I like being a mess, it's who I am

My history with smart phones

2012-01-31T12:08:00.001-06:00

All throughout college I had crappy flip phones. Phones that the hinges broke on and I'd have to figure out a way to super clue pieces back together so they stuck. My dad was footing my cellphone bill back then so I didn't get new phones until I was ready for an upgrade or he switched carriers, which he did a lot while I was in college. I think I started with Cingular, then move to T-Mobile before finally landing with Sprint, who since I've always loved. I haven't had the horror stories with Sprint like so many I know and aside from a horribel Blackberry experience I've always loved my phones with them.

In fall 2007 I had been at my first real job for about 8 months and I was getting comfortable enough to take on my cell phone bill as my own responsibility- that and I'd just received a raise and wanted a cool phone instead of the dying flip phone I hated. I walked into Sprint with my dad and told the guy that I wanted to transfer the line into my own name and I wanted a new phone. The Sprint guy asked what I wanted my phone to do and I told him email, calendar and texting. My dad then jokingly added that it should also be a phone. What I got was this...

Within hours I was in love. This was the best thing ever! A Palm Centro! I had never had a smart phone before and this to me was perfect. It did everything I wanted. I could text like no one's business, email in a snap and it kept a great calendar. Yes the internet sucked and getting directions on it was no fun either. But back when I was 21 and didn't use GPS to the extent I do today or search everything on my phone, it was great! I had this phone for about a little over a year. Christmas Eve-eve 2008 it had a very unfortunate accident involving vodka, cranberry juice and more vodka. I was devastated. I couldn't live without my phone! It had my whole world on it! It was so dead I couldn't even pull the numbers I needed off of it.

Everyone told me to just get another Centro since I loved this one so much they even came in Pink then, but I wanted to upgrade, I wanted something bigger and better. I wanted something that was made for email and calendar. I thought I wanted a Blackberry!

I was so very wrong. I hated my Blackberry cure, pretty much from the moment I turned it on I hated it. I hated it's lack of color, I hate it's swirly little ball mouse, I hated how it gave directions! I hated trying to search for something. The keyboard didn't feel gummy and soft, it was hard and plastic. I hated it. Two weeks later CES announced the Palm Pre and I knew! I'd have to wait it out with the horrible Blackberry till June so I could get my Palm Pre and be done with this awful creation Blackberry.

I was somewhere outside of Houston for a wedding on June 6th, 2009 when the Pre was released. I had resigned myself that I'd just wait till I got back to San Antonio to get it, but then as I sat in my hotel room that morning trying to look up directions to the church on my Blackberry, I realized it was time. My Blackberry could not get me to the church, it kept sending me to some random parking lot with a liquor store and gas station. I went to the front desk and asked for a map to the nearest Sprint store. 20 minutes I was there...

Look! They had balloons set out for all the smart people getting new Pres!

I was number 31! This was the first and sad to say not the last time I paid a ridiculous amount for a new phone. "Ma'am you contract isn't up till next January you phone will be $5,000" "What?!?!" Just kidding it wasn't $5,000 but at the time that's what it felt like. Luckily it was totally worth it.

Look at this beauty! Look at that Palm Pre! Loved it! Not as much as I loved my centro, but the keyboard felt completely natural. I had every intention of keeping this bad boy for two years, but unfortunately after I started dating Bruce the darn things started breaking constantly and I started having to use my insurance to replace it. I'm not blaming Bruce for the destruction of a lot of Pres, but I'm just saying you can't argue with timing.

Nothing ever felt wrong with the Pre, it wasn't like the Blackberry thank god, it did everything I asked it to and it did it well. I honestly had no complaints. Then that damn January came back and I learned about all the fancy new phones coming out in the summer and I got phone envy. Then this happened...

6AM on June 4th, 2010 I found myself in line at the Quarry Sprint store! What happened? There were no balloons, I was first in line out like maybe 15-20 other people. The kick stand it totally wat intrigued me at first. This phone is awesome, I really like it. Again another step better then my previous phone. It does everything I need it to (except sync to my UTSA calendar, but there's an app for that so it's cool). Bruce had total phone envy and after he'd broken his 4th Pre, I'd honestly lost count he eventually upgraded to a cool new Android phone too.

Now it's 2012, no cool CES phone caught my eye. I'm satisfied with my Evo, it does what I ask I never have problems with it. But come June what am I going to do? I don't think I'll want another Evo, but none of the other Android phones out right now are piquing my interest. I go back an forth daily about wanting an iPhone, can I disable Siri if I get an iPhone? Cause that shit scares me. Are there are new Androids coming along down the pipes? Where is the next Centro? I loved my Centro, I will always consider it my favorite phone. Maybe because it was my first, maybe because it was Red, maybe because I don't have a good reason, but for now the Evo will do, maybe I'll hang on to it till something new and cool comes out and just save up my new phone credit. Who knows...

Year of the Nook

2012-01-27T12:47:00.002-06:00

I got my first nook in January 2010. I initially bought it for use as pictured, for the cruise and for the first vacation I was taking in 3 years. Between grad school and a job that took up a ridiculous amount of time I barely had time to read for fun. My first generation nook was a close to $300 investment I was willing to make in order to get back to one of my favorite pastimes reading.

It Sucked and Then I Cried was the first nook book I read. I followed it up with Never Let Me Go, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and Shit My Dad Says on the cruise. The rest of the year I read more bubble-gum books The Facebook book, all the Chelsea Handler books and Kristen Chenowith's bio. I was instantly in love with my nook. I loved that I could switch reading a book instantly and not have to carry 5 books with me constantly in case I got bored with whichever one I was currently reading.

In 2011 I read 21 books. I didn't ready the entire first half of the year. I was finishing my masters, getting married and buying a house, there wasn't a lot of time for anything extra. But in July I hit the ground running. In August I read all 7 Harry Potter Books. I hadn't read them before because I started watching the movies first and didn't want to read the books before I finished all the movies- yes I knows it's usually the other way around, but I like my way better- it also prevented me from having to wait. Throughout the fall I read the first two Sookie Stackhouse books but didn't get into them so I didn't read the next 5 till December when I had a lot of time of my hand. Earlier in the summer I read Theatre Geek about theatre camp in the Catskills, it made me super nostalgic for high school. In mid fall I reread The Hunger Games trilogy for the 3rd or 4th time I've lost count. Before Breaking Dawn part one I thought it'd be fun to reread the Twilight books...man was I wrong. I only made it half way through New Moon before giving up because I just couldn't inflict it on myself anymore. It had been a good couple of years since I'd read them and now I wonder why. I read a free nook book called Garden Spells that was cute, but nothing too special. Then in November on a trip to El Paso I read Robopocalypse and decided that the robots were going to come kill me in my sleep if I ever bought an iPhone or drove a car that could drive itself. OMG it was the scariest book I'd read since I read House of Leaves that one summer at camp. I followed up the scary with the beautifully visual The Night Circus. This was a sweet book, I loved living inside the circus and could perfectly see everything described. Before Christmas my fabulous husband Bruce got me a new nook, the nook Simple Touch. I love it! The first book I read on it was Ready Player One, it was a totally fun read full of 80s pop culture and insight into the gaming world that I know nothing about. I ended the year reading Sookie Stackhouse Novels and started the new year continuing to read them.

2012- I read the rest of the currently published Sookie Stackhouse books those first two weeks of the new year. They're addictive, seriously. I enjoyed the total bubble-gumness of them. You didn't have to think while you read them you could just enjoy the absurdity of it and the continued stupidity of women when they love vampires. It's great. After I finished the 11th book I still wanted more. I read of a book of short stories about the same characters and the companion book that had a short novella in it. I was desperate for more Stackhouse universe! It was sad. I seriously almost freaked out on Bruce when we could find a digital copy of the most recent one. Yes I have an ebook problem. Then I read The Thirteenth Tale I frequently describe this book as a good read for people who like good books. There are a lot of literary references and its a fun mystery. By the time I finished Thirteenth I was eagerly anticipating the release of a new Orson Scott Card book that was supposed to be an addition to the Ender's Shadow series. Shadows in Flight was supposed to be released on January 17th, both book and ebook editions. THE EBOOK WASN'T RELEASED. It seriously ruined my day. I was angry. Everyone knew I was angry and I needed wine. The ebook will eventually be released, but not in it's entirety till 2013. To say I'm pissed would be a HUGE understatement. When I have an extra $15 I'll pay for the first edition hardback, which is fine I have all the other shadow books in first edition hardback anyways, but I wanted to be able to instantly read it everywhere I went and I couldn't. And it ruined the world. OK- over exaggerations over. I wanted to read something familiar. My go to book sight GoodReads has an ebook section you can download books from and it was there I found the James Potter series- yes I know it's fan fiction and can never truly live up to JKs originals, but it was getting really good reviews. So I read the first James Potter book (you can read it online for free too) and it was really good. Not great or amazing but really good. It felt very natural and fit back into the HP world with ease. I totally cried thinking about all the original characters but I really enjoyed it. I didn't want to read the next one right away I wanted some time to sit so I read Mindy Kaling's adorable book. It was light and fun and more good bubble gum.

So I'm currently addicted to Goodreads. It's a great place to keep track of the books you've read, the books you're currently reading and then the books you can't to read. And beyond that you can categorize the books you have too- I only have two categories right now, favorites and bubble gum. Based on these lists it recommends books to you, it also lets you interact with friends, join book groups and fan authors. You can comment on what your friends are reading, look at their book lists and more. It's great.

One feature I'm really fond of is the currently reading section. It lets you track your progress. Mine is very telling. I have been reading Sophie's World since I was 15. I bought in paperback at Half Price Books and kept in my first 4 cars. Whenever I had a little extra time I'd pick it up and read a little. Its a cool book about the history of philosophy and I always really enjoy it while I'm reading it, but never enough to keep me wanting to read it as my main book. I found a digital copy of it so I have it on my phone in case the inspiration to read more of it ever strikes...it hasn't yet. I started 1Q84 this year and since I only have it in ebook I didn't know how massive it was. I read the first two chapters and was like wow this is pretty interesting and I went to update Goodreads about my progress and that's when I found out that it had over 900 pages. I'll come back to that one. I started the second James Potter book and so far it's good except at the beginning a very beloved character dies and it made me sad. Loose Girl is a really interesting book so far about all the reason why this woman thinks she became promiscuous at a certain time in her life. It's really interesting.

I like the reading challenge part. You get to set a goal for yourself and then work towards it. Last year my goal was 25 which I missed by 4 books. This year my goal is 55 but I'm already ahead of where I need to be. Eventually I'm sure I'll go through my phases where I'll be watching more TV than reading or get distracted and wont be able to find the book I really want to read. But by the end of January I'm hoping to have at least two more books to that list and I'll have made a pretty good start.

I love to read. I unfortunately sometimes ignore Bruce cause I'm reading so much, but I just get so lost in my books. I love to completely submerge myself in books. In middle school I used to drag all my blankets and pillows into the bathroom and pile them all inside my bathtub so I could just lock myself away for the weekend with my books and cd player. I could stay in there all day reading feeling all nestled in and allow myself to be completely taken over by the world inside my books.

I love Christmas, but I kinda wish it would go away already

2011-12-23T08:47:00.001-06:00

I just can't get into the Christmas spirit this year. I just can't do it! I've tried, really I have. I watched "Love Actually" with Bruce while decorating our tree and living room. We watched "Hook" because he said it was a Christmas movie. I watched "Mean Girls" while steaming my couches cause hey there's a Christmas scene in it. I just haven't felt Christmasy.

Usually by Thanksgiving evening I turn my radio to the San Antonio Christmas Station and listen to nothing else to Christmas Day. But this year I kept getting so annoyed with it and switched back to Garbage on my iPod, or Drive-By Truckers. I just couldn't do it! At work I was sometimes able to listen to the Pandora Christmas station, mostly because they played a lot of Michael Buble Christmas music and I do love me some Buble. I compromised and listened to Rent- totally a Christmas musical- but had to keep turning it down so my office neighbors wouldn't hear the lyrics.

As of Monday I had yet to buy a single Christmas gift. I had barely given it a thought! I just couldn't figure out what to get everyone! I started going out on my lunch breaks and knocked out some of the family members on my list but still it felt like I was just getting it out of the way.

I just don't feel Christmasy!!! Maybe it's because it's my first Christmas since I left SAC, maybe it's because money has been tight this year, maybe it's because mama almost died earlier this year, maybe it's because I haven't sang Christmas Karaoke ONCE this year! maybe it's because Haley has a baby and everything will forever be different, maybe it's because I bought a house this year, maybe it's because in the next few years we may have a baby, maybe it's because I don't have a chimney, maybe it's because I'm afraid my puppies will eat my Christmas tree and it's behind a baby gate, maybe it's because we're all getting older and we'll all forever be different.

Maybe it's because I didn't watch Ally McBeal. Usually this time of year I re-watch Ally McBeal and see all the fabulous Christmas episodes. The one with the Christmas Unicorn, the one where Elaine finds a baby in Jesus' spot in a manger. The one where Elaine tries to sing with Taye Diggs pissing off Renee. But Ally McBeal always makes me super emotional and Haley says I can't watch it unless I'm in a different frame of mind (she says that in her way).

I don't know, I'm just in a Christmas funk. I haven't wanted to watch "Prancer" or "Little Women" or "Meet Me In St. Louis" either.

I did at least discover a new Christmas song that I am in love with and whenever I hear it this year it does make me happy.

I hate scary movies...I'm scared

2011-11-01T09:48:00.000-05:00

I hate scary movies. I get scared looking at my backyard with the porch light off. I get scared when AC kicks on suddenly after its been quiet for a few minutes. I can scare myself, I really don't need my movies help with that. I can scare myself to sleeplessness just thinking about scary movies I haven't even seen. I'm a wimp, I know it and I'm fine with it.

When I was a kid my dad really liked scary movies and would often watch them in the bedroom where I would casually walk in and get an eye full of Chucky (From Child's Play) burning in a fire and then coming back to life with a glowing red eye. I would then procede to run screaming from the bedroom and out the front door of the house all together. In later years I would running screaming from the room when daddy watched Predator, Alien, the Omen, or Alfred Hitchcock Presents. So it's only fitting that my father would take me to see scary movies in theaters when I got old enough. It's not just horror films, busy scary Sci-Fi really gets me too. With my father I saw Jurassic Park (ran and hid outside of the theatre during the Raptor scenes), Blair Witch Project, Event Horizon and Signs. He really should have known better, after the Blair Witch Project I slept with the light on for weeks. We saw Jurassic Park in the theater 6 times and every time I ended up in the theater lobby waiting for the man in the outhouse to get eaten by the T-Rex and the kids to be safe from the Raptors in the kitchen.

There were some scary movies I could deal with, I never found Poltergeist too traumatizing, I'm not one of those peoples who finds clowns scary. I could watch Carrie and the Shining no problem. In high school I thought I was getting better, I wanted to be brave and thought maybe I had outgrown my fear. My senior year I saw the Ring with some friends and remembering clawing my escort through his leather jacket so hard his harm was bruised afterwards. My friends had extra fun teasing me a few weeks later when at a lock-in at the Magic Children's Theatre they pointed out a cabinet that had what looked like the Ring tree etched into it. One of them hid inside it to jump out at me while I screamed my head off to their laughter. Apparently I didn't learn my lesson that time cause at the end of my senior year I went to the movies with the same group to see 28 Days Later and slept with my lights on till I left for college that August.

Throughout college I successfully avoided scary movies till my last semester, unless you consider Harry Potter scary, which sometimes it totally is. I took a group of residents when I was an RA to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and one girl told me when a scary part was coming and I still managed to scream and startle the half of the theatre that didn't find the final maze particularly creepy. My last semester at TLU I decided to take a Film Studies class just for fun. It ended up being a difficult class but what was worse was I saw on the syllabus later in the semester one of our in class viewings was going to be Alien. OMG are you serious? I was going to have to watch Alien in class with my professor and peers. I warned my professor that I tend to scream during scary movies and then rush out of the room quickly so I don't die. He told me that I could scream all I want but that I had to stay and watch the whole movie. I tried to surround myself with students who had seen it before and asked them to warn me of the scary parts. But apparently they were all taking notes when the scary things happened and I ended up screaming every 20 minutes whether things were scary or not.

A few years later again wishing I had outgrown the scary I saw I Am Legend on a date. Horrible, horrible idea. At the time I lived by myself on the third floor in my apartment complex. I liked it cause it was quiet, well that was why I usually liked it, but after watching that movie I was convinced the scary vampire zombies were going to skip the bottom floors and break down my door to eat me. Lights stayed on in the entire apartment for a week.

When I started dating Bruce a few years later to my inner-chicken's nightmare he turned out to like scary movies. Although he had some serious delusions on what actually was scary versus what was really scary. Zombieland is not funny, it is scary and you will suffer for making me watch it. Sean of the Dead is NOT funny, it's scary and I will sleep with the lights on cause you made me watch it. No I will not see Paranormal Activity 1, 2, or 3 with you cause they are scary. I don't care how campy the scary movie may be, or if it's a parody of other scary movies, I don't do Zombies and if scary things happen in Space I will probably die, while I can appreciate that Event Horizon was a cool movie, it still scares me and the fact that Sam Neil was also in Jurassic Park means that he'll forever be uber scary to me. I think by now Bruce has come to terms with the fact that I don't do scary movies and I like to think that it is one of the last things I can blame on my dad. Maybe if I hadn't seen Chucky rise out of the ashes of that fireplace with a knife as a 5 year old all would have been fine.

What made me think of this the day after Halloween? I've seen a surprising amount of these movies on io9's list.

My Sister is Making me an Aunt

2011-10-22T20:45:00.001-05:00

A month from today my little nephew is scheduled to make his highly anticipated debut. November 22nd, 2011 is a day I have been waiting for since Haley got married. My sister, my best friend and future mother of my nephew is having a baby! This act along with my marriage, my home, Master's Degree and my new job round out 2011 as one of the best years I've ever had. I'll never forget the day she told me besides my wedding day and I'm sure the day Isaac Archer Swift enters the world, the day she told me she was becoming a mother was one of the best days ever.

The spring was so busy with my new job, internship and preparation for the wedding I didn't really want to do anything special for my birthday. So the Friday of my birthday week I met mom, Haley and Greg for lunch. We went to Yardhouse at LaCantera and had a big booth in a mostly open dining room. Mama ordered appetizers and a bloody mary, I couldn't have one cause I had to go back to work. When Haley and Greg got there we ordered and then they told me I should open presents even though I had previously said I didn't want any. Mama gave me vodka :) thanks mom it was delicious. And Haley's gift was in a bag with a box that said Coach a card and a folded piece of paper. I went straight for the Coach box but Haley scolded me saying there was a card in there first. When I open the card and the folded piece a paper there's a sonogram in there. I screamed. I screamed like in the movies and the other 5 diners in the restaurant turned to look at me, mom asked what's wrong and I announced to the room "sorry, my sister just told me she's having a baby". Like in the movies people clapped and then I started to cry buckets. I hugged my beautiful sister and greg and stared and stared at my future nephew.

Since that moment at lunch I've been so excited. I still get misty eyed when I think of Haley telling me and I think about her becoming a mother. Throughout her pregnancy I've done research with her on numerous baby products, read customer reviews, mommy blogs and shopped in the baby sections. I've talked to her after all her doctors appointments and asked about the baby every time we speak. I've worried with her if she thought something was wrong and screamed for joy when everything goes as it's supposed to. I can't wait for November and the joys it'll bring.

Haley is my best friend and my sister and that's the best combination because it's a relationship that cannot be broken. While we may fight and argue ALL THE TIME, we never stop loving each other. Once Mr. Isaac gets here our worlds will change forever, our relationship will change forever but it'll all be for the love of a child which makes it okay. I love Haley and Greg and Isaac more and more everyday. I'm so excited to be an Aunt and so excited to be the sister and best friend of the woman having this baby.

Puppies and Ringworms

2011-09-28T21:41:00.003-05:00

Bruce and I are now the very happy owners of two beautiful puppy goddess.

