Category: Uncategorized

As part of my morning routines, I check my website statistics to see how many people are visiting, where they’re being referred from, what pages they’re clicking on, and where they’re from. (As an aside, I can pretty much associate most of my regular blog readers with who they really are based on locations and even service providers — and I can tell what hits are spiders and spambots. If if you don’t think I know who you are, I really actually do because I’m just good like that.) Yesterday I had a random referrer from some site I’ve never heard of — no, Mr. Spammer, I will NOT give you the good graces of a link. I clicked it, wondering who this person was and why they were linking to my website. Instead of finding my link, I found borderline smutty pictures, ads, and minimal text. I shrugged it off, closed out the site, and decided it was a fluke. But wait, there was another hit from this referrer this morning. So I brought out the big guns… Google! Yes, Google is my answer to just about everything. Lo and behold, this guy is notorious. Um, uh-oh? Here’s what I’ve learned…

1. This guy — we shall consider him like Voldemort and refer to him as “He Who Must Not Be Named” from here on out — practices “black hat” techniques. More specifically, he practices referrer spamming. I assume he was banking on me allowing my site patrons to view the website statistics. Sorry, Voldy, I don’t operate that way. The goal of that is to spam my readers with links to his crummy website and try to turn off profit at my expense. Apparently, people have been banned by their webhosts as a consequence of this guy. (Don’t worry, I’ve already tweeted @hostgator and submitted a support ticket to HostGator to nip this Dark Wizard in the bud.)
2. He Who Must Not Be Named is some 60-year-old pervert in the Philippines. Excuse me? (WARNING: RANT AHEAD) I was once a 13-year-old girl who all too often felt the eyes of older men eying her like a piece of meat. I learned how to give an icy glare at a very, very young age. I blame this on living in Broward County, Florida as a teen, a place where sexual predators run rampant. I have absolutely no tolerance for men (or women, for that matter) who prey upon innocent children for their own deviant desires. I am of the opinion that child molestors are in the same league as murderers and should be treated as such. How dare this pedophile come to my website in the attempts to make a profit off of me. I have three wonderful little children that I would protect like a very rabid momma bear — this means you absolutely don’t mess with my kidlets if you know what’s good for you. Now that he’s made himself known to me, I will be doing my part to bring this black magic hat practitioner to justice. (Hey, the website was premised off of Sailor Moon, what can I say?)

Here’s hoping HostGator can reassure me that my site itself has not been compromised.

[From my local paper, via Eugenia Last] SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): A change of location will enable you greater mobility for travel, learning and applying what you know to something that can be quite lucrative. A lifestyle change will do more than just alter your direction — it will bring you clarity and peace of mind. 3 stars

How convenient — I happen to be working on lifestyles changes that I was hoping would alter my direction and bring me clarity and peace of mind. I realized today that I’ve been doing it all wrong. “Baby steps” means just that: baby steps! I have this ridiculous notion that I must find a quick fix that will transform everything overnight. Of course, reviewing what Marla Cilley says through her FlyLady persona, it didn’t get this way overnight, and it won’t get fixed overnight either. (I paraphased that as best as I could.) I am grateful to realize that I need to just slow down, pick out one little thing at a time, and go from there.

Might I also add that I am extremely grateful that I somehow managed to survive today. Last night, our sweet little bumble bee determined that it was the wakeful time of the day. It’s no wonder they deprive prisoners of sleep to torture secrets out of them. I thank coffee and tea for giving me the caffeine necessary to function as a coherent member of society today.

Once again, Gwen Bell has offered me a source of inspiration for daily writing. She linked to The Mindfulist, which appears to be a site she created to post these daily tidbits (I could be interpreting things incorrectly, though). I intend to play catch-up on prompts that inspire me and begin writing on each topic when it is appropriate.

I’m nearly two weeks late on this post, but things happen in life that tend to distract me. It’s really astounding to me that I was born right on the cusp of the boom in ADHD diagnoses, yet I was never diagnosed with it myself. Do you know in third grade my teacher complained to my parents that I “spaced out” a lot? By “spacing out,” she really meant I was daydreaming about all sorts of fun things that little girls daydream about. I’m still very much a dreamer, and… oh look, is that a butterfly? All joking aside, I do fit the diagnostic criteria of ADHD. Granted, I’m not as hyperactive as I was in childhood. I do wish I still had that sort of energy, but I’ll just be thankful I haven’t progressed into old age yet. I guess I’m trying to make an excuse for my lack of posting. I could go on about more excuses, but that’s not the point of this post.

