In Which We Get A Second Crack At New Year, And Blue Takes Full Advantage

Since it's the first day of Chinese New Year, I thought I might as well take a look at how my (American) New Year's Goals have been holding up. For the record, here's what they were:

• Cooking school
• Cooking vacation (that is to say, "find some kind of cooking-themed vacation package, enroll, etc.")
• Yoga vacation (there is actually a place that does a combination cooking/yoga resort vacation, but... it's in Kerala)
• Meet more people interested in Ashtanga (either through a Meetup.com-type-place or by simply posting a sign on the wall of my yoga studio which reads "Ashtanga Students' Happy Hour, because classes are so quiet and no one ever talks and wouldn't it be fun if we all got to know each other?")
• Attend 5-year college reunion
• Go to at least one conference in my field
• See Arcadia at the Folger Theatre
• Take day trip to NYC and see a taping of The Daily Show
• Take day trip to NYC and see TMBG live (see, that's why that $50 AB&B gift certificate will come in handy)
• Enter the New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest... every week
• Eat at The Grill From Ipanema (but not alone)
• Eat at Lauriol (ditto; see, I walk by both of these restaurants several times a week and I've always wanted to go in but never have)
• See the Richard Avedon Portraits of Power exhibit (is running through Jan. 25, so had better get moving)
• Start attending open-mic nights both to meet new people and to see if it's something I want/would be able to do
• And two "secret" goals

And here's what I did:

Cooking School

I signed up for two months of cooking classes at the Lebanese Taverna, but found out they weren't at all what I was looking for. Now I am looking at signing up for different cooking classes, but I am a little hesitant because I don't want to lay out money for something unless I am doing a considerable amount of actual cooking.

Ashtanga & Ashtanga Friends

My actual resolution (different from goals) to clean up my Ashtanga practice is working out well, thanks in part to a yoga intensive I took a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, I had to squander the opportunity to make new yoga friends at the yoga intensive because I had to leave before the party/mixer at the end (there was a work thing I had to do that evening).

Attending a Conference

Yeah, did this one too. I'm not going to comment on it too much because I want to keep my work life out of my blog. *_^

The New Yorker Caption Contest

Haven't won yet. Find it baffling that none of the finalists for the below entry used the (obvious) word "overturned," as in "I hate it when they overturn my verdicts."

Portraits of Power

Saw the exhibit on its last day. MOST AWESOME THING EVER. It really was an unbelievably fantastic exhibit. They made you wander through rooms and rooms until the last thing you saw, before you left, was the Obama portrait. I'd love to do a whole post on this but probably won't; let's just say that I love photography and portraiture and the whole thing really tripped my geek. I don't have a great facial recollection memory, especially for politicians (they all look alike), so it was interesting to stare at the faces and then look at the caption and realize "oh, that's George McGovern!"

And then, at the end, you got to get your own portrait taken in Avedon's style. That was icing on the cake. (Really want to post the portrait but am hesitant to put face on the blog. Will think about it.)


So... those are all the goals I've accomplished in one month. Well, those and one of the secret ones. (I was going to have the second secret goal accomplished today, but something else happened today that made me a little hesitant to spend the money, as the second secret goal is a buying goal.)

As for the rest: haven't eaten at the restaurants because I don't want to eat there alone; haven't planned the vacations or the college reunion trip or bought the tix for Arcadia because they're too far out in the future; haven't even looked at how one gets tickets for The Daily Show because... well, because I think I believe that goal is too impossible--or too complicated--ever to come true.

And haven't even set foot in an open-mic night. Although I keep singing in the shower.

Happy Chinese New Year!