Yeah!!! Internet is back!!

Currently listening to:  Kanye West "The Good Life"

"Come on y'all, let's go on a livin' spree!!"

I'm in a great mood for a few reasons:

-Yesterday was my 2-year anniversary with my sweetie :)

-Today I gave my 30-day notice to move out of my apartment with my laaame roommates

-Yesterday I found a way cute (but small) studio in my budget that I am moving into on March 15

-I am THISCLOSE to being truly independent and the master of my own domain!!

-I spent Saturday- Monday in Lake Tahoe with my favorite people in the world- my parents, my brother and my boyfriend.

-On Saturday I rode the Heavenly Gondola, one of my favorite things in the world to do.

-Tons of NSYNC came on my ipod today- talk about an instant pick-me-up

-Hillary is going to help me clean out my closet soon (please???)  :)

I don’t have internet, I might as well diiieeee

So I haven’t blogged in forever because the internet at my apartment mysteriously turned off.  Luckily my iPhone has kept me updated with my email, Perez Hilton and all the other blogs I read- I just couldn’t update my own blog.  I called Time Warner like 10 times, and FINALLY got through after being on hold for hours it seemed.  Anyway, so it turns out that our modem decided to self-destruct.  The good news is though, that Time Warner is sending a repairman on Thursday and we will get credited for the time we didn’t have service!! The bad news- I have to wait till Thursday!  Until then I will have to sneak in blog posts at work... shhh!

 

Anyway, so I have lots of updates.

 

I went to SLO last weekend, and had a blast as always!  That town is my Happy Place.  I went because Bret was in Berkeley visiting his brother (my birthday present to him!).  I got to see some of my favorite people (Jessica, Marsha, Brian, Katie S, Big Red & Billy at McClintocks, Ali, Kayla, Mike, Lauren, Katie R, Monica, Phil, Alex, Brett, etc this list goes on and on!!) but it only made me miss them MORE when I left!  I stayed with Ali and Kayla and it was Kayla’s birthday so we threw her a party Friday night, which of course featured the VIP wine bag that I brought (long story, but those kids LOVE boxed wine!) and lots of beer pong.  On Saturday I met up with some girls that live in the new housing complex on campus (Poly Canyon Village) and I was totally jelly that they didn’t have that nice of housing when I lived on campus!!  Then I went to lunch with Mike at the Shack (mmmm chicken fingers!) and topped the night off at my favorite place on earth, McClintocks.  Katie and I went to visit two of our favorite people, Big Red and Billy.  Needless to say we got pretty sauced.  Billy supplied us with Dunbars, Strawberry Lemon Drops, Pomatinis and White Gummi Bears.  We also had a “shot for the road” but of course I don’t remember what it was because all these drinks we had in like 2 hours!  Then Katie and I went to Buffalo (our favorite bar in downtown slo) and drank water for 3 hours waiting for Big Red and Billy to meet us downtown.  We met some random dudes in the meantime, but they were suuuuch losers.  Like, such the stereotypical SLO d-bag who hangs out at bars to meet girls.   Anyway, Buffalo got so crowded that we called it a night around midnight (We started at McC’s at 6, so it was still a long night).  Sunday was a bit quieter, started off with breakfast with Marsha at Linnea’s, then lunch with Monica and a quick visit to Brian and Chris’s.  All in all, an amazing, yet exhausting weekend!!

 

Last week wasn’t nearly as great as my weekend.  Basically, work sucked.  Like, more than normal, if that’s possible!! But I will leave that at that.  Oh, one thing to mention. Thursday was like the worst day EVER.  Really, top 5 worst days.  I texted Bret asking him if we could hang out that night because I was really having a hell of a day and needed to relax and cuddle.  Literally, I was close to tears of frustration and misery half the day.  At about 2pm, the lowest hour of the day (boss yelling, scowling, insulting, etc) a delivery man came and brought flowers for me!! Bret sent me flowers at work (miniature roses in lavender, white, whisper pink and coral!)!! I don’t know HOW he did it, but literally, they couldn’t have come at a better time.  I was so happy and it truly made me realize how much work DOESN’T matter in the grand scheme of things.  Thank God for amazing people like Bret J

 

