I really need to sit down and figure what it is that I want in several aspects of my life. Some aspects only need minor tweaks … motivation I guess. While other aspects need a major overhaul.

It all comes down to: what will make me happy (or at least content)?

Some of the small stuff is just a case of making myself make the changes that are needed … pushing myself forward. The other stuff … well that’s a completely different story.

I know that I need to make the change. But I’m scared to make that change. Making that change will completely upset my life as it currently is. And now is not the time that I want to do that. But then again, who ever wants to change a major aspect of their life?

Where do I even begin? I guess I could start with pro and con lists. That would be somewhere. And if the cons don’t outweigh the pros, then maybe now really isn’t the time to make the change. But if the cons DO outweigh the pros, then I need to suck it up and make the change, no matter how much it would freak me out. I just don’t think I can keep going on like this for much longer. If I can’t change the aspect as a whole, then I need to tweak some parts of it. Anything to make myself less unhappy.

Today marks the 4 year anniversary of my new career path. I can’t believe it’s been 4 years already. I went from having a hobby of working on websites (and teaching myself) to working on them for a living. I’ve learned a lot in these past 4 years, and I’m still learning.

The last 4 years haven’t all been peachy. Back in September 2006 I was laid off. It wasn’t because of my work. It was a situation the company encountered. They basically laid off all but about 5 people, and they weren’t guaranteed a position for very much longer. But then about a month later, they offered me my position back. I was the only one they brought back. I’ve basically been with them ever since.

I say “basically” because the company no longer exists. The client that we had been working with hired myself and my boss at the beginning of this year. So I’m still doing the same thing, but my paychecks come from someone else now. And I’ve been working from home since the start of the year.

I definitely love what I do … making ideas come to life online. I do have my bad days, but I think that’s mainly because I work at home. I’m the kind of person who needs to get out of my apartment from time to time, so working from home makes me go batty some times. That’s why I wish there was a coworking location here. Maybe when I win the lottery I’ll set one up. I can dream, can’t I? LOL

While I do love what I’m doing, I’m starting to get more interested in other aspects of the web … namely social media. That’s kind of ironic since I am definitely NOT a social person. I’m the girl who sits in the corner watching people have fun. But I need to change that.

I have no immediate plan to change my career plan yet again. I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing. But I think that in my spare time I might start looking into the whole social media field. It might turn out that it’s not for me. But it doesn’t hurt to look into it. I’m at a point in my life where I feel like I need to get more involved with things. I’m not getting any younger. LOL I think that would help with the working from home thing and feeling like I’m trapped in my apartment.

Where will I be 4 years from today? Who knows. I would like to think that I will still be involved in some aspect of web programming. Maybe even in some other aspect of the web. But since I don’t have a crystal ball and since I can’t see the future, I have no idea where I will actually be. I just hope that wherever I am and whatever I’m doing, I’m happy. That’s all I want. To be happy.

It’s that time of year again. Time for the FargoDome parking lot to be filled with the delicious aroma of ribs and brisket. This weekend is RibFest. You just can’t beat delicious food and concerts for next to nothing. With a discount coupon, you can get in the gate for $3. Parking is $3. But the concerts are free. So for $6, you get to see some awesome live music from national acts. Yeah, the food is extra, but for the amount you get, it’s not bad.

Last nite had Sawyer Brown on stage. Robin, Dannilynn, and I went. We ate some food, watched some pigs race, and then watch the concert. It was the first real test of my camera. Yeah, I used it at Dannilynn’s birthday party, but those pics were taken inside. Last nite was more of a challenge. It was dark out and we weren’t all that close to the stage. Kind of hard to get close when you have a stroller. And loud music isn’t good for little ears. I need to do more playing with my camera to find the best settings, but I did get some okay pics for the conditions. Here’s a preview …

I got a couple of pretty good videos too. The sound is rather loud. I don’t think I have software that will tone down the sound, but I am planning on putting them up on YouTube after I do a little processing to shrink them down in size. I’ll post ‘em here after I get that done. So be on the lookout.

