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2013 Goals – The Recap

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Well it’s that time of year again where we all sit down and make up goals of what we are going to accomplish in the near year. Let’s take a little time and look back on what I set out to achieve in 2013.

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  • Enroll in school: This has been a goal of mine for quite some time now. With my new job, my evenings are free which allows me to make some evening classes. I really want to make this happen. So about that – School most definitely did not happen this year, but has not dropped of the list of priorities. 
  • Save some money: I have no monetary amount that I am wanting to save, but having a little money in the bank will definitely be a nice little peace of mind. I managed to save a bit of my tax return that I received this year and am using it to take a trip to Disneyland in two weeks with a couple of friends. Also, for the first time that I can remember, I did not put a single Christmas gift on a credit card. While this isn’t exactly saving money, it is not adding to the mountain of debt that I am currently chipping away at. 
  • Move out: I am enjoying the rent free aspect of my life right now, as it has been a great way to get control back of my finances, but I am dying for some space of my own. I did not accomplish this, however, still something that I am looking to do, hopefully in the near future. 
  • Blog more on pyropixie.net and spoilyourdinner.com: I am trying to focus on making more time in my day to blog, as it is something I am truly passionate about. I think for the most part spoilyourdinner received a lot more love than the ole pixie blog did. 
  • Create a gym routine:I have had a gym membership for cover a year, but have fallen off the wagon. I know that a lot of people have resolutions or goals that revolve around health/fitness. I honestly enjoy the gym but I get bored easily with the same ole same ole. I need to find an interesting routine that will keep me engaged. I spent the first portion of the year not really hitting the gym, but I signed up to run a half marathon in the middle of March 2014, so lately I have been doing a lot of running and lifting. It feels really great to be back at the gym, though I prefer to run outside than on a treadmill, but with the weather being so cold and it being so dark by the time I get home, I have no choice. I have hit some pretty major milestones fitness-wise. I have lost weight and I can finally start seeing that I have lost it, I can run for 3o minutes at a time, which has never been a thing for me, and in general I feel and look stronger. 
  • Become full time at work: I don’t have control over the hours I am scheduled at work, but I plan on working as hard as I can, learning as much as I can, and stepping up as much as I can to prove that I am worth working full time. HUZZAH! I accomplished this and then some. I became full time in the middle of February and I am now at the point where I have been working overtime to try and keep up. 
  • Get tattooed: I would love to work on my left arm, but that is a large commitment and I have no interest in going long periods of time between getting tattooed. I have a lot of smaller pieces that I would love to knock out, hopefully I can cross one of these off my list this year. No tattoos for me this year – so sad. 
  • Take more pictures with my camera: There was a time when I never went anywhere without my camera. Ever since I got my iPhone I have hardly picked up my real camera. I want to take tons more pictures this year with both my digital camera and film cameras. Sadly my camera still sits untouched on a shelf. 
  • Play more video games and beat them: There are lots of games that I have started but have not finished. I have also yet to 100% a game on my 360. I want to accomplish that at least once. I have been playing more video games but still haven’t complete one to 100%. This will happen… someday… 
  • Read 30 books: I have never been much of a reader, but it’s definitely something that i want to try and improve. My mom got me a Kindle for Christmas, which make toting books around much easier. I accomplished about half of this goal, which in reality, I’m pretty proud of considering I never thought I was much for reading. What I have found is that I just need to find the right books. 
  • Try one new food a month: I have been a picky eater my entire life. I think trying one new food a month is a very doable goal. Does junk food count? The new breakout stars for food for me have been my new found love of almonds and dried cranberries. (they don’t have to be together either) 
  • Pay down some bills: I have been up to my eyeballs in credit card debt for years now. It has been nothing but an extreme burden and paying off even just 1 card would be amazing. Like I mentioned in my money saving goal, paying down my credit cards has been a huge project for me. With some of them set to be paid off in the middle of 2014, I couldn’t be more excited to lift some of that weight of my financial shoulders. 
  • Make a new friend: I am painfully shy. My list of friends here is very short and I would love to gather up the courage to make a new friend I think I made a new friend? We will see how it goes. 
  • Save up for a new computer or laptop: My computer is 10 years old and my laptop died a year and a half ago. I would be content with a netbook or something of the sort. Something with a keyboard would be nice. Some of the money that I saved from my tax return was used to buy a Chromebook. This has been pretty handy! It doesn’t do all of the things that a normal laptop would do, but it’s lightweight and easy to throw in a bag. I also received a Toshiba laptop and an iMac for Christmas – hello upgrades!
  • Get to 1000 finds geocahing: I am just under half way there, and have hardly geocached in the last year. I used to be an avid cacher, but life always seemed to get in the way. Ugh. I did not find a single geocache this year. How sad!

