A Look Back at 2005: Blessed Stability

A Look Back at 2005: Blessed Stability

This year continued my bad co-modding luck. In January I was booted as a co-mod at About.com’s Depression forum because I’m "homophobic." I’m not, but Nancy has to label me something to salve her conscience. Oh well. Her loss.

Official starting weight for 2005 was 166. I'm hovering about 145 as I write this, so that’s about 20 pounds gone. Yippee! But my weight loss did come to a screeching halt in May this year; I was doing well before then. Since May I've only lost about a pound a month. I gained 2.4 pounds in November, and lost 2.2 in December! Right back where I started! This year I hit my one year anniversary for both starting exercising (February) and starting Atkins (March). I am now just barely within a "normal" weight range for my height, gender, and bone structure.

I continued writing the devotions for The Helping Hand this year. I love this "side job."

In March I spoke at church, giving the long version of my testimony. It was pastor's week off, so I volunteered to be the speaker.

In April I bleached my hair and then dyed it blue. I have been growing my hair out and letting the blue fade to green in preparation for bleaching it again and dying it pink this time (I got tired of the blue). The chlorine in the pool wrecked my long dyed hair, so shortly after dying it I had to have it cut short. I figured I could swim and have short hair, hidden under a cap, or not swim and have long hair. I like swimming sometimes so I had the hairdresser cut it short.

Also in April I started blogging on Blogspot rather than the simple blog I'd set up at home. This enables me to post from any computer, anywhere, and lets people add their comments to my entries. Way cool!

The mandatory overtime (that no one is really complaining about) started in April and now we’re in December and it hasn't stopped. My overtime consists of one 12 hour shift a week. One week that will be Sunday, and the next Monday, and so on. One person was hired, but let go after they didn't "work out." It was stupid. We all mess up, sometimes big, but they let him go. Anyway, it works out to 44 hours a week, 8 extra hours per paycheck. I can't say I don't need it.

In May Abby disappeared and was gone for four days before showing up across the street meowing at me for food. Stupid cat. It's the only time she’s ever gotten out since I moved to the new apartment in 2003.

Also in May was the Bay To Breakers race. I equaled my best time ever – 1:37 – by carbing up the night before, the morning of, and during the race. I felt so different from last year when I didn't. Definitely need more carbs when doing something this intense.

Since I had lost my state ID card during the race, and they take time to be replaced, I had to get a passport so I could go on the cruise to Alaska in May. Things were dicey for a while, but I managed to get a rush passport the day before I left.

The cruise ran from late May to early June, one week. We left from Seattle, sailed to Ketchikan, Juneau, and Skagway, then turned south again to Victoria, BC. It was cool. Dad paid for my sister and I and him and his girlfriend to go to Alaska. I'd prefer the Caribbean, but hey, it was a free trip.

I became an aunt in July when my brother Rob and his wife Julie adopted baby Jebadiah. I know Rob is not legally related to me, and baby Jebadiah is not blood related to Rob, but I don't care. I'm still an aunt. :)

I also started an Atkins forum in July. In was short lived on Delphi when Gunter played God one too many times and delisted both my active forums. The Atkins forum moved to Forumer, and the Sabbath keeping forum was swallowed up in the already existing Seventh Day Baptist Yahoo group.

In August I went to General Conference in Michigan. It was really awesome like always. I love getting out of my little ghetto here and meeting people from all over the world. As Conference was starting, John Conrod, who has helped me moderate my Sabbath keepers' forum, died from complications related to MS. Rest in peace, John.

At the end of August I served as Maid of Honor at my sister's wedding. April finally married Renato.

In October I finished the "Bible in the year" project a full 2 ½ months early.

April made her TV debut in November on Move This House on A&E TV. My sister on TV. So exciting! She did great, but there was a lot of nervous laughter on her part.

Also in November Jean-Luc started a private Yahoo group for survivors of Kathi's ExWitch to discuss how to start a forum for ex-Witches, the original purpose of EW before it became primarily evangelism. The Yahoo group is now mostly dead, the forum is up and running, and we'll just see how things go from here. I suggested "The Moon and the Son" for a name, and they ended up naming it "The Son and the Moon." Jesus should get prominence in the name.

All in all, a fairly stable year. I'm in the same job, same apartment, with the same cats. :) This will be my third Christmas (just over two full years) of living in the same place. And it's my own apartment, not shared with anybody except my two cats, so it's doubly cool. Anyone who knows me well know how important (and elusive) stability has been to me. I even get stressed out when my daily routines get disrupted.

{primarily written December 21, 2005, with various edits}