Baby Steps. Slow and Steady wins the race. Etc. Etc.

Energy begats energy. I like to say that little ditty. I don't think I made it up -- I'm not that clever, but I can't find where I found it originally. Anyway, good energy begats good energy. Negative energy begats crappy energy. I know that instinctively, why don't I always pay attention???

Been thinking positive lately. Don't know if it's the Amitriptyline (happy pills) my doctor convinced me to try (and which, miraculously my insurance company actually agreed to pay for -- they dropped "mental health" coverage about a year ago. Idiots, but that's for another blog on another day) -- or whether it's the change in the weather (I love cooler Autumnal weather) -- or whether it's just the good energy from having one of my art pieces (finally) accepted into an art show at the local University: but whatever it is, I'm glad to be on it: this positive thinking roll I'm on.

Wow. That was bad grammar I'm sure. My high school English teacher would faint right about now, but really, this is my blog I can do in it what I wish, eh? I've never been a huge fan of following all the rules anyway. And hey -- if my idol, Dean Koontz, can change the rules by using lots of in-a-row-of-comma-separated-adjectives to most wonderfully describe his nouns in his books, maybe I can change the rules by making lots of dashes and colons used together popular!!! *insert mischievous smiley here*.

K. Back to my intended subject this fine fall morning. I think we had a soft freeze last night. Baby Steps.

I took more baby steps this week in my quest to make more money/be more fulfilled: Stopped into a different Pizza Hut than the one I'd applied at to see if they had any ideas on how I could push through my application. Found out from that assistant manager that the manager at the other PH had been fired (so the rumors were true). This current A-M took a liking to me and so did one of the other employees, so they had me come in and speak to their manager. He has since spoken with the district manager and pulled my application from the other store and I've started all over with the paperwork (to check my state driving record). I have a really good feeling about this: I should be able to start delivering pizza's part time in a couple of weeks and hopefully by the end of December I can be caught up on my bills and back to a positive value in my money account! I'm so far in the red right now (farther than I've been in cash flow in years) that I cry alot (more than usual). Am like $2800 in debt to my boss in payday advances, not to mention the $3000 I'm in debt to "loan sharks" (as my dad calls the car title and payday loan places I have to beg from). One of these days I'd really like to have $5000 in an emergency fund at the bank, $1000 cushion in my checking account, and be able to pay every bill the exact day it comes in the mail. My boyfriend does this (except he's got like $20,000 in an emergency fund in the bank). I'm not greedy, and I'm not full of self-control (like he is), so I'll never be that cushioned. I like to enjoy this life.

Anyway, that's baby step one. Baby step two was to borrow money from said boyfriend to print out prints of some of my favorite photos and print up a bunch of my greeting cards. I've just now got to buy some supplies and actually get my table set up at the local Farmer's Market. Waited too long this week to get ahold of the manager of said market for today's show, but I've got Tuesday, next Saturday, and maybe the following Tuesday left to try and sell my stuff in person. Anything that doesn't sell will finally be put up on that website I created months ago. One of these days I will have a nice side-business selling my "art" which makes me a couple thousand dollars a month. Positive thinking there, but hey, there's some truth to the good old saying: Go Big or Go Home. I'm tired of going home. I'm not determined to Go Big!

When my boss retires in about 5-10 years, I've got to be self-sufficient in working for myself so I won't have to get another job working for anyone else ever again. He's the best darn boss in the entire universe and I'll never find another one as good. And lemme tell you, I've had some of the worst bosses in the State of Texas, and do not want to ever deal with that again. No sirree!

Am also toying with the idea to go back to school (online) to get my Graphic Artist degree. That would help me both freelance and with my greeting cards.

So. To finally shut up and stop rambling, I'll post one of my "pieces" here. Just cause I love you all. ;)

Backup that online data!!!

When will I learn my lesson??? Something crashed and I've lost all my journal entries since May of 2009 (the last time something crashed and I started backing everything up).

Wish I knew of an easier way to do this, and wish I had enough money to buy a really good external hard drive. Just trying to use thumb drives and/or CDs and DVDs. Way too painstakingly long for as much as I do online.

Does anyone else just gobble up music and photo space on their devices???

Which reminds me, duh, that I also need to backup my smart phone. And double check that I have my phone numbers and mailing addresses up to date. Mom used to keep up with all my family for me and ever since she's gone I've done a horrible job of keeping in touch. I am a bad relative. Doesn't help that I like my online friends better than I like much of my family! *insert twisted smiley here*

Seriously, I think that if I could get my family to stay connected online I might find out I like them too! It's just so hard to write 10-20 different letters to all the neices/nephews/cousins/siblings and so easy to shoot off one email. Does anyone else have this problem??? Can I "buy" an online board for all of us to keep in touch on that's safe and easy-to-use (I have a few old fuddy-duddies in the family that are still scared of computers).

Well, I guess my fingers have run out of energy as they've just been sitting here stiff for over 7 minutes while my mind wandered. Hope this post finds anyone who reads me having a good day. If not, here's a hug from me to you: (((((( you )))))

Less than 60 days left . . .

One of my favorite parts of any Harry Potter movie:


see more Lol Celebs


Yes, I'm a 40-something Harry Potter geek. Watched the first two movies with my kids (who were then around 9, 7, and 5) and thought nothing more than they were fantastic fantasy movies. I could not imagine what all the fuss was over the books.