So there is a brief recap of what I accomplished this year and I’m pretty proud. There were a lot of things that I did that were not on my list and I look forward to 2014 being even better.

30 December, 2013
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The Bookshelf

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Hello Friends,

It’s been a while since we last spoke hasn’t it? I’m still here though. Lately I have been getting back in to reading so I figured for my first post back in a while that I would talk a little bit about what has been occupying my time lately.

The first book that I have been reading is Tell All by Chuck Palahniuk. I am a huge fan of his and I would even venture to say that he is my favorite author. I recently finished Damned and I am looking forward to the other two books in the series to come out next year and the following year. I thought I had read everything by him but turns out that I have not read Tell All. I must admit that I was not into this book when I first started reading it. Chuck has a pretty distinct writing style, so sometimes its hard to get into the flow, but when you do, it is so so good. The book is from the view point of the… assistant? I guess that would be the best word to describe her, Hazie who tends to her movie star train wreck Kathrine Kenton and her dabbles with love, pets, drugs, and men. My favorite part of Chuck Palahniuk books is that he is very descriptive without being overly wordy. So far I am about 70 pages in and addicted, I will most likely finish the rest today.

The second book I was gifted for Christmas on my Kindle called A Bad Idea I’m About to Do: True Tales of Seriously Poor Judgement and Stunningly Awkward Adventure by Chris Gethard. The book delves into personal stories about Chris growing up and is extremely relatable as an awkward weird arty person drifting through life trying to find oneself. The stories are hilariously sad, and I can’t put my Kindle down. This is the first book that I have read by him but threw it on my wish list because it was suggested by Amazon due to my love of Rob Sheffield and Chuck Klosterman – not bad Amazon, not bad at all.

And finally, I just finished reading Hyperbole and a Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened by Allie Brosh. If you are not familiar with her web comic, Hyperbole and a Half, please exit my blog and go read all of them. Most of the book is a collection of her best comics, but there are some amazing stories in there. Not only do I find that Allie has a way of saying ALL the things that a depressed person can sometimes not, its comforting to know that even in the darkest times we need to be reminded that we cannot take ourselves so seriously. The book is a fast read due to it being mostly pictures, but it is definitely on my re-read list after my mother returns it.

We also have the normal mixture of comic books thrown in there, though what I have been reading has a few missing issues here and there making all of the stories a tad bit choppy.

 

29 December, 2013
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Easy Fall Inspired Nails

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The last few weeks I have been rocking polish free nails. My work absolutely destroys my nails on a daily basis, so I try not to do anything too fancy that I would be disappointed that could potentially chip off the day I roll into work. Feeling the fall buzz in the air, I perused my polish collection and picked out a few polishes that reminded me of fall.

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Supplies Used:
– Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear – Golden-I
– Sinful Colors Professional – Lets Meet
– Spoiled by Wet & Wild – Don’t Be Cheesy
– Sephora X – Chaotic
– Sephora by O.P.I – Matte Top Coat

I alternated between the yellow and orange, saving the gold polish for my ring finger on each hand. I used one coat of Sephora X over the top and two coats of the matte top coat.

