Things I Learned on 2/27/10

I am a moron when it comes to keeping my gas tank filled. I ran out of gas while driving on the interstate yesterday. This is the second time in less than two months that this has happened. This is a sign that a) I am scatterbrained as hell, and b)well, I think scatterbrained covers it.

When you're a black woman stuck on the side of the road in the nice part of town, black guys will drive by, honk their horns, and tell you that "you're fine as HELL!" but no less than 2 white guys will pull over to actually help you. I'm not judging the black guys who drove by and honked...just pointing out facts based on what occurred, for those of you sensitive types.

You should always have tow cable in the bed of your truck Once I realized that I ran out of gas, I quickly pulled over to the side of the road, but my entire truck settled into a muddy embankment. My tires were completely submerged to the point where even if/when I got gas, I couldn't drive the car out of the "pond" it was parked in. One of the guys that pulled over had a cable and hooked it to the front of my truck and the back of his. He drove and I steered my truck out of the murky embankment with zero problem. He then sat there until GDOT Hero unit appeared with enough gas for me to make it to the next exit and fill up. Thank God for angels on earth!

I'm scatterbrained as hell. Just thought the situation warranted me stating this once more, for the record. At least none of my kids were with me this time.

I MUST do better.

Hocus, Pocus, REFOCUS!

Time to shift gears a bit. I think then readers of my blog deserve a change of topic.



I have great news: I'm starting school in May! Yes, after years of trying unsuccessfully (not consecutively), I am finally going to complete my undergraduate degree. Some people are on the 5 - 6 year degree plan;apparently I was unknowingly on the 19 year plan. I'll be 38 years old by the time I finish. Which means I'll be 41 by the time I become an....well, I'll see how I do picking back up as a 35 year-old undergraduate student before I even begin discussing the next path I plan to go down afterward.

All of the classes will be available online. I'll be finished by December 2012, maybe earlier. It'll be a liberal arts degree and the classes require a ton of reading and writing. Oh joy, three of my least favorite things: reading assigned material, making a case about it on paper, and simply being a student in the first place. Yuck. But God knows I'm not complaining...it's my choice to do this. The end-result is what matters. If I want all 3 of my kids in private school, nice family vacations, and a healthy retirement in 30 years, I've got to get MOVING!!

I'd appreciate your prayers. This has been a long time coming, and I'm obviously not good at being a student, or anything that doesn't yield immediate results. I'll keep you posted on how things go. Transcripts turned in to University: check. Next up, fill out application, complete financial-aid paperwork, and develop personal statement essay.

CBS Interview - The Mentalist

via The Insider

When Harmless Obsessions Go Too Far...

So, I have an obsessive personality. Everyone who knows me realizes this. My obsession du jour has no pattern, really. It always starts out the same way: something grabs hold of my attention momentarily, and I either forget about it within a week's time, or I start looking for more information about it and other people who hold an interest as well. Usually I get bored after a few days, but if not, TROUBLE.

A few past objects of my obsession include: Michael Jackson (from when I was very little), former Falcons player Andre Rison, former Hawks player Spud Webb, Javier Bardem, Seattle Mariners player Ken Griffey, Jr., and Vince Vaughn. But the most intense of them all lasted from 1997 - 2000: Tiger Woods. Given the recent news surrounding him, I'll let that be a post in itself and won't speak more of it here. But I will say that the Tiger Woods obsession was a warning to me that my obsessions can carry me further than I ever originally anticipate. To potentially dangerous places, even. It transcends simply finding someone attractive or thinking they're a great actor, sports player, or singer...the obsession just keeps taking new forms as time goes forward, and the ante keeps upping itself, sometimes without my knowledge. I know it's gone too far when others start taking notice...



Which leads me to where I am now. I watched the movie "Something New" a few years back and was obviously affected by it in a way that I was unaware of at the time. I say this because I can't remember why in late 2008, I randomly decided that "The Mentalist" was the show to watch! I kept seeing really cool previews for it, and posting them to my Facebook profile. But right now, I honestly don't remember if Simon Baker was a factor that led to my interest. I do know for certain that my level of interest in The Mentalist went from 0 - 100 in two months. I began recording every interview he appeared on, configuring my laptop to automatically download embedded videos to my hard drive, installed software to convert said videos into iTunes format so I could download his videos to my iPod. The clincher was when I not only JOINED a Simon Baker fansite, but over a few months time ended up becoming one of the more popular members there. This is pretty scary when you consider that he has a LOT of stans (stalker/fans) ALL over the world. If I've become the most popular, that just doesn't bode well.

