> well, some of that might happen.

It's Infertility Awareness Week

And you should have the opportunity to read more about it so you can be an educated and sensitive person!

I finally started seeing a fertility specialist so I have a lot of great hormone pills and procedures to go through starting next month (we're going to try IUI!). I probably will get my hopes up and not get pregnant right away, and I might not want to talk about it either, but if I act weirdly I will have a good excuse.

Sympathy for dieters

As I've mentioned I've been having terrible gallbladder pain. I'm having the darn thing removed tomorrow. To alleviate the pain I've been eating fat-free meals, which has given me a lot of sympathy for people who are trying to diet or who eat diary- or gluten-free.

The first night all I wanted to eat was sugar butter. I craved everything fatty, from bacon to chocolate to sweet rolls. Afterwards my cravings weren't as strong, since most fats made me nauseous. But yesterday I had some olive oil and vinegar with bread and I felt like my life was complete again.

Over the past two weeks I've been amazed at how limited I felt by fat free. I went out to eat and was constantly worried about if the food would make me sick (thankfully, non-diary fat isn't as bad). We played games with friends and I brought my own snacks since I didn't want them to feel bad I couldn't eat their snacks. I don't really want to subject everyone to a nonfat diet, but I found it interesting how the difference in what I ate made me feel separate and a little lonely. I hadn't realized how much eating the same things makes me feel at home with other people.

So, I guess I'm writing this here so I can remember what it's like to be on a diet of sorts and how, unless your body makes you miserable for eating certain foods, it's really hard to resist the cravings. Also, I wanted to list some fat-free foods in case other people have to go through this:

• dried fruit (apples, apricots, and figs were my favorites).
• fresh fruit
• canned fruit (especially good on oatmeal)
• oatmeal (made with water)
• popcorn (with just salt)
• fat-free bread
• peeps
• rice
• fruit smoothies
• raw vegetables are also fat-free but I never found a way to prepare them I found appealing and fat-free, besides pita sandwiches, which I admit I had with some hummus that had tahini oil in it. 

chronic pain is the worst

I have been sitting around rather uselessly for over a week because of abdominal pain around my gallbladder. I don't have gallstones, and I'm going in for some radioactiving tracing testing tomorrow. I may get to have my gallbladder removed.

I hate feeling like this. I'm constantly looking forward to the time I can take my next pain pill and trying to distract myself from the pain (which honestly isn't too bad when the meds are working). I'm crabby and ill-tempered. I'm missing out on things I was looking forward to. Small chores like unloading the dishwasher or folding a load of laundry are major accomplishments. Is this how old people feel? I hope it doesn't last much longer. Thanks for listening to my whining.

Longboarding tips from an amateur

1. Start out on flat roads until you can stay on your board. Then learn how to push with at least one foot. Pushing just means keeping one foot on the board and pushing off with the other one.

2. Experiment with pumping/slaloming. It's a way of gyrating your body to keep you and the longboard moving. This guy shows several different techniques and is kind of intense but you get the idea. Basically start trying to shift your weight around until you find that you're moving forward a bit longer. I think it actually works better on smaller boards, but it's something fun to try while you're still learning your balance and pushing.

3. Find a helmet before attempting to go downhill. Start out with the slightest of downhills, and try carving. Carving and pumping look similar; in both, the board is travelling in an S shape because you're shifting your weight around. However, carving is meant to slow you down. It usually covers a wider area laterally than pumping (see this video around minute 2 to see a good example). This is why it is a stupid idea to try to longboard down a sidewalk--it's not wide enough for you to properly slow yourself down by carving. Make sure you understand this principle before attempting to go down steeper hills.

4. After you've managed not to fall off on a slight incline, look for a steeper hill. Then start at the bottom of the hill. Basically, you want to be able to practice controlling the longboard at gradually higher and higher speeds. If you start at the top or middle of a steep hill, it's likely that you'll lose control of your board.

5. If you need an emergency stop, jump off your board. You are more important than your board. If you are going very fast you will have to run to slow yourself down to a stop (after you jump off the board). Hopefully you can find a spot where a car won't destroy your board if you have to let it fly for several hundred feet.If you're keeping balanced on your board and your board starts fishtailing, slow it down by carving (and you might need to buy a better board or adjust your current one). I haven't learned to slide-stop yet but this is obviously a skill every longboarder should learn.

While I was writing this I found about.com's guide, which I think is new. It's kind of hard to find how-to resources for longboarding because most people learn from other longboarders in person. I also found this article that explains why skateboarders hate longboarders. Basically, longboards are a poor substitute for bikes in urban traffic and make skateboarders look bad. For long distances, bikes are hard to beat. But biking on roads isn't as thrilling as longboarding down a hill. And just cruising on a longboard is fine, I think, as long as riders can stop themselves.

Do you have any other good longboarding tips? I was experimenting with going down a steeper hill today and it was thrilling. I didn't fall, but I had a few close calls (and don't worry Mom, I was wearing knee pads).

In which I visit Portland

In Portland they have bike roads. With signage.

Japanese gardens

It was overcast most of the time. My feet got cold.

Zen garden from a distance

Just a little flavor of Portland culture (last line)

in California, most of the Native American art is woven baskets, which I feel pretty meh about . This Native American art is easier for me to relate to. 

