[Courses] [Spineful Living, lesson 1: Dreams]

[chris]

On Fri, 2007-03-30 at 12:30 -0700, Carla Schroder wrote:
> What do you want?

In the grand scheme of things I want to reduce my impact on the earth,
help stop war and end poverty.  But I'm a simple monkey, so most of the
things I want on a personal level are pretty mundane.

* I'm pretty spineless when faced with a person who needs help with
something that I can do and I know the person either can't do at all or
can't do as well. When faced with a person I know is perfectly capable,
I have absolutely no problem saying no. So, I want to become comfortable
in saying no to someone who really does need help but probably has other
resources they could tap before asking me. 

* I find that while I want to be doing more volunteer work in the
community, I don't have a lot of time or energy to do so because I'm
doing too many "favors" for individuals. I want my volunteer time to
have greater community impact.

* recently I've awakened to the fact that while I'm excellent at
managing household finances and being a clever little frugalist, I know
little about long term financial planning. So I want to learn more about
long term financial planning. 

* I want to own a home - either build or buy. This is part of the long
range financial planning goal but because we're both environmentally
sensitive, this is also a growing necessity for our health.

* This year, I want to get certified as a skipper by the sailing club so
we can take boats out for weekends without having to buy and maintain
one. In the next 10 years, I want to spend 6 months at the Wooden Boat
School in Port Townsend and build a 36'ish boat that we can take on long
cruises (the class builds it for cost of materials). So, that's another
motivating factor behind the "long term financial planning" goal.


-- health and play goals -- 

* The past few years (nose to monitor), I've fallen into poorer physical
condition than I ever imagined possible. I used to lead an active
lifestyle which means I never established a personal workout routine
outside of competitive sports. Since my lifestyle has changed and no
longer keeps me in shape, I need to figure out this whole regular
workout routine thing. 

* in general, I want to use my bicycle more often than the car, take
more weekends off work, find short hikes and kayak paddles I can do
after work on weekdays, and get better at landing my loaded kayak
through surf so I can camp at my favorite camping spots. 


-- projects that need to be finished --

* I'm converting a '63 falcon futura to an electric vehicle. I'm
currently restoring the body and interior and planning the frame
modifications needed to accommodate battery weight and motor torque. I
want to get it on the road by next spring. 

* after I get the futura EV on the road, I'm really interested in
exploring open source automotive OS's - there's a lot of room under the
dashboard for all kinds of gadgetry and the existing OS automotive
"projects" seem to be mostly speculative (and in German). I probably
should learn C for this.

* I started a garden planning software project ages ago that I want to
make usable this year - the goal is to optimize my garden's year-round
production and minimize the amount of time I spend planning rotations. I
also want to improve programming skills. 

* I want to create a website for planning kayak trips and hooking up
with paddle partners. I tend to put these sorts of pet projects on a
back burner and I want to complete at least one a year, preferably 2. 

* By the end of this summer, I want to have either finished all the
other unfinished projects around the house or pass them on to others who
will finish them. (motorcycle restoration, truck restoration, broken
chairs, bamboo propagation, kayak repair, etc, etc). 


-- work -- 
* I need to improve my programming skills - in college I focused mostly
on databases, declarative and markup languages which was fun, but only
part of the equation. I've been having more fun with OOP now that I'm
away from college and all the bluster and ballyhoo that seemed to
surround programming (blech). Fortunately I have a good basis to work
from, but I do have some work to do.

* my portfolio/resume website is embarrassing and I need to redesign it.

-chris