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Yep. I did it again. I didn’t get around to doing this quiz until mid-January. Not only that, but the last post I actually made was last year’s quiz. I didn’t update my journal for an entire year. I’ve set a new record for how slack I can get. But hey, I’m a student, and a Mum, and a person with lots of stuff going on. At least I remembered to do the quiz!
1. What did you do in 2022 that you'd never done before? I got glandular fever! Or mono, as it’s also called. Not exactly a new experience I was planning on having, but oh well. I tried to toilet train a toddler, you could say that’s something new too. That’s still very much a work in progress, but hopefully by the end of 2023 (or preferably sooner) we will be a nappy-free household. That will be a huge sigh of relief for my bank account. 2. Did you keep your New Years' Resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I always make New Year's Resolutions every year (I enjoy goal setting, I guess), but I don’t actually remember what they were for 2022. Probably something involving losing weight, or eating healthy, or exercising...if so, I didn’t really follow through on much like that. But to be fair, with the glandular fever, and colds and flus etc., there was a lot of other things that took higher priority. I have made a couple of new goals for this year, and I hopefully I actually can make some achievements on those. 3 . Did anyone close to you give birth? I don’t think so...Tai and I have a good friend called Luke (not Jess’ husband Luke, but the other Luke we’ve known since our school days), and he and his partner Steph are having a baby in another couple of months. So that’s quite cool, Luke’s a huge geek and a bit of a big kid in some ways, but he’s always had a natural way with kids, so if anyone deserves to be a Dad, it’s him. 4. Did anyone close to you die? No, thank goodness. Brierlee (my “step-sister”, daughter of Dad’s wife Jill), had a bad round of depression this year which was a little terrifying for everyone. But she seems to improving a lot now, so hopefully she’s okay. 5. What countries did you visit? Nowhere- we have a 3 year old, so travelling would be more trouble than it’s worth I think. That and I am still studying my Master’s, and Tai’s earnings are nothing amazing, so we really don’t have the budget for any big trips for a while. 6. What would you like to have in 2023 that you lacked in 2022? Last year I wrote that for 2022 I’d like: “I'd like to manage my finances better and get some debt paid off, plus I'd like to keep losing weight and getting a bit fitter, and a bit more energetic.” ...so, let’s just say ditto for 2023, shall we? 7. What date from 2022 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? Sabrina’s birthday was memorable, in a good way. She turned 3, and had a delicious Peppa Pig cake. Her birthday happened to fall on Queen’s Birthday weekend, so I decided it would fun to have a royal theme. I got coloured cardboard, and cut some into the shape of crowns, and got lots of stickers, so people could create and decorate their own cardboard crowns. Sabrina loved it, I helped her make a pink crown with animal stickers and glittery stickers spelling out her name.
There was another memorable day, in a bad way. My glandular fever came on slowly, a few months ago. Initially I thought it was yet another cold, or flu, or that maybe I was just tired from staying up too late or not eating healthy enough. But it got worse and worse, and eventually Taina and I went to the after hours doctor in Lower Hutt. They got blood tests done and found my liver enzymes were insanely high, to quite a dangerous level, and eventually figured out it was glandular fever. I was soooo sick, it was horrible. But it only lasted about 3 or so weeks, which I gather is not too bad for glandular fever. 8.What was your biggest achievement of the year? I suppose that in spite of illness, and money struggles, and general stress, I still passed all my courses at Uni this year. One of the courses I’m doing now, over the Summer, is the last of the core courses I need to do for the degree. Now I have to decide though: whether to study the extra courses to become accredited with the Chartered Accountants organisation, or just graduate with the basic Master of Professional Accounting degree. It’s a tricky decision, because I have a potential job lined up, and there’s a possibility they might pay for me to complete the Chartered Accountant accreditation while working for them, but I don’t know for sure. 9. What was your biggest failure? Failure feels like too negative a perspective. Sure, I would like to be fitter and less overweight. Sure, I would like to be in a better position financially. But noone’s perfect, and pushing too hard to be perfect is an excellent way to lead to burn out, and ending up even worse than you started out. So...no, there were no failures as such. I kept afloat, and survived life’s curveballs, and I will strive to achieve new things in 2023. 10. Did you suffer illness or injury? Certainly did. The glandular fever was the worst. Some colds and flus of course. And oh my gosh, I almost forgot! We all had COVID shortly after Easter! Man, I can’t believe that was last year, it feels like it was way earlier than that. Oddly enough, the COVID was the easiest one to deal with. 11. What was the best thing you bought? A couple of months ago I had a job interview, the job that I have been conditionally offered to start next month in fact. I didn’t really have any good job interview clothes, so I splurged and got a pretty light blue dress, and boots and a handbag to match, plus a black business jacket. It was nice to have a good excuse to buy nice things for myself for once. 12. Whose behaviour merited celebration? A lot of people really. Dad and Jill help out a lot, looking after Sabrina and helping with other things from time to time. Sabrina is a real sweetheart, even if she can be difficult sometimes. Taina is a pillar of strength, always getting Sabrina to bed and doing what he can around the house. Debra and John (Taina’s parents) are great too. Sabrina’s teachers at daycare have been really helpful with this toilet training stuff too. 13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? Hmmm...Vladimir Putin? Who else would go, ‘hey, you know what? The world hasn’t had enough problems to deal with lately, only a major pandemic, and climate change, and increasing unrest in the US due to political extremists becoming more vocal and empowered...so let’s go and invade Ukraine and give everyone more problems to deal with’. 14. Where did most of your money go? Apart from that one splurge on a job interview outfit, the rest all went to boring stuff, like Rent, food, bills, all that jazz. 15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? I suppose Sabrina’s birthday. The job interview was a bit exciting. Not much else coming to mind. 16. What song will always remind you of 2022? I got into Air Traffic Controller, and Andrew McMahon In The Wilderness a bit this year. I recall a couple of afternoons, me and Sabrina outside Tai’s work waiting for him to finish, when he was working at the Trentham Army Camp (he had a temp admin contract role there for most of the year), and cranking the song Synesthesia by Andrew McMahon In The Wilderness in the car while waiting. 17. Compared to this time last year, are you: i. Happier or Sadder? About the same maybe. The money situation is more stressful than it was a year ago, and I’ve probably gained more weight...but I also am optimistic that 2023 has some good things coming for us.
