New Year
Russia was really nice, and not as cold as I thought it would be. Had a bit of trouble getting home after we missed our train to Estonia and had to pay £200 for another flight home,(ended up spending the night in Prague airport, randomly) but other than that there were no major disasters. I will try to post my pictures on here when I get them developed - should have some pretty ones of a snowy Red Square.
I feel like I've hardly changed during 2006 - still as fat, unfit, single and inept as a year ago. Wah. Perhaps I'm being overly critical of myself. There are some things I'm proud of, like my job. I managed to break the lifelong habit of chewing my nails. And I managed to do some travelling. I still want to achieve more this year, though.
I'm setting myself some achievable targets, and I hope I can tick off most if not all of them by 2008. (The fact that most, if not all of these were in my list of resolutions for 2005 - didn't make one for 2006, apparently - is depressing and must be rectified by actually achieving them this year.)
1. Lose weight - get down to goal weight.
2. Get fit.
3. Volunteer.
4. Learn Spanish.
5. Try my hardest to get a 2:1.
6. Run a race for charity. (Even if only 3 mile Race For Life one.)
7. Travel.
8. Learn to play the keyboard again.
9. Start drawing again.
10. Put more effort into my appearance(!)
I think I'll stop at 10. Do they seem do-able? I hope so. Russia has made me lose 4lbs, which brings the total up to 11. I'd quite like it to be a whole stone by the time I go back to work (in a week), although that might be a bit ambitious. I'm joining the gym tomorrow, which will hopefully make number 2 happen because if I'm paying for it regularly it'll make me go. Plus I have an ipod now, and Julia has joined the gym, so it's not as boring as it would otherwise have been. I've found out about the volutary work I want to do so all I have to do is literally ring the woman - no excuses for not doing that one. I have a Spanish CD ROM that seems okay, will have to be disciplined about that, and even more so about number 5. Have just joined the mailing list for Race For Life (I don't think I'll be able to managed a half marathon any time soon - maybe there's something in between the two, though.)
I'm trying to convince my Mum that we should go away for a city break to somewhere in Europe at Easter, and she seems not entirely opposed to the idea. I suggested Krakow and her eyes lit up, as did Claire's, so hopefully that will happen. We could do it pretty cheaply, so there's no reason why not. Number 8 depends on me getting my keyboard fixed, and 9 on the amount of free time I've got left after I've started going to the gym, working on my essays, learning Spanish, volunteering etc. 10 shouldn't be hard to do.
I have a few others, but they're not as important:
11. Read more books (1 a week?)
12. Join a dance class.
13. Take more photographs.
There was a possibility of doing Salsa with people from work, so if that happens I'll be able to tick off number 12. I've just e-mailed a dance school in Leeds that sounds alright, but the idea of going on my own is a bit off-putting. Should just force myself, really. I did that with dance at uni and it was okay.
I'm not going to set myself any love-life related targets, because it's not something you can force, but I hope that something will have happened in that department by this time next year. If it could happen before Valentine's Day that would be even nicer - I'm sick of having to convince myself that I'm opposed to it just because I happen to be single every time it rolls around.
That's about it. Happy New Year, everyone. I hope this is a really good year for us all.