here we are just about halfway through the year, and it is once again time to see how i am doing with my goals for the year.

in case you missed it, i tried to get a little more specific with my goals for this year and focus them in different areas in the hopes that i would be more successful in making them happen. i like to have this reminder in the middle of the year that it’s time to check in and see how i’m doing.

everything got a little thrown off with the pandemic so this update doesn’t look quite now it normally would, but here it is anyway.

my 2020 travel goals.

an ellie-veena reunion. this has not yet happened. we were hoping for a late august reunion, but that doesn’t seem like it’s going to be a great time to travel. we are also thinking about thanksgiving, but we will have to wait and see how things change in the coming months. fingers crossed!

go on a solo trip to a new-to-me place. again, yet to happen with everything else going on. i’m hoping to make this happen as a road trip with my week off in august but am still deciding.

my 2020 reading goals.

my overall goal is to read 35 books this year, and i am already almost at my goal [that whole pandemic / lockdown thing allowed for a lot of reading time].

re-read the harry potter series. done! as soon as i decided to do this i knew i was going to knock it out early in the year, and i was right. i started the first one when i went to cleveland in january and kept on rolling until i had finished all seven. these books continue to teach me so much, and i am already looking forward to another re-read in a few years.

finish maya angelou’s autobiographies. done also! i will forever be amazed at all the things she accomplished in her life, from nightclub singer to touring internationally with porgy & bess to campaigning for dr king and everything in between. maya angelou was an incredible woman, and we did not deserve her.

read at least three books translated from other languages. i’ve got one under my belt for the year so far, haruki murakami’s what i talk about when i talk about running. i’m still deciding what my other two will be, but i’m confident i will get this.

my 2020 fitness goals.

these were the ones i was most concerned about, and i am happy to report i am doing well with them.

exercise twice a week. surprisingly enough, i have actually kept up with this. in the pre-pandemic days i went to the gym at least twice a week, and once we started working remotely i was going for multiple walks a day. peloton made their app free to use for 90 days, so i did a few bodyweight and core workouts on there, i’ve gotten back into running, and alex and i go on a weekly hike at shelby forest.. the only week i didn’t explicitly “work out” twice a week was when i went to new york, but i figure averaging 20,000 steps a day counts for something.

cross 1,000 miles on the nike run club app. i am so, so close to getting this! i hardly ran in january and february but have been pretty regular the last few months and am fewer than 10 miles away from hitting 1,000 [at the time of writing i’m at 989.9]. that’s approximately the distance from memphis to albany, ny, which is pretty crazy.

my 2020 life goals.

six new challenges documented on here. i’m making my way through this one, having accomplished one month with no dr pepper, one month of no paying to eat out, one month of taking a photo everyday [that was hopefully not of a dog], one month of meeting my step goal everyday, and one month of sending a postcard everyday. i’m taking a break for june and july while i focus on our summer conferences, but i have a few in mind for the fall. i’m only one short of my goal, so i’m feeling pretty good about this.

and possibly a move? i am still working on this one. i knew it would be a long process, especially since i don’t live in any of the places i am looking, and then of course the pandemic happened, budgets got cut, and a lot of places had to put hiring on hold. i would still love to move this year, but i also know i want to move for the right job, so i am not going to push it. keeping all those fingers and toes crossed, though!

2020 has certainly been a wild year so far. i guess we’ll have to sit back and see what the next 6+ months have in store.

xx