I've been really negligent in posting since I've moved in June. My main problem is the lack of reliable internet service where I live. I've gone from having 4G LTE internet to a broadband that reminds me of the days of AOL dial up! Even cell phone service is unreliable. I've been going through major internet withdrawl. You know you have a problem when you miss reading your favorite blogs and watching your favorite YouTube channels on a regular basis. I've making due with attempting to use the Blogger app on my phone and tablet so we shall see how it goes.
So back to business. It was a crazy summer. Between moving, my uncle's illness and death, finding place to live but having to clean it to make it liveable and getting a new full time job, I'm surprised I'm still sane. Add to that acquiring 3 new pets (I really need to stop taking in strays!) while losing an older beloved one just added to the insanity! Things are starting to settle down finally though. We are finally going to start moving in to the place we rented, though it still needs a lot of work. I've been wanting to take before and after pictures, but after dropping my phone in a bucket of paint Sunday, I've learned that it might not be a good idea. On a good note my phone is still working and it was fully submerged in the paint. Thank goodness for small miracles! I am back working in retail despite my protestations against ever working retail again. It is a lot different working at a small store in a small town as opposed to the insanity that was working at the San Marcos outlets. My co-workers are an awesome group and I'm grateful for this job. Not much else going on until November. My friend surprised me with tickets to Wizard Con in Austin for my birthday so I'll definitely be posting photos and what not of it all.
I guess that's it for now as I'm writing this on my lunch hour and it's almost up. Until the next time.....
It's been awhile since I last posted. Unfortunately my quest to blog at least weekly has not been successful :( I'm determined to get off my butt and blog what I want as opposed to what I think I "should" blog about. An update on the move. We still haven't found a place yet, but the commuting back and forth is killing us with the high gas prices and we cannot travel with all of our pets. By the end of May I will no longer be an "Austinite". I've lived almost
my entire adulthood here and it's going to be odd leaving. We are going to live with my grandparents for now as they have the space while continuing to look for our own home. While not necessarily an ideal situation, it will help with rebuilding our savings as my grandparents don't have any sort of rent or mortgage to pay. We'd help with utilities and groceries which isn't much thankfully. While am still on the fence about moving, I know it's for the best. Fortunately for now, my bills are very minor so I can help out as much as I can both with my grandparents and have offered help with my Uncle and Aunt. I probably won't look for an "official" job until Fall. Thank goodness for crafting abilities and Etsy! By Fall I hope to be working in San Antonio and have my own place again. How I miss having a place of my own. It's rather annoying to have to store the majority of your things, especially when you have to dig through boxes to find something. Another advantage of the move is that a good friend of mine is moving back home as well. While he is moving to San Antonio, it's only 30 minutes away and I've had other good friends that are looking forward to me moving back. While I didn't address it on here, I ended 2 important friendships back in November with 2 individuals that I considered my best friends for the past 10 or so years. While it is still extremely painful, certain actions by them were not only extremely hurtful and immature, it was in a weird way what I needed. I know I'd have a harder time moving back if I still had their friendship. I've learned that I need to let go sometimes. Yes, it sucks to be "alone" but holding on to toxic friendships or stifling friendships are not healthy either. While my head gets it, my heart is still hurting. Still taking baby steps though....
Now for some other more random/fun things! Over the past couple of months I have gotten into doing the whole freebie and sampling thing. It's kind of addicting! I'll probably talk about it more in detail later, but I'm amazed at what companies will give out for free. The only problem is that now with all of the packing, it's just more "junk" to pack. Junk being my word for pretty much all of my things! LOL Another thing I got sucked into is subscription boxes. There are so many out there now! I like it because with the sub boxes and freebie/samples , it's like getting presents all of the time. I do think my mailman/mailwoman (I should just say mail carrier but it sounds too formal!) will be happy when I do finally move though! So that's it for my little update and I'm planning to start blogging more now that we have finally settled on a move date. I'm not making any promises this time as I don't want to break them ;)
In a conscious effort to blog regularly, I'm doing my own version of
Flashback Friday. I was inspired to do this by one of my favorite places
to hangout with friends here in Austin, The Highball and their Friday
night 80's Dance Party. The Highball is a retro inspired place, with
it's dark wood paneled walls, burgundy carpeting, booths in the ballroom
covered with glitter gold vinyl, it's a retro loving girl's fantasy. I
like to think that the Rat Pack would hang out here if given the
chance. It's not a club, but it has a huge dance floor that has vintage
style booths on one side and a large bandstand. They have all kinds of
themed dance parties and live bands that play regularly all throughout
the week. They also have a full service restaurant and bar in the middle,
with great food. The most awesome part is the other side and small
upstairs area. They have a vintage inspired bowling alley and karaoke
rooms. The karaoke rooms are my favorite. Depending on the size of
your group is the room you get and they are all themed. Some examples
are: a 70s disco complete with disco ball to a country and western room
with red gingham wall paper to a Tiki room, all to sing to your little
hearts content in private. But I digress.....the reason for this post.
