Generation gap

Remember me?

 

(This would technically be a “my kid says funny stuff” post but she doesn’t do it often enough for me to make it a regular thing. Enjoy!)

I’ve known my whole life my daughter would never know how awesome it was to grow up in the ’80s (please insert all appropriate sarcasm here). She doesn’t know what Atari is. She doesn’t know that we used to have to get up to change the channel. She doesn’t know what vinyl is (or how AWESOME it sounds…and yes, I know you can still buy vinyl and record players, but have you seen how expensive it is?) She knows how to work my computer and phone better than I do and I’ve been on computers since DOS was a thing and we had to use floppy disks and nothing printed out on normal paper!

But one thing I thought she would know is what a dial tone sounds like because my mom still has a land line phone for her alarm system.

I was teaching Morgan how to set the house alarm because she is getting old enough to be alone in the house for a little bit by herself. We are starting to practice this so she gets comfortable being alone. Then I told her she could call me anytime she was home alone and she told me she couldn’t because “Granny’s phone is broken. It makes this weird noise.”

WHAT?!?!

So that was a bizarre moment when I had to explain to my daughter why the dial tone is there and that it’s a good thing. Wish I still had a rotary phone to show her how painful it used to be to dial!

My 65th post

Wow, it’s been way too long since I’ve written anything. I both love and hate school this semester. I have one writing intensive class that is sucking the life out of me even though I love to write. This guy is even more obsessive about grammar and content than I am and I don’t know how to make him happy.

Anyway, I moved back in with my mom last week during Spring Break to save money. It’s also a shorter commute to school and where the ex-husband lives. I hope to save enough over the next 14 months (give or take because I have 13 months until I graduate and then I also have to find a job) for a decent down payment on a house.

I am going to get my Conceal/Carry license this summer. My boyfriend took me shooting last week. It was the first time I’ve ever shot a handgun in my life and I was hooked. I shot a .22 and a .38. After the Range Officer showed me how to use the sights, I was shooting the center of the target almost every time.

Ohio is getting what I hope will be the last snow storm of the season. I’m so ready for spring and getting to run again. My body needs the workouts again. I do need to start doing some cross training or I’m going to be in a world of hurt after my first run. I’m hoping to do several 5 K’s this summer. I need to push myself to do a 10 K because I’d really like to run a half marathon. And in answer to “why” the answer is just to prove I can.

Where has the time gone?

Hi again, Word Press readers. This one is short and sweet. I’ve been just about neck deep in schoolwork since the first week of January. I’m down to about hip deep now!

Anyway, my ethics/leadership prof showed us this video and it blew me away. It starts out with terrible sound but bear with it because they fix his microphone and then it’s much better.

Simon Sinek: How great leaders inspire action

I’m just a couple weeks from midterms and Spring Break (in February??) but I don’t know how much I’ll be on here. I’m also getting ready to move again so I’m even busier than normal trying to study and pack and throw stuff away all at the same time.

I have nothing to talk about except school

Sad, but true. Hopefully, that will change over the next three weeks. Finals week isn’t dragging me down like I thought it would. I have 3 classes done and another one soon to be checked off as well. That final is at 8 pm tonight and it is the one I have been dreading all semester. Finance, blah. If I was a finance major I might like it more but as a HR major, this is one of those required-let’s-make-you-a-well-rounded-student classes and blah. My last final is on Wednesday and then I get  3 and 1/2 weeks to think about things that I don’t have to be tested on. Oh, fiction books, how I have missed you!

My little girl turned 9 last week but you wouldn’t know it. She didn’t want a party or a cake or anything remotely celebratory. I think she’s waiting for Christmas. That’s usually when she gets the toys! I got her more art supplies and my mom got her clothes. She needed clothes but not very exciting for a 9-year-old.

Back to studying now for the Finance final I don’t want to take and yet want to take to get it over with and done.

A runner’s Christmas

I saw this photo on the Runner’s World Facebook page and think this tree is awesome. Merry Christmas to all the other runners here on WordPress!

Let the long weekend begin!

Today was the last day this week I had to be anywhere important at a specific time and do whatever the boss said to do. (I LOVE my boss so really that last one wasn’t hard today.)

I get to sleep in 3 days in a row. I don’t have to go back to school until Monday. I get to relax, watch movies, hang out with my family on Thursday, and not worry about my hair or makeup or even shoes for that matter on Friday. And I have the knowledge that when I go back to school Monday, we are in the last two weeks of lectures before finals week. Two of my classes will be over before we even get to finals week. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and know that it isn’t another train coming the other way lol!

