A Letter to Google

Dear Google,

Thank you for making it nearly impossible to have to come to Blogger for anything besides typing my thoughts and posting things.

Maybe it's my own laziness, but it's super nice to be able to catch up on what my favorite bloggers have been up to without truly leaving my iGoogle page. I can have my to-do lists, my barely used Twitter, and some random and inspirational quotes all on one page. You even provide me with a search engine to boot! Plus, if I were inclined to, I could check my Yahoo! mail on you as well.

However, you make it damn near impossible to want to go to Blogger for anything else. I can't make comments to my favorite posts from my Reader (unless I just haven't figured out how to) and I can't make a post from there. Most of what I wrote before came about because I had to come here to read my favorite people and saw how neglectful I really was to my blog.

You, dear Google, have made me a very neglectful Blogger. I know I shouldn't blame this on you, but had you not made an easy to use interface and a trustful Reader, then maybe this wouldn't have happened.

Sincerely,
Kate

just an update

I have much to update every one on, so here we go...

My grandmother's surgery was yesterday. My uncle has been e-mailing the family regarding her progress. The surgery itself lasted six hours and has been successful. We won't know how extensive it is until the next few days, but my parents and sister will be headed down to visit tomorrow. I am sending a card with them to let her know I'm thinking of her. I'm not sure how long they'll be gone, but they're going to help my uncle and aunt with the visitation and care. She was moved from the ICU to a regular room and has been asking to be taken on walks and wants to go quite frequently. It's safe to say she's doing well, but only time will tell how far the cancer has progressed. Thank you Lilu and For the Love of Pictures for keeping her in your prayers! :)

I ended up going to dinner tonight with a few of my friends from the barn I used to board at. One of our friends' birthdays was today, so it was nice to go out and celebrate with them. She chose Hooters, which I actually haven't been to very often. I ate a grilled chicken salad, which turned out to be very good. It was a fun evening, we talked about horses and burns, and there were many "that's what she said" moments. After dinner, I ran over to Border's because it was right across the street. I haven't been book-shopping in awhile, so I was like a kid in a candy store. The real reason I went was because I had wanted to read The Time Traveler's Wife. I also picked out an F My Life (I absolutely love that site) and a book entitled Waiter Rant. I'm excited to read all of them. I really want to see The Time Traveler's Wife, which is why I picked the book up in the first place.

We also went to see Brad Paisley last Friday night. The concert was an absolute blast, all three of the performers were amazing. Jimmy Wayne and Dierks Bentley opened the show. I've seen Brad but neither of the two openers, so it was fun watching them perform. Luckily, by the time the show began, the rain had stopped which was great. Afterward, we went out to Denny's and got to wait an hour for food. The Denny's we go to isn't very great when it's busy. They tend to forget things and burn poached eggs which is pretty damn near impossible.

I also am picking up a few extra shifts at work for good I hope. The downside is that it means I'll probably be working 6 days a week as well as having a 10 or 11 hour day once a week. I'll get paid what I do for pharmacy even though I'll be a cashier so it's all okay.

I believe that's it for tonight. I hope everyone is having a good week!

An Early Weekend Update

This weekend has already been slightly hectic, if you don't count Sunday as part of it. Which is to say, Friday and Saturday were hectic but today I slept until noon and spent the day watching an America's Next Top Model marathon and doing random computer things. I haven't even touched much of the laundry that needs to be done by Thursday, or my stupid tax thing from 2008 (the deal with that is I got a letter regarding something that didn't end up on my taxes last year, because I hadn't received a 1099 for it. So now, if I don't do the paperwork, I owe the government over 500 dollars.)

So, onto my lovely weekend.

