The Zumba reMix

There is a new song for the end of Zumba class that is a remix of Sean Kingston's "Beautiful Girls" from 2009. It's pretty catchy and cheerfully infectious.

Finally, finally, finally, integrated new figurines from AWA 2012 into the ever expanding collection. No clue how I'm going to add to the collection in 2013. More shelf space will definitely be a requirement.

This year's AWA turned out to be a ton of fun. There were a lot of game show panels. Those were simply hilarious. It's true, my game show knowledge is limited, but they were still enjoyable experiences. Finally went to the Moonlit Forest Gala (ball). It was absolutely wonderful to attend such a fancy event. Looking forward to going again next year. Maybe I'll splurge on a super fancy dress or use the same method of retrieving the one I had for this year.

Learning LiveCycle at work. It's very exciting. Going in for official training next week. Right now they have us watching videos and doing practice forms to get acquainted with the basics of the software. Judging from what I've seen so far, probably going to have to learn javascript to get any of the super-awesome-cool dynamic functions they have in these videos to work. Something new to learn. Whoo-hoo!

Planning on going to a corn maze this weekend. Whilst I have no idea what to expect, it should still be fun all the same.

Buzzing

Four AM. I haven't been up this late in a while. In fact, this is going to be the first weekend in a long time where I will be completly on my own. Matthew is busy with his family. I have been traveling entirely too much lately and I am giving myself a break from the driving. I'll probably end up going into Atlanta some time tomorrow, but it won't be to meet anybody. There is a screening of The Room that I may go see. If tickets are still available when I wake up in the morning then I will work it into my plans. It will be interesting to have one of those cult movie experiences (and I will know a couple people who are going).

Sudden self-assessment: Crazier about movies lately. I attribute it to listening to a bunch of podcasts about movies. Knitting has also been revived from my childhood. Maybe I was just too young to figure it out then. Didn't really have a teacher either.

I want to find new experiences. We went to see a Doug Benson comedy show earlier this week. Freaking hilarious! Love his podcast.

Wish I could see my friends more often, but it would be nice if they called me for once. The trip out to see Ariel was a ton of fun! Took tons of photos, spent a lot of time catching up. It did have a couple low points, but the trip was worth it.

I should sleep. Gotta be alert if I want the lace shrug I'm working on to come out correctly. Sometimes I want to take an outsider's perspective of myself. Am I changing for the better?

Cards

Seem to have borrowed a lot of cards lately. All games.

Knitting obsessively has somewhat quelled the anxiety building up inside of me. I need a break from this daily cycle. Eat, work, eat, insert some hobby for hours, phone, sleep.

Got a trip planned at the end of April. Can't wait.

Ate a quarter box of ice cream after dinner.

When did I start feeling so lonely again?

Closing

Tomorrow (later today) is the last workday of 2011. It's been an interesting year, and I've managed to record all 363 days of it. Not sure if I'm going to continue this project into next year. I do like it, and it is nice to have something physical to look into instead of cramming it all into my memory.

I've been drifting in and out of loneliness all evening. I've been all sad and weepy lately, and it bothers me. It drove me to finish two Photoshop tutorials tonight and I found those Enfocus Pitstop videos I've been looking for online. Those will be nice reference points in the future.

After work yesterday, I sat down on my couch and read a huge chunk of Stranger in a Strange Land. I finished it when I got home today. The ending was weird, and I wanted to talk about it with someone. Unfortunately, the only person I know who's also read it is Matthew. I know this because I'm actually borrowing the book from him.

Unfortunately, he didn't call tonight.

I realize it's a sad and somewhat pathetic thing to look forward to a phone call. In the grander scheme of things what really bothers me is once I leave work, I don't talk to anyone else for the rest of the day. That's how it's been for the past three weeks. I did have the chance to socially interact with people after work during Zumba, but the classes ended two weeks ago and they don't pick back up till January. I missed the last one cause I stayed for overtime at work and got my dates mixed up.