We’re going back to RibFest tomorrow nite. Diamond Rio is there. They were supposed to play last year, but the weather was so bad, they canceled everything for that nite. I really hope that doesn’t happen again this year. There is rain in the forecast for tomorrow, but there was yesterday too, but the weather was perfect last nite. So here’s hoping tomorrow will be too. And maybe I’ll have my camera figured out for less than ideal conditions by then.

I don’t know what’s been up with me this weekend. It’s a 3-day weekend, but I’ve only left my apartment twice. I went to the car wash and Best Buy on Saturday and went to get a paper on Sunday. Saturday was sort of a nice day. It was windy, but it was warmer and sunny. Yesterday was nice too. But since it was Sunday (i.e. race day), I didn’t do anything. Today is a crappy day. We still haven’t hit 50°. It’s cloudy and windy and chilly. I’m even wearing my jacket in the house.

I just haven’t had any ambition to do anything all weekend. I had planned on calling Robin to see if she and Dannilynn wanted to do something. But I just haven’t wanted to do anything at all all weekend. The only reason I went out on Saturday was because I wanted to get a portable hard drive, and it was on sale.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if I had actually done something around my apartment. But nope. I’ve been lazing around on the couch all weekend. I’ve been on the computer too, but not all that much (since Twitter has been freaky all weekend). I just don’t know what my deal is. I’m drinking an (orange) AMP right now hoping it will give me some energy. The can is almost empty but no energy yet.

I hope this doesn’t become a trend. I don’t wanna sit holed up in my apartment all summer. I’m gonna have to tell Robin to drag me out of the house kicking and screaming if she has too … LOL.

Someone rang my buzzer this morning. Normally I ignore it if I’m not expecting someone. I hate when people buzz just to get let in the building. If I don’t know you, I’m not gonna let you in. You could be a homicidal maniac or something. I’m not gonna be responsible for letting you in the building so you can go on a rampage. LOL

I’ll usually turn my tv to the “door channel”, as I call it. There are cameras at each door. That way, if someone stops by unexpectedly, I let them in. I didn’t recognize who was at the door this time. So I hit the ‘talk’ button and asked who it was. He said “UPS”. Huh? My camera and other stuff isn’t scheduled to be delivered until Tuesday. And I’m not expecting anything else. First I thought he was just buzzing me even though the package was for someone else. But there was a knock at my door. I went to open it, and the package was on the ground. The damn UPS guy just knocked on the door and dropped the package. WTF? Aren’t they supposed to get signatures? Dumb ass.

Anyways … it was a letter sized package. I opened it up, and there was my media card. Talk about confusing. As of the end of the day yesterday, it hadn’t shipped … according to the NewEgg website anyways. When I checked this morning, it did say that it shipped. But no tracking number. And as of 10 minutes ago, there’s STILL no tracking number for it. Someone in their shipping department sure dropped the ball on this one. Another confusing thing … the website says it was shipping from PA. The package I got was shipped from IL. But it was the right thing. So who knows. All that matters is that I got it.

Not that it does me any good. I won’t get my camera until Tuesday. And the camera I currently have doesn’t take SD or SDHC cards. So there it sits in its packaging until Tuesday when they deliver my camera.

Yesterday was a LONG, interesting, but fun day. The interesting started in the morning. I went shopping for some stuff at Walmart and had to lay on the horn twice within a span of a couple minutes while I was leaving the parking lot. People need to pay attention when they drive. Then I stopped at Home Depot to get a chair for my balcony. I had planned on getting a couple of those stackable plastic chairs, but I sat in an Adirondack style chair, and decided to get that. I’ll probably be the one person sitting on the balcony anyways. And if someone does come over and we sit out there, I have my fold-up chair. Getting that chair into my car proved to be very challenging. I thought it would fit in my backseat, but the plastic wasn’t as flexible as I hoped it would be, and the base was too wide to fit through the door. Luckily, a guy saw I was having trouble getting it into my car and stopped to help. Not sure what made him stop, but I’m glad he did. He tried to get it in the backseat, but couldn’t. So we ended up putting it in my trunk and tying the trunk down. I guess Good Samaritans do still exist.