Friday was insanely busy, what with the horse show I was competing in on Saturday. The show is just a warm-up show for next week, when I'm competing against the big guys. Basically, it's just a chance for me to get my horse into the show pen and fix the stuff that will prevent me from doing well next week, if that clarifies anything. It's a bit confusing, I suppose. Anyway, so Friday I went to the barn solely to spend money, since we ended up going to the tack store and I spent a lot of money for some show stuff. Which actually, is becoming my birthday present which means I'm getting refunded for a lot of it from my parental unit. After the barn, I drove back home to go to work for a few hours. Once work was done, I went back to the barn to ride and further get ready for the show. I spent the night there on Friday since we had to get up super early.

Saturday was even crazier. We woke up at 6:30, got to the show by 8. I did a few classes, one that I've just learned how to do so it was nice to get a chance to show in it before next week. The weather was absolutely gorgeous, a little warm. It ended up being 80 with no rain. No breeze either, which made it a LOT hotter to deal with. I didn't show until 4 pm after that, and ended up getting a first out of 16 horses which was great -- and I ended up making 21 dollars from it. I had to leave there at 5 to go to one of my friend's houses to shower and get ready to go to George Strait.

George Strait ended up being a blast. We got there surprisingly earlier, which is odd because with us, we're really running late. But we arrived about 30 minutes before the show even started so we had time to go to the bathroom and get drinks and find a place to sit since we had lawn. The concert ended up being pretty crowded. Julianne Hough and Blake Shelton opened up for him. Both acts were really good, Julianne can really SING and Blake is always fun to watch. He ended up singing that song from the Free Credit Report commercials which was hilarious. George was good, he only sang for an hour and 15 minutes but it was fun watching everyone dance to it. The older ladies a few people in front of us kept roping in the younger guys which was funny.

After George performed, we had heard that Julianne would be signing autographs at the concert. We ended up being the last few people in line and waited about a half hour. I never realized how short she is (she's my height) and she was really cool, super nice and everything. I'm pretty sure my friends all nearly wet their pants. And I'm pretty sure all I said was "my name is Kate." Couldn't think of anything good to say, lol. So we got autographs and a picture with her. From now on, I really need to remember my camera because everytime something like this happens, I don't have it with me.

Julianne Hough & I. It's not great quality
because it was taken on a camera phone..

Afterward, we stopped at the bathroom and then walked back to the truck, which was a lot easier to find since the parking lot was nearly totally empty. On the way out, we hear, "Goodbye C!" and we turn to see no other but Julianne in her car being driven out of the parking lot. (C, by the way, is one of my friends.) We all just about die, and yell good night in response. Definitely a great end to an amazing night.

After the concert, we headed to B-dub's (Buffalo Wild Wings) for some food after the concert, where I found out that eating boneless wings, even if they're only Parmesan Garlic, is not good with chapped lips. (Sad!) It's really hard ending a story involving meeting a celebrity, by the way. Because everything now seems so lame!

Anyways, it may be awhile - I have a busy week ahead of me and will be trying to get laundry done, the tax thing done, and have everything packed and ready by Thursday some time. So I will try to post again, but if not I'll be back June 9th (which also happens to be my birthday) with more tales of amazingness. We officially leave almost exactly 6 days from now, at 3 am or something equally ridiculously early in the morning. Now, it's time to get back to Hitch..

On Working Out

Whew.

I am hoping this gets easier as I go.

I'm speaking of my newfound goal of trying to work out a few times a week. I started swimming this past Monday (the 19th) after work. I'd forgotten how much I enjoy it, and I never seemed to be able to fit it in with my current schedule. But when there's a will, there's a way.

I really enjoy swimming. For being a cardiovascular workout, it really can be low-impact which is safer for my knee. I have a floating patella which means my knee cap isn't always in the right place and that can get pretty painful. When I was in high school and in an alternative gym class because of Marching Band, it used to be very troublesome. I was delegated to walking the track for 30 minutes three times a week because I wasn't really allowed to run. Besides, I don't run very well either but that's besides the point.

With swimming, I'm able to go as fast as I can and not kill my knee. I used to be on swim team when I was younger. I wish I'd kept that up, because I used to be able to swim more laps without getting as winded as I do now.