Sent my socially awkward out to some isolated part in the state of Georgia and everyone else managed to find a life.

One bright spot for today: a field designer at work sent me a recipe for 'Peanut Butter Sweeties'. They're basically peanut butter balls dipped in chocolate on a pretzel stick. It sounds pretty good. Perhaps I will make them this weekend.

Looking forward to more adventures for the new year.

Exit Wounds

Finally got Mail up and running. I know I got berated by my other Mac using friends for never having successfully set up Mail, but I didn't need to since I knew the clemson.edu e-mail would expire in due time. Anyways, they've made it even EASIER since the last time I tried to set it up. Yay!

Spent all day listening to Adele, The Script, and Flight of the Conchords. A nice mix of being depressed to stifling uproarious laughter. It's really tiring to play the same script over five days a week. The old, "How are you? Good." Rinse, repeat x 2342378474857394845347 times.

This weekend was fantastic. My Clemson friends finally came to my apartment! I don't know what they thought about all the little figurines, but I expect to be adding to the collection by the end of September.

Oh, I had such motivation to write in this, but now I seem to have lost it.

Perfect Shots

Lately I've been thinking about photography. I know I'm not the best photographer, and I admit to having never really worked at it. I enjoy taking pictures, but I haven't really used my camera for anything in almost a year. It's a combination of forgetfulness and the desire to fully immerse myself in the moment. Too many times have I missed the best part of an event because I was looking through a lens.

Yet today, I sat in my car and listened to the rain in silence. It was a summer shower and the patterns the raindrops on the window were making were so random, yet beautiful. My mind immediately wondered how difficult it would be to get a perfect closeup from behind the windshield. It was strange, but it goes along with the flow of thoughts that have been running through my mind as of late.

A thought slammed into me while I was standing in between the multitude of soft drinks and liquid tea in Ingles. Someday when I look back at my life, I might just think twenty-two was one of my favorite years. I know I've been living by myself for a year plus some months now, but the self-reliance has really sunk in. Yet, I feel like I'm being extremely lazy compared to other twenty-two year olds. I have a full-time job, but I'm not doing anything to professionally better myself, am I? Maybe I am. I know I shouldn't compare myself to other people; the only real competition I have is my former self.

Things seem to have slowly fallen into place and balanced themselves for the moment. It's strange to not have any real stress or drama. It's unnerving to find there aren't any huge problems or logistics to solve. Even more so, it's odd to feel so loose and happy.

My co-worker was talking about his vacation last week. He said he wasn't aware of the time of day during most of it. I wish I could identify with the experience.

Podcasts

I've been exploring the iTunes store recently; it probably has something to do with recently purchasing a shiny new iPod nano for my dad. Being kind of bored with no one to talk to or meow at might also have contributed.

Ok, rewind for a minute. I've had an iPod for the past five years, and not once have I explored the iTunes store. Why would I want to pay for one song where the only thing I get out of it is a few megabytes of data that might be lost should my computer ever decide to corrupt itself? Plus, I really like getting CDs. I just got a few, and it really saddens me to see the lack of good cover art these days. All that aside, I've started listening to Podcasts. I was fine with just listening to music at work, but let's face it, it's been over a year. I need something else to listen to, to break up the monotony of the 8-10 hour cubicle warfare. Every time I turn the TV on to catch the news, it's always showing missing children or something I have very little interest in.

I tried audiobooks, but I still hate it when people read to me. I just can't get involved with an audiobook. I can't curl up on the couch and let my imagination run wild while I absorb the words off the page. The motivation and curiosity to turn the page is just missing when I'm listening to someone else read. It's like getting trapped in a one way conversation where the other person just drones on and on about some story. Of course, not all audiobooks are bad. I know there are some very well done ones, but I still like the idea of reading a book myself.