Nocturne by Richard Huntington Davis (1955)

We went x-country skiing today... actually pretty fun and not too hard to learn!

Looking back on 2012

Achievements Unlocked for 2012!

• Exploration: Europe and Midwest!
• Road tripped to Arizona to visit college friends, whom I still really like!
• Vacationed to England and Paris! People are different from us, and also similar!
• Vacationed to Bryce Canyon and Zion's national park! Nature is beautiful.
• Visited my family for Christmas. Nothing beats Mom taking care of you!

Muir woods in California

• Baking and Cooking: Only 10% of recipes are too scary to try now!
• Attempted to bake croissants, bagels, and lots of different kinds of bread (rye bread, yogurt bread, sad fail-bread).
• Cooked all manner of strange food like corn chowder, clam chowder, wild duck, falafal, ramen (with homemade pork broth), and almond toffee.

almond toffee, before the chocolate goes on

• Skills leveled up!
• Learned to French braid my own hair
• Currently re-learning to play the organ for church
• Got into videogame journalism: did an internship with Killscreen (journal quote: "I will actually write stuff and it was go on the KS website! I'm so scared and excited!"), and now I contribute monthly to Nightmare Mode. Oh, and I'm on Twitter.
• Wrote an interactive adventure game with Twine for the Adventure Time game jam!
• Consistent Efforts!
• Wrote weekly to my little brother on a mission
• Took our dog for many walks, even when it was cold out
• Got sick a lot, and had awful menstrual cramps, despite all the walking and good eating
• Served a neighbor by babysitting her son three times a week for several months
• Have been learning Japanese kanji consistently through WaniKani since... September?
• Learned and then forgot the names of various clouds, and took pictures of them

these are just regular stratocumulus but the sunset is quite pretty

• Leisure Time!
• Found a fossil!
• Played some awesome videogames like Persona 4 Golden, Journey, Resonance, The Blackwell Conspiracy, LittleBigPlanet Vita, Psychonauts, Devil Survivor 2, Dragon Age: Origins, Ghost Trick, and The Sea Will Claim Everything (I might go into more detail later on my videogamez blog).
• Read a lot of books I wasn't wild about for book clubs
• Read some excellent manga, like Skip Beat and Card Captor Sakura, and watched some great anime, like Natsume Yuujin-cho and Polar Bear Cafe (check out Crunchyroll if you want some free streaming anime). 
• Decided not to bake every cookie for Christmas.

Did I fulfill last year's goals? I didn't update my videogame blog very much, but I did do a lot of videogame writing through my internship. I did read more manga and I also managed to finish some videogames I played. I made a videogame (though I couldn't keep up with the online computer science course I tried), and I've found a way to keep learning Japanese. I did make a nice grilled shrimp bento for a hike we had; I'd like to make more fancy picnic lunches in the future.

Am I different now?

I feel like I fit in a little more in my neighborhood now that we have lived here two years. I started a community Facebook page and that has helped me feel a lot more in touch with things that are going on around me (even if moderating the page stresses me out sometimes).

I have been really spoiled this year; my husband makes more money now and I haven't had to worry about money much. That's a really nice problem, but I want to be more responsible with the things I spend money on (for instance, I've bought a few books and a lot of games that I haven't "consumed" yet). I also want to be better about appreciating the things I have (organizing). Having more money has also made me less sympathetic to those who are always trying to save money, and I don't know why, because saving money is a good idea.

Working at my internship changed the way I view journalism and writing on the internet. Many news pieces are simply blurbs of other news pieces (tblurbs were what I wrote most of the time); I have newfound respect for those who take time to do primary research and do good journalism.

Earlier this year I was really discouraged about not being pregnant; every cycle left me discouraged. Charting my temperatures and working with a doctor helped me feel more like my infertility was something I could live with and that it might not go on forever. Eventually, God will remember Rachel. 

For next year (i.e., now):

I am looking into learning how to write indexes for non-fiction books. It sounds like something I might enjoy learning/doing. I want to do some more home crafts like quilting and maybe learn some embroidery. I'm beginning to think that I enjoy learning how to do things more than actually doing them? But maybe that's just a part of myself I need to learn to manage (like, it's okay to learn new things, but it's also good to improve on skills I've already learned). 

I want to find a way of getting out of reading book club books so I can spend time reading books I want to read. This might be difficult since I'm in charge of book club... I guess I could quit (snobby/impolite?), or simply set a list of books I've already read, or do such a terrible job that someone gets exasperated enough to volunteer to replace me.

I do have a cliche goal, which is to get my house more organized (we have several file systems going on, and lots of wasted space in closets). I'd like to keep up with my videogame editing/writing, organ practicing, kanji learning, and dog walking. 

It would also probably be good to add DDR or yoga to my exercise; I seem to have enough motivation to exercise for maybe two or three weeks and then something happens, like I get sick or have a vacation or start a job, and I get out of the habit very easily. Exercise seems pretty boring to me. We have gym passes but exercising at the gym just seems more boring than exercising at home. One of my goals is to learn how to ski in January... but I'm kind of scared to do it. Let me know if you want to join me! :-)