sue820

The kids were at their friends’ house for a few days, so I planned a great picnic with vintage basket, candles, fancy chicken salad sandwiches, a variety of olives, a nice cheese with cutting board, a pate, stuffed grape tomatoes, curled celery, water crackers, a bottle of wine, and real plates. Met my husband near the river, and we waded out to a sandbar with basket and blanket(I had brought him a change of clothes since he was coming from work). He thanked me several times for the effort I had put into it and commented on what a great stress reliever it was. We saw blue herons, ducks, Canadian geese, and a hawk catching a fish. Very romantic.

Made creole salad, Jen’s chicken salad, and stuffed grape tomatoes.

Well, I finished my business taxes and dropped them off at the CPA’s. Once she finishes with them and we get them mailed off, I’ll be ready to start on our personal taxes.

I have been meaning to do this for years, as it really is helpful for insurance purposes A video record should be fine.

Let this go for a while but have been doing guided meditation once a week the past 3 weeks. Unity churches have this available.

I keep the bags with me but have a problem remembering them until I’m waiting in line to pay. Maybe I’ll just keep one on the passenger seat as a visual reminder. This would result in substantially less waste, as I have two teenagers who eat amazing quantities of food, and each shopping trip nets me an average of 15 plastic bags, which I just end up throwing away.

Because I won’t start a buddy team, and I’m only willing to commit to this for 6 months. Maybe that will be enough to get the ball rolling.

Stopped writing things down for about 2 months but picked it up again last week. It really is eye-opening and attitude-adjusting.

Have already made reservations for this for next week, as we are going to Florida and are making plans to spend a day at Crystal River, where the West Indian manatee can be found in the wild.

I’d originally planned to do this one week of every month for a year, but since I didn’t keep a diary April, May and June, I would have had to abandon my goal as a failure. Instead, I kept the diary 2 weeks in July, which makes up for April. I now just have to keep the diary two extra weeks during the rest of the year to be on task.

My husband graciously agreed to do this with me, although it wasn’t anywhere on his personal list of goals. I guess I thought this would be basically a back-to-nature kind of experience with mostly aging hippies who just didn’t give a flip. I was surprised by the strong sexual current. We chose the day after the 4th of July because that’s the day we had available. This was also a Saturday, so we knew it would be crowded at the pool on this hot, sunny day. When we arrived, we were given a few tips at the office about how to be a good, naked guest(always sit on a towel seems like good advice), and we were told that we weren’t required to take any clothing off but that we would stand out much more with clothing on. When we arrived at the pool, we found this to be true and quickly got naked like everyone else. As there were probably 200 people, I saw more genitals and naked bodies on this one day than I have previously in my entire life. There was a wide variety of shapes, sizes, and ages, and I was relieved to feel that I wasn’t doing too badly in the grand scheme of things. We struck up a conversation with the lady next to us(thank God for sunglasses)and asked what people did there in the winter, as the list of things I’d like to do in the winter without clothes is short. She said they have a REALLY GOOD TIME and then started talking about the party the night before. Several other people also mentioned the dancing, drinking, and shedding of inhibitions. We stayed, sunbathed, and swam for about 4 hours. Everyone was very nice, but there was quite a bit of touchy/feely between the guests, most of whom seemed to know each other. While I never felt uncomfortable, and there were two families with kids, I wasn’t sorry to be leaving before sundown.

Have gone through an additional three books and only bought one, so I’m doing fairly well on this goal. The books I have left are something of a chore to read but may result in some intellectual enlightenment, so I continue to struggle.

Made a deli coleslaw, minted melon, and fresh basil, tomato, and mozzarella sandwiches.

Goal 1:Switch consistently to recycled-paper, nonbleached paper towels and toilet paper and vegetable-based laundry detergent. These don’t seem to be much more expensive than their worse-for-the-envirnonment counterparts, and it seems like a pretty easy fix.

The nursery job was seasonal, and now the season’s over, so I won’t be able to get that exercise without really trying anymore. Will begin to keep track of what I’m doing.

I have narrowed my books down to about 12 that I either haven’t read or would like to reread. A few of them just aren’t good, and I’ve tossed those, but I am going through the rest.

I have a confession, and that’s that I began smoking again in April. I’ve now quit again and will put this at the top of my list.

Since I’m not working outside the home business over the summer, I’m essentially done with this for now.

Enjoy art galleries and will go out of my way to go to one.

No time. Don’t miss it. Will retry this goal in the summer, when my job ends.