Random Musings...
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
·Ticking Away·
- Time is ticking away before I need to have my business off the ground. I hope to go live next Sunday. That's just a little over a week and a half from now. It's pretty scary. Last night I made the greatest things with the machine, though! I was so proud. I should have taken pictures. I'll get to it soon. I'll be making more things. I can't wait to finally get this stuff out there and see if people like it. (Dear Lord, I hope they do!!)
So much is going on right now it's ridiculous.
Posted at 1:30 PM
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·I guess things are the same...·
- Well, I still feel the same as I did yesterday. I want to go home early so badly. I can hardly think straight.
Posted at 9:53 AM
Comments... Post a CommentHope you feel better! I've been a sickey lately too. It sucks to feel like crap and still be at work!
Posted by: 11:57 AM
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Tuesday, August 30, 2005
·Infinite Sick Hours·
- I started feeling a little yucky yesterday afternoon and feel no better today. I think I'll go home in a few hours because honestly, I have enough sick hours to never come back to this place again. But I won't do that because I'm stupid. But I think I'm fully in my right to take half a day when I do feel bad and am not doing anything all that important.
Last night I squeezed in a small amount of work on the business, but nothing as significant as I would have liked. I just felt so wiped out. Maybe if I go home early today I'll be able to take a nap and work the rest of the afternoon.
Posted at 8:36 AM
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Monday, August 29, 2005
·Work·
- Work is aggravating the crap out of me today. The only thing that puts a smile on my face is when someone asks me when my last day is and I'm able to say, "Next week." I'm not going to miss this place. I may miss some certain, very specific things about it, but I can't imagine ever wanting to come back here. It's just ridiculous here sometimes.
Posted at 2:18 PM
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·Convention Rundown·
- I must say I am so very, very happy that I went to this trade show. I learned so much, but I also found out how much I already did know. That was the best feeling. I was able to talk to all of these people who have been in the business for years, and I was able to hold great conversations with them and ask intelligent questions.
We left home a little later than we had hoped on Wednesday. We got into Andrew's parents house around midnight and pretty much when straight to bed. It was brutal to have to wake up the next morning at 6:30 to make it to my first class at 9am. I was really nervous walking into the Charlotte Convention Center (in beautiful downtown...I mean, uptown). There were all of these guys on cell phones talking business and all, and I suddenly just felt like a little girl in pigtails trying to say she was a big girl. I registered and got my cool little badge and headed over to my first class on sales techniques. There were so many great ideas. Best of all, I realized that I was following it all. Nothing was going over my head. I listened to all of the questions my new colleagues were asking, and they all made sense to me. I was filled with a renewed sense of confidence.
I felt a little more nervous again after the class was over and I was heading down to the actual show. I went down the escalator and saw the enormous room full of booths and people. It was pretty intimidating, but I took a deep breath and walked in. It took me a while to get the courage to walk up to a booth and talk to someone, but I finally did it and got my confidence back. I was able to ask and answer every reasonable question. Eventually, I'd have to say that I was new when someone would ask what percentage of my business falls into a certain category, but at no point in any of it did something go over my head. I never looked like an idiot. I was pretty productive. I gathered a ton of catalogs, some free samples, and learned a lot more about what is out there for me to work on.
That afternoon had another class on laser techniques, which was extremely useful. I learned a lot about the different products I can use to enhance the laser's capabilities. It was pretty exciting. After that, I had a class on "Why some businesses go broke," which I thought was pretty important to know about. It was definitely interesting. I learned a lot about why this industry is very different than most and applying normal business models to it doesn't always work out very well. I felt like I learned a lot that I'll really be able to use.
I didn't leave downtown until about a quarter to 7:00. When I got back to Andrew's parents' house, they had a glass of wine for me and dinner ont he way. It was perfect! I was exhausted, though. I ended up going to bed at 10pm that night because I felt completely drained between the lack of sleep and the long, grueling, but exciting day.
The next day I had to wake up at 6:30am again. I went to a class on setting prices, which was probably the most obviously useful class I took. I have some great formulas to try out to come up with some good prices. It was great to get some real, concrete guidance on this specific industry. I went back to the show floor again and learned a little more about the various suppliers and services. Andrew and his family were going to come to down...I mean, uptown to meet me for lunch and walk around since I had a huge gap in my schedule between classes. (One class from 9:00-10:30, the next at 5:00-6:30!) Just before they got there, I came across a booth with the most amazing collection of clip art and customizable logos I had ever seen! The guy showed me all the stuff it could do, and honestly, I was just about drooling over it. I had never seen software like it. Each element of a design could be separated out and replaced with another image or text with just a couple simple clicks. It was amazing. I was bracing myself for the price when it was revealed...$1500. Ouch. I thought about it over lunch and decided to go ahead and buy it when I got back. It was just too perfect to pass up. I thought about how I'm a one person shop and how much time it would take for me to create a custom design for a client. With this software, not only is that set up for me, but I have a catalog provided for me that I cans how the clients so that they can pick and choose what they are looking for. Honestly, it would save me hours and give my clients something much more concrete to think about it. I still think it was worth it, even though it was expensive as hell.
