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Monday’s a BITCH!

Monday, June 25th, 2007

And now for my favorite…Monday’s a Bitch!

This week’s color: Purple

1. What did you think of the Tinky Winky controversy? Leave the fags alone!

2. What was the last thing you heard through the grape vine? Micheal’s going bankrupt!

3. Who do you want to see laughing in the purple rain? Isn’t Tinky Winky already splashing through the puddles?

4. What is Grimace? Up until I was 10, I assumed he was a chicken nugget that fell into a few thousand purple pens that had exploaded. Now I just consider him that dude who does the commercial with the other dude.

5. If you had a one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eater,who would you feed to it? Well…if Grimace IS actually a chicken nugget….

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Posted in Memes | Comments Closed

Wiping debt clean…

Monday, June 25th, 2007

I recently found out that my father had to take out a loan just to take care of his credit card debt. He had about 3 cards and after coming across a low interest credit card he transferred all three cards to one, began payments and then found himself taking out a loan just so he could pay it all off on one shot. Naturally I wouldn’t recommend doing this unless you absolutely have to but thanks to my mother’s love for QVC and everything HOME SHOPPING, he’s spent the last 10 years paying off close to $40,000 in credit card debts. He’s now debt free, in regards to his cards, and working on paying back the loan that he took out. By transferring all of his funds to a low-interest credit card, he actually found out that his credit score had improved. He’s now got a credit score above 760 and couldn’t be happier. His interest rates dropped, his financial standings, as a whole, have improved and he just seems like a happier person in general.

I learned a lot about credit cards from him, which is why I don’t see myself getting one anytime soon. Unless I need one for absolute emergencies then there’s really no point in spending money that I just don’t have. I understand that everyone’s situation is different and I’m, by no means, saying that you’re a complete moron if you’re depending on other’s money in order to get through daily life. However, I do strongly believe that if you can maintain a proper bank account, you won’t need to worry about going to an outside source for funding.

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Posted in Family, PPP | Comments Closed

Monday Madness – Week #2

Monday, June 25th, 2007

It’s time again for Monday Madness!

1. How many times a month/year do you see the sunrise? I try to get out about twice a month, conflicting schedules have stopped me though. While I do see the sky gradually getting brighter in the morning, I haven’t gotten around to the beach to see it first hand.

2. How many times a week/month do you see the sunset? I typically see it every night, I do spend a lot of time outside.

3. Do you go out at night and “gaze” at the stars? Doesn’t everyone do this?

4. Do you ever look for star clusters, such as the big dipper, etc? I know the placement of all of them by heart. My grandfather has been into astronomy for years, he passed a lot down to me.

5. Do you look for planets at night (with or without a telescope)? Those are easy to find without the telescope, trust me.

6. Are you able to see the northern lights where you live? If so, about how often do they come around? No, I don’t but I’d absolutely LOVE to see them.

7. Do you like going outside during a thunderstorm and watching the lightening? Again, who doesn’t do this?

8. Do you have any really neat weather pictures? PLEASE, feel free to share them! I wish I did. I’ve spent so much time outside with my camera waiting for excellent pictures to kind of fall in my lap. You can only snap so many pictures of birds hiding under cars before it gets too boring…heh.

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Posted in Memes | 1 Comment »

Resources: Calorie Counter

Monday, June 25th, 2007

Anyone on a diet knows how hard it is to find free resources to make your weight loss easier. With all of the high-priced programs out there, the last thing you want to do is spend even more money just to find out quick information about your progress, free of charge. One of the links that I’ve had on my resources list for quite some time is a free calorie counter that helps you figure out just what you’re doing throughout the day – without having to calculate points or figure out some huge math equation just so you know what you ate today. I don’t care how someone figured out that 15 mini pretzels is 1 point on weight watchers, I also don’t care to decode all of the mumbo-jumbo that had them come to this conclusion. Naturally I’m going to look for other resources that will work just fine for me, thankfully myfitnesspal.com is a 100% free no credit card required resource to help you move a long a bit further.

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Posted in Dieting, Smorty | Comments Closed

Lots to do, no time to do it!

Monday, June 25th, 2007

Today didn’t really go over as well as I’d originally hoped. I stayed up a lot later than I thought I would, I finally crashed around 10:30 or so and then woke up around 3pm this afternoon to Sean climbing into bed. My alarm had been going off for quite some time, I didn’t even bother to get up to turn it off. The problem with using music behind an alarm is you can kind of ‘rock yourself’ back to sleep. When it comes to the buzzer however, you want to get up and turn it off because of how annoying it is. I think I’m going to have to start taking that route because I didn’t officially roll out of bed until about 5pm this afternoon, 3 hours later than I’d planned.

