Fly on the wall

2023 Is almost over!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Thu, 28 Sep 2023 13:43:00 +0000

Well, again I totally forgot about this blog. Tumblr I'm forgetting as well from time to time, but that one still has more up-to-date stuff than this blog does. Good luck finding my Tumblr haha!

Weather:

So this has changed drastically since the last 2 years. We had 2 ice storms and one the whole city of Austin was at a halt. Roads were icy and not able to drive through to them. We had a weeks worth of not able to go anywhere and a couple of days of our power going in and out. We made it, obviously, but we are fearing it might happen this coming winter. We literally had to make or warm up some food by candlelight and stay wrapped up in blankets. Most of us couldn't even work since the power kept going out every 5 minutes or more. After this happened, well the weather went back to normal for Texas... which means heat. Then we had another somewhat ice storm the year after, but not as bad as the last one. Texas has or still is working on "fixing" the power grids since we're only are attached to our state alone and not with another near us. Back home, we never had to go through those type of issues when a blizzard hit, so I found it kind of strange going through it here. Then 2023 summer here was extreme. We're always extreme with our summers or just weather in general, being in the heat. We hit records of consecutive days straight in a row of being over 100 degrees, sometimes even 110 degrees, but that's humidity for you in the mix. My husband is worried we might get another harsh winter and so we have prepared as much as we can.

Work

Not sure how far back you guys know of this subject with my husband and I. So was working for a call center and in 2019, we got laid off, my whole department. Been there for 5 years and it was a pretty easy job, but it became boring and no calls were coming through from time to time, speaking from my experience though only. Was treated like crap by my supervisor and she kept an eye on me and one time even placed me to sit right next to hers. Talk about very supervised and under the microscope. I think she did it to use me of the information I knew in how to run the team, since she was new to that type and any aspect of it and what we dealt with. Got written up several times for stupid things and I fought for it. When we got the news of laid off, I was happy and yet sad at the same time. Most of the people there were just there for me, not really friends and others were friends. At that point I decided to take some time off and not work for however long it took me to find another job. Took about 6 months honestly and during those 6 months, it was relaxing, but at other times hell since I had to find things to do and keep up with a list of jobs I applied for. Yes, I went into unemployment.

Currently I work for the same company that let me go, but direct with them. They bought or joined with another pharmaceutical company and became one. I have been with them now for 3 years and under 2 different departments by now. I was happy when I got hired since the pay was way more than I was being given in the last one and yet almost quit this one. There was so many different things to learn and retain that, till today, I am surprised my brain can keep everything in and remember it all. After things were changing in that department and I kept being dismissed with other tasks, I decided that I didn't want to stay there for another year in that same department and my skills and talents being overlooked and so I applied for a different department. A department that I knew of and knew that they took more responsibilities for the company and yet I told myself that I didn't want to go to another department that handled calls. I wanted to be offline and taking emails; there's too many people out there that think they are privileged and should have everything then and there. That's not the case and not how the real world works by the way. So I took a risk, applied, and got the position. I was stunned, but happy. I told myself I will try my best to not snap at people on a call when it came time to do that or how the call went. I got my training and when training was close to the first end of the week of it I got good news. I was going to be in the offline team; I was ecstatic yet again. After training was over and I was handling cases, even more good news, the whole department was going offline. No matter if I got moved to a different team or what I was going to do, it was going to be offline and purely answering email requests. I have been doing this since February of this year and hopefully I will stay here for another 2 years or more.

Projects/Photography

My photography has been steady, if you would like to call it that. With this new position at work and bonuses they were giving us while we were catching up on tons of emails, there were tons of incentives that they were giving us and so I treated myself with a new camera and a drone. I grow nervous when working with the drone, but my husband will be the one using it more since it feels and looks like he can handle it more than I can. Since I bought myself this new DSLR camera I decided to make a project which includes photos of bridges. This project is almost complete and why bridges you may ask, well the first photo of a bridge that I took got me more into photography. Yes, this project includes that first bridge I took in it. I will possibly announce the completion of this project in my Facebook Digital Blu page. Another upgrade I did was that I bought a domain and created a website with GoDaddy. The last provider I was using for that started to become more restricting, lack of storage and I was unable to add more content without removing and buying a plan of theirs. I know I have a blog dedicated to my Digital Blu page and website here in Blogger, but I'm not sure anyone else in the world really keeps up with updating those type of things and I don't think others bother to read/see mine honestly. If you would like to see my new website, go here. I may try to find a 30 challenge that consists of using my drone, but there's very few to none of those type for drones currently. Currently I am only focusing on landscape and automotive photography, but I might dive back into Product photography and my other project I was starting with my The X-Files items I have collected throughout the years, but we shall see when and if I have time for these. Plus I need to figure out how to use a new program my husband bought me to edit my photos with.

Slice of Life

Well, besides the obvious from what I already mentioned above, there's been tons of new things in our lives. We moved out of our first home we bought and are renting it out currently. We moved in with my mother-in-law and then they moved out into another home. I believe we lived with them for 2 years after moving out of our home. The taxes and them fluctuating and the city growing rapidly with meaningless stores just killed it for us to live there any longer. I miss my first home, that's all I can say that. Yes, I did cry when we had the last of our things out of it and into a storage unit, but we do visit it from time to time to check on it and if there's anything of repairs wise to do to it, from the outside of course. I got a new job, liked the department I was in, but rapidly grew to hate it due to seeing others that make mistakes or don't look into the finer details and them getting more tasks or responsibilities that come with being observant and looking into details getting these tasks. I was being overlooked in my opinion and didn't think it was fair and just and so, I decided that I needed to get away from it all and onto another department. That happened and I'm glad I am offline and working from home remotely ever since I got hired by this company.

During that time I finally decided to visit a doctor to check on my health due to a time period, while unemployed and before I got let go, that I wasn't myself and I do believe depression hit me very hard. The hardest it has ever hit me and the last time I felt close to the same way was when I was in high school, but this one wins a trophy. I never want to get back to that moment and feeling the way I did and I haven't since then. Yet due to this episode I decided to visit the Doctor for regular checkup and was told crappy news. This is why I never wanted to visit them by the way; barrels of bad news at times. I have fibroids. I got recommended several doctors which lead me with more recommendations of others and finally, I had the time and guts to do something about it all. I am scheduled for surgery on Oct 13th. There are so many rules and restrictions I need to follow for it prior to the surgery day that I understand why they are in place, but my goodness there's a lot. I fear the surgery since I've never had any general surgery and me being put to sleep, but it has to happen. I need to feel better from it all. Hopefully all goes well that day, for me. I'm just glad my parents will be visiting the week after my surgery to help us since I will not want to be walking around, full of pain.

So, we took over my mother-in-laws house and they moved out. Basically we like to look at it as we kicked them out; just kidding! We bought the house that one of my sister-in-laws was living at and they decided to move back to another state. That did not work out well for them at all and they had to move back home. They moved in with us with the children having their own rooms and their parents in an RV next door to us. That lasted about half a year and well, not well. My husband mainly has PTSD from this experience now and has lost the relationship he had with his nieces. Before that happened, the husband and son decided to go to another state and figure out if living there will be best for the whole family. I think that lasted less than a year and everyone, besides the son, moved back here, but with my mother-in-law this time. The son decided to get his life together by getting an education and degree in Job Corps. At this point, I know the parents both have jobs (miraculously for the mother) and the kids just stay put most of the time. Our relationship with them has been severed and we just don't speak with them cause they don't with us. I just wish this didn't happen for my husband's sake mainly, but it's all we can do, nothing.

During these times living with my in-laws and then gaining their home we added to our family, with furry children. We first found 3 kittens in our property next door during some rainy weather and decided to keep them. Then about a year or 2 later, we gained two more little kittens. They both were in bad shape and with colds and so we decided to keep them as well. The momma now has had 2 litters and this most recent one, she had 4 and they are all running and living around our property. Their older siblings, the first litter, the ones that we rescued from batch, are still coming around as well. At that time she had 5 kittens in that litter. We had other adult cats come and go and some we got enjoy their company with, but we haven't seen anymore and may have passed. We do have a tom cat that comes daily and let's us pet him, we named him Tom. Get it? No, well we're sometimes not clever with names haha. We also seen some racoons and opossums come by; sometimes they are a nuisance since they eat all the cat food we provide. I'm not sure what else has been new to add here besides the obvious, if you have me on Facebook, but I'm just nervous for my surgery and hopefully it goes well. See ya all!

2021 say whaaaat?

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Mon, 08 Mar 2021 23:31:00 +0000

Well I just would like to say, welcome to 2021 everyone who still reads this. I do apologize that I haven't updated it in such a looooong time. Quite honestly, I forgot about it and well decided to place more personal stuff that I am going through in my tumblr. So if you have one of those or were following me there before, then you have been up to date with my life than in this blog. I will keep the format the same in this blog and no I will not be linking my tumblr here. So if you it or know me and can find a way to get to it, then I bid you good luck on it. A lot has changed since my last post here and no I'm not saying because its a new year, but honestly a lot has changed and happened.

Weather

Since my last post, the weather was decent after. Your typical Texas weather of being hot and dusty were into play. Once we hit close to the New Year, we got the cold weather. Literally a day or two before the new year hit we got rain and cold winds. After the new year, we did get tons of mixed weather. We did get one Snow day here during a weekend and then it left. We accumulated about 6 inches of snow and that hasn't occurred since 2014 or so. I can't recall what the weather channel said, but it was coming down non-stop. Everyone had fun that weekend and making snowmen and snow angels and your typical snowball fights. The next round of snow came in February and it was nothing anyone was expecting, honestly. All of Texas was in a severe Snow Storm warnings and what came first was the sleet with rain. That made all of our roads be very dangerous and almost inaccessible. Then came the snow, a whole bunch of it on top of the already icy snow and sleet. In all technicality, Texas was shut down due to this weather. Everyone's power went out or flickered, to possibly return 3-4 days after or a whole week after, then on top of that many people's water was frozen and inaccessible and under a boiling water notice.

For our household we only experienced was our lights flickering in and out and being gone for more than 5+ hours and increasing that number every time it went out. We never experienced the water issues and we found ways to cook our food and now are trying to prepare in case it happens again by buying supplies and thinking outside the box for these types of situations. I believe that Ercot, the main company for our light source in all of Texas, is going to go through some changes. I believe some people were already fired due to this negligence we all experienced. I know for a fact when I was living in Illinois, we never had this issue occur. Maybe through thunderstorms we did, but that's a whole different story and situation. Alas, it only took us 4 days total to get "back to normal" regarding with this storm. Others weren't so lucky in a short time frame. Even after the storm was over, they had no electricity and no running water. This time I will we will be prepared since my husband hate not being prepared for situations like these. As of right now, we're in a Spring type weather and a couple of rain clouds here and there, but nothing to major like this we had.

Photography

I definitely put this on pause since last year. I wasn't able to go anywhere nor take any other portrait sessions of anyone. I believe I did have one last year. It was for a family member wanting to have a Senior graduation session. Other than that I haven't been to any conventions or any other events due to Covid still on the rise with numbers. I'm not sure if I will pick this up again or if it'll simply be a hobby for me. I did wanted to expand my business with this hobby or at least my small business with this, but Covid just threw that out the window literally for me. I'll take some of small events or trips my husband and his family might do, but that might be all.

The Corner

So in my last post, I did mention that my husband and I moved into his mother's house. We were able to clean up the house with help, we were able to find a realtor to put our house in the marketplace for leasing and we did find tenants we liked. We did fire our first realtors we were with, company wise, due to fact that they weren't listening to a single word we were saying. So we found another company, got our house fixed and cleaned to their standards for leasing and got a family in there already since October or November. Somewhere in between those months; they moved in a day or so earlier than planned. They signed the lease for 2 years and we've been back in the neighborhood a couple of times to check in on it. Been through bumps on the road with it, but made it through and I miss it so. I did cry most of the times we stepped in it before they moved in, but it will not be sold... ever and that is a guarantee my husband gave me. I did mention that I was going through a depression of sorts in my last post and taking over the counter medicine that I found online. I do believe in fact that I do have PMDD from time to time and the pills that I was taking for it, I stopped taking them. I stopped due to the fact of not seeing any difference with being on them or not. I did start taking Brillia pills that help with anxiety and stress. I believe those pills worked better than the others, but I also did start taking my multivitamin pills daily along with vitamin d3. I figured out a dosage for the vitamin d3 that is working out for me and did start in the highest recommended dosage for Brillia, but then cut back on it as well within time.

If you know me I don't like visiting doctors and such, but I told myself that this year, the new year, that I will be better with that and I have been. I went to see the dentist first and took care of some cavities I had. Then came the OBGYN for the yearly checkups there and all came fine, except of having Fibroids. I have decided to hold off on having any type of surgery for this until after July of this year - for personal reasons. I also got my eyes checked and all is good and went back to the prescription that I had when I first started wearing contacts, which threw me off completely with that, but its good news. I also got hired for a company I used to work for before and have been with them since August and its already been 6 months. I almost felt like quitting due to my anxiety being on the high rise and holidays coming up, but I didn't. I was doing all of my checkups purely because I was thinking of quitting my current job. It gave me anxiety due to so many rules and lines of businesses I still deal with currently, but I have learned to manage it all without my head exploding and my husband being on my side on whatever decision I made, to stay or quit.

I decided to stay and in the department I'm currently in for a year. I thought to move departments as fast as I could once I hit my 6 month mark and find another department that's more fitting for me and asked to shadow other departments. They were informative, but I decided to stay where I'm at for a year and see how it goes. My supervisor always tells me that I'm doing a good job and I recently got a raise with a bonus. I learn new things every day with this company and department. I'm also taking classes my job offers me regarding with excel and any other program like it and I dont need to pay for them. The company pays for them. I need to figure out what other class I need to take while they're offering them.

As for the property or land we bought, next to my mother-in-law's house, we have done a bunch of things to it. So far we have cut down a bunch of trees already and there was a storage building that was made and we knocked down most of it as well. We still need to haul a bunch of stuff that was inside the storage, so that's another project in itself. We still have more trees to knock down and deciding to buy a storage building to add to our land and move our items into it to save more money. We currently have our items in a storage place already. My husband wants that to happen soon, like in 2 months, but we need to clear out the land and time to do so. Maybe we can do that this coming weekend or so, who knows. I think so far I have updated this as much as I can here. Hopefully I don't forget to update this one and bring back some more interesting news.