So Andrew's family came by and we walked around Charlotte. I love it there. The day was absolutely perfect, and it was so fun to walk among all the skyscrapers and parks and sculptures that are scattered all over the city. We had lunch and then headed to one of the museums. It was fun to walk all around the city that became my "second campus" my senior year when I had the internship down there at the Performing Arts Center.
I headed back to the Convetion and went to the last class, a class on marketing. It was pretty interesting. I headed back to Andrew's parents' house just before my brother-in-law and his new wife arrived. We had a nice dinner that night. The next day we took a nice walk at Jetton Park, went to visit Davidson, my dear old alma mater. We met up with one of Andrew's old friends at a bar that night too. It was 45 minutes away and I had completely forgotten my ID. Man, I felt like an idiot!
Anyway, I really was so glad that I went. I got so much out of it and we had fun. We're actually going to be going back in September because Rebecca's boyfriend is coming to visit from England. That's a whole other story!!
Posted at 11:10 AM
Comments... Post a CommentWOW. It sounds like the conference was fanatastic especially the workshops that were offered!!!
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Wednesday, August 24, 2005
·CRAZY·
- Things are crazy here! But I just wanted to jump in and give my dumbest question of the day award, even though it's only 10:30am. A students just came in and said, "I need to know what classroom my acting class meets in." "Which class are you in?" I ask. She responds like I'm an idiot: "Acting class." Umm...this is the theatre department. I tried to explain to her that we have about five pages worth of acting classes and I needed to know exactly which one. "Yeah, but do they all meet this period??" she asks all full of attitude. Umm, no, but I'm sure about 15 of them do. Do I have guess which one? What an idiot.
Leaving today at 4pm for Charlotte for the Trade Show. I'm so nervous. Wish me luck!
Posted at 10:37 AM
Comments... Post a CommentOH Miss Rosalie.. I hope the trade show is going/went great! Hope contacts were a plenty and the biz will be a-buzzin soon!!
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Tuesday, August 23, 2005
·Calm Before the Storm·
- It's been eerily quiet today. Not to say that I haven't been very, very busy. (I have!) I'm just wondering where everyone is. It's weird. It makes me terrified for what tomorrow morning is going to look like. First day of school jitters are not just for students!
Interestingly enough, my traffic to this site has about doubled in the last month or two. I feel like I've been so boring lately, too, since all I can even think about is the business. (Not that my blog has ever been utterly fascinating!) I'm not even sure who my "regulars" are anymore. Not looking to out any lurkers, because I'm quite the blog crawler myself, but if you feel like letting me know you read this, say hi and go back to lurking. :)
Posted at 11:37 AM
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·Well, I'm not a Total Idiot·
- Ok, good news and bad news regarding the whole problem I was having with part of my merchant services as relates to setting up my website. Here I was trying every which way I knew to fix things, and I'm thinking to myself that I know a pretty decent amount about computers. More than most people anyway. I don't know any real stuff, but I can pretty much figure out my way around them. So that's why I didn't understand why I could get NOTHING to work. My ego was pretty bruised at the prospect of facing up to the fact that most people can figure this out on their own (since I have been offered no assistance!) and I was just being stupid.
Finally, I was able to reach a live person yesterday on tech support the second I got back home to ask what the heck was going on. We started with my email. The guy on the phone was like, "Yeah, you have it set up just fine." And we looked at piece after piece, and he confirmed that I had set everything up completely appropriately. Umm...so WHY WASN'T ANY OF IT WORKING??? He poked around a bit and realized that the domain transfer hadn't gone through. I had received an email about about a week and a half ago, though, and I had followed all of the links and changed every setting I could. Well, I did everything correctly. It's just my old hosting service that's dragging their feet with the final transfer. "It could take several weeks," he told me.
My first reaction was outrage. Several weeks?? I need to be working on this so that I can go live before or on the day of my last day of work here so that I can start making money. But then, my little ego had the last word as I thought to myself, "Well, at least it's not that I wasn't smart enough to figure out how to set things up on my own."
