Curious May – Looking back with Curiosity

Hello birthday month – good bye weird May. I usually love May but this year is rocky. And May was another rough patch. So much work to catch up on which resulted in me working on weekends and holidays. Not full eight hours but I worked. And that is something I have rarely done in my 9 years of self-employment. And if, not for such a stretch in time. I am trying to take breaks, do things slower… Sigh. BUT there have been so many happy moments in my curious May and I’d rather focus on these.

I satisfied my curious mind by

• reading two new-to-me authors.
• giving an AI workshop at my husbands agency hoping it will help them to get back on track and getting out of my comfort zone in doing workshops.

I satisfied my curious life by

• visiting Madrid for six hours on our return flight from the Dominican Republic.
• making homemade milkshakes after we couldn’t buy any and had a craving.
• starting my 100 day project but going very slow and loose about it – no pressure. No sharing while doing it. I will eventually do here I think but for now it is just something I do to re-connect with my creativity which has been on the back burner way too long.
• checking out the indoor pool and swimming for one hour straight.
• visiting Hamburg for a work-trip, a celebration of my clients 50th anniversary and a trade fair visit. Busy days, exhilarating, tiring.

I satisfied my curious connections by

• welcoming my niece to our family.
• meeting my sister and her family (my godchild) for dinner because they came to Berlin to welcome the niece & cousin. It was nice.
• growing a budding friendship and meeting for lunch.
• face-timing with my best friend – no in person meeting because of circumstances and time issues. I haven’t seen her since February. It’s never been so hard to meet in all our years even with the kids being tiny. Sigh.
• a nice chat in church with my group – we decided we are going to read a book together and picked Unorthodox by Deborah Feldman. Can you believe there is no English copy available in all of Berlins libraries. I wasn’t planning on buying this book. Sigh.
• managing to catch up a bit on blog reading – 70 comments left.
• co-working with my business friend and sharing knowledge and chatting about life.

I tickeled my curious soul by

• re-installing my little fountain after a good clean.
• taking a nap one day I was utterly exhausted (100 minutes).
• stepping outside on the terrace looking at the starry night before going to bed.
• admiring a full moon (a blue moon) and doing yoga stretches by the open window.
• tending my garden and enjoying the first blossoms.
• meditating. Not much exercise but I tried different meditations and it was helpful for my soul.
• smelling the fragrance of blooming trees.

I curiously continued my health journey by

• having my skin screening done.
• using sun screen (and still getting a slight burn arghhh).
• eating herbs from my terrace garden – sorel and chives and basil so far.
• recapping my arctic trip with my trusted ChatGPT personal trainer – it was helpful and sad and much needed. It was good I took two month before getting back into.
• forming a moving forward plan in my health and fitness journey. I share more later.

I was most curious about

• side hustles and looked at a different bunch of options.

I did one new thing

• met my niece.
• learned what a blue moon is.

I managed to check off a few not so curious things

• another sudden (extended) family death.
• a femoral-neck-fracture of my parents friend who was visiting at the country home – he’s had a walking disability for all his life and I feel so sad for him and what the recover means to him.
• deep cleaning the terrace – a joint effort with the husband and it is amazingly bright now.
• clean windows – at least half. I order further mops for the window robot but they didnt arrive in time so I needed to stop otherwise it would have smeared dirt everywhere.
• a run to the recycling yard.

If this wasn’t digital I would share my niece but it is not and so you get to see this wood moth that is chilling on my terrace.

I will tickle my curious mind by
…reading that damned book I am so excited about but never pick up. → roll-over goal.
…attending the AI community call with the stat-of-AI update and co-working with my AI friend.
…attending a freelance conference for two days – a was gifted a ticket by a networking friend from my AI community.
…attending an online networking event.

I will tickle my curious life by
…planting my pre-grown veggies into the outside pots – zucchini, mangold, sugar peas and beans.
…celebrating my birthday.
…celebrating the husbands birthday.
…enjoying our two week home vacation with lots of golfing and a few other fun things. We each made a list of three things we definitely want to do. And we added a fun drinks challenge (I’ll share ore probably).

I will tickle curious connections by
…definitely seeing my best friend in June.
…meeting a church acquaintance who wants to hear all about my arctic trip – and always has great arctic book recommendations.
…brunch with my sister and the newborn.
…dinner with my parents.
…two church meetings for my volunteer role and a fare-well party for one of our pastors.

I will curiously continue my health journey by
…going to my neurology appointment and talking about my new drug. Also I need to mention possible new symptoms – three days of vertigo and queasiness but no head pain.
…making an appointment for general check-up – I need to call, unfortunately no online option.
…making an appointment with the orthopedic – I have an issue with my shoulder and I fear I have plantar fasciitis → roll-over goal.
…drinking at least one liter of water a day. Better more but let’s start here. Too much coffee lately.
…continuing to use apple fitness and testing it out. I think I want to try the HIIT and/or strength classes this month. → roll-over goal.
…getting back to better eating – fresher foods, more proteins, less sugar. → roll-over goal. Like seriously.

I will tickle my curious soul by
…watching the sky – day and night.
…yoga outside while my fountain is bubbling aways.
…catching up on my daily journal and keep being more consistent with it. → roll-over goal.

I am going to be curious about
… golf. For lack of better inspiration and for not overwhelming myself.

I will commit to the following not so curious things
…tiding my office aka craft lab. It’s a disaster and I can’t think. Let alone be creative.
…cleaning the rest of the windows.
…repairing the old laptop (the insurance will cover it – they told me the day I picked up the new one…) and figuring out if to sell it or use it as an AI device in order to test stuff.
…washing the outdoor poof covers.
…washing the couch cushions and all blankets.
…bike cleaning and maintaining. → roll-over goal – which needs to happen before the vacation is here.
…going to the piercer to finally change my jewelry – 4 5 months later than I should have. → roll-over goal. I need to put it here otherwise it’s not happening. And obviously it’s not fun so I moved it from health to this section.

Any curious things happened in your life? What are you currently curious about? Any curiosities you want to explore in June? Any book read about a curious thing?