Monthly Archives: June 2016

I’ve Made Progress (or I Think My Therapist Will Be Proud)

Posted on June 16, 2016 | Comments Off on I’ve Made Progress (or I Think My Therapist Will Be Proud)

Yesterday, I had a phone interview/audition for a commercial about people who have binge eating disorder. I actually had auditioned for this commercial last year when it was slightly different, but when I saw they were shooting again I submitted myself.

Typically for auditions you don’t have a phone interview, but since for this project you have to prove that you have been diagnosed with BED by a doctor and meet other requirements that aren’t normally an issue with commercials, the phone interview is the first step.

I’ll start by saying that I’m not going to get the audition for this because they need to fit certain age and size requirements right now, and I’m not a match for that. It’s not a big deal and I’m totally ok with not being able to audition because I got so much out of this phone interview.

The woman I spoke with yesterday was actually the same woman who I spoke to last year for the phone interview and audition I had. It was nice to catch up quickly with her and she was excited that I had submitted myself again for the project (I was afraid that they wouldn’t want me to since I didn’t get it last year, but I figured it was better to try than not to).

The phone interview first covered a lot of technically stuff. You do agree that you are willing to share medical information with the production team (if you got the commercial, it wouldn’t be public so your privacy is protected) and you have to agree that you are ok with sharing the fact that you do have binge eating disorder. Since I share that on here, I have no issues with saying that in a commercial. I think that most people aren’t as comfortable being public with things as I am, and I understand why the casting team wants to check with the people they are talking with to make sure they know how public it will be.

After going over that I was diagnosed by a doctor, we went over what treatments I’m doing for my eating disorder. I mentioned that I’m still taking Vyvanse and that I’ve finally been seeing some progress with it. I think a lot of the progress is due to some personal development I’ve been doing along with the monthly challenges in my Spark Planner. But to be honest, until I had to share what things were like before versus what they are like now, I didn’t realize how much progress I’ve made.

My eating disorder is not gone (I still wish it was and I know that it is not a totally realistic goal to have), but my episodes are less frequent. The reduction has not been as much as I would have liked it to be, but anything is better than nothing. I’ve also had more clarity lately about things. I’m not letting myself stay down about stuff as long as I would have in the past. If I have a bad meal or bad day, I’m getting back on track a lot faster than I would have before. I’m not waiting until the next week to fix things.

I haven’t seen my therapist is almost 6 months now. When I last saw him, the plan was to go 6 months and to see what that brings. Of course, if I felt like I needed to see him sooner I could have made an appointment. But the past few months have been pretty awesome for me. And when I see my therapist again next week, I think he is going to be pretty happy with the progress I’ve made and hopefully he can help me plan out how to not just continue with what I’m doing but to continue making steps toward whatever recovery will end up being for me.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailA Year On Vyvanse (or Help Is Expensive) Default ThumbnailMoving Forward With Therapy (or Educating Myself) Default ThumbnailOver A Month On Vyvanse (or A Meeting With My Therapist) Default ThumbnailAnother Therapist Check In (or Showing Off My Happiness Checklist) Default ThumbnailAnother Therapy Check In (or Someone Sees Progress) Default ThumbnailSeeing My Therapist (or Building Habits)

Comments Off on I’ve Made Progress (or I Think My Therapist Will Be Proud)

Posted in Acting, Health, Tough Stuff

Tagged , , , , ,

A Full Summer Day At Disneyland (or Seeing Favorites And Seeing New Stuff)

Posted on June 15, 2016 | Comments Off on A Full Summer Day At Disneyland (or Seeing Favorites And Seeing New Stuff)

My Disneyland pass is about to be blacked out for the summer. As much as I’d like to go to Disneyland in the summer, it’s so much more crowded then plus the heat can be pretty unbearable at times. I may do a quick Disneyland trip next week (a new ride is opening), but my day in the parks this past Monday is basically my last trip until the end of August or beginning of September.

I went with my usual Disneyland buddy, June. She is really one of my favorite Disneyland buddies because we enjoy the same rides and since we both have a pass we never feel too rushed to do stuff. When I drove over to her house on Monday, I realized that we were looking a little matchy-matchy. It was pretty funny and we took advantage of our look with a quick photo in the park that afternoon.

Matchy Matchy

When we first got to the parks, we focused on California Adventure to start. Our first ride of the day was the Tower of Terror, but we had a funny experience on the way over there. We were walking down toward the ride when there was a toddler playing with a water bottle. She kicked it over toward us and started walking over to where we were. She looked up at us and had the most intense serious look I’ve ever seen. We joked that it was like the Terminator was coming over to get us! The baby was really sweet, but she looked like she wanted to kill us! After that moment, we were inspired for our photo for the Tower of Terror.

Tower Of Terror

June pretended to want to kill me and I was pretending to be terrified of her. We both got a good laugh out of seeing our photo and decided that we would keep that photo idea going for any other ride photos we did that day.

Our next stop was the Animation Academy. We saw that they were drawing Captain Hook and June really wanted to do it. I’ve never been too successful at drawing anything there, but I’m always happy to try. I really don’t know if my drawing looks like Captain Hook, but I think it’s one of the better ones I’ve done. Mine is on the right and June’s is on the left.

