A stretch goal

I stumbled upon that term the other day online. A stretch goal is just a bucket list goal with better PR. Instead of setting the goal's focus on something you do before you die, which, honestly, is a little negative, the focus is on stretching yourself is some way to improve yourself. I like it. It's a little zen, a little I hug trees because they need it, a little awesome.

Which brings me to my new stretch goal:

I love to read...seriously. No hyperbole at all. If you know me, you know that about me. If you've been to our home, you've seen how we 'decorate' with our books. Now, two of my goals this year are to finish reading the King canon and to view AFI's top 100 movies in reverse order. The King goal is all about getting some serious reading of my favorite author done; the other comes with lots of bonus reading as well as some serious movie viewing. However, I don't want to spend my whole year only reading King or mountain sized novels or stuff for school, so enter today's goal.

I'm going to read 52 nonKing, nonAFI books this year. That breaks down to about a book a month ( if I did my math correctly...I do teach English guys). Haha...just kidding, I know it's a week. This is definitely a goal I can achieve. I've been blowing through books since January when I got my kindle so I think this indefinitely doable. Yesterday, I was an emperor; today, I am invincible....or something. Go me...

Here are a few of the novels I want to read this year. They have been sitting on my nightstand for a while and they deserve a chance:
The Satanic Verses
Middlesex
The Road
The Help
Ethan Frome
Lolita






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It's Official...The Emperor is NOT Naked...

Not at all. In fact, the emperor (that would be me...empress, maybe?) has way too many clothes because the emperor can’t stop buying things. Cute things. Things on sale. Shiny things. Full price things. Things I don’t really need because I have seven others in seven different colors. 

So the challenge is this: I am going to go a whole year starting on my birthday (!!!) without buying any new clothes. I feel ok celebrating only the high holidays (back to school and December 26 as long as it’s on sale) but no shopping other than that. It’s going to be tough, but I keep telling myself that in order to fund the rest of this list I need to stop buying needless things. 

I’m also going to attempt to wear a different outfit every day. No repeats and work out clothes don’t count. 

Gah, this is going to be tough, but just take a gander at all the different places I store my clothes. Both dressers, the wardrobe and the closet are all full of SUMMER AND SPRING clothes. The fall and winter clothes are in buckets at the bottom/top of my closet and shoved under the bed. It’s pretty ridiculous.

On the other hand, I was voted Best-Dressed teacher this year by the students...I guess that’s something. :P

I’m so glad this month is full of awesome things to do and awesome clothes to wear before I have to buckle down. Bon Jovi better appreciate my last day of choosables (especially since he WILL speak to me)!

So so much stuff... shoes in one basket, belts in the other.

Mostly cami's and cardis...work out shorts...this is ridiculous.

Head on of the closet...buckets full of crap.

t-shirts!

Not at all!

Not a very big closet...

Little Slices of Cake

I have a thing about movies. I love them; they're like little slices of cake. I love sitting in the theater alone or with friends watching a good story unfold on the big screen. I love curling up for a few hours with my netflix account and gettting lost in plot and character development. However, I’m sadly lacking in some basic movie knowledge. Like that poor, sad kid who HASN’T seen Empire Strikes Back at least four times, I need to correct this as soon as possible.

Because it’s been a rule of mine for years to read the novel before seeing the movie, I will stick to that here for the novels I haven’t already read. I’d hate to have to go through Gone with the Wind again. I love me some Scarlett, and Rhett is all Southern gentlemanly perfection. Plus! We meet him first in the library. Swoon… but Ashley is a damned whiney baby and….. confession time: honestly, Melanie’s death is the first time I ever remember being happy that a character died. She was insufferable (sugary sweet often ends up being sickeningly sweet). Anyways, so glad I don’t have to reread Ms. Mitchell’s best again because, by God, I swear I’d never make it through twice!!

I chose this list because I really like AFI, I adore movies, and I want to use my super awesome netflix account for something other than marathoning Buffy while grading papers. 

The Plan: The deal is to watch the list in reverse order and write some sort of review or bulleted list of impressions about each film as I come to it. After all, the thought process isn’t complete without some sort of articulation. I’ll also link back to this post to cross out titles as I finish them. (Makes me feel like I’m getting something done. And, I really like lists.)

So here’s the movie list. I’ve bolded the ones that I’ve already seen, italicized the ones that were novels first and starred the novels that I’ve already read. If I’ve seen it and read the novel, I feel ok skipping it in the list. Same thing goes for non-novel movies as well.

