Learn to drive a manual car.
Recently one of my sisters bought a new car and I was given her old one. It’s a Ford Telstar 1992, and it’s white. I haven’t driven it on the roads yet, but I have been practising along the dirt road on the farm. So far I’m doing okay but finding time to practise is really hard at the moment. Usually it’s dark by the time I get home and all I want to do is eat and go to sleep.

Learn the basics of car maintenance.
When my dad and I were sorting out the change of ownership papers for the aforementioned car, we spotted a hot pink, sparkly book called Essential Car Care for Girls. My dad bought it for me. It’s pretty informative and now I know how the engine works and what various parts are, as well as some useful maintenance information! It’s actually a pretty good book, but it’s definitely written with a girly-girl in mind who may or may not be completely fucking stupid. Probably the latter… I felt my inner-feminist bubbling up a bit during the course of reading it, but I was able to set aside my despair at the blatantly stereotyped target audience and learn a bunch of useful stuff.

Learn French
Well, I’m taking French 101, so yeah. I’m definitely planning on taking the 102 course and possibly continuing on to Stage 2 courses after that.

Create and stick with an exercise plan.
Back in March I joined the gym at university and got an exercise plan created for me. The last couple of weeks have been difficult so I haven’t gone (literally have not had time), but I’m looking forward to getting back into it come Monday!

Read 50 books I’ve never read before, not including ones I have to read for school.
Just read a fantastic book called How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff. It’s about a 15-year-old girls who gets sent to stay with family in England when a modern-day war breaks out (at first I thought it was related to the London Tube bombings, but it wasn’t, plus I can’t remember what year they happened in and it might have been after this was written). Anyway, she falls in love with someone and lots of scary stuff happens and you’re not sure if she’ll be okay and if she’ll find him again, either. The narrative is really well done and I totally cried towards the end!

Newly completed

Ask someone on a date.
Although Josh and I don’t really call them ‘dates’, we do go on them! And I have initiated some of these little dates, too, so I think that counts perfectly fine. We love to go out to eat and also to the movies, amongst other things.

Learn to use the sewing machine and make at least 2 items of clothing all by myself.
Back in late February I made two skirts. Here is a photo of me wearing one of them.

All up it’s been a really nice day, and fairly restful. January is full of birthdays in my family (there are five!) so the last few weeks has seen me crafting and birthday shopping, celebrating and, eep, eating a lot of less-than-waistline-friendly foods! This week is going to be much less hectic and I had a really nice afternoon relaxing and catching up on internet things (blogs, emails, auctions, etc.) before getting some exercise.

Speaking of exercise, I really must do more of it. I’m trying to do something six days a week, but it barely counts if it’s less than thirty minutes! I have a yoga video (yes, as in VHS, lol) but there isn’t really much room in our tiny loft living room to do it, so my yoga workout is basically from memory, plus a few poses I cut out of a magazine years ago. Aside from yoga I’ve been walking a little bit and incorporating running intermittently with that. My fitness level isn’t good enough for me to run the whole way, but my goal is to work up to that.

I’d actually really like to join the university gym, which is $250 for 12 months, but I don’t have the money to spend on that right now, unfortunately. It would be great if I eventually join though, because I have some decent gaps between classes next semester and I could work out during them. They’ve got a climbing wall which I have my eye on! Hehe.

To be quite honest, I’m getting insanely bored of this summer break. While I want to make the most of summer and enjoying not stressing about studying, I really miss the learning. I miss classes, I miss the subjects and I miss the people! It’s nice to know that, so far in my academic career, I am really enjoying it and am capable of doing it well. I know some people just don’t enjoy the academic side very much and I imagine it would make life a bit difficult, especially if there is pressure from parents to get a certain degree or do extremely well.

Anyway, tomorrow morning my mum, sisters and I are off to Life Pharmacy to get facials! They’re free there at the moment and I think it sounds divine!

Before I go, I have some exciting (I think) posts coming up, including a photo one full of some epic cute, so stay tuned! In the meantime, why don’t you ask me something?

Develop more self-confidence – Completed
Ok, while technically this is the sort of thing that is continually in progress throughout life, for the purpose of this exercise I’m going to say I’ve completed it because, in comparison with this time last year, I have bucket loads more self-confidence. Hurrah!

Continue with being vegan – On hold
Unfortunately due to various circumstances and a bunch of other stuff I don’t want to go into, I’ve ceased being vegan for awhile. I do intend to go vegan again in the near-ish future, however, and it’s still a hugely important goal that I have.

Continue writing in my journal at least three times a week – In progress
I’ve recently picked this up again, though I must admit the journal entries are generally rather short and not very deep. I’m combining them with notes and bits of stuff I glue in there, so it’s sort of like a scrapbook in a way.

Watch 100 films I’ve never seen before – In progress
I keep forgetting to note down the films I see but I’ve managed to remember most of them and have since written them down. Here’s hoping I keep that up to make future updates less painful!

1. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
2. Tale of Desperaux
3. Jane Austen Book Club
4. Batman: The Dark Night
5. Elizabethtown
6. He’s Just Not That Into You
7. Death At A Funeral
8. I’m Not There
9. Burn After Reading
10. The Duchess
11. Twilight
12. Gaslight
13. Shakespeare In Love
14. The Very Thought of You
15. Transformers 2
16. High Noon
17. The Brothers Grimm
18. The Immaginarium of Dr Pernassus
19. Run Lola Run
20. Man of the House

Read 50 books I’ve never read before – In progress
Much like with the films, I keep forgetting to note down what I’ve read… However, after some thinking, I’m pretty sure I’ve now got down all the new books I’ve read this year.

1. Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
2. Persuasion by Jane Austen
3. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
4. The Scandal of the Season by Sophie Gee
5. Rich Dad, Poor Dad For Teens by Robert T. Kiyosaki
6. Fire by Deborah Challinor
7. Set In Stone by Linda Newberry
8. The Touch by Colleen McCullough
9. Lost In Austen by Emma Campbell Webster
10. World Without End by Ken Follett
11. On The Road by Jack Kerouak

Get a massage from a proper masseuse – Completed
I got a head, neck and shoulder massage a little while ago from a place at the mall. It was divine, very relaxing and more affordable than going to a spa.

Quit biting and picking at the skin around my fingernails – In progress
I’m really trying hard not to pick at or bite the skin or my nails. So far my nails are growing very nicely and the skin around them in slowly beginning to heal.

Start university and complete first year – In progress
I began university on July 20 and have since completed my first semester. I’m pretty proud of myself, though I don’t really let that show much. On the inside I feel all sparkly about it.

Maintain good grades – In progress
So far my grades have been between C+ and A-, peaking more around the B to A- range. Next year I aim for as many A range grades as I can get.

Blog at my website at least three times a week – In progress
Maybe I should tack ‘and none of the 5000 Question Survey posts count’ onto this? lol!

This is a general update of goals I am in the process of completing, some of which will never technically be complete because they are the sort that are never ending, e.g. believing in myself and what I can do — I imagine I will still be reminding myself at 70 that, yes, I can make awesome pastry and…I dunno, knitted scarves. Actually, at around 70-75, I plan on taking up drugs.

But, I digress, so here is my actual update!

Get my learner driver license.
I was supposed to have gone for my test at the beginning of this month, but I had a depressive moment in January and haven’t studied much since then. Bad Sam, I know. It’s not that hard to study for, really, I just have to memorise the answers and Bob’s your uncle, but I’ve been lazy. However, I will make the effort from now on to study and thus take the test at the beginning of March. Either way, I want to have done it before my 21^st birthday because I don’t want to be the dork who can’t legally drive on the road at 21 for shit’s sake. Not that other people who don’t drive at that age are dorks. Just I would consider myself one.

Gain more confidence.
This has gone downhill since the beginning of the year, actually. I’m really terrible at being my own cheerleader. I’m the sort of person that can be highly anxious and then I freak out over everything and want to huddle in a corner. I haven’t really learned how to see my fears as obstacles I can overcome, and that once over the other side of those mountains I’ll likely look back and think it wasn’t that hard. Theoretically I know all this, but practically I don’t believe it.

Nurture my self-belief.
Not going very well with this, either. If I didn’t have this problem, which is a big one, then I wouldn’t have the above problem as much either. Funny that. I’m not trying very hard, to be honest. I know I don’t really suck that much, but again, in practise I am not good at remembering it, and life is all about reality and what you put into practise, not what you know by theory. Theory doesn’t get you anywhere if you can’t do.

Continue with being vegan.
This is going well. I have the food thing down and I’m using up the rest of my non-vegan cosmetics, cleaners, etc. before I buy vegan ones. It’s surprising how much is actually available when you look into it. Now I can go to the chemist and buy a whole range of vegan-friendly cleansers, moisturisers, shampoo and stuff. The other upside to many vegan-friendly products is that they are also made with all-natural ingredients so are free from icky chemicals and such.

Please excuse me while I go and hug a tree for a sec.

Continue writing in my journal at least three times a week.
I’m going alright with this, but the truth is that I don’t write as much and am not inclined to write as often if I’m not in a bad mood/stressed/depressed. I’m just not that good at being cheery in my paper-journal. It’s all whining and crap, which is awfully boring. The truth is that I write my journals with the forethought of never destroying them and leaving them as a record of my life for future generations of my currently non-existent offspring. I think I do that because it’s the sort of thing I would love to read and so I assume at least one of my children or grandchildren might inherit my love of past times and think reading about me is The Shit and so on. But I have nothing interesting to write about. I don’t have a scandalously fascinating love-life or anything (not that I’d really want one, really; so much hassle). I do write about my feelings and the stuff I don’t talking about in my blog or with other people, so I supposed that will lend itself nicely to reading if I never tell anyone. They might be surprised by things.

Make an effort to stop procrastinating.
This isn’t going so well, either. It’s my biggest flaw.

Watch 100 films I’ve never seen before.
I think this goal is inhibiting my progress with the above goal… I am doing quite well on the film watching front, though I still need to join a video store to accomplish it fully. I would like some recommendations though, so if you have any, fire away.

Read 50 books I’ve never read before, not including ones I have to read for school.
Also going well, though I have lulled in the last few days with my reading. I’m still on ‘Tropic of Cancer’ by Henry Miller which I should have finished by now. It’s not necessarily the easiest book for me to read because I have to be in a certain mood to make the most of it and enjoy it properly.

See at least four live bands every year during 101 in 1001 days
So far I’ve seen one out of twelve. Nine Inch Nails was the first for this year and the second will be Kings of Leon. I need to start seeking out local bands though (because they’re more affordable, ).

Save for my overseas trip.
I put money in every week, so it’s slowly growing! Hooray!

I have finally started and uploaded my 101 in 1001 days list. It’s not complete yet but I wanted to get it public and up and all that. I’m quite excited about it, actually! I think it’ll be a good motivation to accomplish my goals. I like to finish what I start and I like a good “race”, so, here’s hoping I do, indeed, do 101 things in 1001 days.

Anyway, aside from that I have been fairly hermit-like as of late, except today I went out looking for job vacancies (there isn’t much but still worth handing in my CV to places) and hung out with my mum and one of my sisters, plus her two kids. The weather has been very warm lately and therefore no one wants to do anything! Including me.