Category Archives: Fun Stuff

Helping Friends Make Progress (or An Evening Of Feeling Like I Have A Purpose)

Posted on October 16, 2020 | Comments Off on Helping Friends Make Progress (or An Evening Of Feeling Like I Have A Purpose)

There are so many things I’ve learned about myself during this pandemic. One thing I learned was how important having a purpose is to me. I’ve always kind of known this and that’s one thing that pushed me into union service. But now more than ever I understand how having a purpose is something I need. When I don’t have a job and feel like I’m accomplishing things, it’s more obvious than ever when I don’t have a purpose. I feel like I’m just floating along in life and I’m not grounded. So whenever I have a project to do, I go for it because it gives me a purpose and makes me feel so much better.

And sometimes, I get a purpose out of being helpful. And that’s exactly what I got to do this week. Someone that I did improv class with reached out to me on social media. I don’t think we’ve seen each other since finishing the class, but we’ve stayed in touch over social media so we both know what the other is up to. So he knows I’m pretty involved in the union. I don’t think he exactly knew what I do with the union, but since he had a question about the union, he reached out to me.

He is still not in the union yet, but he wanted to make a union project to put online. This is actually one way that someone can become eligible to join the union and is a very common type of project that people do. But he wanted to make sure that he was doing everything correctly so that he can hire union actors and he didn’t want to make mistakes. So he reached out to me for more information.

I’m not an expert in self-producing and haven’t done it much. But I did have a little background information on what he needs to do. I also know people who know a lot more than I do, so I was able to reach out to them to answer his questions and connect them so he can ask them more. It was a very productive conversation with him and I think he feels much better and confident about the project he’s going to do. He’s still in the beginning stages of getting things ready, but that’s exactly when you need to start getting the union paperwork together. So he did it perfectly because he is going to get all the paperwork done with plenty of time before he is planning on filming.

These days, it’s a little more complicated than normal because you have to have more safety protocols in place. But it’s still possible to film. And my friend who knows more about this than I do is going to help him make sure he gets everything that he needs to make it completely compliant with our new protocols. And he does understand why things have to be this way, so he’s very willing to work with the protocols. It’s always good when someone gets why things are the way they are and I’m glad that he’s willing to work with the rules and figure out how to make it work.

The entire call I had with him went so well and I am so excited about the project he’s working on. It sounds like he’s really passionate about self-producing and taking advantage of the free time he has right now. I can’t wait to see what he creates!

And even though this is a little selfish, I’m so glad he asked me for help. It did make me feel like I was useful and it gave me something to do that I could accomplish. He did give me a purpose that day. And I needed that feeling. I’ve totally been feeling lost lately and he helped me focus on something, even if it was only for a short time.

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Default ThumbnailMaking My Acting Bold (or Feeling Great From An Audition) Default ThumbnailFriends Helping Friends (or Not Being Afraid To Ask For Support) Default ThumbnailAn Evening Out With Friends (or An Excuse To Dress Up) Default ThumbnailA Week Of Progress (or Feeling More Like Me) Default ThumbnailFeeling More Progress (or Olympic Workouts) Default ThumbnailFeeling Better About My Progress (or Coming Back From The Dri-Tri)

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Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff

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Trying Other Types Of OTF At Home Workouts (or Adding More Variety)

Posted on October 5, 2020 | Comments Off on Trying Other Types Of OTF At Home Workouts (or Adding More Variety)

I’m coming up on 7 months of working out at home (side note: how have we been in safer at home for almost 7 months?!?). Since the first week of working out at home, I’ve been using the official Orangetheory at Home videos that are posted on their app and YouTube channel. For a while, I have also been doing 1 workout on Zoom a week with one of my OTF coaches. This routine has been great for me and I’m still so happy that I have been able to keep up my routine while at home. But this past week, I changed things up a bit.

I’ll start with my Friday workout because that was the one that was the same. That was still my Zoom workout. We had it a bit earlier than normal to fit with our coach’s schedule, but it wasn’t too early. It was just as hard as always, and possibly a little harder because my body was a little sore from the night before and I didn’t do as much stretching as I should have done before the workout. But it was still amazing and one of the highlights of my week!

For my Monday workout, I did a workout that was on Instagram Live! The coach doing the workout was actually my normal Monday coach from OTF, so that was even more amazing for me! This was not exactly like my old Mondays, but it was the closest I’ve had in a long time. I loved getting to work out with Coach Brendon and having his motivation the entire time.

