Monday, June 05, 2017 @ 5:28AMGood morning. This is us 😊 Not much going on today. Just going to gym – HEY we’re GOING to gym! OMG I hope we carry this feeling for a long time. I also hope that it is a little less scary. This second instructor is a little more frightening, because she is harder and less likely to chat – make it a little less stressful. We had the feeling that she was trying to knock people off the ledge. Wait a minute is this the same part that started this paragraph? What happened there? PLEASE let this not be an excuse not to do the hard stuff. Oh-oh … seems like something that should make Dr. Marvin’s hard list.Done deal … let’s be moving on … We should find something a little less stressful, hmm? Hey, we were working on receipts yesterday. We got further than we had, but didn’t quite finish the task. Hopefully, we’ll get that done today. We went through the bag and took pictures. There were exactly 50. Some are older – the ones that we found on top of Rich’s dresser. Wow! Doesn’t anyone ever clean in there? We also finished processing about 18 that had been loose in the box. I’ll show you on top of the page what all that looks like.This is a picture from Evernote of the two right columns (of three). The notebook shown is only for the Walmart receipts and there is more on the list than shown with the 5-26-17 receipt. We’ve been taking all the picture against the contrast of the kitchen table – so I like that part too. It’s kind of cool. And, the labels for each receipt include the date starting with year and then month, and then we put the name of the store, the amount of the receipt and how the receipt was paid. And, because the receipt is in the same Evernote Stack as other stores, we can click on the stack category which is “financial,” and then you get a list that looks more like this …
This list is just the middle column, but you can see the variety of stores – as it happens between May 22 and May 31rst.Yes, Rich gets around.These are all from him.I don’t collect many receipts … now if we were talking about Amazon hehe.
Giggling up a storm.Yup-yup, Rich has nothing on me as it comes to shopping.The list shows that, we’ve purchased 43 items in the last 6 months – hey!That includes Christmas!Ok, better back down off that ledge.Thing is that there are ways of catching up with these things. WOW! I didn’t realize. Do you know that Amazon and us have a 15 year relationship? I just found out, I go back to 2002. That was the year before my father and step-mother died. I bought two books on the “I Ching.” They were a favorite book from earlier years. I believe I bought a book for myself, and one for a friend I knew at the time from Tampa Florida. I’d also bought the book for my Great Aunt. Loved that book. I spent a year of my life – 1986 Living with that book every day. It looks like that book was purchased on January 1rst and those are the only two things we got that year. I didn’t have the knack for Amazon shopping that I have now. Ok, one more picture from Amazon. This is the 2003 picture. It seems that that year we had five orders and were catching on to the fact that we were going to be indebted to Amazon forever hehe.
I made some hefty purchases.That was the year, we purchased a camera and a vacuum cleaner.You can tell my priorities.The teamwork books were for a goal I was working on for the new Leadership group at work, and the other two orders were the purchases of Adobe Photoshop, and then two books for my field.I could write an entire expose of my spending habits over fifteen years, but I won’t, but Pswhoo!I love it!I didn’t realize Amazon had been writing to me for this long!The music on my Amazon Alexa is singing “I’ve been in love with you.” Oh Lord, now strangers in the night! I must stop, I can’t stand it. It’s been such a love relationship!This all started with what we’ve been doing about collecting receipts. Hey, is anyone else working on a budget? Just saying heheBack fifteen years ago, we bought a vacuum for what we are now paying for a dinner out for four. Or, for that matter that cost matches what I spend on ONE medicine for the month. Life just isn’t fair. Better move off that topic too. Where were we going with this? We could mention that we did better with our goals in the morning than the afternoon and evening. We eventually found ourselves watching sappy TV. The best part is where we woke up at 7 pm, so we turned off the TV and lights and put ourselves to bed proper. Man, that’s like the new us, right? And, even though we didn’t get down all the stuff we’d planned, we did maintain a 1600 hundred calorie – 120 carb diet AND, we did put in 11 hours on our activity Dashboard at an 83% rating. Yup-yup best activities – Word (writing) and Evernote. So, we got in what we’d really intended – or at least part of that. The big activities that got bumped was finishing our receipt project – we still should label those last 50 receipts – it’s not hard, and we have to do some editing of those materials, we were writing back in 2004. Life is doing some reverse for us hehe.I forgot … we had a goal to again make some scrambled eggs this morning too. That or cottage cheese? Not sure. There is 45 minutes to figure that out, then another 1 ½ hour session writing, shower and then gym YAY! Good girls 😊 I’m not sure if we’re seeing Amie the nurse today. She must call and plan something like that – though we’ve got her penciled in between 2:30-4 pm this afternoon. OR, we could be doing editing. I think Linda is quilting, but might have time this afternoon to connect. Otherwise, when she gets back home, she is saying that she might not have time to talk because that is her preparation time to be making dinner for her and her sweetie. I know we’ve talked sometime during that time, but it was not as regular as the morning. Just we can’t have our most valuable energized time spent socially. The people we are studying say that your first hours are your most efficient. We’re not cold, just have things that need to be done. There is another time block that we’re worrying over. We’ve been trying to make the evening more productive with either organizing, doing budget, or reading. Any of that would be better than our tired TV watching. It looks like normally, we don’t have paperwork or budget on the M, W or F schedule, but that’s penciled in during that spare 7-9PM time as a back-up to reading. As stated yesterday, we’re doing better with loose structure if we’re moving the harder projects up.We talked to fishyman last night. That was a very nice thing. He’s having a good time with the guys. There were some grumbles that are normal when you’re with people who aren’t your dailies, but for the most part he’s having a good time. He said the bed was sleep able and he’d caught a northern and a small bass and was going back out to look for Muskie. Good boy! AND, he misses me. Well, he’s still having a good time … but, we’re on a respectable “still love you” list hehe.He’s our baby!Ok, moving on *giggle* you caught us in our girlish ways! Maybe if we go back now to where we left off yesterday. We had just taken out our “Focus” weekly calendar and were going to go over a few things jotted down. We didn’t make too much headway with that yesterday. Somehow it had reminded us to go through the processes ordering that vanity plate and plate cover. You remember? Oh, wanted to say one more thing before going back … we are still coming back down after the gain we put in after the colonoscopy. This morning we are at 268.8 lbs. Back almost at that thirty-pound mark. Trying to stabilize it. We’ve hit it a couple of times but have not hit it and moved on. We’re working on it though … and now we’re at the gym. Something positive should be said about that, hmm?Dakota just came in to check on breakfast – we’re 25 minutes from that, but it did give us a chance to remind him that we’re going to the gym today. I think somethings he can understand with repetition. We believe he understands what we mean when we tell him we’re going to Dr. Marvin’s, or when we’re going for a car ride. The other thing he seems to have a grip on is going to see the quilting girls. He knows and trusts that situation. He seems to have a regular life with the group.Oh, forgot about that, wanted to tell you about Dakota last night. He’s been watching some Baby bunnies out in his back yard. They are just steps from the rhubarb sidewalk. Last week Rich put a little light fencing around them so Don wouldn’t mow them over. He weed wacked over there home which made me furious. He just has a hard time understanding. But, Dakota was the one that told us about the bunnies. He’d been tracking them over the yard – got his big sniffer out moving across the yard on their paths, and then he put his nose down a hole and came up with bunny fluff on his nose. That’s always a dead giveaway. Rich called is out once last week and he said look. He’d taken Dakota out and Dakota was just there laying in front of the hole resting – he was on guard for the bunnies. He did that again yesterday.Last night was interesting though too … When we went out in the sunroom on our way out, I saw and then he saw a BIG bunny in the yard. He was mesmerized and whined a little. So then, the next step was that we went to the door and we opened it holding Dakota’s collar. He just starred at the bunny. He was paying it rapt attention, but was not pulling at the collar or whining. We were both being