Towards the end of last week I started to get sick, and I’m surprised I even made it to 5:00 on Friday.  I don’t get sick often so when I do I am a HUGE baby and have a really low tolerance for pain and discomfort.  I really just shut down until I am better (but, I usually get better in 2 days so it’s all a wash).  After work on Friday I went home, and literally slept from 6pm till 8am Saturday morning.  14 hours!! I don’t think I’ve ever done that in my life!  I went over to Bret’s Saturday morning to make him breakfast (scrambled eggs and peanut butter toast!) and then when he went to basketball I treated myself to a trip to the scrapbook store, followed by a few hours of scrapbooking my parent’s ski trips (I have to finish this week, their anniversary is on the 19^th!).    For Valentine’s Day Bret took me to one of my FAVORITE restaurants, called 26 Beach in Venice.  I also got to wear my brand new super cute dark purple dress from Banana!!  We had to wait over an HOUR for our reservation, but they had heat lamps outside and it was worth it.  They make the most amaaaazing chicken parmisian there, and I was sure to only eat 1/3 of it (don’t worry, it was huge) so I can enjoy it for lunch today and tomorrow!!  I wasn’t feeling well so I was a total V-Day dud and had Bret take me home after dinner, and I was asleep by 9pm (I even skipped dessert!!!).

 

Sunday (yesterday) was a lazy day, I got up early again and went to Bret’s for breakfast and some Sunday Morning Tivo (The Office and 30 Rock) before I went home and climbed in bed for a day of healing.  I watched Amelie (AMAZING MOVIE! I’ve seen it before but the 2^nd time was even better!) and Closer, which was a truly depressing movie, I wouldn’t recommend it!  It was basically about two couples who cheat on each other with each other and no one ends up happy.  But, Natalie Portman was in it and she was EXCELLENT.  She’s up there with Kate Winslett as my favorite actresses.

 

So that’s about it! This upcoming weekend Bret and I are flying to Tahoe for some winter fun! We will be gone Friday night through Monday night, and I am just antsy in my pantsy!   Tahoe is getting TONS of snow right now, so the skiing should be great! Bret, David and I are also going to make a trip to Harrah’s for some blackjack (fingers crossed for a big win, though I’ll probably stick to slots!!) 

10 Reasons why today is going to be a great day:

1. It’s FRIDAY!
2. I’m going to SLO today
3. I’m leaving work at 2:30
4. Driving to SLO with my good friend Matt who I am going to grill about getting a job at his company

4.5      Matt just BCC’ed me on an email where he told his boss how awesome I am!!  Keep your fingers crossed for me!

5. I just drank cofffeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!
6. I am going to see all my lovely little wowie babies tonight!
7. Tons of beer pong domination tonight!!!
8. It’s my Bret’s birthday
9. I kicked ass at work this week and have already met most of my monthly quotas (my boss will never acknowledge this, of course, because he thinks I am a dumb young girl, but I know in my heart that he has no other way of explaining why sales are so good)
10.  When I drive through Camarillo tonight I am picking up a bunch of new clothes that my mom bought for me at the huge Banana Republic sale.  YAY!

I'm so micro-bored!

I've been praying to my iphone for weeks, and they've finally arrived!  I give you:  2009's "Buzzwords."

Personal

Co-rumination: Excessive chattering about problems, real and imagined. Leads to the amplification of real anxieties, and creation of new ones. Has increased markedly in recent years, as email, messaging, texting, and Facebook have given the self-obsessed a multitude of outlets.

Junior moment: Flip-side of a senior moment. Can be committed by adults, with a sudden lapse into immaturity; or by youth, displaying the lack of thoughtfulness, sense or self-preservation we oldies associate with them.

Extended financial families: Several generations of the same family living in one home. Love and devotion might be the glue that keeps them together, but it's more likely to be the need for care or child minding, with the added benefit of cash savings.

Micro-boredom: What we used to call downtime, now increasingly filled by fiddling with mobiles or BlackBerrys. Those who market these devices, or the services they use, see it as an opportunity to sell us something. Potential victims of this can be recognised by their adoption of the:

BlackBerry prayer: The hunched-over, self-absorbed pose adopted by those fingering their Blackberry, or texting on their mobile. Often accompanied by facial expressions to match tenor of the message being sent.

Digi-necker: Driver who, when passing a road accident, whips out their mobile and takes a picture.

Environment
Nano-solar: Sunshine absorbers that don't need expensive, silicon-using panels, but use a thin film of solar cells that can be applied to any inorganic surface - windows, roof tiles, even metal. The predicted effect is that the cost of solar power will be reduced to a third of the cost of coal.

Energy dashboards: Control panels that monitor performance of your heat, light, and power use, in the same way a conventional one does for your car. Will be net-enabled so you can see what energy you're using, and at what cost, and come into their own when you have full device convergence, and you can talk to your appliances, and they can 'talk' back to you, and to the power source.

Negawatts: Latest word for energy efficiency, coined by the public utility commission of California. Greenies also use the term fifth fuel.