I love 80s night, a regular Friday night occurrence, not only do they have awesome music, but they have a
big screen where they show the videos at the same time. As a child of
the 80s, I'm in Heaven! A huge group of people of all ages, dancing and singing along to awesome 80's music, dressing up 80's style is optional but definitely welcomed. From Cindy Lauper to Duran Duran to Run DMC, it brings back so many memories. Unfortunately, The Highball was recently torn
down in a remodeling effort with the Alamo Drafthouse Lamar and will not
be back for some months. This is my way of dealing with the
absence until it returns.
What is up with Rick
Springfield being everywhere today???? First he was on The View, then I
heard Jessie's Girl on the radio several times today and finally I was
watching silly videos on Cracked and they had one on Rick and Jessie's Girl. I've always found it interesting to hear the word moot in this song, or any song for that matter. Has it actually ever been used in any other song? Not any others that I've heard. I mean, who uses the word moot in a song? Why would you use the word moot in a song? What does it all mean in the context of the song? While most would use another word, Rick is just awesome enough to say screw it, I like the word moot, so gosh darn it I'm going to use it and the rest of you can screw off! Or at least that's what I like to imagine he said. Anyways, maybe it's a sign that he should be my first FF. Not that I'm
complaining. I love that guy. I remember first seeing that video when I
was in elementary school and thinking he's cute. Those smoldering eyes, that perfectly feathered hair and the ability to sing and play guitar had my 9 year old self swooning. (Yes my celebrity crushes
started young. Sad to say my first celebrity crush was at the age of
5. My heart belonged to Chachi, oh how I loathed Joanie! That however is for another post.) I still get
get excited when he occasionally pops back on General Hospital. Dr
Noah Drake, how the fans love you! He was actually in town last year on a
book tour, but I wasn't able to go :( One day I will meet you Rick
Springfield! Hopefully it will be soon as I don't know how much longer
you will still look good as you have gotten a bit too thin! So without
further ado, a favorite 80's video with a song to get stuck in your
head.
Random Trivia: Did you know he dated Linda Blair back in the day? Yes that Linda Blair, the head spinning possessed child in The Exorcist. She was 15 or 16 and he was 23. Her family approved and he even spent Christmas with them one year and stayed in their house. (I really need to stop watching VH1's Behind the Music and E!'s True Hollywood Stories.) Can you imagine an 20 something rocker dating an underage teenage star now?!?! People would freak, rail and rally. Can you imagine all of the bad press and paparazzi drama. They'd be TMZ superstars. I still find in a bit odd, even though they both are still good friends and were really in love back then.
When I started this blog I promised myself that I would have at least one post a week. Things became a bit hectic and here I am almost three months later finally posting. Life has a funny way of interrupting things.
