Posts from — September 2008

Ok so here’s the big question… If you are a woman reading this, I want to know – do you like the way your ass looks??

Are you one of those people who think they have a nice ass but really do not?  Or perhaps a decent ass but never really thought about it that way.  Well, I don’t know where the heck I fall into this range, but all I know is that I do try to get a gander of my personal “rear view”.

But you know those moments…you’re walking by the 3-way mirror in the dressing room and boom, you can finally see it.   Straining to see behind me, craning my neck, I give it the full assessment.  It’s ok, I would think. Not the best but hey, not chopped liver.

Until today.  Today I received in email some photos from the event I went to in Cleveland.  And guess what was in the picture, a prime view of my rear view…to which I GASPED OH MY GOODNESS….. It’s WORSE THAN I THOUGHT!

And to make matters worse, I didn’t just let it go by, I had to zoom in and get a closer look.  I just had to torture myself and get a closer gander.

What happened to all the damned squats I’ve been doing faithfully??  Where is all my chi goodness?  What the heck happened? All my sweat, practicing my forms, sit ups, stretches, blah blah blah…  I thought the tapping after a hard chi workout dissolved fat cells…not that I can see!

“It’s” caught up in a fold that should have been straightened out by SPANX.  I gotta try those things… Funny thing is while I was in Cleveland, I was wearing a light camel color pants, and they fit pretty well.  Until I went into the elevator and caught the gander on my hip, that was clearly showing panty lines and other unsightfuls… I thought, damn I need to change these pants!  This is not happening!

Ok so, I should love myself more, la-dee-dah…  I’m not usually vain or really care about things like this.  But its those gasping moments… I just had to share.

I just entered into my 4th decade of being on this planet.  Despite the angst of turning the big 4-0, I did manage to enjoy myself quite a bit.  And ate alot of cake…of course the surroundings were different as evidenced in these photos:

Cake at home:

Cake with the Girls:

So about this past weekend… A few months back, a few of us had talked about getting away for a weekend up north to our cabin on Willoughby Lake in Vermont.  Originally it was going to be a weekend down to my brother’s house in Cape Coral, FL… but my new budget consciousness told me that that trip was “out of the budget…”  So plan B was heading to Vermont, and we had a great time…

Figuring the foliage would be prime, and it was, me and my three best friends spent the weekend at the lake.

Pam, Lori, Kelly in that order

We did card readings with Russian Gypsy cards - they are alot of fun, easy so anyone can do them unlike the Rider-Waite decks.   Even better was a couple of friends I met up in Vt when I was much younger – I think it was 12 yrs old – were also visiting for the weekend and they came over to join the party Sat night.

Know what was nicest about being away?

- I didn’t have to be accountable
- I didn’t have to step over any one elses clothes
- I could drink and eat what I wanted without hearing “what can I have”
- I could talk about men without having to worry who is around the corner
- I could go to bed without feeling guilty like I owed somebody a little something something
- The only noise at night was me breathing, and maybe a few crickets
- Girlfriends seem to know exactly what you would like, as opposed to husbands who are completely clueless and require coaching which at that point MISSES THE POINT

Ok, maybe I’m only looking on one side of the coin, but it was pretty delicious to be there and just do nothing, or anything.  Life has been full of suprises lately so it was a perfect moment to kick back with friends and not worry.

Thanks to Kelly, Pam, and Lori – who hung out with me.  My cousin Lisa was supposed to come….ahem…but nooo….her daughter had to up and have a baby on her .   And Jodi and Jill who also came by to participate in the festivities, and brought some great wine I finished off….  They are the coolest ladies, full of wisdom, intuition and compassion, I’m grateful for them in my life.  They showered me with such lovely gifts too…I really am speechless.

And thanks to my new Facebook friends who wished me a Happy Birthday!  All my old Waltham school friends are resurfacing, and it is really cool to reconnect with them all.

Thank you Thank you….

Ok, promise a funnier blog post is coming.   Wait till you see this pic.

I recently set up a MySpace profile so I could participate in some fun family exchanges, as several of them are on MySpace.  They’ve invited me to be in their “mob” and have “bought” me several times over on “Own Your Friends” application.

The problems started when one of my son’s friends was trash talking by changing the “status” of those friends you own.   Under normal circumstances, I don’t mind a little trash talking.  I figure they are exploring their own independence, and I usually don’t wrap myself up in feeling offended because who cares, really.

