Sunday, November 7, 2010

FOOTLOOSE DREAM ZONE

Some of you may have noticed that all was quiet on the southern front yesterday. That is my quippy way of saying that I didn't blog. I did read a couple of blogs, but not many. My head was killing me and it just didn't let up. Usually I can squeeze a few good hours out of a day, but the last few days... make it the last week or couple of weeks, it has been challenging. And it has been manifesting itself in every aspect of my life. The migraine meds just don't work for me, so it has all been pain mgmt via pain pills. Well... I know that too much of that stuff is bad for you.

I have been living on pain medication for years, so I really try to not take it unless it is necessary. Well... for the last couple of weeks my migraines have been so bad that they have been waking me out of a sound sleep between 3-5am. Ladies and gentlemen, this is not good. This means that I am taking meds all day long; as soon as the medication wears off, the migraine kicks back in. Not surprisingly, the last few days my stomach has really been hurting. I have no doubt that it is a response to all of the pain medication. I sent off an email to my doctor today. Fortunately, she is excellent about replying.

Normally, I don't post this kind of crap on my blog. No one wants to hear about your medical junk. Besides, I know many of you have medical junk of your own. I am also a big believer of negative builds on negative and positive builds on positive. So, I really try to throw positive stuff out into the universe because that is the foundation that I want to build on. I believe in positive comments, positive thinking, positive visualization, asking for what you want, believing you will get it, and that there truly is a Grand Design (no matter how messed up everything looks at any given moment).



Yesterday was supposed to be my magical music day. That didn't happen. It was my spend the day in bed day. Yuck. And my laptop is at the computer fix-it place being wiped. That has me less than happy. All of my wonderful youtube footage saved in my favorites for later are very likely lost in space. *sigh* Ironically, I didn't even have an 80s group picked out because I was feeling so bad all week long. Yeah, it was really that kind of week. So, now I am sitting at my step dad's computer and thinking about how I might accomplish this mission without totally annoying my mom. She is at the next desk, which is only a few feet away. I love listening to youtube music. It drives her up the wall. I have nothing saved and no ideas. It is entirely possible that she might kill me, even though she loves me like crazy, and I am her only daughter. It would be a crime of passion. Totally an "in the moment" thing. I know that she would feel terrible later.

Well, I will try doing some listening and see what happens. If she gets that look in her eye and goes for the iron skillet in the kitchen, I might have to switch gears and do something else.

Well, this turned out to be easier than I thought. I strongly encourage you to listen to the inspirational song for today. You will probably look at the name of the song and band and scratch your head. The only reason I am familiar is because this song came out at a time when I was actively watching CMT. Why CMT? Because if I felt cruddy and only could stand 10 minutes of TV it was no big to turn it off. There was no emotional investment in a "show." However, as soon as I saw this song I LOVED it. However, I never heard it on the radio... of course. Because it was awesome. Probably not country enough for country radio, rock enough for rock radio, etc. Basically it just didn't fit in anywhere. In other words, it was awesome. So, give it a listen even if you hate country. It may never rank up there with your faves, but it is a very cool song. Definitely inspirational.

Click here to watch the video. It would not embed.


I have been thinking that I wanted to do an 80s soundtrack for a while. My original thought was to take a successful soundtrack and pick a couple of songs that had particularly interesting videos. Well, that isn't how this post is going to work. However, that idea is still on the backburner. Instead, I am going to go with an 80s artist that had two REALLY successful songs on two DIFFERENT soundtracks. In both cases, this artist shot the videos using footage from the movies. That was brilliant. Had the movies been duds, that would not have been a good idea. However, both of these movies were box office blockbusters and this was a case of a song using MTV in yet another visual way. The movie, the song, and MTV all were using each other to ride each of these separate, but interlocked, entities to success. People watched the video and then had to see the movie. People watched the movie and then loved the video. People loved the video and had to buy the soundtrack. It was one more unanswered question of which of these caused the other to become the unparalleled success that it became. Who knows?

The only thing that was certain was that the fans were glued to MTV, buying the soundtracks as fast as they could, and hearts were palpitating all over America for Kevin Bacon and Tom Cruise. Yep, the artist we are talking about was Kenny Loggins. In the 70s and early 80s he was "speaking" to our parents. In the mid-80s, he jumped the generational gap when he became the musical voice for FOOTLOOSE and TOP GUN. Yep, Kenny Loggins jumped back on the musical rollercoaster and became a hot property. If you don't remember, or doubt what I am saying, just watch the footage. Kenny Loggins knew when to step in and when to step out and it put him back on top. Yeah, he was, once again, a top gun.... lol.







