Love Suddenly

Why is it so hard for me to just go to bed? Damn internet.

Went running at about 11:00. Only did about a half mile, but totally loved it. Felt great. It always feels awkward at first, but when I settle into the feeling of it, it gets to be a lot of fun. I can’t wait till I can run for a good 20 minutes at a time. I’m sure I’ll really be able to zen out. I then came home and broke out one of my old pilates tapes, cause I am a tone-less ball of goo.

And I just got a text saying my sister is on her way over, and I still haven’t showered. Gha!

I mean to write here more often, I really do. I just don’t actually get off my digital butt and actually do so. By way of at least writing something here’s a general update.

I went to breakfast this morning with my mother and sister. We went to a little breakfast place right by the park here. My sister, in her fit awesomeness, ran home from there. At which point she was then going to be biking around the city to get around. Grr. I know it’s going to take time for me to get the body I want. I just want it NOW! *sigh*

I finally got an art project done for an assignment from a group I chat with online. Some of the stuff they’ve come up with is pretty amazing.

Um.

There isn’t a whole lot going on right now.

As you may or may not know, I participate on an online forum community for people who no longer believe in Mormonism. There are folks in all sorts of situations, from one very open believer (who is chill enough to survive), to those who were never Mormon, but married believers. People may wonder why, if we’ve left Mormonism behind, we continue to gather and talk and rehash over and over again. It’s different for everyone. I hang around there because I’ve made friends there. Most people are there because they still have believing family and friends, and Mormonism isn’t done with them.

One question that is hashed over and over again is whether the good that Mormonism, or in extension, any church, does outweighs the wrong. There is no consensus, and I’m not here to state where I stand. That isn’t a question for me to preach to you. If you’d like to know, or chat about it, I’m always willing.

The board has been keeping an eye on all the FLDS proceedings, for a multitude of reasons. Not having a vested interest in Mormonism on the positive scale, we’ve spent time talking about the similarities between them and the LDS church. As much as modern Mormons would like to protest, the two churches at the very least share the same origins, and most of the same scripture. Yes, at this time the two churches have many different beliefs, but from the outside, they aren’t as glaring as many would like them to be.

This morning, one of the board members posted the following picture. Please be aware, it is disturbing. I know that it is not today’s Mormonism that has created this tragedy. But the same leaders that created todays Mormonism paved the path for this man to create it. Yet this man made the choice of his own volition, so it is not entirely their fault either. I do not know where the finger should be pointed in the end, I just know this is vilely, vilely wrong. Remember: This man, and many like him, truly believe this is God’s word.

Please allow me to pimp two very nifty people in this digital world of ours. Naomi of IttyBiz works from home helping very tiny businesses figure out how to tell the world why they’re awesome. While that sounds like it would make for a niche-oriented blog, her writing is accessible, engaging, and often very relevant. Sometimes she gets downright high-larious (yes, I’m channeling Jayne). She’s one of those networking people. She either knows something awesome, or she knows someone who does. I’ve found several interesting reads following her web of links around the net.

Which leads me to my next little bump. Wednesday, Naomi put up a fantastic guest post on motivation from David. First off, the post is excellent, so go read it, and then come back and I’ll tell you about David and his company. Go on… I’ll wait…

David runs a nifty little company called Postcard Perfect. Here’s the idea: upload your own photo, tell them what you want it to say, and where to send it, and then they print and mail it for you. You can do this from the internet, or insert the memory card from your camera into one of his kiosks. Imagine a personalized “Wish you were here” card, with a photo you took just ten minutes before, with none of the hassle of buying stamps or finding a post box.

I was impressed by both his post, and his idea, so I shot him an email to give him some kudos. Every struggling entrepreneur (are there any that aren’t?) needs a high five every once in a while. He got back to me within minutes, and he came across as one of those pleasant people. When I’d mentioned that I was less likely to use his service, as most of my friends live close, he replied that it was his goal to get people to see mail, real hold-it-in-your-hands mail, as something of value again. He says he surprises his wife with cards all the time.

He was gracious enough to give me a free trial, so I shall return and report (and hopefully pimp again) when I’ve given it a test run. Until then, check these peeps out!

For three or four days last week, I had a little spider doing laps around my bedroom ceiling, teasing my poor cats. Then I discovered he’d made his way into the bathroom, and I decided to get some pictures to see if someone on the net could tell me what kind it was. I’ve posted the good ones on my flickr, and yall should check them out. He was really small, so a lot of the detail in the pictures wasn’t visible to my naked eye. I’ll refrain from posting them here, as I know one of my readers doesn’t like spiders, and I don’t want to freak her out. Just a link. Enjoy.

There is nothing in my life that stresses me out so much as money. There’s just so much that gets me about everything. First of all, if the money isn’t there right now, there’s not a whole lot you can do about it. Yes, I can go out, work hard, etc., but that doesn’t make money appear in my hand at the end of the day.

I also have a lack of firm control of myself in this area. If I sit down and really study out the whole picture, I can be good. But if I just have a vague idea of how much is coming in and going out, I invariably find myself with less than I thought. When you’ve got things that require getting ahead of your paychecks to deal with, “less” is not a good idea.

I’ve been in a mild panic for the last… well, it’s been awhile. Anyway, things are starting to pick back up again, so I’ve been a little looser with my spending. Foolishly, I hadn’t yet sat down and really figured out where everything was going, so I’ve spent more than I should have. This is embarrassing at best, and very disappointing, and potentially damning to BF. No details here, sorry.

He called me the other night, with a reminder that sets things a bit on its ear. And he wanted to know how things are money-wise. He’s very good to me. He’s trusting me with handling everything, and he’s not hovering or asking questions. Thus far I haven’t lived up to his trust. I haven’t sunk us, but we’re worse off than we could have been. Better off than we’ve been over the last few months, but that loss of potential is very sad, and totally my fault. I knew this in the back of my mind, and this triggered my usual stress response. Run away.

Running away from financial difficulties is a far cry from the best option. I don’t think it can possibly do anything but make everything much, much worse. So tonight I faced that fear. I’ve got our financial set-up mapped out in a pretty detailed way for the next several weeks, and it’s in an extensible system that lets me add input and output on the fly. I think I’ve finally got the big picture. I’m still working on getting it all documented, but now I know where it all is, where it’s all coming from, where it’s all going, and I think we’ll be okay. It’s going to be tight, and I DEFINITELY need a better paying job, but we’ll be okay.

*remembers that this thing exists* [poke poke] *grabs a chair and her stitching to sit on the porch in the sunshine*

I was going to audition, but I called later than I meant to, and all the spots but one had been filled. Because I’m working a show at the same time, that one spot did me no good. Oh well. At least I have the headshots. It’s a start, and I can go from there.

I’m going to audition for Into the Woods (it’s a musical) next Saturday. I will actually be vastly surprised if they give me a second thought (honestly, I have no experience, and I will have had five days to practice my music of choice. Which I haven’t chosen yet), but I’ve decided to go for it anyway. Fortunately, I have some excellent resources at my disposal, and my dear friend was kind enough to take pictures for me to use as a headshot. I was going to post the one I picked here, but he beat me to it. Go there and check out my sexy.