2011 Goals Check-Up: April

A picture may be worth 1,000 words, but I blog much faster without photos
Here is my monthly checkup for the goals I (should be) working on:

7.5 hours of sleep per night - I slept so much in Cuba! Usually I am always up before B. on weekends, but during the trip I slept as long - and some nights longer - than he did. On top of that, I'm pretty sure I napped on the beach or by the pool every single day. Upon my return to Calgary, unfortunately, I think I managed to get to bed on time for only one night :(

Drink at least 1 L (one water bottle) of water per day - I think I lied in March. I've been drinking as much, if not more, water as I did last month and, well, I'm not going to finish that sentence. I came down with a cold for a couple weeks and *definitely* met this goal. Now that I'm not sick anymore I have to force myself, but I probably finish at least 750 mL/day... which I know isn't really that much in the grand scheme of things...

Continue increasing number of blog posts per year - I only wrote five posts in April 2011 vs. eight in 2010. It's not that I have nothing to write - in addition to the new recipes and new restaurants I've been trying, I should also write about the food in China and in Cuba. You'll notice that my posts sort of come in spurts, and I think it'll be like that for the rest of the year. Now if only I could get a solid chunk of time off just to blog... (and still somehow get paid.)

Read at least 12 books this year - I still haven't bought book number... 2... yet. My friend's dad is the author of Bitter Medicine, which is up for the Alberta Readers' Choice Award. I'm voting *almost* every day, and seriously thinking of picking it up.

Win a kickboxing/Muay Thai fight - I'm entering an exhibition fight during May long weekend! I've been putting in my hours, but not getting as much sparring practice as I'd like. We'll see how it goes.

Cook at least one recipe from every cookbook I own - Mama T is away right now, so I think I will tackle a few recipes this month. Unfortunately I only cooked from blogs in April.

Put my savings/RRSP somewhere where I can make more money - I need to book an appointment with a financial advisor.

Create more/Participate in another creative/reflective project this year - I find that every time I think of journaling, I end up picking up the phone and talking to B. about it, which allows me to put it into words and get some form of feedback. I'm slightly disappointed that the May #reverb11 is very similar to the February one, but I am still enjoying their "resources" (when I have time to look) and there's an interesting article from the Harvard Business Review called Four Reasons to Keep a Work Diary. Huh. Maybe I should start journalling again.

Set aside one weekend every month with no commitments - Cuba was *fantastic*. I'd never been to an all-inclusive resort before, and wasn't sure if I'd like vacationing that way because usually when I travel, it's all about doing stuff and seeing stuff. It was a truly relaxing trip, and we still did a couple of excursions, so we weren't just laying around *all* the time. My only regret was that the weather wasn't very cooperative (it was sunny, but windy) so we couldn't try any of the water sports. Other than that, the week away is perfect.

Now a dilemma - B. feels that since we've spent seven days away in Cuba, plus 25 days away in China (though it is arguable whether or not we had commitments on the days we were in Hong Kong), that we've used up all our "commitment-free-weekend days" (i.e. 24), so we shouldn't allot anymore time. I think that it's not about the number of days, but about giving ourselves an opportunity to take a breather every month. What do you think?

Rewards
Aside from the days where I was sick and drank copious amounts of water, I don't think I achieved any of my goals in April. So no rewards. Hopefully May will be better.