In other news, my brother officially moved out of the house this past weekend.He is finally out on his own. He has his own place (over two hours away from my parents!!), is in charge of the bills, everything! It's weird. My baby (23 year old) brother. Well, my parents finally left him on Sunday. I called him that night to see how his first night of independence was going. I then called my parents, and they were so cute. They both got on the phone with me and were like, "What did he say?? And then what?? Did he say anything about this? What did he say??" Made me laugh. Although it must be weird, this is pretty much the first time it's ever been just the two of them. They got pregnant with me two months after their wedding.
So imagine my surprise when I got a call yesterday saying that my brother was in an accident!!! He's completely fine, thank God, but his car was wrecked pretty badly. Some cops and firemen came to the scene and helped him bend the bumper backout so that he could drive the car without having it scrape against the tires. So on top of all the regular stuff he has to deal with in settling into a new place on his own for the first time in his life, he now has to deal with all of this crap, which is a pain in the ass no matter who you are. My poor baby brother!! I'm just glad he's fine. Also, I don't think my parents could have lived with themselves after how freaked out they felt leaving him there in the first place.
Posted at 8:54 AM
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Monday, August 22, 2005
·Hell Week·
- This is the worst week out of the entire year here at work. Why I told them I'd stay on for this time, I have no idea. I think I'm a masochist.
Well, it's been a little over a week now since I've had a day when I haven't had a meltdown. Work has been crazy and then trying to get my business going has been even worse. The merchant services crap has officially whipped me. I'm calling the guy who sold it to me to demand better assistance or else I'm cancelling the services altogether. I'd have to start all over again and search for new services. It's just ridiculous though. I can't even set up my email or anything. I follow each step-by-step instruction printed on the webpage, and it still doesn't work. Nothing else works either. What the hell am I doing wrong that NOTHING...N-O-T-H-I-N-G WORKS out of all the bazillion components to this whole thing?? I called the 24-hour help line last night and NO ONE CALLED ME BACK. What the hell?? I can't do shit and I'm leaving for the trade show in TWO DAYS! I have to at least have the email I printed on my business cards be valid. I feel so lost. God, I'm terrified I'm in way, way over my head.
Posted at 10:18 AM
Comments... Post a Commenthello friend. I hear your pain. Work sucks big time right now. I am just counting the days till sweet September
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Friday, August 19, 2005
·Money·
- Do I know that our bank account is not bottomless? See, a lot of me knows that, so I'm pretty stingy. I hardly buy anything. I just don't shop. When I drag myself to the mall, I immediately head for the sale racks. If nothing is there, I'm out. Heck, I even shop the sale items at the grocery store. I'm just not that big of a spender.
However, as foreign as the concept of blowing through money is for me, the concept of buckling down and really penny pinching during extraordinary times is just as foreign. Here I am approaching my last steady paycheck in less than a month. I just shelled out two checks, each in the amount of five figures, to start a business. We are finally getting around to fixing the hurricane damage from last year, and the quotes so far are approximately $1500. Andrew called me this morning to let me know his car died in the middle of 13th Street. It's probably the alternator, so it won't be cheap. And yet, in light of all of this, I scheduled a massage for tomorrow with my friend Kim. I started thinking a few weeks ago about going on a vacation with Andrew this November since we haven't done anything like that for just the two of us since our honeymoon. And I'm thinking if I want to go out to eat tonight. Do I just not get it? Are we supposed to be limited to Ramen Noodles right now? I mean, am I being stupidly naive? Or are things not that bad? I have no idea. I just have trouble picturing myself not being able to afford going to a restaurant if I want. Am I spoiled? What should my attitude be at a time like this?
Posted at 3:42 PM
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·Anxiety·
- I've been having little mini-anxiety attacks just about every night this week. Last night's was a little less "mini" than usual. I finally had to accept that there is no way I'm going to be able to design the coolest website on the planet within the next three weeks with all of the other crap I need to get done. I'm going to have to use one of the templates they've given me because it just makes things so much easier. Everything is all integrated and perfect if a bit bland, but I'll just have to deal with it at first. After I finally start making money, then I can think of how I can jazz it up.I just can't do everything. Even as streamlined as I have tried to make everything, I made a list last night of the 9 different companies/services I am needing to use and integrate with each other along with their websites, wildly dissimilar user names, and ever so slightly different passwords. I couldn't handle it anymore, so I actually had to make a list to keep next to the computer. No, it's not smart to keep a record of all my passwords right there, but I'm sick of having to call customer service and not even remembering my user ID because it's either 189073423a, 764327641a, or rty1. So, whatever. If someone breaks in and gets to that piece of paper that looks more like a grocery list written in code, I'm screwed anyway.