Captain Hook

We were enjoying the relaxing vibe inside the building where the Animation Academy is, so we decided to do some more exploring around there. We made a stop at the Beast Library (I was matched as Belle and June was matched as the Evil Queen) and then enjoyed watching the Turtle Talk with Crush show.

Beast Library Turtle Talk

Our last stop in California Adventure was the Soarin Over California ride. This ride is closing down this week (it might actually be closing today) and will be reopening at the end of the week as Soarin Around The World. While I’m excited to see a new movie with the ride, I’m really sad to see this go. The Soarin Over California music was the ringtone of my phone for several years and this was one of the rides that has been a favorite for my entire family. We said our goodbye to the ride and I’m hoping I might be able to go to the park for a quick stop next week to see the new movie.

Soarin Over California

As soon as we got into Disneyland, we saw Belle in her blue dress right in the entry area of the park. There wasn’t that long of a line for photos, so we figured why not stop and get another fun character photo!

With Belle

When I was taking June’s photo for her, this random guy came up to me and was asking if that was Snow White. I kept saying that it’s Belle, but I think the guy was pretty convinced that she wasn’t. It was a bit odd, but June and I got a good laugh out of it.

Disneyland was pretty crowded on Main Street, so we tried to wander through the stores to stay out of the crowds. We ended up being where the Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln show is, and they have the most amazing map of the original Disneyland park in their lobby.

Disneyland Map

We decided to watch the show. I know they redid the animatronics a few years ago and I hadn’t seen it since the update. It’s a little odd how realistic his face is, but it was a nice little show and it was pretty empty in the room so I could forget for a bit that the parks were super crowded.

We continued around the park and went to Hyperspace Mountain next. This time, I got to pretend to want to kill June and she was scared of me for the photo.

Hyperspace Mountain

I seriously love how our photos came out! It’s so much fun thinking of funny ideas for the photos and I’m so grateful that June is ok going along with whatever crazy idea we come up with!

We hit up a couple of rides back to back after that. We went on the Haunted Mansion (it’s a treat to see it not dressed for Halloween/Christmas so that was awesome), the Jungle Cruise (they recently updated the ride and it looked amazing!), and then got in line for Indiana Jones. Sadly, Indiana Jones broke down while we were in line. We tried to wait it out to see if it would be up and running again soon, but after waiting 15 minutes we decided to leave and go on something else.

Our last ride of the night was Star Tours. Neither June nor I was chosen as the rebel spy for the ride, but I was seated right next to the person that was chosen so that was fun. And because the 3-D glasses for the ride look so cool for photos, we decided to both put on a Terminator look for a quick selfie.

Star Tours

We were heading out of the park then, but we realized that the Paint The Night parade was going to start in about 10 minutes. We walked toward the Main Street Railroad station (so we’d be close to the exit) and actually found a pretty great spot to watch the parade. This was the first time I had really gotten to see it (I had seen it from a distance before so I only saw the tops of the floats), so it was nice to be right by where the floats went by to see the details and fun things they put on them.

Paint The Night

It was a bit crazy trying to exit the park right after the parade, but we managed to get out quickly and got onto the second tram that went by. As we were on the tram back to the parking structure, we could see a bit of the fireworks. So when we got to the parking structure, we got to our level quickly and watched the grand finale of the fireworks from the side of the park.

Fireworks

It was actually a pretty good view of the fireworks and even though we couldn’t see the projections or hear the music, fireworks are still fun.

We were in the parks for about 8 hours that day, and I think we accomplished a lot! I was pretty exhausted after that full of a day and I feel pretty happy that I got my Disneyland fix in before I can’t go for a while. If I go next week to see the new Soarin Around The World, I’ll totally write about it. But this was really my last real Disney day until the summer is over.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailA Disney Morning (or Dealing With The Heat For One Ride) Default ThumbnailGuardians and Ladies Who Lunch (or A Fun Summer Day At Disneyland) Default ThumbnailDisneyland Bucket List (or One Last Visit Before The Summer Blackout) Default ThumbnailHaving A Fantasmic Day (or A Relaxing Time At Disneyland) Default ThumbnailA Full Disney Day! (or Character Photos, Ride Photos, And Only Being A Group Of 2) Default ThumbnailA Very Full Disney Day (or Finally Able To Get Back To The Parks)

Comments Off on A Full Summer Day At Disneyland (or Seeing Favorites And Seeing New Stuff)

Posted in Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , , ,

Just A Fun Dinner Out (or Remembering To Have Fun)

Posted on June 14, 2016 | 1 comment

Last week, I met up with my friend Camber for dinner. I know Camber through my WIF mentoring group, and we’ve hung out a couple of times outside of the group meetings. I’m still so incredibly grateful how my mentoring group has continued to meet even though we don’t see our mentors anymore. And many of them I also hang out with outside of the group meetings, so I’m just grateful to have more awesome friends in my life.

Camber and I went to dinner at a place in Marina del Rey right on the beach that I used to go to when I was in college. I was joking with her that we live so close to the beach and I rarely take advantage of it, so we had a beach dinner! It was not a beach type evening at all (we are in June Gloom right now), but it was still nice to be by the water and to smell the salt in the air.

