Reading

I wish I had more time to read. I just finished Angels & Demons by Dan Brown and loved it more than the DaVinci Code. Both books were really great and I was up way too late reading them because I had to see what happened. The same thing occured when I read the Harry Potter books. I love to read and learn new things. I have no time..... well it seems like I don't. I can go into a book store and easily come out with a few new books to sit on the shelf with the others. I think I'm going to try and start reading for 30 minutes or so before I go to bed rather than watching the news or TV. Maybe I need to start reading during my lunch hour now that it is nicer out. Better yet, maybe I should stop working and read instead! Ok, nevermind......

Lesson Needed

So I decided yesterday I need a lesson in tolerance. Tolerating my mother. While I know this sounds completely horrid, it's the truth. I find that ever since Kyle left that I am even more obligated to do stuff with her. Yes, this makes me a horrible person to even be thinking this. I'm the only one she has stuff to do things with. So when she asks me to do something I feel like I HAVE to. Otherwise she will do nothing. She sucks at asking her few friends to do anything, feels like they have their own families and friends to do things with. (Mom if you never ask they won't do anything with you) Yesterday was Mother's Day and I felt like I needed to be with her all day. Sure, I really had nothing else to do, but it was the fact that I am the only child in town and it's a day to be with your mother, who does / has done so much for you, and here I am feeling irritated. Yes I love my mother but being with her for prolonged periods of time can be too much. She always seems to be upset or down and after awhile it takes a toll on me.

I feel like an ungrateful horrible child to be thinking / feeling this way. Any advice or suggestions? After all it's my mother we're talking about and she's the one who put me here.....

My blog problem

So once again it has been about a month since I posted to my blog. I'm sorry, honestly. I guess for the few of you who arein't on Facebook (my new way of keeping in touch with everyone, even those I don't really want to) I should be better at this. I simply forget that I have it and in all reality feel like I don't have anything to share. I work, workout, do random stuff and all of a sudden the day, weeks, months are gone.

For those of you not on Facebook here is a life update:
1. Going to Kyle's and Ashley's this weekend to see the Dave Matthews Band concert and have a Kentucky Derby party. I bought a hat and Autumn, my best friend, helped me to decorate it. It rocks and is going to kick Ashley's hats ass!

2. Work blows. We lost a member of our staff and I have taken on all his roles in addition to my own. Why can't people take care of their own stuff and not have someone constantly remind them what to do or how?! I don't recall anyone EVER babying me, how come I now have to? We're also going to be adding another fundraising campaign and somehow yours truly got nominated without even being asked. AWESOME! I've been trying to look but I might as well be looking for a needle in a haystack.

3. Mom and I are going to Colorado in June. Yes, I said I was done always traveling with her and people get on me about it but I really have no one else. All my friends are either married or engaged, travel on their own, don't have the same interests, don't have enough vacation, or some other random weird thing. I really feel on my own when it comes to wanting to travel and having people to travel with. So while I will bitch about going with Mom and we'll get into a huge fight like we always do I feel no other option.

So I hope that was as thrilling to read as it was to type. Now you see why I have issues updating this on a regular basis.....

Cruise

So.... I'm back. I have to admit I about cired when it came time to come home. More than ususal coming home was depressing. Work is more stressful than ever and more uneasy, the weather still hasn't turned and I dreaded the idea of getting re-connected via phone, TV and Internet.

The cruise was great. I love the idea of a floating hotel. The weather was wonderful. Bright sunny days and awesome islands. It was cloudy one day but I was getting over sunburn so it actually worked out nicely. I loved being out in the middle of the ocean, the waves putting me to sleep. The food was great although maybe if I was more of a "foodie" I would have enjoyed it more. We took the late seating which wasn't until 8:30 so it was 10 or later when we were done. The formal nights were even longer with more silverwear and courses than I could handle. Don't get me wrong, it was all great food, but I guess I am just more of a simple person.

Our room was great. We had a balcony that we often left the door open to at night to hear the waves. It was nice to be able to sit there and look out. It got kinda small at times as the closet was right by the door to the room and the bathroom. You had to make sure you weren't going to hit the other person a lot of the time.

My favorite island is Grenada. Why? - basically for how it looked. It looked to me how the "typical" caribbean island should look. All of the islands were beautiful in their own way. I'm glad we took an excusion at every port because we got to at least see part of the island. I wish I could have taken more excurisions and that we had more time in each port. At least I feel like I got to see a lot of different places.

Here are some pictures. I would type more but to be honest I'm not feeling that great and don't want to depress myself more by talking about it. More to come later....

The Economy Hits Home...

The Economy has come knocking on my front door. Sure, hearing about companies loosing employees, the stock market tanking and corrupt executives effects me to an extent. The economy was effecting me but not personally, that is until Monday. Monday was the day of layoffs at LLS. I knew it was coming as raising money when the economy sucks is well, really hard. As an organization we are down from budget this year because some of our programs just didn't deliver. I was lucky in that I had a heads up that layoffs were on the way. We lost one member of our team. Overall the organization had a 10% decrease in staff.

While this is going to sound horrible, I'm not really that upset about the loss. I wasn't always sure the person who was laid off was into his job or did as much as he could. Don't get me wrong, I feel bad for the guy as I don't wish him any illwill and know he is going to have it rough. What keeps running through my mind is that the position is gone. The rest of the staff is going to have to pick up the pieces. How we are going to be able to 1 - figure out what he had going on, 2 - add more to what we all have going on and 3 - coordinate our efforts so we don't go batty, is on my mind. Unfortunatley I think a lot of it will come to me to figure out and coordinate. Sure, I needed more to do!

I suppose I should be grateful I have a job. For now. Of course no more layoffs are planned, but isn't that what they always say? I'm not really hurting for money and have a pretty good life. Work just got 100 times harder and more complicated but I'll survive that also. I suppose I am wondering I should be doing to ensure my career future isn't thrown off track.

Oh well. I'm off on my cruise next week so I'm sure once I get back I'll have it all out of my system. :)

Time

Has anyone else noticed that time seems to go by at warp speed these days? Sure, everyone older than myself tells me that as you get older time goes by even faster. So does this mean 30 is old? Does it mean life is going to go by even faster now? It just seems like every second of the day is taken. Granted some of the stuff I choose to do, workout, be a lazy butt and watch tv, nap, but it always seems like there is more I want to do and no time. I wish I had more time to read, visit with friends, talk on the phone to friends. I'm sure I could do more multi-tasking to get some of this accomplished but then again I think I may end up feeling more exhaused. I guess time does go by faster as you have more to do. I suppose I wish at times I could simply slow it down.

Simply Waiting....

For the end of March. I will get on a large ship and criuse away to the Southern Caribbean. I cannot wait. Warm sun, ocean, waves.... wonderful. It has been WAYYY too long since I've been on vacation. It was last March when I went to England. Not going someone this past summer sucked. I'm just a vacation junkie and love going places. Sure I go to visit Kyle and stuff but that's not going somewhere new. So I am simply waiting to leave. The weeks are going bye pretty fast and I'll leave before I realize it. Then I'll have to deal with coming back..... boo...