I'm also freaking out a bit over my inventory. I was thinking that I want to start off a bit smaller and then add new products as I go. A while back, I was going to start with just glasses since I already know how to do that. Then I realized, though, that I'm going to be blasting a one-time only email to anyone I have ever exchanged more than ten words with when I finally open for business, and I'd rather them see the variety that I will eventually end up with, rather than saying "Eh, I don't need etched wine glasses," and never look at my site again. Jewelry boxes! Bracelets! Decorations! Photo Albums! Key Chains! I want to make sure people know I'm offering those things too, and it's probably more likely to make an impression. If they don't buy anything right away, maybe they'll at least remember that girl they met at a DMB concert who sells stuff that will make parents and grandparents shed a small tear when Christmas season rolls around. It means that this lead in time is a bigger crunch, but hopefully it'll be worth it. I'm also going to set up a mailing list for those who may want to keep up on what new products are coming in. I don't want to bug people with a bunch of emails who don't want to be receiving them, but I want to make sure anyone who is actually interested keeps up to date.
Man, it's so much I have to think about. Of course, I've never even heard of anyone who said that starting a successful business was a cinch, but I figured since I was giving myself months to prepare that I'd be able to just ease right in. I'm an idiot. I just hope to God that I'm not getting in over my head. A vendor wrote me back yesterday and said that they need my Florida reseller ID. What the hell is that? Am I supposed to have one? I guess it's different than my EIN ID? If it is, where do I get this ID? I can't find it anywhere on the state's website. What the hell am I doing??
Update: I found out what a reseller ID is. I get it from the Department of Revenue and it's actually called something different, which is why I couldn't find it. Now I need to go ahead and get it! I thought I could wait on that until I was actually making sales. Guess now. Argh!
Posted at 8:22 AM
Comments... Post a CommentI LOVE the mailing list idea!!! A great way to keep people informed every time you get a new product in!
Have you thought about advertising on any of the wedding websites? They usually have a section for LOCAL vendors and it would be free (I think).
http://wedding.weddingchannel.com/local/featured_vendor_result.asp?category=17&ruid=359604087&vuid=&city=&state=&zip=&search_type=regional
There's so MANY wedding websites out there and they each have a section just like that.
CORI
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Thursday, August 18, 2005
·Out with a Bang·
- Well, I always know that this is the busiest time of year, but I always forget exactly how busy. Thank goodness this is my last time of dealing with this. From now until the time I leave, it's going to be non-stop!
Posted at 10:29 AM
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Wednesday, August 17, 2005
·Drumbeat·
- Gator Football is close at hand! I hear the band practicing right now. Exciting!
Posted at 10:04 AM
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·$22K·
- Seeing that figure is just about enough to make me hyperventilate...or make my chest so tight I can hardly breathe. One of the two.
Posted at 8:29 AM
Comments... Post a Comment$22k? So you finally sat down and figured out how much you've spent going to Dave Matthews concerts over the years? :)
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Tuesday, August 16, 2005
·Credit Cards Suck·
- I can't believe what a pain in the ass it is to set up credit card processing!! I thought by signing up for merchant services through my bank that it would take care of everthing. After all, what are these "services?" I would pay big bucks for someone to just set it all up for me. This being contact by each separate credit card company and being asked for all these numbers and getting all of these different user IDs and pay schedules, etc. is a pain in the freaking ass.
Posted at 3:55 PM
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Monday, August 15, 2005
·Home Again!·
- I'm staying at home again today to work some more on the business. I got a ton done over the weekend, and I'm still trucking along. My dad is coming back up today to help me set up a few more accounting things. I've begun ordering my inventory and everything. It's not long now before I'm able to start fulfilling orders!
One fun thing I did over the weekend was digging through some of my old pictures. I found some real gems, and I only looked through one box! A lot of great ones from college like this one from our sophomore year when a group of eight of us friends took a Spring Break trip to Disney
and a picture of Will, Andrew's old roommate who cheated on me.
Oh, and very randomly, I found one of a project I did in 5th Grade on how the camera works.
My God, no wonder I didn't make any friends that year!!
Posted at 9:32 AM
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Friday, August 12, 2005
·I Remember That Name!·
- I called our paper supplier this morning to place an order for 15 cartons of paper. I haven't ordered from them since about February. We have a whole area of our new copy room especially built for storing paper, so it's much easier to order bulk three times a year or so.
I told the woman who answered the phone the name of our department, but she said she couldn't find it in the computer. "Have you placed an order with us before?" she asked. Yes, I told her, although it had been several months back. Well, we tried every possible form of our name until we finally decided to set up a new account. I gave her my name, our delivery address, our billing information, etc. After I gave her the number and expiration date on my purchasing card, she confirmed with me, "And the name is Rosalie Preston on the card?"
"No, actually. It says Rosalba Preston on it. R-O-S-..."
