My Hair

Sigh. I can't even lie. I have treated my hair like crap for the past few years. It's almost pretty embarrassing. I've been on every hair challenge there is, and I can never stick to them.  Even when my hair starts growing nicely, I always do something to jack it up.  I'm seriously starting to think that I was subconsciously messing up my efforts on purpose.

In any case, 2012 is going to be different. I listed below some goals that I want to accomplish for the new year, but I didn't mention anything about my hair.  I am determined to make this year different. I plan on doing that by protective styling all year long.  I (think) I've finally found a protective style that I can live with - Crochet braids!

Here's how my hair gets messed up. I will either put braids, a weave or rock wigs for a while. Then I get bored and start messing in my hair. I always see someone else's hair and want to do something different.  It's when that happens when I start to get really rough on my hair. I'm not gentle with it at all.

However, crochet braids really do seem to be the the answer.  With the crochet braids, I can have all of my hair cornrowed away and not have to touch it at all. I don't have to leave any hair out to blend it with my leave out (for weaves or 1/2 wigs).  I don't have to brush it back if I want to wear it in a bun. I can just "crochet" the loose hair into my cornrows and get moving.

I did a set of crochet braids this weekend and I love them.  I'm not crazy about the hair itself right now, but I can live with it. This style allows me to change my hair up as much as I want to while keeping all of my hair tucked away. I absolutely love it.

I'll post pictures later.

What I want in 2012

As a new year approaches, I'm thinking about all of the things that I would like to accomplish.  To be quite honest, I didn't really accomplish too many of my goals in the last year or so.  The only great thing I did was become a homeowner, but that was in 2010.  Since that time, I have not really done anything that I wanted to to.  I started, but then stopped.  Terrible, I know.

I really do want this year to be different, though. I told my mom and sister, I cannot live 2012 the way I lived 2011.  2011 was a really rough year for me (financially and emotionally). That's never really happened to me before. I mean, I've had rough times as we all have, but this year was ridiculous. So, in order to combat that, I've decided to make a really clear list of what I want to accomplish in 2012.

These are more than just resolutions. These are the things that I want to bring and keep into my life for good.   Here are some of the things I want.

• Pay off my bills
• Get ahead on my recurring bills (I want to have at least 2 or 3 months of bills like electricity and water paid ahead)
• Find a second, dependable car
• Exercise at least 5 days out of the week - at home
• Eat cleaner (more salads, less proceeded food, definitely less sugar)
• Begin to date
• Go out more with my numerous Meetup groups
• Save more money
• Hustle for more money (side jobs, selling things, etc)
• Find a new job (which should actually be at the top of the list)
• Find a church home (this has been so hard for me - which is weird because I live in Atlanta..a city that literally has a church on almost every corner)
• Meditate with God every morning and night (I wake up so early in the morning already, so I may not be able to do both times of the day, but we shall see).

These are just a few (yes, I said few) of the things I can think of right now.I'll come back with anything else I can think of soon.

Random: IRS

So, I wanted to call the IRS to ask them a question. Not to get too personal, but I have a payment arrangement with them and wanted to ask them a question about one of their payments.

I spoke to the representative who advised me that their systems are currently down and are expected to be up....ON JANUARY 3RD!!! What the...?  You're a government agency. A major if not THE major government agency, and you're telling me your systems are going to be down for almost a week?

Is it me or does that sound strange?

The Holidays

Well, it's a few days after Christmas. I wish I could say that I was doing something amazing for my holiday vacation, but I'm not.

I actually had to come to NY because my sister was having surgery. I drove to Virginia Beach to go and get my mom and then drove up to NY to be with my sister. Thank God everything turned out okay.  However, we're now just sitting up in the house just looking at each other.

I can't really blame anyone, though. I spend so much time driving to and from work and spent so many hours driving from Atlanta to here that I welcome to break.

Of course with a new year approaching there are so many things that I want to do for the new year.  I really have to start thinking about my resolution list and the things I want to change.  It's not as easy as it used to be when I was younger. Now, that I'm an adult and have a rough idea of what I want out of life, trying to come up with ways to accomplish those goals can be quite a task.

I'll keep you posted.