Well the heat turned up, and the trash talking went way beyond “Yo-Mama” jokes and right into obscene.  This has carried on for a few weeks, and I finally had enough.  While I’m all for kids exercising independence and having a voice, this was going a step too far.

So I called the Mom and told her that she may just want to take a peek at her son’s MySpace.  I didn’t allude to the horrors of what was written – some of it was insults about me, my son, body parts, and such.  I would just loved to been a fly on the wall to see her reading this material.

I think the problem is parents may not really know what’s going on with MySpace and other Internet sites.  I think its important that if you know your child is on MySpace, that you set up your own profile, and see what’s happening for yourself.  You’ll be able to see the types of conversations, their “friends” and more and can help guide them.  There is just too much latitude on the Internet for a child, especially ages 12-18.  I found that younger children tend to stick to their worlds of penguins and things, but when they near teenage years they begin expanding outward to the MySpace’s of the world.

But I do feel like a stooge, I’m not one for telling other parents things about their children. It’s a gray space.  Just over the summer my son had a very unfortunate incidenct with a younger neighbor who was playing at my home.   My son was in the wrong, and it all came out, parents confronted, it was pretty uncomfortable all around. And we’re not friends anymore.  I wave when I go by for a walk, but that relationship has been severed for good.  I do feel bad about that, and I think it was a scarring event for that neighbor’s child.

So, as we all struggle with the new boundaries of the Internet, stick with your gut. If you think it’s going to far, it probably is. And ask yourself, “Would You Want to Know?”   I know I would.

When you were in school, did you parents ever help you with homework??

Mine did not, in fact they pretty much stayed out of it totally. Even when I needed something typed, my Mom would sit me down in front of the typewritier and let me at it.  With plenty of white chalk error removal tape that is…

Times are different today.  I do think today kids get more homework. But I know when my son was in the younger grades (K-6), that sometimes homework projects were more a competition between parents than the kids.  In 5th grade my son had to make a crazy project, kind of like a mousetrap, that required diagrams, working models, and all.  While I know kids have the capacity to create wild ideas, its a whole other thing to implement them.  My husband and his brother spent a whole day trying to build out a project for my son’s 5th grade project. It was pretty cool and David (son) was a proud as any child could be.

But I digress…this morning was another one of those special homework moments.  It all started last night and I must set the stage.  First, it was the start of CCD, which runs from 6:15-7:45.  It’s a good thing I input all the calendar dates over the weekend, or I would have blown right by it.  Of course, at 6 pm son is asking “What’s for dinner”  and I haven’t started a thing.   Then my iPhone beeped to remind me he needs to go to CCD.  So off he goes, no dinner but a yogurt.   Also leading up to this moment, my son was asking me for help on a project for school.  Yea, yea…we’ll do it later.  Well, turned out there never was a later.

While he’s at CCD, my grandson gets dropped off, and in that timeframe I completely lose track of when David need to be picked up.  Then my husband bounds up stairs, its 7:52 pm (he gets picked up at 7:45), and he said “Did you get the boy?”  “No, I didn’t”… and he dashes out the door.

Mind you I’m running around after my grandson, and I’ve totally lost track of my own son. What happened here???  I think I’m losing my mind.  Three minutes after my husband leaves, the phone rings. My son is wondering what happened, clearly he’s the last boy left at CCD.  My heart breaks, I feel like crap. What a shitty parent I am – forgetting about my own son while taking care of another’s.  Not that I don’t love my grandson, I do, but it adds a new level of distraction in my life that I’m having a harder time seeing through.

So, long story short, both father and son come home.  Son has booming headache, and runs upstairs.  I coddle him, trying to make up for the fact that we forgot about him.  But wait…Hmm…didn’t he have a project due tomorrow?

So this morning comes, its 7:15 and son is not up yet.  SURPRISE!  Here we go, week 3.  I go get him moving and ask him about the project. Turns out it is not done.  So what do I do?  I END UP TYPING STUFF ON THE COMPUTER SO HE CAN PASS IT IN.  What the heck is wrong with me?  This is what I complain about.  But I did neglect him the night before.  And I wonder what is wrong with this generation?

Now I work at home, but that doesn’t mean I’m emotionally available to help him after school.  I may be there in physical body, but if I’m in the zone, I’m in the zone.   Plus he’s in 7th grade for gosh sakes, shouldn’t he step up here?