Before I went to sleep last night I wrote myself a huge list of things to do over the course of the next few days, I wanted to have all of this done by tomorrow night but I’m unsure if it’s actually going to happen. Karen’s sister is possibly going to be down for a visit from EARLY Thursday morning to possibly Monday afternoon, naturally I want to clean up a bit. She ALSO may have an extra guest on Saturday night and since her friend has never been down here before, a pig-sty is a horrible first impression.

CLEAN

  • Bedroom – Wash all sheets, do laundry, vacuum carpet, fold clean clothes.
  • Bathroom – Scrub toilet, tub, sink and floor.
  • Laundry Room – Straighten up, throw out all garbage, make it look less like a junk room. ORGANIZE SHELVES!
  • Kitchen – Wash all pots and pans, wipe down all counters, clean off island.
  • Dining Room – Clear off table and shelving of unnecessary crap.
  • Living Room – Vacuum, straighten up, wipe down coffee table of coffee rings.
  • Porch – Sweep, send all donations to the Salvation Army.
  • Office – Vacuum and straighten up, can’t work in filth much longer.

So yea, I have quite a bit of work cut out for me over the next 48 hours. I just know that the dogs are going to make life very difficult. Princess loves to crap on the floor and completely MISS wee-wee pads considering how long she is. Candy more than likely can’t hear the vacuum coming up behind her and she’s so skiddish that you feel mean for even lightly tapping her just to make you aware that you’re there. I’m just praying the poor thing doesn’t have a heart attack. And Bella, so freaking precious Bella, loves to eat toilet paper rolls so 10 minutes after a rug has been vacuumed, you have to take a second run to pick up all the little pieces of paper.

Hopefully Sean will help me out, not counting on it though. His sleep schedule is even more messed up than mine!

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Posted in Boyfriend, Daily, Stressed | Comments Closed

Keynotes

Monday, June 25th, 2007

I’m not sure why but lately I’ve seen a rise in Keynote and Entertainment speakers. For the past few months I’ve been doing some work here and there for Dick whom keynotes for businesses that what to use new media like blogs, podcasting and wikis to inform customers. I’ve actually spent quite a bit of time thumbing through his blog because he’s consistent with having an entertaining blog to keep you interested.

Up until recently, however, I had absolutely no idea what exactly a Keynote was. Based on my trusty wiki I found out that it’s a motivational speaker and the keynote is the one who kind of tells the stories behind the main speaker. I’m unsure if that’s the case, I’m sure Dick will tell me where I went wrong. But I’m basing it on the following:

A keynote in literature, music or public speaking is the principal underlying theme of a larger idea — a literary story, an individual musical piece or event. At political or industrial conventions and expositions and at academic conferences, the keynote address or keynote speech is delivered to set the underlying tone and summarize the core message or most important revelation of the event.

But, moving along. There’s a site called internationalspeakers.com that provides motivational public speakers, primarily for business. Their goal is to inspire and educate people in the corporate environment. They claim that with a celebrity speaker from their company, you can be sure that you get the attention of your employees. They give you access to successful public figures and all of them provide great programs that can be used to customize your needs. So if you’re in the market for someone to give your employee’s a stern talking to – more than likely this will be a resource that you keep in mind.

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Posted in PPP | Comments Closed

Accepting it still doesn’t make me happy

Monday, June 25th, 2007

For many years now, my grandmother has been having some serious trouble with her legs. So much so that she finds going up and down the stairs, let alone walking in general, to be nothing more than excruciating pain. A few months ago my aunt decided to call a company that designs custom stairlifts for all kinds of homes. She has one that leads to the basement so it’s easier for her to get her laundry done. My grandfather helps out as much as he can but at the moment he’s not only dealing with prostate cancer but he’s had horrible knees for as long as I can remember. They both use the stairlifts on almost a daily basis just so they can keep the house maintained. I know relatives go over to help out but when you’re closest form of help is a phone call and about 15 minutes away, anything can happen.

When it comes to the main floor of the house she alternates between her cane and her wheelchair. She’s completely capable of walking around, it’s just that if she does it too long she winds up in quite a bit of pain. Her frustration now-a-days is the fact that she’s now also dealing with arthritis. For many years she’s knitted, sewed and done everything you would expect an Italian grandmother to do. Now she’s unable to hold the needles, or even thread a spool onto her sewing machine in order to get anything accomplished, yet again she’s looked towards outside help.