Health
Healthy eating habits: Include more fruits and vegetables into my daily diet, reduce sugar and white carbs, and tailor my caloric intake to my specific dietary needs based on BMR, breastfeeding, and level of activity.
Exercise: Aside from using the public transit as both a means of activity (I spend about 1 hour, 15 minutes walking in total to and from bus stops), create an exercise plan consisting of several types of crunches, push-ups, squats, lunges, and other exercises that do not require bulky equipment or a gym membership.
Lose 29lbs and 33inches: I may or may not decide to follow Giyen Kim’s format with a weekly picture with weight and measurements, but the baby fat must go.

Home
Get back on the FlyLady bandwagon: I’ve gotten so disorganized these days that I don’t even know where to start most of the time. It’s time to bring myself back under control and form some routines. I’m tired of having to stash the mail and paper pile on my kitchen counter every time we have company, only to lose important paperwork later on because I didn’t deal with the darn things when the got there. I also need to snap back into that “quite whining and playing the martyr role and just do it!” mentality.
Potty Train Tati: Well, she’s coming up on her third birthday, so I guess it’s time to buckle down and get it done. We kind of eased up as my belly got bigger because we knew there’d be regressions anyway, but it’s not pleasant having to wipe two behinds.

Self-Betterment
Write Daily: If I wish to be a writer, I should actually BE a writer. I took the Gwen Bell Blog Challenge in December, and it clearly inspired me to reflect through my writing. I find comfort in seeing my thoughts turned into concrete black-and-white text (or ink and paper). I’m not going to figure out the next Great American Novel if I don’t toy with my writing, and I’m surely not going to get anywhere if all my stories are left unfinished.
Make Friends/ Strengthen Current Friendships: My new is Meredith, and I am a lousy friend and an agoraphobe. I always told myself that I wouldn’t be like some other people in my life when I moved away from old friends. No, I would be keep in touch and remain a true friend. Fast forward to the present, and here I am disconnected from many good friends. While I’m no where near as bad as Paula Deen once was, I do feel that everyday I make it out of my home is a tiny victory. I’m way too much of a home-body, and I guess I’m too scared of giving out my trust too easily. I’ve been burnt many times before, and I supposed that’s made me far too timid in terms of meeting new friends. I’m also enochlophobic, but I’ve been working on it. I mean, I ride the bus home from work at the end of the day without feeling panicky anymore. In any case, I need a social network — and not just the kind you make on the internet.
Religion/ Spirituality: You know, I’m Catholic. Have I actually read the whole bible before? …no. Do I go to church every Sunday? …no. Do I feel bad about these facts? …yes. Granted, I feel more spiritual than most devout church-goers, but I at least want to take the time to try following my religion a little more closely. Of course, I’ll be observing this coming Lent, as I always do.

Ah, I feel so much better putting that out there into cyberspace. Now that I’ve got an audience, I might feel a lot more accountable to my resolutions as well. Here’s hoping I accomplish my goals by December 31st, 2010 at 11:59pm!

All week I knew we had a chance of snow forming here because I knew we were expecting cold enough temperatures when the cold front was due to drop some precipitation on us. The weather forecasters started to predict it, and I got very excited. Snow in Florida? Too good to be true! Of course, the snow would be an overnight thing, and last night I didn’t have the energy or patience to pull an all-nighter — not to mention I have kids and really can’t do things like that anymore. My husband woke up in the middle of the night and saw that we had snowflakes falling. He saw about 10 and woke me up. I saw two snowflakes drift down. Giddy, I ran down the stairs to put on my gloves and winter coat. We went outside our front door and stood patiently waiting to see a flurry. A cold wind blew.

“I’m not properly dressed for this. I’m going back inside.” And I went back inside to look at the doppler. I grabbed my scarf, stuffed my thick-sock-covered feet into my sneakers, and went back out to watch and wait. Nope, not even a drop of rain. We went back inside and checked to see if we might see more later. While I could’ve gotten up at 6 when my alarm went off, I decided I was too tired and cold to get up again. On the one hand, I’m happy I even saw two little snowflakes drift downward through the sky. On the other, I feel like Charlie Brown on Halloween.

