Epiphany

We all got up around the same time Sunday morning. I was glad to just take it easy for the day, and not worry about running around or doing anything on time. That's the beauty of the weekend, and that's exactly how it should be. I've bitched over and over again, my utter hate for people who make things more complicated than they need to be--meaning they make things complicated for themselves, and eventually roll over their complications to everyone else. It's ridiculous. Not to get all hippy on people, but I honestly don't understand how people LIVE like that. It's not living, it's being MISERABLE. At least in my book it is. I've been all about enjoying myself these days, and not giving a fuck if anyone else is having fun. I've spent too many years of my life working around others, and I'm just not doing that anymore. Totally over that whole scene. 

I was really sad to leave Marissa's. I seriously had such a good time! Weekends like these, 

are the epitome of ME. What I like to do, what I enjoy doing. I always feel like I'm not the fun one in our group, and I've grown to realize that's not the case at all. Sure I'm pretty objective and not as crazy like some of the bunch, but I'm crazy in other ways. As I'm getting older, I'm really starting to notice things that bother me. Going out from weekend to weekend is getting monotonous. I can't deal with it anymore. I'm not the girl who likes to go downtown to bars and get hammered, so much that I can't remember what I did the night before. I'm all for a good time, but not always up for what everyone else's definition of a "good time" is. It's not fun for me. I'm starting to go through a pretty big transition in my life. It's definitely time to evaluate my social habits.

We're not teenagers anymore, we're pretty much half way through our adult lives. The era of being irresponsible spoiled brats have come to pass. The excuses of making bad decisions will only carry you for so long. I need more motivation in my life, passion and something that drives me to find any meaning I can in my life. I'm finding it in travel and adventures around the world. I just feel like I've been drowning in a stagnant pool of nowhere land, and I need to come up for air. I love my friends, I really do. It's just time for a change in me. Different things are becoming more important in my life, and I'm just not on the same page as others are. It's always kind of a sad moment, when you realize you're on different paths with the people you love. I'm not insinuating that I'm better or above anyone else, we just grow at different rates. Everyone sooner or later will reach a point in their lives, where what they've been doing just isn't enough anymore. It's like poison, not having enough stimulus in your life. Drags you down, kills your moods and beats out any passion that ever existed in you. I'm simply not allowing it to dominate my life. 

I may live a small insignificant life to others, but that doesn't mean I'm not important. I may be at the mercy of other people temporarily for a few hours a day, but they hold no rightful ownership to the story of my life. In the grand scheme, you just can't let the "little things" hold you back from all the bigger things that are yet to come to you! It's taken me a long time to understand what that means, and I'm taking full advantage of it now! I've always felt like people don't understand or know me. How I operate, cope, what makes me tick. This weekend was more than just having a great time with one of my besties; it made me realize what's important in my life, and totally attainable to regain my umph back. 

AAAAAARRRRIBA!

Cinco de Derby!

The drive to Albany was pretty quick! Jeff and I arrived around dinner time, and we all decided to grab a bite to eat. Marissa is really good at finding new places to go. Her and Jeff have a really great attitude about trying new things. She took us to this small family Italian restaurant, and we had a great time. After dinner, we did some driving around and then headed back.

Saturday was amazingly fun! We all got up and got some breakfast in our bellies, and it was off to find some adventure! I'm always glad to be around people who have the same adventure mentality as I do. I'm very open to trying new things like food, activities, basically things that I've never done before. What's the point of TRAVEL if you're not interested in the culture, food and or things that a city, state or country is made of? There's really no point. I wouldn't classify myself as a picky eater; I mean there are definitely some things that I don't like, but I'm seriously no stick in the mud. I've been getting into hiking a lot more. It's a really great activity that is physical and it's actually really emotional too. There are few things that you can easily take part in, that literally take your breath away. Hiking is one of them for me. We headed to one of the state parks and it was totally packed. I couldn't have gone up for a visit at a better time. 

We hiked until we got way over there!

Under the waterfall!

We started at this cliff overlook point and parked the car. There were lots of people there, so we just kind of followed the crowd around the paths to see where it took us. We could see this waterfall in the distance, but I couldn't really tell how far it was. Jumping right in, we suddenly came to this SUPER STEEP staircase that lead straight down. The stairs were old, but there was no danger in them giving out. Pretty soon, we found ourselves twisting and turning in some really tight spots, until we magically arrived behind the waterfall. It was super awesome! I had my phone with me, so of course I was shutter bugging away at everything! We kept going on our hike and found a few more caves and another waterfall. We wound up on the other side of the park, and had to climb another set of steep ass stairs to get back up on the hill. It wasn't until we got up and started walking back, that we realized how far away we had gone! We were hiking for easily two to three hours. If I had to estimate, it was probably like a four mile hike at least, plus stairs. It was a good time.

