So last night, a co-worker calls and says "Chris I am picking my son up at the air port tomorrow evening. I work 4-12, can you work 8-midnight so I can pick him up?" I so wanted to come up with some BS excuse why I couldn't work for him, but then I remembered, Lex and I had planned on going roller skating together tonight. I promised her we would do that, so I actually didn't have to come up with some excuse. I was like "this weekend doesn't work for me, I promised Ally I would take her roller skating tomorrow night."
So tonight at the roller skating rink, it was interesting. 1) i really need to get my own skates again, because A) my skates are size 9's and apparently I havent been that size for about 3-5 years now. and B) the skates at the roller rink suck really bad. I think the time I had while we were skating would have been a little bit better if I had skates that fit really well. I want to get Ally and Zoe into things like skating and bowling so that we can do those things together for quality time. So the skating schedule goes on friday night, 7-11:30, saturday night, 7pm to 11:30, sunday, 2-4 or something like that. I guess there are matinee times also for saturday such as 2-4. I don't think I want to go to the late saturday night one again because there were nothing but young middle school kids, half of them paid the $6 and then didnt skate, but instead were out on the skating floor just dancing and taking up space. It's like "seriously? Get the hell off the floor if you're not going to skate!" I used to skate at a rink that was really big and really awesome, and we danced but we danced while we were skating around. Everyong skated the same direction, and the rink was good size, so it wasn't like you were too crowded. I want to find a skating rink like that again. Those were good times.
Skating doesn't have to be mostly young kids like this place had. The skating rink I went to when I was younger (skate land), had not just young kids, but older teens and even adults out there skating. It was big enough and had enough to do that it was fun for the whole family. At the rink tonight, with their skates I used, it was an effort to keep my feet straight because these skates were all lose or something and wanted to keep turning. I know how to skate backwards, but I was afraid to attempt it tonight for fear of wiping out really badly because of my skate trying to turn or something.
There were things that I realized would change the skating experience at the place we went to tonight. 1) when we have our own skates that are good quality, fit well, etc, and if there was more room to skate without having huge crowds on the floor just standing there dancing, that'd improve things. When the crowd of dancing kids got smaller for a little while and I could actually go on a straight away for a minute or two and then turn and go the other direction, I actually started enjoying myself. When the amount of space shrank and it felt like I was just constantly going in a circle, my feet started killing me.
All in all, even though it was way too crowded, and such, I enjoyed it because I was out having a father daughter bonding night with Lex. I would have loved to leave after 30 minutes of the 4.5 hours, but I held out until lex wanted to go because I wanted her to have a good time. So, to focus on the positive, it was a fairly fun activity that Ally and i got to do together, and that we will try to work on. I asked the owner if it is less chaotic on sunday afternoons and she said it's a lot nicer. So next weekend we will try to go on sunday and see how it is. If it's even just a little bit better, I'm sure we will both enjoy the outing 20 times more. I figure that'll be the case based on the fact that after I was hurting and thinking tonight was going to suck, I went out on the floor again, and there was more room to skate around and I actually started having fun. I thought "well i'll be damned! maybe this place isn't so bad!" maybe it was just the high numbers of kids and me being the only adult skating.
Oh well! So a friend of mine, Melissa, began a new blogspot blog tonight. I had the pleasure of being able to become a new follower of hers, and I am very grateful. Basically, what she and I have in common, is the fact that throughout our lives, storm clouds have had the tendency to block out the sun and make our lives seem dark. When this happens, it's hard to keep thinking positive thoughts about life, and in fact, personally, I find myself wondering if things will ever get to where I want them to be, if the finances will ever get fully on tract, if we will ever have a real savings account with a good amount of money put away, if we will own a house, etc. It's like my experience with the lottery. Too many people out there simply say "i don't know why you bother, you're odds of winning are very low." I like to say "you can't win if you don't even try." Speaking of the lottery, I bought this e-book about how to aproach picking lottery numbers out, and how to look or patterns and use those patterns to better guess which numbers might have a higher possibility of coming up. It has a lot of mathematical info in there, and so I find it hard to understand some parts of it, but through reading this book, and looking at the pattern of numbers that have been drawn in the past drawings, I have already noticed myself selecting numbers that end up coming up. Of course, I haven't been a big winner yet, but I like to think that it's more a matter of "when" and not "if."
One thing though is I have to adapt it to our state because the guy that wrote this book must live in florida because he gives examples for lottery drawings in florida. My friend melissa has a nook (and I was able to download this e-book wirelessly to my kindle), and so I was thinking about sending the book to her too so she could see if it makes sense to her, and if so, she could try down there *since she has the lotto games that are given as examples). I would die laughing about the irony if i sent it to her and then she calls me and tells me she won a large jackpot of millions of dollars.. I'd be like, again... "i'll be damned!" LMAO! So melissa, if you are reading this, maybe you can answer a question for me. For the kindle, we have a email address we can send ebooks and pdf files and stuff like that to, and then our kindle will sync and download it, allowing us to read it on the device. It's how I went from only being able to read this book about the lottery on my computer, to being able to read it on my kindle. Does the nook have that ability?
If so, text me with it and I will send you this e-book. You could use it or you could not, it'd be up to you, but I figured it wouldn't hurt for me to share this information that might help you more than me being that it has actual florida lotto examples on how to watch or some things, and whatever.
