Back In The Saddle

I apologize for the two-month delay in writing a post.  I was going gang busters until AdSense rejected my application so I sort of lost steam.  I think I’m going to reapply, though, and see how that goes. 

In the meantime, I found a new job.  Yes, I had only been at my last job for a short while (9 months to be exact).  I won’t go into the details of that, since they are pretty nasty.  Suffice it to say I got out of there just in time.   So today I’m going to talk about cutting the crap and not feeling bad about it.

That’s right.  I walked away from what I thought was as close to perfect as I could get in a job.  You know why I walked?  Because I wanted to leave on my own terms.  I don’t feel bad about that.  At all.  I did at first, but I got over it.  When you hit one of those roadblocks  - you know the kind I mean – that make you stop and wonder what the heck you did wrong, then it’s time to stop and evaluate what you want.  Don’t feel bad about that.  Just evaluate.  Decide what you want.  Don’t feel bad about saying to yourself that you deserve to be treated better.  Don’t feel bad about looking for something else.  Cut that crap out.  Do what is best for you and your family and move on. 

You know what else you shouldn’t do?  Don’t feel like you wasted your time at that particular job (or whatever it may be).  You know why?  Because that time wasn't wasted.   It never is.  You always learn something from each experience, no matter how horrible it that experience may have been.   

So that’s it for today’s post.  I had to get back in the blog saddle.  I think I’ll write more later about the job hunting process and how to cut the crap out of that.  Boy, did I learn a lot this time around…

What's shakin'? I'm back. Again.

Today I decided to brush the dust off my blog and start talking about crap again.  It’s been too long.  In my defense, work has been crazy busy for like three months straight.  It’s still crazy busy.  However, if I don’t give myself an outlet other than Facebook, that crazy busy is just going to become CRAZY AMY.

What have I been doing, you ask?  I only have like 8 followers, so if you guys want to know, then I’ll tell you.

Working.  A LOT. 

Have I been cutting crap?  Not really.  I’ve been adding crap, but I HAVE lost 6 pounds.  I’ll tell you about that in a few minutes.  What have I added? What have I cut?  Here ya go.

•  My daughter now takes singing lessons.  That’s an add.  My recent pay raise pretty much pays for it. 
• We stopped going to Awana, because my daughter was just NOT getting enough sleep on Wednesday nights.  That’s a cut.  While Megan got a lot out of it, it was complicating bedtime and Thursday morning.  The amount of sleep a 7-year-old gets seems to be pretty important.
• Speaking of my daughter, we’ve decided to homeschool this coming school year.  That decision was a tough road to walk, but we think the benefits will outweigh any detriments.  If you’re the praying type, please keep us in prayer.
• My husband lost his job.  There went the rest of my pay raise.  Now my income is paying for all the necessities, but there is literally nothing left over.  That’s a cut.  Can I just say, though, that I love having him home full time.  It has really removed some of the other stresses from me, even if we are a little strapped for cash at the moment. 
• We started a business.  That’s an add.

And that brings me to that 6 pounds I recently lost.  When I say recently, I mean in the last seven days.  After hounding some people and doing the research, Rob and I decided to try out the ViSalus 90 Day Challenge.  After only a week we’re both seeing results.  Rob also lost 6 pounds.  That energy dip that usually comes mid-afternoon has been non-existent for the past week as well.  Overall, I’m already feeling a little better.  We’re so sold on the product that we’ve decided to become distributors.  Our goal is to replace Rob’s within 60 days.  I’ll let you know how that goes, and in the meantime, if you want to try a sample, let me know.  I’ll USPS you some. 

I'm back!

Goodness!  Has it really been three months since I posted on my blog?  It HAS!  Sorry about that.  I really didn’t have the bandwidth to update my blog since I’ve been so busy with work.  When I was done with work each day, I was pretty much DONE with everything.  I didn’t even want to look at a computer, much less post an entry here.  My poor children got the bare minimum attention, because my brain would literally shut down.  Not good.  My poor husband did his best to weather the storm.  I really do love that man.  He’s far from perfect, but the stuff he puts up with… O.M.G. 

That being said, I still love my job.  It has its harrowing moments, but it’s a pretty sweet gig.  We get bagels every morning.  I have awesome benefits; aside from the normal medical, dental, eye stuff, I also get regular training on the company’s dime.  I get to work from home on snowy days… or when I’m sick (shouldn’t be doing that.  I should cut out that crap)… or if I have the cable guy coming over.  I work with brilliant people, and I get to work on way cool stuff to educate present and future generations of students.  Can you say OpenClass?  Have a look.  It’s pretty dang cool.   So even though I’ve had some pretty demanding projects lately, I’m not cutting out my job.  It just isn’t crappy.  Or cut-worthy. 

So how have I cut the crap over the past 3+ months?  Not as much as I’d like.  The Paleo Diet has waxed and waned; Rob is finally on board, though, as he’s reading 4 Hour Body.  We’re going for a BMI test next week.  My quest to weed out my email inbox is still ongoing, but my company gave me an ADDITIONAL, corporate-wide account that had 5000+ emails already waiting for me in it.  I deleted those.  I’ve been weeding out friends and causes and likes on Facebook.  My kids have a box of toys to be donated (or sold at a yard sale), so that’s pretty good.  Recycling efforts were reinforced at Christmas.  I made reusable sandwich wraps for all the nieces and nephews to use in their daily school lunches.  I also tried to wrap as many presents in either recycled paper or reusable bags.  That was cool. 

So, I have been keeping with the spirit of cutting the crap.  I just haven’t been blogging about it or stepping it up as much as I wanted for 2012… at least not so far.  I want to get my reader counts up this year.  I want to write more.  Quite frankly, it’s like therapy to me.  I need it.  And I want to find more ways to cut out the crap from my life.  There is plenty of it!  Help me stay accountable, People! 

Snacking, not portion size, largely driving U.S. overeating

Snacking, not portion size, largely driving U.S. overeating

So according to this article we're eating more often, and we're adding calories. Add to this that we're not getting enough exercise, and this is the reason Americans are more obese than ever.

I fall into this obese category, unfortunately.

So... simply put... to reverse this alarming trend all we need to do is exercise more and eat less. Yes? However, is that going to happen? Today we have more jobs that require sitting (in front of a computer or otherwise) than ever before. This means we'll need get exercise before and/or after work. Many people are so busy with family commitments before/after putting in 8+ hours a day that they don't take the time to exercise.

Exercise is an individual choice. However, it would be nice if those sit-down jobs would encourage more activity. My company does. Not only do we have locker rooms onsite, but we participate in the Global Corporate Challenge every year. We participate in Bike To Work Day, and we even have a dedicated bicycle storage in our parking structure. Even our company president leads by example by biking to work as much as humanly possible. We have posters all over the place advocating healthy life choices. We have onsite workshops that talk about current health trends. We've even had a fitness boot camp here. We also get corporate discounts at places like 24 Hour Fitness. Do I participate in any of these things? Occasionally, yes. Sadly, I should do more since I have so much available to me.

More companies should be like mine, though. They should offer incentives to people to get healthy. Still, exercise is an individual choice. As a whole, I think we Americans need to choose to get healthy. Until then, this trend will become ever worse, I'm afraid.