The Instagram Live workout was done through the FitOn app account. I hadn’t used FitOn before for my home workouts, but Brendon was now a part of them and he had some video workouts available on the app. So after doing the workout on Monday, I downloaded the app so I could test it out on Wednesday.

All the workouts on the app are free, which is awesome. And there are a lot of different types of workouts and coaches that are on it. But I was mainly focused this past week on the workouts that Brendon had on there. On Wednesday I did the workouts that are OTF ones on the app and on Saturday I did the workouts that Brendon did but wasn’t OTF specific.

I say “workouts” when talking about what I did on a single day because the videos were a bit short. For example, there was a cardio one that was about 25 minutes and then an upper body strength one that was about 20 minutes. So I did both those videos to get a full workout in. I didn’t explore the app too much so I don’t know if other types of workouts or other coaches have longer workouts. I’ll probably look into it a bit more this week.

But I did love the workouts that I did. It was really nice that Brendon does the workout in the video with you. Even though the coaches at OTF when you are in the studio aren’t doing the workout with you, they are constantly coaching you and encouraging you. And Brendon did that in the videos just like he would do in the studio. That’s something I loved about the Dri-Tri at home workout I did too. The official OTF workouts are normally a little coaching at the start of each block and then it’s the workout screen with all the exercises since they aren’t necessarily timed (so not everyone is doing the same number of rounds and aren’t on the same exercise at the same time).

I also used my jump rope again this week. I only did it once, after my Saturday workout, but that was still something considering the break I had taken from it recently. I had to ease into getting back to the jump rope and I made the intervals a bit easier for me, but it was still tough and I was sweating hard!

I’m not sure what I’ll be doing for my workouts this week. I might do more FitOn workouts. I might do some of the official OTF workouts. But I am happy that I have some more options now that I know I like so I can mix things up more than I have been doing.

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Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff

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Another Family Day (or The Best Father/Daughter Project Yet)

Posted on September 30, 2020 | Comments Off on Another Family Day (or The Best Father/Daughter Project Yet)

As I mentioned the other day, I recently did a full 2-week quarantine so that I can spend time with my family. It’s not easy to do a full quarantine, but it’s worth it to see my family. I know I have to do this to make sure that I’m not sick and I don’t get anyone sick. If I wasn’t taking these precautious and someone got sick, I would never forgive myself. So doing the full quarantine is a small sacrifice to make in order to feel good about seeing people who I do not live with. I can’t wait until I don’t have to think about this before seeing my family (or being able to see my friends), but I just remind myself that this is will end eventually and it is what we have to do in order to have our future.

Just like my other recent visits with my family, this was just going to be for the day. It’s not that long of a drive (only about 90 minutes each way) and it’s just easier to be there for the day than it is to pack up everything that I would need to spend the night. Plus, if I was staying overnight, it would only get me a few more hours as I would be going home the next day. So doing a day trip is just easier for me. I’m sure my parents would love it if I stayed longer, but they understand why I don’t.

This time, we were going to be hanging out at the rental house my parents were staying at because they had the dog with them! I hadn’t seen Tucker since the baby shower, so I was so happy to see him. He can’t be inside my brother and sister-in-law’s house because they have a cat. So to let him hang out with all of us, we had to be where my parents were staying. But that also worked for another reason.

I take a lot of pride in finding awesome gifts for people, and I was starting to think of things I wanted to get for Rory. And something that kept coming up in random searches that I was doing was busy boards. A busy board is basically a collection of things that babies and toddlers like to play with such as light switches, doorknobs, wheels, different types of locks, and stuff like that. And while there were some really nice looking ones that I knew I couldn’t make, in general, they didn’t look too fancy and it seemed like something I could do. Or at least something my dad and I could do together.

So I talked to my dad a month or so about this idea. The original idea was to make this for Rory’s first birthday. So we weren’t in a rush for anything. We both said we would just look around to see what we could find that would be good things to put on a busy board. We didn’t think we would need to buy a ton of stuff. Most things could be random things we had as extras from other projects. And then a week or two before I was going to see my family, my dad and I started talking more about the type of board and holder we would use for this. We wanted to maybe work on it when we saw each other, but we had no idea how to actually make it stand up and be safe. We looked at a few different ideas online like artist easels and other pre-built things, but we ended that call not knowing what to do. I promised my dad I would do more research.