Hera the Goddess of Women

Hera is our beautiful German Shepherd Dog. She's almost 5 months old and feisty as hell. She's got her puppy teeth and isn't afraid to use them. She is my puppy. If we're home alone together and she can't see me she'll come find me, she likes to keep me in her sight. If Bruce is home that's another matter- then she's usually attacking his feet. She knows her name and comes running when you call her. She's a beautiful beautiful dog and I can't wait to see her grow up.

Helia is a Sun Goddess (previously Akai)

Helia is our mutt...kinda. The Vet said she's a Red Heeler, but it's very obvious there is something else in her too. When she walks she totally looks part boxer so we'll see when she gets older. She is a total sweetheart. Her puppy teeth are still kinda dull so it takes her a little while to eat her treats and if she doesn't eat them fast enough Hera lets her know by stealing them. Helia had a rough start to life, she was tied up with wire and left in an ant pile- so when GaDaH-SA got her she had tons of cuts and a rash. Most are all healed up but her tail is still super sensitive and if Hera gets a hold of it she cries and then runs away.

We were originally supposed to just have the one pup but Bruce's heart melted for Helia so we had to take her too. Helia and Hera love to play all the time, especially when Bruce is around. With me they're cool to just chill and nap in the living room. They do know the tricks though and sometimes wont come back in the house unless enticed by a treat. They love the big backyard and can run around in it all day if we'd let them. They've found weaknesses in our fence a few times and escaped- luckily only going as far as the neighbors front flower bed.

We have them still sectioned off in the front of the house and Sookie the Viking Kitty has the whole back to herself. Every once in a while while the puppies are out in the living room she'll come to the baby gate and torment them, then I can't get them to leave this spot till she goes back away.

We don't plan to keep them separated forever, just temporarily. While they get over...

RINGWORMS!

ICK! My poor babies came down with ringworms. One day I notices a spot missing hair on Hera's nose and then it started to get bigger. Then I noticed she had more on the tummy. On Helia it was harder to tell since she had already had some spots on her from her previous life as an abandoned pup. It was so sad I felt terrible for the puppies. I took them to the vet and met up with GaDaH-SA Jenny and the vet told us what I already new, that they were in fact ring worms and that both of them had it pretty bad. The vet gave us some antibiotics and an anti-fungal pill to give them daily.

Hera's look to be healing quite nicely but poor Helia got them bad on her tail. And she wont leave it alone! Yesterday before I went to work I noticed some dried blood on the floor in the kitchen and soon realized it was coming from Helia's tail. She has been biting the thing raw. I called the vet for advice and she told us to give the meds a little more time to work but in the meantime to wash it and try to put some of the ringworm ointment on it. So last night Bruce and I cleaned it off with hydrogen peroxide and then slathered it up with ointment. She screamed and cried throughout the whole thing and hid in Bruce's lap. Luckily this morning things looked so much better. Her tail was pink again and looked less irritated. We'll probably keep washing it daily for a little bit now. But I think she'll be okay.

For now both pups seem to be taking the medicine pretty well. But their puppy-mama cannot stand to see them sad or in pain. So every little wince and wimper breaks my heart. After puppies with ringworms hopefully it'll only get better. They have already filled our house with such love, I know it will only grow.

Puppies! Puppies! Puppies!

2011-09-07T07:37:00.002-05:00

A little more than a year ago Bruce and I adopted our cat Sookie. She's a beautiful 20 lb Maine Coon and we're totally in love with her. She's everything a cat should be, lovable when she wants to be, weird most of the time and a total bitch when it suits her best. I have an entire album on Facebook dedicated to the furry mess so I may be a little more in love with her than Bruce.

Sookie the Viking Kitty

We've always talked about getting a dog when we were finally in a house, cause its just not fair for a pup not to have a yard. When we've talked about dogs German Shepherds always came up over and over. So after we got in the house I started looking online. Most of the summer I found nothing, but since we had rescued Sookie we wanted to try and rescue again, there are just sooo many good dogs out there that need homes. In early August however I got lucky and found a rescued German Shepherd PUPPY! I was amazed! You never find German Shepherd Puppies that are rescued- I think it's cause they're too damn cute!

This is Hera.

Hera was rescued by Give a Dog a Home- San Antonio in May with her sister Athena. Unfortunately Athena died from Parvo and then Hera got pneumonia. Hera has been off her antibiotics for a week now and seems to be doing great. She goes back to the Vet today for her final check up and if she's all cleared we could be getting her very very soon. Adopting Hera is a very interesting process theres a 6 page application, 2 reference letters from non-family members and a reference letter from your vet. After that there's an in-home visit and a two week trail period. If all goes well with the Vet today then we should have the home visit this weekend and start our trail period next week- I'm super excited.

The lady who runs the dog rescue is really awesome and has invited us into her home to spend time with Hera while she's been sick. The first time we visited about 2 1/2 weeks ago Hera didn't have a lot of energy and we mostly played with the other dogs. She has 4 full grown German Shepherds of her own PLUS 1 she's fostering and 3 puppies. It's dog-city there. The second visit was just me and Hera had just finished her antibiotics and had become very playful. She played all around with this cute Red Heeler pup and then kept coming back to me to make sure I was watching.

Hera and Akia playing together

I'll figure out how to rotate the video later and edit it...If you have suggestions let me know :)

Last night Bruce was able to come again and got to see Miss Hera in all her puppy glory, but Bruce of course fell IN LOVE with another dog! The nerve of him! Little Miss Akia both times has come over to him and fallen asleep on his lap and licked him and just shown a more all around interest in him than Hera. Hera likes me better and will definitely stick by my side if things get too rough in the dog house for her. So now we are discussing the two dogs and its horrible. I still have my heart set on Hera because she's more protective and you can already tell that she'd be a good loyal Shepherd, but Akia is also very very sweet and adorable but we don't know all that in her, we see some Red Heeler but there could also be pit bull and so we just don't know what to expect. Either way we've told Sookie about the incoming dog and she is not happy...it's okay Sookie don't cry mama still loves you.

Is it fall yet?

2011-07-27T15:30:00.000-05:00

I love summer. I love love love summer. I do. I love to wear sundresses, go swimming in the river, go swimming period and I love getting at tan and toasty. BUT this summer has been hellacious. I know we don't have it as bad as some people and I know we are truly truly blessed to have what we do have, but has anyone besides me been keeping a record of all the horrible things that have happened this summer? It seems like everyday in the news this summer someone has died, killed themselves, been raped, been on trial for being a horrible person, shot up a summer camp- I mean it's been an icky icky no good summer all around. So when compared to all of that my summer stuff doesn't seem nearly as bad, but it sure as hell is enough to make me wish it was fall already.

Top Five Reasons Why Tyler's Summer Was Crappy
5- Summer started out with my mother in a coma for 6 days and in a hospital for a month
4- Bruce and I had to cancel our honeymoon and may not get the money back for the cruise
3- The day after my mom got out of the hospital my Grandma fell and broke her hip
2- The week after Bruce stopped being able to see out of one eye one day and had to get eye surgery to fix that 1- In July my Grandfather (mom's dad) died

While the first four have all been taken care of. My mom is doing amazingly (even though the doctors don't know what the hell happened). My grandma recovered like a pro and was in the hospital and therapy less than a week. Bruce's eye healed up and he can see as well as he could before. We rescheduled our honeymoon for next week, it's no cruise, but it is Vegas and we love the place.

The only one that isn't really fixed or taken care of is my Grandfather dying. There really never is any fixing it when someone dies, but all you can do is take comfort in the fact that if they were in pain or suffering then they aren't anymore.

Maybe it would be more appropriate to say that I have had an emotional summer or a emotionally crappy summer, because all of this on it's own would normally of course not be okay, but it wouldn't constantly feel like the hits keep coming. Small things have gone wrong, small things that seem so inconsequential to anyone else but when piled together with the frustration the rest of the summer has been are enough to make me constantly tired and drained. Small things missing my graduation cause my mom was in the hospital. I still graduated so I can be happy about that, but it feels like it just passed and was very unnoticed because we were all doing something else vastly more important. Another think like the pretty flowers my cousin and I planted dying- even though I watered them everyday and they sure got plenty of sunlight. My art exhibit not getting the supplies needed till the day before the exhibit opened. My washing machine deciding to stop spin drying clothes forcing me to hand wring them before throwing them in the dryer.

Small very petty things I know, but it's been a long, hot, emotional summer and I'm just ready for it to be over with. We go to Vegas next week and when we get back it'll be a sprint for school to start and hopefully then things will get back to normal and less stressful and way less emotional.

On the opposite side some very good things have happened this summer to counteract all the bad.
#2 Haley found out she's having a boy! Which is the best news ever
and
#1 Mama woke up even when the stupid doctors told us to pull the plug- and as long as I keep thinking of that number one thing then everything else totally seems doable.

The Problem With My Kitchen

2011-07-08T11:33:00.001-05:00

OMG I love my kitchen. I really really do, it's open and has a huge window (currently concealed behind Bruce's tapestry thing) and it's just big enough for two people. But...once I got all my stuff in there I realized it's definitely too small to have what I would normally like to have out on the counters out on the counters, if I ever want to do any serious cooking. Which as of today I have still yet to cook anything on my stove top...I know, I'm a bad wife.

Here's the problem...

Here's a better view of the problem...

I have very little counter space to begin with. Currently the microwave has to live on the counter because there is no where else to put it. In a perfect world I'd be able to mount it above the range but the headroom above the range is already too shallow. The kitchen aide can really only go on top of the counter- and it's way too pretty to hide away anyways. The blender usually lives on top of the counter as well because I use it like everyday. All my cookbooks currently live on the counter because I don't have my super awesome wall spice racks turned into bookshelves yet. The waffle iron shouldn't be on the counter I don't know why it's there but I'll move it immediately when I get home. The dish drying rack I guess can move into the left sink but really what else am I supposed to use the counters space above the dishwasher for.

BUT even if I move all those things and organize a little better- I still have very little cabinet room. The bottom cabinets are TINY. I only have two drawers. The cabinet to the right of the sink is really narrow. And my pantry well I'll deal with the pantry later, I really really dislike the pantry but I'll make it work. But like I said I still love my kitchen. More than two people can stand in it- which is a vast improvement from the narrow, narrow, narrow kitchen we had at the apartment. I like to be able to turn around in my kitchen and take a step back and all those little things.

This I do not see as a problem, except for the rug thing hung over the window.

This area doesn't bother me. It's the perfect size for the table and it'll work fine. Once we pull the table out a little bit you'll even be able to walk behind it and I'll have plenty of room on the wall for my plates. The tapestry is concealing the sliding doors and a 1 1/2' space between the sliding door and the other wall. It's a lot narrower than I thought. So I'm either gonna have to get smaller spice racks, or just figure something else out, but I do still want my cookbooks there. And drapes, drapes, drapes, gonna have to figure out how to have them but not hide that little space on the wall otherwise my whole plan will fall apart and I'll cry.

Sookie likes it when I pull the tapestry up cause then she can see outside and sit in the sunbeams. Not relevant to the post but Sookie's cute.

Anyways so yesterday I did work a little more on the decorating stuff and went to Hobby Lobby. I love Hobby Lobby, they always always have sales and coupons online. Coupons + Sales = lots of savings. Guess what I found?

PLATES! On sale for $2 down from $7 I only bought one but if I go back later this summer and they are marked down more I'll buy 'em. I got the Asparagus one cause it's yellow.

Then since wall hangars were already cheap $1.99 no matter the side I snatched up one of each size so I could test them with my plates to see which'll work. And then because frames were 50% off I bought a couple large sized clip frames, cause I can't pick out real frames to save my life and everything looks nice in a clip frame. All in all I spent very little at Hobby Lobby and will go back next week to check out what new sales they're having.

Current plate collection is kinda sad- that big wedding plate though is HUGE 17" diameter luckily my plate hanger works up to 18", the blue one looks way cooler in person and the IHOP one looks loved.

Garden Ridge aka This Place is Huge

2011-07-07T11:31:00.000-05:00

Day One of my "getting serious about decorating" plan and we went to Garden Ridge. This first trip really should have been all about looking cause there is just so much there! My awesome decorating friend Jenn said to tackle one room at a time and give yourself a budget. I'm really bad at following directions. I chose three rooms to complete before the Housewarming party- one in which I have absolutely no control of how it turns out- cause I'm crazy. So my big goals are the kitchen and the living room, and I'm starting with the kitchen first because it only has two walls and one of those walls is tiny! Which means in my head there's less to decorate in there- yay! But while I was at Garden Ridge I forgot that I was starting with my kitchen first and got lost in the football field of frames and mirrors.

Anyways- I've made a mental note to take before and after pictures of my kitchen and promise to eventually post them, but basically my kitchen is a rectangle with 2 and 3/4 of the walls taken up by counters, pantry, fridge and walkway. So I have one full wall behind the kitchen table and to the right of the sliding glass doors that lead to the patio. All the appliances in the kitchen are white, the cabinets are a very pale, pale weird wood color (pictures to come I promise), my dining table is not a pale wood color but a medium-light wood color with chairs that have Christmas trees on them and green seats. I have two black and white checkerdy mats on the floor and under the table- cause they looked cool and I had yet to pick a theme for the kitchen. Above the cabinets there is space and one day that space will have plants (fake ones) and pitchers- because someone told me that's what I should do and I turn down no free decorating advice.

In my head I see my kitchen as a warm cozy place that I'll be cooking in very frequently. Cooking things like Chicken Sinegalese, Chicken Piccatta, Greek Gyros with homemade tzatziki sauce, Carrot Cake and hundreds of thousands of Green Smoothies (just because they're cold doesn't mean it doesn't involve cooking). Currently most of my counter space is taken up by my microwave, 12 cookbooks, my kitchen aide stand mixer, dish rack and my Black & Decker blender/food processor that I'm in love with. To solve the counter space problem the little sliver of a wall that's left between the sliding door and the other wall would be perfect for some spice rack book shelves. Then the only piece of decorating that I'll actually be creating myself will be the plate wall! I love plate walls! They remind me of this next door neighbor we had growing up who had a wall that was covered in coffee mugs, none of them matched but it still always looked homey and fabulous- Right now my plate collection consists of 4 plates I've deemed wall worthy- one is the plate Haley gave me for the wedding that everyone signed it's HUGE and will be the center piece, another is this plate my ex-best friend Robynne stole for me from IHOP a hundred years ago when we worked there in high school, the 3rd plate is a plate that has a shoe on it- a cute dessert plate, and the 4th is an awesome blue eye shaped plate with sparkles that I found for $4 at Garden Ridge. My rule for the plate wall is that all plates have to be under $5 and I'll just buy them as I find them- I'm gonna hit up thrift stores and goodwill to find more. Other than that the kitchen will need curtains over the sliding door- right now Bruce has an old tapestry thing hung up over it and while nice it does not match my vision or allow for easy access- also it blocks out too much natural light- it's gotta go. Then the pitchers and vines must be located for above the cabinets. Hey I found vines at Garden Ridge-

Too many vines if you ask me. In the first house I lived in my mom had REAL ivy that grew all over the tops of the cabinets and it was really nice, but I kill plants so I don't want to have dead plants on top of my cabinets. But there are soooo many types of fake Ivy out there too and I don't wanna spend $15 on fake plants for on top of my cabinets- I'll wait for Hobby Lobby to have a sale.

Back to Garden Ridge- so wandering through the HUGE Garden Ridge Pottery we found frames, mirrors and wall art. Bruce got lost in the wall art for a while and I looked at mirrors. The theme for my living room is kinda early my couches are moss green and I'm gonna have this beautiful picture of the trees at my mom's house from the wedding. So with that minimal idea my living room needs a mirror-

Like this one!

Partially obstructed mirros are cool

Or this one- mind my legs

This one was neat too the metal was different hues of natural colors

I kinda liked this one too- the leaves might be too much though

The plain-est three different size mirrors might be nice.

We're getting a hutch from Bruce's mom the weekend of the housewarming party, so unfortunately I wont have it early enough to really play around with everything before the party, so I'm making due with a picture and my minds-eye (which is a horrible thing to trust). I image the hutch to the left of the back wall of the living room and to the right of the hutch a mirror or mirrors. Then on the wall opposite of the mirror the picture of the trees at my mom's house. Another room with only two walls to decorate- it makes me happy. Then I start thinking about curtains and want to hang myself... there are two windows in my living room...sigh

So at Garden Ridge we were really overcome by home much stuff they had- furniture, clothing, luggage, kitchen stuff and cheap suits of armor (Bruce wants one). I ended up getting a big beverage dispenser for the party for my Sangria I'm making, a big bowl for ice and that cool eye shaped blue plate for the plate wall. Not a very good first shopping trip, I'm hoping tonight's excursion to Hobby Lobby goes better. But I still feel like there's lots of time so no worries yet.

I don't have the decorating gene...

2011-07-06T11:33:00.001-05:00

I bought a house! Well back in April I bought a house, before the wedding, before mama went to the hospital, before my lease was up and before I graduated. The house was a part of the wedding deal we made with the 'rents. Instead of having a big big wedding both my parents generously donated towards the down payment of the house. So with their contributions, my own, help from my grandma and my not too horrible then credit I was able to get a nice little house on the North East side of town.

In May 2010 Bruce and I officially moved in together in a new apartment in the same complex I was already living in, we moved into a 2 bedroom, 2 bath pretty good sized apartment. 7 things went on the walls of that apartment in the year we lived there. 2 posters Bruce wanted, 2 pictures I've had since High School, 2 cork/message boards and one big kissing poster Haley gave me for my old apartment. That was it! Nothing else. To say we never really decorated is a huge understatement, we did nothing to that apartment except live there for a year and make a mess of the living room. So when we bought the house I knew I was in trouble cause if you're living somewhere for more than a year you really should decorate. Crap.

We officially moved in on May 21st, we were delayed because mama decided to take a three week vacation in the hospital- she's doing fine now and we were happy to delay our move for her...really we were happy to cause we hadn't packed a thing as of May 3rd anyway. We took another month to finally get every out of the apartment and on June 19th I turned in our apartment keys!

My step-mom helped us find and get the house and she kept asking me about a housewarming party- I said we'd do it eventually once things settled down. On June 24th I realized we hadn't unpacked a thing in our house (except our 300 DVDs and part of the kitchen) yet and it was starting to annoy me. So I made Bruce and I pick a date for our housewarming party. Since July is also his birthday month (the big 30) and I graduated during mom's vacay in the hospital, I made the executive decision to combine the three in hopes of getting more people to come celebrate. We picked July 30th because it was still in his b-day month and cause Haley said we had to do it that weekend- she's pregnant and scary and if you don't do what she says she may sit on you.

So with a deadline in mind I started trying to get serious about unpacking. Then I realized that I'd have to decorate this house as well BEFORE that deadline- or at least start. I can't have a bunch of people coming over for a party and have absolutely nothing on the walls- cause right now even today with 17ish days to go there is still NOTHING on those walls. My good friend Jenn has a nack for decorating (apparently she has the decorating gene- B) and has volunteered to help me figure out what the hell I'm doing. She told me to pick just a couple of rooms to try to get done before the party. I chose the kitchen, living room and guest bathroom because they're the main rooms that will be seen during the house warming party.

Will I reach my goal? Will my house be unpacked and decorated by the 30th? I sure hope so, we have more furniture coming in the 24th and then the weekend of the housewarming so hopefully it'll all fit!!!

The Things I Got to Call Work! My First Job 2007-2011

2011-01-09T13:18:00.000-06:00

March 2007- January 2011

Here are some memories through pictures and one video of my time at San Antonio college

Trying to be in chronological order...

May 2007- I was able to go with a student organization and Posadas to Monterrey, Mexico. We took about 30 students and saw museums, the country side and some rural towns where the students taught children English songs and rhymes. One day a tour bus took us to a park/resort and we were able to either climb up the mountain or take a donkey- Posadas opted for the donkey but I walked and saw beautiful waterfalls.

May 2007 outside of Monterrey Mexico

February 2008- I got to play with an armadillo which was super exciting for me cause I alway thought they carried leprosy. The were racing the armadillos which I'm sure would upset animal support groups but the handlers assured me they were fine....

