33

Technically, the tagline of this blog is "Exploring Food, Continents & Life." I don't really delve into the life part too much. For someone who blogs, I am a relatively private person.

Well, today I am going to try to open up a little bit, and let you know a little more about me. One thing that I should mention is that today is my birthday. Yes, that's right. I'm getting OLD. I'm going back and forth about how I feel about my birthday since I am definitely starting to see the numbers creep higher and higher. When someone shows you a picture of themselves in 1993, and they're in a baby carrier, and you clearly remember 1993 as your sohpmore year of high school; then yes, you start to feel old. Luckily, Husband J is older than me, so I feel a little better. :)

I thought I would reveal a little about myself by listing some of the things that I wanted to do for myself this year. I found out about cool lists like these from my blogger friends. Often these are 101 things to do 1,001 days. Some of my blogging friends like Brooke over at Claremont Road; the lovely Liz over at E. Louise; or Amy at The Nifty Foodie (who has a great food blog by the way; her recipes and food porn are great!) all have 101 in 1,001 days lists. Another blogger friend, Nodakademic, has recently made one with her 30th birthday as the deadline. Alas, my 30th birthday has come and gone quite awhile ago, so I am just going to focus on this year.

I thought I would be a little bit ambitious and do 33 things in my 33rd year. Yes. I am THAT old.

I think I look pretty good for my age (except for the Crow's Feet, of course).

I make yearly goals the beginning of each year, but those are the more heady things for like finances, spirituality, etc. This will be fun stuff, so please excuse the fluff. I do have serious goals too. :)

33 Things in my 33rd Year

Travel

1. Go the to the TBEX (Travel Blog Exchange) Conference in Vancouver in June 2011. Let's see if I can even get tickets to this. I think I missed the latest round of tickets sales.

2. Go to India and/or Southeast Asia (preferably a trip around Vietnam, Thailand & Cambodia all at one time)- If you follow me on Twitter, you'll know I am currently obsessed with these areas of the world. I also want to go to these places because I am slowly realizing that certain future life changes will not make it easy to travel any and everywhere I want. By the way, when I mentioned this, Husband J said, "Didn't you just go to Southeast Asia?" UMMM...SO WHAT? Geesh, Husband J. Get with the program. ;)

3. Go to Egypt with Husband J. This actually might happen. Stay tuned....

Food

4. Shop at a farmer's market 2x per month - This should be interesting 'cause I find the farmer's market to be more expensive, but I really want to switch to local, seasonal produce as much as I can.

5. Master a cookie, cake and pie recipe - I am intimidated by my Kitchen Aid mixer. 'Nuff said.

6. Learn how to make many of the Antiguan dishes that I should know how to make by now. This embarasses me that I don't know how to make many of the dishes from Antigua that my Mom made for me growing up. I should do this not only for myself but my future children. What kind of dishes am I talking about? See below. By the way, I chuckle at the TGI Friday's Caribbean menu.

Clockwise: Fungee (boiled cornmeal with okra), codfish/saltfish (what the rest of the world calls bacalao), spinach, troba (sauteed eggplant), okra

Blogging

7. Get a professional (even if just professional looking) head shot for this blog.

8. Increase traffic to this site up to __ visit per day. I know how many visits, I'd be happy with.

Health

9. Run (well really jog) on a treadmill at least once per week.

10. Complete a 5K race. I'm not doing Couch to 5k. I've just recently gotten over my fear of the treadmill (Yes, people like me exist). I've just essentially started running on the treadmill, and so far Husband J and I have been running/jogging once per week as well. So far I can go about 20 minutes at okay pace. I'd like to extend my running time and increase speed. Husband J thinks we should do a 5k this fall, but I doubt I will be ready.

11. Do a 5 day fast again. I've done it before, and I am hoping to do a good job transitioning in and out of the fasting period. I did the Blueprint Cleanse, which I liked quite a bit. No thought required.

12. Take vitamins 3-4x per week. I have a really hard time taking vitamins, which is why I didn't say everyday because I know that's not happening. The bottle could be right in front of me, and I STILL ignore it. No joke. Any recs for how to get better at this?

13. Take a Yoga class 4x per month. I'm not interested in becoming a big time yoga person, but I would like to increase my flexibility.

Beauty

14. Get better at taking care of my hair, i.e. more hair treatments weekly or bi-weekly, etc. Good background on my hair.

15. Get a facial from someone who knows something about people with melanin. I'm thinking about Mamie's Skin Care Center. Angela Bassett and Queen Latifah have been there, so it can't be all that bad.

16.

Learn how to put on makeup. I'm a makeup dunce. Plain and simple. At my age that's not so good. I barely wear anything on my face, but sometimes it would be nice to wear something for special occasions or just 'cause I want to.

Artsy Fun

17. Take a dance class once per week for 30 weeks. I danced for many years, and I miss it.

18. Read an actual BOOK (NOT a magazine OR blog) one hour per night at least 5 nights per week.

19. Go to an art museum or gallery once per month (and get rid of my fear of art galleries). For some reason, private NYC galleries intimidate me. I need to get over it.

20. Go to 5 museums that I've never been to before. We've got so many museums here in NYC: The Lower East Side Tenement Museum, the Museum of American Finance, the Rubin Museum of Art, the Museum of Sex (hey, it's real!), and there's tons more! I've never been to any of these listed, and there are several more I'd like to see.

21. Learn to knit.

22. Go to 4 dance performances. I danced when I was younger. I enjoy going to see modern dance mostly, but I have not really gone in the past few years.

Relating to others

23. Volunteer somehow somewhere. Volunteering has been a part of my life in the past, but the past several years I haven't done anything. I'd like to change that.

24. Call or see Goddaughter at least once per month. She started her first day of high school today!! ACK!!

25. Get involved in a young professionals group for an industry that interests me.

26. Serve actively on advisory board for the cafe/community center project in Buffalo, NY. A friend is working on a great new project in Buffalo, NY. I'll hopefully be helping with their food related portions of the project and their online presence.

Random

27. Learn video/movie editing on my new computer (coming February hopefully).

28. Finish training for Project X. Training for something that may or may not pan out into something new career-wise.

29. Make 10 Ipod playlists that I actually like (random indeed)

30. Write 5 and 10 year goals.

31. Find way to reuse or recycle the books on my bookshelf. I've been using Paperback Swap, but maybe something more proactive perhaps?

32. Buy a purse that's not $25, bought on the street and will last more than a few months.

33. Play mas during carnival in Antigua. This may be some of the last moments in my life where I have a body to wear something like this:

(source)

Okay, you have to promise not to tell my Mom. She'll freak :)

So what do you think? Ambitious, isn't it? I think some of these will be manageable while others, who knows?! At the very least, I have some fun things to strive for this year.

Have you written any fun or serious goals lately? What's your favorite one?