And so it is...

Foreword

I'm quite aware it's nearly 1am on New Year's morning and that I should be out with my friends but I'm writing a blog instead, however, I have to get up for work at 5am and I did go out until a little after midnight so I'm not completely lame.  Just partially...

Non-Foreword (because I don't know what else to call it, are there any people that are actually good at English reading this?)

And so we have a new year on our hands.  After a pretty awful 2008, I'm welcoming this year with a new perspective on life.  I'm going to forget all the garbage that's happened in the past year.  All the things that have happened are merely another chapter in my life and it's time to start a new one.  At this point however, there are some things that happened and some people that have really bothered my mental health and I can't forgive that right now.  BUT, I'm not going to let those things drag me down anymore.  I'm better than that.

On the other hand, despite the mess of a year, I've learned a lot.  I've learned to not take anything or anyone for granted.  I've learned to not get upset about petty things.  I've learned to apologize and admit my mistakes.  I've learned I am a good person no matter how much I've beat myself up in the past.  I've learned to listen to my intuitions.  I've learned that I have the greatest family and friends in the world and I love them more than I could tell you.  But most importantly, I've learned that God has a plan for all of us.  I'm not going to sit here and preach to you, but there's no doubt in my mind that everything happens for a reason and that things will work out.  It's not always easy, but it's what needs to happen to have things work according to His plan.

And with a new year comes the dreaded "resolutions".  This year, I'm going to resolve to make things better for not only myself, but for other people.  I'm not talking about the whole "oh I'm gonna go to the gym daily, run 5 miles a day, blah blah blah. I play like 5 soccer games a week, that's enough.  I'm talking about having a better soul and trying to spread that to others.  I'm going to make an effort to not talk badly about anyone because I know how much it hurts to have someone say bad things about you.  I also want to try to fix things with my temper.  I know that I've done, said and thought some pretty awful things while I was angry that have disappointed myself and disappointed others. I want to be someone to be proud of and not someone to be disappointed in.  I just want to try to be a better person in general.  I'm certainly not saying I'm a bad person.  (If you're paying attention to this blog, I even said I think I'm a good person :p ) But I want to step it up and be better than good.

And so with that, I'm through with my blog for now.  I'm not promising any over night changes, but it's definitely something I'm going to work toward.  I'm going to need your help, but this is all pretty obtainable.  Have a little faith in me, okay?

So have a great year everyone.  Learn something useful every day, trust who you love, keep what's important and know who's your friend.

I'm just having a really tough time with everything now.  I know that's pretty vague, but I'm just so overwhelmed with life.  I can't push out of my mind everything that's happened recently and it just hurts so badly.  I don't care about myself being hurt, that's the last thing I worry about, I care about other people being hurt and me not being able to do anything about it or help them.  It's the worst feeling in the world and I feel like such an awful person.

"whatever tomorrow brings I'll be there, with open arms and open eyes."

Can you return the favor.  Please?  I just want things to be back to normal.

Keep the countdown going...

I'm not typically the type of person to be serious at all, so this blog might throw everyone off just a little bit.  However, I feel that everyone, at some point in their lives, need to really get things out in the open for everyone to know.  I've learned over the years (I say "over the years" as if I'm old.  Like thirty or something.  That was a cheap shot at my sister and brother in law if you didn't catch it...) that it's never good to hold in any kind of emotion, be it anger, silliness, sadness, happiness, whatever.

It' been a rough few weeks, months even, for me.  I'm certainly not going to get into details because that could take days of writing.  Anyway, recent events in my life have taught me a whirlwind of things that I think have made me grow as a person.

1.  Have faith.  

This can be interpreted in a few ways.  Have faith in God.  Have faith in your friends.  Have faith in your family.  And most importantly, have faith in yourself.    I know it's easy for me to sit here and preach this to you from behind my computer screen, but it's a simple concept: where are we without faith?  Are we to sit around and wait for thing to happen by chance?  It's just not that easy.  Know that the people who care about you most are pulling for you and know that things are going to work out.  Things are hardly ever set in stone, have faith that things can and will change for the better as long as you hang on to the hope that they will.  The people that care about you most are your biggest fans, trust them.