I have to admit that both of those movies were HOT HOT HOT back in the 80s. And Tom Cruise was the sh*t before he lost his freaking mind. Kevin Bacon still is the sh*t. I have a funny story to tell about high school, but today isn't the day. One day when I am lacking material I will share it. Well, it was funny then... maybe not so much now. Maybe it was a had to be there story. I don't know. But, Kenny Loggins always was classy to me. I always loved that song that he wrote for his father THIS IS IT. At least, I understood that it was for his father. As I understood it, his dad had cancer and was mentally giving up. It was the kick in the ass song that Kenny wrote for his dad. It was him drawing the line in the sand letting his dad know that he had a lot of fight left in him and no one else was giving up. It makes me cry every time I listen to it. So, yeah, I think Kenny Loggins is hardcore. In his soul. Where it counts. And I think he knows something about walking in the Danger Zone. Not necessarily where there is artillery and gunfire (I don't know about that), but fighting the good fight. Yeah, I think he knows about that. And he isn't a quitter. I like that.

Friday, November 5, 2010

FINDING THE FIRE ~ YOU CAN THANK CHRIS FOR THIS ONE

As many of you are aware, I purchased my very own domain name a couple of weeks ago. I was so pleased with myself. It was this HUGE milestone. Finding just the right domain felt like it had taken forever. In actual fact, it had been weeks. Possibly months. But that can feel like forever when you feel ready to go and are being held back by something like just the right name. Therefore, once the right name hit me, the desire to snatch it up, was irresistible. Of course, I did it. Couldn't help myself. Ignored that voice that said, "You know nothing about setting up a website." Did it anyway. Called a friend of a friend for some info. Spoke to another friend about possibly designing a header. Both of these people were helpful; they just weren't quite as helpful as I hoped. In other words, they really didn't have time for my project.




On the bright side, I did figure out how simple tabs are on blogger. On the not-so-bright side, the fact that it was so simple and I missed it, left me feeling even more worried about this site than before. It would have made me feel better had it been more complicated. The fact that a chimp would have figured it out more quickly was not encouraging.

Be that as it may, after hearing from several "computer" people about how wonderful various hosting sites are, I decided to go with the first one. That would be the one that I heard about from the friend of the friend. He, at least, returned my calls and I knew would help me out as much as he could. So, Tuesday evening I decided that there was no more putting it off. I have excellent ideas for this site. I just have to tinker with it in order to make them a reality. Wednesday was going to be magic. If it took me all day to figure out how to move it onto that host site, well that was what I would do.

Wednesday I woke up with a bone cracking migraine that lasted all day long. Nothing would break that sucker. I never made it out of bed. I sat up, pulled up my laptop and posted briefly that I was down for the count. Obviously my big plan for moving my site onto a hosting site didn't happen. Yesterday wasn't much better. I did my HERE'S TO YOU THURSDAY and went straight back to bed. I finally caught something of a break today (hence a "real" post). So, I went back and started reading what you folks have been writing and got stopped fairly quickly when I read Chris's post at A DELIBERATE LIFE. She was talking about finding the fire (her motivation) to really step up her efforts in her weight loss goals. She has lost so much and gotten a bit too comfortable. She isn't where she wants to be, but she has gotten too comfortable.



It made me think about me and my need to find the fire with my domain site. I am not a bit comfortable. I kind of have the opposite problem. We both are treading water for different reasons. I am thinking about my site, coming up with great ideas, reading books on non-profit organizations, etc. I can't say that I am not "working" on getting this idea off of the ground, but I am not moving into that place where I am really nervous. Make that scared. Really scared. Because I have no idea what I am doing. I, too, have to find that fire and go with it. Put it on a hosting site. Well, that can't be too painful. Stick a page up indicating it is under construction and then tinker around. Eventually I am bound to backdoor my way into something that works. Sadly, that is pretty much how I roll. Pretty much every successful thing I have done on the computer has been totally by accident. I figure this site will probably be a lot like that.

If that doesn't make sense to you, it could also be compared to my driving skills. I was a sales rep who had a fairly large territory in eastern GA and western SC. Before that job, I was terrified of getting lost. It would cause massive anxiety attacks. I got lost so often on that job that I stopped getting them. It became a daily occurrence. I had to account for my time as a new sales rep and every day I had a various amount of time spent "lost." Sometimes it was several hours. My manager would call me when he got these reports. "You were lost two hours yesterday? What was up with that?" I would launch into this detailed description of where I wanted to go, where I ended up, how I tried to retrace my steps, where I then ended up, how I was late for my appointment, etc. We only had this conversation once and he no longer called. He just accepted my time spent "lost" as me truly being lost.

