I know, it’s been forevers! I guess I needed to stack up many things to actually talk about in order to freakin’ blog.
I went to NYC in May for my birthday! Mucho fun and adventures. Last year when I went, I was a bit timid. I didn’t go see too many things, and I didn’t take a lot of pictures. But this year I decided to embrace my inner tourist and just go wild. Up and out the door every day around 9am, didn’t go back to the apartment I was staying until after midnight usually. I remembered to take the time to sit back and really enjoy myself when I was seeing and doing stuff, but I made sure to keep busy. I took tons of pictures, you can (hopefully) see my NYC gallery on Facebook, it should be public. A few self-photos, which often turned out halfway decent, yay. The iPhone was fantastic for taking pictures and then sending them to people right away to make them jealous. I did some cheesy bus tour things, which were awesome, because I was able to see a bunch of great places in a short amount of time, without having to figure out how to get there! Ate great food every day, rode the subway, got to see my pal Mike Lavoie!
I had also taken a day trip to Philadelphia, to see the Mutter Museum and have a real Philly cheesesteak in Philly. Sadly, the museum did not allow photos. But I assure you, it was my favoritest thing in my entire trip. I even got to ride a train for the first time! I wish we had Amtrak where I live, that was comfortable and convenient.
Other than my trip, life has been fairly boring, which I’ve been trying to change. Lately it has been my goal to focus more on freelance work. I’ve been working on getting better organized and official with some of the stuff I do; like keeping track of my schedule, being accurate about time spent on things, and invoicing in a more businesslike manner. So far Google Calendar, SlimTimer, and Billing Manager (all free!) have been the things I’m testing out. So far so good. I think these have helped keep me motivated and on task to increase my turnaround time. Why trying to buckle down lately? The image to your right is an accurate representation of how I look every day at my 8-5 job. (Also, favorite ani gif ever!)
On the home front, I have still been looking to get a dog. As it turns out, my aunt is looking to give her dog away! So a couple weeks ago, I went over there and visited and met the dog. Very sweet! Needs a little discipline, but she seems like a promising choice. She’s about a year and a half old, and my aunt has cats that she’s grown up with. She says the dog will kind of “play” with the cats, which the cats don’t care for. But it sounds like she won’t try to eat any cats, so that’s the important part. A lab mix. I decided to wait and think it over for a little while before getting the dog and throwing myself into a mess without proper thought. But I am fairly sure I will be getting her sometime in the near future.
I am currently sitting outside on my front porch! Summer has been slow to come to northern Minnesota, but it does seem to finally be on the horizon. It’s a bit chilly out yet today, but I still want to enjoy the fresh air. I have ordered a nice bistro patio set to have out on my porch soon, so that will be lovely for laptopping in the summer! Just last weekend I weeded and planted my little flower garden just off the side of the porch, so it’s already quite lovely to sit out here. Come on, summer!* Funny thing, after I planted my garden and was sitting outside for a bit, my neighbor noticed and started giving me plants from out of her garden! So all the non-flower plants in the photo are freebies from my neighbor! Nice!
*Cut to a month from now when I’m bitching about the heat and humidity, while worshiping the air conditioning gods.