Edible estates: Phrase coined by US campaigner Fritz Haeg for digging up your lawn and growing in its place something you can eat. After all, we did it in the war, when the Dig For Victory campaign increased the land used for food production by 80 per cent. For examples, see any traditional cottage garden, or back yards in Switzerland, Italy, France, Germany - where grass is for sport or ruminants, not something to be made a fetish of.

Eco-embedded: The idea that business and government adopts eco-friendly practices that leave the consumer no choice. A ban on plastic shopping bags, for instance, or other plastic-free zones (such as a shopping centre in Balgowlah, New South Wales), carbon emission laws, or 'green' credit cards where consumers pay a little extra to offset the carbon cost of their purchase.

Technology
Geo-fencing: What you do when, via a GPS system or mobile phone, you set a physical boundary to where someone can roam. If they exceed it, you get a warning. Used by delivery companies to be notified when drivers stray off designated routes (which sounds Big Brotherish, but could also alert a firm to a hijack). There are also geo-fencing services that can track your child's mobile, sending you a message if they deviate from their usual haunts.

Cloud computing: Use of the huge capacity of corporate computers by individuals or small businesses.
Corporates have sophisticated software, and you have broadband that lets you connect with this computer 'cloud' floating above you. In other words, software will not be something you buy, but rent and access.

Telepresence: Fancy word for video conferencing. A few firms now have special rooms where life-sized images of off-site participants allow a meeting that satisfies every sense except that of touch. Not to be confused with teleporting, which only happens in sci-fi movies.

GRIN Tech: Genetic, Robotic, Information and Nano Technology. Mostly it means those breakthroughs which have yet to find a practical, cost-effective application. But, we're told, they're coming. Er, probably.

Consumer
Austerity 2.0: What we're all about to experience in 2009, if those dubious think-tank predictions come to pass.

Flexenomics: Our word for the economy growing up to support the need, in times of far greater uncertainty, for people to keep their spending and consuming flexible. More of us will rent homes, white goods, TVs and entertainment systems, or lease cars. It also covers contract working, and reduction of all but essential financial commitments - which will help relieve that already established condition: debt stress.

Brickor mortis: Property market where few homes are being sold.

Upcycling: Recycling disposes of things that might (repeat, might) be reconstituted rather than left to rot; upcycling gives objects a new use. Its American advocates cite an example of chair cushions made out of old ties, which doesn't bode well. For examples of less frightening upcycling, visit etsy.com. The concept is popular with Imbys, who favour anything local, until, of course, it threatens their space and privacy, whereupon they become the far more familiar Nimbys.

Staycation: A vacation without the travelling. Or the expense. Or the tan.

Enoughism: The creed that holds that we over-consume, amass far too much "stuff" that only ever provides a fleeting pleasure, and ought to cry "Enough!". Experts like John Naish and Oliver James argue this incessant acquisitiveness leads to dissatisfaction that can develop into mental illness. Been around for a while, but fast gaining currency.

Unplugging: Technological wing of the above, where someone realises that the time they spend online, on the mobile, curating the Facebook page, etc, is no substitute for living. So they put themselves on a digital diet, and possibly even cultivate an interest in things without keypads. Like other people. What we all need, probably, are more islands of tranquillity, or thinking time, as it used to be known.

Business
Instapreneur: Instant entrepreneurship, via online shops and selling services, allow anyone with something to sell - even a design or idea - to go into business right now. The online service takes a rake-off, but the instapreneur does not even have to invest the financial, or time, cost of making or buying stock. Via lightningsource.com, you can even submit a book manuscript to Amazon.com and start taking orders almost immediately. There are also sites for T-shirt designers (spreadshirt.com), and much more.

Crowdfunding: Financing of ventures or projects by a number of individuals brought together, usually via the net. Disaster relief funds are a form of crowdfunding, and this old concept is now being used in new ways, especially in the US. Examples include ArtistShare, where musicians can raise cash via online micropayments (four years ago Maria Schneider became the first ArtistShare beneficiary to win a Grammy); BeerBankroll, a brewer managed by its online community (membership as low as $50); and greedyorneedy.com, which allows people to submit a need or wish, with participants then voting which ones get the donated cash.

Pinkwashing: The dark art favoured by certain companies (you know who you are) of using ostentatious support for breast cancer research to promote your products or services.

Perkonomics: Small add-on benefits offered to you by firms to get or retain your business. Examples include fast-track guarantees for theme parks or car hire, and mobile network Orange giving users access to concert tickets 48 hours before they go on general sale.

And finally...
If buzzwords enrage you, then write a book about it. You will thus contribute to the rising tide of books about things that make the author angry, known, of course, as Wrath Lit. There is, it seems, a buzzword for everything.