Decaffeinating
Posted: Mon 9 November, 2015 Filed under: 2015/16, Diet Coke, Domestic, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Food, Health, Sleep - or lack thereof, Thoughts, Weirdness 1 Comment »As people should have gathered, I’m currently doing a bundle of plans for the coming year, as well as continuing to make changes to my general life, health, fitness and so on.
One of those changes is – yet again – cutting down a lot on my caffeine intake, and seeing how things go.
My caffeine intake is highly cyclic, I cut it down (and sometimes out) for a while, and then it slowly goes back up again. And lo, another cycle continues.
Anyway, this time round I’m working on it again, and so far it’s fairly successful. I’m drinking a lot more water, and the Diet Coke intake is commensurately much, much lower.
What’s annoying, though, is that even with a massively reduced intake, it hasn’t affected my insomnia at all. It’s annoying because just about every person who has ever pointed out I drink too much Diet Coke (or caffeine in any other format) has said it explains my insomnia.
But nope, even when I’m just drinking water – and have been for a couple of weeks – my sleep is still atrocious. Indeed, sometimes even worse than usual.
It really is bloody annoying.
2015/16 – Health and Weight
Posted: Sat 7 November, 2015 Filed under: 2015/16, Change, Domestic, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Health, Thoughts, Weigh Less, Weight Loss Leave a comment »Over the last year, I’ve worked on both health and weight with some success – albeit not as much as I’d have liked to.
A lot of the actual progress has happened over the last three or four months, once I’d changed gyms to one that was better located to fit in with my times and work life. That’s enabled me to go more often and more regularly, which has helped things immensely.
As a result, I’ve definitely lost inches, and gained muscle mass. That’s meant that I’ve pretty much stayed at the same weight – although it’s started coming off properly in the last month or so – which I suppose is good, if frustrating.
The plan for the coming year is likely to be more of the same. Some of it will depend on what happens for the next contract, and wherever I’m based at that point. If I’m based in London and commuting by train, the gym will still be perfectly placed. If I’m going to be based somewhere else, I’ll have to reassess and see what works.
Ideally, I’d like to lose a couple of stone over the next 12 months. That’s a feasible goal, assuming I can maintain the progress of the last few months, and keep doing more as I go on.
My other target/plan – albeit one that’s slightly less achievable – is to do another of the Marie Curie 10Km walks, and to do it in 60-70 minutes. That’s pushing it – although I’ve done other, shorted walks at that kind of pace, so it’s also feasible. It just might require a bit more training than the last two have…
2015/16 – Finances
Posted: Fri 6 November, 2015 Filed under: 2015/16, Bankruptcy, Domestic, Finances, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Thoughts Leave a comment »One of the more important things for the coming year will be continuing to rebuild my finances.
The first – and, to some degree, the biggest – step comes at the end of this year, when I make my final payment of the bankruptcy period. Really, that’s the end of it – from there, it’s just the time to rebuild and make progress. And that’ll be the plan in 2016.
Once the payments are done with, I’ll be putting the same amount into a savings account instead. I’ve got used to it going out of the account, and it’ll be the start of a good process.
I’ve got some further ideas, but the basic outline will be to build the savings up over the year, and have a decent amount by the end of the year.
I have an idea about giving myself the ability to have some time off in 2017, and the initial stage/target of that will be to have amassed at least six months pay in savings – to be able to fund a break, if that’s what I still decide to do, once this year’s plan is completed.
In similar vein, I’m considering overpaying on my bills, adding in some padding on that score as well.
Of course, it’ll also depend on having stability this year work-wise. I know my current contract will come to an end, so there’ll be a time for getting a new one and seeing what happens from there.
But all told, right now at the start of this next year’s plans, I’m feeling pretty optimistic and positive about the whole thing.
The More Things Change, The More They Stay The Same
Posted: Wed 21 October, 2015 Filed under: 2014/15, 2015 vs 2014, D4D™, Domestic, Finances, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Looking Back, Single Life, Thoughts Leave a comment »In preparation for another post (one of the usual ones for a couple of weeks’ time) I’ve been looking at things from (roughly) this time last year, and it’s been a bit odd in some ways.
There’s a distinct synchronicity between the two years, which is surprising. Last weekend, I bought some new tyres for the car – and it turns out I did the same a year ago. It also got a full service done – which I’ve just booked in again.
It’s also just under a year ago that I started doing the day-trips when I could (and/or when I wanted to) on weekends, which has continued and been pretty cool. I haven’t done one in a couple of months, mainly due to a madly busy period with no weekends ‘off’, but that doesn’t mean I won’t again.
Along the way, there’s also been a lot of good stuff.
Comparing where life was last October to this is like comparing pearls with cow shit.
October 2014 was a low point, although nowhere near my lowest. (There’s some competition for that ‘honour’, mainly September 2010, April 2012 and August 2012, although I’m sure there’s a couple of other close-runners too) At the start of it, I’d just walked out on ShitCo with nothing to go to, nothing even in the pipeline. That was a bit scary, but infinitely better than the prospect of staying working for them. I know, I still haven’t written much about that time, and probably won’t – safe to say, it was No Fun At All.
I got a new contract within two weeks though, and that was the start of the recovery process and climbing back to where I find myself now. I’m still working for the same people, and will be ’til at least the end of the year. It’s been good – and helped by being a role where I work for/by myself for four days a week. I’ve rented an office in central Milton Keynes, which works best for my schedule and environment, and keeps me vaguely sane. (Which working from home four days a week probably wouldn’t)
I’ve done a lot of rebuilding again in the last twelve months, and I’m pleased with how it’s gone.
Onwards and upwards!