Have a safe, fantastic holiday with your loved ones, dear readers.

Happy weekend!

Apologies for the depressing post on Wednesday. Today is a better day.

I had a rough econ test this morning but it’s over and we are in the home stretch here for this semester. I get a long weekend with campus closed on Veteran’s Day and the week after that we have Wednesday through Friday off for Thanksgiving. Yay! Two short weeks in a row. I need this break really bad. Mini vacation time for momma. The ex has Morgan for Thanksgiving so I can totally sleep in and do nothing but stay home in my pj’s. Perfect bliss for me.

 

Empty from the inside out (or Word Vomit)

I’ve had a rough two weeks. Apologies for not writing last week. I’m not getting into it because I don’t have the mental capacity to completely re-hash the last two weeks but needless to say, I need the nonsense and the craziness to stop.

I need my car to run right and stop breaking.

I need my professors to stop saying something is not important and will not be tested on and then put it on the freaking test.

I need people to drop out of the full 9:30 am class I was planning on registering for so I don’t have to stay in the 8:00 am class next semester. (That just ruined my morning when I logged on to register for Spring classes.)

I need to run and it’s too cold to run outside which is something I never thought I would say but I have discovered the hard way that I can’t breathe if it’s below about 50 degrees. I don’t have a treadmill or the room for a treadmill so it’s going to be a looooooong winter.

I need to cry for about a half hour and then put the pieces back together.

Urgh. Argh. Ugh.

This is one of those times when I really hate that I have to acknowledge my feelings instead of bury them. I don’t like feeling powerless and overwhelmed.

What’s next?

Several days (weeks?) ago, Evan Sanders at The Better Man Project wrote about something that made a lot of sense to me. (BTW, go check out his site. AH-MAY-ZING) I don’t remember exactly which blog it was or I would link to it (Sorry, Evan, and if you know which one I’m talking about, leave me a comment and I’ll link to it).

I don’t even remember what the blog post was about but this idea stuck with me. People plan and plan and plan new goals and new resolutions without planning about what they will have to remove. It doesn’t even have to be something negative that needs removed. It could be that you need to remove something good to have something great. Until you can identify and remove the old, you can never bring in the new. We humans have a finite amount of things we can deal with at one time.

Pretty powerful, huh? Obviously, everyone’s list of things is going to be different. You have a different reaction to stress than me. You have different amounts of time free or busy at different times than me. You have different goals, hopes and dreams than me. (All great because life would suck if we were all the same!)

I used to have this problem. I used to be one of those people who would set New Year’s Resolutions and watch them turn into nothing. Some of that was not caring, some was not knowing how to set SMART goals, some was just the immaturity that I needed to grow out of on my own.

I haven’t had this problem for about a year and a half. I really hadn’t put it into words but I knew way down deep when I could add something new as a goal and when I was already overwhelmed and I would start cutting, sometimes without even realizing I was doing it.

Now, however, I need to cut some okay things and some good things to make way for the great things and it’s actually scarier feeling than I thought it would be. It’s easy to look at something and say “This is bad (or harmful or toxic or whatever). This has to go.”  It’s a lot harder to look at something and say “This isn’t hurting me but it really isn’t what I want or need anymore so I need to make space for something better.”

So, in between a full class load, a part-time job, and being a mommy, I’m going to be doing a lot of soul-searching and a lot of list making to figure out what needs to stay and what needs to go. And I’m not just talking stuff in my home but in my mind, heart and soul as well. And since I know I need a deadline or I’ll just let life get me too busy, I’m going to randomly pick November 12, 2012 as a date to have a plan at least 75% ready to work on.

Be the change you want to see, my friends!

Better late than never

I know, I know…I said I was planning to post on Wednesdays because that’s when I usually am caught up on homework and have some free time. Well, with 3 (ugh) tests this week, I spent my Wednesday night studying. So, here I am without much to say but I’m writing because I need to write something or else I will forget about my poor blog. Trust me, I’ve done it before. Check out the months where I only posted once. Yep, I forgot I had a blog!

I am in the middle of reading Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series for the first time. I finished Voyager a couple of days ago and am waiting for Drums of Autumn to come in at the library.

Well, that’s all I’ve got going on right now. School, sleep, work, be a mommy, sleep and repeat. Is it summer yet?