Impossible List - 15 September

How far I've come over the course of the last month in regards to the impossible list of goals I've set for myself.

Professional

Last month I was feeling very lethargic, listing back and forth between projects. It feels like this month I might have moved the needle a little bit, but I'm still rudderless. I still feel like I need to take some time of and work on gaining a focus.

Health / Fitness

I’ve been fumbling my ultra running training. Not terribly or anything just not putting in all of the effort I was hoping to. I am getting some specialised training with bogs and ascents which is nice. it also feels like I've got a decent engine behind my running, I just want to get some bigger runs on my agenda and stop missing runs. I still haven’t had a drink this year.

I've lost weight this year, but not at a 1lb a week rate. I'm down a half stone since the beginning of the year really. Not great, not bad either. We'll keep at it. I really need to consider counting calories and sticking to it for a good several months. Actually I've started to notice a link between drinking energy drinks and weight. It appears to go up when I stop drinking them. But as that is a goal of steps, first stop drinking energy drinks which I have now for a few weeks, then I'll stop drinking fizzy juice entirely. At that point I'll re-assess weight and work on diet. One step at a time.

I've still got the Ochil Ultra 50 mile race later this month to look forward to and train for. It has a soft cut-off that means I need to put away 40 miles of the race in 12 hours which I think is doable, but I can't hang about. It's got 6 main climbs throughout the day, but they will be focused on the beginning of the day, get through the first 24 miles and 5 of the 6 climbs will be complete and I'll be free to make up time as best I can. I can still finish if I miss the cut-off it will just not be the whole course. I don't want another defeat this year.

Personal Skills

I've been working on focusing on two projects over the last month: both a Bluesky posting t-shirt generator that is political and sassy. it's not as funny as I'd want it to be, but I'm slowly bringing it around. Then I have been building a tool to help me plan my training and work towards my big race goals.

Flickr has 871 photos in it.

Travel / Events

I've been to Lithuania and Latvia now. It was interesting to see, but I can say that I seem to be a lot more interested in natural tourism than cities. I want to hang out in mountains and the like. Vilnius felt a bit Disneyfied much like Edinburgh playing on stereotypes, but it was interesting none the less.

Most recently I attempted to climb all of the Munros on Skye and weather and my own fear of death stopped me from completing them. I only completed two. I'll need three more guided days on Skye and I am going to look for a clear winter day to climb up Bla Bheinn bringing a tripod and get a solid photo of the Cuillin ridge.

I am working on planning a trip to Malta to finish my citizenship renunciation quick than waiting for London to schedule me in.

Next year I am still planning to go and spend some time with my Dad, don't know when yet, but that's the only solid plan for next year. Looking at going to Ireland with Louise to see Sean and his wife as well as possibly a trip to Chamonix.

Volunteering / Charity

We continue to out perform our budget and last years numbers. This will go a long ways towards making up for our last two years of financial performance. Digital sales have been very helpful. I'm still working on getting the basics set in place for Tayside Re-Users and that is moving along nicely. Our trustee numbers have been a concern lately, but over the last month this has become critical, as of the end of October we will be down to 3 trustees. But in our efforts to recruit more we've had at least two people sign up, so perhaps we will be OK after all.

Education / Languages

I've been reading a lot, but no focused education has really been looked at lately. Still need to win the lottery to give this too much more focus. I am hoping to read 36 books this year, I'm currently 24 books in.

Financial

Just working hard in my role as Staff Engineer and trying to sort out my shop and put everything into a good status. We are moving forward, but this might take years. I am also starting to look outside Insights a bit and start to plan what my next career steps my take. I think I'm going to run into a wall and I need to pick my battles a bit more carefully. One of the key issues holding me back is a lack of people management experience recently in my career. I have also, mostly non-seriously, looked at taking a course in management put on by the Chartered Management Institute.