Camber and I are actually talking about working on a documentary together. I can’t say too many details because we are super early in the process, but it’s really exciting to have another project in my life that I’m super excited about and that helps me feel creative. I’m not huge on being behind the camera, but if it’s something I feel passionate about I am fine doing so. I’m really hoping that we can make this documentary happen and of course I will post on here any updates in the project I can.

Even though we discussed the documentary over dinner, most of our dinner was just a fun hangout. We were both updating each other on our lives (which I know we’ll do again when we have our next mentoring meeting) and sharing random stories with each other. It’s was just a fun night out.

Being at that dinner made me remember that I do need to have more fun with my friends sometimes. It’s great when I go on adventures like to the Hollywood Bowl or Disneyland, but just getting together for a nice dinner and talking is awesome too. I get caught up at times trying to go do something fun or crazy with my friends. Yes, I do that sometimes because it makes for a good blog post. But also I do that because sometimes I forget the simple hangouts that I used to do and feel like I need to make everything an event.

Of course, saying that know I know I’ve got a couple of “event” hangouts with friends coming up. But I think that this dinner made me realize that even on the evenings when I’m working, I can still try to meet up with a friend for dinner or a drink just to catch up with them in person. I feel like I know what everyone is up to because of posts online, but I do need to make more of an effort to see people in person too.

I’m just glad I’m more aware of how I really should be focusing on my free time and not thinking that I don’t have time to see my friends. I know I have time, I just haven’t been utilizing it properly and hopefully I can make hanging out with my friends a more common occurrence.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailPlanning My Next Project (or Meeting A Director) Default ThumbnailOver Scheduled In The Best Way (of Taking Time For My Friends) Default ThumbnailRemembering To See My Friends (or Actually Scheduling Hangouts) Default ThumbnailVery Belated New Years Cheesecake (or A Birthday Twin Dinner) Default ThumbnailRemembering To Have Some Fun (or Hangouts Don’t Always Have To Be Events) Default ThumbnailGrownup Dinner (or Seeing A Gym Friend Outside Of The Gym)

1 Comment

Posted in Fun Stuff

Tagged , , ,

Taking Things A Bit Easier (or No More Injuries)

Posted on June 13, 2016 | Comments Off on Taking Things A Bit Easier (or No More Injuries)

This past week of workouts ended up being a week of being cautious. I have no clue what happened, but on Monday morning last week I woke up with a very stiff knee. I didn’t do anything over that weekend that should make things hurt, so I’m wondering if I slept in a position that tweaked something. The knee pain is almost only at night (it wakes me up if I shift positions at night) and hurts a little in the morning when I get up. So since I was dealing with that, I didn’t go as crazy during my workouts because I didn’t want to hurt myself more.

Monday was a partner workout which was awesome because my friend Dena came try her very first Orangetheory class! So she and I partnered up together for the workout. During the partner time, the person on cardio controlled the switching. The cardio person did a 200 meter row and a run on the treadmill at inclines. The run was supposed to be .2 miles, but I know I can’t run that long nor did I really want to run on hills. So I decided to walk at inclines so I was only doing .1 miles each time. On the floor, while we waited for our partner to be done with their cardio work, we did arms, chests, lunges, and abs. We kept going the floor work until our partner came over and switched us out.

I have to say that Dena and I made pretty good partners for this. We were pretty equal on time for cardio, so neither of us was stuck on the floor waiting for too long. I was working on using some heavy weights on the floor, so I was mainly using the 20 pound ones for my work. At the end of the partner time, we had a small block that was like a normal block. While it was still hills on the treadmill, I did run during the 1 minute all out at the end so I got a little bit of running done.

Wednesday was an endurance, strength, and power day that didn’t switch between the blocks so I was on the treadmill for 30 minutes straight. It was an interesting day because all of the blocks were pretty short. Again on the treadmill, I walked for most of the time. I did run for the all outs again which were a minute each time. Running for a minute is getting a bit easier for me, but my heart rate is really high during it and I have a bit of trouble catching my breath after. I know that this will be worked out the more I run, but it’s a big adjustment to get used to.

During the floor, we had some lunges and arm work, but the big thing to me was the timed row blocks. We had 2 blocks where we had timed rows. One was for 3 minutes and one was for 2 minutes. I really wanted to do well, but I was also so tired after the cardio time so I knew that I wasn’t going to be hitting my best distances during those times. So I just wanted to get the minimum of what we are supposed to do, which is basically 100 meters every 30 seconds. For the 3 minute row, I got 606 meters which met my goal. But for the 2 minute row, I was just too tired to keep my momentum going and I only got 355 meters in. I know I could have probably gotten to 400 meters if I really tried, but my legs just weren’t having it (and a majority of rowing is leg power).

Friday was another strength day, but fortunately we were switching between blocks. Again, I walked almost the entire time on the treadmill. Since it was a strength day there were plenty of hills to work with and I really tried to keep my inclines where they needed to be. I did run during the all outs (either 30 seconds or 1 minute long), but while runners were supposed to run at a high incline, I kept it at either 2% or 4% (4% is the flat road for walkers). I’m really not ready to try to run at an incline where I’m still struggling to run at all.

The floor ended up being a really great day for me. We did have a 400 meter row, but rowing wasn’t a big part of the day. I was using 20 pound weights for my arm and chest work (including bicep curls) and during the burpees we had to do I was always adding in pushups. We also had an entire block just using the TRX straps. Most of the strap work was core work, so I was feeling pretty awesome t the end of class.

My knee did hurt throughout the week, but again it was almost only at night. I woke up almost every single night with pains in my knee while I was moving. In the morning, I would be very stiff but after an hour or so the pain would end. I never felt pain during the workout (that’s a good sign) but it wasn’t getting better or worse through the week. I really have no clue what I did and I doubt doing to the doctor would give me any guidance. There’s always a chance that my hip issues are causing the knee pain, but again, I can’t really do much to fix that. Over this past weekend, I pretty much did nothing to try to rest my knee and that seemed to help.

I’m hoping that this week, things will be a bit better for me. I would like to try to push myself a bit more in my running because Peak Performance Week is coming up soon. I know I’ll be doing the 1 mile challenge day, but I don’t think I can do the other treadmill challenge days because of my schedule. So I’m trying to focus on what I can do to prepare for that day and making sure that I have the best workouts possible leading up to it.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailMore Progress And Steps Back (or Trying My Hardest) Default ThumbnailA 4 Workout Week (or Only A Few More Weeks Of 2015 Workouts) Default ThumbnailA Full Workout Week (or Sticking With My Plan) Default ThumbnailBusy Workout Week (or Maybe Overdoing It A Bit) Default ThumbnailUnexpected Injuries (or I’m Still Doing My 5K Tonight) Default ThumbnailStill Taking This A Bit Easy (or Not Going To Push Too Hard)

Comments Off on Taking Things A Bit Easier (or No More Injuries)

Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff, Health, Tough Stuff

Tagged , , , ,

Staying Super Busy (or Another Job)

Posted on June 10, 2016 | 1 comment

I’ve been super busy with work lately. I’ve got my regular box office job which hasn’t really changed since I started there almost 2 years ago. But because I will be out-of-town for a weekend in July, I’ve been working extra hours to make up what I will be missing (that way my pay doesn’t get docked). I’ve been so grateful for that job since I got it, even though it doesn’t have the most flexible hours. I’ve also been busy with my data entry job. I actually just got some more hours with that job and a new process that I’ve been helping with. It’s nice to have variety with that job since it can feel very repetitive researching events and entering them into the system.

Between those two jobs, I’m working 43 hours a week (not counting the extra hours I’m working now with the box office job to make up for July hours). I’ve also got my random box office job on occasional weekends and babysitting. So in a single week, I can easily be closer to 60 hours in a week. It’s great, because I do need the money and I know that I’m so lucky to have any work right now. But of course, I had to add another gig in as well.

I’m now working very part-time (4 hours a week) for a friend of mine doing some assistant/producer work. It’s not hard work, but since she is so busy she doesn’t have the time to do it. Again, the extra money is nice and I know that this can lead to more work so I’m super grateful for it. Plus, working for a friend is pretty fun and I know that we work well together. This job is only going to be for the next 6 weeks, but any extra work is helpful in getting my bills paid and saving up for my new computer (which sadly doesn’t look like it will be released until the winter). Since I know it can lead to more work, I’m totally fine with temporary work. Technically my data entry job was temporary since I was only going to be able to have a 2 year contract, but now I’ve got more hours than ever and it looks like I might get that 3rd year contract. So if I have to start at 4 hours a week to end up with a regular gig, I’m fine with that.

Only my box office jobs and babysitting have set hours. Everything else is on my own schedule and I don’t want to seem like I’m slacking because I set my own hours and there are no quotas I have to reach each day. With my data entry job, I think I’ve got a great line of communication with my boss and she’s been telling me how everyone has been happy with my work. And I doubt I’d be getting additional hours and possibly a contract extension if they didn’t think I was meeting or exceeding what they expected of me. And since the other job is with a friend, I know she’ll call me out if she isn’t happy with things and we have already had multiple texts back and forth just making sure we are on the same page with everything.

With all these jobs, I’m getting tougher on myself with my time management. I used to think that time management was one of my strong points, but as my time as gotten more crazy and less structured I’ve realized how much more work I’ve had to put into planning things out. I’m a little OCD with things (I’ve always been like that with organization) so my calendar is color-coded and I’m using the alerts and reminder apps a lot so I remember to send invoices or other work related tasks that are time sensitive. I’m still trying to figure out the best way to view my schedule because I love the monthly view on the calendar app on my computer, but some days I have so many things scheduled that I cannot view all my plans unless I go into weekly or daily view (I’d love any tips from other people with this issue on what works!).

Besides all my jobs, I also have my career (acting) and my writing (both on here and where I freelance) to schedule so I’ve been focusing on making sure I meet all my deadlines for those too. So far, I haven’t run into issues, but I’ve seen where issues could have happened so I’m working on setting myself up so those issues don’t ever become an issue.