February 2008 Armadillo Races at Wild West Rodeo Roundup

April 2008- The Student Activity Fee partially sponsored the production of Beauty and the Beast, Posadas choreographed it and I got to be a part of the ensemble- it was great! Totally reminded me of NESA. It was fun to go to rehearsal, put on costumes and make-up and perform two weeks in a row- obviously this was before I started grad school...

Spring 2008 Beauty and the Beast

April 2008- For the rewards Banquet Posadas let us bring back a band we liked called Fort Pastor. They are great guys totally cool and relaxed. The first time they came in the fall of 2007 I took them on a tour of downtown and we went to the riverwalk. This time they came was during fiesta so I took them around Market Square, Alamo plaza and back to the riverwalk. Jono from Australia even wore a SAC t-shirt around all day. Their favorite restaurant you ask? Dick's Last Resort- we had the same waitress twice!

April 2008 Downtown during Fiesta with the guys from Fort Pastor

May 2008- One of the fun best parts of working at SAC was the traveling I got to go to so many places. This year I got to go to Washington DC with the ladies from SGA. I just started bawling at all the memorials so at the Lincoln Monument I put on sunglass to get a pic of me without red eyes. I loved DC and walked around at night in Dupont Circle without feeling unsafe at all...looking back that probably wasn't the smartest idea...

June 2008 Washington DC view from Lincoln Monument

July 2008- Posadas and I went to a conference in Miami for SGA. I think we spent more time on the beach and downtown than actually at the conference. We rented a convertible and drove around downtown. It was a lot of fun. Both Posadas and I came back to Texas red as lobsters...the sun is a little stronger down there.

July 2008 view from hotel in Miami, Florida

January 2009- Every January for 3 of my 4 years I went to the APCA Conference in Las Vegas. One of those years Posadas went with me and we lounged around at Margaritaville inside the Flamingo Hotel. The first year I went to the conference my mom still lived in Vegas so I stayed with her, the next two years I stayed at the conference hotel the Mirage...the first two years I got into a little too much trouble but by my last one I'd learned better...

January 2009 Margaritaville in Las Vegas, Nevada

May 2009- Back to Florida again for SGA this time with the students in Orlando. We went to Downtown Disney or Adult Disney as one of the advisor's said and shopped around. I should have been studying for finals, but this just seemed like a lot more fun. The sparkly mickey ears were my favorite.

May 2009 Downtown Disney Orlando, Florida

Halloween 2010- Another great part about working at a college is you still get to dress up for Halloween. My first year I was Little Red Riding Hood, the next year I was Mini Mouse, the third year Posadas, Aaron and I were jail birds and this year the theme was toys but I think I'm the only one that actually played along.

Halloween 2010

May 2007- I know I've already done Mexico but I didn't mention that at the top of the mountain they had bungee jumping. This is probably my best memory from traveling with SAC. The guys strapping me in didn't speak English and the first time I tried to go they said "no, no, no" at the last minute and luckily I hadn't jumped yet. But then they told me to just fall forward so I leaned forward and went....

How many people can go Bungee jumping in Mexico and call it work? I'm gonna miss SAC. Just looking through all these pictures makes me kinda sad, it was a great 4 years and I'm gonna miss it. But I know I'll make new memories at UTSA. I was 21 when I started at SAC and am leaving at 25, I can't stay a kid forever...

Hello 2011...what's cookin'?

2011-01-01T08:56:00.000-06:00

I don't really want to sum up 2010 cause anything I had to say about it I probably already said in another post. I went to lots of weddings, went to school, sang karaoke, took a cruise to Greece and got engaged- to me that kinds sums it all up. 2011 however is gonna be busy busy busy. I really may be crazy because I am going to try to do so many things.

First I have to leave SAC, which I hope is going to be the hardest thing I have to this year. Comps, getting married, moving those should be easy! I've been at SAC for 3 year 10 months. SAC was the first job I interviewed for after TLU and the first job I got offered. I was the Assistant Coordinator of Student Leadership and Activities which initially meant I got to create new events and activities on campus, work with a few student clubs and organizations and travel when necessary with sports teams as their soccer mom. Over the years the position really grew and evolved and hopefully I grew and evolved with it. When I look at my job there now it barely resembles what it started as and that has been making me unhappy so it was just time to leave. I am going to be so sad to leave the people I work with, they have become a really great dysfunctional, sometimes judgmental, but definitely loving family. I will also miss the students, faculty, staff and some of the administrators, it's gonna be so strange to stat someplace new. January 14th will be my last day.

Then I get to start a new job on January 18th! I can't wait! I will be starting my new job as Program Coordinator at UTSA main campus. This job is in the University Center, a huge 3 building area that could eat TLU's whole campus in 2 bites. It's crazy big! At this job, from what I understand so far, I will be working with student workers and the activities board. I will also be in charge of their new art gallery- so excited- and help get the exhibits in there and do the openings and such. I'm thrilled about this since I've actually worked in a museum before and got a little taste of public history at TLU (before they cancelled that degree option). I'll also be working with the students in "the roost" their game room area. I'm so excited it's going to be very different from what I do at SAC but I'm hoping that it'll make me happier and give me a little more time and flexibility that SAC wouldn't. From speaking with my new supervisor I think it will. One big change will be the dress code- OMG they wear business casual clothes! I'm so excited but also have to go shopping cause none of my casual clothes are in anyway business appropriate. But they have such a more relaxed dress code there and I'm totally looking forward to that. They also have a million places to eat on campus and two Starbucks- majoring drawing point. Enough about the new job cause I haven't even started it yet!

Comp exams, finals, and graduating! While starting a new job I will also be trying to finish my masters. Not trying- but finishing. I have to finish this semester or I will go crazy. We get our comp exams on February 7th and they're due March 7th these are 4 very large research essays on the 4 main core areas of the degree program. They used to be given a little later in the semester but I'm so glad they're going to be early so I can concentrate on other important Spring business afterwards. The exams don't scare me as much as they initially did when I started the program. When I first started I didn't think I'd ever learn everything I needed to to be successful on them, but now I think I'm pretty well equipped and know where to get my info. In late April or early May we'll have finals and in my program usually finals are just more papers so again now as worried about that. I currently have a 3.75 GPA and would really like to bring it up to a 3.8 at least this semester so hopefully I can get my 2 As to do that and be done with grad school...for now. If all goes well I should graduate on time in May with my Master's in Educational Leadership and Policy Students: Higher Education Administration.

But before I graduate I have to get married! Not have to but get to! To my amazing fiance Mr. Bruce Moran. I cannot wait to be married to him, but there is just so much stuff to do first! We luckily already have my dress and shoes, my bridesmaids all have their dresses, we have a venue for the ceremony, a restaurant for the after ceremony dinner, invitations picked out and the officiant for the ceremony. I'm trying to get the bulk of most of the major decisions made before comps, so I have till February and I think it's going pretty well. After comps we'll start worrying about the other fine details like alterations and flowers. But most of my wedding trials and tribulations will be available on my other blog Tyler Getting Married so I wont go into very much more detail here except to say oh ya this is happening the week before finals...I hope...Saturday, April 23rd.

Everyone does keep giving me the- that's a quick wedding, are you...? NO I AM NOT PREGNANT. What is going on is that instead of having a big multi-thousand dollar wedding we have decided to have a small family wedding. We're getting married at one of the houses I grew up in that is just perfect for a small wedding. Then taking the money that would have been spent on a large wedding we're going to get the down payment for a house. The rationality behind this is why spend $9K on 6 hours when we can spend that or less than that for a down payment on a house we can love a lifetime. My lease at the apartment is up in May...I think...so in March or April we're going to start actively looking for a house, I can't resist and have been looking now anyways, but we'd really like to move in the beginning of the summer to our new home. Like my wedding dress I kinda already know what I want and will probably not be satisfied till I find it, but also like my wedding dress I may find homes that have things about them I never knew I could love so much. We're looking for a 3-4 bedroom, 2 bath home in the NEISD school district. We'd prefer to stay kinda in the 281-1604 area but are flexible. Can't wait to really start house hunting. And super luckily my step-mom is a realtor.

After the wedding and after my graduation we're going on a cruise! This cruise was originally supposed to be my graduation gift, it was being planned almost from the instance we got back from the last cruise. I wanted to do something special for graduation and also wanted Bruce to be able to go on a cruise as well. Now that it's following so close to our wedding it's kinda gonna be a small honeymoon as well. We still want to take a real honeymoon someday but this one is gonna be kinda perfect in itself. My mom and one of my sister's friend's friend is going with her and then my cousin and her husband are also going. So it's like a pseudo-honeymoon with friends and family which we're both just fine with. This cruise is at the end of May and is going to the Western Caribbean.

I know this only covers the first half of 2011, but I still feel like it's an awful lot even if I was trying to squeeze it all in to a full year. It's gonna be busy and messy but that's okay, that's how I like my life.

New fiance, new internship, new job and a new blog

2010-12-23T08:13:00.000-06:00

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! This has been a very exciting December for me and it's not even over! The last week of work December 13-19th was just packed full of fun.

Monday the 13th- Bruce met with my father to ask for my hand in marriage (well kinda he asked for his blessing). And of course my daddy said yes cause everyone loves Bruce. I was so excited but then had to play the serious waiting game because he had the ring, he asked my father so now all he really had to do was propose.

Tuesday the 14th- I met with my internship advisor at the Cafe College downtown. It's a P-20 initiative to get students from middle school, high school and adult learners through college and beyond. It's a super cute building on a weird side of town, so it kinda sticks out and you can see it from the high way. But the inside is nice and cute and bright and friendly. I will be doing 150 hours there helping future students apply for college, fill out Financial Aid packets, pick colleges and plan. It sounds exciting.

Tuesday night we had plans to hangout with some friends and karaoke. We went out to dinner and karaoked at the place we met so I totally wanted him to propose there but alas he had other plans.

Tuesday was also the first day of #ringwatch

Wednesday the 15th- Was a regular day at work but it was frustrating cause I was waiting to hear back about a job for UTSA and Grades and my ring. So these three very important things I was waiting for and it just felt like none of them were ever going to get here. I was also trying to wrap up work stuff before the break. I emailed the lady from UTSA about the job and she said she was still waiting to hear from HR, I checked the UTSA grade page like every hour and nothing, and then it was time to go to the Braniff Christmas Happy Hour.

And very luckily!

I totally wasn't expecting it to happen there but soooo glad it did!

After happy hour we went and Karaoked the night away at Legends Sports bar!

Thurday December 16th- Nothing too terribly exciting happened this day but I did get to show off my beautiful ring to all my work friends and then created a new blog to start sharing about that journey. Tyler Getting Married

Friday the 17th- At about 9 AM I got a call from a UTSA number I was sooo excited and ran out of the office, only to have it be another interview for a different job I'd applied for at UTSA. Back to the office to wait. I kept checking for my grades and nada. Around 10AM I got another UTSA call and was a little slower to run out of the office but this was the call I'd been waiting for! UTSA was offering me the job as Program Coordinator in their University Center. So excited! And so totally scared! First they wanted me to start right away but I couldn't cause I needed to give SAC 2 weeks. I called my mom, Bruce and Deirdre to try to figure out how to negotiate some of the finer points like my cruise and school and salary. Friday was only a half day at SAC so I was already running around like crazy to finish everything that needed to be finished but adding this to that day made it seem even more rushed.

At five o'clock I checked for my grades again at UTSA and still zip.

Then we added two Christmas parties to this list and the day just would not end! First we went to the office Christmas party at Mr. Posadas' house and I was able to share with everyone my good but sad news. I spent most of the afternoon crying and stressing about leaving SAC and how I was going to get everything done in two weeks when we got back. After that party we went to my dad's where we knew absolutely no one!

By Saturday the 18th we were wiped out. It felt like it'd just been a week of celebrating which is good when you're newly engaged. But we were just drained. Finally around noon on Saturday I was able to see my grades. I passed yay! One more semester! Bruce got off late Saturday night from work and so we decided to do some light Christmas shopping, dinner and call it a night.

Sunday the 20th- Another Christmas party and more Karaoke! It was the ToneDeaf Christmas Party at Oak Hill Tavern and it was a blast. We got to sing which always makes us happy and got to see a lot of the karaoke people we didn't see Wednesday night to share our engagement with.

It was a busy busy week and if only this week had been calmer. But last week was perfect cause I got everything I wanted my grades, my job and my wonderful fiance Bruce.

Merry Christmas!

New Blog!

2010-12-16T10:46:00.000-06:00

I'm getting married and I have a new blog to prove it! Check it out!

http://tylergettingmarried.blogspot.com/2010/12/december-15th-2010.html

The First Year with my nook

2010-12-12T09:52:00.002-06:00

Yah if you don't know what a nook is that might sound not right...nook (mine is the first generation on the right). January 31st 2010 I got my nook. I was so excited I'd been wanting one since the previous November and finally got it for myself. The reasoning behind me getting an electronic reader was that I am a weird book reader. I usually have a book in my purse, a book in my car, a book in my desk, a book in the living room and a book by my bedside, Bruce can totally attest to this. I am usually reading 6 or more books at once- I like to have a fiction option, non-fiction, bio, short stories or sci-fi to chose from at all times. That's a lot of books to carry around so an e-reader just seemed like the logical choice. I went with the Barnes and Noble one because B&N is my FAVE bookstore, and I really only buy books online when they're textbooks so the Kindle didn't really interest me. But to each their own...

I raced home from La Cantera, opened my nook, turned it on and waited for the magic to happen! Pride and Prejudice, Little Women and Dracula were already loaded onto the nook under the "Barnes and Noble Classics Series" heading. Then there were a lot of free books you could chose from.

The books I read this year on my nook from Barnes and Noble were (in order):
Are You There, Vodka? It's Me, Chelsea
Accidental Billionaires (book The Social Network was based off of)
A Little Bit Wicked (Kristen Chenoweth bio)
It Sucked and Then I Cried (dooce book)
Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang
Eclipse (yes I own the hard backs, what's your point? needed to reread it before the movie)
Breaking Dawn (no good excuse really, I think I was bored in an airport)
The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner
Never Let Me Go (Kazuo Ishiguro- READ THIS)
Shit My Dad Says
The Toaster Broke So We're Getting Married (might have been a free book or maybe I just liked the title)
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Hunger Games (READ these too! So good- thanks Taylor)
Catching Fire (I loved them so much I read then in August and again in October)
Mockingjay (They're that good!)
My Horizontal Life
I Love, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti

Wow looking back on the year it looks like I was really into bubble-gum books. In my defense I didn't really want to read heavy stuff while on the cruise in Greece...The Chelsea Handler books were hilarious so I had to read all of them. I did take some flack for downloading books I already owned, but my nook fits so much better in my purse than a 450 page hardback book and if I get tired of one book I can so easily switch to another!

Another great thing about the nook is you can download countless classics from Project Gutenberg its this huge archive of books in different digital formats. I downloaded the entire James Joyce library for free!!! I haven't explored the Gutenberg press as much as I could but there are tons of great books in there for free that I hope to get next year. My nook also has the internet and games and the ability to be an mp3 player but I really just use it for books and the occasional Sudoku game.

Now my nook didn't take the place of paperback books for me at all I still read real books. In the Spring I was making my way through all of Alain de Botton's books, on Valentine's I always reread his "On Love". Almost ever summer I reread an Orson Scott Card series, this year I reread both Ender series with the new edition Ender in Exile. So my nook wont replace all the books on my shelves its just a nice portable library I can take wherever I go and one that can constantly grow.

The Broad-Way

2010-10-17T21:22:00.000-05:00

My earliest memories of exposure to Broadway is dancing around the living room to the Cats soundtrack. I would sing along and dance around the couch and coffee table in my pajamas- I don't really dance anymore but if Broadway is on I'm most likely singing to it. The On Broadway station on Sirius XM is either the greatest thing or the worst thing ever invented. I love it because I get to listen to Broadway whenever I'm in my car! I hate it because it makes me miss it, I miss singing and dancing...

I guess it never really leaves you- I've always loved Broadway music because of the passion behind the music- it's all about the subtext regular music doesn't have it...or at least not to me. Cats was probably the first show I saw in a theatre, followed by Chorusline, Phantom of the Opera and Jesus Christ Superstar. JCS is still one of my favorite musicals ever but the other three I'll see if I can but I don't really actively search them out. I'd drive to Houston if there was a production of JCS that I really wanted to see. Growing up my grandma used to buy season tickets to the Majestic and I always got to pick what shows I wanted to see. I saw dozens of shows with her and thats what really sparked my love for the theatre. I remember going to church with Mimi so we could go right afterwards to the Sunday matinee shows, I'd get all dressed up and sit at the edge of my seat for every note.

The first musical I was ever in was The Sound of Music and it will forever be on that list of faves because it's just so beautiful. Is there a prettier countryside waltz than Edelweiss? I remember on opening night my dad brought me the collectors edition VHS, apparently its one of his favorite musicals too. In high school I was usually just ensemble which is totally fine with me because to me it was so less stressful and so much fun. The musicals we did at NESA though were more of the popular shows or shows with lots of dancing, things people wanted to see to feel good, not really the serious shows that I now am obsessed with. In school my friend Katie used to burn me CDs of shows she really loved and eventually I came to love them too. She introduced me to Jason Robert Brown which lead me to the plethora of musicals that are just truly heartbreaking.

The classics fall into another category, they usually end happily but have their moments where they are tear jerkers- Funny Girl is probably my favorite movie musical and the song Funny Girls always makes me cry then My Man makes me bawl. If I could find The Sound of Music on DVD I would buy it, but it is evading my grasp. Meet Me In St. Louis is wonderful, makes me cry but ends on a happy note. I love Cabaret, my mom bought it for me on VHS when I was sick in high school and I could watch it over and over.

Just about two years ago I took Hail to see Wicked for her Optometry School Graduation gift. I just sat there in the audience with her and Jenn just crying the whole time. Pretty much from start to finish I cried, the words just get to me. My fave song...

There are just some songs from shows that just get me every time, I can just hear the start of it and I'll start getting misty. I love the happy cheery musicals that are just for fun like Mama Mia and Hairspray- too much fun and I love them and am in the mood for them sometimes. But give me a musical that pulls at my heartstrings and I'll listen to it a hundred time over and over just to feel that pain. Does that make me a musical masochist? Next to Normal, The Last Five Years, Songs for a New World just break my heart-

For Good- Wicked
No One is Alone- Into the Woods
I'm Still Hurting- Last Five Years
Song of Forgetting- Next to Normal
Breathe- In the Heights
Funny Girl- Funny Girl
Kiss Today Goodbye- Chorusline
21 Guns- American Idiot
I'll Cover You (reprise)- Rent
The Winner Takes it All- Mama Mia
Something Good- Sound of Music

I find myself so often wondering if everyone else hears what I hear. Why am I always the only one driving down the highway listening to Wicked and crying their eyes out? Why doesn't everyone else leaving the theatre have mascara streaks down their cheeks? Maybe they're just smarter than me and wear waterproof mascara. I wonder who I'd be if I wasn't raised surrounded by music.

I have a problem with TV shows...

2010-09-07T08:32:00.000-05:00

I don't really think it's a problem, my sister and Bruce might think it's a problem, but I think it's just another reason why spending money on cable is not necessary. I own a lot of DVDs, I like movies, but I also own a ton of TV shows on DVDs because I can watch certain TV shows over an over. When TV series end I get really sad because I am definitely one of those people that gets too emotionally involved with their TV shows.

My first major TV on DVD purchase was Ally McBeal, the show ended when I was in high school and I remember watched it over and over on syndication. Then my junior year of college I found it online, it was close to $200 but I didn't care I needed those DVDs! When I got it I was ecstatic and watched them back to back over a period of a week. I was kinda disappointed because they were burnt copies, and a couple of them had a few glitches. It didn't bother me too much though because I was just happy that I had them. Now the real DVDs are out and I really want to replace my crappy burned copies but I'll be patient for those and get them eventually I'm sure.