And More Time Passes

Well, more time has passed since I've written a post. I can't believe that I want to blog all the time, but constantly forget. I have got to do something to try and remember.

Talk About Totally Ridiculous

I'm talking about myself. I can't believe I can't do something as simple as writing a blog post every day.  Even if it's not every day, at least let it be in the same month. The last time I wrote a post on here was in May. I need to be ashamed of myself.

I'm putting a reminder to just start writing everything on here. It doesn't even matter any more. I want to keep a blog (apparently so since I have several of them) but I have to stay motivated to keep writing. I think I'm going to put a reminder in my phone to do it daily.

Damn shame. SMDH at myself.

Where The Hell Have I Been?

Damn. It's been so long since I've posed here, I totally forgot I had this blog. Seriously. I don't know what's going on with my mind these days. So much is going on. I really need to get it together. I am definitely going to start posting more. I have to. I've started two new blogs since I started this one. I'm making it a point to write something. Please let me stick to my promise.

Here's what's been going on with me so far:

When I moved to my new house, I moved about 25 miles further away from my job. That's not a big deal except that I already lived about 60 miles away from my job when I lived in my apartment. It wasn't a big deal, but almost immediately after I moved into the house the gas price started to soar.  Unfortunately, I have somewhat of a gas guzzling car.  It's not financially feasible for me to get a new car (and have a new car note) just to save on gas.  So, I asked my job about the possibility of working from home at least 2 days a week. The extra gas money was really starting to cause a financial strain.

Even though I sit at my desk for almost 8 hours a day (I don't take "lunch" or go out), they said no.  The company is not big on people working from home (even though we can occasionally).  Now, I don't want to say the name of this company, but this is a huge well known corporation.  The fact that they are not willing to let people work from home is ridiculous.  Keeping in mind, I have a job where I'm on the phone (not a call center job..even though I did do that for this company at one point) all day sitting in meetings. I can do that from my house.  I can't be mad, though.  It's their company and they have the right to do with it as they see fit.

I also have the right to exercise my options, so I'm actively (and aggressively) looking for a new job that's close to home.  It kind of hurts because I've been with this company for almost 10 years.  However, if the company can't change based on the current economy, then there's really nothing more I can do.  Keeping in mind, this is a company that's very cheap and will try to do all that it can to save as much money as possible.

I am just trying to keep my head and pray that something will change soon.  It has to.  I know all of this is happening for a reason. I'll just be glad when it's over.

Working Out...Again

I think on this blog (or possibly a different one) I said that I was going to start working out. Well, because I have been lacking in writing new posts (and because I procrastinate a lot), I never followed through with that. So, I've decided to change that.

On my vision board, one of the things I want to manifest is a brand new body. I didn't know how I was going to do that, but it's something that I really want, rather need. It's funny how things actually come to fruition. A few weeks ago, I accompanied my best friend to her daughter's dance training camp. While there, I met the mother of a little girl that my best friend knows. For simplicity, I'll call my best friend "M" and the other mother "K."

Well, "K" was telling "M" how she has a personal trainer and how she's going to enter a bathing suit contest. "M" and I were both pretty impressed. Well, a few days later, "K" gave "M" the information about the trainer for both of us. A few weeks ago I decided to go and see this trainer.

Ok, let me just start by saying my trainer is a body builder and (apparently) is ranked among the top 10 body builders in the world. I was pretty impressed. I was more so impressed by the number of people that he's helped. He works with professional NBA and NFL players to get their bodies right. I liked him (and his wife - they're both trainers and run the studio together) right off the bat.

However, I was as fond of them once I started working out. Let me just say they work you out HARD...BUT they take care of you. Once you've been going there for a while and they can see what you do in your daily life (you must turn in journals to them once a week), they put you on an exercise plan (first) and then an eating plan. Today was my 3rd week going (I go on Saturday mornings), and I was given my exercise plan. It looks pretty strenuous, but I know I can do it.

I think I'm going to be sticking with this for a while. It's funny how you stick with something when you're the one that's paying for it. I'm going to start my exercise plan tomorrow. I can't do everything at home (because one of the exercises involves a treadmill which I don't have), but I can at least substitute something else in its place.

We shall see....