2. Don't be afraid to say how much you care.

This one is really a no brainer but tends to be overlooked.  It's quite obvious that the reason you keep the company that you do is because you care about them.  Don't be shy and let them know, even if it means daily.  I don't know about you, but I don't think I'd ever get sick of someone telling me that they care about me.  Not only might this brighten someone's day, but it gives them something to look forward to and makes you feel pretty good.  A simple "just wanted to say hello" or an "I love you!" can make a world of difference to someone you care about.

3.  Don't sweat the small stuff!

Life's too short to be upset at someone for something they might have said or done to bother you.  Let them know so they can fix it and make it up to you if it need be.  You never know what can happen in  a matter of days, someone that you might be upset with might not be around tomorrow to say "it's okay, let's get things back to normal" to.  Let stuff go, because sometimes you don't realize how good you have it until it's too late.

4.  Have no regrets.

Again, life is entirely too short to look back at what could have been done differently.  Everything happens for a reason, don't question it.  You'll find out soon enough why something happened the way it did and it will all make sense.  Granted, this doesn't happen over night.  Be patient though, you'll figure it out.

5.  Don't take things for granted.

Know what you have and cherish it.  Simple enough.

6. True friends will never leave you.

Even though they may be miles away or unreachable, a true friend will never leave you.  They might not be physically there for you, but you have to hang onto the fact that they're most definitely thinking about you and your well being and that they're praying for you.  They've been there for you in the past and they'll be there for you forever.  In turn, don't ever forget about these friends no matter how much one might change over time or what the circumstances might be.  After all, you've been through so much  together.  

7. Stay strong!

Although things might seem ridiculously awful at a certain point in time, it doesn't mean it's going to stay like that forever.  You've only got the rest of your life to live, so don't back down.  Look at your troubles in the past.  All they are now are mere "bumps in the road".  That's how it will be from now until forever.  You've gotten past so many hurdles, keep going.

8. Have pride in yourself.

Be proud of what you do, no matter what other's might say or think.  Don't get discouraged and know that people think highly of you, do the same for yourself.  Most likely, you deserve to pat your own back.

So with that, I'm through.  I hope you're slightly inspired with my little blog here, because I just inspired myself [to make a cup of hot chocolate and watch "A Christmas Story".]

Take good care and hang in there.  This is the first day of the rest of your life.  Make it a good one.

 

I'd like to think I'm a pretty relaxed person, but lately things have been really, REALLY annoying at work.  It's a mixture of annoying people and a case of "I need a new job.  BADLY."

Things that irk me on a regular basis:

1) People walking outside for exercise at 5:30 a.m.  GO TO BED.  Please, for the love of God, if you have time to be going on stroll through lovely Newington, you have time to be asleep.  Think about the hundreds of people (or at the very least, think about me!) who would forfeit a paycheck, or heck, a kidney, to be asleep.  Is it really essential to be exercising that such an atrocious hour?  Is your body going to balloon and 100 additional pounds will appear if you, Heaven HELP you, go for precious walk at say 8 a.m?  They might say "but Jennifer, we go so early because we have to go to work".  Here's a thought, walk AFTER work.  Simple concept; sleep trumps all activities before the hour of 8 am.  If the opportunity is there, seize it!  (side note: just because you're walking wicked early doesn't mean people can't see you.  Spare us the spandex and neon yellow shirts with fanny packs.)

2) When I go to Starbucks everyday (and who am I kidding, it's sometimes multiple times a day), I think it's the polite and perhaps even a sort of job security to bring coffee back for my bosses.  And everyday, without fail, the idiots I walk by on the way back to my office with the drinks who I didn't get a drink for proceed to walk towards me pretending to grab the cups of coffee and say "you shouldn't have" because they think it's funny.  News flash:  you're not the first one to do that, nor is it funny!  You're right, I shouldn't have bought a coffee for you, that's why I didn't!  At first, I give the fake "haha ohh you got me!" laugh, but after the first person, they get the whole "seriously, knock it off, I didn't buy you coffee.  And don't even look at my coffee, let alone pretend to grab it.  And another thing, your new hair cut makes you look like Barney Rubble from the Flinstones".  One by one, I'll get the 100+ employees to realize that they're not funny and terribly unoriginal.