3 busy bees!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Tue, 21 Jul 2020 20:19:00 +0000

Weather

Well, Texas has not been bipolar now. We're in the summertime now and boy is it hot! Not only do we have to deal with the heat, but the pandemic and the Sahara dessert's dust coming in the air. From what I heard, Illinois got some of that dust as well and that hardly happens. Seems during the week we just might some rain and I hope its more than an hour worth of rain. A whole days worth is what Texas needs of rain!

Photography

I have put my hobby on hold for now. With this pandemic and now lack of room in the new location we're at I wouldn't be able to do any of it. It does not mean that I completely stopped taking photos, it just means I'm putting a pause on it. If someone still needs me to take a family portrait or a product and if I stumble upon a beautiful location then I will snap a photo of it. I may need to take refresher courses to remember this, but it's ok maybe something I didn't know now I will learn then.

Texas

As we all know, or don't, Texas is one of the places in this COVID-19 that the numbers are rising. It doesn't help if the people who don't think it's real walking around without masks or the new term being tossed around as The Karens or Karens. We don't need you to preach of what lacked or what went wrong and that you're privileged; simply we just don't need your drama during this time and well any time, its pointless and you're in the wrong. This virus is real and no one wants to catch it! Everyone has family that they want to see over the coming years, so if you don't have any family or friends and don't want to wear a mask then stay home. At least keep your distance if no masks! Hopefully we can come together to fight this pandemic and get this state out of that "banned" list or quarantine.

The Corner

So since my last post, my negativity has been dormant. I haven't had much of this going on, until yesterday. Yes, I am currently taking my Go with the Flow pills and at one point I stopped since I didn't have any and figured that I didn't need them at the same time, but I did have a small episode of just a lot of things on my plate and I crashed. My mother-in-law gave me some vitamin d3 pills and talked to me for a moment to calm me down and I was fine the day after. Yesterday, a thought of not loving poured into my mind. Why? I asked myself and I know its not true so why have this type of thought in my mind and consuming it. With things like this is frustrating and you need to figure out the source to make you think this way. I have not figured that out yet and it's irritating. Another feeling that I'm having is being irritated. I would like to play the blame game, but I know I can't do that every time or every month and I figured these pills should've helped at least 75% of this. I guess I get like this every time I know some things aren't done my way or I get forced to do something I don't want to do or a lame routine. I don't know, I just need to know what the source is and well bite it back.

At this point my husband and I have moved in with his mom in order for us to save money. No, we didn't loose the house and we're not selling it. We're actually renting/leasing it out and we're fixing it for the new tenant. So far the flooring for majority of the rooms are going to be fixed and in the process. Next will be the paint in some of the rooms and then the fridge. We really need to fix that ice maker in it and hopefully with the parts we already got it will do that. After all this is done, get someone professionally to clean the whole house and pest control as well. I think we may have someone to rent it out, a friend of mine, but we will need to see if they were talking serious about it. Everything is falling into place with the house and hopefully by August we can start saving up. The property/land will be next with cleaning it and then finding a house for us. The house is a slow process since I need to find the right layout, kitchen wise, but we have time for that. Another thing that is falling into place is me finally getting a break with a job. Ironically its with the same Pharmaceutical company I worked with before. They bought another Pharmaceutical company and well it'll be remote. So very soon there will be 3 people working from home by the beginning of August. Other than these changes or blessings there's nothing else to mention here. I will work on this specific thought and see what makes me think this way, but it all can be hormonal.

It's a pandemic!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Sat, 09 May 2020 00:01:00 +0000

Weather

Well welcome all! Since my last post the weather has changed dramatically. Texas is bipolar and no offense to anyone. At this current moment it's very windy, but sunny. The sun has gone in and out all day and at times it seemed like it was going to rain. I like the rain, especially if its like pouring cats and dogs and all day, not just stopping here and there. If it stops, then it will get humid and no one likes that feeling around here, but it's Texas after all. I believe it will continue to be like this into the weekend and the new week, so we shall see.

Photography

The last time I posted here about this topic, I had some let downs. Yes, honestly I read my last post and it made me sad in the state of mind I was in. For now my photography hobby is on hiatus. I did have another offer for a wedding, that ironically is within the family and still happening this coming Saturday, but due to the pandemic that is happening in the world I had to ask and say no to it. When I was asked, yes asked, to photograph their wedding, I was ecstatic and jumped on the opportunity to add new photos and experience under my belt and this was back in the beginning of March of when I was asked. When I asked for an update, due to the major world event happening, I was told that it was continuing but with limited people attending and the DJ/music player was able to do the photos as well. My heart did plummet down for all of the news, but I rather be safe than sorry. Hopefully after this madness is over, they might ask me to do other types of photos for them and I wouldn't mind. I have taken other photos during this pandemic time in my house, of product photography for practice, but I feel like I'm just being lazy to not upload and edit them. I also hate how down I was in my last post regarding this topic. So much sadness and internal blame was placed in that post that I never saw how negative I was and didn't flip it into a positive note at all. I do apologize to anyone who read it and just let their heart ache for me and took pity on me. I don't even know if anyone really keeps up with reading this, but this is mainly for me in a therapeutic and venting type of sense and of course to look back at. Speaking of looking back..

COVID-19

This pandemic is just crazy! I really never thought that we or the world would get into this type of state with a virus. We have been through this before, remember Ebola and how everyone panicked about that? I don't remember how long that lasted with everyone, months wise, but this one I think takes the cake. We have ventured out here and there buying to stock up because my husband was in that mode and just want to prepare. No, we weren't one of those people stocking up on toilet paper and cleaners, no. We were the type with veggies, different kinds of meat.. or whatever we can find, and other canned goods. Luckily my mother-in-law has purchased us, in time for this, a mini freezer. We had a larger freezer a while back, but it died and we didn't want to spend an arm and leg in fixing it, so we trashed it. So, by the time this pandemic hit, we were prepared and overstocked of 2 months worth of food. Currently, the state is lifting some closures in wave forms. My husband thinks its dumb and I agree with it. Agreeing because the world/state is not ready, the people are not ready, not just cause he is my husband. I have no reason to venture out, so I just don't and I only venture out with him and not to places that have many people. We actually went 4 weeks in not going into any stores, after stocking up on food and it was at least 2 months since we stepped into our local HEB grocery store. It wasn't till last weekend that we did and it just felt odd, I'm not gonna lie. I just mainly order everything we need through Instacart and it has its successes and misses. I just hope that this simmers down soon and that there's a vaccine that's successful. My husband thinks it may get worse during Flu season and I can understand and see that happening so, we shall see how it all goes.

The Corner

So I would like to apologize for my last previous posts here. Both, or so, do sound so negative with whatever topic I was talking about. I have been trying to be a more positive person with myself and with people around me. I'm hoping that the funk, a state a mind my husband may have been going through and I named it that way and only very few people know what I'm talking about with this, has surpassed now. I have been in dark clouds because of the funk with the feeling of walking on eggshells and not screwing up to make it into another factor for the funk to stick around. I also was asking, tons literally, of "what are you feeling/thinking" type of questions and I know it was an annoyance, but since I realized all this, I have stepped back and also simmered down on it. Even though its common sense to appreciate and admire an individual since getting together with them or just on a daily basis type of thing, not everyone realizes this until somewhere down the line or your life. I had my moment of both and it felt as if a blindfold was taken away from my eyes. Why till now you may ask? I have no clue, but once I did I just felt horrible not realizing it sooner than later. All in all, I love my husband and it's okay to make mistakes, you are human and no human is perfect and at least you realize whatever you needed to realize. I'm expanding my skills and positiveness to learning new things. I have ventured into learning to make some of my parent's recipes and cooking them up. I have 3 more recipes that I need to figure out in how to make and already tried with success with 2 of them. I knew I needed a way to learn to cook and not let my husband take all the burden of cooking. He loves to cook, so I don't want to take it away from him since its therapeutic for him, but I know I had to help somehow in this department and I do help him when he does cook, always have helped. Another thing I did for myself as well is to take some over the counter medication for my self diagnosed PMDD condition. Self diagnosed because I knew I was going through something I never experienced before, I have no insurance, and I knew I was going through it during that "nice" time of the month moment. I started to take pills that balance my hormones and relief them and they're called "Go with the Flow". So far I have been taking them for like a week and a half and I feel like I am more positive and I do have my moments of going into the darkness mode or ideas, but I just try to fight those. I only take one pill and I just may continue to do so.

I do have my moments of thinking negatively and they just disappear. I hate when I get them because I know its something not true and I just continue to do me and whatever else I was doing. I just want to try to keep my husband stress and worry free and I don't want to burden him with other small childish like things. He does tend to ask me the same question I used to pester him with, but that's only because he sees me in a trance of staring into nothingness and at times it is nothing that I'm thinking about and other times it is the negative thoughts that I know mean nothing. Another thing I have done for myself is forgiven events or people that I needed to forgive. I made a list and want to just burn it when I have the chance since I need to forgive and forget. I may burn it when I have the chance which is when this pandemic is over and we can finally and officially celebrate! I already started to drive as well and some of my fear of it is going away, so I'm proud of myself for that. My husband has been proud of me in anything I have conquered and tried, like driving and cooking.I'm glad he is and I always know he will be with anything I do. Another thing we both finally conquered together is buy land. It was a goal to buy the land by his mom's house and that dream has finally happened. We will add a photo of it once the "Sold" sign is up on the property. Our next goal and mission is to lease our house and find a way to save up for a house to move into the property. Baby steps, but it will happen and he is predicting for us to officially move into that property within 2 years, but we shall see with his family. His family is on a mission to help us in any way possible and I am very grateful for that! Actions do speak louder than words and I need to keep that advice that a great find provided me through my darkness. I feel like I need to apologize to that friend and hopefully with my absence I given between ourselves that our friendship wasn't tarnished nor broken because of my crazy self sabotaging mind that I have. I'll speak to that friend in another week and hope nothing killed our friendship. My mind is crazy and a good example is today. I went from reading an email that told me that I didn't get the job to hating the company and knowing that they don't deserve me and motivated me to get off my seat and work on my resume and apply to another job. I just wish my mind did this with other thoughts I get in it or events. Well, that's all the updates I have so far. So stay positive, be safe and stay home if you can!

The long sigh

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 18:16:00 +0000

Weather

As usual, my posts start off with this topic. To think of it, I have no idea why I do start them off with this, but I'll continue it. The weather has been crazy here. One day it'll be nice and sunny and the next just pouring rain, gloomyness and back to sunny all in one day. We did get snow one day, but it was only an inch and didn't last long. My dogs were very curious about it, as they should since it's not common here. So far, the weather has been in the 60s if not 70s and the mornings are the cold moments of the day. It just really depends honestly.

Photography

I did mention in my last post that I hope my photography business booms and that I had things lined up for me that made me think that it just might grow. I had a wedding gig lined up for me, but it fell through. They wanted a videographer and I don't do that and so I couldn't do that gig. I do have another chance for a wedding coming up soon, but my husband doesn't want me to do it since it's family and he wants me to enjoy the time. I also was told that the same client I did a session with earlier in the year wanted another session with extended family, but I have yet to hear from them for all the details. So my plan or goals I added to myself with this business was for me to get at least 2-3 clients each month and depending on how many people in each session charge extra per person and this will keep me afloat and with income, but so far no clients for the month of February occurred. March just started, so I'm not saying I'm giving up hope yet for this month, but the dark cloud is glooming and forming already slowly.

I also tried to get some photos in during C2E2, but I got discouraged very quickly with my camera. The images were dark and not focused. In those type of events you don't have the time to make the person stand there for more than a minute or two while you adjust your settings, yourself and well you don't have the room because of other people passing by. You lack room and well lighting and so the first photos came out and I was trying a new setting, it just discouraged me quickly and made me very depressed. Honestly I took only 1 photo, one. So I either need to get better with my settings/camera, upgrade my camera or fix me and not be so hard on myself or do all. I don't know, but doing this for almost 2-3 years you think I should already know this and not have mistakes and I'm sure I'm right on that, but keep in mind I'm hard on myself. Rome wasn't built in a day and people learn new things every day. I do have an event I'm wanting to go this Saturday and it's a car show. Those type of events or topic of events to me are easy. They're cars and they don't move. One setting and nothing to worry about. We shall see how it turns out and go from there.

The Corner

I guess I decided to call this section of my posts as "The Corner". Because quite frankly, it feels like I'm placed or feel like I'm stuck in one, by choice or not. I felt at ease and free once I realized that our department was coming to a close. I have been wanting to get out of it and no one wanted to pick me up. After I came into an acceptance with both, I decided that I need time to relax at home and with my husband actually pushing for me to not work and him being the sole provider with no stress of sorts then I grew to also accept that. It's only been 2 months of me being unemployed and I feel bored and discouraged again. My feelings were swirling in every way possible. From happy to not needing to worry about the tasks that the job, any job, gives you to sad because of no socialization to even worriness and boredom.

As I type this I feel like I should and shouldn't go back to working. I worry on finances and laying all the stress of it on my husband, which isn't fair. Yet I feel I deserve to relax and just stay home. Why I mentioned discouraged is because yes I'm on unemployment and yet every time I apply for every job I have (50+ jobs) none of them has wanted me. Ok I take it back, I had 1 interview and 2 offers of interviews. It's obvious that I didn't get that one job and the others I'm contemplating on replying back for set-up. But besides that, all the other jobs I applied for and seeing the reply back in email form of "No Thanks!" or no reply at all just discouraged me and I'm sure anyone in this position feels the same way. It just makes you feel like you're not good enough at all and not wanted. Again, I've given myself goals or strikes with this as well. So far one strike exists and if there's 2 more after an interview then I won't bother to move on. I will follow rules I need to go by, so that I will keep up with.

With all this in mind I just feel like I'm putting other feelings out in the open or just worse. I went into a deep depression around Thanksgiving last year for a week or so and did my hardest to not show it outdoors or towards others. Only my husband witnessed it severely and for that I'm sorry towards him. We both have learned a lot from each other; lessons and for that I'm grateful that I know now what I know and learned. I do believe after having that experience I feel as if my anxiety rose to a higher level with other moments in my life. I get tense during certain moments like when I'm in the car, I read an article online that I can relate to somehow, a video, just anything like that it will flare up. I cried a little when I landed in Chicago this last time I went. It was a different kind of cry and I felt my anxiety flare up while being up in the air, in the plane as well. I couldn't rely on my husband since our flight was packed, we "arrived" late and we're not sitting next to each other basically. I had to calm myself with listening to music, which 100% of the time when I'm flying I do anyways, but it helped. I also feel like my other feelings like anger or my joking parts of me have either intensified or have disappeared. I just seem to feel like I need to state "I'm joking" more now than ever before when I didn't need to.