I have a couple of complete series- I have all the Sex and the City seasons, all the Gilmore Girls but I got those as they came out. Every summer when they'd get released on DVD I'd buy them. Sometimes when I think of all the money I spent on those seasons it does make my head spend a little bit but I get over it when I think of all the fabulous memories the shows bring up. I remember watching the series finale of Sex and the City with my first college roommate. I remember watching the 6th season of Gilmore Girls with my friends Liz and Rachel from choir at TLU. So to me its another investment in my memories.

I have a lot of seasons that I've bought up to date- Weeds, Grey's Anatomy, True Blood, Glee...I am buying these as they come out. Shows like Lost and Battle Star Galactica I'm working my way back from. I have some of the seasons but not all of them- so I'm working on it. The Black Donnellys was just a one season series so of course I have that and then I have a couple of TV movies that are too awesome not to own like The 10th Kingdom and the 1985 versions of Alice in Wonderland.

Last night however I was able to get an entire series for an unbelievably low price at CD Exchange- in fact it was a collectors edition of a series too. Charmed. Yes THAT Charmed. The one about the 3 sisters that are witches- with Alyssa Milano and Hollie Marie Combs and eventually Rose McGowan. I loved that show. I used to make Haley watch it with me when it was in syndication while my mom cooked dinner and rolled her eyes at us. But it was so good! I got the entire series last night for like $86 there were 49 discs! So I got $10 off. It came in this super awesome book case that has cool drawings of the demons they killed. I was in nerd girl heaven. Then I Bruce started looking at me like I was crazy and I had to buy him the first season of Batman the animated series as a hush bribe so he'd stop looking at me like I was the crazy girl who just bought the complete 8 season set of Charmed.

That show started when I was in middle school and didn't end till I was in college! It couldn't have been that bad...well maybe parts of it were but still I'm super excited about my purchase. Looking back at it all spelled out it does look like I might have a small problem, but hey if it keeps me from having to pay for cable I'm all for it. Why do I need cable when I own a million DVDs and have the internet?

Favorite Memories in my Red Ford Focus

2010-08-19T15:01:00.000-05:00

I know I'm probably getting way too emotional about my little red car but I have had some great years in it. I got my little red Ford Focus the Christmas of my Sophomore year at TLU after I was in a horrible accident in my little silver Ford Focus on Highway 90 outside of Seguin. The car was totaled but it was the idiot in the F150s fault so I got to get a new car. Everyone was convinced that the Focus was what saved my life since the paramedics didn't know how I got out of my car seeing how all the doors were pinned shut. So another Focus it was!

5 1/2 years later the little red Focus has been in one major accident on 1604 on my way to my friend Carrie's wedding. It was raining and some old lady pulled into my lane and smashed the front passenger side in. A nice southern fireman came and asked if I needed any help or if I was injured, I stupidely told the truth and said no...and watched him drive away. I blocked traffic for miles, my dad came and stood with the cops and laughed at me as I paced back and forth on 1604 in my beautiful blue dress and 4 1/2 inch heels on the phone with my insurance company trying to arrange for my rental car. I had the whole situation totally under control, behind the tears. About 20 minutes after the accident my sister and her boyfriend at the time (hubby now) passed us pulled over to check out the damage- they too were on the way to a wedding they joined the laughing cop and my father on the side of the road.

The car has been good- no major problems and it can be packed to the gills. I could get my entire dorm room in that car in one load. I've moved twice in it- same apartments though. I drove though a tornado on the way to camp one summer- that car was a trooper! I bought my first set of tires for the car two Christmases ago. I have changed countless flat tires in high heels while either on my way to Cowboys or coming home from Cowboys for the car- I have since stopped going to Cowboys. Then of course there was that time on Christmas Eve when someone backed into my car in the HEB parking lot then drove away. Luckily at the time I was dating a nice boy who fixed cars and got that all taken care of for me. Unfortunately the car is not as resilient when it comes to running into partitions on the side of 410, but seriously it came out of nowhere! So there are a few scratches on the passenger side and one on the front bumper where my brother-in-laws car and mine became close friends one evening when a sleepy teenager fell asleep along a curve in the road.

Besides the few cosmetic improvements I've had done to the car I've also done some maintenance things, I've had the breaks replaced, an axel replaced and the alternator replaced just last week. It's been a great car and I'm sad to let it go. I'm planning on getting another Focus this weekend. They're safe little cars and get great gas mileage.

Bye little red, I'll miss you!

"You're at the age where we should start looking into anti-aging procedures"

2010-07-29T17:03:00.000-05:00

It's been a rough few months for my body. First my facialist told me what sort of precautions I should be taking to prevent my age from showing on my face- I heard the work botox and wanted to cry, regained composure and told her I'd be happy to continue my chemical peels and see how the next ten years go before trying anything radical. Then just this week my OBGYN told me that I was no longer at the age where I could avoid weight gain. He politely told me that I would have to work out more each year than I had the year before just to maintain my current weight. He then told me that my drugs were not causing me to gain weight I was just lazy and happy. Everyone seems to be blaming then crazy thing called happiness for the extra pounds. Then as if in cahoots with my facialist and OBGYN the gym I signed up for 3 months ago and have only attended maybe 4-5 times called to tell me its time to come in and get weighed and measured. Just shoot me now.

So I took a step back and really looked at myself in the mirror and saw that my body really has gained some new curves. I decided to step on my Wii Fit for the first time oh in a few months too- since before we moved and it tells me I've gained 7.5 lbs- since April. My BMI is 26.4 and it should be between 18 and 24. Now this doesn't sound like too much but I'm at least 8 lbs overweight and I'm supposed to be between 98 lbs (in someone's dreams) and 132 (which is more than I'd liked).

I enjoy exercising I've never disliked it, I'm just too tired for it. I love healthy, fresh good for you food, I just don't always feels like cooking. But as Dr. Troy pointed out what I used to do is no longer working and so it's time to at least begin to change. I always start with food because obviously that is my biggest problem. I love to eat and I love to eat rich and creamy pastas, with custards for dessert. Mmmm that flan I had for lunch was delicious! So I need another food makeover which luckily Bruce is fine with since I'm the one doing the cooking...

So ten hour days at work are really not my thing and there are usually at least 2 hours of those ten hours where I'm just useless, so I search online for interesting articles or videos. That's when I ran into a Good Eats episode called "Live and let Diet". Apparently Alton Brown (please tell me you know who he is) gained alot of weight during the last twoish years- 90 lbs to be exact and as a food host on the Food Network he didn't have the most time to exercise so he drastically changed his diet (eating habits). His food plan sounds like something I could very easily do except for one part you'll see-

Things to eat daily:
Fruits
Whole Grains
Leafy Greens
Nuts
Carrots
Green Tea

This seems pretty easy cause I can combine a lot of those into smoothies like my green smoothie- fruits and leafy greens right there, and carrots with almond butter for a snack and then some brown rice and green tea. DONE!

Things to eat 3 times a week:
Oily Fish
Yogurt
Broccoli
Sweet Potatoes
Avocado

I really like all these things, I just don't eat sweet potatoes and broccoli too much cause it's more effort but hey I'll put that effort into it and see what happens. Avocados YUM! and yogurt and fish are good too. DONE!

Things to have ONE time a week:
Red meat
pasta
desserts
alcohol

OMG what the hell? Who do you think I am? I can't possibly have only one alcoholic drink a week! That makes me sound like an alcoholic when really I'm just a normal member of my family- we don't do that. And Pasta really? What about Wheat Pasta? I promise to just eat wheat pasta and how about we move that one up to category two- just three times a week! Desserts fine, I can do just once a week and then I don't eat a lot of red meat to begin with so that will almost be a challenge to make me do it once a week.

The hardest will definitely be the once a week category- I have family dinner every week with booze and my hobby is karaoke which alcohol is a requirement for. This is gonna be tough. But I'm determined I'm just gonna keep looking at this picture to remind myself why I need to do this...

How is June almost over?

2010-06-23T08:02:00.001-05:00

Hour 9 of a 10 hour workday

Gah! It's been a while. This summer is just speeding by and in a week from now I'll be packing for the cruise. This whole year is just zipping by- except for the 10 hour work days, those are dragging, so you'd think I'd have more time to write, but really not.

What I've been doing-
1- Karaoke-ing (we seriously went 3 times one week it was a little excessive)
2- Unpacking (it takes a while!)
3- Sunbathing (not nearly as much as I would like)
4- 10 hour work days (the worst possible idea ever! not mine. by 5 o'clock though I'm useless)
5- Exercising (maybe only 3 times a week but that's better than 0 like I was before)

What I haven't been doing-
1- TNMCing (which is sad but I've just been busy)
2- Playing guitar enough (I miss it)
3- Spending time at home (I feel like we're always gone!)
4- Saving money (being always gone is expensive)
5- Studying for my GRE (I really need to do that)

Of course I've been spending a ton of time with Bruce is great, but we live together now (officially) so its not really that big of a surprise. We had the one year anniversary of the night we met back on June 3rd and had a very nice date night. We had our first little gathering at our new place back earlier in the month I made Summertime Beer and some of Bruce's friends and some of my friends came over to swim. It was a lot of fun, till I started my first fight with Bruce. But Bruce things one fight in 10 months is pretty good...

I've been spending a lot of time with mama and Haley. Its summer so we're having our swim nights at mama's again. Even though we haven't swam once yet cause of weather, but we have been going every Wednesday since the beginning of June and she always cooks and makes drinks. It's a blast.

Next week Haley, Greg, mama and I leave for the cruise to Greece- we start in Italy, move on to Croatia and then several Greek Isles then end up back in Venice. Should be fun. It's my first vacation in 3 years. I plan to come back browner than ever before with orange hair (the sun, it's inevitable). When I get back there will only be one more week of summer for me cause after that Orientation will start and it just speeds back up from them. But next Tuesday is my last day till Mid-July and I'm turning my work email OFF! I think I'm most looking forward to that- no work for TWO WEEKS!

sigh

Moving Part II: Unpacking Sucks just as much as Packing Does

2010-05-06T10:43:00.001-05:00

How come no one ever talks about unpacking sucking? Is it cause moving is actually so horrible that it dwarfs the horrible-ness of unpacking? I hate unpacking. My old kitchen was tiny, so why doesn’t my new bigger kitchen want to hold all my pots and pans? Why do I have 23 blank books? (or what normal people would call journals) 23 is entirely too many. About 7 of them are filled and others have writing on like 2-3 pages but I don’t know where to put them. In my old apartment they were on my bookshelf but since it’s now “our” bookshelf it seems less appropriate. Needless to say it’s slow going unpacking everything. While packing the old apartment I found boxes in my outdoor storage that I never unpacked from when I first moved in after college. It was stuff I obviously didn’t care about so I got rid of most of it- if I hadn’t used it in 3 years it was probably unnecessary anyway.

So back to Saturday night…

After I walked into the filled new apartment and realized there was still a hell of a lot more to do before we could say we’ve actually “moved in” I walked through all the rooms of the apartment to assess the situation.

Dining room: filled with boxes for the kitchen, dining room, living room and extra bar stools that need to find a home

Kitchen: filled with boxes and cleaning supplies

Living room: furniture arranged in a way that is can’t be sat on, flatscreen laying down on the love seat with paw prints on it (made mental note to kill the cat)

Guest bedroom: full of bags and suitcases of clothes! Everywhere clothes and more clothes and a side of clothes!

Bathrooms: every counter top covered and stuff in the sink.

Bedroom: vacant middle space with all the furniture to the extremities of the room and the mattresses leaning against the wall where I couldn’t possibly use them for the desired sleep

LOUD GROAN/SIGHing and moderate crying ensued.

I cleared off space in the bathroom to find towels and soap and proceeded to take a nice long bath. Found a cleanish extra large t-shirt threw on some shorts and went and got Taco Cabana. When I got back to the apartment I found my laptop and cleared off a spot on the couch to sleep. None of the unpacking was really necessary till the next day anyways.

Bruce came home around 1:30 and helped lay down the mattresses so we could sleep in our new bedroom. Then on Sunday we ran some errands and began unpacking. Bruce put together the bedroom set and I started to work on the Guest Bedroom. That night it was so nice to sleep in our actual bed in our new home.

The rest of this week has been spent very slowly unpacking. I’m slowly trying to unpack things, little by little. Everyday after work I give myself a little goal and so far it’s gone pretty good. The guest bedroom is all set up and that’s good cause we have our first guest this evening. Bruce’s sister is coming down to pick him up to go to Houston.

So that means I have the new apartment to myself this weekend. I’m gonna get serious about unpacking the rest of the kitchen and fixing up the dining room. I’m just ready to have everything in there settled.

Does anyone actually like moving? Part I

2010-05-04T11:49:00.000-05:00

Since we started dating Bruce has practically lived with me. No seriously, 9 months ago it started with just the weekends, then just Thursday through Sunday, then Wednesday through Monday and sometime in January he just stopped going home. I recommended that he just “officially” move in and he thought it was too soon. In February I told him I’d stop bugging him about it and the next moment he brought it up like it was his idea. In mid-March we looked at apartments in my complex and found a floor plan we loved they told us we could move in May 1^st. I spent most of March and the beginning of April stressing about packing and how I was gonna move this stuff. Bruce told me to not stress we still had time before the move. Then one day it was the middle of April and OMG the move was just two weeks away!

I started things slowly, packing all my books into a HUGE box and then Bruce saying it would be too heavy and me unpacking them. I tried to do all the laundry in the house; not knowing how long it would be till we could get a new washer to go with the dryer my dad was giving us. I’d wake up in the morning to see that Bruce had packing amazing quantities of things while I slept. He can get more done in the hours between midnight and sunrise than I get in any full day of trying to pack. How did he fit 300 DVDs into two boxes that he was able to carry by himself? How did he do that?

So the week before the move Bruce had Sunday off. We rarely have days off together so I thought we’d go see a movie then come home and pack. Bruce decided we should make a date out of it. So we went to the Alamo Drafthouse and REALLY made a day out it. We started around 2PM and ordered just a couple of beers then we sprung for the Growler, which is 2 liters of beer. We had a beer before the movie, a Growler during the movie and then refilled it before we went home (don’t worry it’s legal because it can seal shut). When we got home I headed in to start packing and Bruce tells me he’s invited his friends over to hang out real quick. Real quick turned into all-night and 6 AM came too quickly Monday morning. So NO packing was done Sunday and Monday night I was so tired that little packing happened then too. Bruce luckily got to work and was a packing machine. By Tuesday Night my tiny apartment was filled with boxes and suitcases full of all my stuff I’d accumulated over 3 years.

Wednesday I got the keys and started making trips back and forth to the new apartment dropping things off. Thursday Bruce spent the day moving stuff with his friend Mark. Friday I was on my own again making small trips of stuff, trying to get all “packed” things to the new place so Saturday we could do the furniture and get completely out of my old apartment.

We started Saturday morning off around 10:30 AM with Bruce, my dad and my brother Michael in from Lubbock. I was supposed to have one of my students there to help but he totally bailed and didn’t even call! But that’s okay the three guys I had are awesome and rocked. In about 2 hours they got the couches, the coffee table, the rest of my heavy packed stuff and pretty much everything except my bed and dresser out of my apartment and into the new place! I was impressed. For the amount of stuff I had they were just plowing through! Then my brother ended up having to go spend time with his family so it was just Bruce and I for a while. My dad came back and did another quick run with us but eventually he left too, but took a bunch of stuff to Goodwill for us. (Seriously a 40 gallon bag of clothes for Goodwill and two big bags of shoes and purses) Then we waited…

Bruce had to go to work around 4 and at 3:30 his friends to help us with the rest of the stuff arrived. The stacked washer and dryer took forever for them to get down the three flights of stairs. Once that was out of the way everything else was pretty simple. Bruce’s friends Mark and Steph were so great and helpful and my friend Mike took my washer and dryer off my hands in exchange for his washer. Bruce took off around 4:30 and Mark, Mike and Steph stayed to help till about a quarter to six. At that time I had to go back to my old apartment to clean and turn in the keys.

Walking back into my old apartment at 6 on Saturday made me feel totally defeated. I’d lived in that place for 3 years, the carpets were filthy, to say the least, and I’d never washed my baseboards, and don’t get me started on the scrubbing the oven. At 9PM I called Bruce almost in tears, the vacuum had stopped working and I had chemical burns on my right hand, I was done and couldn’t possibly spend anymore time cleaning that apartment. He said “Don’t cry, baby, we’re in this together now, go home and I’ll get the last of the stuff after work”. I took out some trash, locked the doors and turned in my keys. I walked into the new apartment hoping to feel relieved but then I realized I had to UNPACK.

…to be continued.

Frustration and Food Porn

2010-03-11T15:21:00.000-06:00

I can't write the blog post I want to write right now. I've tried three times this week and it keeps getting out of control. When I hit 7 paragraphs I realize no one is going to want to read it and that it's too far gone to even edit at this point. So I will put my blog post about coincidences and how I feel about them on the shelf for another time till I can write concisely how I feel about coincidences.

So my boss has been bugging me to take more time off forever but I keep telling him that there isn't time! He then tells me I have plenty of time in the bank but then I remind him that there just isn't time because there's too much I have to do. This argument happens most Mondays and Fridays and occasionally on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. Apparently it was getting to be a problem. So he told me to take next week off. It's spring break we're off Thursday and Friday anyways and he told me to make a week out of it. I argued but in the end gave in and turned in a leave slip for the whole week.

A whole week off? What on Earth am I supposed to for 9 whole days (two Saturdays and Sundays plus a work week)? In three years I have never taken that much time off- I've probably taken 9 days total off in that time but never together. I don't know what on Earth I'm going to do but I plan to enjoy it.

Which brings me to food porn! I love food and I love to cook. But unfortunately I don't have the time to do it as often as I'd like. So I try to live vicariously through other people's stories about food, cooking and that amazing thing called "free time". I think I spelled that right.

For a while I've been a fan of Happy Foody and a lot of my healthier eating habits come from that site. My Green Smoothie recipes and all the fun stuff about Chia. My new found love of Almond Milk comes from here and I'm dying to try this recipe. Sarah, the blogger, writes so passionately about food and how eating is such a whole body experience for her and her family. It's inspiring. It makes me want to eat healthier and live greener. It makes me want to dread my hair. It makes me want to travel the country in a veggie oil powered RV and car! Until I read Smitten Kitchen...

Smitten Kitchen is food porn at it's best! Oh the richness, the decadence and the impending heart attacks await! It's Paula Dean meets New York City and I love it! I have yet to make anything from her amazing blog but if I baked I'd bake chocolate whiskey and beer cupcakes or if I wanted to channel Martha (Stewart of course do you know another one?) I'd make Martha's Macaroni and Cheese. I could go on forever. But each recipe comes with a delightful story about her discovery of the recipe and then her execution. She isn't perfect and sometimes her recipe fails and she shares that and the blogosphere collectively weeps for the failed caramelized brown butter rice krispie treats that had so much potential.

While I have long given up on the idea that I will ever get to be the amazing housewife/cooking machine that my mother was/is I still dream of finding time at least 3-4 or more realistically 1-2 times a week to cook something amazing and tasty (hopefully sometimes healthy) for my family some day. Next week maybe I can pretend. Maybe I'll try Martha's recipe because I'm pretty sure that could feed me all week long depending on how much Bruce eats while I'm sleeping. The beer cupcakes are screaming to be made and eaten with my sister Haley in her awesome kitchen. Then that almond milk recipe must be tried and perfected, because I'm tired of buying the way too think and un-drinkable-straight brand they sell at HEB. I want something thinner. So on my glorious 9 days of freedom I hope to try some of these recipes and feel that sense of calm that I see these women posses as they talk about food and enjoy the best part- eating as well.

Spring Cleaning and Shopping

2010-03-08T09:26:00.003-06:00

Last week was an incredibly stressful and emotionally draining week. Actually starting the previous Saturday. I worked like 8 days straight and saw Bruce for like 5 hours that entire weekend. The week didn't get better- work was sucking and after an extremely uncomfortable conversation with my boss I felt even worse. The only cure was to shop.