So I am SOOOOOOOOo glad that it is the weekend. I'm not planning on having any really late nights, because I need to get plenty of sleep while I can before my new work week starts. Last week sucked royally. Apparently because of not getting off saturday till noon, I didn't get a lot of sleep and then sunday we were busy so I didn't get much sleep then either, so when I went into my work week starting monday evening, every day I felt dead on my feet by 5 AM. I stayed awake my whole shift the first day, but then wendesday and thursday I actually dozed off near the end. I was out in the parking lot doing patrols making sure that only doctors parked in doctor parking spaces, sitting in my truck watching, and I had about 20 minutes to go both days. I would glance at my watch. 7:45, 15 minutes till I get off. Next thing I know, I glance at my watch again and it's either 7:55, or 8:04, and I'm going "oh shit!" realizing that apparently I nodded off. It's interesting how when you are so dead tired, you can nod off and not even realize that you did it. Erin always got on me while I would be laying on the couch, saying that I was snoring when I was certain I had not even been asleep. In fact, the movie we were watching, I remembered enough pieces of it that I could have told you exactly what kinds of things happened.
So, by thursday, I was praying to God for guidance. I definitely need a life change. These over night shits are getting harder to handle, but I am doing the best that I can. I am still pushing forward in school, and as far as that goes, i think I decided on something. I already know that I am going to finish my associates in hospitality and tourism, and then I am going to probably get a bachelors in business or somsething, but why not keep going after that, get my masters and try to become an online college instructor? Good pay, good benefits, good hours, work from home, that'd be kick-ass! I think I would be a really good teacher when I'm actually not face to face with the students. It's 1,000 times easier for em to talk to someone through email and text compared to if you are face to face with them.
A few weeks back, a co-worker and I butted heads and he made the prime example why I prefer not to be face to face. He was trying to say I was always late, I was pointing out that I wasnt, and he stared at me with his eyes looking like they were bulging out of his head, trying to use his intent stare to intimidate me. It worked. I was so stressed out about my job for the first time in a year and a half that I started thinking that maybe it's time for a change eventually. I don't know when, but I do think that better opportunities are on the horizon.
Take the job offer I got about driving the truck and only being home 3 days every 3 weeks. Yes I decided that I would not take it because I don't want to be away from the kids. However, I haven't officially told him no as of yet, and the money that I would make is still screaming at me. I know that technically we could really use the money. It'd pay off all our debts and have many thousands of dollars put away in the bank before I worked a year or year and a half with them and then resigned. So, will I decide to go with them? Right now, no I will not, but he told me if I decide to go with it, to print off the forms he sent me and fax them to him along with a new application and they would send me a bus ticket to head out to take the truck driving school. You could say we aren't making any major decisions about anything really. We are trying to make slow thoughtful decisions about our lives and make sure that whatever we decide is the best decision we could make. That's what I'm doing with work. I will be here at my job until the day when I decide that there is a much better opportunity and that my time has come to move on.
Anyway, I think i could probably ramble on about other things, but I will call that it for tonight so I don't talk your ear off. Feel free to comment away and feel free to direct others of our friends here so that they can follow me if they want as well. ;)
C
PS We have been really into renting movies from the Red Box lately. For those that arent familiar with Red Box, they are these red machines that are outside a lot of the businesses here where you use a credit card and email address and you can rent movies. They cost $1.00 and then you have them till 9pm the following day. As long as you return them to one of the machines (it doesn't have to be the one you rented from), by 9pm, you are not charged again. They are really cool! the price beats the hell out of going to the video store...
so anyway, we just watched the movie Red. That was a kick ass movie! Lots of action! I'd definitely recommend. Other movies I saw recently, The new predators (it was ok. quite a bit of action, but not as good as predators 1&2, or aliens vs predators). We rented a movie called "House of the devil." By the look of this movie, it looked like it was filmed in the 80's, so imagine my surprise when erin read that it was filmed in 2000 or something and was made to look like that deliberately. Wow.. lol. I'd tell you about the other movies, but I can't think of any more titles. Movies are always a nice thing to talk about eh? Anyway, talk to you next time!
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Looks like getting a home loan is more possible than I thought =)
So Erin and I have been looking into the possibility of getting a VA home loan. I contacted the VA recently and got redirected to Quicken loans. They looked at mine and her credit and said that we aren't high enough for them to approve us for a loan, but they have a department that can help with that. So today I received the phone call from them, and although it will cost us $300-$600 for the credit repair on both of us. However, we don't have that kind of money just yet, so the representative said he would start it with one of us and half the payment, so for me to start, he'd charge me $150.00 and then when I get paid again, I could pay the other $150.00. Then we could get Erin started as soon as possible after me. He said that he estimated about 4-5 months that it'd take before we could get approved for a loan based off our credit if we started with his program. 4-5 months is a good time frame or us, and so we are moving forward with that.
a day of change
Well, a few things for ya before I have to take off. So hopefully I can type pretty fast because 1) when I came on here, it took me about 10 minutes longer than I had hoped to change some settings. Why was I changing settings on here you might ask? Well, it just felt like it was time for a change on the blog. It turned out that with school, work, and everything else, obviously it didnt work out with coming on here every single day to post 365 days of trying to improve my life. So, instead of occasionally adding another post towards the 365, and then ditching this blog and starting a regular one, I figured "why not just change my current one and make it a regular one? That way readers can see how I began for the first 90-100 posts, and then how it has evolved.
So, as you may notice, there are a few minor adjustments. 1) the url is changed to something simple, which is basically blodgettchris.blogger.com or something like that (i'm sure I typed it wrong just now, but if you look you will see. 2) I modified the title and description. So this blog is officially just my regular blog that was once a blog about trying to improve my life. Might as well.
