Please, enjoy the message I sent to my cousin for his birthday today:
Cousin. I believe today has been your birthday. I have a mild case of food poisoning/intense case of indigestion and a fever, so I let it get away from me. If you can, imagine a phone call from me, in which my mom and P—— and I all sing “Happy Birthday” – remember that my mom will be off-sync, due to being on a different phone, and P—— will be in and out with the vocals due to what’s next in the sentence – while P—— gives his honest but digressing attempts, due to a lack of practicing, at playing the melody of the song on piano while also keeping normal time, and I do my best to follow his lead for the base chords, since he’s the melody and the melody is in charge. Likely, I also, chime in and out with the vocals, because, no matter how many times we practice, when it starts to go poorly, I can’t stop laughing hysterically and mostly silently. We might even have thrown in there “Las Mañanitas” for you, sung by my mom, in which case, you have almost no vocals for the English “Happy Birthday,” because P—— is concentrating so hard on playing notes and keeping in time and I’m too busy holding my gut as I keel over laughing but still diligently playing the piano part correctly. Hope that brightens your day! Happy, Happy Birthday, Cousin!!
Also, enjoy photos of our real life egg hunt today
This last one is the one we never found at Easter. I guess a raccoon got it and ate the candy inside… and, possibly, the other half, too?One of the eight possible candidates for the real eggs
Happy Birthday! Chickens laid eggs today for your birthday!
I’d say it’s a darn solid birthday message, especially considering my being somewhat sick and all. Decently done, Nanner! Decently done! Haha 😛
Dear God, please, gran my cousin safety and success in his endeavours to do your will. Thank you for such a wonderful cousin and friend. In your name, I pray. Amen.
I attended a women’s self-defense class today. A friend invited me multiple times, so I imagined it was expected to be a good class. It was taught by a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu instructor, which was actually the main reason I went. I had a feeling she would cover some extremely valuable stuff that is different from what we do in karate. By going, I could begin to round out my self-defense repertoire, something I’ve been wanting to do for some time now.
And I was right.
She covered some very simple ways to get out of wrist grabs, being bear hug-grabbed from behind, as well as how to take on being knocked to the ground and attacked by a man from the front/top, and, not only to stop him in two different scenarios, but to render him unconscious by restricting blood flow. That last part was definitely awesome to learn. I had always wondered how to do that, and I learned much for it today.
The whole class, though, I was thinking about whether I could execute this stuff on someone bigger and stronger than I am. I have always held my own in wrestling matches that are for fun, but all that stopped when I met my man. I do believe that I have not once bested him in any kind of wrestling scenario. I mentioned something of this to the instructor, and she said to bring him next time, so I can practice with him at the end of the class.
I guess I get to look forward now to practicing these crazy things with my man!
Thank you, God, for the many blessings of today. Thank you for this life. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Well, it poured and rained for most of the day today, yet the festival was still a success. Not all the groups got to perform today, but they all did yesterday, when loads of people were at the festival, so it kind of balanced. Nowhere near as many people came today as yesterday, but there was still a surprisingly good number of people, despite the rain. When the rain started letting up somewhat in early afternoon, even more people kept showing up. So, sure, the grounds were basically flooded in spots all over the place, and most people just walked around, getting soaked, no umbrella to be seen. (That part actually really got me. Sure, the weather forecast had changed a bit from what it had said last night, but the sky was dark this morning. The sun barely even rose. There was no way one couldn’t look or step outside and not know that it would be raining a decent amount today. And, likely, it already was raining by the time anyone did step outside to head to the festival. Nonetheless, loads of people had no rain protection whatsoever. Okay, folks… haha.)
Anyway, great day and great time with my family today, and then great dinner with my dad and my man this evening. I’m already in bed about to go to sleep, and it isn’t even ten PM. Thank you, God, for all these blessings. Be with us always, please. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Sometimes, I bite my nails, because they’ve grown too long, and I can’t seem to stand them another minute… and they end up being all rough and uneven around the edges. And then they catch on things a bunch, including my skin and face, until I bite them some more and/or eventually find a nail file and file them down to where I’d wanted them to be in the first place.
It seems an utterly ridiculous struggle to have, yet I face this struggle regularly and often. I have reminders on my phone, telling me to do my toenails and my fingernails at certain increments of time that I figured out were accurate about a year or so ago. And yet I still struggle more than half the times with availing cutting them and ending up biting them down out of annoyance a week or so later (al while my phone still displays the message telling me to trim and file my nails).
I haven’t quite gotten to the root of the struggle, as we can all see by my consistent struggling with this same issue. It seems like it must be an easy solve, if I just gave it a bit of actual time and attention again. Or followed my reminders like I once did. Nonetheless, a ridiculous struggle continues.
And it has me wonder: How many other ridiculous struggles am I having in my life right now? How many other seemingly rough situations actually have a simple solution, for which I need only give it some genuine attention and effort and consistency?
Although, now that I think about the specifics, perhaps it is just becoming clear that I always was one of them… hmm… haha
Tonight, instead of going to bed well before 10pm, as fully expected and planned, I got caught up working on a coding project. I had to build a landing page that adjusted well to different screen sizes. It’s one of the final projects in the whole section on web design for my course. I decided a while back to have fun with the projects, whenever I’m having to make most of it up, anyway. For the half-existing things where I just edit or add bits, I don’t do much personalization, if any. No need there. But, if I’m basically making it all up, anyway, I want it to be something I’ll enjoy and actually want to show someone else, you know?
Anyway, so I was making this page for ‘a club, real or imaginary.’ I happened upon an idea that I loved, shortly before my planned bedtime… like twenty minutes before it. Next thing I knew, it was two and a half hours later, and I was still working on the project. It was definitely progressing, and well. But I was 100% not in bed.
Instead, my man made me some seared tuna – I know – after it thawed half an hour, and then I worked even more. At about 1am, I had finished my project and shown it to my man, and was finally heading to bed… only four+ hours later than planned…
I felt like I was finally starting to be like all the other nerds who end up having that late night, ‘because I was working on some coding,’ and/or, ‘and I really wanted to resolve this one part.’ I did that tonight, and not for the first time. But it was the first time I had a full product at the end.
However, I already do this with things. I already stay up late just to finish something up, even if it isn’t even time-sensitive. I’ve basically always done this, until I started occasionally forcing myself to go to bed, everything left to be done tomorrow, so I could wake up early for the gym.
So, this was nothing new for me… except that it finally was for coding stuff.
Whereas I love hanging at home and going to bed during rain storms, with all the thunder and lightning and wind and rain outside, the dog resolutely disagrees with me. And, frankly, tonight, she is pissing me off. If I didn’t despise having to touch her crate right now, after I’ve already showered and gotten all clean and all, I already would have pulled it out and locked her inside it. No, I don’t like trapping a dog inside its crate. But it is sometimes the only option to prevent them from freaking out so much that they destroy just about anything they can get to.
She looks at me so pathetically, yet won’t accept the comfort I offer her of a fancy faux-fur pallet on the floor right next to my bed… she isn’t even allowed in the bedroom usually. But she’s about to blow it… ugh…
Dear God, please, keep my man safe and bring him back to me safely each night, including tonight. In your name, I pray. Amen.
Dear God, please, help us to improve our schedule. Help us to sleep the sleep we need to be our best selves each day. Help us to do our best work. Help us to love our best and to be our best with and to one another. In your name, I pray. Amen.
P.S. Please, let it be everything I’ve dreamt to have and more. Let it be the answer to my prayers and the key to my future. In your name, I pray. Amen. St. Jude, pray for us, too, please.
Not doing great with the idea of getting to bed early and getting up early and going to the gym this week, but I have gotten up earlier than I had been getting up, and I have done the full workout at home just after getting up both mornings. And I’ve gone to bed a bit earlier than I had before (not counting last week, that is.) So, there’s a positive there.
More work to be done, more improvement to be had. For now, I bid you a good night.
I haven’t much liked working out on my own in the past. However, there has been something about it this past week that has changed my mind a bit. I think the music at the gym has gotten too loud for me to want to be there so often, and the classes are sometimes too full for me; it has become a bit of a drain on me emotionally and social just being st the gym, I think. It’s almost like it has been overwhelming, in a way… just too much stimulation to be going five days a week. Even four days is a bit tough, it seems.
I think I am doing these workouts at home in large part due to the fact that I can stay away from all of that external stimulation and not have the shock it provides, let alone the reset and quiet time and relaxation it demands afterward for me. The mental disruption from classwork was already enough of a struggle before, but it has become increasingly obvious that the overwhelm of the scenario itself has become a bit much for me lately.
Perhaps working out at home once or twice a week will be all I need to get myself exercising five to six days a week again. I can still go to the gym three or four times, that way, and get that extra push from having folks do the workout with me. But I might strategize a bit and pick my classes as the lower-attended ones most weeks.
I’m wondering if this might just make a huge difference for me and my fitness and workouts, as well as productivity…
hannah ananas 