2011 Vegetable Garden

Well, it's that time of year again!

We're getting ready to go into growing season. I have been doing some container gardening for the past 3 year, and I love it! There's a sense of satisfaction that you get knowing that you grew something from (semi) scratch and can eat it!

I didn't think I would start buying any vegetables yet since it's only mid-February, but I went to Wal-Mart yesterday and saw they were selling a few items. Of course, I had to pick up a few.

What you're seeing to the left are starter plants. I bought Arugula, Romaine lettuce, spinach and strawberries. I was too tired, so I didn't pick up any soil. I have tons of pots from growing last year. I'm going to get some potting mix (not potting soil...there IS a difference) this weekend. I can't put them outside yet because the temps still dip down pretty low at night. I'll put them in the breakfast nook of my kitchen. That way they'll get lots of sun until I can put them outside for good.

I also bought a bag of red onions. There were 100 in the pack. They're very small. I just have to put them in soil when I'm ready to start planting.

I'm so excited. I can't wait!

Law of Attraction and All That Jazz

I decided for 2011 that this was going to be a new kind of a year. I am going to manifest the things that I truly want in my life instead of complaining about them. At least, I'm trying to. I really want to manifest some great things this year, but I figured I would try to manifest something small.

Last week, I decided that I wanted to manifest $100 by this past Sunday (today is Thursday). I figured I would use it for extra gas money. I put it out there in the Universe and just expected that it would be there by Sunday. However, it never showed up. I just made a mental note of it and moved on.

As I stated, we got really bad snow down here in Atlanta, and since the city of Atlanta apparently doesn't know how to handle it, I have not been able to go to work all week. I've just been working from home. While I was home, I found my old planner and inside were two checks that I forgot to cash. They were very small checks, but still checks nonetheless.

So, mail pickup has been suspended all week but finally picked up yesterday. When I went to the mailbox, there was a refund check in the mail. That was sort of a surprise. I expected I would be receiving it at some point, but I didn't think it would be so soon. Then I received another refund check in the mail today. Here's the breakdown of the checks I found/received:
- $4.00
- $7.51
- $63.90
- $30.00
That's a total of $105.41!!!!

The ironic part is, even though I didn't get the money by this past Sunday, I didn't need it (extra gas money) because I got stuck in the house all week. Now, I have a little extra gas money for next week!

This has definitely renewed my faith in the LOA (God).

2011 Snow

Aww man. I've been hit hard with snow these past few weeks.

When I was in Virginia Beach visiting my mom, we got a lot of snow there. I wanted to drive my mom back to Atlanta so that she could see my new house. The snow was so bad, we never got a chance to come down. She's going to make a trip down in a few weeks.

Now, Atlanta gets hit with snow this past weekend. Apparently, no one told Atlanta that you need to treat the snow/ice BEFORE it snows and not after. So, they brought in a bunch of additional snow trucks to help with the snow. However, the trucks didn't shovel the snow when it was actually snowing. These geniuses decided to wait until after it snowed and froze over to then get the shovels and salt out. Needless to say it's been a clusterf*ck ever since then. The schools have been shut down every day this week, and will be shut down again tomorrow, which is Thursday. That's mainly because the temperatures have not even reached to above freezing.

I saw the UPS man and the mail truck today. I made the mistake of asking the mail woman how the roads were. She said they weren't too bad. So, I go out in my truck and try to make a run for it...mainly because I'm going stir crazy.

THIS chick. I don't know what her idea of not that bad is, but the road I went down was HORRIBLE. This is the main road I need to take to get to the highway. It was covered with ice and snow like it had just happened. I almost slid into the ditch. Then when I went to make a u-turn, I almost got stuck in the ice. Needless to say I carried my butt on home. Looks like I won't be heading out of here until it warms up sometime this weekend.

I'm just glad I didn't lose power. I've been pretty lucky on that end. I have food, heat and electricity, so I'm not doing too bad.

Too bad I didn't think to buy liquor.

Damn.

Happy New Year!!!

This is just a quick post to wish everyone a very happy new year. I did not go out tonight. I barely made it to the new year, because I'm so tired. I'm just grateful that I got a chance to see another year with my family. I'm ready for 2011!

Let's get it!