First #100Days Update

Our new favorite park, Aozidi Forest Park

I've been a Lady of Leisure now for 74 days. During this time I have written nearly 24,000 words, run nearly 42 miles, and learned over 100 Chinese characters. Though these first #100days have turned out to be more about finding a rhythm and routine than meeting any particular goals, I still think I'm making pretty good progress against what I had hoped to achieve.

My first #100days focus was supposed to be making running a habit, which has not yet been achieved. I've run only 21 days out of 73. That's not even 30% of the time. Not good. And def not a habit. I'm hoping it's because I've been forcing myself to run in the mornings (because I've always run in the mornings so I must be a morning runner, right?). But here, the mornings are too hot for running. Most people who run in the mornings are running around 6am. Ladies of Leisure don't know what 6am is. But we know what 5pm is. So, I'm switching to evenings.

I've got another month to meet my original #100days goal. If this switch doesn't help the habit then I'll be resigned to only running in the mornings once the weather turns (which should be happening sometime later this month or in November). Because I'm not waking up at 6am to go running. That's just crazy talk.

I'm doing pretty good regarding Goal #2: write something, from start to finish. I'm working on a novel which I hope to enter into a writing competition by the end of the year. I've identified the writing competition, which provides a theme. Although I've written the most I've ever written on one project, I'm still quite a ways off from the 75,000-100,000 word requirement. Luckily, I've still got three months to complete it and, if I continue at my current pace, I should be done well before the December 31 deadline.

Goal #1: speak, read, and write Mandarin is also coming along quite nicely. I use my new language skills every chance I get and, though usually a failure, I do occasionally find success. For example, I've successfully bartered twice, I made at least one person laugh, and I also made a couple of successful inquiries. I learned approximately 100 characters and phrases in the month of September and I hope to quadruple that in October, now that I have a rhythm. Fluency happens with approximately 2000 characters, so I still have quite a ways to go but am well on my way to meeting my goal.

Sunset

My other two goals, which are writing related, will have to wait until after I've completed my novel. I never intended to jump right into a novel but I'm happy that I have. Having never had the opportunity to focus on my writing like this, it's been very interesting learning what my process is. Who knew I'd be a sober writer?

In other news, both Mike & I have now received our ARCs (Alien Registration Certificate), which means we're both now legal Taiwan residents. Mike also received his national insurance card but I'm still waiting for mine (I'm about 2 weeks behind him in processing). Once that's received, we'll be 100%. As with all things regarding Relocation 2014, this process has almost been completely painless. Hopefully this means we're getting good at this and future relocations will run just as smoothly, though we're probably at least a couple years away from having to test that theory.