After our hiking adventure, we headed back to the apartment to watch the derby of course! We washed up and headed out to a Mexican restaurant of course for dinner. I borderline hate Mexican food, but I didn't tell Marissa that lol. Some people will argue and say "oh it's because you've never had REAL Mexican..." BULLSHIT. Real Mexican food of course, is NOT Taco Bell. I've traveled plenty and have been exposed to some of the best Mexican restaurants around. I'm not really a fan. I'll eat tacos, because they're pretty much the same. It's the spices that I don't particularly care for. If I do Mexican, it's usually like TexMex. The wait was long of course, being Cinco de Mayo and all. We found seats at the bar and ordered margaritas. BIG MISTAKE. These bad boys were STRONG. I know I haven't been drinking much at all, but even Marissa got drunk after just one. I was about half way through mine, when all the sudden it hit me. Then the Dos Equis girls came around and bought us a round of beers! GREAT. By the time the hostess found us for seating,  I wasn't completely confident I could walk in a straight line to get to the table. As usual, I took it like a champ and made it safe and sound!

The food was really good! I have some strange expectations when it comes to food. I LOVE the smell of hot sauce, but I literally cannot eat it. Medium is even too spicy for me. I LOVE the smell of Southwestern/Mexican spices, I just don't like the way they taste. Odd ball right? Overall Saturday was a great day, when we got back to the apartment I totally passed out. It was a great day!

Brass Monkey

The death of an era.

Adam Yauch aka MCA from the Beastie Boys passed away after his battle with cancer. I am seriously super bummed. The Beastie Boys music was a serious part of my childhood and adolescence, their songs took part in the soundtrack of my life.  I am truly sad about this. There's something so awesome about their music, something that makes you just wanna get up and get crazy. Their songs were more than just about partying and having a good time, they were about living. Everyone is alive, but how many of us truly live? Yeah, ponder on that for a hot minute.

I remember when I was a kid going ape shit on the trampoline to "Brass Monkey". I couldn't get enough of it! Hien, Whitney and I would jam out to tunes while he bounced our way through summer on the trampoline. Shit, I even remember when we used to camp out on it and sleep! Grandma bought it for us in the summertime, and she was probably cursing at herself a few months later when the injuries started rolling in. We were all hell on wheels. No matter what activity she'd put us in, we'd tear it up! The trampoline was the single most useful investment my grandmother got us for our summer monkey fests. We'd bring out little stereo boom box outside and start jumping like wild animals to The Beastie Boys. Singing along and have fun just being crazy. It was probably one of the best memories I have with the girls. 

To pay homage to Adam, I'm rocking all Beastie Boys tracks in my car today. I'm headed to Albany to go visit Marissa at her new place, and plan on having a really nice weekend. It's Cinco de Mayo and DERBY DAY! So we'll probably end up at a Mexican bar someplace, drinking margaritas and watching the race lol. Tomorrow morning, Marissa is taking Jeff and I hiking. I'm super excited! I haven't been hiking in a while, and I'm anxious to get some exercise and adventure hunting in. Especially because the weather has been so nice. 

Speaking of Brass Monkey, I tried out my new clarifying shampoo today! Holy shit. What a difference it made! My hair is squeaky clean and it smells awesome! I highly recommend it! It feels like Vick's Vapor Rub on your scalp and it makes the whole shower smell minty fresh! I am definitely keeping this product in my bathroom at all times!

It's not really that expensive. The shampoo is about $13 and conditioner is $16 I think. For the results it gives, it has more than paid for itself. I can't even tell you how relieved and refreshing it is to have your normal hair back again! I picked mine up at Ulta, but you can find it in Sephora and online. 

All right everyone! Have a fabulous weekend, full of Derby and margaritas!

Ole!

Skank wave

Today was crazy busy!

I went to bed Tuesday night super late. Marissa called me for a late night gab fest and after I got off the phone with her, I finished watching season 1 of Sons of Anarchy. What can I say, I'm addicted to TV series okay?! The morning came super early, seeing as I never really went to sleep. I was excited to see my friend Jodi and her son Garrett for breakfast! It's been literally ages since I had a good breakfast. We met up at Denny's and had a really good time. It made me sad, I miss her and Garrett a lot. Good people in your life are hard to find, and with age I'm becoming to understand it more and more. Garrett was busy playing with jelly packages, and Jodi got him to call me Thao Thao! So cute, I love it. Even though at first he kept calling me E-I-E-I-O! He's about the cutest two year old boy I know! It was great to catch up with her. Since leaving work, she seems so much happier. I really wish she'd have another baby already! I can't ever get enough of spoiling other people's children ha!