However, the awesome thing about being lost was that I found stuff. New accounts that I didn't know where there. Shortcuts to places as I began to recognize road names. Most importantly, north, south, east, and west stopped being something on a map, and began to actually mean something to me. You would think that should be obvious. Let me tell you: it wasn't. And driving is so much harder when you truly cannot comprehend NSEW. A whole new world opens up when you do. When something moves from theoretical to practical it changes your LIFE. And that is what being lost did for me. That... and no more anxiety attacks. Well, until I started forgetting how to get where I was going when I should know. But that is memory loss and NOT being lost. Two totally different things.



Back to this website business and finding the fire. I have spent the last few years trying to avoid stress because it causes migraines. In some ways, amping up your life, testing your limits, finding the fire is stressful. So, my natural reaction now is to step back. Move away. However, if I don't dig down just a little and find the fire to get this site on a web hosting site than I am in idle. My project is in idle. It is all well and good to have wonderful ideas. Ideas that can change the world. But, if they never leave your head they don't DO anything. They don't CHANGE anything.

Chris has lost over 100 pounds. She looks beautiful. Her head is in a good place. She can do things with her kids. She is healthy. If she decided that she was happy with her weight right now, no one could argue. Drop in on her page. Look at her. She is gorgeous. However, she has not met HER goal weight. And that is what matters. She set a goal and she intends to meet it. To do that she says that she has to find that fire she had at the beginning of her journey.



The reason that I love Chris's blog is that whatever she writes about, be it weight loss or life, is applicable to anything in my life at any time. There is always crossover value if I am open enough to see it. Right now, I need to find the fire just to get my domain name onto a host server. Then I am going to have to find the fire to keep plugging away at figuring out how to make that site do what I need it to do. I have faith in the rest of it. I have faith when I send you people the email about the need for the doctor info that you will give me what you know and will move the email along. And that email will keep moving and my inbox will be overflowing. I don't worry about that part at all. It is the website building that makes me feel faint. Paralyzed. So this finding the fire business isn't a one-time event. It is a life event. Over and over we have to dig deep and find the fire. Things happen that seem too much, too overwhelming, impossible, etc. Or maybe you know that they are possible, but you are just too tired. You have been at this for a long time and tried so many different things and none of them have worked right yet. That is when it is most important that you find the fire.

As an aside, life doesn't make this whole fire business easy. My laptop found its own sort of fire via a virus, and is currently residing with the computer fix-it people. My cursing veto went right out the window, and I made excellent use of the f-bomb in every possible context. Noun. Verb. Adverb. Adjective. I was very prolific about the whole thing. It is only going to cost me $100 that I don't really have to get it back. Yippee. So, I will have to find my fire on one of my parents' computer or wait until Monday to find it on mine.

Thursday, November 4, 2010

HERE'S TO YOU THURSDAY


Today is the day that I celebrate all of the amazingness that you contributed to blogland this week. Yep, it is that day again. What day is that you ask? How can you have forgotten? Drum roll please. It is HERE'S TO YOU THURSDAY, of course! The very best day of the blogging week. It is the precursor to the best day of the work week.

Here is what is going down: this is a weekly event. The best (or worst) part is that I am not going to explain why I chose "whatever" footage for each of you. If, you watch your footage and are scratching your head at the end, well that means I didn't do a very good job. However, all is not lost. You can email me at rarichards68@gmail.com and ask me what I was thinking when I chose that particular piece of footage off of youtube and connected it to you. And then I will tell you. Then I will start sending up prayers that I haven't offended the crap out of whoever is on the receiving end of that email....lol. Because, honestly, I will tell you right now... I admire all of you enormously so I really hope that doesn't happen.

Also, this is not an exclusive venture by any means. I hope that you will take the time to watch ALL of the footage because I don't pick bad footage:-) I also hope that you might check out the blog of the person I dedicated the footage to because they are pretty darn awesome. If you haven't figured this out yet... I pick the footage based on something that you've written or something that I've gleaned from your personality. Think on that for a while... If you are having trouble watching the entire video (meaning it is being cut off on one side), click on it a couple of times and it will take you straight over to youtube. If you click on the four squares at the bottom corner of the video, it will enlarge it to fill your screen. The escape key will bring it back to normal size. The back arrow will bring you back to my page.

Now, let's get this PARTY STARTED!!!!

This one is for everyone:




This one is for Chris at A Deliberate Life:




This one is for Liza at Middle Passages:




This one is for Lira The Struggling Actress:




This one is for Misery at enjoy the silence:




This one is for Colleen at Carpe Diem, Gorgeous!:




This one is for Leanne From Chaos Comes Happiness:

Click here to watch. Embed feature disabled.



This one is for Martha A Real (Upstate) NY Housewife: