Adventurous Kate accommodates affiliate hyperlinks. When you make a purchase order by these hyperlinks, I’ll earn a fee at no further price to you. Thanks!
A model new 12 months and right here we’re. Let’s check out every little thing that occurred in January 2025!
Locations Visited
Highlights
A pleasant, quiet month at dwelling with the cats. That is our third 12 months in a row of not going anyplace in January (aside from day journeys) and it was SO good. One of the simplest ways to begin off a productive 12 months.
A month of Dry January. I do a sober month yearly and extremely suggest it! It’s reminder to try how a lot alcohol can permeate our lives — and keep in mind easy methods to socialize with out defaulting to ingesting.
Getting again into energy coaching. One in every of my objectives has been to get again into energy coaching and truly be in line with it. I used to be within the gymnasium six days per week once I lived in New York, however I haven’t been in a position to maintain that degree of consistency in Prague.
Actually, there have been numerous suits and begins in resuming lifting weights over the previous few years. This time, I believe it’s working as a result of I began slowly and am including to it little by little.
I’ve a Peloton subscription (simply $12.99 per thirty days) and some units of weights. First, 10-minute energy exercises thrice per week. Now, 15-minute energy exercises 4 instances per week. I do know I’ll continue to grow from there.
Past that? Not so much occurred this January!
Challenges
A scary near-accident on the tram. I used to be sitting in a seat on the tram and all of the sudden the motive force hit the breaks HARD to keep away from hitting a automotive that pulled out. It was so abrupt, I flew onto my ft and smacked onerous into the plastic divider on the aspect of the doorways.
I used to be positive, however in ache the remainder of the day — and thought to myself, “If this occurred in America, somebody can be suing town.” That stated, we really get healthcare coated right here, and I’m grateful that the motive force was in a position to cease so rapidly and keep away from an precise accident.
Heaps and many vet visits. After Murray’s many medical problems with December, this month was all about Lewis. He harm himself within the eye by some means, and whereas the primary spherical of meds helped initially, his eye obtained a lot worse after we completed them.
Lewis is now on totally different meds, prescribed by a special vet, and I actually hope that they work this time. I would like my candy little bear to be again to his common self.
And giving a cat two units of eye drops — 10 minutes aside, 5 instances a day — is a ache, particularly when he was at his sickest and needed to cover underneath the mattress. At one level I needed to lay on a blanket and drag myself underneath the mattress, seize Lewis, and have Charlie pull me out by my ft. Enjoyable instances.
Weblog Posts of the Month
Most In style Reel on Instagram
My prime reel of the month is which metropolis NOT to go to in 2025. I don’t do a lot of this anti-influencing, however right here it’s warranted.
Town is Rome. 2025 is a Jubilee 12 months for the Catholic religion, which is able to maintain town further crowded and further costly all 12 months lengthy. When you’re trying to go, I’d recommend ready till 2026.
You possibly can watch the reel right here and comply with me on Instagram at @adventurouskate.
What I Listened To This Month
I’m listening to all 500 of Rolling Stone‘s 500 Biggest Albums of All Time, which I’m having fun with immensely. I’m loving discovering new artists and listening to albums I’ve by some means missed my whole life till now!
This month, I listened to albums 479-436. Listed below are the highlights:
Favourite discovery: Eli and the Thirteenth Confession by Laura Nyro. WHAT A STAR. I had by no means heard of Laura Nyro — she was a WILD singer and songwriter, insanely proficient, with a stunning soprano voice, and songs that swap tempos and melodies wildly, that may be at dwelling on Broadway.
Actually, Laura Nyro impressed a LOT of main songwriters, together with Elton John and Stephen Sondheim, and he or she wrote songs for artists like Barbra Streisand, Three Canine Night time, and Fifth Dimension.
She died younger of ovarian most cancers, as did her mom. It hurts understanding that if she had been born a couple of a long time later, she may have taken motion to forestall that. I’m grateful that extra choices, together with genetic testing, exist at the moment. And now I would like EVERYONE to know her.