So, to touch base quickly on something. Recently I received a job offer from this trucking company that transports refrigerated goods all across the US. They would train me, and I would be able to get experience through them. The pay is really good, potential to make over $100,000 in just a year. The catch is this. I would be gone 3 weeks at a time, home 3 days, then gone 3 weeks again. I have thought really long and hard about this, mainly because of the $ that is involved. 100k would really help us, but is it worth it? After a lot of thinking, and praying, I have come to the almost certain decision that I will pass on the job and just wait for a better offer. 1) my kids. Erin and I, I believe, could be apart that much for a year and we would be ok, but our kids? I know they would be ok, but I don't want to miss out on almost a year of their childhood. They will only be kids for so long, and so I need to take advantage of all the time I can get with them RIGHT NOW! No amount of money is worth that, unless of course someone came to me tomorrow and said "I will pay you $1,000,000 to do this job, but you will have to be apart from your family for 12 months! NO CONTACT!" It'd suck, but I think it'd be different if it were such a large amount like that, erin and I would of course talk about it, and figure that after 12 months, and having $1,000,000 in our bank account, we would buy a house with cash, own our cars, set up college funds for the girls, a really good retirement account both for me and erin, and then leave the rest in the bank to live off of. We would be set up for a loooooooooong time, if not life, and so in that case, it'd be a different story.
#2 reason is school. My dream career is to end up working in the hotel industry. My degree aims me in that direction, and I think I should continue focusing heavily on my school and getting my different degrees such as my associates, bachelors, and who knows, maybe a masters after that, but succeeding, in my opinion, would best be accomplished through my education, and I don't want to put that on hold again. Plus, I value my family time too much. With schwans, I left when Zoe was still asleep, and when I came home, she was already in bed, so it felt weird that most of the 10 months I was with schwans, zoe and I really didn't get much time together. She's so young, and growing, and I want to be there for her. So, there you have it. Have I anounced my decision? Nope. I figure, I will hold onto the offer a little bit longer, and continue thinking, but I'm pretty certain that is what I have decided. I have asked a ton of questions, and tried to get as much information as possible, but that is where I stand currently. Just means that paying off debts and stuff might take longer, but that's ok. We're young, no need to rush it.
So anyway, I have to sign off, but there you have it! Thanks for reading! Talk to you again soon!
So, as you may notice, there are a few minor adjustments. 1) the url is changed to something simple, which is basically blodgettchris.blogger.com or something like that (i'm sure I typed it wrong just now, but if you look you will see. 2) I modified the title and description. So this blog is officially just my regular blog that was once a blog about trying to improve my life. Might as well.
So, to touch base quickly on something. Recently I received a job offer from this trucking company that transports refrigerated goods all across the US. They would train me, and I would be able to get experience through them. The pay is really good, potential to make over $100,000 in just a year. The catch is this. I would be gone 3 weeks at a time, home 3 days, then gone 3 weeks again. I have thought really long and hard about this, mainly because of the $ that is involved. 100k would really help us, but is it worth it? After a lot of thinking, and praying, I have come to the almost certain decision that I will pass on the job and just wait for a better offer. 1) my kids. Erin and I, I believe, could be apart that much for a year and we would be ok, but our kids? I know they would be ok, but I don't want to miss out on almost a year of their childhood. They will only be kids for so long, and so I need to take advantage of all the time I can get with them RIGHT NOW! No amount of money is worth that, unless of course someone came to me tomorrow and said "I will pay you $1,000,000 to do this job, but you will have to be apart from your family for 12 months! NO CONTACT!" It'd suck, but I think it'd be different if it were such a large amount like that, erin and I would of course talk about it, and figure that after 12 months, and having $1,000,000 in our bank account, we would buy a house with cash, own our cars, set up college funds for the girls, a really good retirement account both for me and erin, and then leave the rest in the bank to live off of. We would be set up for a loooooooooong time, if not life, and so in that case, it'd be a different story.
#2 reason is school. My dream career is to end up working in the hotel industry. My degree aims me in that direction, and I think I should continue focusing heavily on my school and getting my different degrees such as my associates, bachelors, and who knows, maybe a masters after that, but succeeding, in my opinion, would best be accomplished through my education, and I don't want to put that on hold again. Plus, I value my family time too much. With schwans, I left when Zoe was still asleep, and when I came home, she was already in bed, so it felt weird that most of the 10 months I was with schwans, zoe and I really didn't get much time together. She's so young, and growing, and I want to be there for her. So, there you have it. Have I anounced my decision? Nope. I figure, I will hold onto the offer a little bit longer, and continue thinking, but I'm pretty certain that is what I have decided. I have asked a ton of questions, and tried to get as much information as possible, but that is where I stand currently. Just means that paying off debts and stuff might take longer, but that's ok. We're young, no need to rush it.
So anyway, I have to sign off, but there you have it! Thanks for reading! Talk to you again soon!
Friday, March 18, 2011
Post number 91
Hello all. I was about to log off and I thought "I haven't posted in a while." Then when I logged online here, I thought "it's funny though, I technically only have melissa and Erin as followers, so I'm not even sure if anyone else even comes here at all." So, despite that, here goes.