I just feel like I'm dragging and a burden and walking on eggshells of needing to apologize more and think of my actions or words before speaking them. No one needs to live like that, but it seems it's growing for me. I just don't know what to do anymore and blogging for me is like venting but also therapeutic. I'm just sharing what I'm going through and hope I find a solution or acceptance of my words when needed. I always say what I mean in the sense of my apologies, but I hope I can fix what's broken inside me and dismiss it all. For now all I can do is have a long sigh in these moments.

In the year 2020!!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Mon, 13 Jan 2020 02:58:00 +0000

Well, welcome all to the year 2020! Where many people say that they're going to make resolutions, changes, and organize their lives and then several days or a month later you forget it. I'm one of those people. Not by choice, but because I do have enough time in my hands nowadays. So, why do you ask? Well, due to a bittersweet circumstance that might bring me more advantages and possibly some goals completed. So on to what I usually do here.

Weather
So we were supposed to get a really bad storm this past weekend and well nothing happened. From hail to a possible tornado, but nothing really happened in our area. As of right now, it seems that our temps will be in a roller coaster ride. I'm wanting to make plans in the sense of exercise and such this new coming week, but we shall see how I can work this out. I can't complain nor give the excuse of time, since I have whole bunch of it now.

Bittersweet time
What I mean with this title is a lot of different things. For some, when they get let go from their job, they are mad and yet happy at the same time. Then after reality hits, sadness since no income and boredom-ness and starting from scratch occurs with looking for a job. I would say that I should be in these stages once my team found out that our account was closing, but I wasn't. In the long run, I was happy since no one including myself was not happy there and too many complaints occurred. I tried o escape before, but couldn't. A lot of people had other people to fall back to for income, since they had significant others or the alike, but many as well didn't and I felt for them. Were offers of other jobs given there? Yes, and some took the bait, but again I wasn't one of them. My time, my chance, has come to close this chapter with this company. I've been there for 5 years, 5 and now I need time to rest.

With this new freedom feeling I decided to organize/clean my house and so far most of the rooms that needed it the most have been staying clean. Now I just hope that my husband keeps up with them and doesn't destroy them somehow haha. I do have other rooms to organize and clean, but I also want to have actual time to relax. On top of that literally after the holidays were over, I had a request from a friend for a family portrait session and I took it. I had fun doing so and my husband and the client/friend also noticed it. Instantly once I was in progress with editing their photos I had another friend reach out to me for a wedding session. I greatly accepted, but need to hear back from the client or my friend first for confirmation. So it seems to me that this unemployment or relaxation is kicking my new year correctly with booking appointments for me for photography sessions. Hey, I do need the money and need to practice in one way or another for exposure and to finally build and update my portfolio and website as well. Hopefully word spreads of my services once I do provide the finalized photos of this current family session and this wedding as well. I just might also lend a hand in another wedding, if needed, with one of my husbands cousins as well. Whatever photography session comes my path I will surely take it, but keep in mind that it won't be free. Freelance people for any kind of art need to make a living as well to survive, so there will be a fee with our services!

Other than my photography business coming into a bloom again in a perfect timing, I also want to work on myself in the sense of exercise. I've been told that I need to get on a low-carb diet and well since I no longer have breaks for walks, I don't know how to gain my walks again while at home. My dogs don't obey in staying around me or just go crazy when we take them on walks, so that is out of the question and walking on your own can sometimes be lonely, but I guess that'll be my only solution for now. I don't know but also when you're cleaning your house you get a workout as well at the same time, so that's another plus on that or what I noticed. We shall see what I come up with in this part of my life. I just hope my photography business kicks in soon because I do enjoy it and my husband wants me to focus on that only and not get a [real] job back. So many plans and ideas and lots of time to expand and make them grow somehow!

Reflections

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Mon, 25 Nov 2019 17:56:00 +0000

This post is going to be a different type than the usual. I still haven't found a title or name for my "Alex's corner" deal I wrote and did in my last post. I'm usually good with naming things, but this time I'm just in a halt with it. I'm sure sooner or later I will bump into something clever. I guess this is also a disclaimer for what I'm about to write about and most times my title to my post is what I would be talking about. I figured I would give you guys a clue as to what I would write about, so that way you can determine if you even want to read it or not. I know some of you or majority of you don't care and don't want to waste your time reading my crap. I'll be blunt at times too with myself. I'm sure you figured that out by now.

Alas, this past weekend I had a lot of things that bumped into me and literally slapped me in my face. I felt as if I was in a rut, kind of like a pet mouse running in place in its spinning wheel. A cycle that never ends or goes back to square one and repeats. I guess I can break up what I want to talk about into sections here and it might be easier on me and you the audience to understand. Let's see what the easy approach would work. As I write this I am listening to Pink Floyd's "A Momentary Lapse of Reason" album. It's helping me and the set mood I'm currently in, if you want to jump in with me.

Work
I guess the best thing to start off with would be work. It is a part of everyone's life, if of course you do work. Mine revolves around a call center for a Pharmaceutical company, if you didn't know that already. When I started in this account it was easier, simpler and of course scary, but I overcame all the fears that came with it in time. Looking back at it and comparing to it now, it has changed a lot! Not only did the program, but the medication, the people, the "location" (ironically, haha) and well the customer service vibe. Our new clients want us to follow each and every script verbatim. Basically be like robots and mainly do transfers. I get it, I get why all these changes and precautions, but it seems to me to be also like a cover-up for something bigger or less, depending on how you see it. We've been getting a bit more of emails regarding other job positions here and a coworker did bring up a thought on it.. it was what they were doing when the other account I was in shut down. The same actions were happening then but now and almost in the same months, October through December. They were, in their own creepy way, telling us to get away or a heads up and of course I didn't listen to those warning signs. At the time, I couldn't take the new position I was offered earlier. The shift didn't fit well with me at the time and well the big ball dropped and the account was closed by the end of December.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that a lot of things have changed in this account. Some for the good and others for the bad. Mainly, I am not happy here anymore. So many restrictions, lack there of communication, and well lack of calls I'm getting that all this is making me bored. It's time to move on, where I need to get challenged, especially my brain. It's turning into mush and well I don't like that. We've been offered a new position in a new account here and I have been contemplation on applying, but what holds me back is the shifts and no guarantee of which shift I'll get. I know it won't be there forever to apply, so I need to really consider it somehow and quick. I have been looking around the job marketplace, but it's hard to find the right one in the sense of good location and pay! My husband tells me to wait it out until we get the boot and collect compensation on it. I'm not sure if that's the route I should take. Although I can have a vacation away from working until the right one comes along. I just know that I'm not happy here anymore and I need a challenge.

Social-ness or lack there of..
I always loved being outdoors in any shape or form. Whether it was a trip, walking outside, playing outside, or just walking around a mall without needing to buy anything. It's a way to escape and see new things while at the same time getting exercise! I like hanging out with people and just socializing as well. Yet, in this department I was never good at with people sticking around in my life. I would try to hang out, keep close friends or best friends, but things just tend to slip away for many reasons. As I posted in my last post, it was due to someone else at the time. Even though I don't like blaming people on my actions, but at times they do tie in with it all. Also I do remember one time trying to hang out with some of my high school friends and they either cancelled the event or they just bailed on me. I at times tried to make an event and invite them to it, of course, and well boom none of them can come. As an adult, I've gone out with coworkers and those events too backfired on me. While away on PTO preparing for my wedding, I was told after that a lot of people talked about my wedding and well my list. They laughed at it and wondered why I had such items on my list. I was told this by someone who again is no longer working here and not in my life anymore. It made me sad that a lot of people felt the same way with my wedding and well bring things that happened into Facebook land and into work-land light as well. People just like to put other people down it. I have learned that these type of people just don't like themselves and the path they're in in their life. They like bursting people's bubbles and light for it to shine on them more or plainly they're just jealous.

Anyways, nowadays I don't have many friends and I try not to hang out with anyone from work outside of work for all these other reasons. Yes, they're all different people now and attitudes/personalities, but you take a risk in finding out all this and by the time you do, you may be screwed and be too late. The only friends I have are the one's I gain through my husband and in which have been a lot since I moved here. Yet, I only see these people once in a while and none of whom I met on my own through work at all. I don't hang out with either crowd away on my own. Upon realizing this, it made me sad. I wish I had friends I can go to and hang out with them in their place or a social setting, but I don't. I was never good in this department and I think it's because I'm holding myself back due to driving. Don't get me wrong, I was never like this with driving. I wanted to learn so bad and be behind the wheel. I don't know what happened that made me step back and not care for it after getting my license. I guess it was the flexibility of my dad being there and always offering to take me everywhere... comfort and security. He was always there and never hesitated to give rides to his family. Why would he? He would rather take his children to wherever they needed to and know that they would be safe. Plus I'm sure he always enjoyed the ride and exploring new places or just simply sight see, even if it's the same views daily. I wasn't going to take that away from my dad and never did. I grew comfortable in relying on him for rides and driving me around. I guess that's where the mistake happened for the future, which is now. Yet, if my dad wasn't around for a ride, I relied on public transportation. It is everywhere in Chicago, whether trains or buses, it's there. They may have public transportation here, but it's so limited on how far it goes. It's not convenient at all for me. So this goes with the part in needing to learn to drive and then I won't be limited and also get independence. Other than that, I need to find ways to be social on my own and hope for the best on this.

Love thyself
I can openly admit to this, I do not like myself. Why? Because of first all the things people have said to me and all the actions I have seen done to me either by the universe or by others. And there is one grand golden rule that everyone has heard once in their life: "You need to love yourself in order to love others". Let's reflect on this quote with me. I do believe in this because how can you express this to someone else if you couldn't express it to yourself? I have a lot of flaws, as anyone in this world does. Nobody is perfect! Virgo's, my zodiac sign, are known to want to be perfectionists. So everything we touch, it has to be in our way and well done perfectly, almost like an OCD like trait. This I have noticed with myself. I don't mind it, but others around me do! So back to loving and such with yourself. I have had a lot of things said to me and well I would easily dismiss them. Actions are a different story, they speak louder than words. Most of these actions were done to me when I was little, in elementary, in the forms of bullying. Other actions were inside your home, but that is all I would say in this subject matter. Summing this up is basically is that whatever happens to you growing up or the actions is how it can mold you to be when you're older. It may hurt others in the process in how you can love them in return. I sound like a therapist now ironically, but ultimately it ties down to everything I'm saying. I'm sure all the actions that I have encountered is why I am the way I am now. It sucks with some aspects, honestly. In other points, it's society's fault with how women should look like. Slimness all the way baby! Or needing to have a butt or boobs, the works.

Sadly, I was not blessed with either that I have mentioned and at other times, I do feel like I need to personally loose my small gut I gained. Happy life Happy wife they say. You'll gain pounds once married, etc etc. All this is true since I witnessed it. I was once a size 0-3 in pants and XXS/XS/S in shirts and we you can say that it's nice being there cause of cheapness. I was those sizes all throughout my high school years and college as well. I actually wanted to gain weight then and now that I have, I just want to loose the small gut I gained and get tone/definition of muscles.... that is all, folks! I have done small things here and there to get where I'm at, but then other things slip in my path that leads me to square one again. I'm annoyed when that happens, but it happens to all! During my breaks at work I do exercise by walking outside, if the weather permits. So I guess I'll keep doing this to my heart is content. My mind in the other hand, wanders to want to do a lot of things and yet none get accomplished. I need to get back to what I enjoyed doing, which was art. Painting, drawing, digital artwork that is what I like doing including Photography. It seems that I just jumped into many different topics, but they do all revolve around the word love which is the topic in hand.

I need to get to things that I once enjoyed on my own. It's almost therapy time for me since I need to focus on one thing and one thing alone and alone. Everyone at times needs their space. This space would be good for me in so many ways, so that way I can discover myself and see what I do love about myself. I literally googled "how to love yourself?" and the first link that came up was a very informative one. Once I finished reading it, I just needed to know more to start the process. Within that article I saw another one that I needed to click and most of the points it provided I do currently or used to do. Here is the link! I am still currently going through this long list and still check the ones I have done in my mind. I just never thought that they were considered self care ideas, but they are. They better and improve you in the process of doing other things. It just seems I need to add more to this list that is more personal to me and what I like doing. I have stopped spoiling myself since I realized that I needed to go on a budget for other things, other goals in life. So I'll see what I can get myself that isn't clothes or shoes. Also I will research more sites and articles in the topic of loving myself.

Goals
Speaking of goals, I do have some for the new year. These mainly go in the subject of money. I know I have maybe mentioned this in another post. I'm slowly getting rid of debt or things that take my money. Bills will always be a part of anyone's life, but you can simplify it. I already have assisted in getting my parents their own phone account and I'm on my own. The plan was for me to merge with my husbands account, yet if I do this along with another goal I'll mention shortly, I won't have any credit in my name growing. So we decided for me to stay solo with the phone bill. My other goal is to get rid of my student loan. Once the new year hits, sometime in January or February, I will pay that sucker in full! That would ultimately leave me with one bill and more money for other [fun] things. With this in mind, I will follow through with looking into extracurricular activity that will fill my time. I mentioned Fencing in one of my previous posts and also kick boxing, but one is cheaper than the other ironically. I'll look into this Fencing classes I found out that happened close to home. They look fun and interesting since they offer a variety on them. Another thing I've been thinking about is to change my hair color. Nothing to drastic so I won't have to keep up with it. I just want something lighter that will compliment my natural color.

I got a lot of things I want to accomplish! From driving, to be actively fixing how I look, to figuring out how to love myself and the things that I used to love to do. Seems to me that I need to bring the old Alex back with some improvements of course. I will research in the love myself part as I stated earlier since I feel a lot better now since I spilled all of my feelings and guts in this long post. In the long run, then I can spread more love than what I have to my husband and our "children", our dogs and love myself and my decisions along the way. Sorry to have been a nuisance, sorry if I have offended you before in any shape or form, sorry for the lack of communication, and I'll see what I can do to better myself with all.