3) I'd say I have one of the most common names in America.  So why is it that I get called an assortment of things that AREN'T my name?  There's guys that have done contractor's work for us for years that still call me Jenna, Shannon and even ROSE.  I clearly answer the phone "I.S. this is JEN. How can I help you?".  Contractor says "hi Shannon, is [so and so] there?".  Really.  Shannon?  Jeeze Louise.  And to make things worse, my coworker's don't correct the mistake, they just instigate the contractor.  They'll say something along the lines of "I'm sorry who are you looking for?  Oh Jenna, sure hang on one second.  JENNA.  It's for you.  JENNA?  Hang on, I'm getting JENNA for you."  Thanks a lot.  I'm pretty sure we should just change your names to Jerk so I can say "hey Jerk, pick up the phone" and not be rude.

4) When customers call to check the status of an order and then get mad when I tell them the estimated delivery date.  I typically get "I thought it was supposed to come in on Wednesday.  Why are you telling me it's coming in on Thursday"  Okay, for one, if you thought it was supposed to come in on Wednesday, why on God's green Earth are you calling me on MONDAY to see the status of it.  You know when it's tentatively coming in, so why don't you call me on the tentative day?  And secondly, what is whining going to do?  I certainly can't make it get here any faster.  Oh wait, this one's a whiner.  Let me get to freaken Tennessee RIGHT THIS SECOND so I can pick up your piece of garbage dishwasher and get it into our precious life right now just because you whined.  Talk about incentive!  If anything, I'm going to delay (this is what we call "forgetting" and/or "fax machine error") communicating to your contractor once your order is in if you're going to whine.

5) The phrase "What do you mean [enter phrase I just said]?"  Gee, what I really meant by "I can't get someone out to your house this afternoon" was "someone's on their way since you asked me what I meant!"  It is what it is.  I'm fairly certain I know how to speak proper English (for the most part...)  I can see if I were working with a group of deaf aliens and they asked me "what do you mean".  But I'm pretty sure I speak the same language you do.  If you ask "what do you mean", it's not going to make me change my mind.  (see previous comments on incentive.  Don't be obnoxious and I'll try to help you out).

6) Whenever I have to go out to the sales floor, I manage to bump into the customer who needs something that we're out of.  To make the customer happy, I look in the computer to see if we have any on hand.  With my luck, we never do.  The customer will then proceed to ask me if we have any in back.  Well sir, since you asked, I'm going to let you in on a secret.  Grab your ear muffs, fuzzy sweater and a cup of hot chocolate.  I'm going to bring you to the magical land where we keep the item YOU need but isn't out on the sales floor.  There's butterflies and unicorns and we can skip back there while holding hands and sing joyous songs.  It'll be perfect, I'm so glad you asked about the back!

7) What is with people leaving stuff on my desk?  It's no secret I'm slightly OCD (not joking, this was diagnosed...), so why do people feel the need to leave half-consumed cans of Red Bull, notebooks, reports, manuals, apple cores, dead mice (okay that's a whole different story, our printer broke because a mouse died in it!  I thought it would be funny if it came out where the paper comes out, but no such luck).  It's a simple idea:  if you put something there, get rid of it when you leave.  I'm pretty sure I learned that in kindergarten.  And while I'm thinking of it, why were you in my office in the first place?  Jeeeeze!

8) Not to toot my own horn (that phrase kinda bothers me since "toot" is a word associated with bodily functions, but I don't know another one to describe being full of one's self without actually saying it), but I'm pretty efficient with getting my work done.  I can get eight hours of work done in about two, so I need to keep myself occupied for the rest of the day.  This usually involves pointless tasks around the office including painting.  That's not what bothers me.  What bothers me is the million people who walk by and say something along the line of "oh what are you up to?" or the highly intelligent "painting?" comment.  Well heck, what gave it away? Was it the PAINT roller?  How about the PAINT brush.  Could it have the can of PAINT or the PAINTER'S tape?  Congratulations, you've just stepped up to neanderthal status.  I'm proud of you.

I guess that's enough for now.  I might be sad if you write a blog similar to this and add "reading Jen's blog" to your list.