Different favourite discoveries: #1 File by Huge Star, 3+3 by The Isley Brothers, Near the Edge by Sure.
Favourite revisited album: BLACKsummers’evening by Maxwell. That is one in every of my all-time favourite albums — it helped me get by 2010. I hated my job then and took a protracted stroll throughout my lunch day by day whereas listening to it.
My favourite factor about this jazz-influenced R&B album is how intimate it sounds — you possibly can inform it’s a small band, everybody taking part in off one another completely, and you’ll hear all of the individuality of the musicians. Extremely suggest giving it a pay attention.
Favourite songs: “Donde Quiera Que Estés” by Selena and Barrio Boyzz, “Ghetto Youngsters” by Juvenile, “Lu” by Laura Nyro, “You Should Be with Me” by Al Inexperienced, “Why Ought to I Be Unhappy” by Britney Spears, “Bother within the Message Centre” by Blur.
Get the playlist: I’m making a playlist of my favourite songs from the five hundred albums — most one per album — on Spotify. You possibly can hearken to it right here.
Lowlight of the month: Ege Bamyasi by CAN. This German band apparently pioneered Krautrock — that’s a factor! A lot of the album was fairly listenable, however within the center they made this AWFUL cacophony stuffed with noises like nails on a chalkboard, however turned as much as 11 — why put that on an album?!
Random thought: The proper size of an album is 35-45 minutes or so. When you transcend an hour, it begins dragging. A LOT of artists wanted to be edited down — significantly hip-hop artists from the 90s (and I say this as a HUGE 90s hip-hop fan). Some albums begin out SO nice and find yourself turning right into a drag as a result of they’ve to incorporate every little thing.
What I Watched This Month
It’s formally Oscar season! The completionist in me tries to see all of the Finest Image nominees and every little thing nominated for the main awards.
The spotlight of the month was positively Conclave — a superbly plotted, twisty, tense political thriller concerning the cardinals selecting the subsequent pope. And maybe essentially the most completely forged film I’ve seen in fairly a while. I hope Ralph Fiennes wins the Oscar.
I additionally loved A Full Unknown, which made me need to dive into Bob Dylan’s and Joan Baez’s music (there’s a LOT of that approaching the Rolling Stone record!). Anora was a enjoyable nail-biter of a film, with an unimaginable efficiency by Mikey Madison — although I want the movie had been a bit much less male gaze-y.
This month we additionally watched the second season of The Diplomat. A GREAT drama on Netflix, starring Keri Russell because the US ambassador to the UK, appointed after an act of terrorism, who uncovers a number of Actually Dangerous Stuff and has a husband who is a superb former ambassador himself, however the sort of man who makes me yell, “HER HUSBAND IS A DING-DONG!” on the display screen as soon as per episode.
They actually need to do extra episodes, although! The primary season has eight episodes and the second season has six. It has been renewed for season.
Coming Up in February 2025
Again to Mexico, child! I like Mexico SO a lot and it’s now been three years since I’ve been there — it’s time for a return.
Charlie and I, together with our good friend Nick, shall be visiting 4 locations: Mérida, Bacalar, Mexico Metropolis, and Oaxaca. 4 of my 5 favourite locations in Mexico! (Sorry, Guanajuato, we’ll miss you.)
Our agenda? Having fun with all our favourite Mexican issues, from a day at Los Rapidos in Bacalar to an evening out at Lucha Libre in Mexico Metropolis. And dealing on my Mexico content material, after all.
(I took a break from writing about Mexico after COVID hit and one million journey bloggers moved to Mexico and began area of interest Mexico blogs, making it onerous for my content material to rank — however now that just about all of these blogs have been hit onerous by Google updates, I really feel like I’m prepared to leap again in, particularly when including high quality movies on Instagram and TikTok.)
And as common, our pricey good friend and cat-sitter, John, shall be shifting in to deal with Lewis and Murray in our absence. They could love him greater than they love us.
Any plans for February? Share away!