5 months passed

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Mon, 11 Nov 2019 01:34:00 +0000

Weather
Well after June, the weather settled to the normal hotness that Texas gets. As soon as it hit September, it changed in the form of cold nights and freezes overnights. I think we have had at least 5 days expanded into different times in months of chills being in the 50s or so. I know for sure we're getting another one this coming week as I type this. Even though I am a Northerner I never got used to it living up there. Although I see lots of mixes of temperatures this week. From 60s to 50s and then again 70s. We shall see!

Goals and events
Well in my last post I did write about small goals I want to accomplish. I mentioned that I wanted to exercise more and I did make that into a daily thing and so far it has been, but only walking at work during my breaks. I walk with a good coworker friend and we just chat during those times. I try to get to know her better in those moments and I think she tries to do the same. I don't mind it, but it seems she's the only person I got that I can trust and rely on at work anymore. I don't want to repeat the same mistakes I did before with new faces in my team now. I try to stay to myself at work and won't say too much personal stuff to anyone. Why bother when there are some people in this world that just back stab and use things against you. Then you get those people who are just sociopaths and two-faced. You have a whole mix of stereotypes at my work and some you just can't pinpoint on what type they are yet or never.

Anyways, I think my other goal was to take photos of my X-Files collectibles. I did manage to do that, but then other things got in the way. There are some posted on my Facebook Digital Blu page, but that's not all of my collection. I might dive into this whenever I have some extra time in my hands. My tv/show reviews just came to a halt since I got a lot of other things coming my way. And well to be honest, no one jumped on board on this to help me out on it, as in an audience and suggestions. As for events in June and beyond. there were some events I found along the way. We had small vacations come and go and during those times we had stumbled into events and yes, I took photos. If you do follow and like my Digital Blu page than you have seen most of those events and vacations.

Trips
After June, we did have a mini vacation to New Braunfels, Houston/Galveston and Chicago. New Braunfels, Texas was for our wedding anniversary vacation weekend. We had fun staying in the area and exploring all around it. During my birthday my parents surprised me by visiting me that week, the week of my birthday. While they were here we took them to see the areas we visited while in New Braunfels and they enjoyed that very much. Houston & Galveston, Texas was in the month of October and literally in the weekend of Eric's birthday. So we decided to make it into another mini vacation for us and spent some nights there too. Eric's family went to Houston as well for an event they were having in NASA for kids with Autism. After that day, Saturday, everyone except Eric and I stayed in the area. The following days we looked for tourist spots and enjoyed ourselves and an opportunity for me to take photos as well for me to visit Galveston. I have been in that area before, but never had the chance to see anything sadly. All in all, we had fun while there and vacationing. Then 2 weeks after that vacation, it was time to visit my family in Chicago. I always make it a goal to visit them at least twice a year. One for an event now that its like a tradition for my family, which is C2E2, and the other is for my nephews birthday which is in Halloween. For now, we have no other small trips for November and December, but I already miss traveling for this year and in general. I love to travel, we love to travel! We both admit it and love staying in hotels. Is it odd for us to like such things? I feel like planning trips for next year now already. Find days that are holidays and just make it a weekend thing. I guess its a reason why we decided to not have children because we can do such things, but yet it doesn't mean we are made out of money or so. We always budget and check to see if its possible to begin with. I got some things or places up my sleeve to visit, we shall see.

Alex's small corner
I had no clever name to name this spot in my blog. Mainly I will write about what's been going on with me, without diving into very personal things, but still about me. Well, work with me is the same... it's a pain in the butt. Same 'ol Supervisor that doesn't know how to do her job and now might be able to enjoy nitpicking everyone with their calls. I have yet to get an extra meeting than my usual 1 on 1s which I think its a good thing. All I hear is that we listen to our own calls during those times, which for me is useless in my opinion. Also the client is the one being more picky and wanting us to sound robotic and nothing customer service like anymore. Bottom like, just transfer for anything basically. I just make some time while at work to actually apply to other jobs. HH, which is where I work at, is going downhill rather quickly and firing 146 or so people. I feel like sticking around till the end, but I'm not too sure on that and if that is the right path for me. I don't know, I've been trying to leave there for years now and in August I completed being there for 5 years, but it's not really worth it. It's an easy job, good location, and you do what you're told to do...so why leave it right? No growth and raises, honestly it's the bottom line.

Also, I've been feeling like reconnecting with people I stopped talking to. People I met during work and people I've stopped talking for childish reasons in my past. It's hard to start a new conversation or any with them since the connection has been severed a long time ago. Heck that individual may think that I want to start talking to them again because I'm nosy and saw something different in their lives and want to know things. I'm not like that, never was, but when I did loose communication it was because of something so small and stupid. While typing this out, I thought about at least 3 people I've done wrong to. For that, if you think you're one of those people and you may be right, then I am sorry. I shouldn't have dragged you into my insecurities or problems. I shouldn't pick sides, thought one way of you and well stopped talking to you because of someone else. I have so far reached someone I met at work recently from Michigan and the only reason I stopped talking to her was because I felt I was bringing my work problems to her and nothing else. Yet she understood what I spoke about and well anything work related. She has moved on to another job she aimed to look for and apply for and well, got her dream job. I stopped because I simply forgot to respond back since nothing has changed at work and her job, she was still getting used to. I didn't want to intrude and bring more things of the past job she left, which is where I still am. I have sent an email to her today and waiting for a response still. The other individuals were during a break-up moment of my life with a guy and then being on the guys side or being their friend. Yet, she was unavailable due to an illness of sorts she was going through. Mainly she was still being friends with my ex at the time and that ex is now my husband. Go figure. Another was during college and I really can't remember why I stopped speaking with her, but I'm sure I was one-siding with who I was dating with at the time, which oddly again is my husband now. Haha, seems I always take sides with whomever I was with... guy trouble.

Anyways, I just want to have friends that I can just call whenever I need to vent or just have small chats with and that I know I can trust besides my husband. Don't get me wrong, he is a great guy and my best friend, but sometimes you just need a third party or a different point of view from someone else... not related to you, haha. I have had people like this I can rely on, but seems times/events/moments just take them away from me and its never the same again after. I don't know, but I guess I'll find ways to speak with them somehow without sounding or looking creepy and wanting something from them. In the end of it all, I do want something from them, but I can return the favor too. It's been too long since I wrote in here and as I always say here, I'm sorry for it. I used to write in this at work, since it seems its the only time I can, but my Supervisor being such a pain I don't want to risk getting caught in her web again. I also have gained some new friends from my husbands side of work that I do, at times, consider family. Yet I don't see them daily since I don't work at the same place as they do, but it's good to know that I have other friends away from my job. Well there you have it. I wrote tons since I haven't had the time to anymore. I'll try to keep up with it next year, I hope.

Setbacks..

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Mon, 03 Jun 2019 16:41:00 +0000

Weather
Well, this one has been a doozey. We have been told that we would be getting harsh winds and rain, but only the winds did occur. Most of what you see happening in Texas, the tornadoes and the alike, are North of where my husband and I reside in. All mainly in the Dallas area or the panhandle of Texas. So far, we have been in the humid spell and it seems it might stay that way. Who knows!

TV/Movie Reviews
I have decided to move this portion to my other blog, my Digital Blu blog. So far, I believe I have done like 2 audio recordings and none are edited. I am only starting, but if you would like someone to be natural and real then I guess you reached the right place for that! I might make this into a more concrete hobby of sorts, once I feel more comfortable and have time to do so.

Exercising
I was part of a "competition" of sorts at work with walking. They did have prizes for 3 runner ups. I wasn't really doing it to get any of those prizes, but to motivate me into exercising again. It lasted for a good 2 1/2 or 3 months total and I wasn't a winner in any tier. Now I feel as if I should find another part of my body to work out besides my legs. I'm sure my legs still need to be toned or need more muscle, but you need to give your body or a specific part of your body that you're more focused into a break as well. I need to focus more on my stomach, but I need to find easy and effective workouts that will tone it down and build muscle. I will need to find these on my own, without any app, to help me. Apps, in my opinion, tend to remind you which in turn turns into routines and tell you to not forget your workouts or homework per se. I hate homework and I don't like things pushing me to remind me to do stuff. I will just quit if people or things tell me to do things on a daily or force me to. Slow and steady wins the race after all.

Events
I have yet to find events for June and well, with my husband accepting a new job position, we have decided to not go to A-kon. It disappoints me to this day on that news, since it was going to be a mini vacation for us and I was going to officially use my new lens with cosplayers while practicing shooting them, well those ideas are out the window. I'm not sure how long we are able to not setup or schedule a small vacation for us, due to his job, but I'm grateful that he got one. I guess now we can do events for either Saturdays or Sundays, depending on other factors of course.

Photography
I have decided to have a goal for myself. New month, new goals! I have one already in progress with my house and maintaining it organized and clean. This project is going slowly due to resources and other factors like weather. So far the weather has been in our favor and I just might work on our extra rooms this coming weekend, so we shall see. The other small goal is to photograph all my collectibles of The X-Files that I have. I always wanted to do this and its not a challenge, but a goal. Once again, I hate calling such things as challenges because if you force me to do something, I will eventually quit. For now its called a goal and the goal is to photograph one item each day and edit it as well to display in my personal Facebook page. If I decide to add it to my Digital Blu Facebook page then I will. For now, it will only be in my personal page once they are all edited! I need to dive back into product photography since that is my main focus and make it into a career, I hope. I will be needing to step up to it since my husband is wanting to make a small business and well with the items we will be selling, they need to be photographed at some point right? I don't want to dive too much into detail with that small business for now, since we don't know what to call it and we are getting all the major tools we'll be needing for it slowly. I will announce it once we are fully ready!

Hobbies into Careers

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Thu, 04 Apr 2019 14:35:00 +0000

Weather
Well, so far the weather has been decent for us. It has jumped up and down from time to time and right now, its decent, with some rain in the forecast. I hope it stays constant from this point on though.

Updates
As you can tell, I have did some updates on this blog with the other pages to navigate on. Mostly the updates consist of movie reviews. I will test the waters on my own with making movie/tv show reviews of my choice, unless you ask for me to make a review, by podcast style.

Disclaimer: I have never went to school to be a critic on movies or tv shows! My opinions are strongly my own and if you don't agree with them then that is okay. I don't mind me being an amateur of such hobby or task, but if you don't like reviews from non-experts then this is not the place for you! If you like reviews from ordinary people, like yourself, with no career background or degree in the matter, then this is the spot for you and I Thank you for it in advance!

So, you will see reviews of movies we went to see in theaters and I will make my own reviews on it. I might make my husband jump in and be recorded from time to time, but for now I will do it on my own. If you like this idea and would like to follow through with it with me, then I encourage you to do so and to comment on the matter. I will place this post link on my personal Facebook page and you will need to comment on it below your ideas or just your opinions. Maybe, I will post the review post only to my personal Facebook page instead of these type of blog posts. If its a success, in this format of audio, then I will expand my horizons with other things/topics/subjects the same way.

Events
The 2 events per month is still in effect. The Car show and C2E2 were a success and the car show events photos are slowly leaking into my Facebook business page in this month, of April. Once all car show photos are completed in being edited, then the cosplay photos will be next! Keep checking back on my Facebook business page for updates on photos and new events. I have 2 events I would like to attend this month that are coming up and have yet to find any for the month of May and an extra one for the month of June. If you see any events that might spark my interest, please let me know in my Facebook page or tag me on the events page!

Writing
Due to personal stuff going on and other events or projects, the writing monthly prompts will no longer continue. If you would like to continue them on your own, you can always find them by going to Pinterest or simply googling them. As for any other writing projects, they will continue. Please refer to my Digital Blu blog post for more information regarding writing projects! There is a project occurring, but for more information on it, go to the post.

Workouts and Exercises
We had to put this on halt for a good brief moment due to a car accident we were apart of recently. We are both fine and with our lives which is what counts the most right? So the Keep app is still available for anyone to download and start and I do recommend it! I have been signed up to do a walking exercise at work and its's motivating me to do something exercise related to get back into the routine. So hopefully with the weather cooperating soon and everything else personally being settled soon, then we can get back on track with other goals and this one as well.

I might consider also doing an audio recording of this post, word for word, so keep that in mind if you do see a link of a recording. It will be the same information in my voice being in audio! Audio files will maybe for now only be about reviews, so keep that in mind. Thanks for reading!

Minor Goals

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Sun, 03 Mar 2019 16:38:00 +0000

Weather
Well, our weather has been crazy here. We have been in the 70s to back to the 50s and this coming week we will get a big cold front. I think its predicted that it will feel like we're in the 20s, but actually in the 30s or 40s in the mornings. This is affecting all of us with our health cause of this crazy weather and its annoying since we haven't been able to exercise like we planned to daily outdoors. I have other things being left on hold or postponed due to the weather, which really is annoying. Hope we can make it through this week and even though I am from the North where there is always cold weather, no I shouldn't be used to it.

Journal Prompts
One of my goals or just hobbies is to pick up where I left off with my writing. I love it, but hate reading. Ironic right? I have pushed myself to reading as much as I could, but just the fact of making myself push to read is what kills it for me. If I have to force myself to do something that I don't enjoy or can't dive into it on my own, then it won't work out for me. Its how it works with me, plain and simple. So, I decided to find a way to write again and use my brain while I'm at work. As sad as it may sound, I don't do anything at work. I hardly get any calls or just don't get any period. When I try to make calls, it gets taken away from me or people judge the way I do the task or how many I do. But back to the topic at hand. I want to get back to writing and I figured to find ways, simple and small ways to dive back into it besides writing in my blog here. I found some monthly questions in my pinterest account that do make you think of things you never think of asking yourself. I was just trying to put a photo here of the writing prompts, but my tablet is limited. So instead I decided to give you a link, just click here and you will see the questions for each month. Once I complete this by the end of March, I will upload my answers, but I am contemplating on that. I will do it every 2 months. So one hobby is being picked up again and hopefully by the time I have an idea on a short story then, I may have an editor.