Things were a little interesting in November. My birthday was the day before Thanksgiving this year, and mellow. Just how I liked it. I received some nice gifts, though my favorite was a Pop! figure of Daryl Dixon from a good friend. I'm a huge Norman Reedus fan and have been fortunate enough to meet him a couple of years ago. Such a cool guy. Thanksgiving was low key, thank goodness. Unfortunately we received some more bad news. While my grandfather is doing quite well, my uncle not so much. He got sick the Monday before Thanksgiving. They took him to the ER and had to run tests on some tumors they found. The following week we received the bad news. He has pancreatic cancer and they gave him 4-6 months. His health was fine until he was taken to the ER. Fortunately my dad lives with him and my aunt. My aunt T is my father's oldest sister and suffers from Alzheimer's. My dad has been living with them and helping out since he and my stepmother divorced a couple of years ago. It was decided that she shouldn't be told giving her memory, but she knows something isn't quite right. My dad's other sister came from Chicago right after New Year's to help out as well. I'm very fortunate to have a family that comes together when we need too. We might not always like each other or get along, but we love each other and are always there for each other. My uncle's illness has affect both sides of my family. I'm originally from a very small town (population 1000-1200 max) and families tend to intermarry (not within the family because that is just eww! Example: a brother from one family marries a girl from another. Later her younger sister marries her husband's younger brother). How it affects both is my dad's oldest sister married a man who one of my mom's cousins. If we lived in a bigger town/city we'd probably wouldn't see much of each other as so happens with distant s relations. Not so in a small town. I have such a huge extended family. I know a lot of my distant cousins, though as the older generations pass on and we move away, it's now more of an acquaintanceship. Sorry for the long winded explanation, just wanted to clarify! :D
Christmas was really good. Reconnected with my cousin Jessica. I'm an only child and growing up she was like my little sister, we were so close. After high school she made so many bad decisions and we drifted apart. She's finally gotten her life back together and I'm glad to have her back in my life again. I made sure to spend time with my uncle as this will be our last Christmas with him. I must say that he really inspires me. We go to visit often as we are still looking for a home there, and his attitude is always so upbeat. He has always been a very positive and upbeat person and that has not changed in the slightest. The only change is he tires so easily. Part of it is age, he's 78 , but most is the illness. When I get down or frustrated, I quickly put myself in check because if he can be positive, so can I.
Not much else going on. I plan to start posting pics of things I've been doing, buying etc. as I don't want this page to be a downer. I started it to just post about things I like, I'm into, I make, cool places I visit here in Austin, etc. I want to thank you three followers that I have. I thought after the first post, no one is going to read this, so I'm glad to see someone is! I meant this to be a mini update and started to ramble....sorry about that. They will be shorter and hopefully more interesting!
One thing I need to learn is patience. It has never been one of my strong points and Lord help me when I have kids. Now that we've settled on moving, we want it done now. Looking at homes and trying to get things settled takes time yet I want everything done yesterday. I think it's because I really dislike being in "limbo". Part of the problem is that the area where I'm from is changing rapidly. They have decided to drill for oil in the county and all of the surrounding towns are changing. Housing is getting harder to find due to prices increasing to take advantage of the oil workers due to demand and housing is scarce to begin with. I find it all so odd. Some of these towns are so small that there is only one stop light. Heck I remember when the stoplight was first installed when I was a kid and that was a BIG deal. Sadly I'm not joking, there is only one major stoplight in my mom's hometown and the town we're moving to has flashing yellow lights on the main intersection. Now roads are being expanded and hotels are springing up. In towns where the only place to eat out is the local Dairy Queen and a Mexican restaurant (that may or may not be owned by an extended family member), it's weird to see a La Quinta being built. Makes me want to take a video camera and start filming a new reality show. It could be a cross between Black Gold and The Simple Life with a little King of the Hill thrown in. I could call it Roughneck in the Country. Then again, maybe not...
On another note, I've meant to write a few more posts but I hurt my back. Up until Sunday I was stuck in bed, flat on my back where even breathing hurt. Thank goodness I can move again, there is only so much daytime TV and Netflix a person can take.
For the longest time people have suggested to me that I start a blog, though I'm not really sure why. I really don't think that my life is that interesting, actually it's pretty boring to be honest. I think it might have to do with my sense of humor. I had one co-worker/friend try to convince me to try stand up comedy. He was strongly rebuffed! What made me change my mind is in one word changes.
Many things have happened this past year that have accumulated into a life altering decision. The final one is my grandfather's health. After a long hard look at things, my mother and I have decided to move "back home". Since she had retired and I'm currently at a crossroads, we are doing something we swore we'd never do, move from Austin to a small Texas town. I've have lived here half my life, and almost all of my adult life (excepting that year after I graduated from college). Sometimes life has a funny way of throwing curve-balls. I should know better than to never say never because it always has a way of biting you in the arse . Moving from a large city to a town with about 1800 people is a big change.
This blog will be my little spot on the interwebs to laugh and hopefully laugh some more. I will say that this blog will be a little bit of this and a little bit of that in that I'm not setting out to write a "specific type" of blog. You will probably find everything from recipes to crafts to movie reviews to who knows what else. If people read it and enjoy it great. If no one reads it, well that would kind of suck but it's life and I'll get over it. In choosing a title for this blog, the first thing that came to mind was Alice in Wonderland for some odd reason. Given that when I was younger the "Big City" was like an odd Wonderland for me. It is a place I will greatly miss and dream of, but hopefully will one day return. So hear goes the start of something interesting...