respectful. So then after a couple of moments, we made the next step. We continued holding onto his collar, and we went to the top steps of the stairs and sat down. After another moment, we had Dakota sit, and then lay down next to me on the top of the stairs. I was very comfortable that he wasn’t going to tear off. We both had the same goals of just observing the rabbit to see what it would do. It had frozen in one spot. After a bit, it hopped off. It had been eating clovers that had popped up in our yard over the last couple of days. It was toward the end of the rose garden – leading us away from her babies, when we loosened our hold on the dog. He was patient – he went over toward where the bunny was. And he was sniffing up a storm. Then the rabbit hopped off just to be sure around the neighbor’s house. Dakota started to chase him, but by the time he had gotten to the rose garden – we’re talking seconds here, we just said sharply, DAKOTA! He was busted. It stopped him in his tracks and he excitedly came running back to us to tell us about the rabbit. He was so proud to be making a new friend.That’s pretty much the story. I think we told you he’d laid down with the bunnies again after Don scared them to pieces with that dang weed Wacker. I was so proud of Dakota and I’m glad we’re having this experience together. He’s doubled-up on the number of times he “must” go out. Sure, he tinkles a little just to prove a point, but we know he’s going to check on his baby bunny friends. He’s such a good dog. I know that we’ve heard a few stories about dogs eating baby bunnies in their yard – once by the ladies at the gym and then another time by the wife of one of our old contractors. Yeeks. That would disturb me. HEY – did we tell you we’d seen three raccoons the other day all lying dead in the road? To see one is unsettling, but then the next two were together just around the corner. That’s enough to upset a perfectly good morning. Just saying. We’re one of those that are attracted to living things. Well, except insects and spiders. Don’t care for them. You know bigger critters.Ok, I know time to move on again. Just that now we’re getting to the time where we should move on to the eating part. In our normal schedule … we’d be hearing from the dog soon about his breakfast and we’d be taking our medicine, and then Rich would be making our eggs. Ok, that’s not going to happen this morning. But, what are we going to do? Should we try the eggs again? They seemed to work out yesterday. I am a little intimidated by the whole mess and process of cooking. We’ve broken ground by making the fruit/chocolate protein shakes. Yup-yup, we’ve been doing that whole thing including cleaning up the three pieces of the blender. Oh my gosh, you didn’t know? We’re using the blender like it were nothing. Talk about a power tool!I apologize if we told you this, but what we’re doing is putting in the blender a cup of almond milk, and then a scoop of whey protein, and then a cup of frozen fruit, And, about a half cup of ice cubes, and then we blend it for about a minute, and it’s just the best drink. It fills a full glass, and then a two-cup measuring bowl. That’s the one, we drink first. If Rich is around, we’ll offer him the other glass, and sometimes he’ll take it, but other times, we just drink it later -put it in the fridge. It’s so good. The next lesson is trying not to sit on the couch watching news while eating it. It can consume some serious time and knock us off our schedule. But, you just want to keep scooping … it is the temperature and texture of a milk shake. SOOO good! Oh yeah, and it is good protein *giggle* Sure there was that reason.Ok, now we’ve gotten up to almost 7AM. Dakota has been outside let’s see if he comes in with the chimes from the clock. He just walked nonchalantly past us. Will he hear the chimes with the music on? Holding-holding …7:34AM Back! And, we’ve done well over the last half hour. We had to say a soft sound to catch Dakota’s attention, but he came in in a flurry. He knew it was time to eat. He likes to jump on my shoulder to indicate eating time. Hehe. So, we fed him, and then we took our medicine. After that, we made Jell-O – raspberry. And, while that was boiling, we swept the kitchen and dining room floors, and then we finished that, and then we made scrambled eggs. Yup-yup all at the same time. We had time to clean off the main kitchen counter, but we haven’t put the dishes away yet. We’ll do that the next round when we either put our egg dish away, or maybe when the five-minute break timer comes on … that’s more likely. And, then we’ll be pretty good as to getting dishes done before we go to the gym. We like that because they’ll be clean by the time we get