So, I bring him to school late, with an excused note for being tardy, with 2 completed projects in hand.  He feels great. I feel like I am out of my mind.

Lord, help me please…

So last week I spent the majority of my week at a Wyndham hotel in downtown Cleveland. It’s been awhile since I spent time there, last time I went I was in my early 20s on my first press tour.

Well, since then the downtown has changed a bit. It’s a bit deserted, which was too bad.  But what was wierd for me wasn’t the location, or the deserted downtown, it was my dreams at night. Strong dreams, the kind where I woke up wondering, what the heck did that mean.  So I’ll tell you a little about both.

First dream: Horses and Fast Cars — So my immediate family was there, and they gave me the most beautiful brown horse for my birthday.   I was excited, and I remember patting it, then jumping on its back and galloping down my old Loretta Road in Waltham (small circle behind my house).   Then I jumped off, and I was in a horse ring of sorts, the horse was galloping around. Then I jumped into a really fast sexy sports car, in the back seat, and the driver started fishtailing right out into the street, leaving the ring in the dust.  I remember yelling “hey hey slow down” and then I was back in the ring.   The brown horse was still there, but over by a smaller brown horse and he started kicking the small horse, and I remember getting upset.  Then some man jumped into the middle of picture, and asked to buy something from me.

Hmmm I looked up horse in a dream and I got some mixed answers.  Horses in a dream generally mean physical power and strength, and that would match because lately I have been feeling like I’m on this powerful energy stream taking me to good places.  But I didn’t get the last part – maybe I’m feeling like someone is trying to wreck it – or maybe I have subconscious efforts at play that are screwing things up.  Who knows.

Dream 2 – Britney Spears was in this one, even weirder. I don’t listen to her stuff, and try not to pay attention to that drama.  But anyway, she was a crack head in the dream – and she tried to stab me with her dirty needle. Yuck!  Again – another sort of “infected” type dream.  Even worse, was my husband Dave was in the dream.  I was walking by these two male energies (could not discern) and they started harassing me, and I was fighting back.  Dave jumped out and was trying to protect me and he got hurt- and ended up shrinking up like a rag doll in my hands.  That was the freakiest part, and Britney just looked on like “you’re an idiot”.

I just may be an idiot at times, I can handle that.  I’m human after all. But it would seem that I have some unsettling thoughts about my own stability and direction.  But maybe in that second dream it is saying that I’m entering a new ground where traditional influence – meaning those people I know – won’t be as large as it used to be, who knows.  I’ve been through enough transitions to know that things change, especially as you enter new areas in life.

I’m up for other interpretations.  Thanks!

It’s finally that time of year where I head out ISA’s Marketing & Sales Summit with my partner Shari Worthington at Telesian Technology.   It’s our 3rd annual summit.  I was on the planning committee since the inception, and I’ve been working on this event (along with several others) since last March.  Let’s just say I’m glad it’s here.  It’s always good to get these things behind us.

This year I’ll be making a co-presentation with a nice guy from Jacobs Automation – Scott Summer.  We’re going to be talking about how marketers can do a better job in working with sales.  “Marketing Strategies that Enable Sales Success” is the title, I think.  A little bit buzzy, but it works.

I always enjoy the travel experience, and view each trip as a mini-science experiment.  I always enjoy discovering who, by LOA, is sitting next to me, or in line in front of me.   My Sensei Mike has shared some funny little tricks to do with energy while I’m on the road.  I’ll keep you posted on how I do, and if it actually worked.

But seriously, traveling always brings such interesting moments – moments of fun, laughter, amazement and also other less glamourous situations which I refuse to name so I don’t breathe energy into them…  I anticipate that this will be a pleasant experience, especially the mirco-brewery tour Thurs night.

I’ll also regularly post Twitter remarks as the conference goes on under #ISAMS3…

I’ll pop back in and let you know how the travels go.  Until next time…

I gotta get myself packed and buttoned up!

Well, I spent the majority of my weekend figuring out how to move my blog from the 1and1.com hosted blog to my own hosted blog. It was like trying to dig around the Great Wall of China with a spoon. A wealth of information is out there, but where do you find the specifics to what answers you need at that moment?