But the next day, my dad texted me to stop the search. I guess he got inspired because he went to the hardware store, bought some wood, and built this.

And it actually can flip and be used the other direction so it doesn’t have as much of an angle! This is way better than anything my dad and I were looking at online. I was shocked that he was able to build this and do it so quickly! And he said that he would have it painted before they were in Santa Barbara so we could work on adding the gadgets together.

We were going to have a few hours before my brother, sister-in-law, and nephew came over after I arrived; so when I got there my dad and I immediately got to work. We had a bunch of tools to drill holes and get everything in there safely. And we had figured out that we might give Rory his present early (instead of driving it back and forth) so we were extra motivated to get it done before they arrived! We had a little bit of planning to do so we could figure out what should go where, but that ended up being pretty quick. And we made an awesome team with getting everything installed. My dad did most of the hard work and I did the prep work (like getting the correct screws and washers ready). It still took us a few hours, but we got it done! And I am so proud of how it looks!

My dad and I have done a lot of projects together. It’s something we like to do and we are good at it. Our go-to ultimate project for a long time has been a screen door we built years ago. It came from a box with instructions, but we did have to do some customizations. But this busy board was completely from scratch. Honestly, I think it’s the greatest thing we have made and I still can’t believe how it looks. I’m so proud of it and this easily beats the screen door!

Rory is still a little too young for this, but he was fascinated by it. We let him try to play with it, and he was so interested in what things were. He just didn’t know how to do them just yet.

This photo is also the first time he sat up unassisted, so I guess the busy board motivated him to do that! And I know that as he gets a little older, he’ll love it even more. He’ll play with the different things that spin and move. And I hope it will keep him busy for a while so my brother and sister-in-law can get other work done and know that he is entertained! And in the future, my niece will hopefully enjoy playing with it too! I can’t wait to see him really enjoying it, but the few moments that he was playing with it while I was there was enough to make me feel so good about what we made.

Besides letting Rory play with the busy board, we had family dinner that night (the cookies I made were for dessert). We also spent some time hanging outside because the weather wasn’t too bad. And when we were outside, Tucker seemed to want to be a part of the conversation too.

After dinner, my brother and sister-in-law needed to go home to put Rory to bed. And I started to get my stuff together so I could drive home. I was able to spend almost 8 hours with my family, which really was awesome. Of course, more time would be better, but just those 8 hours revived me a bit. It had been so long since I had a hangout like that and I needed it.

And fortunately, I won’t have to wait too long before my next family hangout. Usually, my family does a big Thanksgiving with my extended family. But this year, that just isn’t possible. Between travel and trying to keep people safe and healthy, we just can’t get together like we normally do. So my immediate family is going to do our own little Thanksgiving. And because house rentals and other things are more expensive during the holiday, we are doing Thanksgiving a few weeks early (this was actually the original plan for the extended family Thanksgiving too). So I am only about 6 weeks away from seeing everyone again. That does mean that I am about 4 weeks away from another quarantine, but like always, it will be worth it. And I can’t wait until I get to see everyone and get to spend a few days with the family!

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Default ThumbnailFamily Brunch (or Sibling Catch Up Time) Default ThumbnailHaving Fun With Photos (or My Brother And Nephew Are Twins!) Default ThumbnailFull Thanksgiving Week (or Lots Of Family Time) Default ThumbnailI’m Officially An Aunt (or Welcome Rory!) Default ThumbnailMore Family Time (or Seeing All My Immediate Family Last Week) Default ThumbnailFamily Weekend (or Hanging Out With The Dog)

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Posted in Family, Fun Stuff

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Trying A New Recipe (or I Forgot How Nice It Is To Bake From Scratch)

Posted on September 25, 2020 | Comments Off on Trying A New Recipe (or I Forgot How Nice It Is To Bake From Scratch)

I’ve said so many times that I need to get into cooking more often. Especially now, I don’t have an excuse not to. I’m home all the time. I don’t have much to do. Yes, it’s not super easy to get all the ingredients I might need, but that’s not that big of an issue. I should be cooking more often for both my physical and financial health.

I’m slowly getting better at doing that. I’m not great, but I’m trying. I’m not cooking every day or every meal, but I’m cooking more often than before. I still don’t love that I don’t have people to cook for. I’m trying to remember to either cut recipes in half or to freeze portions since I don’t want days of leftovers. But I still get more joy out of cooking when I know someone else will be enjoying it.

