"Road Warrior"

road warr=ior - a: a person who travels frequently especially on business.

Hello! It's been a while. I realize* I haven't posted in a long time, but life has been pretty hectic lately. This is usually the busiest time of year for me.

In the past month, I have stayed in my apartment a total of 5 nights. And that doesn't look like it will be changing this week. As a matter of fact, the next time I step foot in my apartment will be the last day of March! :( But I wanted to provide a little update of my past couple weeks:

I've been traveling a lot for work. Usually in the spring I am on the road for about 5-6 weeks. Luckily for me, the territory that I travel does include my hometown. What does that mean? Well, I haven't stayed in a hotel room for work in the past 3 years. I usually stay with my parents, sister or cousin. So it does make it nice to have family around while I am on the road. The hard part about it is that I also work a lot at night on the phone. And this can sometimes be overwhelming when trying to balance that with my parents, sister, niece and nephew. So to say I have been spread thin would be an understatement.

Speaking of my niece, it was her 2nd birthday this past weekend. It's always fun to see how excited they get over their birthday parties. It was a "purple" birthday to say the least! My niece is in love with the color purple. In fact her is an example of one of our conversations the other day:

Me: Maci, what would you like to eat tonight?

Maci: Purple!

Me: You can't eat purple, it's a color.

Maci: (with a confused look) green?

Me: No, green is a color also.

Maci: (all excited, thinking that she now knows the answer) WHITE!

Me: No, that's still a color. How about pizza and cauliflower? (she loves fried cauliflower btw)

Maci: (with a grin) Yes JJ! ...... and purple???

As you can see, she is a genius! :) Anyway, her birthday went well and she absolutely loved easter!

Not too much else to report right now. Hopefully after my traveling I will be able to be a little more consistent on my blogging!

*One thing to note: The other night I did qualify for a $50,000 guaranteed poker tournament in May. It's a 2 day event. Last year the total prize pool was over $100,000. So it should be a good time.

Keep on, keepin' on

-J

"Green"

green - a: The hue of that portion of the visible spectrum lying between yellow and blue

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY!

Well, it's that time of year again when irishmen and non-irishmen get together and celebrate a totally made-up (but necessary) holiday. Let's be completely honest, this day is basically just another excuse for people to go out and drink beer (albeit green beer) and make complete fools of themselves.

Now I don't claim to be irish. Well I guess sometimes I may say that I have 1/16th irish in me just to say it. But anyway, this doesn't stop me from enjoying the festivities. Although this year will be the first year in a while that I have been out of town traveling. So my St. Patty's may be a little more laid back this year.

I have however celebrated St. Patty's this whole weekend:

Friday:

• I went on a party bus excursion with a bunch of my friends. We do this every year around the spring break time. We ventured to 4-5 different small towns and went to some dive bars. Basically, we probably double the monthly income of these bars in one night!
  

Saturday:

• I headed to a sports bar for an annual tradition that me and a couple of my buddies partake on. During the conference tournaments for basketball we engage in a all-day session of drinks, food, friends and basketball. Our current record is 13 hours. Last year we went through 3 waitresses, 2 large pizzas, 4 appetizers and several groups of friends that would come and go throughout the day. Unfortunately this year we only were at the sports bar for 12 1/2 hours. So we were a little short of the record!
  

I hope everyone has a great St. Patty's Day! I'll leave you with this:

"May your pockets be heavy and your heart be light, May good luck pursue you each morning and night."

Keep on, keepin' on

-J

"Young"

young - a: of, belonging to, or suggestive of youth or early life. b: vigorous or fresh; youthful.

Age is but a mindset. You may hear people say that often. And for the most part I feel like it is true. Sure, I'm no spring chicken. I can't go out partying everynight like a 21 year-old. (Although, I seem to put forth a good effort on occasion) My spring breaks may not consist of week long drinking binges. (More like 1 night, if I'm lucky) I may not have that young, youthful baby face look that I had as an 18 year-old. (I consider it a more mature, distinguished look)

But I do realize age does eventually catch up with everyone. And although I may feel young at heart and still look relatively young on the outside, I can't expect to continue to be carded at every bar I go to. So the other day I decided to bring back some of my youthfulness by purchasing the .......... wii! Now, as many of you may know, this gaming system is very hard to come by. I, fortunately lucked into one!

For those of you not familiar with the wii, it is the most interactive gaming system out there! You actually perform the movements for the games. It comes with these sports games: bowling, tennis, boxing, golf, and baseball. You can also find out what your wii fitness age is.

Anyway, I have had this for the past week. And this is where I got the idea of this post. No matter how young we may feel, when you start to do activities (such as bowling, tennis, boxing, etc) that you haven't performed in a while you are bound to be a little sore. But, no one ever told me that both my hips would hurt, I would have tennis elbow, and a sore shoulder, all because of a gaming system!!! So I have decided that age may be creeping up on me! :)

But before I go, I would like to point out that last Thursday I had to go out and celebrate my 21st birthday all over again! That's my wii 21st bday. You see, I did my fitness age and it came to 21. (I will post a picture for proof) I've been told that is the lowest you can get. So maybe afterall, I'm not quite as old as I thought!!!

PS: I'm off to ice my elbow and putting a heating pad on my back! :) (And I've added a song below for your enjoyment)

Keep on, keepin' on
-J

"Stress"

stress - a: an outside force or event that has an effect on our body or mind.

I haven't posted for a while and a lot of it has to do with the stresses in my life right now. I have been extremely busy in all aspects of my life. I just feel so unorganized not only with work, but with my personal and social life.

This is the busiest time of year at work. Actually not only the busiest, but the most important. And everything seems to be coming at me at once. I'm just starting the travel part of my job for the next 5-6 weeks and I feel overwhelmed with my other duties. One thing that does not help is one of the areas I am responsible for has had a lot of change this year. So it has taken up a lot of my time.

Socially I have been pulled in several ways. Everyone always wants to do something. And sure, I enjoy hanging out with friends and family just like everyone else. But lately I've had to say "no" more often. There is just too much going on and I can't keep everyone happy.

Personally, everything is going ....... ok. I've actually been trying to forget some of my problems. In fact, one of my friends "K" is going through her own problems right now. And though I am extremely busy, I hate to turn my back on my friends. She is not in a very good place right now and needs someone to talk to. The other night I received a call from her late and she was pretty emotional. I hope she realizes she has a big heart and shouldn't put herself through all of this. Hopefully everything starts to turn around for her, because I'm worried about her right now.

So all I can say right now is that I am very stressed! I just feel very overwhelmed. This will pass and things will slow down, but for now I better get back to work.

Keep on, keepin' on
-J