Workouts and Exercise
Due to the weather, like I mentioned above, we haven't been able to be active. We did want to walk daily after work around the our neighborhood and did it for a month if not more, but the weather ruined that for us. I am also self conscious about myself and with an innocent conversation at work and a statement that, "either you have a chest or a butt" and that got me to thinking of needing to work on myself since I don't have either. Saying a statement of that sorts may not be hurtful, but can make someone think. So I decided to work on myself. I found some workouts I can do while sitting a work since I hardly do anything there. Those exercises I found on my pinterest account. Most of those exercises are for the legs and one for the butt. Another exercise app I just downloaded is called Keep or K. I just did one session based on some of their questions that it asked me and it was only 18 minutes, but it did get me to gain sweat. I might need to do this more often, since it only takes 18 minutes of your day to do the workouts. I might also add more as well. We did decide to get a treadmill, but we might hold off on that. So this is one thing is going to continue and we shall see how it works out for me for now.

Events
I will keep this part short, but I am trying to at least have one if not 2 events each month for me to go to for photography. I need to practice some more and find a way to get my name out there and get something going for me to get a business started and finally leave the job I am in currently. I hardly do anything there and it seems that my mind is slowly dying due to boredomness. So far, I have 3 events in my calendar that I'm confirmed to attend due to tickets already bought. One of those events is free to attend and you don't need to purchase tickets. The free events re car show and the alike that I can take photos of. I have placed placeholders of these events on my Facebook page and will continue to do so when I will attend an event around me. I think for now this is the best update from me you will get, but keep coming back for new stuff. I was going to try something new here, but I still need to figure something out with it. I also want to start a vlog or podcast of some sorts cause I just need some stuff to do once my projects around the house that I got planned are done.

Pump it up!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Sun, 03 Feb 2019 15:38:00 +0000

Weather
Well ironically enough we have been having bipolar weather here. Some days 50s, others 40s with cold winds and today it was sunny and in the 70s. I believe tomorrow it will rain and go back to the 50s and even colder by the weekend. I blame the winter weather happening in the northern states. Yes, my family is finally getting snow. Go figure huh! **Update: Since I wrote this a lot of changes in the weather happened. Not only in Texas, but also in Illinois. My family finally did get snow, yes, but not only that but very harsh winds and it went below zero, to negative 27 degrees and feeling or actually feeling negative 17 degrees. The state declared to tell everyone to stay home and if you needed to work then be careful being outdoors and do not talk. I think I have never had to experience that, but only heard of it since I left and I think it has occurred twice since I left my hometown. My family is ok and they did stay home from work and I am glad.**

"But I would walk 500 miles and I would walk 500 more"
No copyright infringement intended there! Well we are getting there at least, but that's a lot of walking. So far, we have been staying in 2 1/2 miles, give or take a little. We decided to add a mile once we complete a week with the same miles. It feels nice after the walk because it seems we can do more, but the sun doesn't stay too long for us to continue and our dogs, Ok one dog... Puppy, tend to stop at every pole sign or fire hydrant, but what can you do. So we will continue to do this until we can manage to jog and then eventually run.

We have also decided to cut back on ordering out or buying food from restaurants and also eating healthy. Now, anyone who knows me or has been around me growing up I am very very picky and don't like healthy things or vegetables. I have grown to enjoy certain vegetables now and adapted myself to with some since my husband, Eric, knows what I like and don't like. Oddly enough he has found ways to add those veggies that I don't like in dishes he created from scratch or let me have my glory of making them into bigger chunks for me to remove them in my time. But back to the topic at hand, we have found other things to cut back in and add into our eating habits for them to be healthier. We never thought they would taste yummy or come out great, but you just need to try them out and see. Ironically I read an article on CNN stating that its not the exercise you need to worry about to loose weight, as my husband is trying to do to get healthy, but its the food you consume. Found this article right around the time that we started and decided to get healthy and be healthy for the new year. One thing that was a big hit for us was Cauliflower rice. Google it and it has been a replacement for us for actual rice, something we both miss dearly, but its for the best.

Goals

We both have goals for this new year. I'm sure some were mentioned or heck, even talked about in the last blog post I did here not that long ago. Yes, one goal is to actually get healthy, exercise, run, and basically be more active. Another goal for both of us is to be more social. Between both of us, I am the more social person, who likes to go out to stores and just be out and have fun and not be stuck indoors. Eric, on the other hand, is a homebody and can just stay home and play video games all day. We both need to become more social and the only way to do so is to go out or have date nights with friends or just have game board nights with friends. Sometimes some people just can't commit to meetings that were planned and I have been through that or knew of such meetings and never was invited. It sucks, yes I know, but now I believe we both have friends that can keep these commitments and heck even make plans thinking of us or just without a second thought invite us right away. So I do believe we have this goal already in great progress with the new friends that maybe soon enough can call family if not already there.

Another goal of ours is traveling. We already have several planned out for the first half of the year. As always we made it a tradition to go to C2E2 in Chicago and we have already booked all for it. Within that goal, for me, I will take more photos of cosplayers and hopefully they turn out great this time. We do have another convention to go to in June with friends and we will make it as a tourist type of mini vacation as well, with all of them. I also believe they have planned another outing with them, of the camping type. I never have done camping cause of the fear of bears and well bugs, mainly all due to my parents. I really don't mind experiencing an event of that sorts once in my life and then I can just take it off my bucket list or just be able to say that I have done it to someone else. Well at least that won't be a goal that's broken or can't be done since there's already steps or plans happening. Another goal of mine, with the help of my husband, is to organize and decorate my house to my liking in which is already also in progress. Being active & eating healthy, traveling, being social with game nights/study groups/vacations, organization and so much more that I'm sure I can't even remember are things being written for us and need to be planned and they are in progress.

In the year 2019!!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Sun, 06 Jan 2019 03:59:00 +0000

Welcome to the New Year everyone!!

I hope 2019 treats you all better, different, but most of all positive. I sure hope it does with me with a plethora of new adventures ahead of me. Most of all, I will focus on myself first and know how to stand my ground and not get trampled around by anyone.

Weather
As always, I start my blogs with the weather. This last year has been interesting for everyone with this category. We went from hot to cold in matter of the same day or the next. We've been told that we would get snow in Texas and also in Illinois, but either Texas got none and Illinois got some, but disappeared due to rain. I was happy to be able to see my family for Christmas, with hopes in getting snow when I visited so I can take pictures of the snow, but unfortunately there was no snow. Right now in Texas its pleasant, possibly today in the 60s with a slight cold breeze, but this prediction is only of a couple of times of me stepping out in my backyard, nothing more. I'm sure in Illinois, its a different story.

4 months
Well, it has been a long time since I have written here. Literally, it has been since our last vacation to Fredericksburg, Texas back in July. Since then, there has been many changes within me and around me. I have gained new friends at work and a more non hostile environment, but sadly that has changed in the last 2 months or less of the year. Not with the individuals I have gained as friends, but with the person we all as co-workers look up to as an example. Yes, you guessed it, that strong individual that we go to for any assistance and grants us changes and should have our backs, but doesn't. Personally, I have been targeted twice almost back to back with write-ups that I have never gotten in the past 4 years I have worked in the same workplace until now. Once all this occurred it was once I denied for a position that was vacant even though I expressly told 2 people, my Supervisor (which whom we're talking about) and Operations Manager, my conditions for gaining that position and if those aren't available to be done then I don't want none of it and also placed my input on what can be done with other situations in the account that would make everyone in the team run more smoothly for them. After this certain meeting regarding all of this is when everyone's attitude changed in one way or another, mainly the big bosses and strictly it seems towards me at certain times.

Look, with all this happening, it really pisses me off that things of this nature happens in any workplace yet something like this always happens towards me. I had conflicts before, with either bosses or co-workers, in prior of my jobs and it seems to follow. I need this type of stuff to stop and it sickens me and well just makes me feel some way of myself as an individual. Other than that, I must say that I would like it to stop and if others have put their 2 cents to HR, like I have with my second write-up, then maybe I need to start something else and another ticket in to HR. Off this topic, but everything else has been well with us and hoping things change for the better for my husband and I this new year. We, my husband and I, are hoping for us to travel more in this new year. So far, it seems that it may happen and I'm hope it does and I will be excited when it happens. We do have a couple of events/trips coming up already, but we're gathering more and most of them are with my husbands coworkers.

Photography
I have been dragging with my side hobby and I really don't like it. Things that have been happening, especially the lack of motivation, just makes someone have less and less interest in things you once had interest in. The lack of interest has been years, but I'm not sure what made it occur and start. I wish i knew, that way I can nip it on the butt and start to have the motivation again. I'm trying to find a photography challenge that I can actually do, that won't make me do things on a daily basis since if you're making someone do a task then you will loose interest since its forced upon. So I must find a challenge that will help me get focused on what I need to practice on while its not daily and get motivation again. Once I find something that I can combine all of this into one, which must start soon, given the new year then I will start it. I need to research this long and hard and hopefully the research itself does not make me loose interest.

Bettering yourself
I have noticed that there was a 9Round added close by to where I live. I looked into it to see what it was about and its kickboxing. I always wanted to do something like this since its like a 2 in 1 type of event. I would like to take a self defense class along with it having my body have a workout. I know I need to get healthy and well just basically work out my body to have muscle on certain parts of my body. It also doesn't hurt to learn self defense if I ever will need it, which I hope to God, I never do need to use it. Eric, my husband, needs to get in shape as well. We need to find some type of diet that's not restricting and not a fast and quick to ignore or stop eating a certain food/item. We might make our own diet with lowering a certain food intake each week and more exercise of course. Hopefully with the new adventures that await for us in the work environments, it play with our favor in order for our minds and bodies to be worked on and no stress to occur anymore. So we will see what we can do with all these accommodations, but they will have to wait when we get certain news for each of us. If all goes into our favor, especially mine, well maybe I might work on other things within me like fashion/wardrobe and looks. It all depends on other things.

Back to square one!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Wed, 01 Aug 2018 14:26:00 +0000

Weather
Well good day to all. It has been a good while since an update in this old blog. Well, the weather has been crappy here. The last time I posted about it, it was bipolar, but now it has remained steady and sadly over 100 degrees. We did get a "cold front" over night from Monday night into Tuesday morning, but they tend not to last around here. It might stay like this for another month or 3, but we shall see.

Fredericksburg, Texas
So for our 4th of July, my husband and I took a trip to Fredericksburg, Texas. It was only a 2 1/2 hour drive from our home and we decided to stay a couple of nights over there and explore the city and the surrounding areas. We got there on time for the parade, have breakfast, drive around and then storms came to ruin the evening. With that being said and done, we thought that there wasn't going to be any fireworks happening anywhere, ate dinner at a Mexican restaurant and then we decided to stay in our hotel room and watch tv while keeping ourselves company. The next day was still a bit cloudy, but no small rain or clouds was going to stop us. We explored Enchanted Rock and then downtown Fredericksburg, with all their small shops on their strips and had our leftover food from the Mexican restaurant we went to the day before. Our last day, Friday, we left our hotel and continued to explore all around other areas. I have heard and read about Stonehenge 2 in Ingram, Texas and it was about a 30 minute to 1 hour drive from where we were staying. I thought it would be in a big open field with its own parking and well not near a busy road or highway. Oddly enough the area worked where it was at, but there shouldn't be any baseball field or any sports field next to it or at least no fence near it for better picture taking. Then we had more time in our hands and tried to find other tourist spots and one was recommended to us by google called The Coming King Sculpture Prayer Garden, a mouthful isn't it? This attraction is in Kerr, Texas and throughout our trip there were pictures taken for sure.

We did have some mishaps during our trip, like Eric falling in Enchanted Rock, our camera stand to record our drive didn't work, the hotel blaming us for selecting the room we did, construction going on in the hotel and the rainy weather. We got all of them fixed in one way or another or just didn't bother with it and we still had a great time in our mini vacation. For sure next year, we will decide to go to Niagara Falls again and spend a good long time there and more pictures. We do have other trips planned for the rest of the year and already have one planned for the next year, so we're hoping to have many small road trips at least one weekend every month. We shall see if that can be pulled off and what photos I can take!

Photography
Speaking of my photography, I have been improving it in other possible ways. I might enter into having a "side gig" of product photography and already have been practicing. I think this genre of photography will best suit me since there's no one to hassle with, settings are basic for the camera and you don't need to second guess yourself on the settings or lighting. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't turn down an opportunity for someone to book me for a session, that is still offered and available especially a genre that I have never done.. like Newborn or Real Estate photography. For now I will focus the best that I can with Product Photography and there aren't many of people doing this genre in my area, so if someone notices my work and website, then I don't mind. I almost had a session with someone I didn't know at all, but they backed out due to "money problems". With any session, I have a discussion with the potential client in asking them if there's a theme, a location in mind and so on and once that is all covered or when they ask, I tell them my fee. You're lucky if we set this up a week or more prior, gives you time to prepare for it or gather the money if need to, but when you seal the deal and money is not an issue then, then it's set. Do not come to me once I sent you an email reminder of this session and say you don't have the funds for it and yet you still want the session. I'm sorry, I might be practicing in this field, but I need something in return than experience. If I am going out of my way to make this happen for you and I'm talking about traveling wise, distance, then I need at least the money we agreed upon for gas. Other than that, I am glad you came to me to help me out and yourself out in having a session with me. I appreciate your time and business!

I almost had the chance to change my path or career twice recently. In both occasions, I did not accept the offer. A lot of cons instead of pros were given to me and the only 2 pros were the monetary amounts that were offered with the positions, but it will be a set back for the both of us in many different ways. We travel a lot and like travelling, so the offers given weren't going to be paid, ever, and I couldn't settle for contract. I need something that is stress free, worry free, and that will benefit me in the end. It may look like I took a step back or back to square one, but this chance is giving me time to reflect and actually study for something or a career that will benefit me in more ways than one. So we shall see what I read up on to move forward and get a better job or so. Until next time!

Finding thyself and moving forward

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Fri, 20 Apr 2018 15:01:00 +0000

Weather
I'll cut to the chase here. Our weather in Texas has been a bit bipolar. Now I shouldn't be using such words, but its the only way to describe it. One day you get 60s/70s weather, even possibly 80s, and then the next cold winds and tons of rain. I am not sure if mother nature took her pills on time or correctly, but I sure hope it stops soon. While I was away to visit my family in Illinois, it snowed twice in April and even though I grew up most of my life there it shouldn't be a shocker to me, but it was. I believe they are in the 50s if not 60s by now and if not, then I sure hope they get better weather soon. Mother Nature you have been weirder and weirder as the years start and move on by, please stop and act normal or happy or just not as destructive... Thanks!