So Tuesday night I went shopping and got a bunch of clothes then Wednesday night I went shopping and go a bunch of stuff and Friday before class I got a bunch of crafty things to make a wreath. I went shopping between work and school and trying to have a life. The small shopping trips I had did a lot of damage. I came home with 5 bags Wednesday night and instead of looking appalled by my shopping loot for once Bruce just looked kind of sympathetic. Shopping is obviously a more agreeable outlet for stress than drinking.

Once I got all my treasures home it was very obvious that there was no room for new things in my house at this time. My kitchen didn't want to hold my new awesome Tea gadget, my closet did not want more dresses and my dining room definitely did not want to accommodate all the fake flowers and reef stuff I'd purchased to be crafty. Cleaning would have to be done and soon.

The week was so busy that I didn't get to it until Sunday. Sunday I spent the whole day cleaning and organizing. I made piles, bagged old clothes and shoes and at the end of the day you couldn't tell a lot was done but I still felt a great sense of relief as I saw the bags ready to go to Goodwill.

The hardest part is definitely parting with clothes. I come from a long line of hoarders and I can talk myself into keeping anything...anything. I just know that one day my clunky-sequined-Doc Martin-combat-boots are going to come back into style- I know it! Or the dress my mother made me in high school may one day fit again and the adorable retro style Mary Jane's that have a heel broken will one day be fixed! Then there was my 2001 ISA National Honors Society T-shirt. Sure it has paint on it, but one day I'm going to start exercising and I'm gonna need grungy shirts to wear. Sigh. I got rid of 15 t-shirts and kept 9.

I've heard about making quilts and blankets from old shirts before. My sister made a quilt out of her old optometry shirts and I have had a bag of about 20 TLU shirts sitting by my door for a while for her to do the same with mine. But t-shirts from high school covered in paint I will close my eyes and add them to the bags.

Then I decided to hit my purses.

But I love my purses. Sure I only carry the same purse for about 3 months and then move on, but one day I may really want to have that yellow leather banana republic purse Robynne gave me in high school. Sure I didn't take care of it and the leather kinda dried out but I'm sure someone can fix it. So now I have a laundry basket full of purses overflowing to my floor and hopefully tonight I can go through and get rid of 10 of the 36. I think that's a reasonable number.

The point is I made the effort and I think I made great progress. You can see the floor of my bedroom and the floor of my closets. I really am giving a lot of stuff to Goodwill, only I hope they don't go through it in front of me cause I don't think I want to see the looks on their faces when they see that I donated a red and black corset that Haley gave me years ago that I never used.

My Morning Cup

2010-03-04T10:50:00.000-06:00

I can't remember the first time I tried coffee. I remember always drinking the coffee creamers out of their little cups when we'd go to restaurants. My earliest memories of coffee are all my dad's coffee cups. I remember my dad having tons and tons of coffee cups, on the weekends I can remember him at the kitchen table in his robe with a coffee cup and the newspaper. I also remember mom having her coffee too but it was normally taken standing in the kitchen. I started drinking coffee sporadically when I was about 8 or 10 and then consistently when I was in high school. Mmmmm Starbucks. Then sometime during my last year in college I stopped drinking coffee and switched to tea.

8 or 10 years old? Okay I might have been a bit young but again it was really infrequent. When I was around those ages I remember going out with Deirdre to Mama's Cafe and sitting at the bar counter drinking coffee and eating cheesecake. We'd sit there for hours it seemed talking and drinking coffee. Now lord knows what as an 8 or 10 year old we had to talk about but I do remember the tradition continuing through my middle school years so hopefully I contributed more to the conversation those times.

In high school I was a musical theatre major at the North East School of the Arts and a student at the International School of the Americas. Both of these schools were into coffee. After school we'd go to Starbucks, before school we'd go to Starbucks, and when we skipped school we'd go to Starbucks. Don't worry when we skipped school we'd usually run into the Principal of ISA and she'd remind us to bring our dance teacher a Starbucks when we went back. Needless to say the rules for the Magnet School Kids were a little relaxed. Back when I was in high school anything Starbucks I loved- I loved the White Chocolate Mocha or the Java Chip Frappachino and non-coffee items like the very sadly retired Tazoberry and Cream, truly the most delicious whipped fruit cream thing ever! also the Chai Latte which Angela always said "it tastes like Christmas" and it really does. We had tons of those reusable cups and were always going to Starbucks.

In college the nearest Starbucks was in San Marcos! 45 minutes away, or back in San Antonio 30-35 minutes away. So my affair with Starbucks was on hold for a while. They served Starbucks brand coffee in Lucky's but it was never the same. My first year I had an illegal coffee pot and my roommate loved it when I made coffee cause she just liked the smell. Over Christmas break I guess I forgot to take out the filter and we came by to the grossest unplanned science experiment ever and threw out the entire machine. After that I decided I'd either buy my coffee on campus, use instant or switch to tea.

When I moved into the on campus apartments I had switched almost entirely to tea. I was obsessed with making my own Chai, I loved cold chai with vanilla creamer and tons of ice! It was delicious and since our campus was super warm 8 months of the year the perfect drink to take everywhere. Sometime during my last year a Starbucks opened in New Braunfels, slightly closer but I no longer needed their sweet temptations.

So where does that leave me today. In my apartment now I've never had a coffee maker, I just didn't need one, I'm cool with instant if I need it and tea is so much easier. After all I have my awesome yellow Le Cruset tea pot that I love to use.

So 6 or so months ago Posadas and I were in North Star and went into Teavana. A glorious tea shop with beautiful tea sets and the yummiest custom mixed teas to chose from. Neither of us purchased anything that day but we both knew that one day we would. In my quest to become ever healthier I've been looking for something to drink in the morning non-coffee and for when I don't want to go to the trouble of pulling out the blender for a Green Smoothie. I make Chai Tea a lot but since I'm also moving to a no-milk lifestyle as well I learned that Chai Tea and Almond Milk are not my favorite combination and I don't like drinking Chai straight cause it makes me jittery.

I read yesterday about Yerba Mate a good coffee substitute tea that doesn't need much else to make it yummy. So I went to Teavana last night hoping to get a cool tea gadget and a tea blend to call my own. They gave me a White Chai Yerba Mate blend that was delicious without milk or sugar. Can you say score? I got 1/2 a pound and a cool tea gadget that is a steeper/strainer all in one. You add the tea leaves to the cup type think add hot water and let steep. When you're ready to drink you take your mug and put the steeper/strainer on top of it and the deliciousness flows into your cup. This morning I tried it myself and was pleasantly surprised it didn't suck and also that it woke me up. I found it relaxing and comforting, all the things I need from my morning tea.

I still love Starbucks and go a couple times a month but it's no longer a religious habit. My first year working at SAC after college I went every morning for about a year till I did the math and realized I spent approximately $260 a month on Starbucks. So now if I can just spent like $20-30 a month on tea I think that is much better.

Chocolate Guacamole Does Not Sound Appetizing

2010-03-03T16:11:00.000-06:00

Thanks Blake! No one wants to try my Chocolate Avocado Pudding anymore. I just call it Chocolate Pudding now because everyone else is too disgusted when I say there's avocado in it, but I promise it's delicious.

A few weeks ago I was at Deirdre's (my birthmom) house getting my hair dyed. This is usually a great time for us to catch up and talk and I actually get to see my siblings cause they don't tend to frequent the Thursday Night Music Club where I almost always get to see Deirdre. My little sister is a 16 year old vegan and she has been for years now. She used to be mostly vegetarian but now I'm pretty sure she's completely vegan. At first I was appalled cause I love meat and I just never thought you could get all the great flavors without the savory-ness of meat. But over the years I've warmed to the vegetarian lifestyle and a lot of the dishes. I try to eat two vegetarian meals a day then try to only eat one meal with meat a day and I try to always have that one meat be chicken.

This year I've been trying lots of awesome healthier vegan, vegetarian and raw foods like my Green Smoothies which rock, vegan chili, Chia Seeds and just general healthier stuff. So far it's going great. I've definitely lost some weight but I also feel a lot better. I feel healthier and I have more energy. Those Chia seeds and Green Smoothies really make me feel like I have more energy so yay.

So anyways my little sister came into the kitchen while my hair was setting in it's color and started adding some avocado to the blender. To this Deirdre asked if she was making her chocolate pudding thing. My sister Grace then went on to explain what it is.

Chocolate Avocado Pudding
1 Avocado
2-3 tablespoons Cocoa powder (depending how chocolate-y you want it)
Agave Nectar to taste
A splash of vanilla

Whipped together in a food processor

She then let me try some of the concoction and it was great! It tasted just like chocolate pudding and you couldn't even tell there was avocado in it. Grace told me that she suggested letting the mixture sit overnight to get more of the pudding texture out of it. I was super excited and put that little recipe in my head for later use. We talked a little about chia seeds and my sis Grace is apparently a fan of the gel and then just adds stuff to it- I like to doctor it up from the start- see previous post on Chia :)

So weeks went by and I noticed some avocado in my fridge about to be too mushy and so I bought some agave nectar and cocoa and decided to try it. After I gathered my ingredients I realized I didn't have a food processor. I almost gave up and waited till I could buy one but then I just bit the bullet and started mashing with a fork. Luckily the avocados were soft enough and mashing wasn't too bad, I added the rest of the ingredients and tested it. It tasted great! It was a little thick but it had all the potential of an awesome chocolate pudding. Because I had some in the fridge I added about a 1/4 a cup of vanilla almond milk and it got much smoother and even looked like pudding.

I put it in the fridge to set and started dreaming about eating it with bananas the next morning for breakfast. A few hours later Bruce came home and I wanted to put him to the test. I run up to him with a spoonful of pudding and said "honey I made homemade chocolate pudding wanna try it?" and shoved the spoon in his mouth. He said it tasted great and then I told him what was in it. He seemed surprised but not as disgusted as I was expecting. So it passed the Bruce test yay!

The next day I took it to work with a banana and everyone in the office seemed more than disgusted by the idea. I posted it on Facebook and again got a pretty grossed out reaction. So for now it looks like there are only a few fans of the Chocolate Avocado Pudding...but it is really good. You know you want to try it.

Chia Seed Pudding

2010-02-22T13:05:00.007-06:00

Still on my healthy foodness. I killed my blender last week so I needed to replace my Green Smoothies with something else healthy for breakfast. Enter Chia Seeds! I've read a lot about these awesome little seeds and was skeptical to try them till I heard that my Vegan Sister Grace was cool with them.

So what are Chia Seeds. Chia seeds are just like the stuff you smear on terra-cotta pots to make Chia Pets only you eat them instead of letting them grow green fuzzy grass. Apparently the folks down in Mexico have known about these guys for a while and make their Chia Fresca with them. Here's what they look like raw and in my fave pudding (see video at the end)

So Chia Seeds are super jam packed of good for you stuff. They have more protein that any other food of it's type, tons of calcium and boron, potassium, more antioxidants than blueberries, iron and omenga 3s and 6s. So basically they're just all around good for you. And unlike Flaxseed they wont go back and you don't have to refrigerate them after opening them. For more info visit

Chia Seed Info

Chia seeds will absorb whatever liquid you soak them in. As they absorb liquid they form a thick gel around them. The ratio is something like 1:9 Chia:liquid. So you can make just plain Chia Gel and add stuff to it or you can make a gel out of the liquid of your choice. So last week I ate a lot of Chia for breakfast and snacks. I read lots of recipes for it and chose the one that sounded like the best for breakfast. Chia Seed Pudding! As I try to drink less Cow's Milk I'm trying lots of milk alternatives. I hate soy milk but almond milk and I get along just fine. So I put 5 tablespoons of Chia seeds in a plastic container and added a cup of Vanilla Almond Milk, shook it up and let it set in the fridge overnight. When I woke up I had a delicious almost tapioca pudding type breakfast and a video on it is below

Chia Pudding from Tyler Archer on Vimeo.

I hope you try Chia seeds and come to enjoy them as much as I do!

Sookie the Viking Kitty

2010-02-15T13:19:00.001-06:00

This weekend Bruce and I got a cat! It is so exciting. I have been wanting a kitty for a few months now but didn't think I was home enough to take care of one. But since Bruce is around so much and he loves cats he said he'd help me.

Friday night I decided that I really wanted one and Bruce and I decided we'd get one on Saturday. I told him to start picking names and I would chose from 3 girl names and 3 boy names. He chose Boys: Kermit, Gizmo and Yoshi and for a Girl: Bella, Wednesday and Sookie. I chose Kermit and Sookie. So Saturday after I got off of work we went out in search of our cat. We went to the Petsmart on 281 and Bitters and all the cats were older. So then we tried the one on Dezavala and at first it didn't seem like they had too many. There were only 4 out in the middle of the store and one was adopted already. The one I played with first was cute but seemed a little sad and tired after being played with all day.

Bruce and I were gonna give up and go home but then we went over the Petsmart's permanent adoption center and were looking at about 8 cats there. We weren't really finding anything we liked until an adoption advocate walked in and asked us what we were looking for. I told her I wanted a lap cat but that Bruce still wanted one that was kinda playful. She asked if we cared if it was an older cat and I said this it didn't really matter to me but that I still wanted a somewhat younger cat. So she said "Let me introduce you to Lisa (soon to be Sookie)."

She knelt down and opened the cage of an enormous cat. She started telling us all about her and about how she was probably a mix of Maine Coon and Norwegian Forest Cat and so she wasn't fat (at 17 lbs) she was just big boned. She told us to get down with her on the ground and see how we liked her. As soon as we started petting her she got her motor boat going and was so happy. She purred and purred and after a few minutes she got out of her cage and crawled into Bruce's lap and just rubbed on him. When the adoption lady came back she asked us what we thought and we unanimously knew that this was our cat.

So Saturday night we get her home and she goes and hides behind my China cabinet. She hid there for a few hours then migrated to behind my kitchen trash can. She hid out most of the evening and when it was time for me to go to bed she was still hiding out in the kitchen. For some reason throughout the night I kept waking up and at 4 AM I went to the living room where Bruce (the night owl) was still watching Lost episodes. He told me that at 2 AM he went to take a shower but couldn't cause Sookie had claimed it. He left her alone and told me if I went in there quietly she might still be in there. So I go looking for her and she's not in the shower. I go back to the dining room to look behind the china cabinet, no Sookie and then I look in the kitchen, no sookie. So I go back to the bathroom and notice that the laundry hamper door is slightly open so I open the door...

...and there she is. Piled high on top of my towels. Somehow she opened the door, got inside and closed it again behind her. I started laughing and just sat there for a while petting her and she seemed totally relaxed and happy.

I went back to bed and in the morning she was in the same spot. She hung out in my hamper for most of the night and came out once or twice to eat. But around 7 o'clock last night she finally came out and laid with me on the couch. We bonded watching the olympics and when I went to bed she was still out around the apartment playing with Bruce or begging to be scratched.

She is nothing like I thought I wanted but now I know she's perfect for me. She is so smart and sweet and I can't wait for her to get more comfortable so she wont feel the need to hide as much.

Cooking for Two

2010-02-11T08:03:00.007-06:00

I love to cook. Growing up I used to watch my mom cook and she made dinner every night for us and we had a family meal (without Haley though cause she was usually at dance class). But I remember sitting on the countertops and watching her cook and just seeing how calm and serene she looked while doing it. The majority of the time my mother and I spent together growing up was in the kitchen. So maybe thats why I love to cook.

Before I started dating Bruce I probably cooked for myself once or twice a month. I just never really did it because I hated cleaning up the mess and cooking for one is just so boring and wasteful. So the first few meals I made Bruce were kinda meant to WOW him, I made things with lots of flavor, lots of flair and made sure the table was always really nice. In the first few months I made him Chicken Piccata, Green Enchiladas, a roasted whole chicken, countless breakfasts, Carrot Cake, Dump Cake and more.

I haven't been cooking as much this semester cause we've both been so busy. What I have been doing though is keeping lots of food in my fridge so there's at least always something to eat. I keep healthier food around and try to limit the amount we eat out. I am loving the healthier food, I find myself eating substantially less fast food and fried food and actually rarely even crave it anymore. I eat all three meals a day usually with a snack in mid-morning and mid-afternoon. Things I like to always have on hand are: eggs, wheat bread, low-fat cheese, low-fat yogurt, milk, various nuts, stuff for sandwiches, apples, lettuce, spinach, cottage cheese, granola, wheat thins, cranberry juice, tomato juice, avocados, wheat pasta, trail mix, apple sauce, frozen fruit (for smoothies) and red potatoes. I know not all of this is healthy but a lot of it is much healthier than what I'm used to.

For me it isn't so much the losing weight, it's just about eating more balanced stuff. I used to live on Whataburger like 3 times a week now I can barely have one without feeling super super sick. Part of why I want to eat healthier is so that as a side-effect I'm also helping Bruce eat healthier. I know I can't control what he eats when he's not with me but I can make sure that when I cook, I'm cooking healthy balanced meals that are good for him too. He's diabetic and so these last few months I've been really reading up on it and trying to cook things that I know are good for him. Left to himself his diet usually consists of lots of fast food and about gallon of Diet Coke a day. Through my research I've found that there are certain vegetables and different things you can cook with that are great for diabetics and help work to keep his sugars down and kidneys working, so I always try to incorporate those into meals as well. He's definitely noticed my new found interest in getting healthy and I think its starting to have the effect I want and rubbing off on him. He's eating a little less, not drinking as much Diet Coke and most importantly smoking less.

So this week I've taken it a step further. On Sunday I made my birthmom's Vegan Chili which was about 4 cups of beans (red and black), bell peppers, onions, celery, carrots, chipotles, adobo sauce and seasonings. I cooked it all day and it turned out great! Bruce loved it, even though at first he was at first skeptical of the lack of meat. It was Super Bowl Sunday so I guess as a man it is the day to crave meat. But he loved it all the same. I made some spanish rice with it (which was not healthy) but luckily the chili is so filling that he didn't eat as much of the rice. Then for the rest of the week I've been making my Green Smoothies as seen below and they have been great. They are filling and I really feel the difference in my energy levels. When I have one in the morning it helps me stay awake and alert for the rest of the day.

So yesterday morning I was making my 4th Green Smoothie of the week and I ran out of Spinach! So I will definitely have to double my purchase or maybe just get a much bigger bag. But last night I was getting ready for bed and Bruce asked if I would make him a Green Smoothie and stick it in the fridge for him in the morning. I was so excited! I hadn't even thought to offer him one because it just didn't seem like the kinda thing he would normal go for but I was so thrilled that he wanted to try it. I told him I'd run out of Greens but that I'd happily make him a smoothie, I'd just have to figure out a way to put the lowest sugar fruits in it for him. So this morning I woke up and put a banana, 1/2 and orange, 1/2 an apple a small handful of blue berries and blackberries and then a good amount of carrot in the blender for him and whipped it up. I tasted it after to make sure it wasn't too sweet and it tasted fine. It didn't taste nearly as sweet as the ones I make for myself so I stuck it in the fridge for him. I am just so happy he asked, today I'm gonna look up online fruits and their sugar contents and try to buy some that I can put in the smoothie that will be good for him. I would hate to be giving him these delicious smoothies that are healthy for me to him and have them be unhealthy for him. I'm just so thrilled he is making a conscious effort to add some healthy-ness to his diet.

So it looks like my strategy is working. If I eat healthier he'll see it and want to do it himself! I know I wouldn't have started all this healthy stuff if he wasn't in my life. I want him to get healthy and the best way to do that is to get me healthy at the same time. For me the important thing is just adding lots more fruit and vegetables to my diet. I'm not taking away things, except for fast food, I'm just adding good stuff. I can't wait to keep exploring all theses great healthy food options. The best part is, that healthy food often has much more flavor than fatty-fried foods. They're also a lot of fun to cook. One day I hope I'll have little kids in the kitchen watching me cook healthy wonderful meals so they can grow up to do the same.

Green Smoothies Day 2

2010-02-08T08:58:00.002-06:00

Green Smoothies Day Two from Tyler Archer on Vimeo.