Her leg problems started many years ago, she’s always had bad ankles and even with surgery to attempt to fix her problems, it only made them worse. The surgeon managed to cut into a nerve that has destroyed all possibility for a full recovery. She’s dealing with a lawsuit on top of the fact that she’s worse now than she’s ever been before, and it ticks me off to no end that this doctor claims he had nothing to do with it.

My grandfather just recently came to find out that he has prostate cancer. His prostate is so enlarged that they can’t even really begin proper cancer treatment on him. They’re giving him some kind of medication to shrink his prostate and then they’re going to work on the kemo and everything else that he would need in order to get himself all ‘fixed up’ as he puts it. Either way I know he’s in a lot of pain, who knows how much more he’ll be able to stand.

The topic of my grandparents is slowly taking it’s toll on me. I realize that they’re not going to be around for much longer and while they have all the help in the world, that still doesn’t cut down the chance that one or both of them may no longer be with us tomorrow.

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Posted in Family, Smorty | 4 Comments »

Keeping myself busy … without much to do.

Monday, June 25th, 2007

I’ve been keeping myself busy by playing around with a few new templates for blog-ideas.net. I’m waiting, rather patiently at this point, for Sean to get started on the back end so I can launch the site. It’s been over a month, it’s basically completed and I absolutely hate being delayed!

I was considering setting up WordPressMU on the site and offering blogs to users looking to get their hands on something different. However, I doubt that would take off to where I’d like it to go. With WordPress powering their own off spring of WordPress.com, and Typekey running both Movable Type and LifeJournal – there’s really no room for a smaller site coming up for more blogs to be thrown on. The problem really is that everyone and their mother has a blog and some people like to sign up on free blog sites just to hold onto the username. I think that sucks, honestly. I’d setup rules where if you don’t post at least 3 entries within the first month – you’re booted and lose the name. I know personal issues can get in the way of some people actually using their sites but there are usernames on Livejournal that I’ve been interested in for YEARS and the owners haven’t touched their account since as early as 2001, it’s kind of unfair to the rest of the community – you know?

I also threw up a new template on curvy-chick.net, I know it’s my third one in like two weeks but I got sick of all the blue that I’m surrounded by these days. It’s bad enough I’m stuck on blue sheets until I can buy a new set for the bedroom. I don’t need it all over my websites as well. I changed it to a pink/gray format and while it looks like complete crap and will more than likely be scrapped for one of the blog-ideas.net freebie templates, at least the blue is gone. I just like using completely CSS based templates as well. Imageless is always the simplest way to go.

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Posted in Blog Ideas, Curvy-Chick, Sitely | 2 Comments »

Backgammon Masters have some interesting news!

Monday, June 25th, 2007

PPPA quick update for my favorite people over at backgammonmasters.com. Recently they’ve added Poker to their database. You can now play for real money. To celebrate this real money launch, they’re offering games with no house commission for a limited time. Ever since their launch, they’ve been gaining popularity with the online backgammon community, I myself am an avid player of the game online.

Now, poker fans will be able to login and play up to three game tables at a time which would overall increase their game activity and experience. Players can also play in no charge fun mode so that you don’t have to be at risk for losing any money when you go up against the professionals. For years now I’ve been playing online around Yahoo or any other site that just seems to have the game featured online, now I’m going primarily through them for all of my online gaming and I couldn’t be happier. The reason they’re gaining popularity with the online backgammon community is because of their graphically rich playing environment complete with realistic 3D avatars and sound…makes you feel as though you’re actually in the game.

For the past few weeks Sean has been playing a lot of Chess on Yahoo, little does he know that on my side of the room I’ve been fiddling around with my backgammon boards and beating the pants off anyone who comes near me. I rule like that, don’t I? He’s asked on a few occasions why we don’t personally have a backgammon board because he’d gladly play with me, the problem is he’s a pain to teach anything to, he wants to learn but I can’t even get him to put the seat down, how could I have the patience to teach him how to play? I’m sure something will work out eventually. For now, however, he has his chess and I have my backgammon!

Check out backgammonmasters.com, let’s play!

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Posted in Boyfriend, Gadgets, PPP | Comments Closed

Your advice would be greatly appreciated.

Monday, June 25th, 2007

I have a plan of action behind everything that’s been going on over the course of the last few weeks. I know for sure that I’m going to AIU Online to get my Bachelors, I also know that instead of spending $19,000 at AIU to get the Associates required for the Bachelors, I’m just going to go to Penn Foster so that’s all taken care of sooner than later. I know I need $850 a semester for Penn Foster and the AIU Online based schooling is going to cost me in the area of $32,000 – this is why you’ve seen me posting so frequently with paid posts. I have multiple domains running on paid posting now and hope to have a few more over the course of the next couple of months, once I can get those stats up at least. From there I’m also going to be continuing with design work, working on getting scholarships and then basically anything else I can get my hands on and place in the bank.