I have been with Securitas working as a Security Officer here at the hospital for almost the past year and a half so far. Things are just rolling along here. We aren't sure whether we will ever have the chance to own the house we live in that is technically owned by my parents, so we are looking around and looking into trying to get a VA home loan. We figure, we have lived in our house for about 3 years now, and there has been no hint from my parents about whether they will ever let us buy the house from them, or if they would want us to just rent permanently from them. Personally, we want to "own." I got into a debate in one of my last classes about whether it's better to rent or own. They said they lost their house and they feel renting is much better because they are not tied down. I said that owning is better because after you own the house, you don't have to make any other payments on it except things like taxes and stuff, but as far as monthly house payments, there would be none. Personally, I like the idea of having "less" monthly payments going out.
I know it's very common to think "that's in the past." Tonight I got curious, and again I did a random search trying to see what I might be able to find out about my ex-wife. Things could be worse, I could live much closer to her, and know people that know her and hear about her constantly. I think I would hate that more, knowing that our marriage failed but hearing about her constantly, so I should be happy that I'm so far away with no contact what so ever with her. I guess my mind just some times drifts and wonders because of all the stuff going on in life. Take work for example. I love my job, but at the same time, lately, I have found my self quite a bit saying outloud to myself, or in a spoken prayer as I drive between north and south campus "Lord please bless us financially. Bless us in the way that will allow us to make the financial decisions that we dream of being able to make." And other times saying "Lord I really need a change for the better. I'm doing my best, but sometimes I feel like even if I do my best, I'm still not going to be able to physically handle the stress I feel regularly with working my overnight schedule, and with thing at home. Please Lord."
Just gotta have faith. It's like the lottery. I don't talk about it to my friends, because everyone will say "oh there's no point. The odds of winning arent very good, so it's a waste of money." But the fact remains that "you can't win if you don't play." So I am constantly saying "it's a matter of IF, not WHEN." I do believe that it will happen, and not just that,but I believe that it will happen very soon. When it will happen, I have no idea. I would love to check my current tickets, which include $5.00 power ball, $5.00 megamillion, and a $20.00 ticket that was drawn on St Patricks day that has 4 1 million dollar winners, and several smaller prizes. I'd love to go check it and be told "you're one of our $1,000,000 winners!" We will see! Keeping my fingers crossed, keeping a positive attitude, and keeping the faith! We could really use the financial blessing of that magnitude right now. We would be home owners in a matter of a week probably, my plan when that financial blessing does take place is to resign my current job, take the family on a very nice vacation, of course set aside bank accounts for the girls college educations, maybe put $30,000 to $50,000 in an IRA for myself and one for Erin as well. I did the math the other day, if we won $1,000,000 and we put $50,000 in an account for each of myself and erin (so I guess $100,000 total), after doubling about 6 times before we each retire, we would each have a bank account with $1,600,000 (or $1.6 million) to live off of when we are retired.
Of course, if we spent our original funds wisely, we could have more than that, but that amount is just with the IRA possibility. So, who knows. I'm just gonna keep pushing forward, working hard, praying to God, keeping the faith, trying to keep things positive, and see when the financial blessings take place, and just go with it.
Other than that, before I close this post out, school is going well. I just started another 9 week term. So far I have completed about 30 credits towards my associates degree. That means I am about half way there. It sounds like my tentative graduation month for my associates will be in December of 2011, so that will be awesome. I'm thinking that I will want to go up there for my physical graduation. Why not right? then again, I'm pretty shy, so it's possible I will freak out and say I should just get sent my degree. I dont know. I think it'd be something I should allow myself to experience, and just go through the actual graduation ceremony, but I'm not sure. I have plenty of time.
Other than that, there are things that Erin and I are planning and working towards that I'm not goin to mention yet. We're keeping a few of our plans on the down low until we finalize any of them so that only people we decide to tell will know what we're doing. Just trying to not say anything till the major decision has officially been made and then we will inform the jobs and the parents/land lords, and such. Anyway, time to call it a night! Talk to you all next time =)
I have been with Securitas working as a Security Officer here at the hospital for almost the past year and a half so far. Things are just rolling along here. We aren't sure whether we will ever have the chance to own the house we live in that is technically owned by my parents, so we are looking around and looking into trying to get a VA home loan. We figure, we have lived in our house for about 3 years now, and there has been no hint from my parents about whether they will ever let us buy the house from them, or if they would want us to just rent permanently from them. Personally, we want to "own." I got into a debate in one of my last classes about whether it's better to rent or own. They said they lost their house and they feel renting is much better because they are not tied down. I said that owning is better because after you own the house, you don't have to make any other payments on it except things like taxes and stuff, but as far as monthly house payments, there would be none. Personally, I like the idea of having "less" monthly payments going out.
I know it's very common to think "that's in the past." Tonight I got curious, and again I did a random search trying to see what I might be able to find out about my ex-wife. Things could be worse, I could live much closer to her, and know people that know her and hear about her constantly. I think I would hate that more, knowing that our marriage failed but hearing about her constantly, so I should be happy that I'm so far away with no contact what so ever with her. I guess my mind just some times drifts and wonders because of all the stuff going on in life. Take work for example. I love my job, but at the same time, lately, I have found my self quite a bit saying outloud to myself, or in a spoken prayer as I drive between north and south campus "Lord please bless us financially. Bless us in the way that will allow us to make the financial decisions that we dream of being able to make." And other times saying "Lord I really need a change for the better. I'm doing my best, but sometimes I feel like even if I do my best, I'm still not going to be able to physically handle the stress I feel regularly with working my overnight schedule, and with thing at home. Please Lord."