C2E2 2018
While visiting my family I also went to the C2E2 convention. I always make it a mission now to go and enjoy myself there and quite frankly, it is tradition with my family to go. My whole family doesn't go, but my husband, me and my sister and her small family and most of the time we have a good time just browsing and looking at the cosplay. Ironically I have seen a pattern going on there, with most of the cosplay and it really disappoints me. Now you can really tell which people or person took a lot of time on their hands to get their costume accurate and well perfect. To those people who take 100+ hours to get your costume right, kudos to you! You took time after work or so to dedicate it to your costume and found someone, a character, you love and enjoy. I myself would like to do that one day, but I have yet to find one that I would like and well put more than 1-3 hours or less to put it together. I can easily say I will be Jessica Jones because I have the hair and well most of the wardrobe, especially the accessories (a DSLR camera) already and that's ok, but its not too much thought put into it if you get my drift. Once again kudos to those who take time to research and spend hours upon hours to get it right and figure out your material! Sad to say, I saw more Halloween costumes and face painted this year too there and no you do not get credit, sorry. One reason I have gone to this convention every year was for this and if it has gone down hill, well that's one reason to put in the Con part of my list. I don't even have a list made yet of reasons not to go to C2E2, but now you know how bad it is.

I also got discouraged this year and my camera gear or skills. I swear I know, or at least think I do, know the settings to put on my DSLR to take photos of the cosplay and other stuff, but once I take at least 2 pictures of the same person and it comes out blurry or out of focus, I just simply give up. The location where this takes place doesn't have much lighting to begin with. Yes, I do own an external flash and I could use it, but you are also limited on the space around you since it does tend to get crowded. The other factor is timing because most of these people would like to venture off to check the event or just move on and not stay with the same photographer for more than 3+ minutes unless you have set up your gear in a corner where cosplayers actually want you to take their photos in a professional matter. I see most of both sides happen there and well I'm nowhere near being a professional yet, but time limit and all other factors come into play and me knowing I'm not there yet really gets with me and the pressure, so I merely give up if I see my 2-3 shots are no good; I get discouraged. I beat myself up mentally after leaving the event because I feel like I brought my gear for nothing, yet I wanted to take photos of the cosplay. I will need to practice with different kinds of atmospheres or locations to figure all this out.

Happy mind, happy self, healthier you
I found myself lately to not be fully happy. Now most people would say or blame things around them not going their way or just trying to reflect this onto someone or something else. I am talking about loving yourself type of deal. If you're not happy with you, then you won't be happy with everything and/or everyone else as well; it will reflect and you will notice it right away. Like the saying says and goes, "Happy wife, Happy life!" and so I want that to happen away from the marriage aspect, but ironically this situation spreads towards others because others get affected with your mood/tone. It just spreads, period! So I decided to bring it upon myself to find ways to love myself because quite honestly and to get to the point, I don't love myself. There's many factors that lead me to this conclusion and some I have been battling still to this day. I will not state what exactly are the factors here because quite frankly anyone reading this can start something that shouldn't have, rumors or twisting my words or family, etc. You only have to blame yourself at times for situations like these. I guess you can also say that I put other people first to make them happy and see them happy, but not myself. I never come back around after completing that to make me happy or set attention to myself. I love helping people and seeing their issues being solved, even if it's lending my ear to hear their troubles to vent or actually doing something for them, then I'm happy that their happy.

I guess you can say that I would like all these troubles I have deep down inside myself in order to move on and love myself. It's the only way to work them out and be positive and enjoy your life and be happy and spread it towards others. I need to find a way to fix this within myself and at times, I have thought about seeing a therapist, but they are not cheap and this is why I created this blog along with all my other blogs to let my ideas out or vent if need to and if others are suffering the same thing I am and dealt with them the same way as I do, then at least they have found my blogs and read what I am attempting to do or find to fix all of this. Literally if you are in the same boat as me and thinking the same routes that I have been, even creating blogs, then at least I believe you're in the right place or step to let things out. I always bottled up everything, every frustration that came my way which led to me being depressed I'm sure in a period of my life. Things reflect basically and bounce back to you somehow. So how can I help myself to fix this while helping others out? Well research is the first thing I do; google it. As stupid as it may sound, adding the words you need to in the search engine, like "Ways to start loving yourself"is the way I do it. A lot of site links that pop up may be helpful while others are not, but you need to actually click the links to see if it helps YOU! Everyone is different with this situation, so you need to do a research to benefit yourself. See what works for you! Baby steps and start inward, because outward might not helpful.. but ultimately it depends on you. Find the root cause and go from there for you! Here are some of the links that I found with that keywords I mentioned earlier:

1. 21 tips to release self neglect
2. How to start loving yourself
3.15 ways in how to love yourself

I will be reading these since while skimming them that these might benefit me, but find some that reflect with what you need. I hope you find what you are looking for to benefit you and then from there, once you take those steps into consideration, work in the outer you whether its eating healthy, exercising, changing your clothes, and so on. I will be researching this more and see what will work out for me. If you have anything you can think of that might work for me, then send it my way as well. I would like to go back to what I was doing before and that is also enjoying writing, painting, taking pictures, and having art in my life more than just a 5 minute thought or feeling of wanting to do it or them. Time may rob this from me, but I need to regain it back somehow.

The firsts of 2018!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Fri, 05 Jan 2018 16:59:00 +0000

Weather
Don't get me started on this topic! Everyone doesn't want to hear about it anymore and well, I don't blame them not one bit. So, since my last post our weather did go back up to the 70s and I do believe they stayed around there. Once it hit the week of Christmas, then its when it got worse. We plummeted to the 50s, then 30s and during those mornings we were at teens if not 20s and only made it to the highs of the 30s. I'm sure no one expected that and at one point, we did get snow, but it didn't last that long and in total we had 2 days that we got snow. They were not back to back though and not even close to 2 inches on both times. Right now, we are expected to be in the 50s as the high and by the weekend, we might get to normal temps for this time of the year in Texas, which I do believe they are around the 70s/60s. We shall see about that!

2018
So its the new year and I hope everyone has a happy, healthy and safe New Year! I bet most of you have made resolutions and I hope that they are being taken care of and if you slip, then no worries, you can get yourself back up and start again. If you didn't make any or just don't want to call them that, then it's ok. Just be the best that you can be, fix what you want to fix within yourself and around you and if there's something new you're going to try, then I hope you succeed and it goes into your favor. I myself have made resolutions or things that I want to accomplish to change myself or improve myself. It's not a long list, but it's definitely a short one so if I slip or forget then I won't be so hard on myself for "forgetting" or "failing". My list is:

Exercising- by working from feet to head and I will focus on only one part of my body for one month and change on to the next month. I might do 2 days within the week, if possible. I just might decide to do this on Sundays, so I have something to do while my husband is away at work and work my butt off during them to make up for the other day I might have missed or not do.
Photography- I will be doing a challenge on this. I found a great one online and will be doing it weekly. There are so many of them out there, but most of them are daily and I know I don't have the time to do those type, so I found one that is only weekly and as well focusing on what I need to work on, portrait. I need to improve on that since I'm not well in that department and I do need to improve a bit more on it. I will still be taking classes soon for it in March, so I would like to know or have the knowledge on it before entering the class.
Writing- I used to come up with short stories like there's no tomorrow or my dreams would help me with this to create one, but recently I haven't had a good dream to make it into a story/novel. I would like to get back into writing and if need to, improve on it. So I also found a daily challenge to make me think and improve on my writing. The challenge I found is a daily one, but I will be making it into a weekly one. I can't keep up with daily challenges and its why I make them into weekly.

Most of the challenges I'll be doing I'll be putting my progress or what I am doing in my tumblr page. So if you would like to keep up, be a supporter, or join me find the challenges there. I have already added my first writing challenge, so be sure to read it when you can. Most of them I have found on Pinterest, while others I searched for in the internet. So join me, read along or just be a good support system in reminding me to do these things. I do need to get into shape, get my brain working when I have tons of time, and improve on what I need to improve on.

The other challenge I have for myself is finding another job. As easy as the one I'm working in now is, it doesn't have its perks. No raise, lack of communication, and any other departments/accounts around me are less pay than what I'm getting unless you're licensed or they are seasonal. The only raise you get around here is if you turn team lead, supervisor, or trainer, anything of that nature that you potentially are not an agent anymore. Evidently, I will be looking for somewhere else by this year. I have told myself that I don't want to stick around a negative place for more than 3 years, well, I am already in the 3 year mark sadly. Hopefully I find something after March, since the photography classes I'm planning on taking are in March and this schedule I have now is a good fit for it. Once I learn more of that trade, I can make it into a side business for more income and I might focus on product photography as well. My husband is trying to get a small business going as well and might as well be his photographer for his products. More on his small business later, once it picks up.

The X-Files
Well it is back! For you friends of mine who are fans of it as well, what did you think of the first episode of season 11? Were you disappointed in it? Happy? Shocked? Did you throw a big party and didn't invite me to it?

Well let's just say that I was happy it came back, but shocked towards the end of it. Although the opening title did give us a small clue or eye opener, I bet it is that. If you haven't seen it, then I'm trying not to disclose too much detail, but you should go and see it! I will be or wanting to make some pointers on this, but I think I shall wait on it. There are some other shows I'm waiting for them to come back up, like Handmaids Tale, Mindhunters, Humans and well luckily Black Mirror came back already, but I'm sure I have a bigger list on this. I will need to back track on it. Do you have any shows that you liked and would recommend to someone else? How were they memorable and why?

Well, we shall see what the new year will bring for my husband and me. Hopefully its more fun adventures of travel, of learning new things, and any other way possible and that God let us enjoy them as well. Hopefully for you, the reader, I hope its a better year than the last and that it brings you joy and well safe and healthy one too!

Around the corner

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Thu, 30 Nov 2017 21:37:00 +0000

Weather
I am so glad that when I went back home recently, that I brought the cold weather with me. Or at least I give myself that credit. Some people appreciate it and others don't, but just take it as I go. We have been in the 70s and have hit the 50s in certain days. For now, we have been consistent with being in the 70s during the day and at night around the 50s or even 40s. Hopefully, it stays this way throughout the end of the year.

Tv shows
Well wit the lack of cable in our household, I can't really keep up with the new fall tv lineup. We mostly stick with watching whatever is on Netflix, Hulu, and HBO Now. We have finished WestWorld, Mindhunter, Stranger Things 2, Fuller House, and The Keepers. The most recent ones we finished are the ones that I listed first and yes, I don't mind some documentaries. We just jumped into watching The Punisher and Once Upon a Time season 6 and so far they are promising! If you would like any reviews on the ones we have finished please let us know. I might need to plug in our Pi to catch up on "How to get away with Murder" since Hulu removed I believe the first few episodes of this current season. If there are any other shows that you would like to recommend to us, please do so and we will get to it. You guys already know what type of shows we like, going by the ones I have listed above, but it not we like sci-fi, fantasy, true crime, crime, and comedies. We are all over the map and if we see one that interests us, you bet we will watch it.

Podcast, youtube, vlogs
So as I mentioned above, we do love watching tv shows and movies as well. We have been bumping back and forth on wanting to do a podcast or youtube channel to give our input on either. I just love watching and hearing other people's input or conclusions on certain shows. I was anxious for a youtube channel to come out to see what they thought on "Twin Peaks" and most of the time, I agreed with them and the others not so much. I had a lot of thoughts and conclusions myself with that show, but never expressed them to the public, only my husband and well anyone else who watched it around me. Eric has been thinking of making one as well and combine video games as well with tv shows and movies and I was thinking the same, but adding even more stuff to it.. not just being limited to 3 categories. Tv shows, movies and video games reviews and if we find a random article on Facebook that made us both laugh, then we will share it and our input about it. So if anyone is interested in wanting us to start one, then please leave us a comment here or on our Facebook pages and we will get on board to start it.

Photography
I am still on board with this hobby. I did step back from it for a bit, but my sister wanted me to do some photos for her small family and so I did. My nephew seems to be a natural born model. He went right away with striking a pose and just being prepared. I will definitely be taking classes in March and then follow that with other classes to help me in Lightroom. Maybe I will be more confident and get more sessions booked by the time I'm done with my first set of classes. I would like it to be an extra income for us or at least play money until I know I can make it into a business. I just know that I need to get better at it and be more confident with my work. Hopefully, I can get recognized this way for my Landscape photography part too, which is what I'm really passionate about. Once also I complete my classes, I will start building my portfolio along with the rest of my artwork from college. Then I can officially call myself a Multimedia Artist!

New Years
2018 is around the corner for all of us. How odd that it's slow, but ironically enough fast as well creeping up on us. I hope everyone has a better new year than what they had with 2017 and I sure hope Eric and I can travel even more as well. I would like to travel and just sightsee, that way we can have mini vacations and not be too stressed out about work or things that randomly pop up in our lives that give us issues. We had a lot of those in 2017, we don't need them too much or at all in the coming new year. Hopefully, Eric and I can have a great new year and actually go out for it to celebrate. Although it's nice to just relax and stay home sipping on some alcoholic beverages of our liking. We shall see and hope that its positive New Year for everyone! Be safe all!

Finding thyself

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Mon, 09 Oct 2017 02:02:00 +0000

Weather, shows, and new adventures

Well, as usual, the weather here is pretty hot. Ironically, we had some rain this past week and it has cooled down a bit here. We haven't been in the 90s or high 90s in a week, which is really nice. Texas doesn't really get Fall weather and less of Winter weather, only a week for that one. Well, hopefully it stays in the 80s and maybe some more rain to come our way... I welcome it around these parts.

As for all the tv shows we have been keeping up with, they all ended sadly. We need to wait on "Handsmaid Tale", "Game of Thrones", "The X-Files season 11", "13 Reasons Why" and well we're not sure on "Twin Peaks", but I'll just say that its the end on that one. We have been watching "How to get away with Murderer", but this one just barely came back on with a new season and would need it to pass time so we can binge watch it and "Mr Mercedes" has been pretty good, but its not on Netflix nor Hulu, from what I know of in Hulu. I have been wanting to get into another show, but I have no idea where to start or which one is worth it. We have tried "Riverdale" and "Penny Dreadful", but one is slow and the other has action, but I think I know where its going or at least the story. I will find one that I can see on my own and has an interesting story along with it. I do still watch "Teem Mom" series and "Catfish" as well, but at times you just need something different.