100. Yankee Doodle Dandy

99. Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner –sadly, not the version with Ashton

98. Unforgiven

97. Bringing Up Baby

96. The Searchers

95. Pulp Fiction

94. Goodfellas –pretty excited about this one actually

93. The Apartment

92. A Place in the Sun

91. My Fair Lady –Kim will be happy about this one

90. The Jazz Singer

89. Patton

88. Easy Rider

87. Frankenstein*

86. Mutiny on the Bounty

85. Duck Soup

84. Fargo

83. Platoon

82. Giant

81. Modern Times

80. The Wild Bunch

79. The Deer Hunter- not looking forward to this one

78. Rocky

77. American Graffiti- love me some non-prequel Lucas

76. City Lights

75. Dances with Wolves

74. The Gold Rush

73. Wuthering Heights*

72. Ben-Hur

71. Forrest Gump

70. The French Connection

69. Shane

68. An American in Paris

67. The Manchurian Candidate 

66. Network

65. The Silence of the Lambs*

64. Close Encounters of the Third Kind

63. Stagecoach

62. Tootsie

61. Vertigo

60. Raiders of the Lost Ark- it hurts my feelings that this is so far down on the list.

59. Rebel Without a Cause

58. Fantasia

57. The Third Man

56. MASH

55. The Sound of Music- really the sound of me groaning. Ew.

54. All Quiet on the Western Front

53. Amadeus

52. From Here to Eternity

51. The Philadelphia Story

50. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

49. Snow White and the Seven Dwarves- Agreed. Doc, who’s obvi been to med school, does NOT belong in a cottage in the woods. What is he doing with his life?

48. Jaws

47. Taxi Driver

46. A Clockwork Orange

45. A Streetcar Named Desire

44. The Birth of a Nation

43. King Kong

42. Rear Window

41. West Side Story*

40. North by Northwest

39. Dr. Zhivago

38. Double Indemnity

37. The Best Years of Our Lives

36. Midnight Cowboy

35. It Happened One Night

34. To Kill a Mockingbird*

33. High Noon

32. The Godfather Part II

31. Annie Hall- stoked about this one

30. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre

29. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

28. Apocalypse Now*- Mistuh Kurtz, Mistuh Kurtz!! I’ve already read this one. YAY!

27. Bonnie and Clyde

26. Dr. Strangelove

25. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

24. Raging Bull

23. The Maltese Falcon

22.  2001: A Space Odyssey*

21. The Grapes of Wrath

20. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

19. China Town

18. Psycho

17. The African Queen

16. All About Eve

15. Star Wars- how did this not crack the top ten??

14. Some Like It Hot

13. The Bridge on the River Kwai

12. Sunset Boulevard

11. It’s a Wonderful Life

10. Singin’ in the Rain

9. Schindler’s List

8. On the Waterfront

7. The Graduate

6. The Wizard of Oz*

5. Lawrence of Arabia

4. Gone with the Wind*

3. The Godfather*

2. Casablanca

1. Citizen Kane – damn Rosebud

Landslides

I’ve been feeling kind of listless lately. Well, a little more than lately…and after a lot of doing nothing about it at all, I finally put my finger on the problem. Maybe it was finding out how old Mark Zuckerberg is. That would be a newly turned 26, and he’s TIME magazine’s person of the year. Or maybe it was watching LeBron run rampant over his peers. Granted he had help –Dwyane Wade is a beast  (when he isn't whining about migraines).  However, King James and I matriculated at the same time. And then there’s Charles Lindbergh who flew solo across the Atlantic. He was paid $25,000.  He was also 25. 

Here's the deal...honest to blog:P

I am turning 25. And I’m freaking out about it...just a little. I've also been listening to a lot of Stevie Nicks lately, and I, too, have been wondering how I'll handle the seasons of my life. 

The problem is I haven’t accomplished anything like Mr. Facebook Fancypants or his Highness or Chuck up there. I don’t know very much about computers, I’m not a Fierce Amazon Basketball Dominator, and I can’t fly a plane. Anything you can do I can do better - as long as it isn’t computers or basketball or flying, apparently.

See I’ve always had life planned out in four year blocks since, oh, around 4th grade but I haven’t lately. So in light of turning 25 AND my current state of listlessness, I present a list of 25 goals for my 25th year. You could say that I’m listful now instead of listless. Ha-sorries.

The Plan: Today I’m just going to reveal my list (!!!), and then I’ll flesh the ideas out over the next 15 days before actually beginning with numero uno.

Bang your head! (Thinking stuff)

1. Create and keep a themed daily blog.

2. Watch AFI’s 100 Years… 100 Movies list in reverse order (2007 edition).

3. 365 clothing challenge.

4. 52 non-King or AFI books (otherwise it’d be cheating).

5. Take more pictures (Gotta fill up that INTERVENTION wall somehow).

6. Finish reading the King canon.

Look! There’s future everywhere! (Career stuff)

7. Back to back to back trips to State. Specifically starting the 2nd day in the winner’s bracket. (No pressure girls!)

8. Enroll in grad school.

9. Kick TVASS in the ass! 

Broadening Horizons (Traveling/New Experiences stuff)

10. Travel overseas

11. Either BE on TV or attend the taping of a TV show

12. Pro athletic events.

13. Rappel- after making the climb first

14. Ride in a hot air balloon

I’m a material girl! (Owning new stuff stuff)

15. Grown up furniture.

16. 3rd tattoo.

17. Orpheum season tickets.

18. Grown up set of luggage for #10.

Silliness (Why the hell not stuff)

19. Learn to juggle.

20. Really want to learn how to do the egg-spatula trick.

21. Audition for a play.

22. Apply for a reality TV show.

Let’s Get Physical (In the exercise way, not the creepy Olivia Newton-John way stuff)

23. Size 8

24. Complete a half marathon.

25. Create a 26 list – 75 is going to be busy!

So like Mr. Lennon said, “You may say that I’m a dreamer, but I’m not.”  I’m not. These are some dreams of mine, and I, I am a doer.