Fortunately, this week I had an opportunity to make something for others to enjoy. I got to see my family yesterday (after another full 2-week quarantine) and I’ll write more about that next week. We were going to have dinner together, and I asked my mom if there was anything I could make or help with. She didn’t need my help, but I offered to make something for dessert. Since she didn’t have a dessert planned, she said I could make something. So I decided to make Bon Appetit’s Best Chocolate Chip Cookies.

I know there is a lot of controversy with Bon Appetit right now, but this recipe was something I saved a while ago and really wanted to try. I don’t plan on seeking out any recipes from their site until their diversity is improved and pay discrimination is fixed. So this was a one-off until things are better for their employees.

I don’t bake that often, and I bake from scratch even less often. I have a few go-to desserts I know how to make, and I think only 2 of them are from scratch. The others are either box mixes that I like or box mixes that I modify into something different. Baking from scratch isn’t hard, it’s just not something I do. And I rarely bake just for me because I don’t want to have a ton of desserts in my house. But seeing my family gave me the perfect excuse to try this recipe.

I only had 1 small fail while making it. I sometimes do brown butter in the microwave, but this microwave is still new to me. So the butter exploded/popped and got all over the inside. I cleaned that up and then had enough butter to do it over, but this time I used my stove instead. Brown butter seems to make everything delicious, so I was happy it was in this recipe. It also made the combination of butter and sugar easier to mix. I didn’t need to use a hand mixer or wish I had a stand mixer. I was able to use a whisk and get it perfectly smooth.

The only other fail I might have had was in either rest time or oven temperature. I do have a thermometer I put in my oven to make sure it’s accurate. I thought it said the right temperature, but I’m not sure now. And the recipe mentions letting the dough rest if you feel like it needs it. I didn’t think I did, but after baking them I’m questioning it.

These cookies spread out so much when I baked them. I only put 6 on a full-sized baking sheet, and they still were touching! I know this isn’t the biggest problem when making cookies and I actually think it worked, but still. I tried one after they cooled down and they were really good! The edges were crisp and the center was gooey. I do wish I added more chocolate chips, but I was trying to follow the recipe perfectly and didn’t want to adjust anything. But when I make these again (because I know I will be making them again), I’ll just remember to add more.

I was proud that I made something new from scratch and that it wasn’t a failure like it could have been. And knowing that they were going to be enjoyed by my family made it so much better. I might have to find other things I can bake and drop off to my friends so I can test out more recipes and then not have to have a ton of leftovers in my house.

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Posted in Food, Fun Stuff

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Driving To Nowhere (or Just Getting Out Of My House)

Posted on September 23, 2020 | Comments Off on Driving To Nowhere (or Just Getting Out Of My House)

Over the past 6 months, I’ve done some random drives around LA. These drives do have some practicality. I need to make sure I drive my car every so often so that the battery doesn’t die. It’s not horrible if the battery dies because I can call AAA (or ask a neighbor for help). But I’d still prefer not to do that. Sometimes I have to drive places for real errands, so I don’t have to do these random drives all the time. But when it’s been over 2 weeks and I haven’t driven anywhere, I usually take my car to just drive with no purpose so that it gets some use.

But these drives also are a bit for my mental health. Looking at just the walls in my house can be maddening. I have said this several times, but I am very lucky that I love where I live. It’s not perfect and it’s small, but I’m very happy. And I have made improvements over time that has made my home even better for me. And even though being so isolated and lonely is a struggle, I also know that I am lucky that I don’t live with a roommate or partner that annoys me. My home is a safe and peaceful space for me. But it is only about 400 square feet and I need to see things outside of it.

So going on drives changes what I am seeing. Even if I’m not driving to somewhere that is scenic, any change is nice. Seeing crowded normal city streets is a change. It is also weird because I do see people doing things that I don’t know if they are safe (like eating at restaurants or not wearing masks), but I try not to focus on those things. I just try to enjoy being outside my house and feeling grateful that I have the ability to drive somewhere in a car that is safe.

I had to do one of these random drives this past weekend. I will be driving my car this week, but I had realized that it had been a while since I had driven and I didn’t want my car to have a dead battery when I actually needed it. And even though I just had gotten a car wash for the outside of my car not that long ago, my car was very dirty. With the fires and changing weather, my car was covered in dust, pollen, and ash. I don’t know if it’s worse than normal or it seems that way because I’m not driving most days so everything is just sitting on my car. But I decided to do another drive-thru car wash to get my car looking a bit cleaner when I did my random drive.