First and foremost, I am so incredibly grateful for electricity and the indoor climate control it enables for us. While I enjoy the cold weather, I most certainly do not enjoy sitting in a 53°F office trying to type while wearing gloves. UF’s heating system was offline most of this week, but they finally fixed it last night. It was still 53°F when I got here this morning, but it was up to 65°F by about 10AM. We’re now just barely under 70°F in the office. Ah, comfortable working environment at last!

I’m also grateful for the little bit of fragmented “one more day” I kept getting this week. The chairman let us go home on administrative leave, which was really quite nice. I still got up early and came in to freeze a couple mornings, but at the very least I still got to go home and nap with the baby for a bit. It helped make up for the whole baby not wanting to sleep at night bit.

I am also grateful to see some [redacted] opportunities coming my way again, although I did have one offer pulled after the company got a certain amount of posters. Now if only I could really justify writing about [redacted]. I suppose it does sound like an interesting topic that I personally would like to read more about — I am going to have to worry about aging eyesight at some point in my life, after all. I think I’ve justified it. I will need to learn about it some time as an alternative to glasses, so I’ll just share it with all my wonderful readers!

So, Ms. Bell’s final challenge of the year forces me to reflect upon plans I had made that couldn’t be followed through with for a very good reason. At the start of the year, I knew I was headed into my second year of employment with UF MSE and would have my coveted two years of experience by the end of it all. I was hungrily eying Southern New Hampshire as a realistic goal for August 2010. We paid our credit card debt down to the recommended 35% mark with our tax return and planned to pay the rest off in 2010 and buy a car. I would polish my résumé and hunt for jobs in NH. I was going to look through different apartments available to work out a realistic salary request. Then we found out our Valentine’s celebrations had resulted in a very big surprise. This news changed our plans — and our lives.

I had to put all plans for Southern NH on hold until further notice. All extra funds needed to be saved. We needed to skrimp as much as possible. We needed to ensure that we could welcome our sweet little boy into the world as securely as possible. On top of that, I couldn’t imagine trying to move across the country a mere 9 months after having a baby. While I know babies are born up north just like they are here in Florida, I also can’t imagine having his second winter spent in dramatically colder weather. I stopped worrying about finding the “perfect” town to settle into — I have standards, you know. (I’m looking for the lowest poverty levels, the highest graduation rates, the best salaries, the most affordable houses, and the optimal people to land ratio. We need a place where we can thrive.)

While I’m incredibly happy with the surprise ending to 2009, I’m also a bit sad that I can’t be planning a move in about seven months. I may revisit planning in the new year, but I’ve been reminded this year that you can’t plan too far in advance because life has a plethora of variables. You never know when things will get shaken up.

If you look around the poster, you will notice I start with spring (my desire to have cherry blossom trees on our land), move to summer (Weirs Beach is this really awesome place where they have the biggest arcade in the world), then onto fall (apple picking, pumpkins, leaves changing color), and winter (snow, skiing, snowboarding). I added pictures of houses I found on Realtor.com that looked nice. I’ve writen “New Hamp$hire or bust” and “Southern New Hamp$hire Bound” to further motivate me. Someday, I’m going to bring my family there where we will settle down in our very own home. We will enjoy growing our own fruits and vegetables, we’ll play in the snow, we’ll have picnics under the cherry blossoms, and we’ll be a homebase for when the kids go off to college. It will be a home that’s ours to stay in, to never have to pack boxes and move away again. We will grow roots.

…it’s squishy baby you will get!

Since at least a few of you have expressed interest, I thought I would finally get my rear in gear to share my littlest of the brood. What makes this one of my favorites? It actually captures just how adorable he is, and it captures those sweet moments when he curls up on me for a little catnap. It reminds me of when he was still in my belly enjoying the sound of my heartbeat and gurgling of my stomach. One day he will look at this picture and say, “aww, Mo-om! This is SO embarrassing!” And on that day, I will need this little memory the most.

I love paper. I love pens — multicolored are my favorite, actually. I still have a collection of stationery that I haven’t finished using. I hold onto it in the hopes that I’ll have a good use for it. Well, at my baby shower back in September, one of the professors gave me a gift. This gift included a beautiful card inside the most beautiful envelope. I have a penchant for all things shiny, and this envelope was a shimmering silver color. It was so beautiful that I decided to keep it along with the cards I received to put into Brian Jr.’s baby book. If you want to see my eyes light up, give me something shiny — I will immediately revert to my two-year-old self.