30 Days of Truth: Day 1

"30 days of truth" http://hope.gr/30-days-of-truth/

So I stumbled across this the other day... kind of liked the idea... except some of it's pretty private... so i think answering some of them honestly could lead to some hurt feelings and unnecessary drama. . . but i think it would be fun for me to answer at least some of them. PS. I make no promises to answer them in order.

Day 1: Something you hate about yourself.

I don't really like the idea of hating something about myself. I don't have anything that I feel like i hate 24/7 and any given time... however, being a little scatterbrained doesn't serve me very well. However, it does make my high-strung husband laugh on a regular basis.

Secondly, my vocabulary could use some work. I have a habit of pronouncing things as they're spelled, rather than how they're said. Examples: "Herb" instead of "erb" and "equivocation" like "e-quiv-voc-ation"... i'm still not sure how that's suppose to sound. secondly, i mean, thirdly, when i can't think of a word, i'm fairly liberal on my substitutes. I used the word 'door' instead of 'driveway' or 'the entrance to a apt complex.' This type of thing tends to leave many people confused...

And lastly, I could use some more confidence.

That's about it. Nothing i hate about myself... just stuff that could definitely use some work.

Taxes & Obama: I'm really upset

So, i just got this email that listed many of the things that will be in affect by January 1, 2011 or shortly there after... and a lot of it looks legitimate... And AWFUL.

It basically says that Obama will tax the crap out of everybody and give them very little credit for anything. I assume that's because he's just given us all these *bonus* stimuluses that put the country in greater debt. Funny thing is, there's a lot of people and businesses who got shafted in these stimuluses.

A small example from my life, is their appliances stimulus. Bring in your old appliance, and get a new one, on Obama's bill. Merchants jacked up their prices because there was a sudden high demand. Consequently, upon getting married, my husband and I were having trouble affording our FIRST appliance. Suck. It's frustrating all these people getting their NEW car and NEW appliance and NEW TV adapter, when we couldn't get an ORIGINAL. Secondly, if we're in so much debt, where's the justification in getting NEW stuff? "Stimulus" he says. Has the president ever had a home economics class? There's a term called TNSTAAFL. That means, There's No Such Thing As A Free Lunch; or in other words, Obama spends it for us citizens - like it's a free gift to us all... but he ain't paying for it. We are... plus interest.

That's going to make it ridiculously hard for anyone to save for retirement... or anything for that matter. We're all going to spend our lives paying interest on National Debt.

It's the Health insurance that makes me the most angry. Who gave him the right to tell me what i need to buy? If I'm tight on money, i'd pick food over health insurance any day.

The Truth behind the News

There's many that i want to be, and few that i am.
I could tell the truth behind the news, but who then will listen?
I could be the one to uncover the lies, but who's to say i'm not a liar?
Is truth to be found, or shall it hide another day?
Will i know truth when i meet it? Will they see it too?
Who will care enough to try? And unspeakably, who wishes lies to stay?
In all Truth, How could truth change our world as it now stands?

Those who yelled truth from the housetops of the holocaust died in the lonely gas chambers of lost dignity.
The screams of the children in african wars falls on 150 deaf nations.
Police forces of select nations send trapped women back to their brothels.
All the world will not listen, but only wishes to discover truth through its own experience.

Safest is the one in shadows and corners, the one who makes no comment.
A peacemaker and a diplomat may be what the world needs,
perhaps a hero behind the scenes...

Either way, safe is where i stay.

Mary Kay Parties

So a neighbor of mine invited me to a Mary Kay party she was throwing to have 'fun' and to 'help out her friend' so she could earn a car. I've had mixed feelings about Mary Kay parties in the past, but this sounded like mostly no pressure, so i went.

And i hated it.

It was an hour and a half of selling product, selling the idea of becoming a consultant, and selling me on going to another mary kay event. I feel like its so deceitful to say it's a no pressure fun party, and then spend the whole time listening to a sells job that pulled at your emotional 'help me earn a car' and 'of course you WANT all the products listed... but which one the most?'

This was a pedicure party, so we tried about 5 different lotions all over our body... and, did i mention i hate lotion? I felt disgusting by the time i got home... and took a shower. However, i didn't wash it off my face for some reason, and a couple hours later, my face was so oily, my husband was disgusted... which is rare.

My very favorite part of the whole party (and that's severely sarcastic) is the part where we wrote down our favorite facial makeup item and then whoever relinquished the greatest number of friends and phone numbers got their favorite item. I hate getting referred, so the last thing i want to do is help my friends get contacted. However, i got talked into playing the game... and i got the most names down... so i won... except my phone numbers weren't there, so then i lost. Then since i lost, i decided i definitely wasn't giving up my list of friends personal information, changed every phone number, and then left early before she could collect my paper.

Of course, she called me a couple days later. She changed her mind and told me i had won, but that she needed my paper, and she would bring over the facial makeup item. Of course i won now... she just lost proof of me even being to that event, plus she was 10 phone numbers shorter. I didn't call her back.

Now, i know i have a few friends who work mary kay. And that's fine... it is a job. But, my anger is with how the company seems to set it up. The product seems to need salesman because it's overpriced and the quality is debatably not competitive. Secondly, the company sets it up so that salesmen are motivated by rewards and working on your own time, but at the expense of your friends. I know a few people who avoid mary kay consultants simply because they do not want to deal with being confronted with buying something. Thirdly, they use emotional strings, fun games, and promises of rewards or prizes to get you to buy into it.

