Handwritten.

Things I Plan to Do More Often.

-Read my Bible
-Go to church
-Think happy thoughts
-Eat healthy food/make more healthful decisions
-Hang out with people
-Update my blog

Songs that WILL NOT be on my Christmas playlist this year.

-I'll Be Home For Christmas (most specifically: Josh Grobans's version - not to be played under any circumstances)
-All I Want For Christmas is You
-Blue Christmas
-Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
-Happy Xmas (War is Over)

Songs that will be played often to make up for the lack of the songs above:
-Purple Snowflakes by Marvin Gaye
-Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree by Cyndi Lauper
-Soulful Christmas by James Brown

Things that I Read Every Day.

-All the Facebook status updates I can stand (good thing I only have 113 friends).
-As much Yahoo news as I can get away with at work.
-Annie's Blog
-The Happiness Project
-All of my e-mails (even if I don't always respond to them).
-Job postings on island.
-Working on reading my Bible everyday.

R is for Read, Reading, To Read.*

Books I Have Recently Read.
Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss
The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell

Book I Am Currently Reading (because I can only read one book at a time).
Blink by Malcolm Gladwell

Books I Am Preparing to Read.
Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer
Thinking in Pictures by Temple Grandin
Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer

Don't I seem quite intelligent?

(Call it cheating that I just realized I was on R and could sneak this post into my alphabet. I call it resourceful.)

Things I've Been Reading Lately.

A Year in the Book of Psalms.
Eats, Shoots & Leaves by Lynn Truss.
Mental_floss magazine.
The Happiness Project.
The Girl Who Stopped Swimming by Joshilyn Jackson.
Freakonomics by Stephen Dubner and Stephen Levitt.

Projects for the Next Year.

Take a photo every day.
One sentence journal every day.
A year in Psalms every day.

Any other suggestions?

Albums that I know Every Word to Every Song.

R.E.M. - Automatic for the People
The Spice Girls - Spice World
The Blues Brothers Original Movie Soundtrack
Blues Brothers 2000 Original Movie Soundtrack
Kid Rock - Cocky
Barry Manilow - Ultimate Manilow
Kirk Franklin - Nu Nation Project
Natasha Beddingfield - Pocket Full of Sunshine
David Cook - Analog Heart
Bright Eyes - Letting Off the Happiness
Gavin deGraw - Chariot
The Ataris - End is Forever
Home Town Hero - self titled
Joan Osbourne - Relish
The Killer - Sams's Town
Death Cab For Cutie - Transatlanticism
Avril Lavigne - Let Go
Natalie Cole - Unforgettable With Love
Cabaret: The New Broadway Cast Soundtrack

Things I have grown to enjoy as of late.

Rob Dyrdek.
Matching my socks with my shirts.
Root beer chapstick.
Anoop Desai.
Neutrogena Shampoo and Conditioner.
Boot cut jeans.
Sprinkling rain on my head.
Okinawa (maybe, just a little bit).

Like the deserts miss the rains...

Things I miss (possibly just because I know I can’t have them):

-Panera Wild Blueberry Muffins and Cinnamon Crunch Bagels. And the Frontega Chicken Sandwich. And the Baked Potato soup. And chips. So, Panera Bread in general.

-Target. Not a single Target on this Island. And so far, nothing even resembling a Target. Since moving into the dorms my freshman year, I have relied on Target for everything. Mascara? They’ve got it. Something to wear to a wedding? Check. Neato one dollar thingamajigs? In excess.

-Pizza Chain Restaurants, furthermore good pizza places. My dear friend Stacee has brought it to my attention that it may be possible that my husband and I are pizza snobs. Fair enough, but I think we earned that title the day our dear friend David Letterman gave us a pie on our honeymoon. Ah, digression. Pizza here is terrible. Or at least the one place we ate was terrible. Think of the worst pizza you’ve EVER had and subtract about ninety taste points. Thank goodness for the Secret Family Recipe.

-Dry heat. Self explanatory.

-Coldstone Ice Cream and Frost Gelato. It was both good fortune and a curse to discover the beauty that is Tucson’s Frost Gelato Shoppe. Good fortune to have experiences something so very delicious and not a curse because I crave it. And there is really never a time that I am not craving Coldstone.

-Wendy’s. Something about Wendy’s just conjures up great feelings of nostalgia. Maybe it’s because Theatre History class was never over until our crew was done with their Frosty’s. Maybe it’s the late night drive-thru runs. The “good-good” commercials do not help this craving.

-Non-tempura fried shrimp. Beer battered shrimp is my seafood restaurant stand by. Tempura shrimp generally tastes like shrimp dipped in oil. Fried shrimp here = Tempura shrimp. ‘Nuff said.

-InTouch Weekly. My guiltiest of guilty pleasures. The Island is not without InTouch, it’s just that the issues you can find are at least three weeks old. At least. By then, the news is proven, disproven, or just plain no one cares any more. And although I can get all my celeb gossip online, there is something cathartic about flipping through my favorite glossy at my own leisure. Oh, and I definitely miss “Who wore it better?”

Things I will probably miss when we leave the Island:

-Vending Machines EVERYWHERE. I never fear about having low blood sugar while driving here thanks to the plethora of vending machines. You literally cannot drive a kilometer on this Island without driving by an inexpensive drink machine. And it’s not just soda – it’s tea and about a million other types of drink that I’m not quite sure of but just can’t help but try.

-Cutesy-ness. Everything here is cute. Signs all have cute cartoons here. I saw one for a hospice that had a very happy old man in a tub with his family/caretakers all around him, equally happy. You can find all sorts of items emblazoned with the cutest things you could ever think of. And, it’s the home of Hello Kitty. You don’t get cuter than Hello Kitty.

More to come, I'm sure.