back and we can put them away during the lunch period. At this rate, we’ll have the Jell-O ready to eat by the time we get back from the gym.When we get up, we can also make the bed … Hmm, maybe that while we’re up getting showered and dressed. I’m so pleased with ourselves. As mentioned previously, we aren’t great in the afternoon or evening yet, but we’re putting in a solid work period in the morning. I really love this new routine. We also woke up at 5 am, a half hour before the official start, so we had time to make coffee and go through our email. I’m a little concerned in that the inbox doesn’t seem to be gaining as fast as it should. Maybe, we should check that out.Shoot that was rough – and there can be more we’re not seeing. It seems AOL mail is picking and choosing where to send the email and we’re not sure if the emails we’re finding under other months aren’t just copies. We did a quick straightening out of what we could, but we’re not changing everything to accommodate. We accommodated the entries by coding them. Hmm, might have to adjust that – it didn’t pick-up our # sign. Ok, enough of that for now just a frustration … not sure how to get the note to go where we want … I wonder if we put something in the message bar. Ahh here it is … we need to put in the subject line @**2017 06 June Work/File. Let me check that out.Ok! That works I just sent it to @* Inbox … that was pretty simple and it zoomed right to where we wanted it … Pswhoo! Can move on with our day 😊8:14AM … we have about 45 minutes left before our shower. Maybe we can now get over to that Focus weekly calendar? OK, one more thing … we just checked our MyFitnessPal. This is what our new morning looks like – the days that Rich doesn’t cook. Not too bad – a bit high on the salt though, might have to take out that dash we’re putting into the eggs, hmm?
There – just got another cup of coffee – third *sigh* And we made sure all the dishes were at the sink ready for the dishwasher and that the living room was picked-up.Should have set my phone to charge last night – it’s at 44% about an hour and a half to charge.Shoot there is the official five-minute break … better go do those dishes now.8:30AM Back – solid half hour left. We took care of the dishes, cleaned out the litter box, and took out the garbage. Well at least to the sunroom. Usually Rich takes it from there, but we’re going to need bringing it all the way to the garage and then that reminded me, it is Monday and we’re going to need bringing the big garbage to the curb. It’s garbage day. We’ll do that before the gym too. Might want to leave a few moments early. I can do this, right? AND, we must remember to get the mail, AND water Rich’s plants today. That’s ok, we’ll be dressed and ready to go. We can do this, right? The house and us are running great!Ok, over to that evasive focus calendar! There may be a few things … let me see if we can root them out. 1) is to come to grip with tasks being added to Trello, 2) compare growth mindset to growth mindset. This seems to be one’s openness to change. 3) Validation – accepting your own experience – the good & bad, PLUS you must be present. 4) relating to validation – create a plan of action to work which will help with intrinsic satisfaction. Then it says 5) Make a guess (to learn & Improve) as an extension of the growth mindset. 6) That mindset uses exploration as inspiration to succeed in the face of adversity. 7) it asks (our reading notes) for us to be a star in our own life, instead of a player in someone else’s movie. And, 8) To validate how you feel about your accomplishments – you cannot be a supporting character.There these are the notes. Let me see if we can put this together. I think they are not all related. First, develop a growth mindset - open and self-validatingSecond, accept one’s good and bad, and stay in the presentThird, create a plan of action that is self-satisfying – develop tasksFourth, learn and grow by guessing – inspire self by exploring in the face of adversityAnd Fifth, to feel self-accomplishment, be the star in your own movie WOW! There is a lot to write about here, but we only have a few moments. It took a while to put this together in a way that made sense … could we boil it down again?Be open and self-validating. Direct and star in your own movie by accepting good and bad, and staying in the present. Develop a plan of action by creating steps or tasks that will inspire us to accomplish while exploring, even in the face of adversity. It’s an ADVENTURE!WOW! That’s it. It’s a great statement – even though parsed, curated through thoughts of others. It’s mine – putting it over under our “Things to think over in Trello.” Maybe we could talk it over with Dr. Marvin. 😊