Just gotta have faith. It's like the lottery. I don't talk about it to my friends, because everyone will say "oh there's no point. The odds of winning arent very good, so it's a waste of money." But the fact remains that "you can't win if you don't play." So I am constantly saying "it's a matter of IF, not WHEN." I do believe that it will happen, and not just that,but I believe that it will happen very soon. When it will happen, I have no idea. I would love to check my current tickets, which include $5.00 power ball, $5.00 megamillion, and a $20.00 ticket that was drawn on St Patricks day that has 4 1 million dollar winners, and several smaller prizes. I'd love to go check it and be told "you're one of our $1,000,000 winners!" We will see! Keeping my fingers crossed, keeping a positive attitude, and keeping the faith! We could really use the financial blessing of that magnitude right now. We would be home owners in a matter of a week probably, my plan when that financial blessing does take place is to resign my current job, take the family on a very nice vacation, of course set aside bank accounts for the girls college educations, maybe put $30,000 to $50,000 in an IRA for myself and one for Erin as well. I did the math the other day, if we won $1,000,000 and we put $50,000 in an account for each of myself and erin (so I guess $100,000 total), after doubling about 6 times before we each retire, we would each have a bank account with $1,600,000 (or $1.6 million) to live off of when we are retired.
Of course, if we spent our original funds wisely, we could have more than that, but that amount is just with the IRA possibility. So, who knows. I'm just gonna keep pushing forward, working hard, praying to God, keeping the faith, trying to keep things positive, and see when the financial blessings take place, and just go with it.
Other than that, before I close this post out, school is going well. I just started another 9 week term. So far I have completed about 30 credits towards my associates degree. That means I am about half way there. It sounds like my tentative graduation month for my associates will be in December of 2011, so that will be awesome. I'm thinking that I will want to go up there for my physical graduation. Why not right? then again, I'm pretty shy, so it's possible I will freak out and say I should just get sent my degree. I dont know. I think it'd be something I should allow myself to experience, and just go through the actual graduation ceremony, but I'm not sure. I have plenty of time.
Other than that, there are things that Erin and I are planning and working towards that I'm not goin to mention yet. We're keeping a few of our plans on the down low until we finalize any of them so that only people we decide to tell will know what we're doing. Just trying to not say anything till the major decision has officially been made and then we will inform the jobs and the parents/land lords, and such. Anyway, time to call it a night! Talk to you all next time =)
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Day 90!
Ok Ok, I know that technically I titled the last blog entry as number 90, and then tonight I was reading over some of my last posts and I realized that I really had only written 89 blog entries. So, I retitled the blog entry to 89 and then here goes number 90! I hope you all are doing well. I am doing ok. Some days are obviously better than others, but for the most part I am managing just fine. When I say some days are better than others, I think a big part of the stress is lack of sleep. A few months back when I was trying to write every single day in this blog, I was getting off work at 6AM after having come in at first 8PM, and then that was changed and we came in at 6PM and were working 12 hour shifts. Those were the days! I am one of those types of guys that loves my days off. I mean really! Who doesn't? If you are reading this and you can honestly look me in the eye *through the computer screen that is* and tell me TRUTHFULLY that you would rather work and never have days off, I will . . . . . well, I'll pat you on the back and say way to go! Yup! That's what I'll do! You thought I would say I would do whatever you wanted for a day or something didn't you! I know how your mind works! lol
So anyway, I believe I am in session number 4 of my classes. That's classes number 7 and 8. With the 4 credits that have been transfered in from other schools, and the 18 credits I have completed so far, that leaves me with 22 credits completed with a GPA of 3.22. Not too shabby I say, not too shabby at all? What does shabby mean? I have no freaking idea! I'm sure it means something! It's just been a saying I have used for a while since I was young. With my luck, it probably means something completely innappropriate. lol.. oh well! So, I was looking at my progress, now mind you I am lazy and personally would prefer not to be going to school, but at the same time, I know that the only way I will get into a good paying job, one that I love and can work better hours than what I do now, is to get my degree, so I will not allow myself to give up.
So anyway, I was looking online on my student website at my progress, and I noticed that when I complete the next 7.5 weeks of my current classes, I will be roughly about 28 credits completed, and my total credit requirement for my degree is 60 credits, so after this session, I will be about half way to my associates! That completely blew me away, because here I am, going from one 9 week session to the next, completing two classes each time, and thinking that it will just go on forever, and already I am going to be half way to my first degree. I say "first" because I plan to continue going to school till I at least have a bachelors. I'm leaning towards a bachelors degree in business to go with my hospitality and tourism degree. I still plan to pursue the possibility of taking over and owning one of the more run down hotels here in Clinton, and re-vamping it back up and turning it around. I know it can be done! You just have to have someone running the business whom wants to bring more customers in, wants customers to come back, and wants to succeed. The hotel that we stayed at, the regency, has lots of potential. Honestly I loved it's layout. It just has bad management because they don't seem to care that the way they are running the hotel is driving away business. (Erin pointed out to me that I had only listed one of the three or four things that we didn't like about the hotel. I can't remember exactly what was said, but I will point out some things here).
First, it was hot in the hotel. 2nd, the tv didn't have that many channels, I think it was like 25 channels and nothing kid friendly like disney or anything. 3rd, found out after we checked in that the pool was out of commission. Here I thought it had only been down for a little while. When I checked out early, I complained to the manager about it, and she was like "yeah, the pool being down has cost us a lot of lost business." I asked her "How long has the pool been down?" and she said "It's been down about 7 months now." I couldnt believe it. The first thing I said to Erin when I got home was "if I ever succeed in acquiring us a hotel here in Clinton, 1st Im going to turn it around, add everything that we know people want, such as a working pool, channels for the kids, comfy beds, the ability to moderate the temp in your rooms so you arent burning alive, I mentioned maybe a small arcade room but Erin recommended that we buy used refurbished Nintendo 64 systems and have them in the rooms. That could work. Above all, I was like "and if we ever have a problem and the pool goes down or anything like that, we will pay the money to get it up right away!!! none of this leaving it down for months crap, that drives away business and that's stupid!" I don't remember her exact words, but she felt the same way.