I know that most people work just as crazy or crazier hours than I do. A lot of people work 60-70 hours a week every week. I’m lucky that when I have a 60 hour week or have to work 3 jobs in 1 day that those are rarities and not the norm. I probably keep taking on all of these jobs because I’m finally getting to a better place financially and I remember when I wasn’t working or working enough and how much of a struggle everything was. I don’t want to get to that place again and the best way to stay employed is to have as many jobs as I can. I know that jobs can go without warning and I really want to be as prepared for that possibility as possible.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailMissing Out On Some Fun (or Flexible Time Management) Default ThumbnailWork Begets Work (Old Bosses Possible New Jobs) Default ThumbnailDay Job News (or Things Are Getting Better) Default ThumbnailAlmost Getting My Lazy Birthday (or Staying In And Staying Busy) Default ThumbnailBusy Time (or Scheduling Again) Default ThumbnailBusy Busy Busy (or Triple Job Day)

1 Comment

Posted in Saving, Work

Tagged , , , ,

Finding My Way Back On Track (or A New Balance)

Posted on June 9, 2016 | Comments Off on Finding My Way Back On Track (or A New Balance)

I have been doing pretty great with my food lately. I’m cooking a lot at home now. Most of my meals are pretty boring, but I’m ok with that. I’ve found that with the boring food (like veggies and a turkey burger) I don’t get as bored with the food as quickly as I do when I make fancier things. I’m not sure why that is, but I can totally eat a turkey burger every day without issue when I can’t eat 3 days of leftovers. I’m aware that I might be in a bit of a rut and I’ve been trying to remember other things that are easy to make (and I can make 1 serving of) for other meals, but I’m pretty good with how things have been going for a while.

But then last week, I got off track pretty badly. Fortunately for me, being off track now is not as bad as it was before. I’m still not ordering delivery food (although I was craving Chinese food the other day) so if I want to eat “bad” food I have to go out and get it. So those bad days are not as bad as I know they could be. But they are still pretty bad and I’m still having issues coming back from them.

This time, my bad days lasted a couple of days before I was able to pull myself out of it. Ironically, it was the meal at the Hollywood Bowl that got me on track again (even though that meal wasn’t that great). I’m not sure what triggered me to get back to what I should be eating, but I am grateful that it happened. It did have an effect on the scale, but because I’ve been doing better lately my bad days were a weight that was my good day weight in the past. I’m almost back down to where I was before the bad days, so that’s a relief for me.

I know that it’s totally normal to have good days and bad days and that they have to be balanced out. That’s totally normal for everyone, but since I’ve never really had normal eating habits it feels really weird to me. I’m trying to remember that slip-ups are a part of life and they don’t have to make the rest of my day/week/month just as crazy food-wise. It’s a new system that I’m trying to figure out and it’s still very foreign to me.

Sometimes I do wonder if living alone makes things tougher on me because I don’t have someone to use as an example, but then again when I had roommates I actually had worse eating habits than I do now. With roommates (and none of them that might be reading this are the ones I’m talking about), I found it almost impossible to cook or use the kitchen. There were never clean plates or dishes and the kitchen was such a mess that all I wanted to do was grab my food and get out of there (again, any of my past roommates that would read this, know that this isn’t about you). At least now, all the messes in the kitchen are my own and I try to do my dishes every night (or the next morning if my evening gets too full).

I’m trying to keep myself accountable for my food choices and I’m doing ok with that. Even on the worst days, I’m still maintaining 100% food tracking accuracy. I’m not always tracking where I can see the calorie counts, but I’m writing down everything I eat in an app that allows me just to write the food and track any feelings I want to put down. I’m not hiding from what I’m doing like I’ve done in the past. I have to confront exactly what I’ve done every time I have a bad day.

Finding the balance between eating foods I’m craving but still staying on track is tough, but each time I find a new way to keep myself accountable helps and makes me feel like recovery is possible. It’s also made me think about what recovery will actually look like for me, and I’m finally letting go of the idea that recovery means no more bad days or cravings. That’s not ever going to be my reality, and letting go of that idea that has been in my head for years (and decades) is tough. But it’s also made me much more hopeful for what my recovery will look like and the idea that I might be closer to it than I thought.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailThe Good Outweighing The Bad? (or When Will I Get Back On Track?) Default ThumbnailGetting Back To Better Food (or Finding My Own Balance) Default ThumbnailFinding A Balance (or Eating Healthy And Fun At The Same Time) Default ThumbnailFinding A Work/Life Balance (or Preparing to Not Be Unemployed) Default ThumbnailTrying To Keep All My Good Habits (or I Need To Get Back On Track) Default ThumbnailRoutine Time Again (or Getting Back On Track)

Comments Off on Finding My Way Back On Track (or A New Balance)

Posted in Food, Tough Stuff

Tagged , , , ,

Starting My Bowl Season Early (or The Little Mermaid Live)

Posted on June 8, 2016 | 2 comments

Technically the season for the Hollywood Bowl hasn’t started yet, but they have started with their lease events. A little while back, I saw that they were going to do a screening of “The Little Mermaid” with live orchestration and celebrity singers! I was totally in! But sadly, tickets sold out for the 2 dates before I had a chance to buy them (well, technically some of the seats in the $250 range were left, but those aren’t in my budget). They had also announced an extra Monday show, but by then I just figured I wouldn’t be making it to this show.

Then I got an email about tickets on Goldstar for the event. I told my friend Dani about it and she was in! But when I went to Goldstar to look for tickets, there weren’t any. Again, I guessed I was out of luck. But for some reason, I decided to check Ticketmaster for tickets and by some miracle there were 2 tickets close together (but not next to each other) that weren’t totally out of my budget! I got those seats and Dani and I were so excited that we were going to be able to check out this show!

