Reusing my favorite groundhog drawing thus far. I’m actually on a break at work right now, and I don’t have time to draw a new one. Plus I just like this one.
So. Fifteen years of us not smoking! Whaaaaaat! Wooo!
Combined stats, as of the 15 year, 9 hour, 7 minute mark:
$57,533.48 not spent!
191,778 NOT SMOKED!!
Hot diggity dog! :) :) :)
About a year and a half ago, we adopted two cats, littermates, brother and sister. I myself grew up with three (human) sisters, and I always wondered what it would be like to have a brother, and in fact I envied some of my friends who had brothers. I’m starting to understand now, though, that the stereotype of the pesky little brother can be very real and true. Sabine, living the part of the beleaguered big sister; Griffin, relishing his role as the relentless tagalong slash bully: this is the daily pageant at our house. When awake and not eating, he almost always wants to play, which often looks like quite vicious fighting. She sometimes wants to. Just the other day I learned that she can hiss really effectively while in full galloping retreat, which I did not know a cat could do. They’ll often spend an entire morning playing/fighting and then we’ll find them cuddled up together or giving each other a face bath. It’s very cute.
They were both holding perfectly still when I took this picture. Like I said, relentless.
And, there are in fact two cats in the picture below. Sabine is the happy-looking one.
Some time ago our basement stairs camera captured these two consecutive 5-second videos.
Cat Attack! Sabine gets fed up and gives Griffin some smackdown!
Cat Attack: The Sequel! Griffin, unstoppable, launches himself at his unsuspecting sister!
And now, as of a few days ago, thirteen years of not smoking! I’m not sure when this happened: I no longer ever think about how it would be nice to have a cigarette. I used to sometimes think that if disaster struck and I lost everything and everyone, then I could take it up again. My brain* doesn’t even go there any more. Perhaps because these days, we’re all rocketing toward disaster faster than we ever have? And I’m very busy coping?
Anyhoo. No stats this time. However! I took the stats from the last 7 years, and put them into a neat little make-a-graph program for kids because I know nothing of graphing, and voilà!
You can project where the numbers might be if we had numbers for this year. (Currently arguing with my computer about why no numbers this year. You don’t want to know.)
So, lucky thirteen is lucky! We’re so glad to be quit!
* My waking brain, that is. I do still dream about smoking once in a while. But I always feel bad doing it, like I am failing. I’ve tried to train myself to recognize that I am dreaming if I am smoking — because hey! If I’m going to be dream-smoking, I might as well be aware it’s only a dream so I can enjoy it, right? — but that hasn’t worked yet.
With both girls in elementary school now, I get to take the bus to work sometimes. I love it. I get in some steps walking to the bus stops, I don’t have to drive or pay for parking (super expensive on campus). And, especially, it’s this guaranteed spot of time where I can just be quiet, watch people, and listen to music or a podcast. With adult themes even! (Lately I’ve been going through all the archives of the Savage Lovecast, and it is so so good. I dread the day I catch up to the present and can hear it only once a week. I also dread the day Dan stops doing the podcast, because of death or whatever, but that’s another post entirely.)
This morning I was walking to the bus stop and I noticed there was a bus approaching. I looked back at it a few times to make sure it wasn’t my bus, because if it was, I’d have to run to catch it. It wasn’t. But apparently the bus driver noticed me looking, because as the bus drew near to me, it slowed to a crawl. The driver gestured to ask if I wanted to get on. WHAT?! That is a first. I was almost sorry to have to turn him down. How cool.
When my bus did come, it was crowded and there were a few people standing already, with four miles and many stops yet to go. I ventured to the back, since there is often an empty seat hiding back there. There wasn’t. More and more people boarded, and everyone crowded in, crammier and crammier. (Let me just pause right here and say: this is not a story about public groping. Yay!) I was not super steady on my feet and had to keep adjusting my handhold, and during the peak of crowdedness, as I was trying to figure out how to hold my stuff and also not fall down, one of my rings flew off my finger and bounced away. It’s a ring with some heft, and so it bounced and rolled a good ten-fifteen feet away. I could hear it even with my ear buds in. And there was no way I was going to be able to go after it without causing a huge disturbance. But! Not only did people notice it rolling down the aisle, they picked it up and passed it back to me.
Faith in humanity was shored up a bit by all of that. Yay bus!
Well I’m ashamed there have been no posts at all between Groundhog Day posts this time. And happy to be celebrating another year of success! Stats today, combined for the two of us:
Not spent: $51,141
Not smoked: 153,423
YAY!