So I have two guys I work with, both of them I'd consider friends, both of which arent going to school. Erin said one of them (Eric), has his associates degree or something, but keeps saying he wants to go back and finish, but has yet to do anything. Matt, the other guy I am talking about, has no degree and no plans either from the sounds of it, both of which lately have complained about the job here and money, and hours, and stuff. Out of everyone here, I've been here the longest. Eric just passed his 1 year mark not long ago I think, and I think Aaron has probably hit his too. I've been here about 14 months so far, with that whole time being here at the hospital. Aaron has been here at the hospital maybe like 7 months I believe but he was at ADM (a big factory here in clinton) for a few months before that. Matt has been with Securitas 4.5 or 5 years but here at the hospital the last 3 or 4 months. I guess the way I look at it is, you do what you can with what you have been delt. If you don't like what life is like for you, then get out there and change it. My plan is to remain here working security for the hospital until either I get a better job, or until I finish school and then get a better job.
I know that no matter what, my chances for getting into a really good position will go up tremendously after I finish school. I'm looking forward to me getting my degree and then calling up my sister in law and saying "so how's that degree coming for ya?" As far as I know, my brother and sister in law have both been working on their associates the past 5-10 years. One or two classes here and one or two classes there. I'm lazy!! Thats why I went with University of Phoenix online instead of the local community college because one semester at the community college went from January 1st to May 15th. That's too damn long unless I want to take 6 or 8 classes at once and that's an INSANE class load. I had a few people in my class at the community college that said they were taking 18 credit hours. At the time, I was only in 3 classes and I felt so overloaded, what with working fully time, working over night, and having to take care of things at home, spend time with the family, etc, I knew it wasn't going to work, so as I finished that semester out, I spent a few nights here and there getting information on online schools and in the end, phoenix was the best. Yes it's expensive going to school with them, but at the same time I have no complaints because i'm succeeding at it. I'm doing what I said I wanted to do, and in the end, I may have several thousand dollars in student loan debt, but I will have an associates and a bachelors degree.
It all comes down to what you want, and how much do you want it. Take my friend Melissa for example. She works her butt off! I don't believe she has gone to college yet, mainly because she cant afford to, and I believe (but am not certain) that the reason she doesn't go yet is because she doesn't want to get lots of student loan debt. If I remember correctly, I think she mentioned wanting to be a teacher, and honestly she would be a great one. But like I said, we each decide what we want and how much we want it, but not only that, we decide how we will go about it. I figure that eventually melissa will probably go down that road, and no matter what she does, I will always be there for her 100%. I hope that when our girls get to their graduation, that we will be definitely sending them off to college. We try to emphasize to Lex how important school is, that if she wants to do really well, and maybe have it easier than we did, that she needs the education to back her up.
I'm going to quit right there, because now I feel like I'm rambling and jumping from one topic to the next without much description. I guess that comes from being tired eh? Got my homework done for the night but by then it was 11PM already, and I was scheduled to come to work at 12. Zoe wouldn't sit down, so I figured I'd lay down on the couch for 10-20 minutes and try to get Zoe to lay down with me to cuddle and relax. She finally did but we only had like 5 minutes by that time. The rest of the week should be fun! Erin works and so chances are I wont get much or any sleep when I first get off and then will be able to crash when Erin gets home from work. That'll be good at least. It's not something that I am happy about but I grin and bear it, and just do the best that I can. I've gotten much more into video games recently and you wanna know something funny? When I'm staying up in the morning watching Zoe while she watches a show on TV, me lounging in the recliner, if I try to watch with her, I feel like dozing off. But if I pull out my psp or my DS, I can play a game and I will still be tired but I will be more alert.. Not sure what is up with that.. Anyway! Enough of my rambling! Talk to you guys (and gals) again next time!
C
So anyway, I believe I am in session number 4 of my classes. That's classes number 7 and 8. With the 4 credits that have been transfered in from other schools, and the 18 credits I have completed so far, that leaves me with 22 credits completed with a GPA of 3.22. Not too shabby I say, not too shabby at all? What does shabby mean? I have no freaking idea! I'm sure it means something! It's just been a saying I have used for a while since I was young. With my luck, it probably means something completely innappropriate. lol.. oh well! So, I was looking at my progress, now mind you I am lazy and personally would prefer not to be going to school, but at the same time, I know that the only way I will get into a good paying job, one that I love and can work better hours than what I do now, is to get my degree, so I will not allow myself to give up.
So anyway, I was looking online on my student website at my progress, and I noticed that when I complete the next 7.5 weeks of my current classes, I will be roughly about 28 credits completed, and my total credit requirement for my degree is 60 credits, so after this session, I will be about half way to my associates! That completely blew me away, because here I am, going from one 9 week session to the next, completing two classes each time, and thinking that it will just go on forever, and already I am going to be half way to my first degree. I say "first" because I plan to continue going to school till I at least have a bachelors. I'm leaning towards a bachelors degree in business to go with my hospitality and tourism degree. I still plan to pursue the possibility of taking over and owning one of the more run down hotels here in Clinton, and re-vamping it back up and turning it around. I know it can be done! You just have to have someone running the business whom wants to bring more customers in, wants customers to come back, and wants to succeed. The hotel that we stayed at, the regency, has lots of potential. Honestly I loved it's layout. It just has bad management because they don't seem to care that the way they are running the hotel is driving away business. (Erin pointed out to me that I had only listed one of the three or four things that we didn't like about the hotel. I can't remember exactly what was said, but I will point out some things here).
