恭喜發財

Welcome Year of the Rat!  Gong Xi Fa Cai!  Happy Chinese New Year!  To celebrate, I suggest you all head out to your favorite Chinese place, test out your chop-sticks skillz and add one of the following phrases to the end of your fortune:

For the silly and innocent types: “in the bathtub”
For the scandalicious and less innocent types: “in bed”

I have a strict rule about New Year’s Resolutions.  I never solidify them in January.  I always wait until Chinese New Year.  I figure if I can’t keep a resolution for a month, I don’t have any reason to feel guilty about it for the rest of the year.  So, the shortened, “I’ve already done this for a month, I can do it for eleven more” resolutions list is as follows:

1. Get heidikins.com up and running.
2. Sign-up for Salt Lake City Half Marathon. (Race Date: April 19  Yikes!)
3. Begin training program for Half Marathon, continue after the race is over.
4. Cook at least one meal a week, this means real cooking, not “combining ingredients”, or eating out of a box.  We’re talking chopping vegetables and making a sauce… multi-step dinner. (This is the 4^th year I’ve made this resolution in January, and the first year that I’ve actually been able to use it on my February short-list! Huzzah Domesticity!)
5. Hypothetically, the combination of numbers 2-4 should turn my wobbly bits into something not as wobbly… hypothetically. 
6. Write every day.  (Not necessarily a blog post every day; I’m also working on my first book.  So!  Exciting!)
7. Read every day.  (Also, not limited to blogs.  I read real books too.)
8. Leave the country.  Tijuana and Niagara Falls do not count.

Alright, there’s The List.  Now that I have announced it to the “world” I figure I am bound by The List.  Or something like that, of course. 

 As a Happy New Year present, Z at Autobiography of my Feet gave me the Daily Dose Award yesterday.  She said my shoes, my book-buying trips and my writing make her simultaneously covetous and envious whilst still putting a smile on her face.  I can’t tell you how flattered I am, and surprised, and pleased!  I didn’t even write a speech.  Or wear a sparkly red-carpet dress.  I did, of course, wear fantastic heels today – but the rest of my ensemble is suffering from some winter-blahs.  (Gray slacks, black short-puffy-sleeve mock turtleneck… no pizzaz whatsoever.)  However, I would be a slovenly ungrateful puss-ball indeed if I did not graciously acknowledge receipt (Thanks Z!  You are the Best! Blogger! Ever!) and then continue the tradition with a Daily Dose Award of my own. 

On this day, the Seventh of Februrary, Year of the Rat, I pronounce The Daily Dose Blogger Award to Trish over at Trish’s Dishes.  She’s funny, she’s witty, she’s gonna be a Published Author and, on a personal note, she has given me some of the best advice for just about every major stress-inducing event of my 20-something life.  (Seriously Trish, it’s still on post-it notes on my bathroom mirror.)  I can’t wait for her book to come out!  I’m standing in line at Barnes & Noble; I’ll camp out if I have to!  I’m sure the bits of wisdom and humor, with a side of “finding Mr. Right” will blow readers away.  And I just want to be able to say “Yeah, that Super Famous Author Trish (no last name needed)… I totally know her!”  Go check her out because she is my Daily Dose Award recipient!

That being said, I am on my way to Vegas this afternoon and then tomorrow Handsome V and I will make the drive to Phoenix for The Booksale!  I’ll be sure to take a lot of pictures and keep copious notes of the available books so you will all be so jealous that you’ll immediately add this event to you calendars for next February.  Have a fantastic weekend!  And don’t forget to eat some fortune cookies!