"OH!! I REMEMBER THAT NAME!!" she exclaimed. "You HAVE ordered from us before."
Considering I had been giving her a whole list of every bit of information on us without ringing a bell at all, I was a little struck by that.
"I've seen your name around before," she continued.
Ok, I know my name is pretty uncommon so it is likely to be somewhat memorable, but I'm pretty sure that it must be a case of my name being passed around the call center like, "Hey guys, get a load of this one!" Maybe they all have a competition of who gets the funkiest name for the day and my name cinched it for someone that day.
I have a love/hate relationship with my "real" name. After all, I've often had people literally laugh in my face when presented with my name on paper. Every other time someone is trying to say it, they just give up and say, "I'm sorry, but I'm not even going to try that one." When they do try it, I get Rosablah, Rosabel, Rosabala, but usually just Ros-rosab-R-Ms. Preston. I get bewildered looks when I try to explain that it's pronounced exactly how it's spelled: Ro-sal-ba. No one really gets it, and honestly, even when it's pronounced correctly, it just sounds weird. It's much nicer in Spanish, but really, it's not my favorite name.
After I got married, and I went to change my last name, I suddenly realized that I was being presented with a totally seamless and hassle-free means of finally changing that name to Rosalie, a name that I love, absolutely everyone in my life calls me by, and really and truly is "me." I was shocked to find myself completely reluctant to do so. After years of feeling embarrassed, years of confusion and correcting, I found out that I actually had an attachment to this name.
I have never felt that I am Rosalba. It's just another detail in my life like an address or a phone number, really. I've had a few people begin to call me Rosalba, and it's so jarring that I can't even bear it. I have to ask them to call me Rosalie. At the same time, though, it's a part of my identity in a more indirect way. Although it is, in fact, a real name (albeit very uncommon, even in Spanish-speaking countries), my parents arrived at it by combining the names of my two grandmothers, Rosa and Alba. I've always kind of liked that sentiment and imagine that my grandmothers must have loved that I had been named after them. Rosalba also lierally translated to White Rose, which naturally became my wedding flower.
But perhaps more poignantly in my mind, as I stood there debating my new name, I realized that with this one form, I will have nothing left of the name I was born with. Suddenly, I was going to go from a completely Hispanic name to a completely English name. I knew for certain that I did want to take Preston as my last name, but I wasn't so sure I wanted to give up on the rest of my name. I was born and raised in Puerto Rico and speak spanish every day of my life. As completely American as I am, I am also completely Hispanic. I wanted something in my name to reflect that huge part of me. So I kept the Rosalba. I just couldn't let it go. I moved my maiden name to my middle name and just tacked on the Preston to the end. As funky as it sounds to be Rosalba Preston, it's still exactly who I am. I couldn't give it up.
Posted at 9:24 AM
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Thursday, August 11, 2005
·Beginning of the End·
- I started cleaning out my desk this morning since this is the last slow week I'll have until my last day. I'll get rid of all the stuff I should have gotten rid of or filed by now. I'll be left just with what I need for the next couple of weeks. After all these years of moaning and groaning, it's kind of exciting!
Posted at 10:31 AM
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·Is it Friday yet?·
- Andrew surprised me yesterday by saying that we were going to go out to my favorite sushi restaurant with some friends. It was so wonderful! I gorged myself, as usual. I don't know what it is with me and sushi.
Last night I had the most stressful dream. I dreamt that I signed up for two four-week training sessions for my laser machine. One was $700, and the other was $2000. I went to the first one and when I got back home, I found out that I had missed the other one. Apparently, they were both taking place at the exact same time on Monday nights. And I couldn't get any refunds. I remember everyone thought I was such an idiot for throwing away so much money so carelessly. It was so upset.
Hopefully I won't make mistakes that dumb!
I woke up this morning thinking that it was Friday, but alas. I can't wait until the weekend is here!
Posted at 9:03 AM
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Wednesday, August 10, 2005
·25 Things to Be Happy About·
- Because sometimes I get blinded by everything else going on...
1. My husband snuggles with me every night and every morning.
2. My dog jumps up whenever I get home, even if he was just sleeping and has the hardest time keeping his eyes open as he wags his tail for me.
3. I have a 23 year old brother who isn't too cool to tell me he loves me and misses me.
4. My dad has been helping me so much with this business that I realize there is no way on earth I would have ever been able to do it without him.
5. I got 3rd row tickets to see David Gray.
6. I have less than a month left of this job.
7. We have more invitations to do things with our friends than we can usually accept.
8. I have been healthy for nearly two months.
9. We may be going on a family trip with my extended family this New Year.
10. I'm going to be my own boss soon.
11. There are babies in this world like my godson, who makes me smile and tear up simultaneously.
12. Dave Matthews
13. Some plants I planted way back in April are finally flowering beautiful yellow flowers.
14. My office has more wall space since we moved the bookcases so I can put up more artwork that we have had sitting around in a closet.