So I'm slowly trying to add more healthy things to my diet- I'm not dieting per se I'm just adding healthy stuff to what I already eat. Right now its the Green Smoothies. One of my favorite blogs Happy Foody talks a lot about Green Smoothies and they have always been tempting but I just had never tried them. They seemed messy and like more work than they are so I just never went there. Well this weekend I was making Deirdre's Vegas Chili and decided to take the plunge and also try my first Green Smoothie. Happy Food has a very simple first recipe for them and I made my first one on Sunday. It was easy, it wasn't as messy as I thought and it tasted delicious.

The recipe is super easy:
1 Frozen Banana
1 whole peeled orange
handful of mixed frozen fruit (strawberries, cantaloupe, lots of berries and pineapple)
Fresh pineapple
Lots of Spinach

One thing that Happy Foody says that I wanted to try was putting you smoothie is a fun cup cause you'll be more likely to finish it. Also using a big straw so you get more of the good stuff faster. I'm using my Vegas cup from Fremont Street and it works great.

The green smoothie is awesome and freaking people out while drinking the green goop is fun too!

Last Minute Resolutions

2010-01-27T08:46:00.006-06:00

Now that January is almost over, hopefully everyone has their resolutions in order. Thanks to a friendly co-worker who sent this to me in an email- I think these are some great jumping off points for how to always live, but even better to start the year off right by doing them. Try to pick at least 2 from each category and make it a point to do those things all the time. I'd love to make some of them mandatory for my office...but since I can't I'll just share with as many people as possible. I'm bolding the things I need to work on or already somewhat do and italics are my thoughts.

Health:

Drink plenty of water I've been trying to do this one all school year actually and it's going pretty good. Rarely does a day go by where I don't drink at least one bottle of water and several glasses with meals
Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a beggar Doubtful that I'll ever be able to do this one, Lunch and Dinner are usually my best meals
Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat less food that is manufactured in plants. I'm trying to do this one this semester- right now I'm in the just adding phase, I'm just adding these types of foods to what I already eat
Live with the 3 E’s – Energy, Enthusiasm and Empathy. I think I've always kind of done this one and I try to pay special attention to this when I'm at the office
Make time to pray.
Play more games. I got a Wii :)
Read more books than you did in 2009. I would love to!
Sit in silence for at 10 minutes each day.
Sleep for 7 hours I try to get 8 hours at least 4 nights a week and 6-7 hours the other 3 nights...but usually there's one night that I get like only 5
Take a 10-30 minute walk daily. And while you walk, smile. I'm trying to get Bruce to do this with me too sometimes- I suggested it like two weekends ago and we still haven't gotten to it...maybe this weekend...but I walk at least 30 minutes a day and probably usually more- plus I live on the 3rd floor of my apartment building so I move

Personality:

Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is about. Will try...will try
Don’t have negative thoughts on things you cannot control. Instead invest your energy in the positive present moment. I suck at this! I get totally wrapped up in things I can't control so I'm totally gonna try to do this.
Don’t over do it. Keep/Know your limits.
Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
Don’t waste your precious energy on gossip. This is one of my actual New Year's resolutions but I specified it to family gossip because my family is horrible about!
Dream more while you are awake.
Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need. Enough said.
Forget issues of the past. Don’t remind your partner with His/Her mistakes of the past. That will ruin your present happiness. I'm on it.
Life is too short to waste time hating anyone. Don’t hate others. I did realize this last semester and I've been doing much better with this one.
Make peace with your past so it won’t spoil the present. I'm trying!
No one is in charge of your happiness except you.
Realize that life is a school and you are here to learn. Problems are simply part of the curriculum that appear and fade away like algebra class but the lessons you learn will last a lifetime. I feel really lucky that I have some really great teachers too. I have tons of people trying to help me out with this one.
Smile and laugh more.
You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree. Bruce and I take turns winning and losing, but we haven't really had real arguments...

For me the Personality Ones are gonna be the hardest- I'm kinda judge-y, I do get envious and I argue a lot. But I do a lot of the positive stuff too, I just need to balance it out better with more positive happy stuff and a lot less of the judge-y stuff.

Society:

Call your family often.
Each day give something good to others.
Forgive everyone for everything. I'm pretty good at this one already.
Spend time with people over the age of 70 & under the age of 6.
Try to make at least three people smile each day. DONE
What other people think of you is none of your business. Oh-goodness. Yes it is.
Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch.

Life:

Do the right thing!
Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or loyal.
GOD heals everything.
However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up. This is important because chances are once you do you'll feel better after you're there.
The best is yet to come.
When you awake alive in the morning, thank GOD for it.
Your Inner most is always happy. So, be happy.

A Healthier Me

2010-01-26T12:48:00.006-06:00

The way people eat often reflects the type of person they are or are trying to become. I think food can be a spiritual thing for some people but also a healing thing for others. I greatly believe that what you put into your body is reflected in your physical appearance and energy. I'm really working on what I eat. I'm not trying to do anything drastic all at once like I've tried and failed at before, but I'm just trying to change the way I use food. I am definitely a stress eater, an angry eater, an emotional eater, and a social eater. I can eat all the time. If I'm upset the first thing I'll look for is all the chocolate that is hidden around my apartment for those such emergencies. I crave carbs and can stand in my kitchen eating tortillas with butter on them for 1/2 an hour before realizing what I've done.

I started last semester trying to take my lunch to work and try to have balanced meals and snacks. I was able to keep that up for about a month. Then when I started dating Bruce I started cooking a little more often, but also started eating Whataburger close to 3 times a week. When I cook I always try to have a salad and veggies but that is the extent of what was healthy in my meals. As the needle on the scale quickly started racing towards 140 I decided that none of the measures I'd taken to lose weight worked and if they did, they were not working for me. Last summer I tried several crazy diets- the 3 day diet which is basically starving yourself and eating less than 700 calories a day. I made it half a day. Then I was suggested Diet Pills (I should have known better I know). I took 3 or 4 Venom (The name alone should have scared me) a day and while yes I had great energy I also was incredibly dehydrated and had to force myself to eat the little these pills allowed me to keep down. Needless to say these were both horrible ideas.

So this semester I will try again. So I've gone to HEB twice since the new year and each time I've tried to get lots of veggies and healthier food. I hate wheat but I've been eating wheat toast, wheat sandwiches, wheat pasta, wheat cereal and more I'm sure. And I try to have at least one piece of fruit today. I drink low-fat milk and try to drink a ton of water throughout the day. I snack on whole grain wheat thins with a low-fat laughing cow cheese wedge. After only another month of this I haven't noticed that much of a difference. I've lost some weight but the clothes aren't fitting. One thing I have noticed is I'm not craving salty things anymore like chips. And if I eat something really fried it hurts my stomach. Which is sad cause I miss my Egg Rolls from Jack-in-the-Box, but hey I don't need fried food. I'm actually not craving any fast food. Now its only been a few weeks and I'm already really bored with my lunches. I do still allow myself to eat out but I try to only have fast food once a week (usually Sunday's when I take lunch to my mom up at the hospital). When I go out to eat I order something healthier and tend to eat only half of it and save the rest for lunch the next day. This seems to be working cause magically I've lost 8 pounds already.

Now enter the Wii Fit. I have been waiting for my Wii fit for about a year. I've been wanting it and after 3 days with it, I'm loving it. When you first get your Wii it puts you through all these tests to find out you Wii Fit age (it tests balance, coordination and center of gravity- it's cool). Based on the tests I'm about 8 years older than I should be. My BMI is right below the level for being Overweight at 24.4 and my Wii trainer suggests I lose about 16 more pounds to reach an optimal weight. So far I really enjoy the yoga on the wii. It's kinda like having your own yoga instructor- there are all types for more advanced and less. I also enjoy all the step-aerobics type activities too. The Hula Hoop training is fun but right now my personal fave is probably rhythm Kung-Fu. So I'm doing about 30-45 minutes a day on it and we'll see how long that lasts. Again I'm not looking for drastic changes, just a little at a time and just trying to be a little healthier overall.

Please don't call me Pookie

2010-01-15T11:34:00.000-06:00

For as long as I can remember my nickname has been T-bird. All my family calls me T-bird and I think once my brother-in-law has but we both agreed it was awkward and he hasn't done it since. When I was a baby, or so I have been told, my paternal grandfather used to call me Smyler cause I was a very happy smile-y baby. Smyler never caught on but I still get T-bird all the time, mostly from my dad (he also class me just Bird sometimes for short).

When I went to High School I wanted to "reinvent" myself so instead of going by Tyler I decided to make the big, bad choice and go with just "Ty". My family made fun of me for months, friends would call and ask for Ty and my parents would jokingly start saying "Oh Ty, you have a phone call" and such. Eventually someone in my Musical Theatre class started calling me My-Ty (Mauy-Thai yah like the drink) and then that caught on with all my close friends. Throughout High School though I stopped introducing myself as Ty and just went back to Tyler, but with most of my friend Ty and My-Ty stuck. By the time I got to college I had completely dropped Ty and most of my college friends just called me Tyler, once I got closer with people though they'd take it upon themselves to nickname me Ty. Today I always get a little giddy or excited when someone calls me Ty cause it reminds me of high school. The secretaries in the office sometime make fun of me and call me Ty-Ty but Ty still makes me feel safe and at home. My brother-in-law and his best friend call me Ty a lot they don't usually call me Tyler, I guess they think Ty is more informal so they chose that. I don't really have a preference I've always really liked my name but Ty will always have a fun, sweet emotional reaction.

I call everyone "hun" or "honey" or "darlin" or "pretty girl" or "sweets". Those are just my general nicknames. I call my sister Hail (not spelled like her name mind you) and I am very possessive about this nickname. You have to earn Haley's nickname to be able to use it and I am totally the judge. I even call guys hun it's just kinda second nature. Every time I accidentally call one of the secretaries hun and then I remember that I probably shouldn't.

Now nicknames with guys are completely different. Not even with guys I'm dating but people like my brother-in-law and guys I've known forever I'm always "sweetie" or "love". If my brother-in-law isn't calling me Ty then it's sweetie. My birth-stepfather always calls me sweetie and one of my best guy friend's from high school calls me love. Strangers, bartenders, waiters all tend to call me sweetie (but that's probably just a female thing that they always do as the go-to nickname).

Boyfriend nicknames are still another issue. Babe. Baby. Love. My love. My darling. Simple straight and to the point. Nothing cutesy about it. I don't like pet names that are too overdone, that aren't just simple and to the point. I can understand sometimes when they're person specific or they hold certain memories, but maybe i've just never been in a relationship where those organically come about...which is actually fine with me.

What I find the most interesting is how few people actually call me Tyler. The students and my coworkers yes call me Tyler, but my friends, family and loved one rarely just say "hey Tyler". I tend to notice when people close to me call me Tyler, because it totally throws me for a loop. I'm like oh-wait that's me. Because I'm just not used to people using my name.

Art in Education

2010-01-14T16:27:00.001-06:00

When I was in Elementary School I remember always seeing the ads on TV for “Save the Music”. Musicians and artists would come on TV for PSAs talking about schools cutting music programs due to costs and such. I never really knew what they were talking about because my elementary and middle schools all had very strong music programs that I was very much involved in. When I went to High School it was another story. I went to the North East School of the Arts (NESA) at Robert E. Lee (I also went to ISA but that’s another story). At NESA I was a musical theatre major in a class of 17. From the start of the program we were trained by amazing teachers. Mrs. Bianco, our voice teacher, was an amazing performer and great teacher, she helped all of us find things in our voices that weren’t there before NESA. Ms. Starnes our dance teacher and later Ms. Mabry pushed lots of us to our dancing breaking point leaving all of us sore in places were weren’t being sore in “My body doesn’t bend that Ms. Starnes”. Mr. Connelly our acting teacher put us through the most amazing acting exercises that made us an extremely close knit class. All throughout NESA these 17 classmates were my best friend and all of that is because of Mr. Connelly, he made us best friends, people we relied on and needed to be with. I’ve never experienced anything like it before then or since then. We were able to work on our craft everyday for HOURS and it never felt like work because it was what we all loved and enjoyed. When we did shows, sometimes we were at school from 7 AM till 11 PM. We’d be exhausted but we’d always show up the next day. This of course instilled in us a great work ethic. Musical Theatre was everything but we still had to do well in our academic classes to stay in the program. Musical Theatre was almost like the reward for going to High School. Well as I’m sure some of y’all have heard, yesterday there was an announcement that NESA may be a casualty of the NEISD budget crisis. Dr. Middleton (NEISD Superintendent) is considering either laying off some of the teachers or cutting the entire program. The average High School student costs the district $6,500 a year while a NESA student costs about $8,000. But look what you get out of it. Dr. York notes that 99% of NESA student go to college and last year alone NESA students received over $10 million in college scholarships. NESA students do better academically and on standardized tests too. The idea that NESA may not be around next year is heartbreaking. I know that NESA made up such a huge part of who I am and has influenced and effected my entire life. If it wasn’t for NESA I wouldn’t have learned about ISA (my other magnet school) and I wouldn’t have graduated in the top 5% of my class, allowing me to get amazing scholarships, that allowed me to go to an amazing private university. I owe so much to NESA. I had some amazing life experiences there too. I just am so sad. My little sister Grace is there now and I just can’t imagine making all those students in their first few years of High School go back to their districts and their own high schools. If you want more information or want to join a Facebook group about it please see the following links:

Video:
http://www.foxsanantonio.com/newsroom/top_stories/videos/vid_949.shtml

News Article:
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/education/Cost_may_kill_NEISD_School_of_the_Arts.html

Facebook Group:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=246423119716&ref=mf

"When You Say You Love Me"

2009-12-10T16:36:00.001-06:00

When you say “I love you” everything changes. When you actually say it out loud to someone where they can hear it and understand what you’re saying then things are never the same. I’ve said, “I love you” (and meant it) to 3 guys that weren’t my friends or family members. The guys have always said it first; I’ve always been too scared. That first time it’s spoken in a relationship, though, that’s the best. That first time you hear someone say “I love you” the world kinda stops for a minute and if it’s welcomed then sheer joy follows. Then time picks back up and you say “I love you” or “I love you too” or “love ya” all the time. The words then get said a dozen times a day to that person and they become almost a required part of the relationship. If they aren’t said once then the worrying begins. But at the same time since they are being thrown around so frequently they become a habit and almost just a secondary response. Only sporadically do you stop to think about the words you’re saying to make sure that their real meaning is still there and being understood. But that first time, the first time you say “I love you” is the scariest, the best, the worst and all feelings in between.

In high school I told all my friends I loved them. My musical theatre class was really close, there were only 17 of us, and we were constantly throwing “I love you”s around. This slowly leaked over to my life with all my friends. Phone conversations (this was definitely before Texting) always ended with “I love you” or “love ya”. I didn’t really date in high school to the point where “I love you” was ever even proposed so I didn’t have to deal with telling someone I loved them and having those feelings not reciprocated and the drama that I’m sure would have followed.

My first college boyfriend and I had been dating a little over two months when he first told me. He said he had wanted to tell me after the first month but refused cause he “knew” it was too early. I think I kinda worked the actual “I love you” out of him cause we were standing outside somewhere and I was complaining about not knowing how he felt about me and he said something along the lines of “you know I love you”. I didn’t say it back right away, I waited probably another two weeks or so. Again this was before Texting too so we said it on the phone a lot, also we lived in separate cities the phone was a large part of our relationship. We dated for about a year and over the summer I went away to camp as a counselor and we had tons of phone calls and actual letters that ended with “I love you”, the letters probably were just singed “love” but I can’t really remember. All I know is that with him I did not overuse “I love you” I really tried to only say it at the end of calls or when I was actually with him. It didn’t need to be said a hundred times a day or constantly when I was with him- it was fine we knew we were in love so lets move on. And then one day I moved on. One day I woke up and realized I wasn’t in love. I didn’t know this person I’d been with for a year and was worried that the love wasn’t there.

But where does the love go when you break up with someone? How do you just fall out of love with someone you’ve been with for a while or that you thought you could love forever? When you’re broken up with I understand the falling out of love thing. A**hole broke your heart so yah you’re not gonna love the jerk anymore. Dumba** cheats on you again totally understandable to fall out of love. But are there other ways to fall out of love? I guess sometimes you later find out things about a person that you didn’t originally know and that can make you fall out of love but that’s more sudden. It’s the slow fading out of love that troubles me. When over a period of months you just become indifferent towards the person and you try to convince yourself that it’s still love but one day it’s gone. It makes you wonder if it was really love to begin with.

The next time I said I love you was with my ex-fiancé. We started dating in the spring of my sophomore year of college and it took us about 5 months to become actual “boyfriend/girlfriend”. But before he even asked me be his girlfriend he told me he was falling in love with me. The day he told me he actually loved me was the day he asked me to be his girlfriend, almost 5 months to the day since we met and started seeing each other. He just said it the once and I started to cry and told him I’d be his girlfriend but didn’t say I love you. I finally told him I loved him about 2 months later. Again it wasn’t a frequent occurrence of the words and eventually I said it more than him. I always told him I loved him when I saw him, when I left him, on the phone, for lots of reasons. We were together another year and a half after that. But the last 5 months of our relationship were like the first 5 only reversed. We slowly learned that we weren’t right for each other and the love was there we both admitted to still loving each other, but we fought all the time and started avoiding each other till one day we decided to take a break.

Why isn’t love enough? This goes for friendships and relationships. Cause both can end even when there’s still love there. I go back and forth between believing that relationships can survive even if it seems like the love between you is all you have. But sometimes I just don’t believe that love is all you need to stay with someone. There are so many other things. Respect, honesty, trust, laughter, affection. These things are also needed to make a relationship work. I know some people would probably argue that without these things then you don’t have love either, but again where did the love go? It was there and then as these things go does it just disintegrate? I think that love can still be there even when these things aren’t. But at the same time I think respect, honest, trust, laughter and affection are needed to make a relationship work. If you still love someone but these other things aren’t present then obviously something in the relationship isn’t working. Is that the time you give up and say you don’t want to be together? Or is that the time that you count on your love to bring you through and hope that one day those things will come back?

This brings me to my current boyfriend. Things are still good and great and wonderful so I don’t want to do too much reflection, just kinda look at the facts then look at the similarities and differences of my “I love you” moments. We hadn’t been together very long before the first time I wanted to say “I love you” to him and if he hadn’t of said it when he did I’m sure eventually I would have just busted out and screamed it at him. About a month ago we attended my sister’s wedding and it was all just so romantic, pretty and happy. We danced a hundred slow dances together and I would just look up at him (he’s very much taller than me) and think wow what an amazing guy this is that was brave enough to come to a huge family event like this after only being together a month and a half. That night he told me that he didn’t want to tell me he loved me but that he was definitely falling for me. I was happy with that reaction. Another month went by and everything just kept getting better and we were still very luckily just as happy with each other. About a week ago we went out karaoke-ing (how we met) and he was introducing me to the last of his friends that I hadn’t met. I make horrible, horrible first impressions and was incredibly nervous about the whole situation. Afterwards I had a mini-girlie-emotion attack in the car while we were leaving and while trying to calm me down he said “you’re gonna make me say it now aren’t you? I love you Tyler” and that just of course made me cry even more and he said it again and then I told him that I loved him too. Now considering it’s been barely a week I sure as hell hope we both still feel the same way but it’s just so nice. I just look at him now and am so happy just knowing that there’s this great guy who loves me and that I love too.

Comparing this to the others- I’ve always been told “I love you” at night and in the later nighttime hours. Like I said earlier I’ve never said “I love you” first. The biggest difference with my current boyfriend and the others is that this is the first time I’ve said “I love you” right back, all the others it took me a while to finally get to that same place. No judgment or reflections on this love compared to the others since it is so new. Right now it is just love.

Meeting the Parents

2009-11-24T09:09:00.005-06:00

It's been years since I met a boyfriend's parents...years! Like 4- Mike's parent's don't count cause he was my situation not my boyfriend at all. So it was Ben's parent's back in 2005 and before that it was back in 2003 when I met the Wolff's and before that Ryan's back in 2002. So I don't have a lot of experience with that sort of thing and that makes me kinda nervous...less nervous actually and more anxious. To me the family this isn't that big of a deal. I have a huge family between the 3 families I have it usually ends up being like 5 seperate holiday

Meeting parents after college I think has to be different though. I mean in High School and college it was easy to say, "oh, she's a good girl, she makes good grades and stays out of trouble." But as an adult what do you say, "oh, she got her BA in History and now works as a Student Activities Coordinator?" What does it say about me that I didn't pursue a career with the degree I spent 80K on? I mean how do you qualify girlfriends after the college age. I guess since I'm in grad school you can say "She makes decent grades in Grad School" but still. Its different. My parents always ask the same thing, "Why does he do", "How did you meet" and "Where'd he go to school". Why don't they ever ask "why do you like him" or "what do you think about him"?