This is going to be an adventure, that's for sure. But I'm excited to try to keep up with this work out plan as much as possible. Currently, I plan on swimming two to three times a week and possibly doing weights an extra day per week but we'll see how that goes. I assume I will be in pain for most of the first few weeks of this!

On My Favorite Thing - Spending Money!

Let me just clear the air here... I LOVE shopping (not totally unusual I suppose, but I used to be the biggest tomboy and never enjoyed it much). For the most part. By that, I mean when I find items that are really cute and probably as inexpensive as possible thanks to my income. But luckily for me, there are places like Old Navy with affordable, cute pieces (my most recent adventure for a pair or two of jeans turned into a hundred-dollar affair, though I DID get quite a few things for that amount of money). There are also places like Burlington Coat Factory where I finally purchased my new winter coat for half off it's original $200 price tag.

I know, even HALF of $200 is a little more than half of my paychecks, but I decided that I was tired of having the same jacket I've had since oh, maybe 2004. Maybe even 2003, it was when I was still working at Build-a-Bear (that is an adventure of it's own!). What I figure when I'm shopping is if I wear it enough, it's worth whatever the cost is. I'm an avid watcher of What Not to Wear which is surprisingly useful. Even with not having been on the show.

But I'm quite excited about my new coat, I'll eventually have to take a picture. It's definitely cute!

Besides my Old Navy obsession, I also LOVE book shopping. There's nothing better then coming home with a new find. Or an old find, since I've recently begun reading the Harry Potter series. I'd never read it and figured it's about time to see what the hullabaloo was about (that word totally does not get used nearly enough!). So far so good, I'm on to book number three and enjoying myself so far. Once I get into a book, it's hard for me to put it down without finishing it entirely. It was the same with the Twilight series too. (I am an out of the closest book nerd if you've not been able to tell!)

Now that I'm rambling, I believe it's time for bed. Work comes too early on Sundays!

Making (and Keeping) a Schedule.

I finally set up a proper g-mail account for myself. I've been debating but I had heard of their calendar and their e-mail being really good so I figured I'd give it a shot. Mostly for their calendar.

As I set that up today, I began to realize how busy this semester of college is going to be. Even without really having a full class load, I have work 6 days a week, between two different locations for pharmacy technician, and yet another job in which I work one night a week. I am also trying to exercise a little bit more because I am out of shape. Terribly out of shape. Plus the time I need for homework and my online class, not to forget about the time I need to take care of my horse. After looking at this calendar, it seems every block of time is used for school, work, homework, or taking care of my horse which in itself sometimes feels like a full time job.

I begun to realize though that if I have a set schedule like this, I'm either going to blow it all off or I will follow it and things will go smoothly. As smoothly as they possibly can at least. I've figured that I don't even have to be up before 10 on most days. Which is relatively lucky. Or even if I feel the need to, I can work out in the mornings and be done by 9 at night. In either case, I've got some options even with this schedule I'm setting for myself.

I hope I can stick to this calendar. Because before it was hard seeing when I could fit everything in, but now that it's all laid out... Maybe it will make everything easier!

With New Year's being a week ago, it's been sort of nice to take an introspective look as to what I would change and how I could better myself as a person. I feel there's only one thing consistent as people, and that's the ability to change. It doesn't matter if you feel there's nothing TO be changed because it's inevitable. You may not even notice it happening, it just does its thing and a year or even a month later you sit and realize how differently you've looked at things before.

I like change. I like the fact that even though we think we stop growing up at a certain point, it turns out we really don't. Who I am today may not be who I am a year for now, I know for certain a year ago this time I didn't know where I would be at as far as life goes. No one can really predict this kind of stuff.

Just six or seven months ago I was eager to trade my life in for a whole new one. As off-base as I was, I thought that with who I'd met was going to turn out to be special. Boy, was I wrong! What really blows my mind about it was how certain I was that it was my ticket out of here. Instead, I wasted several months on somebody who wasn't real, on somebody I put on a pedestal. Inadvertently, I too became a different person because of him. Because of an idea, really.