Speaking of shows, Eric would like to make a vlog, a youtube show. He wants to start off with video game walkthroughs. I would make one or be in one regarding movies and tv shows. Anything at this point for extra cash for both of us as a side job. We will see what we can come up with an hopefully, its an adventure for the both of us. I thought about a Photography business can be a great job for me to get away from the job I already have and make my own hours and make others happy in the same process, but my passion is Landscape photography. Now, Landscape photography is a harder market for photos to be purchased and to get known, so I fell into the portraits and I do enjoy it, but keep it in mind... its tier 2 on my belt for photography. I still don't mind getting sessions from friends or family on portraits, if they want some from me, then so be it. There is always a reason for things or in this case people to come back to you. You have something they like or love about your skills/abilities and why would I make excuses to not make others happy. I'm still trying to find my second niche in the world of photography, so I won't limit myself with one subject only. If I'm requested to do an event, then so be it. I will learn from any mistakes I did during it and along the way, see what I can improve on my post processing as well. Maybe I will take some classes next year on it and stick with it. I was going to this year, but life got in the way of things that just jump on you and then just drag you farther and farther away from it or you loose interest somehow. I'll get back in the grind somehow and won't let others influence me to stop in mid tracks or so. So we shall see what adventures come my way or our way.

Who I want to be
So recently, I started watching "Awkward" again and I didn't start from the beginning. I didn't want to because I can't relate to her accident. Though, in the end of season 4, I believe, I can relate to her. Many people have found themselves already, at a certain age or during college. I honestly have not yet. Yeah yeah, I am old enough to know or should know who I want to be or know myself, but well I don't and I'm willing to admit that. I still need to find what makes me happy, aside of my husband and pets, something of a hobby or maybe be confident in not caring of others think of me or talk behind my back. I shouldn't care of any of that and when I try my hardest to do that, it crawls right back up and in high voltage. One day I would like to say, "F*ck you and your bullshit! I don't care what you say or think of me!" Oddly enough, slowly its going in that route in the work environment I'm in. I'm slowly not caring, but when I see or hear whispers going on in the background, its high alert time and makes me think its about me. I will put here what Jenna wrote as her creative writing final here and then you'll understand as to why I'm writing and thinking this way.

"I have been struggling to think of what to say, so I stopped thinking. I was convinced I didn't know who I wanted to be. And then I realized the answer was all around me. I want to be someone who’s willing to forgive. I want to be someone who cares more about others than themselves. I want to be someone who can tell it how it is. I want to be someone who’d give up everything for the right reason. I want to be someone who sees the best in everyone. I want to be someone who’s a good friend. I want to be someone who always tries to be a better person. And someone who learns from their mistakes. I guess I just want to be someone who encompasses all those things so I can finally be someone who doesn't need somebody to be happy because I’ll know how to dance all on my own." --Jenna Hamilton, "Awkward".

Even though I know this is fictional and with fictional characters, it does say a lot of truth and I want to be that someone and most of them listed, I am. I guess I just need to be more like Sadie, the person who can tell it how it is. Be the someone who can have comeback instantly, be sarcastic, who doesn't care of what others say about me, and anything else relating to any of this and at the end of it all to just brush it off or tell them to beat it. I'll still be kind, to those who deserve it and have not done nothing wrong to me, that part of me will never fade away. We shall see about this in the coming months, or even days.

The ends are near

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Mon, 21 Aug 2017 22:58:00 +0000

Weather
Well, as usual, the weather here is always, hot. We don't get any rainy weather and when we do, it doesn't last long. We have gotten some rain within the last month or so, but it didn't stick too long. We will see in the months ahead, in Fall and Winter times. Today, I hope everyone who wanted to witness the Total Eclipse was able to in the safest way possible of course. I was stuck at work and possibly saw it for a brief moment, of it not being too bright out, but it is not the same. CNN was advertising it on their site and I saw it that way.

Tv Shows **SPOILERS AHEAD**
Twin Peaks

I have been seeing this since it started and yes, it has me in hell. You don't get the answers in any of the episodes until well, now. Maybe after episode 10 we have gotten some concrete answers and lots of mystery here and there. All I say is this, I bet you Agent Dale Cooper will come back to himself either with: 1) His favorite gum comes back in style 5 minutes before the show ends in the last episode or 2) Mr. C dies by the man in the green glove giving him a duel and out comes Dale Cooper. Many people think that Richard is Mr.C's and Audrey's son, while Audrey was in a coma and others think that Dale Cooper will come back when he finally eats a piece of pie. So many of the small clues that the Fireman/????/Giant gave to Cooper have already happened, if not almost there, so we don't have much to put together. The only thing that needs to be put together is this Linda, Tina, Billy and Richard deal together. Also maybe Sarah Palmer is a Doppelganger as well and "Mother" has the real Sarah Palmer stashed somewhere in her house or even in the Red Room. Who knows, but I also hope the side stories come to a close as well. We only have three episodes left in this one.

Game of Thrones
Yes, we have been keeping up with this as well. So far, all the battle scenes have been great, but are they the true answers to everything that's happening? Not really. Mother of Dragons, according to my husband, shouldn't have gone to war. It maybe the right thing to do, but not in the political stance. I just believe that Cersei Lannister is stupid and if her brother, Jaime, gets captured she would not care to rescue him and only is now pregnant to keep him locked up somehow. I am not sure in which direction this show will go. Possibly Lannister will fall and then we would have to see the battle of the century with Jon Snow and Daenerys/Mother of Dragons at the end of it all. You basically got 4 groups: Snow group, Daenerys group, Lannister group, and The Nights King group. I do believe we have only two episodes left if not one.

Orphan Black
Yes, I have only been keeping up with this one. There were lots of plot twists and turns and it is getting very interesting. So many characters have died already and hopefully, the ones that do matter do stay alive. I am unclear as to how many episodes are left in this show, but this is the last season and it won't return.

Two-faced and backstabbing
You know, I at least know the definitions of these two terms. Many people like to throw them out there like nothing and thinking they know what they mean. I have shared my times of having such individuals face me being in these masks and I have forgiven them along the way. I won't forgive the individuals that have done it twice to me. Fool me once, shame on them, fool me twice shame on me. I have learned my lessons with such situations and individuals. I will treat you like you don't exist, but if you are going to mock me or talk behind my back while you are near me, then I will play the same card with you. I will play your game back at you! Don't go crawling to a superior or others to make them like you and just chat with you, karma will play its card there and soon enough it will break you and come back to haunt you. It already is playing the card in my favor, but don't you push it more for your advantage... it won't work. I have a higher card in this game of yours and people are behind me this round. Don't be a child and say you will stay away or ignore the HS drama that occurs in front of you, you don't fool any of us. We know you are nosey and will always be that way. Most of us already know how you play and we won't tolerate it because we know your game. I'll wait to see what card you will play next, just like a Magic the Gathering game. Just know that nothing you are doing, work related or not, talking with others or not, will not help. Bless your little heart and soul as well!! I'd say keep to yourself and don't cause anymore mayhem for yourself cause it will backfire for you. Just you wait! For now, I will keep to myself and be spoken to people who actually like my company and soul.

Summer, here you come!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Wed, 07 Jun 2017 15:57:00 +0000

Weather
Well the summer has always been here. It is Texas after all and we only get is like a week or 2 days worth of winter and the rest is fall or spring like weather. So far its been spring like weather, always raining. We have gotten more rain this year than any other year, since I have been here. I don't think we are due for anymore rain this month, so that means heat and humidity. Expecting to be in the 90s this coming weekend and the rest of this week for sure.

Photography
So I have decided to take classes for this adventure. I have been reading up on the subject the best that I can do while at work and I need more practice, but I need motivation. I thought I was going to gain that once my husband's shift changed, but it seems not. Anyways, it seems that I will be booked for the month of July and September in taking classes. I was planning on adding more classes to them, but I should hold off on any other genre type of Photography classes that they're offering till next year, if they are offering them again. I figure that if I am not happy where I am at and nothing in the work marketplace is offering me another job that I am content with, then I should start working on my Photography career and business. I like capturing people's ideas and I will not limit myself to a certain type of genre or style, because if you limit yourself to one specific topic/subject/genre then you are holding yourself back to many other things and at the same time you may find yourself and what you like doing and are best in. Once you find yourself and what you like doing, then you can expand it to many other aspects in your life, thus being more open in many different ways.

I am still needing to practice Maternity, Engagements, Newborn, Candid, Food, Product, Macro and Sports Photography genres to just familiarize myself with them and see what else I want to focus on besides Landscape and Wedding Photography. Once I take the classes I'm taking in July and September, maybe I will go ahead and take the rest of the classes they are offering that are relating to the genres I listed. To get better you will need to practice and even when you know your stuff, its good to always have a refresher course. With this being said, I am setting aside some money for those 2 months ahead and can't wait to once again be a student. So I am able and available if anyone needs me or knows someone who falls into those categories/genres I listed above, send them my way so I can practice!

Tv Shows

Twin Peaks: The Return
Yes, we have been watching this show. I first encountered it in Netflix 2 years back and wanted to see it because I knew David Duchovny was in it and well, he was playing the part of a woman. So I wanted to see how he acted and as well, see what the show was about. For the life of me I could not get into it at first. It was weird and slow for me from the beginning. I think at this point I never made it past episode one and if I did then wow. I started to watch it again possibly a year ago and it caught me. It was one of those shows that I would watch to put me to sleep, but it was interesting. It grew on me after passing the first episode, so yes you do need to keep at it to watch and learn. Since I knew it was coming back on, I figured I continue to watch the new season too. Also keep in mind that there is a movie of it out as well called "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me". I was told that it explains what happened to the main character being investigated and so I did not watch it. It seems that we need to see it now, since there are so many twists and turns from it and objects/topics that come into play in this new season as well. Now, on to the new season. How it starts off is just plain weird and every episode after it as well. Some side stories that you see happening play and then you are left wondering if they are going to be part of the whole story later. You just don't know and you need to continue watching it to see if they will. So far there's only been 5 episodes and what I read, there are 18 total that will be aired. I also read articles that can be seen as rumors that there might be 2 new seasons, not just one, so we will see if this story continues. What my question is, if you have been watching it, is "What happened to Agent Dale Cooper after the last scene and episode of season 2?" So many scenes in the new season are left almost blank and confusing. You would think that the characters that were near him knew what happened to him, but most are left clueless themselves and not knowing what happened to him as well. My prediction is that if they do not explain this in any new seasons or episodes now, then a movie will be made to explain it. Almost like "Fire Walk with Me", that movie shows the last few days of the main character, Laura Palmer. The movie idea I can see happening, so we shall see.

The Handmaid's Tale:
I saw previews for this one in Hulu's own commercials. It seemed interesting and I decided to look it up to see what it was about. I didn't know that it was a book first, so I went to see what the book was about first. I was in shock as to what it was about and sadly can see this happening in our world, but let's hope it doesn't. It's basically about our world in the future and unable to bare children due to STD's and toxins/pollution getting worse and worse. Almost cult like, women who had children are taken to be a handmaid for a family and their only job is to, you guessed it, bare children with the man of the household. This show or story is June's story and how it all came to be. It is very eye catching as well since it does open your eyes to how the world may become. There are some sad parts to her story and some gruesome scenes because that is their punishment. You are hanging on and wanting to know what will happen due to some plot twists and turns and almost left as cliffhangers. My husband and I had a bet with this one, but due to anyone reading this and spoilers, I will not state our bet unless you have been up to date with it. All the episodes are up on Hulu now and a new one is or should be out now. They upload a new episode every Wednesday, so catch up and join in on our bet. Is there a show you are watching that are similar to these? I wouldn't mind a recommendation if you got one.

Vacations, vacations
I think I am planning another vacation soon in my future. I have one lined up in the last minute to see the family, but these deals going on in the airline I take are hard to not look away from. So we shall see and I wouldn't mind going away from all of this. Thinking of doing 3 trips a year to see the family, but hopefully that will change soon. One can only imagine and hope.

2017... you sneak!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 21:29:00 +0000

Wow, well everyone say goodbye to 2016 and welcome 2017. What?! Already you say? Yes, oddly enough. Hope everyone's New Year has hopefully started out great and if not, I hope it will soon for you and continue to be in the path you want it to be.

Valentine smush!
Whether you celebrate it or not, have a significant other or not it is always a good thing to spoil yourself with chocolate. It don't have to be in this specific day for you to stuff your mouth like crazy with chocolate or candy or anything sweet to your liking, but this time around you should. Unless you want to celebrate SAD (Single Awareness Day), which is tomorrow, but its up to you. Anyways, Happy Valentine's Day to those who do celebrate it or enjoy it! I already gave sushi to my husband as his "candy" and I got roses in return.

Weather
The weather has been a constant changes here, drastically and typical. We got days that were in the 60s or 70s and then the next drop down to 40s and 50s. Recently, it went from 80s one day to 50s the next, like literally. Its raining now here and do get periods of that, a week streak of rain, and then a hot week. I hope when I do go back home, the weather there is spring like or close to it, so I can get some great photos of Downtown and some iconic areas there. I need to practice more and dive into Landscape Photography again.

Photography and otherness
Well my photography has been improving. No I'm not a professional yet and even when I know my camera and all in and out like the back of my hand, I will always be learning. I have been straying from Landscape due to me wanting to learn Portrait to have another skill of photography on my belt, plus I got a new lens from my husband as a Christmas gift, so I've been playing with that as well. My passion is Landscape and I think I need to get back into that; I feel as if I lost interest and motivation all together for Photography and I don't want that occurring. I still want to take classes for this, but I will need to find time and mainly a ride to do so. We will see what I can do.

Puppy just turned 1 this past weekend. It all happened so fast and he grew up super fast as well. I just recently saw the movie "A Dog's Purpose" and it was sweet. It made me cry like over 5 times, so if you're a easy cry baby or sentimental, I do recommend seeing it, but bring tissues! I went home after the movie and hugged my dog. Don't let the controversy of the movie not make you go see it. If you google the movie, you will know what I'm talking about cause it will literally pop out quickly in the search bar. The other movie I saw is "Split" and it was great story line and well moral or meaning towards the end of it. Some tie ins as well come into play with the girls and the guy, but I won't spoil it much for those who want to see it. I would recommend it, but if you're the type of person who don't like the topic of pedophile or hints of it, then don't see it. I will be seeing or wanting to see "A Cure for Wellness", "Logan", "IT", "Insidious: Chapter 4", and others that I can't remember now. We will see if I can see them all, when they come.