7 October, 2013
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Social Print Studio

Posted in Inspiration by

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If you haven’t at least heard of Instagram, you’ve probably been living under a rock for the last few years. Whether you like it or hate it, its everywhere. I personally am a huge fan of Instagram and have been toying with the idea of printing some of the pictures I have posted. I thought about printing them at some place like Target or Kinko’s but I was really hoping for a nice matte cardstock finish. I checked out a few apps on my phone that offered printing service but none of them really grabbed me until I downloaded Social Print Studio.

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Social Print Studio offers 4 different sizes of prints. I opted to purchase 2 3/8″ x 2 3/8″ sized pictures because I have a journal that I planned to use the pictures in. The prints were super easy to order. I pulled up my library on my phone and scrolled through the pictures and selected the ones as I scrolled. Note that all of the pictures you select will have a white border on them, so if your Instagrammed pictures have another border, it is possible that you will have both. The app allows you to crop pictures that are not in square format as well as zoom in on pictures (any format) to crop out any other borders or if you want to zoom in on something else in the picture. After selecting the pictures you want to print, it allows you to select how many of each picture that you want to print. Check out is a breeze and shipping is not only a flat rate, but extremely fast. Two days after I ordered my prints, I had them in my hand.

I have created an album on my phone and I put a copy of every picture I want to print in there so that I don’t have to keep track of what I have printed and what I haven’t. I can’t wait to amass a few more pictures and place another order. I can’t recommend this app enough as I am really impressed by the quality of the prints as well as the fast shipping.

(note : please note that this post is my own opinion (like all other posts) and was not paid or compensated with goods from Social Print Studio for this post.)

3 October, 2013
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My Week In Geek – Vol. 1

Posted in Features by

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It is no secret that I am some what of a nerd. I have written about all kinds of nerdy fandoms here and on other blogs that would further cement this fact. Instead of my normal rambling on about what game I am currently obsessed with, I thought I would put together a handy list of geekery that I am either watching, playing, working on, etc.

  • I purchased my first copy of a Grand Theft Auto game. Now let’s not confuse this and jump to the conclusion that I have never played a Grand Theft Auto game, because that is not the case, but after watching Richard drive around Los Santos, I really wanted to play it for myself. I am about 10 hours in and so far really enjoying it – though I have come to the conclusion that I really suck at driving.
  • I also started playing Lego Hobbit from the beginning. This is some what of a daunting task, but at least this time around I will get trophies on my gamer tag.
  • I started playing my character again in Torchlight on my 360 in attempt to pacify my love of dungeon crawl games now that I am not playing Diablo III anymore until there is an update. About a week and half or so ago after entering into the second act with Richard, his game froze corrupting all of his game data, causing his character to become obsolete. Not wanting my monk to suffer the same fate, I have put off playing until Blizzard puts out an update (as I have read that this has happened to other people online) Back to Torchlight. Torchlight and I broke up a while back (see here) but we are talking things out and have been going on a few outings. The only reason why I am playing really is to get the last achievement I am missing for the game which is achieving maximum fame in the game. I was SO close on my last character that it is almost heartbreaking to have to start all over again.
  • If you are into Disney Infinity and you have reserved the new figures coming out, just a heads up that on Monday, GameStop announced a GameStop exclusive Limited Edition Jack Skellington piece that comes with a graveyard case. The upgrade is only a few more dollars and I was able to switch it over in a few seconds. I also have all of the other upcoming pieces reserved as well as the series 2 power discs. Where am I going to put all this stuff?!
  • A couple friends and I have started a Disney social club that we are really excited about – once we get a few more details hammered out I will post about it over here, but lets just say, I am pretty stoked on our jacket back patches right now and our upcoming visit to Disney in January.
  • While I understand the features of the new Steam controller that was announced, that thing is all kinds of horrible looking. Same can be said for the Nintendo 2DS, which if I didn’t know better, I would have thought was some cruel super late April Fools joke from Nintendo.
  • And last but not least, I am currently lusting over this Game Boy luggage over on Think Geek right now. If I didn’t think it would make me a prime target to have my luggage stolen, I might consider the 70 dollar price tag. Do. Want.

(image copyright Rockstar Games)

2 October, 2013
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