There was lots to be done today. I went over to PetSmart to pick up some things. I ended up wandering around the store for a while. After I decided to go on a mission to find a new hair place. I've been desperate to get my hair done. I've been so spoiled going to the city. My main man, Alex does a great job! Not to mention he's Malaysian and works at an all Asian hair salon in Queens. Finding a good hair stylist is hard freaking work. I'd trust this man with anything...and I mean ANYTHING. He could chop all of my hair off, shave one side and dye it purple and it probably would look amazing. Besides, he wears the coolest Zelda shoes ever! I've been having massive problems with my water at home. We go off of a well, and the water is hard. I've always known our water was hard, but I don't ever remember it being this bad. My hair feels like brittle straw and is disgusting. I already have oily hair to begin with, but it just feels like I didn't rinse all the shampoo and conditioner out of it---when I KNOW DAMN RIGHT I DID. I can't even describe how gross it is. I'm super embarrassed about it. LIKE SUPER EMBARRASSED, enough to make me tie my hair up everyday!

I don't trust people around this area to do my hair. There is not a single soul in this podunk town that can style Asian hair correctly. I took a leap of faith and went to Ulta to get it done before my Aviva appointment. I was greeted with a big bright smile from Adriene, and she did a great job. When she was standing behind me in the mirror messing with my hair, I couldn't help bug squirm in my chair. My hair looked disgusting, felt disgusting, okay it was fucking disgusting. We got talking while she was shampooing me about the whole hard water thing. She said she had it at her house too, and it turned her blonde hair like a brassy red. Or as I like to call it effing SKANK WAVE. You all have seen the skank wave...don't act like you haven't! Skank wave is that dirty looking hair, greasy, out of control and off color. It just looks damn sloppy, and I've been rocking this look for the past month thanks to the well. She suggested getting a filtered shower head at Lowes, and that's EXACTLY what I intend to do. Meanwhile, she showed me some clarifying shampoo I could use.

Apparently the clarifying shampoo may or may not strip your hair of it's color. GREAT. That's fine though, no big deal. I mean, my hair is JET BLACK. I could stand to go a little lighter anyway I suppose. She told me when she was blow drying my hair that she could tell instantly what the problem was. THANK GOD! SAVED! My hair was still like gross and sticky, better than it was before but not great. That being said, I was confident she knew I wasn't a dirt merchant! I headed over to Aviva for my appointment and it went quick. I ended up gaining half a pound and yes that's still enough to get me pissed. Cody of course was super encouraging and told me not to give up. I have no intentions of, but I can't wait until the weight drops off again. Looking through my weight chart I have, it's a going trend with my personal case. IT PRETTY MUCH BLOWS. LOL

I headed home after my appointment and waited for my mom to get home. I really wanted to take her out somewhere to eat, and she ended up taking me. GRRRR. I hate when she does that. We tried a new Vietnamese restaurant near us, and ordered a traditional soup dish called pho. It is my favorite thing in the world. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either. The service was all right, but I'm leaving Vietnamese cuisine to my mom. No one ever makes anything as good as your mother does! :)

Oh, I love a rainy night!

When I'm under something that is!

I secretly love this song lol, goes back to the day of playing GTA on PS3!

Today was pretty busy to say the least. However, I didn't accomplish near as much as I wanted to. There's something so awesome about sleeping in! I saw on someone's Twitter today there was a post about sleeping in versus being active and how it isn't attractive. Pretty much saying that men prefer girls who don't sleep in and get up at the crack of dawn to do whatever. Welp, I hate to break it to all my prospects out there--but I fully take advantage of sleeping in like a freaking teenager! LOL. When you work the hours I do, and the type of work I do you'll totally understand.

Working in my field is more than just "pushing a button". It's physically exhausting. I fully intend that by the age of 40 I'll need a lumbar spinal fusion. I'm only 26 years old and I guarantee that my back looks like I'm about 38/40 years old. We do a lot of pushing and pulling. Most of my patients can barely move by themselves. Luck for them  I go to the gym. I always appreciate the people who try and move by themselves, and curse profusely in my head when young people (20-60 years old) don't even TRY. Gee, thanks so much for all of your help! I don't mind helping people who are in pain or physically unable to. It's kind of how I feel about people on welfare or Medicade. I get it. People who genuinely need it, deserve to have it. It's the ones who come in that are "helpless" that I can't get a grip on. Truth be told, I don't really care WHY you came in at all. Just please cooperate with people that are trying to HELP you. Gah!

It's been kind of a rainy gloomy day. I went to get my oil changed and my tires rotated today. Should have totally had them done like two weeks ago, but I didn't have enough time on my week off. They were busier than usual today! I had to wait like half an hour to even get in, and then another hour on top of that. By the time I got out of there, it was too late for me to get my other things done. Some days, I really hate regular business hours of places. Anyway, I am super glad I got to sleep in today. I really needed that extra time to re-charge my batteries! Everyone needs time to just get a good nights rest, especially when you don't sleep well usually.