ii. Thinner or Fatter than last year? I don’t know for sure, but I would assume fatter. My eating habits haven’t been great these last few months, and I can’t afford a gym membership so exercise is intermittent at the moment.
iii. Richer or Poorer? Undoubtedly poorer. Tai had to take unpaid sick leave a couple of times. Then his current work had a shutdown period over Christmas and New Year, but they would only pay him if he used leave...except he was all out of leave. So we had very little money coming in recently.
18: What do you wish you'd done more of? Exercising and meal planning perhaps. But in the end, I did what I could with the energy I had, in the circumstances that were thrust upon me. So I don’t need to beat myself up about anything. 19. What do you wish you'd done less of? Buying expensive food, like at cafes and bakeries and fast food places. 20. How will you be spending Christmas? Sabrina came down with a flu or something right before Christmas. Even Christmas Eve night she seemed exhausted and grizzly. I was so worried Christmas would be a complete let-down. But I guess the excitement of presents gave her the burst of energy she needed, because she was full of energy opening Santa’s presents on Christmas morning. She slept a lot of the afternoon, but we all still had a good day, good presents, good food, and spent time with Dad, Jill and Brierlee. 22. Did you fall in love in 2022? I am a married woman with a 3 year old daughter. My life is already filled with love. 23. How many one-night stands? I am a married woman with a 3 year old daughter. My life is already filled with excitement. 24. What was your favourite TV programme? A few things. We’re currently working our way through the most recent seasons of The Crown, and Dead To Me. I also have been watching episodes of this really, really old quiz game show from the 1950s/1960s America on YouTube. It’s called What’s My Line? It’s great, the humour is a lot more innocent than modern shows, and it’s quite entertaining. 25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year? No. I’m pretty chill. Noone’s done anything to annoy me, so I’m all good. 26. What was the best book you read? Eek, I haven’t read anything other than Uni textbooks for ages. I read Hairy Maclary to Sabrina before bedtime sometimes, I guess that’s the best book I read. 27. What was your greatest musical discovery? Didn’t delve into much new. But as previously mentioned, I listened to a bit more stuff by Andrew McMahon In The Wilderness, and Air Traffic Controller. Plus my usuals, like Walk The Moon and Bleachers. 28. What did you want and get? I got a Farmers voucher I haven’t spent yet. That was nice. And Tai and Sabrina got me a nice dress for my birthday, a bit like the one I had bought myself for my job interview. 29. What did you want and not get? I’d like to get a DNA test. I spent a bit of time earlier this year getting into all the genealogy stuff, building my family tree online and such. But it would be great to find out a bit more about my genetic background. 30. What was your favorite film of the year? You know, I’m not actually sure if I even went to the movies this last year. I probably didn’t. We were busy, we were sick, we were short on money. Even when I found myself considering it, there was usually nothing on I wanted to see anyway. We watched some new movies on Disney+ when they came out though. Encanto was great. 31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? I turned 37. Unfortunately I had an exam for Uni on the day of my birthday. Tai was at work, Sabrina was at daycare, and my day revolved around studying for and sitting the exam. I invited some family, plus Jess, Luke and Riley over the next weekend though, just for a chill lunch thing at our place. 32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more enjoyable? More money. I’m not shallow, I don’t need a ton of fancy stuff. I’d just like to not always worry about whether I can afford bills or not. Did you know, in the almost thirteen years that Tai and I have been together, we’ve never both been working full-time at the same time. Money’s always been tight, but with recent world events driving up inflation, it’s been getting tighter. 33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2022? My personal fashion concept was, “What’s at the top of the drawer, and fits well?” 34. What kept you sane? Watching clips of Stephen Colbert, or Trevor Noah on YouTube. 35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? I don’t know about fancy as such. But I’ll miss Trevor Noah being on the Daily Show. He’s just such a genuine guy, and so passionate about issues he talks about. 36. What political issue stirred you the most? I suppose a lot of things. I did an assignment for Uni, discussing how companies purchase carbon offset credits, basically they pay money for someone to plants trees or something, and use their monetary contribution to it to excuse themselves of the responsibility for the carbon emissions they are producing into the atmosphere. I got the idea from a John Oliver video on YouTube, but it was really interesting, learning about how dodgy the carbon offset industry is, and how easy it is for big corporations to shirk responsibility for their actions. 37. Who did you miss? I miss Mum, because I wish she could have met Sabrina and seen how cool and adorable she is. I miss my grandparents too sometimes. 38. Who was the best new person you met? I didn’t meet many new people, at least not any in-depth meetings. I briefly met people at the job interview I did, they seem nice. I briefly met Lisa’s new guy partner, he seems nice. 39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2022? A year where all you achieve is just keeping afloat, and doing what you need to do, is still a successful year. 40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year: When the going gets tough, the tough get going...yeah, the main reason I thought of that song is it was just playing on an ad I saw on TV. But, if the shoe fits...
weezieishness · Tue Jan 17, 2023 @ 06:16am · 0 Comments |
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