Podcasts allow me to listen to funny and interesting stories while I crank out forms in InDesign or work through crazy customer supplied PDFs. It's been quite enjoyable so far. Unfortunately, I can't stop perusing the iTunes store for cool podcasts. I've already filled up quite a bit of space on it. I can barely manage to hit the 3 gig mark with the music I have collected in five years. Three days and I'm already up to 15 gigs because I added so many podcasts!

Life's just funny, isn't it?

To make it even better, I found the Animenation podcast. Yes! I might have found another source to keep up with the times. Which is what I really need since I haven't found a real replacement for NTUSA. That will always been the number one magazine in my heart.

Stumble On

Compliments of Stumble:

Road Rage

Lazy Summer Days

It's around 9pm on the first Saturday in June. I've been in Greenville since last night, and I've done nothing but relax. Went out and spent a few hours at Mr. K's this morning (by myself). There was some great stuff to be found! I bought a set of radio drama CDs from the Golden Era of radio. Can't wait to listen to them.

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I'm returning at 2:00AM after dinner and a movie. We rented Black Swan. That was not what I expected at all. Granted, I only wanted to borrow the movie because there was so much hype surrounding it for a while. Had absolutely no idea what it was about beyond the synopsis on the back of the DVD case. It was a really good movie, but it left a lot of things up for interpretation.

I've decided to take all the frustration I'm feeling with myself and channel it into something that might be kind if useful. Maybe I really just need a new hobby to think about. I know by doing multiple things at once, I can never perfect anything, but maybe that's ok. The only constant is my desire to get better in Adobe Creative Suite. Yet, slugging through tutorials seems rather unappealing.

I have to re-cycle through a series of things or else I get bored. There are a variety of things that will never seriously fall back into the cycle, but maybe I will revisit them from time to time. Or...maybe I just need to revisit the things I did when I was younger, more creative, and ambitious.

Either way, I've decided to take up sewing again. So, I got my very own sewing machine today. I've used my mom's all my life, then I moved and discovered that having a sewing machine around is actually very handy. I've recently had to do all my alterations and quick fixes by hand. A machine will at least make fixing the hem on my pants easier and cleaner. Plus, this is my sewing machine. It's similar to my mom's but with a few new features that I'm really excited about exploring them. Time to put that scrap material sitting in my drawer to use.

Bought a new pattern on a whim. It'll be fun!

Strut

It's a quiet Tuesday night. There aren't any TV shows on, so I watched Volume 2 of Welcome to the NHK. That was pretty good. Very cute. I'm starting to like Misaki (main girl character) a lot more.

This past weekend was a lot of fun. I went camping AND whitewater rafting for the first time. Hurray! Stepped out of the comfort zone and managed to come out mostly unscathed. I did kind of bruise my knee on a rock when we splashed around in the lake on Saturday evening. At one point we had a campfire and we were all eating cobbler and looking at the stars, attempting to pull out whatever astrology knowledge any of us had. I never realized how bright the stars actually are. I always felt like it was something they emphasized in movies to stress how romantic or calm the scene is. Now that I've seen it for myself, I can understand why.

Sitting out there reminded me of a story I heard at the Rocky Mountain Science Center when I was younger. Something about the animals getting together after a blanket covered the sun. They tried to throw things and come up with ideas to get rid of the blanket, but one little bird decided to try flying straight through and he poked holes in it to let in the little bits of light we now know as stars. Does anyone else remember hearing that?

I spent my first three day holiday of the year having fun. On Monday, Matthew and I walked around some random antique shops in Dillard; then we paid a visit to Goats on the Roof and had ice cream. I had vanilla bean ice cream on a cone. It's been so long since I've done that. As I got older I started getting a scoop of ice cream in a cup with a spoon. Racing the heat to lick the ice cream off the cone almost made me feel like a little kid again.

While I do still get excited when the ice cream truck goes by under the window at the apartment complex, I haven't gone down and bought any. For some reason the memory of a blue bugs bunny ice cream bar really sticks out. I got that all over my dad's old car.

And now, it's time for sleep. Hehe.