15. Sushi
16. The Office and Arrested Development DVDs
17. Notes from my grandmother
18. I drive by palm trees and lazy alligators every morning.
19. We have hummingbirds visiting our yard every day.
20. Houses in our neighborhood keep selling at higher and higher prices.
21. I've had my engagement ring on my finger every day since a few weeks before I turned 21 and I still look at it every da and see how the light dances inside the diamond as I move.
22. My house is nice and spacious and accommodated this home business a lot easier than I thought it would.
23. A duck just had baby ducks in the pond in the park where we walk Lucky everyday.
24. No matter what happens to my face, my body, and my hair, I still like my eyes and I don't care if they're too big.
25. I have cute skirts.
Posted at 4:10 PM
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·Stress·
- I've been so stressed out lately. Like, stress as in I'll just be sitting around with a tight feeling in my chest and wonder why. Oh yeah. ALL OF THAT! I hope I don't give myself an ulcer. I have so much on my plate right now it's ridiculous. Sometimes it feels like it's hard to breathe.
Thankfully the David Gray news this morning has helped make my mood a little lighter today! :)
Posted at 12:25 PM
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·EEEEEEE!!!!!·
- EEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!! I just got 3RD ROW CENTER TICKETS TO SEE DAVID GRAY IN ATLANTA THIS NOVEMBER!!!!!!!!! I CAN'T BELIEVE IT!!
It kept telling me sold out, but I kept refreshing and refreshing like the obsessed person that I am. I was just about to give up after about ten minutes of refreshing, but I convinced myself to try for 5 minutes longer. Sure enough, up pop up two tickets in 3RD ROW CENTER!! HELL YEAH!!!!!!!!
I could cry. Seriously.
I've been on the biggest David Gray kick lately. Just yesterday I watched the entire DVD start to finish. Geez, for months now I have been becoming more and more into him. Seeing him 3rd Row center is not going to help ease my growing addiction. He's second to DMB in my list of favorite music, but is gaining ground from distant second to...dare I say it...close second!!
3RD ROW TO DAVID FUCKING GRAY!
Posted at 10:26 AM
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Tuesday, August 09, 2005
·Rocking Out in My PJs·
- Ok, maybe I;m not really doing anything that could qualify as rocking out, but it is 10am on a Tuesday and I still am wearing my PJs. And I'm not even sick! I love it!
Which is not to say I haven't been productive. I've only watched 5 minutes of any TLC show so far.
Posted at 10:16 AM
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Monday, August 08, 2005
·What the Heck!·
- Hey, I think I'll take tomorrow off. What the heck. I love it. I just told my boss that I'd take tomorrow and possibly another day off this week. Who knows! :)
My goal for the week: Sign up for new health insurance and begin constructing a website.
Posted at 4:28 PM
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·Lazy Weekend·
- Andrew and I had a wonderful, lazy weekend. Actually...not so lazy at all! I got A LOT accomplished this weekend for the business, but it hardly felt like work. I searched for specific products to include in my inventory and skethced out a basic design for my homepage. I think it'll be pretty cool. Hopefully I can figure out how to put it into action on Dreamweaver. I'll be working on that this week.
But anyway, the only committment we had all weekend was Andrew's birthday party. Other than that, we did what we pleased. The party was more fun than I expected it to be. We were at Ale House for several hours and a lot of people came and went. Eventually, we moved the party over to our place. The last people didn't leave until 2am. We went through A LOT of beers! Wow! Andrew stumbled the whole flight of steps up to bed. He paid for it, though. Andrew did nothing but lay around yesterday!
Posted at 9:35 AM
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Friday, August 05, 2005
·At Least I Don't Look Like This...Yet·
- I found a really neat website (http://www.ifonlylifewasaspredictable.co.uk) that takes a photo of you and ages you 10, 20, 30, 40 years. So I did it and wow, I have nothing to look forward to!!
Here's the picture I submitted...
Here's me at 46.........................and then there's me at 66...
Ouch!! The good news is that I did an old picture of my grandmother when she was 20, and it didn't look like her now! Glad to know that's not my future!!
The weirdest part, though, came when I did the transformation to male...
Umm....that's my brother.
I was completely freaked out!!