The rest of the afternoon was pretty much lazy. I watched some stuff I had on tape from the past week. That’s about it. Then I started getting ready for the concert. Robin and I went to the Daughtry/Bon Jovi concert last nite. We took a shuttle bus from Big D’s. I’m glad we did. It saved the headache of getting to the Dome and finding a place to park and having to get out afterwards. But it made for an interesting experience. But more on that later.

I met Robin at Big D’s a little before 6pm to hop on a bus. I was afraid they’d leave before we got there, but we were fine. Had plenty of time to spare. The bad part of taking the bus … they dropped us off on the west side of the Dome but our seats were on the east side. So we had to walk all the way around to get to our section. And walking through that mass of people sure was interesting. The show was sold out. They said there were 25,000 people there. I think about half of them were in line for the women’s bathroom. Geez! Why is it that there is always a huge line for the women’s but never a line for the men’s?

Our seats were basically at the top of the Dome, but there were up front almost right on the side of the stage. So, while we were way up top, we could still see the stage really good. And they had video screens. So we didn’t miss anything. And those video screens, they were cool. Leave it to a geek like me to notice them. I first noticed that they were moving up and down. Then I saw them kinda pulling apart. Apparently they were made up of some sort of strips of video. They were separate screens and they morphed into a single screen and it was just cool. And the back of the stage moved too. And had video on it as well. Very geeky and cool. I wish I had my camera with so I could have gotten pics. I tried to take some with my cell phone, but that doesn’t have a very good camera on it.

As for the concert itself. Awesome. I love Daughtry. And he was basically the main reason I wanted to go. He didn’t disappoint. And damn if the man ain’t HOT!!! He put on an awesome show. And as for Bon Jovi … I don’t know all of their music, but I know enough to enjoy the show. I missed the first few songs because I was in line for the bathrooms (grrrrrrr). But the rest of the show that I did see was awesome. At one point, he was out on a small stage basically right in front of us. If I had my camera, I could have gotten some good pics.

Getting back to Big D’s after the show was where the interesting REALLY began. Read the rest of this entry »

The past couple nites, I’ve been trying to figure out when I wanna take my vacation. I was thinking of the end of June or the beginning of July. Maybe the week of the 4th of July. I really don’t know. All I do know is that I wanna go somewhere. I haven’t been on a REAL vacation since June 2002. I went to visit my friend Melissa in Kansas. I’d go visit her again, only she’s living in Germany now. Her husband is in the military and stationed over there ’til 2010. I don’t have the money to go THAT far.

But I do wanna go somewhere. The past few years, I’ve taken my vacation during the fair. I don’t plan on doing that this year. The lineup isn’t as good. Only 3 concerts, and I really only wanna go to one. But don’t know that I’ll spend $20. I mean, I’ve seen them (32 Below) before … many many times. Yeah, I’d love to see ‘em again. But to pay $20 to be smooshed around by drunk people. No thanks. They are having bull riding a couple nites and races a couple nites. I’ll probably go to both of those things … at least 1 nite each. But that’s not what I wanna do with my vacation.

I really have no idea where I wanna go. And with gas prices the way they are (and probably getting worse), I don’t know that I’ll travel far. Unless I could get a really good deal on a plane ticket. But then again … I haven’t flown since before 9/11. I don’t know what I’d be in for.

All I know is that I wanna get out of my apartment … out of town. Even out of the state if that’s possible. I mean, I do live like 10 minutes from Minnesota (depending on traffic and how fast I drive ) and only a little more than an hour from South Dakota. I just don’t know where to go. And I’d probably be going by myself. Robin has Dannilynn, so I don’t think she could travel too far for too long. And she’s been really really really busy at work (I think she’d say that’s an understatement). I could probably get my sister to go with me. But I’d have to pay her way since she doesn’t have a job (hey putz … move up here … ). I don’t know how much fun I’d have by myself. I guess it would just depend on where I’d go.

So … this is where you come in (all 2 or 3 of you readers that I still have … LOL). Where should I go on vacation? Give me some suggestions. I’m serious here. I really wanna DO something for a change. I just don’t know what. So I need some help. Help me brainstorm for places to go on vacation. I’d really appreciate it.