Bruce already met my family and they liked him, so that mean's all that's left is for his family to like me. I'm not sure if a holiday like Thanksgiving is the appropriate place though...I mean don't families usually fight on holidays? From what he's told me about his family it doesn't seem like their fighters but still. My family always fights on holidays either me and my sis or me and my mom. We're going to Houston and I'm getting nervous. I don't know what to pack to wear. I obviously don't want to wear too revealing clothing because Bruce and I are staying at hotel that way the sleeping arrangement thing doesn't make anyone uncomfortable so I'm thinking that conservative is the way to go. But at the same time Bruce has visible tattoos so if they see me all conservative and goody goody wont that seem a bit off? All my tats will be hidden cause it's cold so wont they think it's odd? I don't know I'm probably just over thinking it.

Okay only a few hours to stop being a spaz about this...

Simple Woman's Rainy Day Book

2009-09-22T09:37:00.008-05:00

FOR TODAY

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Outside my window...

Students are students are studying in the Craft Room. In groups of 4, 3, 2 and by themselves. The room is full and all the tables have students at them. It's nice to see life in the Student Center again.
I am thinking...

About how nice it would be to be at home or in a coffee shop reading a book on this raining morning. The weather is changing and it's cooler so it'd be nice to get all bundled up with a good book.
I am thankful for...

Being inside and not on the road. San Antonio drivers are bad to begin with but even worse when it rains. I'm always afraid of getting in accidents when the weather gets like this.
From the learning rooms...(if this applies)

Students are studying. We have mandatory study hall for our Athletes and most of them just pretend to study but some might actually study since we have seen their grades improve since we started.
From the kitchen...

Or the cafeteria...we see students coming out with food, lots of energy drinks and hot chocolate. The coffee here is pretty weak but energy drinks are very popular. I just want to scream at the students "they're horrible for you!"
I am wearing...

A brown long sleeve dress and closed toe shoes. It's wet outside so I didn't want to have anything dragging on the ground but I also didn't want my toes to get cold. I'm also wearing an entirely too thin khaki jacket that is not keeping me warm at all.
I am creating...

A mess on my desk. I have paperwork that is completed it just needs to be filed. I also have business cards spilling everywhere and too many bottles of hand sanitizer.
I am going...

To pick up academic regalia eventually today, when it stops raining for tomorrows PTK inductions. Academic Regalia is heavy and may not all fit in my little little car.
I am reading...

"A Framework for Evaluating the Success of Early Academic Outreach Programs" and "The Texas Education Code" when I get bored with one I move back over to the other, cause both are long and wordy and don't hold my attention for long. For fun at home I'm reading "The Romantic Movement" and "Status Anxiety" by Alain de Botton both are wonderful.
I am hoping...

To go Karaoke-ing tonight after class cause I kinda want to sing to relieve some of this stress. I'm also hoping class goes by quickly tonight and it doesn't rain while I'm driving to and from Karaoke.
I am hearing...

Sonya's music through her earphones- I think it's R&B. I hear students studying- which means they probably aren't studying but chatting instead. I also hear ping-pong balls bouncing outside my door because we moved the ping-pong tables closer.
Around the house/office...

Carla is speaking to whoever will listen and it's hard to tell if she needs a response or not, Carrie and Trish are talking about budget while Sonya, Aaron and myself are in our own worlds.
One of my favorite things...

Is feeling accomplished enough at my desk to take a quick break to write a blog post. I've done almost half of my Tuesday To-Do List so I feel confident to take intermittent breaks.
A few plans for the rest of the week:

PTK Induction Wednesday Night, Thursday Night Music Club and Outdoor movies Friday Night- the weekend studying. I'll probably throw a little guitar playing in there somewhere and possibly sleep and food.
Here is picture for thought I am sharing...(add your picture here)

This is a picture of my sister and two of her husbands friends. Last Friday night after having dinner with her husband. Two of her husband's friends invited her out for a couple of drinks. Her husband didn't mind and let her go out with them (not that she needed permission but you get the idea). I thought it was incredibly cool that he didn't insist on going with her. I ended up going with her, but he just stayed home that night. They're still technically newlyweds and yet they seem so comfortable and set in their ways that they can go out with friends independently and don't always have to be together. I really like that.

xkcd.com

2009-09-17T08:40:00.002-05:00

I'm kinda addicted to xkcd.com right now and this comment totally reminded me of my brother-in-law

Back to school...

2009-09-04T15:17:00.000-05:00

Every fall while in undergrad I loved that second Sunday in August. I loved taking 1604 past Randolph, then I-10 East past Woman Hollering Creek and Marion where the Ware pare live. I loved taking the back road down HW 90 to get to campus 3 ½ minutes faster than taking the 46 exit. I loved moving back into the dorms at TLU and getting everything set up. I loved trekking to Hein for that first meal of the semester and I loved walking to chapel and the auditorium for opening convocations. That first step onto TLU for the fall semester always held such excitement and potential for greatness.

Monday I drove to UTSA- took the frustrating 40 minute drive (due to traffic) down I-10West from Downtown. I turned onto UTSA Blvd past Costco, past Valero and staked out the parking spaces in the main lot. I walked the mile from the parking lot to the Starbucks through the concrete cement unattractive corridors and hot outside of the non-green UTSA campus. From Starbucks I walked another ¼ mile to my classroom probably a mile and a half from where I actually parked. There was no joy, no potential for greatness, just the unattractive and non-green campus of UTSA. I didn’t get that great “welcome home” feeling like I’d received at TLU.

While SAC started school last week and most of UTSA did as well, I was one of the lucky ones whose class did not start till this week. UTSA started on Wednesday last week and my classes are Monday-Tuesday- score me! Anyways so I took the summer off from grad school and loved it. It was so nice to have my Monday and Tuesday nights back and I didn’t miss the boring reading or paper writing or anything. So needless to say I was kinda not looking forward to going back to school. The two classes I was taking also sounded really boring Multicultural Issues in Higher Education and Program Planning and Evaluation. “Multicultural? I totally took a class just like that last year” and “I’m a freakin’ activities coordinator, why the hell do I need Program Planning?”. These were my attitudes. Luckily I was super pleasantly surprised. My Multicultural class should be much better than the last one and actually have to do with Student Affairs in Higher Ed- yay! And my Program Planning class has all my friends in it and my favorite Professor in my department, so it too should at least be entertaining. The syllabuses look totally doable, even though this year my work load has tripled for the fall and I will be traveling every weekend in October, and not as time consuming as last year. I’m super excited about my classes and getting to see my friends every week.

I’m excited about school but wish UTSA was prettier, friendlier and smaller.

Dating by the stars...part 2

2009-09-02T14:59:00.003-05:00

I’ve never dated a Virgo but after reading about their personality maybe I should. Virgos are supposed to be modest, reliable, practical, analytical, worriers, critical and conservative. Why haven’t I dated one of these before? Interesting. I’ll have to keep my eyes open for Virgos cause it seems like I could totally get along with that type of personality.

Libras are interesting. I’ve only dated one Libra before and he totally matched the easygoing, idealistic, charming, flirtatious, indecisive and gullible characteristics one associates with Libras. What initially attracted me to this sign was the easygoing charm he had. I later found easygoing to be laziness and his charm fleeting. He’s an okay guy and I’m sure perfect for someone but for a strong and driven Aries he just was not the one.

Scorpios are one sexy sign in my opinion. These men are forceful, direct, exciting, passionate, obsessive, emotional, and a little secretive. I’ve dated a couple Scorpios and they were great. They were all highly passionate and driven people. I saw a lot of similar traits between us and I think we were both attracted to the fact that we were both hard workers. But in the end that became the problem we were such work-o-holics that we forgot to make time for one another. But we’re still kinda friends even now.

I off and on date a Sagittarius. A freewheeling, fun-loving, easy-going, lazy, irresponsible, careless and reckless. Need I say more? For an A-typical Aries like myself that just does not mesh. This guy is great on the 3 days a year this Aries likes to let her hair down, but the rest of the time they can just be annoying. They don’t have schedules they don’t think practically and are content to just let things happen. I can’t imagine myself ever getting serious with a Sagittarius.

I have had several long-term relationships with Capricorns and was even engaged to one for a period of time when I was in college. Capricorns are great guys they’re patient, kind, practical, ambitious, a little pessimistic, disciplined and sometimes hold grudges. But the two I dated are/were (depending on my mood) just great, great guys. They were both very patient and when dealing with a moody Aries it is definitely needed. And they all had some ambition even if it leads them into bad fields. They are hard workers and can look at things practically. The reason these relationships fell apart was totally me- their patience sometimes seemed like they were just waiting forever- like they weren’t moving forward but in actuality they were just waiting for me to move the relationship forward.

I’ve also had two long-ish relationships with Aquarius’s and had the same problem with both. Their personalities are great and with both we started out as friends first. They are friendly, honest, loyal, unpredictable, creative, intellectual and sometimes unemotional. As friends these guys were great and we could talk for hours and hours on the phone I remember losing lots of sleep in high school talking to these boys. Unfortunately they did not live up to the “loyal” trait of their sign and both strayed causing our relationships to end. This leads me to tend to stay away from Aquarius’s now.

The last Fire and Water sign pairing of Pisces with Aries has also been disastrous. Fire and water don’t mix so I should have known better. All the Pisces I’ve known, male and female, have been a lot alike. They are secretive, blunt, critical, lost, loners, dreamers, intuitive and sympathetic. I’ve only dated on Pisces but having a once best friend a Pisces has also probably turned me off them for a while. They hate being judged but are totally judgmental. They were constantly trying to change me even though the Aries is the most stubborn sign. They are also completely unappreciative. The original mystery that attracts and Aries to a Pisces is totally lost when the Pisces refuses to stand up for the Aries like they’ll do for the Pisces.

The last sign I’ve dated is another Aries. They are just the male version of me and a whole lot of fun. We both had so much energy and passion for things that it was almost unbearable to spend time with anyone else. We hated to be apart and had to keep ourselves seriously distracted to keep from going crazy. I would definitely date another Aries because they are just too much fun and just a totally great match.

Overall I don’t date solely based on someone’s sign. But I definitely see the coincidences based on them and the similarities between them.

Dating by the stars...part 1

2009-08-31T15:40:00.000-05:00

I’m an Aries. Artistic, energetic, impulsive, passionate, independent, outgoing, direct, selfish, procrastinator, free, impatient and adventurous- to name a few. I possess quiet a few of these traits both good and bad. And sometimes I’m sure I’m lots of them at once. I’ve dated all the different signs in the zodiac (but one-Virgo) and I’m starting to think there’s kinda a lot to be said for dating by the stars. I’ve dated more Leos and Capricorns than all the other signs and some totally personified their sign depending on their location to the center of that signs cycle. It’s really interesting…at least to me. But it’s easier to go in order.

I’ve only dated one Taurus and good lord remind me not to do it again. Half of my family members are Taurus so that should have been a clue to stay away. I fight with my family all the time so why did I think I wouldn’t fight with the Taurus. Tauruses are known for being possessive and Aries are known for wanting to be free. Tauruses are also unchanging and don’t compromise well at all. When a Taurus makes up his mind, their mind is made and that can be frustrating to live with. The best part about the relationship was that each of us was really passionate about similar things and so conversations were great and watching movies together always good but the fun stopped there.

Geminis- the twins. Their name is so fitting because it often felt like they were two different people with entirely different personalities. I’ve only dated one of these as well and I use the term date very, very loosely because he could never sit still long enough to take it seriously. Geminis are huge flirts, with everyone. The great thing about Geminis is that they’re talented at many, many things. They can be artistic and creative totally inspiring that part of the Aries but they also are a tad ADD and often move on to something new without finishing what they’ve started. The problem with my Gemini was timing I think- today we are great friends and he is one of my best guy friends and totally dependable, sweet and charming and if we didn’t have our history I would totally consider dating him again but I think it’s best for us to just be friends. I wouldn’t be apposed to dating another Gemini in the future just because I think if you catch them at the right time they could be great.

Every once in a while you come across a sign that you totally instantly connect with and want to spend tons of time with. All the zodiac charts tell me to stay away from this sign cause their water and I’m fire but I just couldn’t get enough of the Cancer I met last spring. Cancers are strong, passionate, nurturing, protective, loyal and creative. They have a tough outside and a delicate side hidden away. The crabs of the zodiac world actually do better when in a pair and my one amazing like 13 hours with one makes me believe it. I met the guy in a bar and ended up staying up all night and most of the next morning with one talking about all the things we had in common and talking about music, movies and books. I’m totally intrigued and want to meet another one just to find out if they’re all like this. The reason this guy was only around for 13 hours (and a week full of phone calls and emails) is because he moved far away, out of the country actually but I still secretly hope when he returns I’ll get another 13 hours

Leo the lions. I’ve dated so many of these guys and I don’t know why I think they’ll be different, one day I’ll learn I guess. But there is not room enough in any relationship for the ego of two fire signs, especially when one of them is a Leo. Leos make excellent leaders or artists or something because they are so confident and self-assured. They are incredibly passionate like most fire signs but because both the Leo and the Aries want to be the center of attention and the one receiving the affection the relationship can become exhausting and fights eventually break out when one side wont compromise. I think the reason I keep coming back to Leos is because their confidence makes them extremely attractive and they are also very competitive to the point to where its like a challenge for them to get you to stay with them. They’ll spoil you rotten but Aries’ love can’t be bought.

Dating by the Stars and other revelations to be continued…

There are just some songs...

2009-08-25T07:29:00.002-05:00

Make New Friends but Keep the Old

2009-08-17T08:16:00.001-05:00

In the last year a lot of people from the past have been popping back into my life. And mostly they've been people from High School. Yes we normally find each other on Facebook, but sometimes fate intervenes and reconnects us in other ways. (And yes they are all guys)

A little over 2 years ago when I first started working at SAC that summer we hired someone in the office to work part-time that had gone to ISA. I didn't know him back in high school but he had apparently known who I was. He's worked in our office ever since and we've become really good friends. He was a couple of grades below me in High School so I pretty much understood why we weren't friends back in school but now I'm so glad we are. We have lots of fun together and have some fun things in common.

A year ago 2 guy friends from high school came into my life from seemingly out of the blue. We caught up on Facebook for a while and then started hanging out. I was getting ready to start UTSA and one of the guys was too so we started hanging out more at school and outside of school. What was funny for me was that in High School I wasn't really friends with them at all, I went to a tiny school so I knew them, but we'd never hung out before. We kinda talked about it but kinda avoided the subject at the same time, but for about 6ish months I hung out with at least one of the guys on a pretty much weekly basis.

Then last Christmas another random guy from high school who I knew a little better popped back into my life. We started chatting on Facebook too and eventually started hanging out. When we hung out it was mostly at bars or involved alcohol in some way and it kinda darkened up my Christmas break. Not in a bad way, but we ended u enjoying each others company by drinking and just being really sarcastic about things. We're much more sporadic friends and maybe hang out every 3ish months or so.

Late this spring in April I started going to these Thursday Night Music Club events out in New Braunfels with my family. I started playing guitar and singing more. One night this woman came up to me after I played and asked if I'd even be formally trained to sing and I explained that I had been a musical theatre major in high school and found out that I had been in class with her son. Her son and I had been friends in high school and knew all the same people, but had lost touch over the years. She gave me his number and told me I just had to call him. I eventually did and we played phone tag for a couple of months before finally getting to see him last week. We've only hung out twice now in 6 years and already it has been just a blast. He makes me laugh and we have fun and it's so easy to remember why we were friends all those years ago. Unlike the others we actually were friends before.

I try to keep touch with all the guys kinda regularly or irregularly, but it's hard. The first and last are easy cause one I see daily at work and the other one is still new, but the middle guys I actually have to make an effort to see. I totally enjoy keeping in touch with people from the past I kinda think it helps ground me and it definitely helps me remember who I am and who I was in high school. I just think its interesting how it happens, I was on Facebook years before the middle guys ever made the choice to contact me and the last guy's mom has known my birthmom for years, but she's only just now getting more involved with our family's stuff.

I wonder what old friends will return this year.

My Summer is over...and what that means

2009-08-03T09:43:00.003-05:00

It's August 3rd and my summer is definitely over. It was actually over last Tuesday on July 28th when New Student Orientation started, but I figured I'd give it till August to be officially through.

What changes?

1- No more drinking during the week (probably not true I'll just reduce it to once during the week and then only on weekends when I'm not working)

2- Fewer Thursday Night Music Clubs- so sad it's true but I have to be alert and awake now on Friday cause we'll have events during the days and evenings and little sleep just wont do- I'll still make some but I'll drastically reduce my attendance

3- Return to school- school starts the last week of August and that means my Monday and Tuesdays will be busy once more. I'm super torn about returning to school, part of me wants to go because I know I'm working towards something good but the other half of me wonders what's the point.

4- Less time to play the guitar- so sad and true because I know I'll be studying for school but also busy with ten times more work that I've had the last 5 months

5- The end of dating season- I try only to date new people in the summer cause I have more free time to get to know someone and once fall hits I really only have time for one date a week and that is sometimes just too slow to get to know someone so whoever I'm dating at the start of fall tends to find this annoying mid September sometimes real winners can stick it out till October but I warn them all cause I know its not fun dating busy people I'd be annoyed too, but I'm too busy to notice sometimes

Summer Regrets/Wishes

1- I wish I'd taken vacation time- I just noticed that I never took any time off this summer to go on vacation or to just do something for me

2- I wish I'd gone to the river more- I went twice but that isn't nearly enough

3- I wish I'd spent more time with my dad- I saw my mom and birth-mom every week but my dad only like once a month

4- I wish I'd read more- I don't have time to read as much in the fall and this summer I didn't take advantage of it enough

5- I wish summer was longer

Last August I was getting ready to just start school and I was really excited about it. I was enjoying my last free month and reading like crazy- that was about the time all those crazy Twilight fans (that I am not a part of) were reading the last book so I went out and a bought all four and read them in four days. I must have taken vacation last summer. I also was stressing about the fact that my sister would be getting married and that there was not going to be enough time to get everything done that needed to be done. My mother was also still in Las Vegas and working on her divorce this time last year. I wasn't dating anyone and Jessica and I had just started doing our weekly dates of hookah and karaoke.

Another school year is about to start...is it Labor Day yet?

The Simple Woman's Daybook

2009-07-29T15:44:00.003-05:00

I am loving this- stumbled on to this through one of my favorite blogs Walk Slowly, Live Wildly and it just happy, simple, easy and very summery so I'm gonna try to do this occasionally...the originator has a great collection of these with lots of people apparently doing this for the summer The Simple Woman's Daybook too.

FOR TODAY ... Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Outside my window...

I see an empty room with lots of tables and chairs

I am thinking...
That the office is very cold today and I'm ready to go home and get warm

I am thankful for...
Spending time with my mom, birthmom, sister and best friend last night having a night out in the country once a week with my favorite people helps keep me relaxed

From the learning rooms...
The students have gone home but I'm sure there are some on campus somewhere learning great things

From the kitchen...
(at home) I know there are pieces of the flowers I cut up this morning waiting to be cleaned up

I am wearing...
My cheerleading shoes from cheer camp back in 2007 I don't get to wear them often, my short black skirt from Old Navy and my Be Prepared SAC shirt from welcome week 2008. And my hair in a ponytail which I rarely do cause it gives me a headache...

I am going...
To see Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince again for the 3rd time but this time at an IMAX theatre

I am reading...
I am reading Alain de Botton's On Love for the 900th time but I can read it over and over again because it is amazing! I only let myself read it while out to lunch by myself so I maybe get to read it like once a week, but if you haven't read it you must!