First, it was hot in the hotel. 2nd, the tv didn't have that many channels, I think it was like 25 channels and nothing kid friendly like disney or anything. 3rd, found out after we checked in that the pool was out of commission. Here I thought it had only been down for a little while. When I checked out early, I complained to the manager about it, and she was like "yeah, the pool being down has cost us a lot of lost business." I asked her "How long has the pool been down?" and she said "It's been down about 7 months now." I couldnt believe it. The first thing I said to Erin when I got home was "if I ever succeed in acquiring us a hotel here in Clinton, 1st Im going to turn it around, add everything that we know people want, such as a working pool, channels for the kids, comfy beds, the ability to moderate the temp in your rooms so you arent burning alive, I mentioned maybe a small arcade room but Erin recommended that we buy used refurbished Nintendo 64 systems and have them in the rooms. That could work. Above all, I was like "and if we ever have a problem and the pool goes down or anything like that, we will pay the money to get it up right away!!! none of this leaving it down for months crap, that drives away business and that's stupid!" I don't remember her exact words, but she felt the same way.
So I have two guys I work with, both of them I'd consider friends, both of which arent going to school. Erin said one of them (Eric), has his associates degree or something, but keeps saying he wants to go back and finish, but has yet to do anything. Matt, the other guy I am talking about, has no degree and no plans either from the sounds of it, both of which lately have complained about the job here and money, and hours, and stuff. Out of everyone here, I've been here the longest. Eric just passed his 1 year mark not long ago I think, and I think Aaron has probably hit his too. I've been here about 14 months so far, with that whole time being here at the hospital. Aaron has been here at the hospital maybe like 7 months I believe but he was at ADM (a big factory here in clinton) for a few months before that. Matt has been with Securitas 4.5 or 5 years but here at the hospital the last 3 or 4 months. I guess the way I look at it is, you do what you can with what you have been delt. If you don't like what life is like for you, then get out there and change it. My plan is to remain here working security for the hospital until either I get a better job, or until I finish school and then get a better job.
I know that no matter what, my chances for getting into a really good position will go up tremendously after I finish school. I'm looking forward to me getting my degree and then calling up my sister in law and saying "so how's that degree coming for ya?" As far as I know, my brother and sister in law have both been working on their associates the past 5-10 years. One or two classes here and one or two classes there. I'm lazy!! Thats why I went with University of Phoenix online instead of the local community college because one semester at the community college went from January 1st to May 15th. That's too damn long unless I want to take 6 or 8 classes at once and that's an INSANE class load. I had a few people in my class at the community college that said they were taking 18 credit hours. At the time, I was only in 3 classes and I felt so overloaded, what with working fully time, working over night, and having to take care of things at home, spend time with the family, etc, I knew it wasn't going to work, so as I finished that semester out, I spent a few nights here and there getting information on online schools and in the end, phoenix was the best. Yes it's expensive going to school with them, but at the same time I have no complaints because i'm succeeding at it. I'm doing what I said I wanted to do, and in the end, I may have several thousand dollars in student loan debt, but I will have an associates and a bachelors degree.
It all comes down to what you want, and how much do you want it. Take my friend Melissa for example. She works her butt off! I don't believe she has gone to college yet, mainly because she cant afford to, and I believe (but am not certain) that the reason she doesn't go yet is because she doesn't want to get lots of student loan debt. If I remember correctly, I think she mentioned wanting to be a teacher, and honestly she would be a great one. But like I said, we each decide what we want and how much we want it, but not only that, we decide how we will go about it. I figure that eventually melissa will probably go down that road, and no matter what she does, I will always be there for her 100%. I hope that when our girls get to their graduation, that we will be definitely sending them off to college. We try to emphasize to Lex how important school is, that if she wants to do really well, and maybe have it easier than we did, that she needs the education to back her up.
I'm going to quit right there, because now I feel like I'm rambling and jumping from one topic to the next without much description. I guess that comes from being tired eh? Got my homework done for the night but by then it was 11PM already, and I was scheduled to come to work at 12. Zoe wouldn't sit down, so I figured I'd lay down on the couch for 10-20 minutes and try to get Zoe to lay down with me to cuddle and relax. She finally did but we only had like 5 minutes by that time. The rest of the week should be fun! Erin works and so chances are I wont get much or any sleep when I first get off and then will be able to crash when Erin gets home from work. That'll be good at least. It's not something that I am happy about but I grin and bear it, and just do the best that I can. I've gotten much more into video games recently and you wanna know something funny? When I'm staying up in the morning watching Zoe while she watches a show on TV, me lounging in the recliner, if I try to watch with her, I feel like dozing off. But if I pull out my psp or my DS, I can play a game and I will still be tired but I will be more alert.. Not sure what is up with that.. Anyway! Enough of my rambling! Talk to you guys (and gals) again next time!
C
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Good Day all (Day 89!)