Mary Kay is like car sales. (This is the part where my reader needs to stop reading. Because at this point, i'm just ranting.) Definitely out to sell, and not to Actually care what you're Actually interested in. I'm Actually not interested in make up at all. I don't think i've even worn any in 5 months. Next, i'm broke. And she only had $35-60 product packages available. Of course, i've been broke for 10 years now... actually, my whole life. I've got about 100 items on my buy-someday list, and makeup hasn't made it on that list yet.

I hate sales. i hate sales. i hate sales. i hate sales. i hate sales. I like salesmen who are informative and helpful, but if they start applying pressure at all, my walls shoot up and i get defensive and uncomfortable. I hate sales. i hate sales. i hate sales.

The End.

Living in the Present

I had a friend come over last night, and it turned out to be quite an adventure. She's never been to my new apartment and has difficulty with directions so she followed me home from work [Adventure #1]. We were pretty hungry for dinner at that point, so i started cooking up a quick box meal, put it in an 8x8 glass pan, and cooked in the oven at 400 degrees for the specified time. We sat outside on a couch perched on the deck, chatting about life and her recent dating irritations. Upon the timer ringing, we went back in and found a disaster in the oven. Apparently my glass container shattered [Adventure #2].

I turned off the oven, and we went out to eat. WoOt! We walked there, which was a bit adventure, because of the way the buildings are set up, and we walked into a 10 foot drop... luckily not before we saw it. We ate at Noodles & Co. which is one of my favorite places. My friend had never been there [Adventure #3]. She chatted on about boys again and at some point i interrupted and said, "So what do you think about the food?" She seemed to snap out of her trance and say, "Oh, um, it's really good! I think it's my new favorite restaurant too!"

On the way home, we stopped at Paradise Cafe (another one of my favorites, and a new place for her) and got a free chocolate chip cookie with a coupon i had, and we split it. She was very impressed. "I should take my mom out to eat here." [Adventure #4]

By the time we walked back to my apartment (5 min), she had created and solidified plans with other friends... boys included... and needed to leave to make it there on time. She invited Dave and I, but we're too broke for a theater movie right now, and i told her that upfront.

Looking back on the evening, I see many adventures worth noting that evening, but what stuck out to me the most this time, is her apparent utter lack in acknowledging the amount of wild fun we had. I can imagine her going to the movies with her other friends and saying to them, "Oh, i just went and saw Keshia. I was at Keshia's and Dave's Apartment." with no further detail. Because in her mind, nothing exciting happened.

The saddest part about this is that there are hundreds of people who live their lives this way. So focused on what they don't have that they miss everything they do have; always looking for a better time when a great one is right in front of them.

Photo Album organizing

Today's blessing and curse is that we can take too many pictures too easily. A blessing because then we're sure to get a good picture. A curse because there's a high potential that i'll find a reason to need to keep all of them, therefore leading to photo chaos... piles of priceless photos stacked everywhere... despite the lack of quality in a great majority of them.

Up until this week, it was my intention to scrapbook all of them in 8x10 binders or a 12x12 scrapbook. However, since i have about a small shoebox's worth (600 photos) of printed photos to scrapbook and about two or three more shoeboxes worth unprinted... I'm considering photo albums. On top of that, some of the pages i did only 4 years ago, are already becoming un-glued. They're not going to last.

The problem with the photo album is i can't put anything except photos in them... and i have a crate full of programs from talent shows and performances i participated in, letters, cards, love notes, and movie tickets. Plus there's the occasional picture printed in a larger size than 4x6. What do i do with those? My second problem is that i've randomly scrap-booked all parts of my life; so to keep these photo albums and scrapbooks in order, i would have to take apart some of my hard-labor scrapbook pages. . . or fill in all the missing pages (ie hundreds of photos) andthen start doing photo albums.

My Best solution so far, is to

1- scrapbook the missing pages here or there

2- scan the several pages that i may end up taking apart

3- print and organize all photos

4- put excess or bad pictures in a 'giveaway' box

5- insert any knick-knacks that can fit into a photo album

6- select sections of photos to scrapbook in an album, accounting for the size of the album

7- create binders of all other material that cannot be added into a photo album and scrapbook them in a "no-photo scrapbook" as outlined on google sites.

I'm still frustrated though. partly because i can't pay for prints right now... and partly because i'm not sure how well this system will actually work. The system i really want... scrapbooking everything on 8x10 or 12x12 ... is unrealistic, unfortunately... since most pictures register as 'important.'

How does one know when a picture is a keeper or a 'giveaway?' Google has a list...

1- a decent and rare picture of a family member or loved one

2- it touches an emotion of a viewer and impacts their life [for good]

3- a picture of a life-changing event in one's life

4- it shows beauty and/or truth. Shows my point of view

5- it's proof of an event

6- no particular picture is the best, but the collection together in a series

i could fit most of my thousands of pictures under these 6 reasons... but perhaps knowing the reasons can help me determine better what's worth keeping to me. The last thing i consider when trying to decide whether to scrapbook or trash a picture is asking myself these three questions:

1- Does the picture make you feel happy? or otherwise? Is this something you want to remember forever?

2- Is this something you want to share with your children or friends? Will they see it if it is scrap-booked?

3- Is this picture worth the cost of (A) saving on the computer's memory, (B) printing, (C) putting into one of 200 slots in a $15 photo album, or (D) the cost of the scrapbook paper, stickers and glue on the page?

Lastly... i have a lot of random pictures in the middle... should i make an exception to chronological order for topical order... family photos verses college life... and how do i do that?

Any additional insights?

Environmentalism

My mom rolls her eyes every time she hears about an environmentalist idea... such as banning (BPI?) plastic out of water bottles because it's toxic. I don't know that I'd ever be an advocate of envirnmentalism on any level of conviction, but if drinking water out of non-BPI plastic makes my water taste better, i'm all for it!