Posted at 3:00 PM
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·Ugly Duckling·
- Last night I had a little pity party for myself while trying to get ready for a birthday party. I just did not look right. I put on a new pair of jeans that just made my hips look as wide as a semi truck. I was having a horrible hair day and my face (and even my chest BLEH!) has been broken out non-stop for the past several months. I just feel disgusting. Fortunately, I didn't rip off the tag for the jeans yet, so I'll be returning those. The rest, though, well, I can't exchange my face for a new one, so I'm stuck with it. After my illness this spring, I discontinued a key medication, and my usually annoying, but manageable acne has taken the opportunity to just flourish. My hair has also turned much greasier. I just look disgusting. I can't look in the mirror and feel good. Unfortunately, there is not much at all I can do about it. I am unable to use any prescription medications to correct the situation and I even need to be careful about certain over the counter products. Since May or June, I've been on a downward slope and lately I seem to be getting even worse by the day. It's depressing. It really is. I'm not used to feeling embarrassed by my appearance, but things have gotten way out of control. I was wishing I could turn invisible at the party last night. Andrew tried to console me last night, but what could he say? My hair did look horrible. I was able to put it up in a ponytail, but my face, well, no amount of makeup could hide it. There's nothing to say about that. It's humiliating.
Posted at 9:58 AM
Comments... Ummm ... When I met you last month, I thought you were GORGEOUS!! Seriosuly. I wish I looked like you!!!
PS I didn't even notice that you had an acne problem. And I notice those type of things since I have oiley skin and acne is something I have a hard time keeping in check. For me I need to use a STRONG astrigent on my face at least once a day and sometimes I use it 2x per day. You might try that.
Posted by
I know your feelings about this are real, and I promise I'm not making light of them...but I may need to start calling you Ms. Cubist Painting, because you're beautiful enough to be art, but you've totally lost perspective.
To put it another way: a Porsche with a scratch on it is still a Porsche. When it drives past guys on the street, they aren't saying "Hey, look at the scratch on that Porsche!" The only thing they're thinking about is how much they'd like to get under your hood...okay, that metaphor kinda got away from me, but do you get the point?
:)
Posted by
You guys are very sweet. Really. Cori, I'm definitely going to be looking at better astringent and John, those metaphors are funny and very, very nice all at once.
That said, know I didn't post this to fish for compliments. I generally have a pretty decent self-image. I've definitely taken a turn for the worse lately, though, and the past few weeks have been especially brutal. I don't think anyone can honestly tell me otherwise. I just need to get over it and accept my scratches and new dents.
I've felt the same way latley. No matter what I do, my face looks horrible. I keep hoping one day I'll wake up and my skin will have realized that I'm not 15 anymore and having acne is just not working for me anymore. I just bought a new skin care system and all new make-up today, so maybe that will work, who knows? Everything works for a month, and then it breaks out again. I'm on the same wavelength about the hair too, I haven't gotten it cut in three months now, so it's nasty. I wear it in a ponytail everyday!
Post a CommentRosalie...
Let me start by saying I think and have always thought that you are one of the most purely attractive people I have ever seen. You have a very exotic, yet unpretensious(s?) beauty.
I know ALL TO WELL about oily hair and sensitive skin. I suffer with both. I have times when my skin looks very nice and my hair is good, but then comes those times where I swear my levels are all out of whack and I look, (and then feel) like shit. And there is not anything anyone in the world can say to make me feel better... but knowing that others share this with me makes me feel a little bit better.
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Thursday, August 04, 2005
·Fear·
- Last night I had a little mini freak-out that my wonderful husband was able to talk me through. The pressure and fear that go along with starting a new business has been hitting me in spurts. Last night I started wondering what everyone would think of me if the business failed and it was all my fault. After how much my dad has helped me and how much support Andrew has given me, what if in the end, the business fails because I screw something up or I didn't do something well enough? While having people around me who believe so much in me is the only reason I've had the strength to embark on this uncertain journey, it's also partly the reason it's so scary. What if I disillusion all of those who have been telling me every day how much they love me and beleive in me? Not that people such as my father or my husband would ever love me less or anything silly like that. It's that what if I let them down? What if this thing tanks, and I'm not able to pay my dad back the money that he loaned me for the machine? What if Andrew and I need to dip into our savings we've been earning for the past four years just to pay the groceries? What if everything they thought about why I'm going to be the perfect entrepreneur was proven false? What if I screw things up? There are many reasons a business can fail. Unfortuantely, many of them have to do with poor choices, either because of some error in management, lack of foresight and ingenuity, or just poor selection of industry. I hope that I've covered all of my bases in terms of research leading up to this point. I'd hate to find after all this that there really isn't as big a market as I had hoped. Or what if I'm not as good at sales as I had hoped? What if I screw up my shipments and get a bunch of angry customers who spread the word?'
Anyway, Andrew was very helpful throughout this whole thing. He said some really wonderful things to me, about 90% of which I believed. I guess it's only normal to have these doubts.