Other than that, nothing has changed and hopefully new adventures await for us and everyone out there as well. Hopefully your year gets better or stays how it has been, but always on a positive note. Thanks for reading, until next time!

Creative juices flowing!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Fri, 12 Aug 2016 00:40:00 +0000

So many things have occurred since I last wrote here. Just reading through the last post and noticed quite a few things that have changed and some are now memories, that will be staying in the past, but will be put into a sticky note in the back of my head as a reminder.

Puppy
Our dog is already 6 months and is already completed with his shots. He also has been put a microchip and been neutered for health reasons. On Saturday it will be his first time to get a hair cut, so it will take them time to do so. He did have a small setback with scratching his eye to the point of it having an ulcer, but drops and ointment got him back to normal and he is fine now. He was and possibly still is losing his baby teeth so I'm sure he suffered a lot of pain while losing teeth, having an eye issue and the surgery all at the same time. He is all better now and hopes he likes his hair cut.

Wizard World
With it only one week away, I'm getting more and more excited for the convention. Yes, I'm happy too that will get to see my family in the process and I'm glad that I have lots of plans with them while up there besides the convention. I did buy the VIP badge to get a photo and autograph with both David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson. Yes, she is appearing now too! Eric will also be able to see them at no additional cost, besides his own ticket to enter the whole convention. We will have fun no matter what!

Also, while being there, I will set some time for my family and my photography since I already do have plans to venture off with Eric and sight see. I will try my best to take photos of iconic places there and then edit them once I get back home. I can't wait till October as well, but I won't say much here on that. I just hope it still does happen and get more time with my family. Speaking of photography, I found a nice idea on how I can improve my skills on it. It's called 10 on the 10 and it consists of taking 10 photos on the 10th day of the month. I might do others like it, but when I know I have time to do so. I've also considered taking photography classes either in the fall or winter. Depending on other situations going on, that might be pushed to the beginning of next year. We shall see if time and if God permits.

RIP Matrix
In the last post, I did mention that we were fixing our car by adding new parts to it. We did manage to save money for a new radio and catalytic converter, but unfortunately that lasted for a month completed. On June 7th, we had a car accident due to someone not stopping fully on a stop sign. Eric was driving me to work when it happened and basically the car is claimed totalled. The hit was mostly on the passenger side, yes where I sit, and to the point where I couldn't open the door to get out. The hood was crushed in and main window completely cracked on my side. I do have photos, but they're not pretty. I do miss my car, it was my first and the one my dad bought for me of the year(2004), new at the time, and drove it here to Texas for us to have. I will miss it so and won't forget it. Yes we got a new car, but it's an SUV and in the same color to remember our old one. Minor injuries, but not the point to stay in the hospital.

Rules still apply with "fans" and bless your hearts still. Friends, Thank you still for sticking around and actually caring!

Adjustments!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Mon, 16 May 2016 17:55:00 +0000

Well I haven't written here since.. January, wow! So, many things have changed and gotten fixed, in my view that is. Weather has not been cooperating with us in Central Texas. We have been getting lots and lots of rain and some flooding has occurred in certain parts of Central Texas sadly. We do need it around here, but not to that extreme.

Movies
Well, we have seen a good number of movies. Some through Netflix and others in theaters and whatnot. We have seen from what I can remember are: Deadpool, The Boy, Jenny's Wedding, 10 Cloverfield Lane, Hush, Sinster 2 and Lord of Illusions. Most through dvds we bought or Netflix. It seems we're really into Horror or Suspense movies, which I don't mind since there aren't many out there that do it correctly anymore. All of the ones I have listed thus far are highly recommended to watch if you haven't already! I'm sure I have missed some to add to that list, but these are the ones I could remember for now. I think there are some movies that are still being waited on to be seen in theaters by us like: The Forest, The Darkness, X-Men: Apocalypse, Alice through the Looking Glass, The Conjuring 2, and you get the picture. Most have come out already or are in not the distant future, so we will see!

House additions
Well the house patio is coming along, but we always have to come to a halt, due to weather. Things have been getting even more organized and keeping it that way. We do have a garden going on in our backyard and that is a plus. One of our apple trees is already growing apples and its own apples is weighing down the branch. We do have a new addition to the family, in the form of a pet dog. We have had him for close to 2 months if not already getting there. He is a trouble maker, but he is getting well adjusted with us and a routine and loved. He knows several tricks and is getting there with other training, which is always a blessing. Car is also getting a makeover with parts soon, I hope, to be added once the weather cooperates and hoping to add more to it. One step at a time to add things here and there to our house and car, all things that are needed.

Wizard World
I can't wait till I get to go to this convention back at home. I will be able to finally get to meet my favorite actor, David Duchovny. He, along with Mitch Pileggi (Skinner) and William B. Davis (Smoking Man) from The X-Files will be there. I will get a VIP pass to see David Duchovny and yes a regular pass for my husband, so he can meet everyone as well. I will have the chance to take photos with all of them and well just an autograph from David. If all fails through, we will have fun anyways with my family. I just can't wait and so stoked or excited, whichever you prefer, but I can't hide it haha.

Fans, fans, fans
I'm sure I have good friends, close ones quite possibly, who like reading my blogs. I'm also sure I do have other people reading this blog as well.. one's that aren't an acquaintance nor a friend, not even anywhere in between those two. Some are called fans and others are "fans". Now there is a difference between the two. One is actually caring for you and want to know of your successes and strive for your best. The other is people who are just jealous, who follow, a pack of people who just want to put you down behind your back or in whatever way they want to and always have a negative view and tone of you and your world. Let's just say I'm talking now to those people who are the "fans", the jealous ones. I like how I have a "fan" base because guess what, their lives are obviously that boring to go do such things. Jealous of my life? My right way of doing things? Jealous that I actually have a man who cares for me that much? Jealous of my house or that I actually have one? I feel sorry for you and that you go on to check on this, that is if you do still, but it's your fault for going in the path you're on now in your life. I worked hard to get where I'm at and WE worked hard together as well, my husband and I. I'm sorry for you for not having an honest caring man, a stable roof over your head, and your life just giving you curve balls. Maybe you should reconsider everything you said and done negative and who you make friends with next time because look at where you are now. Do you like it? Quite possibly not, but whose fault is that? Only you are to blame. Thank you though for being my "fan" and dipping into my life and reading it out loud like a story book. At least it's that popular of a book to read and not pathetic. Just proves to me what type of person or people you are and the life you have. Least I am a leader and not a follower. Continue or not reading, but at least I know where I'm at and stand at. Bless your little hearts! For those fans who are the complete opposite, of who I spoke of first, thank you for caring the right way.

Making a Murderer

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Sat, 23 Jan 2016 22:09:00 +0000

Ok, this post is only going to be about this show. If you have not seen this show at all, then by all means do not read this post. There's going to be many spoiler alerts especially if you have not seen it and well, I have kept up with almost, it feels like, every article that is out there about it.

Once again, if you have not seen this show [and don't want to or whatever], go here.

Well, if you have seen this show, congrats.. you tortured yourself long enough to not throw something towards your tv screen. My husband and I wanted to just hate everything of it, but sometimes things of this matter do happen and it sucks for the innocent party. We caught each other saying "Are they stupid?" or "The evidence is right there" or lack there of certain type of evidence. I know the purpose of making this documentary was to show that the justice system can be crooked or just not fair for some, but for it to go beyond how it did in this show, it just plain retarded and unfair.. unjust.

The Evidence:

Like, what the hell? Really? Are you serious? Yes, I had to start this topic like that. They had so many of it that proved that it didn't happen, yet still used it against the party. I mean, the blood or nonexistent blood on the bed, never testing the bed mattress for bodily fluids, and even no chains or a rope of some sort for strapping Teresa Halbach to the bed. The key, really? Where are the rest of her keys if that was her car? I'm sure she needed keys to get back into her house and other places she owned or gone to. Along with that just Steve Avery's prints on them, its not possible.. its her keys! Also, finding the key on the 7th roundup of looking for evidence in his house. The bullets found months later, yet there is no evidence of blood on the floor of his garage. There was no other rope or mainly chain grind/friction marks on the bed posts. They also never found the knife that supposedly they used to cut her throat. There have been many people who believe that Steve is innocent that at this very moment, like himself, are trying to find any evidence that was over looked in order for them to reopen his case and have another trial. I did find one particular article that, someone has found new evidence that might be helpful to reopen the case. An Aol article says and shows it quite clearly to everyone about the keys, what I have mentioned earlier before. Hopefully someone finds one evidence that is useful and helpful for his case. Yes, it might seem that I am on his side, but with what I will be talking about next really makes you wonder the opposite or just confused.

Theories:

There are a lot of "fan" theories out there about who can be the real killer and Avery himself has some ideas as to whom could've killed her. Oddly enough, his theories have brought up some of his own family members into the case. Remember his brother, the one who let the search party for Teresa into the Avery junk yard? He's only seen mainly that one time. What about his other nephew, the one who testified saying he saw the smoke or his own brother-in-law, saying he saw the smoke higher in the air earlier, but then changed his story? Those are only some of the people Steve Avery mentioned himself. Other theories by "fans" added a cult, a next door neighbor, Halbach's own brother and her ex can be suspects. I have found an article that completely goes into detail about all of these theories and others here.

Most of those theories make sense, especially the ex boyfriend, her brother and several of his own family members. Why do I say this? Think about it, Steve was going to get a ton of money from the settlement, his brothers can be awfully jealous.. who wouldn't be in a position like his coming into possession with tons of money and well, knowing he wouldn't share because of knowing your history and how selfish you might be. As for the ex boyfriend and her brother, well its quite obvious that with them trying to crack the code to her voicemail on her phone, they figured that part out, but why to begin with. Did she over hear them saying something that was wrong and was going to happen? What was their motif to even try to hear her voicemail to begin with? At least they admitted in open court about this part. The police can be all in it since they had the time, the DNA mind you, and well they might loose their jobs during this settlement or once it was over and in its last steps. There are some crooked cops out there, its been seen and witnessed by most, but there are some out there that are good to their word and can be trusted as well. Yet with this case crooked cops is written all over it because their lack in doing their job right.

The Motif:

So, lets really start thinking here. What can really be the motif of Steve Avery to kill Teresa Halbach? Did she do something to him in order for him to dislike her that quickly to the point of thinking of how to kill her. We know she didn't like him or felt uncomfortable about him and going to his property, so why not just cancel the meeting or ask someone else to go with her or in her place. I'm sure she felt that way because of his past, which passes judgement on him still looking guilty when he clearly wasn't. If she felt uncomfortable due to him just being in a towel, well anyone would be if they were in that position. Why did his ex-fiance admit now that she was in an abusive relationship with him? She got interviewed by Dateline or an ABC type of show stating that he told her what to say in order for him to look innocent in the documentary. They also had altercations with the cops before all this happened and he was told to stay away from her. I just don't get the point of sticking around that long, playing along and why till now to mention any of this. If you don't like where your relationship is going and know that most of those things are wrong, because of common sense, then leave. If he threatened her for not doing as told, which is what she said he did, then I would get another police department involved or just simply move away after you had enough about abusiveness and lies. The documentary never went into this side of the story for good reasons, but those reasons weren't the real true reason as to why creating a documentary like this to begin with. The reason it was created is to see that there are police departments out there not investigating right and looking at the hard evidence in front of them, convicting actual innocent people and the system is poor and needs to be reexamined and professionally retrained.

I have found many other articles saying so many different theories, stories, and evidence that its hard to dive into them all, but also you do come out of them all even more confused and more on no ones side in this story. Its sad, yes, that a guy got convicted wrongly and his nephew was pulled into this whole mess to end his free life short and behind bars now for life. I'll end this here and leave you guys the rest of the articles that I have found. Don't get too confused now! So, what are your thoughts in all of this? After reading the articles and well, my somewhat review of it all, what do you think about this show and everything in the form of articles coming into light now?

Evidence left out, 7 theories, and Questions remain (video).

New Year, New beginnings!

noreply@blogger.com (Alex) — Sat, 09 Jan 2016 02:26:00 +0000

So, it's the new year! I hope that everyone got what they wanted for Christmas and that 2016 is better and eventful, in a positive way, for everyone! I know everyone usually does a list of goals, also called New Year Resolutions. I try not to do such things since I know I won't complete them. I guess to not fall into the incrowd I made a list and have called it "Something Different 2016". Since the list has been written and made in my tumblr, I will post the link to it here so I won't have to write it again.

Something Different 2016

So what is different thus far?
*water, girlyness, reading, Caffeine, fruits & tv.

*Water: I have been drinking more of it,forcing myself to actually. I never cared for it, but needing to if I want to stay healthy.

*Girlyness: I cut my hair shorter than what I am used to & I'm trying to get into the styles that are out there with still going with my style (clothes wise), Good 'ole Pinterest for this and the help!

*Caffeine: I only drink decaf coffee now. I never realized how caffeine was affecting me and when I quit, I did go through depression and headaches. It was not fun, but it only lasted for like a week and a half.

*Fruits: they are next just like veggies. I never liked zucchini and others like it, but Eric has made them into ways that I would and are healthier for the both of us and that is in spaghetti form.

*Tv: It's getting there.. at least with substituting somewhat educational shows, but I still do need my sci-fi fix show wise! Speaking of shows..

Flash-backs
I wanted to see several shows that I stopped watching mid season. Why did I stop? Life or work got in the way at the time and I never was able to keep up after. Lost, Heroes and Fringe are some of the shows that I finished watching or just started watching on Netflix. I watched them when they first aired, but stopped and couldn't keep up, so now I finished Lost and Heroes. The endings.. what the hell?! On both!

I have seen Daredevil and Jessica Jones and both look promising and glad that they will continue. If anyone wants to discuss any of the shows that I have seen, I don't mind it. I am currently watching "Making a Murderer" and so far it irks me that the system is crooked, but also that Eric and me have pointed out several things or DNA evidence they never done and could do to prove it all. Anyways, let's see what else we can watch.

There are other things changing in our lives. We recently got a basketball and a basketball hoop by our garage and also some bikes and that's how we will get in shape. We both need to for a wedding coming up for us. Eric has been wanting to loose weight and get healthy, so hopefully it'll all work out. We also got in mind to organize the house more, add a bigger patio, just make it more homey somehow. Hopefully we can fix all this this year and get it done. Also I'm going to, or my best, is to get my photography up or learn it better and work on it. I need to get art in my life again, I miss it so. We will see how this goes as well.