We met up and took the Bowl Bus together. But on our way there, another bus broke down so our already full bus had to fill up with another full bus load of passengers. At least it made the trip there an adventure.

Bowl Bus

Once we got to the Bowl, there were a bunch of cute photo set ups as you walked up the hill. But those all had crazy long lines, so we skipped those and I got this photo of the posters for the show.

Little Mermaid

Typically when I go to the Bowl, I bring food in with me. But because this was a lease event, there were extra restrictions on what you could bring in with you. So Dani and I decided just to order food there instead of bringing stuff in (we did bring in unopened water bottles because we didn’t want to spend $4 on a bottle of water). We got some burgers and fries and headed up to our seats.

Hollywood Bowl

We were about halfway up and over to the side, but being on the side was fine because the movie was screening on the big screens and we had a great view of those. And the people who had the seats between Dani’s seat and my seat were very nice and moved over so we ended up sitting next to each other.

The open act for the show was Susan Egan (the original Belle on Broadway) and Brad Kane (the singing voice for Aladdin). Brad Kane sounded exactly how he sounded when he recorded “Aladdin”. And Susan Egan was amazing and ended up singing “A Whole New World” with Brad Kane which was pretty awesome!

Susan Egan Brad Kane

For the Monday show, Jodi Benson who did the voice for Ariel in the movie was performing as Ariel. For the other 2 shows, she did appear at the end for a special encore, but someone else performed as Ariel during the movie. It was pretty crazy to hear Jodi’s voice from when the movie was made in the speaking parts and then to have her come on stage to sing the songs. She sounded almost exactly the same as when she made the movie and I was just in awe listening to her.

Jodi Benson

The other main parts had a pretty all-star cast. I got to watch Darren Criss as Prince Eric, Tituss Burgess as Sebastian (he was having so much fun with the part!), Rebel Wilson as Ursula, and John Stamos as Chef Louis.

Darrin Criss Tituss Burgess Rebel Wilson John Stamos

While the orchestra was playing the score when the movie was playing, I forgot about it because they sounded just like the movie sounds. They did such a perfect job and their performance was flawless (and as Dani mentioned, they had awesome stamina because they played for a long time!).

At the end of the show, they had fireworks. I’ve never been at the Bowl during fireworks so this was something pretty special for me to see.

Fireworks

Overall, it was a pretty amazing night! The show was so much fun and it was really a special event to get to see. I really wasn’t thinking I’d get a chance to see this show when it sold out so quickly originally, but I’m glad that not all the tickets were gone when I randomly looked online!

I’m planning on enjoying a couple of shows during the regular summer season of the Bowl too, but I haven’t gotten those tickets yet. But this was a pretty perfect way to kick off my summer show season!

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailLast Minute Bowl Adventure (or A Very Hot And Humid Night Out) Default ThumbnailLiza with a Z (or How to Go to the Hollywood Bowl on the Cheap) Default ThumbnailThe New TV Season (or Starting My Research Early This Year) Default ThumbnailWorking On My Crafty Side (or Starting Off Halloween Season!) Default ThumbnailA Night At The Bowl (or Movie Music With Friends) Default ThumbnailA Night At The Bowl (or Combining Several Of My Favorite Things)

2 Comments

Posted in Celebrations, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , ,

Celebrating Ms. In The Biz (or 3 Years Later!)

Posted on June 7, 2016 | Comments Off on Celebrating Ms. In The Biz (or 3 Years Later!)

This weekend, Ms. In The Biz celebrated their 3rd anniversary! I’ve been writing for the blog since the beginning, and in 3 years I’ve written dozens of posts (you can see them all here). So many women have written for Ms. In The Biz, and it seems like we keep getting new writers each month! I’m not sure how many of us have been with the blog since the beginning, but I’m super proud that I’m one of the original contributors.

The celebration for the anniversary was held in Santa Monica. There was actually a street festival happening in Santa Monica that day, so traffic was a bit insane. So I decided to take the light rail out to Santa Monica. I’ve taken the light rail a bunch to get to Hollywood, but the extension to Santa Monica just opened up last month so I figured it was a great time to take advantage of it. The Santa Monica stop was only a few blocks from the party, and those streets were all shut down to traffic because of the festival. So it actually ended up being pretty ideal.

When I arrived, I took some time to decompress from walking over and dealing with the crowds before mingling with everyone (I also wanted to smooth down my hair before I took any photos). The set up was pretty nice with a step and repeat with a photographer right by the entryway.

Step and Repeat

There was some food from Chipotle and cookies from Sprinkles (I didn’t know that they did more than cupcakes!). And there was a wine table as well as a liquor table where various liquors were mixed with tea. I didn’t end up drinking, but I still enjoyed checking out what was there.

Shortly after I got there, a couple of my friends showed up so we found a couch to hang out on a chat. It was starting to get a bit crowded, so being able to sit off to the side helped to keep my anxiety away. Since the red carpet photos weren’t being done the entire party, I also remembered to head over there for some photos. I don’t have the official photos yet, but the photographer was nice enough to take a photo with my phone so I’d have it right away!

Red Carpet

The party was pretty casual so that was nice. There was a raffle about halfway through the event (I didn’t win anything but that’s ok) as well as a quick video highlighting some of the projects that the writers have worked on (I didn’t get a chance to share anything so I wasn’t in that). But most of the time, I was just chatting with my friends about lots of random stuff. I know I probably should have networked more, but with so many people in a space I can feel really shy and end up sticking with people I know.

Since I had to take the light rail back home (and I had some work I had to get done), I didn’t stay too late. I was there for a couple of hours, but there were still a few hours to go when I ended up leaving. The walk back to the light rail was easy enough and even though I had to stand the entire ride (while I was in heels), it was still a pretty convenient way to get to Santa Monica. I’ll have to take the light rail again there soon for a beach day since it is way easier than driving over and trying to find parking.

Congrats again to Ms. In The Biz for sharing amazing stories by amazing women for 3 years! I’m always inspired by each article I read and I’m honored that someone might be inspired by what I have to write too. I’m excited to see what cool things will happen for the blog in the next 3 years. I know that there are going to be some fabulous things in the future and I can’t wait to be a part of them!

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailMs. In The Biz Anniversary Party (or Having Fun In A Photo Booth) Default Thumbnail5 Years Old (or My Blog Is A Kindergartner) Default ThumbnailCelebrating At Orangetheory (or 3 Years Down) Default Thumbnail67 Years (or Celebrating An Anniversary With Fondue) Default ThumbnailHappy Anniversary Mom And Dad (or Celebrating 32 Years Of Awesomeness) Default ThumbnailCelebrating 200 Episodes Of The Podcast (or Come and Celebrate With Me!)

Comments Off on Celebrating Ms. In The Biz (or 3 Years Later!)

Posted in Acting, Celebrations, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , ,

Building Up My Running Skills (or Getting A New PR)

Posted on June 6, 2016 | 1 comment

This past week at Orangetheory continued my re-introduction to running. I actually was feeling very scared before this week of workouts because I thought maybe the week before was a fluke and I wouldn’t be able to run again. I thought maybe that was a one week thing and I would be back to struggling during some of my power walking. And I was thinking that maybe the workouts wouldn’t be ones that I could figure out how to run during.

Fortunately, that wasn’t the case for me. I did have to play around a bit with how I added running into my cardio, but it wasn’t too difficult for me. With this past Monday being a holiday, the workout was a 3G class because so many people were signed up. So we only really had about 17 minutes for each block (and one block for the treadmill, one block for the rower, and one block for the floor). The plan for cardio was to do 1.5 miles as fast as possible. I knew there was no way I could do 1.5 miles in the time we had, so I told my coach I was going to try for a mile and he was ok with that. Since I’m still new to running, I didn’t want to go too crazy. But I really wanted to try to do a run/walk mile.

Since I had done a couple of 30 second runs, that seemed like a good plan to me. So I was going with 30 seconds of running followed by a minute of walking. The first few rounds went pretty easily for me. I was feeling really great and I thought that maybe I should try to do a bit more running than 30 seconds. But after I got about half a mile done, I was feeling very tired. I realized after the fact that I did my entire mile at 4% incline (runners only have to be at 1% while power walkers need to be at 4%), so I could have brought my incline down a bit. But once I got halfway done, I knew I was on pace for a great mile PR so I kept going. I kept up the 30 seconds of running/1 minute of walking pretty much the entire time. When I was close to the end, I wanted to try to finish up with about a minute of running so I did about 90 seconds of walking leading up to the last bit I had and I ran for a minute before I completed my mile.

1 Mile

My previous PR was almost exactly a year ago (before the calf tear) and it was 16:30. My dream was to get below a 16 minute mile (so I can do a Disneyland 5K). And while this was the first time I had added running into the mix, I had no idea that I would take an entire minute off of my mile time! I don’t think I could maintain this pace for a 5K yet, but this is such a positive sign to me!

After doing my mile, I still had 2/3 of my workout left. I did struggle a bit with the rest but I tried my best. We had a mile on the rower (1600 meters) and then our floor work was all sets of 100. We did squats, pushups, running men, swimmers, high rows on the straps, hop overs, and triceps dips. I didn’t make it to 100 of each thing, but I got close. But I didn’t really care too much since I killed it on my mile!

Wednesday was an endurance day, so I had to think about how to try to run on the treadmill. A lot of the push paces were between 90 seconds and 3 minutes, and there’s no way I can run that long yet. So I ran for the first 30 seconds of each push pace and then went down to a power walk (and raised my incline) for the rest of it. That seemed to work pretty well for me and I was able to really work on my running form. Because of my hip issues, I have issues walking in a straight line. So on the treadmill, I have to hold on while I walk because I can walk off the belt and if that happened I’m sure I’d fall off. I was holding on while I was running too, but on Wednesday I decided to test myself and I found that I actually can run in a straight line! I’m not sure why I can do that with running if I can’t with walking, but it might have to do with there being less time that my foot is down (and less chance for my hip to slip). While I was running for 30 seconds for my push paces, I did run for the entire minute that we had all-outs.

The floor that day was all arms, abs, and squats. I’m glad the leg work was a bit limited because my legs were feeling a bit weak after all that running. I know that I have to build up my running endurance and while I’ve done lots of walking cardio work, running is a new skill for me to work on. My body isn’t hurting as much as my lungs do when I’m running. But once I’m off the treadmill, I think the adrenaline I’ve got while I’m running goes away and I feel a bit weak. But soon the novelty of running will wear off a bit and I think the floor work will become a bit easier after cardio again.

Friday was a power day, so it was pretty ideal for me for running. We did have some longer push paces (3 minutes and 2 minutes) so I did the same thing I did on Wednesday where I ran for the first 30 seconds and then walked for the rest. That’s a good plan for me so far and I’m pretty happy with it. But after those long push paces, we had a lot of all-outs that were either a minute long or 45 seconds long. So I was trying to do my best to run for the entire time for those all-outs. I didn’t always succeed, but thinking that I ran for 1 minute straight 4 times is crazy considering that it was only about a week ago that I started running. I want to test my limits, but I know I have to take it easy too.

The floor on Friday was a bit tough. The first half was rowing (300 and 200 meters) and a lot of weight work focusing a lot on arms and abs. The second half had the same rowing and a lot of strap and ab roller work. I didn’t get as far in the blocks as I would have wanted to, but my body just wasn’t moving any faster!

Overall, I’m really happy how my running progress has been going. Obviously I wish it was super easy and I could run without having to worry about catching my breath, but that’s not realistic. I’ve got some goals in mind with the running that I think are very feasible such as being able to run for 90 seconds straight by the end of the month. Setting the small goals and milestones is going to be really important for me as I work on running more. I won’t have progress with running like I do with weight work or rowing, but the progress will happen eventually. But for now, I’m just proud of where I am so far and the fact that I’m doing any running at all!

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailWanting To Run (or Focusing On Running And Rowing) Default ThumbnailBuilding My Endurance (or Lots Of Running) Default ThumbnailBuilding Up Endurance (or Shocking Myself) Default ThumbnailTesting Myself (or Running More) Default ThumbnailFiguring Things Out (or Finding A Balance With Running) Default ThumbnailLots Of Running and Rowing (or Proof Of My Progress)

1 Comment

Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff

Tagged , , , , ,

A Fresh Budget (or Starting Over With YNAB)

Posted on June 3, 2016 | 1 comment

I’ve been budgeting with YNAB for almost a year now. I’ve been pretty good about entering every expense and paycheck into the system (I’ve even had some fun laughs with friends when we are out to dinner and we both pull up our apps to enter our expense when we pay the bill). It’s been good for me to be accountable with every dollar that I spend and to have a more realistic view on how much money I’m making.

But even though I was doing all the work, there was a serious disconnect with me happening in my budgeting. I have no clue why I was so disconnected, but something wasn’t right and I couldn’t shake the feeling. I had been trying to figure out what was wrong, but I just kept feeling like something was wrong and I couldn’t fix it.

I started to download a bunch of other budgeting apps. There are dozens of free budgeting apps and some of them seemed ok, but none of them were fitting what I needed (the biggest issue was finding one that didn’t expect the income to be a steady amount). YNAB has actually changed a bit since I got it and the new version is more of an online system (instead of it connecting via Dropbox) and you pay a monthly or annual fee instead of paying for a 1 time purchase. I don’t want to get the new version yet because I want to feel comfortable with the version I have and I really don’t want to have another expense added to my life right now.

So after a few weeks of feeling lost and frustrated, I finally decided to get rid of my current budget in YNAB, delete everything, and start completely over. When I started over I also re-watched all of the videos online about setting things up and how to use them efficiently. I learned things that I missed the first time and I was setting up my budgeting categories into things that make sense to me.

YNAB Categories

I kept the debt, monthly bills, and everyday expense categories because those are pretty basic and they haven’t changed. I still have monthly bills, everyday expenses, and my debt to pay off. But the rest of my categories have gotten more specific. I’m breaking down my expenses by different aspects of my life and the priorities I have with them. Some of my acting expenses can be sacrificed for my day job expenses (classes aren’t as important as paying my estimated taxes). Splitting the expenses in the categories does help me see where I need to save and spend versus where I want to save and spend.

I know that some people have very limited categories in their budget, but I think for me the specifics are really going to help me. Sometimes, I forget about the annual expenses that I have that add up all the time. I only pay dues for WIF and one of the casting submissions sites once a year, and I don’t want that amount to shock me anymore. This way, I can save a little bit each month for those annual expenses and I will see exactly what I’m saving it for (compared to before where I listed it as annual acting expenses).

So far, this new budget is working out well for me. I’m feeling more connected to my money and I’m more aware of what’s happening. I’m trying to set up my monthly savings for my annual things, but I’m still working on how I want them to be organized. In the past, I probably would have just given up with things got hard for me to figure out. But now I really do want to make this work. I know that budgeting has helped so much this past year and that it can be doing so much more for me. And once I get that figured out, hopefully I can start paying down more debt and start saving so I can take another amazing vacation sometime soon.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailWorking on Budgeting (or Spending Money To Save Money) Default ThumbnailGoing Back To An Old Habit (or Finding Control With Budgeting) Default ThumbnailAnother Monthly Challenge Down (or The Prosperous Heart) Default ThumbnailFinding New Money Issues (or Looking At Doing A Fresh Budget) Default ThumbnailBudgeting and Spending (or Sharing YNAB With A Cashier) Default ThumbnailTrying to Budget for Disneyland (or Does Someone Want to Give Me an Annual Pass?)

1 Comment

Posted in Fun Stuff, Saving, Tough Stuff

Tagged , , , ,