My question is for those whom have actually received scholarships, so listen up heh.

When you get a scholarship and the check is cashed and sitting in your bank account – is there a time limit that you have before the scholarship is null and void or could you leave it there until you have full funding ready for tuition? Say that you have a $15,000 scholarship, it’s rare – I know – but work with me here. You cash the check to your bank account and then you have it sitting there until you can get the remaining $17,000 balance towards the full tuition. Is there a set time frame for actually spending the money OR once it’s yours – it’s yours?

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Posted in Discussion, School | 2 Comments »

The media has more influence than I thought…

Sunday, June 24th, 2007

While many people may not realize it, cosmetic surgery isn’t just limited to beverly hills breast reduction. Sure, los angeles liposuction is extremely popular as well but the one thing that was new to me is the ethnic plastic surgery. Yes, I know it seems a little odd but face it, all of the plastic surgery stories you’d see on television are primarily just rich white women looking to improve something that doesn’t even need to be touched.

I was taken back by seeing this link, as odd as that may sound, but typically when I think ethnic I think of a black woman proud to be exactly what she is and how she is. In New York, going into stores like Dots or Rainbow you see a lot of very proud black women who aren’t complaining about being in the plus-sized section of the store, hell – them embrace it. Watching television you see influences like Monique showing off just how proud she is to be a big beautiful woman. So naturally when I hear something in regards to an ethnic woman looking to have a breast reduction, nose job, tummy tuck or all of the above, it just seems out of the norm for me.

I just still believe it’s a shame that no matter how much money you have – you can’t just be happy with who you are. I also see that in a few different ways though. Yes, I’m working on losing weight but it’s based on the fact that I’m unhappy with where I am, it’s also a health related issue. Just because you have a little extra fat on your body doesn’t mean you’re morbidly obese and should go under the knife. Someone, like myself, who’s 100lbs overweight, naturally I’m going to fix it the proper way first without depending upon a surgeon to step in, especially at what these men and women charge to slice you with all kinds of needles and knives just to fix something that can easily be adjusted without going through the pain.

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Posted in SR | Comments Closed

Oh so very lucky!

Sunday, June 24th, 2007

I think I got lucky but I’m unsure of just how long this luck will be here. I checked with Microcenter hoping that maybe they would just have the monitor back in stock. I FOUND IT!. So now all I need to do is shift some funding around and then order it once I’m in the clear on other bills. I just hope this actually stays here for the next couple of weeks so I can get to it. I found another graphics card that may work out better for me so I’ve been considering changing that around as well. Instead of the one I listed previously, I think that this is the route I’m going to take. I basically just need to get about $300 together over the next couple of days. It shouldn’t be too hard considering I have some business coming in. I just need to keep my ass in gear.

I also have to put the rest of all incoming cash towards Birthday gifts, I know I should be getting this first BUT I’m not going up to New York for a couple more weeks because of car issues and schedule conflicts. Either way everyone is taken care of, and I’ve spoiled myself.

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Posted in Gadgets | Comments Closed

A rather uncomfortable conversation

Sunday, June 24th, 2007

I have no doubt in my mind that this is a topic that most people dread to even think about but what some people don’t realize is the importance behind having some kind of a life insurance policy. It doesn’t matter how young or old you are, anything could happen to you between right now and tomorrow that is 100% life changing. A few years back I looked into Affordable Life Insurance Quotes and did manage to get myself onto a plan where I pay a small amount of money each month to buy into my current $30,000 plan, naturally over the years this number will go up but I also know for sure that if something where to, god forbid, happen to me I know that my family is taken care of. Even if it’s only enough to cover funeral expenses, pay off an outstanding balance and cover any hospital fees – I know that nothing is going to be taken out of their own pockets for this.

My father has a life insurance policy, somewhere in the $80,000 range. He has one out on both my sister and myself. He’s also fully paid for his entire funeral, a conversation that I did not wish to have with the man considering we were at the breakfast table. This is a conversation that could at least have waited a few more hours so I didn’t dwell on it for the entire day, most parents don’t seem to understand that concept. His theory, however, “It doesn’t matter how or when I die, I don’t care what kind of a box I’m in or where I’m buried. Don’t say ‘he would have liked that’, I’m dead – I don’t care what things look like!” I was taken back by this, but I can understand where he’s coming from. Some people treat funerals as though they were weddings where they go crazy with flowers, music, dressing things up that don’t really need any dressing up. My father, being so set in his ways, would be happy in a pine box in the back yard with a few chairs setup. Naturally this isn’t how it’s going to happen but again – he’s dead, he doesn’t care anyway. God I hated that conversation with him.