Hello again all! Wow, has it really been 4 months since I last posted? You know what? If I had it my way, I would do everything all the time. I would post here like I committed to doing, I would continue writing in my book every day, I would work full time and then be a full time online student. If I had it my way, I would be able to fit them all in. However, as it seems to me, it's hard as hell to try to keep it all up. If i want my degree though, the way I look at it is this. No matter how much I'd like to stop going to school for a while, I know that the only way I'm ever going to be done and have my degree is if I just push ahead and do it. Therefore, I need to not allow myself to quit. I see it as a way to get out of working the way that I am. Dont get me wrong! I do love my job. I just don't want to be working security and especially working graveyards for the rest of my life. Actually I still really want to own a hotel here in Clinton. In fact, something about that! Recently we had to temporarily vacate the house because we had to clean it up, put a lot of stuff stored away and make the house look like it was unoccupied. We paid for 2 nights at this local hotel called the Regency Inn and Conference Center. Staying there made me realize that when I am able to however far in the future, I don't think I will build a brand new one. Nope, I have a better idea. What I want to do is take possession of one of the lower end hotels here in Clinton such as the one we stayed at.
The problem that we had with the hotel we stayed at were not just one, but a few. 1) the room was constantly really warm...hot even. And I'm the type of person that needs to be slightly cool to be confortable. I have actually had a saying. "You can always put more on but you can only take so much off." Is there anything wrong with being naked? Of course not! However, when you're so hot, and you end up stripping down to your underwear or even less than that, and you're still hot, what then? Soak yourself down with cold water? That's great momentarily, but then as soon as you dry off you are hot again. Then what? Where as if you think it's too chilly, why not just throw a couple of blankets on ya and then you'll be good? That's something I never understood about people that have to have the heat up higher because their cold when others in the house prefer it a little bit cooler. Erin knows what I am talking about. In our house, we don't go above 70 degrees, but i try to keep it at 68 or 69 max. She's used to always having extra layers of blankets on her when she's on the recliner or whatever.
Well I know technically even though this is only the 90th post, there should be another 120 days posted so really today would be like day 210 or something, but hey, oh well! In fact! I was thinking when I was walking around just a little bit ago that I needed to come on here. And actually what I was going to do was start a new blog, but I figure I will post a bit more in this one and see if I can keep it up, if I cant do it every day and it'll take 2 or 3 more years to get 365 posts, I may go ahead and start a brand new regular blog and then I will post the address on here so you all (however many of you there are..;) can follow me over to the new one.
I'm gonna call that it for now. in just under a half hour, I have some more stuff i need to do, but before I do that I have a couple of things I want to do first. So on that note I will talk to you all later (hopefully sooner than last time).
C
The problem that we had with the hotel we stayed at were not just one, but a few. 1) the room was constantly really warm...hot even. And I'm the type of person that needs to be slightly cool to be confortable. I have actually had a saying. "You can always put more on but you can only take so much off." Is there anything wrong with being naked? Of course not! However, when you're so hot, and you end up stripping down to your underwear or even less than that, and you're still hot, what then? Soak yourself down with cold water? That's great momentarily, but then as soon as you dry off you are hot again. Then what? Where as if you think it's too chilly, why not just throw a couple of blankets on ya and then you'll be good? That's something I never understood about people that have to have the heat up higher because their cold when others in the house prefer it a little bit cooler. Erin knows what I am talking about. In our house, we don't go above 70 degrees, but i try to keep it at 68 or 69 max. She's used to always having extra layers of blankets on her when she's on the recliner or whatever.
Well I know technically even though this is only the 90th post, there should be another 120 days posted so really today would be like day 210 or something, but hey, oh well! In fact! I was thinking when I was walking around just a little bit ago that I needed to come on here. And actually what I was going to do was start a new blog, but I figure I will post a bit more in this one and see if I can keep it up, if I cant do it every day and it'll take 2 or 3 more years to get 365 posts, I may go ahead and start a brand new regular blog and then I will post the address on here so you all (however many of you there are..;) can follow me over to the new one.
I'm gonna call that it for now. in just under a half hour, I have some more stuff i need to do, but before I do that I have a couple of things I want to do first. So on that note I will talk to you all later (hopefully sooner than last time).
C
Sunday, August 29, 2010
day 88
Good evening all. Yes I know,,,,,,,,,,I know! I know! it's been a while since I last posted. I'm horrible eh? Looks like this blog will be around for a long time because I did commit that I would do 365 posts here. Only then will I probably not be posting anymore here. Here's the gyst of why I have not been around. I am a full time student online with the University of Phoenix. I'm taking 2 classes at a time for 9 week sessions. My first two classes were Intro to University Studies and Health and Wellness. They just concluded last sunday and I ended up with an A- for both of them, so hoorah for me! =D
The clases i'm in now are University composition, and Intro to Personal Finance. I'm nearing the end of week number 1 for both those classes with 8 more weeks to go. I have roughly about 8 more 9week sessions after the one I'm on is over. So because it has been a while since I have been on here, and I didn't want to forget about it entirely, i figured I'd atleast come online and post something for a change. We've still been playing world of warcraft but I think the reason I'm bored with it tonight after I got off work is because I am really tired. Maybe I will feel more into it tomorrow. Anyway, I'm going to sign off for the night. Talk to you all later!
The clases i'm in now are University composition, and Intro to Personal Finance. I'm nearing the end of week number 1 for both those classes with 8 more weeks to go. I have roughly about 8 more 9week sessions after the one I'm on is over. So because it has been a while since I have been on here, and I didn't want to forget about it entirely, i figured I'd atleast come online and post something for a change. We've still been playing world of warcraft but I think the reason I'm bored with it tonight after I got off work is because I am really tired. Maybe I will feel more into it tomorrow. Anyway, I'm going to sign off for the night. Talk to you all later!
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