I bring this up because I feel that in the past few months I've become myself again, with an added bonus of a thicker skin and being a bit less naive. Changing yourself to be what someone else wants just seems so pointless now, it may be the one thing I possibly regret (I feel that in regretting anything makes it seem like you've made a mistake, however mistakes you learn from and therefore can better you as person). The one upside to it all is that I realized just how much I would lose in order to change my life. For one person.. idea.. whatever you'd want to call it.

What is my point? I've seemed to, per usual, rambled on and lost where I was headed in this whole thing.

I guess we just never cease growing up which is beneficial because everything around us is always changing, it just takes a bit more to see the change in ourselves.


"The more things change, the more they stay the same. I'm not sure who the first person was who said that. Probably Shakespeare. Or maybe Sting. But at the moment, it's the sentence that best explains my tragic flaw, my inability to change. I don't think I'm alone in this. The more I get to know other people, the more I realize it's kind of everyone's flaw. Staying exactly the same for as long as possible, standing perfectly still... It feels safer somehow. And if you are suffering, at least the pain is familiar. Because if you took that leap of faith, went outside the box, did something unexpected... Who knows what other pain might be out there, waiting for you. Chances are it could be even worse. So you maintain the status quo. Choose the road already traveled and it doesn't seem that bad. Not as far as flaws go. You're not a drug addict. You're not killing anyone... Except maybe yourself a little. When we finally do change, I don't think it happens like an earthquake or an explosion, where all of a sudden we're like this different person. I think it's smaller than that. The kind of thing most people wouldn't even notice unless they looked at us really close. Which, thank God, they never do. But you notice it. Inside you that change feels like a world of difference. And you hope this is it. This is the person you get to be forever... that you'll never have to change again." - Everwood.

Time Goes By Way Too Quickly...

I can't believe another year has gone by already. This one seemed to fly by faster than it feels like it should have. Perhaps a steady job and everything I have going on makes it go that much quicker.

Looking back on this past year, I believe I've grown up a little bit more. At least, you'd hope that be the case - every mistake and every "win" is a growing experience. You never really stop changing, sometimes it just happens out of nowhere like a light bulb going off. And sometimes you just look back and see how differently you would act in a situation had it been today instead of yesterday.

I guess that could be taken as a blessing or as a downfall. Change seems to happen so rapidly that it could either be detrimental or positive. However, surrounded by the right circumstances, even a detrimental change has the possibility to become more shaping than the change that happens through a blessing.

So would the detrimental parts be considered an opportunity for more change?

I guess, again.. it's all in how you look at it...

I'm Just Not Good Enough

One of my biggest fears is manifesting itself now in the sense of just not living up to certain standards, some of which I impose on myself unnecessarily. My own brand of a pessimistic outlook, my friends...

I'm just not good enough.

I'm not really positive Pharmacy is the right path for me any more. I think I may have made a mistake, because it seems like I can't even handle being a technician. What am I going to do when all the responsibility is on ME? Then I really can't hide anymore. Everything would fall on me, and what if I'm not good enough then? What if I'm never really good enough at anything? What do I do then?

If not Pharmacy, what the hell am I supposed to do with my life? I've already spent enough time and money in college, and I haven't gone much further than junior college. True, there have been some on and off years and now I'm limited to taking only a few courses a semester because I have to work nearly full time as well to pay for the things I need and want.

I just need to work harder, I guess.

I don't want to be just a face in the crowd. I want to be somebody.

I wish the career outlook was the only place I feel inadequate about. Unfortunately, that's not the case. I don't want to be this 24 year old living in my parent's house, still attending junior college, still not clear about the future. By this point, I had hoped to find myself. Looks like I have some work to do there too.

On Being Busy

Sorry for the lack of update as of late, school and work has been keeping me incredibly busy lately. And for once, I'm putting school above most everything.