But anyway, back to my original point. Having a life insurance policy could be good for all of those involved. It shows that you’re fully accepting the fact that you’re moving on and not leaving excess weight on the shoulders of your loved-ones after you pass on. My father claims he did it to prove that he can and will do anything for his girls, and considering I’ve taken a policy out on myself, as well, I know that I’m also going to be doing it for my loved ones.

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Posted in Discussion, Family, PPP | 2 Comments »

Publically answering emails…April feel’s special.

Sunday, June 24th, 2007

I got an email from my friend April asking what Graphics Card I’m going with when I start upgrading everything. I’ve decided to stay in the $115 range and the one I came across in that range ( that Sean claims is fairly decent ) is the Diamond Radeon X1650 Pro / 512MB GDDR2 / PCI Express / Dual DVI / HDTV / CrossFire Ready / Video Card the one I was considering earlier was in the $400 range but that’s because it’s a NVIDIA card and I’ve worked primarily with them over the years. Either way I’m almost positive that this is where I’m going to end up going. For now I’ll stick with poking through Tiger Direct, but I’m sure other resources will show up with time, I need to get some other purchases taken care of first.

As for the monitor, I’m still searching for it. April also recommended that I just go back to where I bought the first one. I then asked her if she really thought I was that stupid for not looking there FIRST. Microcenter no longer has the 17″ X2Gen monitor. Now they only have a 15″ in silver and a 19″ wide screen. They’ve told me that they no longer carry the 17″ so naturally I’m stuck in a hole at this point. I can either buy two of the exact same ones from another source and just give this one to Sean or I can spend only $150 on ONE and get the one I’m looking for. Either way I’m spending more time searching than I feel I should. Why couldn’t I have just been smart and bought both of them in the beginning? :ugh:

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Posted in Friends, Gadgets, Stressed | Comments Closed

I’d love to live here!

Sunday, June 24th, 2007

Hawiian Beach Rentals - Cove For many years I’ve wondered just what it would take for me to get to Hawaii. I believe the entire state is gorgeous and couldn’t understand why people could find frustration with the palm trees, clean sandy beaches and gorgeous blue water, minus the fact that a few sun-burns are forming at this very moment. For many years I’ve been interested in learning more about Hawaiian Beach Rentals because I would truly love to spend some much needed R&R on their gorgeous chunk of land. The homes are beautiful, the cultures down there are a whole mix of beauty that only locals can seem to understand and even from there.

As you can tell by the image above, the place is nothing more than spectacular, with a view like this – how could you NOT find something to love about Hawaii. I looked into some pricing on the big island hawaii luxury homes and while I find them to be a tad bit on the expensive side, I also know that if I did actually have that kind of money, I’d be there in a heart beat.

So you tell me, if you had the money to live in Hawaii and were only basing it on the image above – would you?

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Posted in Discussion, LL | 2 Comments »

Gamerz Discuss!

Sunday, June 24th, 2007

There are few gadgets in life that I can’t go a single day without using. Naturally my computer and the ever-so-lovely coffee maker in the kitchen will rank very highly on my list. For Valentines day Sean bought me a pink Nintendo DS. With he it got me Brain Age and since then I’ve loaded up on games like Big Brain Academy and Super Mario Brothers. Recently I bought “Magical Star Sign” which is an RPG but since the packaging was so cute, I figured I’d give it a shot. Unfortunately I don’t have six hours to get through the initial monologue, something I wasn’t aware of. This is more than likely the reason I’ve never played RPG games, I know that Jenny is into them, maybe if she has a DS I’ll treat her with an early Christmas gift…lol.

So today I realized that I’m strangely addicted to my Mario game, naturally this is because it’s the only actual GAME that I own considering the other two are mainly based on having to think. I consider myself old school and the original Nintendo controller is what I’d prefer over the bulky XBox360 and Playstation2 controllers, I was unaware of the fact that they vibrate and literally wound up throwing one across the room out of complete and total fear of what had just happened to me.

So, now finally getting to a point (I swear, there really is one). Who owns a Nintendo DS? What games do you play religiously? What game would you recommend that I play? I need ideas people, Mario is getting boring, no matter how much I’m in love with the little Ginny and his trusty green sidekick.

Discuss!

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Posted in Boyfriend, Gadgets | 2 Comments »

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