I have become such a bad blogger. But then again, I haven’t been posting regularly for a while now anyways. But I have become a mad Twitterer. I’ve become addicted. So if you don’t hear from me around here for quite some time, just checkout my Twitter feed or check out the sidebar. There’s a REALLY good chance you’ll find me there.

I’ve been meaning to send out an email to some friends to try to brainwash talk them into using Twitter. I just haven’t sat down to do it yet. But I really need to. I need to find some Twitter-ites outside of Houston to follow … LOL.

I have a feeling I’ll be “tweeting” from my phone tonite at the rodeo. I’m going with Robin, Mona, and Allen. And then to Pete’s for the rodeo dance. Rodeo … that means COWBOYS!!!! And if you know me, you know I like cowboys. It’s times like this where I wish I had a fancy cell phone (a PDA-type phone) so I could follow along with Twitter. I can get notifications on my phone, but that would be a lot of text messages. But most of the time, I have no need for that fancy of a phone. So I’ll just have to live with it.

I’ll try to start blogging more again. But I can’t promise anything. After working on the computer all day for work, I just don’t have the energy at nite. And working from home and not leaving my apartment that often means I have a boring life. Not much to blog about. But I plan on doing some more work on my websites soon. So maybe I’ll get some techy posts up that I meant to when I registered this domain and set up this blog. But only time will tell.

I’d better get going. I have 2 hours before Robin gets here to pick me up for the rodeo … I need to figure out what I’m gonna do for supper and eat early so I can get ready. I already know what I’m gonna wear. I just need to fix my hair and makeup and change clothes. Then I’ll be all ready for all those cowboys … So many cowboys … so little time.

Today is the first day of spring … the spring equinox.

Folk tales from various European countries claim that only on the March equinox day (some may add the September equinox day or may explicitly not), one can balance an egg on its point. However one can balance an egg on its point any day of the year if one has the patience.

From Wikipedia

I know that you can do this any day, but I thought I’d give it a try. I don’t think I ever have … unless it was when I was little. Well … it was a success …

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Even though today is the first day of spring, and even though we’ve been having spring-like temps, winter is NOT yet over. We’ve got a pretty icky storm system in the region. Some areas can get up to 6 inches of snow or so. And of course … the areas that are supposed to get the worst of the weather is where I am planning on heading for Easter. If it gets really bad, I hope Mom has a backup plan for Easter dinner. Her ham is in my fridge. They’re cheaper here than there. I have a ham in the freezer as well. So the weather better be nice enough on Saturday so I can head home.

Times like today are where being an independent woman could get me in trouble. LOL My desk was finally delivered this morning. Unfortunately, due to its size, the delivery guy wouldn’t bring it up to my apartment (on the 3rd floor). He delivered it to my garage, leaving ME to find a way to get the monstrosity up to my apartment.

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My sister is coming up this weekend to help me put the desk together (and I’m assuming do some shopping too). I could have left the desk in the garage until Friday nite or Saturday morning and brought it up with her help. But noooooo. I didn’t want to leave it in the garage that long. So I decided to bring it up on my lunch break. Due to the size of the box (look over to the left … and YES, it is a filthy box) which I believe is larger than my kitchen table (or pretty damn close) … I decided to bring it up in pieces. I brought up the biggest/heaviest pieces to make the box a more manageable weight. When I thought I had it down to a manageable weight, I decided to drag the box in. Well … I figured a little wrong. I should have taken out a few more pieces before trying to bring up the box. Have you seen the episode of Big Bang Theory where the guys bring her furniture to her apartment? I had that thought when I got to the steps. LOL But I got it up.

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It doesn’t look too scary for putting it together. There aren’t as many pieces as I thought there might be (check out the image to the left). And unlike the shelf I bought recently, it’s put together with actual metal hardware. The shelf is held together with plastic hardware. I’d put it together myself tonite, but I know it would be too heavy for me to move around by myself. So for that, I’ll actually wait for when my sister is here, and she can help me (if she’s recovered from her 8 games of bowling by then). But I am going to put together the drawers tonite. Those can be put together separately from the rest of the desk, and they’re small. They won’t take up too much space once they’re put together. I believe there are 2 small and 1 big drawer.

And to think … it’s gonna end up looking like this …

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