Tomorrow I'm getting up early to meet Jodi and Garrett. I'm super excited! Jodi is a good friend of mine that I met through work. She left the company a few months back, and I haven't been able to get together with her. Garrett is her son, and he's quite possibly my favorite little boy in the whole world. Every time I see him, it kind of breaks my heart. When kids get bigger, taller and older it makes me super sad. Some kids, I just never want them to grow up--kind of like puppies or kittens. After breakfast with some friends, I'm going to try and finish getting the rest of my laundry list done and head to my appointment. YIKES! I'm still confident that at least I haven't GAINED any weight that I know of this week. I'd rather take no change in weight, than gain. EEK. I'm starting to hate the "G" word! Tonight should be good, I don't mind sleeping through a little rain and thunder. Have a great day tomorrow everyone!

Happy May!

Can you believe it?!

It's May already, and that means we're closer to summer weather! I'm looking forward to scooting all around on some new adventures. It's going to be a crazy busy summer for me, I have a lot of travel plans and people I need to go visit.

I'm super worried about my appointment on Thursday. No matter what I freaking do this week, I can't seem to shed off the three pounds I gained back. It's literally driving me insane. Tomorrow I have a lot of errands to run, and I'm hoping to get some outside time so I can burn off some calories. I'm starting to think that my stress level is the culprit of this weeks weight plateau. Hopefully that all will change in this week, or at least I can attempt to get my stress level under control. It's amazing the things that stress can do to your body. However, I am  not lucky enough to be one of those people who just magically lose weight due to it. Bastards. 

I definitely need to get more than one thing under control. There's lots to do on my car this week and I need to clean the bitch out. My car is usually immaculate, but my trunk is a complete and utter disaster. Looks like a shoe store back there. Let's face it ladies, when you're out sometimes you need a selection of shoes with you. Whether its changing out of heels into flats, or sneakers into flip flops. A girl has got to have variety! Not only is this a problem, but my room should have caution tape all around it. I'm going to clear out some old threads, in order to make room for new ones. I usually do this like once it hits Spring, but the weather hasn't been steady enough to get rid of my long sleeves. PLUS my co-workers have been bugging me about my scrub pants. I wear scrub pants and usually a fitted top. Scrub tops make me feel frumpy and the ones I have look like a parachute on me now. Yes of course, its such a GREAT thing--but not for my wallet. The thing is, if I put my cell phone in my scrub pocket...my pants VISIBLY start sagging down on one side like I'm about to lose them! The strings are pulled as tight as they will go, and I've put buying scrubs off for six months now. Time to clear the old and bring in the new!

Cleaning does something really therapeutic for me. I'm positive it calms everything down. When your head is full of chaos, having control of your environment gives you that sense of stability back. Don't expect me to go on a cleaning spree through all of my house, or yours thought! Just having my things in order, is enough to set me straight sometimes. It's like having a really crappy day and getting in the tub for a bubble bath. Sleeping better with fresh smelling sheets on your bed, always gets you a good nights rest. When you're head is spinning out of control, you've got to find when your safe zone is again and begin to gather yourself up. This is definitely easier said then done. Took me years to figure out how to calm myself down, and I'm definitely still learning!

As always, I'm going to be super busy this week off. Main focus for me, is on myself. I'm taking time off to do things I want and need to do. Can't be concerned with having responsibilities to other people, and I certainly can't feel relaxed if I'm catering to someone else. I plan on treating myself to a lot of things this week. Not weight loss gifts to myself, but lifestyle gifts to myself. Part of losing weight is reaping the changes and benefits from it. Sometimes you have to get out there and show yourself how much you've transformed!

Zombified

But I definitely don't eat humans!

I REALLY wanted to post yesterday, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. I literally was falling asleep on the drive home, and couldn't even open  up my eyes by the time I got into the house. Barely had my eyes open when I put on my jammies, popped my medicine and hit the pillow hard. 

It probably was the longest I've slept without interruptions in a long time. You know when you try to fall asleep and you just can't? Last night, I could literally feel myself falling asleep. I woke up once to go to the bathroom but that was it! Before I knew it, the alarm clock was going off and I shot straight up and hopped into the shower. Totally not normal for me, I am the snooze button queen. I used to date this guy that hated when I hit the snooze butoon. He didn't see the point in doing it. "If you keep hitting the snooze button, why don't you just set your alarm clock for later?" I could never date a man that didn't appreciate the power of the snooze. I mean, then why is there an option on ALL alarm clocks TO SNOOZE?! Ha ha, I know you all know have been there before right?!

Work snailed on by yesterday. We weren't exactly busy, but it was steady enough to keep my barely awake. BLAH! I'm not big on drinking coffee in the morning to keep me awake, but I definitely need more than my shower if this continues!