This has become more long-winded than I'd like. I'll end this post by mentioning that I decided at the beginning of the year to plan a trip to LA with one of my best friends (who happens to be exceptionally gorgeous and attracts a lot of attention). We've talked about this for several years, but to be completely honest, she and I can go anywhere we want. The only reason I want to go to LA is because of the extremely high possibility that I'll "casually run into" Simon Baker. People who live in LA run into him ALL of the time in the grocery store, at the beach, at the coffee shop, near his home walking on the sidewalk, etc... The reason I've done a 180 and have decided it's not a great idea to go after all is because of how my other celebrity encounters have turned out. Said encounters are the only reason I believe in the "Law Of Attraction"...and thankfully I was not married during any of those encounters. Nothing risque happened at all, but I really need to finally post an entry that goes into my past encounters with celebrities...please don't hold your breath.

Simon Baker in AOL interview

Embedding this here since it's down on the AOL site:

The player will show in this paragraph

Great end to the week!

I have SUCH good news to share. Remember in my previous post when I said that I may have good news to share on Friday? Well, I was so excited and busy celebrating what ended up being great news that I'm just now finding time to post about it!

My hubby passed the Georgia Bar Exam. He is OFFICIALLY an attorney now. All of his hard work and our sacrifice as a family officially means something now. It is a wonderful feeling that's hard to describe. It's more of a relief than anything to be honest. My husband is both humble and a perfectionist. He ALWAYS gives nothing but 100% in everything he does. Let me tell you about this man for a second: When I met him he was a 24 year old college freshman who had just spent his first 7 years as an adult in the Air Force. He attended Hampton University and got an undergrad degree in Pre-Med Biology. When I met him and we fell in love, he decided that he didn't want to spend the first 6 years of our marriage broke, so he decided to forgo the medical career. He wasn't happy with the direction his career was going in after about a year of our marriage, and decided to obtain a degree in a more lucrative field. He got his MBA in Finance the year after our first son was born, while working full time. He loved being a Financial Analyst, but he always wanted to be an attorney. In 2005 after our second child was born, he decided to take the LSAT for the heck of it. He did well and got into GA State University Law School. Attending GA State was the best decision he could have made ...their students pass the bar exam at a higher rate than all of the other Georgia schools (including Emory and UGA, which are actually ranked higher at the time - that will change in due time).

So this brings us to where we are now. I am SO blessed to have a man whose number one priority in life is to leave a legacy and a lifetime of wealth to his family. That's all he's ever wanted, and his pursuit of what to some may seem like impossible goals is proof of this. I have always felt like the most fortunate woman on earth to be married to him. He always remarks that he knows I've got his back because I came from an upper middle class family and yet, married a man that was driving a tow truck when I met him. From tow truck driver to attorney...dream big, people. For those of us that dawdle and can't decide who we want to be, just aim high for something and never give up!! Thank you God for keeping our family immersed in your favor and grace!!!

If you sit by the river long enough...

I don't believe anything is happenstance. I know that the word itself has its place, and I even use it from time to time. But, I just don't believe that anything happens randomly without a purpose, no matter how great or small. I believe that God loves us enough to give us the free will to do as we please, but also longs for a relationship with us in return for His unconditional love for us. This is based on everything I've ever read in the Bible, and based on what He has spoken to my heart over the years during and after meditation and prayer.

I have watched two different prime time shows this year that both used a famous quote from an old Japanese proverb attributed to Sun Tzu: "If you sit by the river long enough, you will see the body of your enemy float by". The first time I heard it was on "The Mentalist", a show starring Simon Baker. Everyone who knows me realizes that I'm obsessed with this show...okay, AND Simon Baker. :-) The second time I heard this quote was on last weeks episode of "Flash Forward". (In unrelated news, the star character of the show is played by Joseph Fiennes; if you don't know how to pronounce his name, just take a good look at him, and that's how it's pronounced - FINE. My gosh.) Sometimes I think that if I wasn't so into my husband (in EVERY way) he would leave me due to these silly, albeit excessive celebrity obsessions. :-)

After hearing the quote for the second time in less than two weeks, I spent a few moments lingering on how exactly this quote may be relevant in my own life. You could just note the context that was used in both shows to get a good idea of the quote itself actually means: the people that are out to get you will eventually meet their own demise, so to speak, and you will usually hear a secondhand account of it how it all went down.

Last night, I spent about an hour on the phone with a really good friend of mine that I used to work with. She still works for the company that I was laid off from, and she gives me updates about things from time to time. I am increasingly disappointed in some of the things that were confirmed for me. One of life's hard lessons is that there are some people that you simply CANNOT trust; my gut usually makes me aware of this, but one of my inherent "flaws" is that I always try to find the good in people, even those that don't deserve it. I sometimes go as far as befriending some of them. But most of the time, untrustworthy people will ALWAYS be just that. That's just the way it is, and can only begin to enjoy our life more when we accept this and adjust ourselves accordingly.

I'm not sitting on the dock with a pair of binoculars waiting on bodies to float by, but I get the feeling that in due time, I might see a couple that I wasn't expecting. Too bad...