GOOD MORNING ladies and gentlemen! It’s a beautiful, wonderful, fan-tabulous Monday morning and I- AH HA HA HA HA…okay, I couldn’t possibly keep that up forever.
In all seriousness, I am in a decent mood. It’s just that I woke up on this chilly Monday morning with some rather intense…feminine issues, and ugh. What a way to start the week.
ANYWAY.
I’m fresh off of two days off during which I got rather a good bit done if I do say so myself (some of that bit being a lot of relaxation because screw you, I deserved it), so what have I got to talk about?
Well, for a starters let’s look at the fact that I survived two straight weeks of not skipping any exercises and not screwing up keto. Huzzah! Maybe that doesn’t sound like the most astounding of accomplishments to you guys – two weeks, psh – but honestly, you have no idea how difficult it is to stick to keto when living at one of these work camps. Not to mention the getting up early to do my exercises because a 10 to 12-hour work day doesn’t leave a whole lot of time for anything else. But somehow or other I’ve been persevering, and the results have been good so far. The scale I’m using is a cheap, old-school spring-action thing so it isn’t exactly the most accurate affair, but at a guess I’d say I’ve lost about five pounds. Since I gained about five when I came out here and started eating camp food, that’s a good start, getting myself back to even keel. If I can get myself down into the 140’s sometime in the next few weeks I’ll be impressed with myself.
Other little random things, kinda complaints, but more just cranky observations…Alberta is transitioning rather suddenly into winter (there is no Autumn here…it’s seriously like a switch flips and it goes from summer to winter) and I’m not happy about it. I’m mostly okay with the chill so far, but the change in temperature and the drastic drop in humidity (to, basically, none) means that my throat has been dry and sore and my skin is starting to crack. I’m starting to feel like Cassandra from Doctor Who, and if you don’t get that reference just assume that I’m doing my best not to turn into a sheet of parchment paper. So many moisturizers just to keep from frikkin’ bleeding everywhere. Such a pain in the butt.
But let’s not delve too deeply into annoyances and gripes. If I don’t stay positive on a Monday morning that happens to be Day 1 of the next 12 straight days of work I may just crack. *forced smile* So instead, let’s get on with the goals.
Goal #1: Write half a million words.
I wrote a little less this past week than the week before, and boy does that sound amusing to me given the numbers I’m talking about, but I’ll get to that in a sec. I was a little slower-going than I would have liked because I was doing my best to finally write some TraceysBasement.com posts, but WordPress was fighting me every step of the way. I wasted a gross amount of time trying to fix image editor issues and get everything uploaded and showing properly, so that really slowed down production. In the end, though, I managed it, and there was lots of fictional writing along the way as well. Grand total for the week was a lovely 19,612 words, which I’m quite happy with, especially since my Pacemaker.press account was only looking for a little over 14k. You guys have no idea how good it feels to be consistently reaching and surpassing those numbers for a change!
- Goal #1a: Write at least a quarter million fictional words. I did finally get some TraceysBasement.com posts (as well as a few other YouTube-related blog posts on here) written this past week, so that’s great. But the overwhelming portion of my word count was still fictional words, which is just as (if not more) great. I wrote 13,639 words in the past week, split fairly evenly between The Other World and the Good Omens fanfics I’ve been writing. It would probably be better if more of those words were for TOW than the fanfics, but honestly, I refuse to feel bad because the fanfics have been really sparking my creativity and actually giving me ideas for things I can do in TOW, so it’s a two way street for sure.
Goal #2: Read at least 50 books.
I must admit, I’m quite shocked that I can’t report finishing Capturing the Devil today! By no means does that have anything to do with a lack of enjoyment of the book. I am absolutely enjoying the heck out of the book. The main issue has been that the time I normally read is when I’m on the bus going to and from work, but by early last week I was so tired from all the other stuff I’ve been doing that I started napping on the bus instead. Then I intended to read on the weekend while I was off, but I got distracted with things like filming a vlog in Spirit Halloween . The end result is that, yeah, I’m only about halfway through the book at the moment. But I’m certain that will change this week, as I’m starting fresh and should be able to survive reading on the bus for at least a few days before I get tired again.
Goal #3: Build my social media communities…EVERYWHERE!
Social media is becoming a bit of a tick in the back of my head. Not that I don’t want to be dealing with or anything like that, but lately it feels like I’m putting in plenty of time toward it and getting very little in return.
Last week’s numbers are as follows:
- The YouTube channel gained 11 subscribers
- The YouTube Twitter account went down 1 follower
- The YouTube Instagram account gained 1 follower
- The Snapchat account’s score went up 15 points
- The Author Twitter account went up 5 followers
- The Author Instagram account gained 5 followers
That’s a mostly positive week there (what the hell happened, Twitter?) but it feels rather paltry considering what I felt like was a very good week of interacting with people. Plus I blew up my YT Instagram Story on the weekend and saw effectively no reaction. So that’s a bit frustrating.
On a more positive note, I wrote a goofy tweet concerning something a coworker said that made me think, humorously, of a Good Omens character, and Neil Gaiman retweeted it. It was kinda the highlight of my weekend, you guys, I’m not gonna lie. That man is a gift.
Goal #4: Play more (proper) video games.
It feels like everyone I know has been playing Borderlands 3 and Link’s Awakening the past few days and it’s making me twitch a little, you guys. Even at the best of times I don’t play games nearly as often these days as I have in the past, but I’m genuinely excited for both of these games, so watching everyone else play and knowing I can’t is definitely causing a bit of a nervous tic. Add them to my list of things I wanna do for a straight week when I get home.
Goal #5: Put more time, focus, and energy into the YouTube channel.
This one went in a bit more of a positive direction last week, although there was the aforementioned fighting tooth and nail with WordPress. Once that was all straightened away, though, I managed to write several TraceysBasement.com posts, which is great since I’ve gotten super-behind again. I’m planning to at least try to write one a day until I catch up, but I won’t make any promises since the cold weather tends to make me more tired and lethargic. I’m really, really going to try though. For the moment, however, I can happily report managing to write six posts last week, plus all the social media stuff that I’ve been doing as well.
There’s also the little fact of doing a Spirit Halloween shopping vlog over the weekend. That was effectively the first thing I’ve filmed since I’ve been out here, so I’m really hoping the footage is good and usable when it comes time for Jason to put the yearly Halloween Hunting vlog together. The store was really crowded and loud, so I did my best…Fingers crossed!
Overall I think it was a pretty decent week. The quiet social numbers and the fact that I’m taking way too long to read Capturing the Devil aside, everything has been going fairly smoothly. Steps in the right direction, as it were. Nothing major to complain about. Minor things to complain about? Sure, but that’s life, right?
When did I get so damn optimistic? It’s kinda freaking me out a little.
How was your week? Did you accomplish any goals? Make any new ones? Do anything else that made you feel awesome and accomplished? Feel free to share in the comments!
Tracey Tobin 