Forums are great, but not so great when you’re 3 hours into an upgrade – mind you it needn’t be this difficult – and you read all these forum questions that are the same as yours, but have no answers!! AHHHH…

My husband is starting to think I have some sort of fling going on with my laptop because I spent so much time in front of it.

I think I like this new template – a big thanks to www.pearsonified.com who offered this free simple template. I’m not quite ready to pay for a template yet, but his Thesis template looks great.

I also have to fix the images here, but I’m in no rush. If you happen to come along to my blog, drop me a comment so I know you’re here.

I’ll be adding a few more features over the upcoming weeks as I ramp this thing up.

Thanks for visiting! More soon, I promise!

You know, I’ve been down this road before. Refinance, turn up the spending, and refinance again. So much that I’ve continually increased our family’s debt by thousands of dollars – maybe even if I added it up hundreds of thousands counting our equity loan. EEEK!! Why and how the heck did I do that? And why did I need an equity loan if I refinanced?

And this is the merry-go-round that I’ve been on that I recently (last May) decided to get off from. I’m not as dizzy as I was in May, being 4 months into managing a tight cash flow budget.

I’m almost debt-free not counting the house, thanks to Dave Ramsey. He’s kept me on the straight and narrow, and talks basic sense about finances and the trouble America is in with debt.

The problem is debt is sneaky, and many of us are still asleep at the wheel. And with all the financial trouble we hear about day-in day-out, things are not getting better. Credit card companies are feeling the crunch in late payments. I know that when I was on the debt-train, that the collection calls were relentless. American Excess was the worst, calling 2x a day and you always knew because the caller ID noted Phoenix or Florida – their 2 collection centers. They can get downright nasty, even after I spent thousands of dollars with them and ALWAYS paid them off – eventually. Maybe not in the time frame they would have preferred – as my husband says, we’re in the late pay pile, not the no pay pile.

And news on the street is collectors are turning up the heat. In the WSJ article yesterday, the creditors are getting bigger sticks to beat their delinquent payers up. They’re even beefing up their collections staffs with the hopes that they will collect a little more.

Got your caller ID ready? Good, you’ll be able to ignore the calls. Whatever you do, DON’T answer. They’ll fake being nice, and then be ignorant.

More importantly, let’s get smart. Let’s not buy into our debt-ridden culture. Let’s use cash, buy with cash, save with cash, like our grandparents did. What happens when the ATM is down? You use cash. It’s always accepted. And is highly prized in crisises like torrential storms where you couldn’t use a card reader to save your life. But with cash, you can.

Cash is King!

I learned that in a training class that discussed understanding financials back a few years ago. It’s still true.

If you are sick and tired of being sick and tired, check into Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover – it’s good, straightforward advice that will get you out of debt and using income the way we should be.

I’m almost out, and I’ve got my entire household asking me: “Is it in the budget?” Music to my ears.

#daveramsey, #finances, #creditcarddebt, #debt

As I settle in for the week after a long weekend, I am gladly reminded that tomorrow school starts!! Yeah!!

Now, while lazy summer schedules are great, I’m always ready for the big yellow bus. My son starts 7th grade, which is a tough year. Especially after last year his sixth grade teachers didn’t give him any sort of homework…all year. I was really amazed at that. The good thing was my son was able to enjoy school and his teachers, but it didn’t do much for homework habits which will be supersized in seventh.

I notice how many parents are involved with their kids homework. When I grew up, my parents didn’t help at all. I just figured it was mine to do, not theirs. Now, kids expect alot more help, want to use the calculator, etc etc. Seems to be too much help around if you ask me. I work from home, so when he starts coming home from school tomorrow around 2:30 (which comes around pretty quick), he expects me to be ready to help him.

This year I need to work more at setting the expectation that he does his work and that I can back him up only when he is really stuck vs.when he wants attention and wants a distraction from homework.

In reading the book “Money and the Law of Attraction” I think some of those statements are focusing on the “lack” side of the equation and won’t do anything to help me focus on what results I do want, so let me give it a try here…

I feel joy when my son sits down to do his homework without my asking.

It feels good when my son has good work habits and helps himself become prepared for his next day or week of school.

I like it that my son reads without alot of reminders, and I know he enjoys reading books on his own.

I am happy when he makes good food choices, and opts for natural foods that are healthier vs anything processed.

Well, there it is. Let’s see how I do keeping my focus and attention there.