Classes are going well, I'm looking forward to Winter Break for obvious reasons. I'm taking a mini-vacation the weekend before Thanksgiving (if you can call a horse show a vacation, which I do being that it's a weekend I won't have to work and I'll be able to hopefully have some sort of fun. Success too. Yes, having a successful weekend would be extremely nice too). And the weekend of Thanksgiving, I plan on attending a horse show to be a spectator (10 bucks says I get put to work on that one). I digress. I am enjoying my pre-Calculus class, because for some reason, math classes make me feel brilliant sometimes. It's one class I finally don't have to work extremely hard at to understand, though I've found that as I get closer to Calculus, a little bit of studying does go a long way as far as tests go. We had a quiz today in which I completely blanked on something I knew, and Tuesday we have a test. Which means that besides the time I am at work or celebrating tomorrow's (today's) "holiday," I will be attempting to do some homework for class.

Work.. hmm.. I'm still teaching one night a week at the horse stable, which has its benefits. I am finally out of debt there (moving my horse played a giant role in this) and now actually receive a monthly check. I can not wait to receive this month's check, as I know it will be good and will help me out for that vacation of mine. As far as the pharmacy gig is going, I'm still attempting to get more pharmacy tech hours. Working up front as a cashier is fun, great, and has its benefits (getting paid mostly) but I want the experience of working in a pharmacy. There MAY be an opening to work full time back in the pharmacy, but I am still crossing my fingers that it will work out.

I can't wait for my mini "vacation."

Trying to find my way

It's been quite some time since I've written anything, so this should be interesting. I just need an outlet to what I think and feel and this is probably the best way to find that release. I'm just trying to find myself, and I think maybe writing down what I think, know, and feel may just be something to help someone along too.

I'm interested in going to pharmacy school. Currently I am working on my general education requirements, which has been a 6 year process so far. Maybe it's a little less given half the time I didn't even complete all of my classes. Part of me feels I'm never going to get past this point. This halfway stage of what I want to do. Part of me also feels like once I do get this all done, I will never be able to be accepted into a pharmacy school because my GPA just isn't what it should be. These classes should have taken 3 years at the most to do but I'm still wasting my time on everything but. Maybe my fear of rejection is silently making its presence known. I am a bit scared about not making it in, but I'm tired of that being the reason why I'm not getting anywhere in my life.

I've always thought I was a good person. I have my flaws, but sometimes flaws make a person beautiful. I truly think that the most perfect people are the ones who let their flaws be heard and aren't ashamed to truly be who they are. I am a bit soft-spoken and don't let myself shine sometimes. It's been a long battle because I was always picked on a little more when I was growing up, about being overweight, being shy, and being into things that just weren't considered "cool." These days I'm learning those quirks make me who I am, and I wouldn't change that for the world. What I would like to change is how other people see me. I've been told I'm too emotional, too shy, and sometimes that all affects me more than I should let it. Finding that balance of how to accept the fact that not everyone is going to like me seems to be my current challenge.

I feel like through all of this emotional stuff I am managing to push away the first person to ever care about me in a way more than just friends. Instead of letting things be, I manage to push that button until it self-destructs. Instead of being the person he got to know and like, I turn into some raging bitch. Maybe the ultimate fear of rejection is playing its role in this as well. Maybe I'm just putting too much thought into it. But somewhere I lost the fun aspect of it and started making myself seem like a pain in the ass, which I know never works. All I know is I don't want to give him a reason to give up on me and if I could change some things, I would. But what doesn't kill me makes me stronger, so maybe if I can just go back to the fun person instead of letting everything bother me, I can fix this.

But in all honestly, one of my favorite things about myself is my ability to adapt. I will make an attempt to change for the better because I know life is about constantly changing. My biggest challenge is finding a way to not totally lose myself in the process, and to also not to alienate those around me. I know what I want in my life, and I'm determined to get it. Maybe someday I'll look back on this and say, "who was that girl?" Maybe I'll look back and wonder what I was thinking. But I sure as hell don't want to be sitting here five years from now wondering what if, what could have been, and what I would be doing now if things were different.

Sorry that got so long... I've had a lot on my mind and it feels super good to get it off my chest. Till next time!