I am hoping...
That my date tonight isn't totally shocked about my messy apartment because I haven't been home enough lately to clean it...

I am hearing...
My co-workers gossiping cause its the last hour of work and everyone gets a little lazy and it's easier to chat than do work.

Around the house...
My guitar music is strewn on the floor because I turned my ceiling fan on high and it blew them all over my living room and dining room.

One of my favorite things...
Going to Thursday Night Music Club every week to see my family and play guitar and sing. Its so peaceful and relaxing and a great way to go into Friday.

A few plans for the rest of the week:
Going to see Harry Potter tonight, Thursday Night Music Club tomorrow, Orientation on Thursday and Saturday, and then resting rest rested

Hot Pink Summer Roses

2009-07-27T11:17:00.000-05:00

Saturday night I went-out/stayed-in for my 6th date with Jeff the 35 year old guy I met online. He's super sweet, funny, kind, gentlemanly and has his stuff together. We talk on the phone for hours and text each other all day it seems. There's really no bad but even though I'm in love with the hot pink roses he gave me, does anyone else think it's kinda soon for that?

So like I mentioned I did meet him online. We emailed for a few days then I gave him my phone number to call me. He did, and we talked for about 2 hours that first time. We had a lot in common from playing guitars, to liking the same TV shows and movies. It was nice. We then started texting each other and planning when we could meet.

Our first date was about a month ago we went out Dave and Buster's where we ate and then played video games- the date lasted about 4 hours which is probably a bit excessive but we had so much to talk about and the conversation never dragged. At the end of the evening he walked me to my car and said he'd talk to me later. I was taught it's always polite to thank a man for a date afterwards (in today's modern age though a text works via an actual phone call) so I texted him when I got home thanking him and saying I had a nice time and he responded right away saying he did as well.

The days following our first date he texted me several times and called. But hadn't asked me out again, on Friday I was thinking about riding it off and just saying he wasn't interested in but he called and asked me out for Sunday again. We ended up going to the movies and had a nice time but at the end of the movie it was kinda late so I had to go home, I couldn't stay out any later cause it was a work night but that maybe we could get together for lunch the upcoming week. I texted him again afterwards apologizing for having to cut the date early but that I still had a nice time.

We talked on later in the week via text and phone and confirmed our lunch date for that Thursday. We went to Zushi Sushi and had a lovely lunch. Again we had so much to talk about and I didn't want to go back to work at all because he was very interesting. He had a lot of interesting stories and was just a lot of fun to be around. He talks a lot which is kinda nice because normally guys aren't as chatty as I am. I eventually did go back to work and we continued to text the rest of the day.

Jeff and I work totally opposite schedules he works everyday except Tuesday and Thursday and works hours like noon-9 or 9-6 and that just doesn't mesh well with me. My weekends are when I have free and then I keep my week days busy with work and evening activities like karaoke and Thursday Night Music Club. He is also a night owl where I am a total morning person. Jeff'll stay up till 3 or 5 every night and I'm in bed by 11 and up at 6. So finding time we can get together is difficult.

So for our 4th "date" he called out of the blue on a Saturday night after he got off of work and asked if I wanted to hang out cause he didn't have to be at work till 12ish the next day. Because we're both unoriginal and can't be creative he invited me to his house to watch movies and stuff. I got to his house close to 10:30 or 11 and we stayed up till close to 4 AM watching movies and talking. He has a really nice house. Two stories way far out 1604, it's a total bachelor pad with leather furniture big TVs everywhere and a small arcade off the kitchen area. He even has a movie screen upstairs with a projector and everything that makes it like a mini movie theatre.

While at his house that Saturday night we planned our next date which was gonna be dinner and a movie but a movie in his cool little move theatre place. Coraline on 3D was coming out so he was gonna buy it so we could watch it with the full 3D experience. It was cool. We got together Wednesday and we ate dinner and then when it got dark enough watched the movie, it was kinda creepy. I was jumpy and definitely screamed a couple of times. But all and all a very decent date with dinner and a movie.

Our next date was a late date after he got off of work on Saturday after 9. We decided to just watch movies at his place again but to my happy surprise he had bought me a dozen bright pink roses. They're gorgeous! I can't remember the last time a guy, other than my father at graduation, has given me flowers! The date was lovely we stayed up till close to 5 AM just talking and watching movies, it was a lot of fun.

So now we just wait and see I guess...and hope I don't kill the flowers...

Trying to write songs

2009-07-16T10:13:00.002-05:00

I've been really getting back into guitar for about 4 months now. I've been playing lots and getting gross calluses on my fingertips and I love it. I pretty much play guitar so I can accompany myself and sing. I'd missed singing so much since college so it's so great to be doing it again. My family hosts a Thursday Night Music Club in New Braunfels at the Faust Hotel. The first time I went I was told that the next week I needed to bring my guitar and play so ever since then I have been. And since I didn't want to suck in front of people I started practicing. Now very rarely do I go a day without at least playing for like 15 minutes.

I first started playing the guitar when I was 12- I use the super loose definition of playing- I basically learned 6 chords at 12 and those are all I ever play. In middle school I wrote two songs on guitar and my step-dad recorded them and put them on a CD with other songs to give to my mom for her birthday or mothers day maybe. Since then I have not written another song. I just play other people songs that I like and that are in my vocal range. My favorites being Lisa Loeb and Shawn Colvin- I love singing their songs.

I wish I could write my own songs though. Every week I am so inspired by the people that play there. My Uncle has written dozens of songs and they're all so good and heartfelt, Tara that 15 year old talent writes the sweetest little love songs I've ever heard and Mike has such haunting lyrics that I can't get out of my head for days. I wish I could write like that. I have lines that stick out in my head and I'd love to create a song around them but I just can't get started. I have a book full of lines I love and think could be cool songs but that's all I've got.

My Happy Place

2009-06-30T10:13:00.003-05:00

I used to live here- and sometimes it totally sneaks up on me. This is the backyard of the house my mom and grandma bought when my parents got divorced. It's about 2 miles north of 1604 on Bulverde Road. It sits on about 10 acres, the house is beautiful flat stone with an aluminum roof. The driveway is a red brick circle drive and the stone fence has two rod-iron gates. There are about 3 acres in front, an acre fenced in around the house for the dogs and then the horse run and pasture make up the other 6 acres. I lived here when I was 9 and 10 I think and then briefly when I graduated from college before getting my own apartment. I remember it seemed forever to get into town from here and now there is Wallgreens about a mile a way and a shopping center maybe 5 miles away. It has built up so much around there, but luckily once you step foot on that land you forget that the city is quickly encroaching.

Every Tuesday before I go hookah-ing and Karaoke-ing with my old college roommate, I go home and spend time with my mom. Sometimes we go swimming but most of the time we just sit on the back porch and watch the sunset while having cocktails. Its so peaceful and quiet and I can't believe I never noticed it when I lived there. One day it'll be all my mothers and she wants to fix it up some and maybe change some things, but to me it's perfect how it is, and so so relaxing.

101 Ways to Hurt Yourself on the Guadalupe

2009-06-23T16:14:00.004-05:00

Last Saturday I went tubing with my sister, her husband and their friend Carlos. It started out as all tubing trips, I was told to arrive at 9:30 and we'd leave by 10, but we inevitably left the house at 10:30 to go wake up slackers that had yet to arrive. We drove half way across San Antonio to try to pick up someone who wasn't even at their house. Around 11 we hit the road to the actual river. We got to the the Lazy L Camp Site before noon and ran into some of Haley's (my sister's) friends. Because I had gone out the night before I opted to be the designated driver that day so everyone else got to drink and drink while floating. The Guadalupe was running pretty slow due to lack of rain and so the tubing place shuttles you up the road 3 minutes and tells us the float will take 3 hours. We were all a bit skeptical but 4 1/2 hours later we knew not to doubt the man with the tubes...

When we get to the water everyone loads in their coolers and tubes. Haley's husband's, Greg's, tube had a leak so he had to go back and get a new tube. Now we were ready to go...go in the loose definition. I think I can describe our float as the longest mile ever! We would go 20 feet and then the wind would push us upstream another 30 feet. After an hour we could still see where the bus had dropped us off and the group of about 20 was well on their way to being more than tipsy.

About 2 hours into the float everyone was getting a little happy and I was enjoying watching people fall out of their tubes, trip on the rocks and try to put sunscreen on their backs by themselves. It was about this time that the first hat was lost, sunglasses and a $400 waterproof digital camera. All the drunkish people decided they should look for the camera as their tubes floated down stream. The camera was a lost cause- it sunk to the bottom and is now a part of the Guadalupe forever, or until some lucky person finds it...

The river started getting crowded 12 and 13 year olds floated by on air-mattresses. Jello shots were being thrown by sling-shot across the river. All cooler radios seemed to play the same bad summer river music- "Pour Some Sugar On Me" and much much worse. Matches were common on the river even though once wet they became ineffective, just like the wet cigarettes people couldn't get to light. Several lighters were lost to the abyss as everything from cigarettes, joints and cigars were trying to be lit. The cops looked on from the shore, helpless to the vast array of illegal activity happening on the river- maybe they should invest in kayaks...

Our large group got divided as more floaters joined in on the sun and I was trying to put us back together. Haley and her husband were calling pet names to one another 100s of feet a part from one another and I tried to reunite them to no avail. I eventually abandoned my tube to swim a while and let the drunks fend for themselves. After a good swim I tried to become friends with my tube again but ran into rocks...more rocks...and more rocks. As the only sober person on the river and possibly the world last Saturday my drunk companions offered their help and made it so much worse. They had begun to drift into really shallow water and became stuck on rocks. As I tried to pull the group through the shallow waters pockets of deep found me and continued to scrape my legs, hips and back.

Our group never came back together as a whole but at the end of the float half of the group was waiting for us and helped get the tubes out of the water. The coolers were now empty and many were sunburned. I wrangled up the group I came with and drove them home. Once we got to my sisters house we started examining the damage. Haley's husband was complaining of his back hurting and insisted (drunkenly) that it wasn't a sunburn but upon inspection the women decided it was. The front of my body was completely sunburned and bruises were starting to form on my knees, shins and left hip. Cuts accompanied some of the bruises and everyone was in awe that the only sober person was so injured by the river. Haley and her friend Carlos were not burned or scraped up at all.

I've never drank on the river, I normally act as the DD because combining my sober clumsiness with alcohol and slippery stones just seems like the worst idea ever.

Are you seeing anyone right now?

2009-06-18T15:05:00.001-05:00

Uhhhggg, I hate this question. And when different people ask it, it has different connotation. When my Grandma asks "are you seeing anyone right now?" it usually has a sense of pitty tied to it cause she's worried that I'm alone. If my mom asks "Are you seeing anyone right now?" it's because she has someone she wants to set me up with. If my boss asks "Are you seeing anyone right now?" it's because I seem lazy, lack energy or aren't taking too much care with how I look at the moment.

But I'm not seeing anyone right now. For the first time in a long time I'm not serial dating this summer. It's been maybe 3 weeks since the last time I went out with a guy that even vaguely resembled the loose definition of a date. Before that it'd been like every week- I had a busy spring for some reason. But all these dates were kinda pointless- they all leaded to now and now is me not dating and not really caring if I date or not this summer.

The last two summers in a row I did the online dating thing and got maybe a dozen dates in a month of trying- maybe 4 of which lead to second dates and 2 which I would say I actually started dating the person. The idea of trying to do online dating again this summer is exhausting I do not have the energy- besides you have to be so careful with all of that. At the same time I don't really feel the need to start going out and looking for guys either. I just don't want to date...I think...

Then I start reading- I couldn't pick a new book to start so I picked up one of my favorite books since high school by Alain de Botton called On Love. It is one of my all time favorites! Thanks to Mr. Flieger for recommending it when I was in like 9th grade. Its the very soliloquized story of a man who falls in love with a woman on a airplane and their relationship- but the way it is written is just amazing and I find something new every time I read it- It is amazing to hear a man thing through things in these ways

"For those in love with certainty, seduction is no territory in which to stray. Every smile and word leads to a dozen if not twelve thousand possibilities. Remarks that in normal life (that is, life without love) can be taken at face value now exhaust dictionaries with their possible meanings. And for the seducer, enduring the trepidation of a criminal awaiting sentence, the doubts reduce themselves to a central question: Does s/he, or does s/he not, desire me?"

"The telephone becomes an instrument of torture in the demonic hands of the beloved who does not call."

"I merely adjusted myself to whatever I judged Chloe might feel. If she liked tough men, I would be tough; if she liked wind surfing, I would be a wind surfer; if she hated chess, I would hate chess. My idea of what she wanted from a lover could have been compared to a tight-fitting suite and my true self to a fat man, so that the evening was a process resembling a fat man's trying to fit into a suit that is too small for him. There was a desperate attempt to repress the bulges that did not fit the cut of the fabric, to shrink my waist and hold my breath so the material would not tear. It was not surprising in my posture was not as spontaneous as I might have liked. How can a fat man in a suit too small for him feel spontaneous? He is so frightened the suit will split, he is forced to sit in complete stillness, holding his breath and praying he can get through the evening without disaster. Love had crippled me."

It's a great book. I really love that a man feels this way and goes through these things. There's only one other book I've read where a man expresses himself in long detailed thoughts like this - Ethan Hawke in The Hottest State another amazing book where the man totally gets destroyed and hurt but expresses it beautifully, and yes I mean Ethan Hawke the actor- it's amazing. But none of these things are enough to make me want to date again, but it's good to read while I'm not dating cause I think if I tried to date while in Alain de Botton's world I might become overly neurotic.

Inspiring young minds...

2009-06-10T15:46:00.004-05:00

It's that time of year again...Freshman Days (aka new student orientation)! Last January I started hosting a portion of the Orientation sessions on Student Life. It quickly left the general focus of Student Life and narrowed into the area of Social Media, and again more specifically Facebook, MySpace and integrating RedRover on our campus. I gave a 30 minute keynote presentation on "The Secrets Behind MySpace and Facebook" and spent the afternoons round-robin-ing about 150 students into the Cyber Cafe to get them registered for RedRover. I was super enthused about the program, I could have done without the speaking in front of a lot of people, but the subject was something I get really excited about. In these orientation classes that I was speaking to, there are all different types of students- really involved students, apathetic students, non-traditional students that are excited, non-traditional students that are bitter, the underage student and then the resentful student who doesn't understand why they have to listen to me speak. I tried to act like all the students were really involved and excited because taking on the resentful student and the bitter non-traditional students just would have made me depressed. In my first orientation season I probably gave 8 keynotes and 36 round-robin classes, by the time it was over I felt totally at ease and had no more worries.

Now it's June- about 4 months since my last keynote and I'm getting nervous. The orientation classes I'll be speaking to over the summer are for the majority younger college students between 17 and 23 years old, I find these students to be the most judge-y. I don't know how to battle their apathy, sometime I think they just look up at me like I'm a huge nerd getting all excited about how these social media tools can change the world they live in. Maybe I am just a nerd about it but I think its exciting. I get really excited when students interact with me on Facebook and reply to my Page posts. But as Saturday approaches I'm getting more and more nervous, I hope I can do this again. Luckily its just this Saturday, then I have another break till July, when they're back to back.

How I use the internet-

2009-06-04T14:09:00.009-05:00

Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, LinkedIn, blogs...the list goes on. There are so many ways to use the internet as a social network. Social media I think is the more professional term to use for these things, or the term to use when using the sites for work purposes. I use these sites for work, I have a Facebook page, MySpace account, Twitter and Flickr account for San Antonio College's Office of Student Life. For personal use I have them all. I'll be the first to admit that I am addicted to my Online Social Networks (OSNs as some people call them) and I have access to most of them on my phone, adding to the addiction. I may one day need help-

Personal Tyler

I've had MySpace since 2003ish when I went to college. My friend Angela was going to school in California and was all over the MySpace thing so I got one and didn't touch it for a while. I couldn't figure out how to do any of it but eventually made friends and started adding people and pictures. I still use it personally today but also have a lot of students from work on there as friends so sometimes it gets cross contaminated with work stuff too. I use MySpace for more socializing and to keep in touch with people I didn't know from a school or professional setting. Also the students at SAC use MySpace more than the other social networks.

Facebook came out in early 2004 and back then your school had to petition to get added and you had to have an .edu email address (yes back then mom, dad and grandma weren't on Facebook it's fine they're on it now, it's evolved). TLU got in the game in May-ish and I jumped on the bandwagon. I liked Facebook lots better than MySpace, it just seemed safer and the people on there were my friends that I actually saw everyday so it was cool. It was also easier to use and everyone's profile looked the same. Your "coolness" wasn't determined by your background or if you had music on your page- everyone was equal. I liked this cause I was really bad at computer-y type stuff once- I'm still bad but in college I was way worse. Facebook is how I keep in touch with people from high school, college and work.

I got my Flickr account because of family peer pressure. My birth-family used it to share photos with one another. I was really into it at first and uploading pictures and sent the links to my friends and family, but after I filled up the 200 free pictures they give you I kinda forgot about it. It's still out there at www.flickr.com/tyleralyse but nothing too new is on it.

YouTube is a new acquisition. I don't use it, but I wanted to get my name reserved in case in the future I ever figure out how to use it. I really want a Flip Camera and then I'll add stuff...

I am totally addicted to Twitter. I love it and am always "tweeting" (a term I hate). I am a total "Twit" (person addicted to Twitter) but I'm okay with that. I've even started to follow that more than my Facebook which is my old obsession. I think Twitter is attractive because it's short and sweet and people are funny when they're only allowed 140 characters. You can also find some seriously entertaining viral videos and blogs. Get in on the addiction www.twitter.com/tyleralyse

LinkedIn I just registered for last week and I've made maybe a dozen connections, but I really just did it so if people at conferences ask me if I'm on it I can say yes. It is supposed to be the Facebook for professionals which is fine I don't really care, but we'll see if anything happens with that.

Finally blogs! I'm all about the blogging- my wonderful birth-family got me addicted with the family blog www.whippleworld.com ages ago. They've been blogging since summer 2003 and once every blue moon I'll post something there too. But I've been going to these Social Media conferences ever since I started at SAC and I just love the idea of blogging. My family's blog is the perfect example of a really successful blog- lots of people post on it and so it's always new and fresh and it has expanded the community of people we can call friends. I'm trying to start a blog for myself, I used to do LiveJournal and never got into it too much. Randomly I'd post little vents about being annoyed and sometimes I'd post song lyrics, but it just wasn't for me. I'm still debating on what type of blog I want. Do I want a blog about my personal life, my work life, my family life? or do I want to combine them all into one? I think it'll end up being a combination, otherwise there will be too much time where I have nothing to say.

Work- SAC OSL Tyler

My Facebook page for SAC OSL has over 150 fans- whoo-hoo, Twitter has over 150 followers, and my MySpace has a little over 100 friends. We have a Flickr too but I don't know how to track the users, followers or whatever they're called there. I hope to move to a student blog in the near future. I want students to write about being students at SAC. With help from this great company we work with SwiftKick I'm hoping that in the future we'll get student leaders to blog and have a really great something to show for it.

The idea behind using all these social networking sites for work is that students use them and are constantly on them (as evident by my usage as well). If we reach out to them in a forum they are familiar and comfortable with the idea is that they'll respond and interact with us. I see it happening, students love MySpace and actively search us out, Facebook was slower at first and now I see that more students have switched to it instead, they are also using Twitter in large numbers too- I know all of these will grow as the next semester starts and I'm really looking forward to it.

The addiction is real though. I feel like I don't know what's going on if my internet goes out or I can't reach Twitter on my cell. I feel like a huge nerd half the time cause if someone asks me "Have you heard from ______?" I say "oh-ya, I saw online that they're __________"- it's crazy! What's even worse is sometimes a student or relative will ask me "how was karaoke last night?" and I get confused as to how they knew and then think to myself that I'm an idiot cause I posted it online for the world to see. I probably don't use these sites the most, I'm sure there is someone out there who is more active than I am, but I'm also sure that there are a ton of people, most of my friends included, that don't use these sites even a quarter of how much I do.

So I guess I'll see you online!