Posted at 9:06 AM
Comments... Wow, that's a lot of fear, and for good reason too. But no matter what happens you did your best and tried something new. Mike and I had those same fears when he quit his 9-5 job to start his business. thankfully with hard work and a tight budget we made it work. I know you'll do the same!!!
I think it's completely normal to have your fears!!! It's really scary (and brave) to chase a dream. I wish that I had half the balls that you have had these past few months! Failure is not such a bad thing. It just means that you tried! That's alot more then what most other people have attempted (even me).
Posted by
Post a CommentRosalie,
I also think it is perfevtly normal these fears. I know you never hear about the "bad" parts of successful business, but I am sure there were moments of fear they all faced too.
Keep that head up, take each day as it comes and learn from it. You have already made the biggest leap in starting in the first place.. that was HUGE!! Take baby steps from here until your ready to run the marathon! We are behind you, and I know we are not footing the bills or even physically there to help, but we are here for you whenever you need to talk about!!
(PLUS you already have a huge word-of-mouth thing going with all of the referrals we are going to give you!!)
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Wednesday, August 03, 2005
·Things I'll Miss·
- I walked by a window here in the office that faces out toward the stadium. The Jumbotron was on and had our big Gator head logo spinning around to create a 3-D effect. It looked really cool from the window there. I stood and looked out for a minute or two. It was nice to get excited about football which is starting up soon, and it was nice to look out across the campus of a school I never attended and still feel like it is my campus. The Gators are my team, and it felt nice to see the old brick buildings through the flowering crepe myrtles with the gigantic stadium towering into the blue sky. I'll have to bring my camera to work tomorrow and see if the Jumbotron is still on. It was a nice image. As much as I hate this job, I do love working at UF. I love feeling a part of this place.
The other thing I'll miss when I leave here next month is the view from my desk. It's so nice to be able to look out at the trees swaying in the breeze, the ducks paddling across the pond, and the afternoon storm clouds approaching miles away in the distance.
Oh and the drives to work. Who loves their morning commutes? I love it because every single morning, without fail, I take the slightly longer route to work that takes me by Lake Alice. It's a beautiful little lake lined with trees. The speed limit is 20 mph, so I have plenty of time to enjoy the view. I see the alligators floating along, the herons and egrets perched majestically, and one certain mornings, depending on the weather, there is a layer of fog sitting right over the water. It's beautiful. I love it.
These are the things I'll miss about this job when I leave. I see the same regulars jogging or just walking along Lake Alice every single morning during my commute. I wonder if that's at least something I can take up so I don't miss out on it.
Posted at 9:08 AM
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·Birthday·
- Yesterday was Andrew's birthday. I had decorated the downstairs with balloons, streamers, and a big Happy Birthday banner before he woke up. He didn't see it until after I already left for work. It was nice to surprise him with that first thing in the morning.
So when I get home yesterday, I quickly arrange all of his bazillion presents on the coffeetable. And the phone rings. He starts opening presents. The phone rings. I start cooking his favorite chicken dinner. He opens a few more presents, and the phone rings. I'm finally about to serve dinner, and the phone rings. We're five minutes into eating and the phone rings. Halfway through our dishes, the phone rings again. We finish our cold food, and the phone rings. I get up to surprise him with a great Oreo cake, and the phone rings again. It was just absolutely ridiculous. I know it's wonderful to call someone on their birthday, but can they have more than five minutes at a time to actually celebrate it?? It was so annoying! Each of his family members called separately, his brother multiple times over the course of an hour and a half because he kept losing reception. One of his friends called. My parents called. My brother called, and heck, even my grandmother called! It was crazy!
We're having a party this weekend with all of his friends in town. Should be fun. :)
Posted at 8:44 AM
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Tuesday, August 02, 2005
·No Post Yet?·
- Past noon and no post yet! Wow.
I had a nice, long weekend. My parents came up on Sunday and left yesterday. My dad helped me get a lot of things done for the business. The last pieces I have left to settle now, really, is designing the website, ordering an inventory, and figuring out some sort of shipping method. Other than that, I'm all official and squared away with every outside entity I needed to answer to. It's a good feeling!
I'm off to a doctor's appointment!
Oh yeah..and it's Andrew's birthday today! #29! I told him that this was his last good birthday, but he wasn't too happy to hear that from me.
Posted at 12:37 PM
Comments... Post a CommentI am so happy that things are moving along for you, although I had no doubt they would!!
OH, and hey, WATCH IT with the age comments lady!! You will be there soon enough yourself!!(trust me,it seemed only a short time ago I was 26, and then poof almost 30..ugh!)
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