Nic Dempsey

Time to think about goals for April.

For this month, I’ve decided to keep it simple, I don’t have much on this month and I’m aware that I’m running a 5km at the start of June, so I need to put some effort into training for that. At the end of this month, I’m on holiday for a week in Amble (yes again, we love it there and there are lots of ruined things for us to see!). So for this month I’m keeping it simple.

Home

1) Paint the living room.

2) Paint the shelves in my bedroom

Fitness

3) Gym 2 x 30 minutes walk/run sessions a week

4) At least 1 longer run outside a week

What about you? What are you doing for April?

It’s almost the end of March and time for a monthly update and just to add to the fun, a quarterly update on my 2013 goals.  Because of all the update fun, I’m not going to set goals in this post, I’ll either post them later today or sometime over the weekend (it’s Easter weekend so that’s anywhere from now until Monday night!).

Let’s start with March. It’s been a horrible month, the third cold of the year (what the hell is wrong with my immune system?) turned into bronchitis, it feels like I’ve spent most of the month at work, travelling to work or in bed trying to get enough rest so I have the energy to go to work. It’s been emotional (and if you can tell me the movie that’s from, you win absolutely nothing at all!) and frustrating. Other stuff, like the tooth trauma, which I’m still processing if the amount of dreams I’m having about losing my teeth is any guide (and I’ve been shocked to find out how many people I know are missing teeth) and people being away at work didn’t help make the month anymore fun. I missed updating last week so I’m catching up for two weeks! The results are not great.

Food

1) Coffee and alcohol, no more than 3 times a week.

Coffee – 15/12. I had a week of drinking coffee almost every day and I really don’t regret it because I would not have got out of bed let alone into work but I got back on track last week and this, so while I could have forsaken coffee this week to meet the goal, I decided not to and let it stand.

Alcohol – 15/12. I was one over for the whiskey as a mouthwash and I will admit to one G&T last Wednesday and drinks with Christelle on Thursday night. I’m not too bothered about this either, I’m not drinking every day and I’m not drinking excessively at all. So for me this is not so good, don’t let it become a habit but not terrible in a really awful month.

Self care

2) No computer after 9pm on a school night (Sun to Thurs).

20/20 this has been easy, I’ve been keeping schoolnight rules on the weekend too because I’ve been so tired.

3) Paint my nails!

I slipped a bit mid-month, the combination of sickness and not looking after them for a week just destroyed my nails, so I bought some proper nail strengthener treatment stuff and am using that, my nails are painted but clear not coloured.

4) Book an appointment with a dentist.

Done, see above note about the tooth trauma. I do have to go back next month other than the one tooth which is an issue the dentist says that they’re all fine.

Home

5) Sort out the DVD’s in the living room.

Done, still haven’t blogged about it but will take some photos this weekend and show you next week.

6) Sort out the pictures in the kitchen.

Sort of done, I need to print some photos and sort some frames, but it’s nearly there and I’ll blog about it soon.

Exercise

7) Gym twice a week. 

Fail. Didn’t get to the gym at all in March but half of the month that was ’cause the doctor told me not to go! This will be a re-do for April.

8) 2 10k walks in March

Nope, another exercise fail. You see this picture below, this was taken last year and when it was warm. However, March has not been a month of spring like weather, whereas this time last year it was warm and sunny, this year it has been cold and sleety.  Not really walking weather.

So it wasn’t a great month but there’s another coming up! Onto 2013 goals. How am I doing.

1.Run a 5km in under 30 minutes.

Not good.  I haven’t run properly this year at all. However, I have a 5km booked in June so am back on the bandwagon for April.

2. Run a 10km, no time target for this, but under 1h10m would be great.    

See above. No progress but plenty of time left in the year for me to achieve this.                          

3. Use the gym twice a week or give up the membership.

I’m not giving up the membership yet because in April, I’m back in the game!

4. Have a medical.  

I haven’t booked this yet mainly because I don’t think I can book the one that work gives us until later in the year.

5. Keep a record of my spending so I know what is or isn’t in my bank account.

I’m doing so well with this, I had a bit of a carefree March, but I knew where the money was and what money was coming in and going out of the bank account.

6. No credit card usage at all for 2013.                  

I cannot tell a lie, I have used one of my cards, twice. First to buy my yearly travelcard and then to book my flight to Washington in September. Most of it has already been paid off and although it’s not fantastic to use them, I’m happy with why and have a plan.

7. Set up a ‘Christmas’ account to pay for next Christmas, have at least £120 in that account. 

I’ve so done this.  I’m way over £120. This is mostly because I had a tax rebate but also because I’ve been putting all my change into the savings account and I just like seeing that total go up.

8. Volunteer.

I haven’t done anything about this yet. 

9. Buy no more than 12 books.

I’ve bought 1 book so far this year.  The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook, which I’ve had on order since last year. The rest I have borrowed off other people or have been in my house already.  I’ve found this both harder and easier than I thought. I can go ages without thinking I need a new book and it’s fine and then I wander by a second hand bookshop (cheap books) and have to remind myself that if a book is new to me, it counts! It’s tough and we’re going to be near Barter Books in a month’s time, help.

10. Painting.    

Living room painting is planned for April!