Then we watched Movie #3, and I was confused as to the whole time-turner thing and figured I needed to read the book, but then decided (wisely) that I should probably start from Book 1 to make sure I hadn't missed something. By the middle of Book 1, I was just as madly in love with Jo Rowling and her splendid characters as the rest of the world. And let me tell you, if you have never read the Harry Potter series and are at all still a kid at heart, you're missing something huge. HUGE I tell ya!

From then on we attended every midnight release party for the books and movies that we could. The kids and I would race each other to see who could finish a chapter first and then we'd discuss it. I finally got smart and bought the books on CD and then we'd drive around as long as I could stay awake after the parties listening all together as a family. We dressed up and re-inacted scenes from both the books and the movies. We laughed and cried together over these books, and had some of the most amazing and in-depth conversations about friendship, good vs. evil, easy choices vs. right choices, and the mysteries of both our universe and the Harry Potter universe.

I quite literally bawl every time I see an intervie with Jo Rowling. She's one of my idols as I'd love to be a published author myself some day. I keep coming up with excuses as to why I never finish any story I start writing and here she was all hunched over the little table in that coffeehouse/cafe with a baby at her feet writing furiously for months. Inspiring I tell ya!

Well, I'll have to write more on this topic later. Work calls and my lunch hour is over.

In less than two months we'll be standing in line (starting around 6 p.m.) eagerly anticipating (and probably crying a little over) the first part of the last movie. It's been a wild and glorious ride raising my kiddos on these superbly wonderful pieces of pop culture masterpieces (I think all-in-all the movies are quite splendid, though not near as fantastic as the books).

Follow-up to Insomniac Rambling #1 (and a partial list of some of my fav films)

Well whattya know? Maybe I do actually need less sleep than I thought. After only making it 4 hours in dreamland the night before, I had a super productive and creative day. Maybe it's time to start charting how well I do on X hours of sleep. It would be super cool if I could end up like the Diane Keaton character in Something's Gotta Give. I'd love to be a best-selling artist like Erica Barry. Every time I sit and flip-flop between sobbing and hearty laughter like she did in that one scene, I hope that means that I'm super creative and not super nutso!

So it's time. . . To discuss movies of course!!! (otherwise this will be a totally useless post). I'll try to narrow down the hundreds of my favorites to like my top 10. Maybe top 20. It would be easier to do it by category. Hmmm -- that's actually a great idea. To follow the "theme", I guess this post will be a list of my all-time favorite Romantic Comedies:

Amy's All-Time Favorite Romantic Comedies on Film

(in no particular order)

-Something's Gotta Give

-Must Love Dogs

-The Ref (with Dennis Leary)

-Bull Durham

-Moonstruck

-Serendipity

-Down with Love

-Amelie

-When Harry Met Sally

-The 40-Year Old Virgin

-Bridget Jones Diary

-Two Weeks Notice

-Dan in Real Life

-10 Things I Hate About You

-Return To Me

-Same Time Next Year

-500 Days of Summer

-Bandits

-40 Days and 40 Nights

-Love Actually

OK. I have to stop. Time waits for no man and I've got to get to work! So there you have it (I guess): My top 20 favorites. It's jut that I know I'm totally forgetting at least one, so I should have made it my top 25. eek!

I would love, love, love to hear what other's favorites are. One of these days I might bore you with a more detailed reasoning as to why some of those are my favorites. And you'll notice that The Ref may end up on more than one list.

Toodleloo for now

Just Amy

Insomniac Rambling #1

Why did my body wake me up at 4:30 a.m. today??? It can't be because it was well rested since I haven't had a good night's sleep in over a week. Or can it? Do I somehow not know that I actually need less sleep than I think I do??? Say it ain't so Sam. Is that from a movie? Probably sorta kinda but not really. I'm sure I took a little from this movie line or that movie line and confused the two and made up something similar but not quite. Yeah, sounds like me. OK. Where was I?

Oh yeah. Rambling on about nothing. As usual.

So. For the last hour I've checked facebook and searched high and low online at places like eBay and Craigslist and even Amazon to try and find a bigger zoom lens for my new camera. Geez Louise but things are expensive. I so wish I had access to more money. Don't really want to work for more money, I'd just really like some wealthy person to just offer it to me! I'd gladly take it and announce to the whole world what a generous person this person was. Anyone? I'll even blog about it here, and tens of people would read about it, so it would be like totally expensive and worthless advertising. Anyone??? ;)

What would I do with that money you ask? Oh my, how much time do we have. I have so many wants/needs/dreams that it might take a few hours. I'll try and put down a partial list though, since I'm sure everyone is waiting with baited breath to find out.

-Bigger zoom lens for my camera. Weren't you reading a minute ago???

-Digital video camera, as I've broken my old one. My kids are still teens and I have years and years more of videotaping yet to do.

-A nice color printer and a ton of paper/envelopes so I could finally get my greeting card business off the ground. How many years have I been trying to get this thing going??? Too many. My how time flies

-Tithing. I would definitely pay tithing. I need all the blessings I can get from the Super Awesome Father up there in Heaven.

-Mini-Vacation for me and a few other divorced moms that I feel lucky enough to count as friends. M and H and C really, really, no I mean, REALLY need a getaway. This mom stuff was a lot harder than we imagined!!!

and yeah. I could go on and on and on and on, but I think it might actually be more beneficial for me to get my hefty arse off this chair and go do some laundry or dusting or photo-editing with all this free time I've been gifted by waking up 3 hours too early. Thanks body. Thanks a million.

;)