I can’t remember ever getting my car washed so close back to back, but I guess when I’m not spending money on much else it doesn’t matter. And the drive-thru car wash is much cheaper than the nice car wash place that I normally go to. So 2 of the cheap ones still are less than 1 of the nice ones. I guess that makes it not as bad.

I’ve seen jokes online about how humans are like dogs now. We pace around our homes looking for things to eat, we have to be reminded to stay away from others, and we look forward to car rides. I guess this is pretty true (although I don’t need the reminder to stay away from people). Going for a drive really is something that brings me joy these days. It isn’t a chore, it’s an adventure. Even when I’m just driving around the neighborhood and going for a car wash. I’m sure that once I’m driving more regularly again, going for a random drive won’t be as interesting to me and I doubt I’ll do them that often because technically they are a waste of gas. But for now, I see more random car drives in my future so I can continue to change things up.

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Enjoying The Emmys (or This Awards Show Will Be A Bit Of A Time Capsule)

Posted on September 22, 2020 | Comments Off on Enjoying The Emmys (or This Awards Show Will Be A Bit Of A Time Capsule)

The Emmys were this past weekend. As I usually do, I watched them live so I could also live-tweet them. I love watching awards shows, I always have. But as I have gotten more and more involved in my union, I have gotten to know people who are up for various awards. This year, there were a few people I’ve met up for Emmys and some people I would consider acquaintances. It made things even better. Also, I had watched “Schitt’s Creek” this year with the Movie Club I helped to start, so I was so excited to see them up for so many awards.

Watching the awards this year wasn’t that different from how I normally watch them. I was on my couch, alone, and I ordered some delivery food. That actually felt really normal to me and having that feeling was something I needed. But the show was definitely not normal.

Because of the pandemic, there was no audience watching. Very few presenters were at the show. There were some that were done by Jimmy Kimmel, who was the host, and there were some that were pre-taped by actors and essential workers (which was a nice touch). And the nominees were all watching on their own with cameras live-streaming their reactions into the show. I saw some behind the scenes stuff about how the Television Academy sent all the nominees cameras and lights so they could do this. It was pretty incredible to see how it turned out and I think it was really good. The cast and crew from “Schitt’s Creek” were watching together and having a mini-party and so did some of the team behind “Watchman”. But they were following protocols and staying safe.

I am so glad that “Schitt’s Creek” was together since they had a clean sweep of the comedy awards! Seeing everyone be so excited for each other brought me so much joy. And anything that brings joy these days is so special. And even watching people win and have to give their speeches alone in a room was fun and joyful to watch. Honestly, I think we all needed an awards show at this time since there hasn’t been anything like that lately to watch. Some may feel like it was frivolous, but so are a lot of things that people are excited about. And to me and I bet so many others, this was something we needed to feel like not everything is gone because of the pandemic.

I hope that this is the only time that the Emmys have to be this way and that by this time next year things will be back to normal and people can be together. I actually didn’t mind this new format and would love to see how it could be incorporated in the future. But I also love it when things are held in a single space and you could see everyone there excited for all the winners.

No matter what, this show was very clearly held during a pandemic. People were wearing masks (and many had ones to match their outfits or found a way to make them stylish). The awards were given to the winners by employees in hazmat suits. People were isolated and not together. One day, looking back at this show, people will instantly know that it was held during this time. It’s a moment in history. I wonder if other award shows in the next year or so will be the same. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

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Posted in Acting, Celebrations, Fun Stuff

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Trying To Not Pick Up A Dozen New Hobbies (or Finding Things I Can Do For Free)

Posted on September 10, 2020 | Comments Off on Trying To Not Pick Up A Dozen New Hobbies (or Finding Things I Can Do For Free)

During the pandemic, I feel like everyone seems to be discovering new hobbies and things to do. For a while, so many people were learning how to make bread. Then people were expanding to just learning to cook and bake other things. There were a lot of people picking up new crafts like painting or knitting. I loved seeing the things my friends were creating and making. Everyone was so creative and could make amazing things.

I did start doing more cooking and I’ve done a lot of reorganizing around my house, but I don’t think those count too much as hobbies. I never thought about making bread except for a short time when I was craving bread and I couldn’t find it in the store. But now the stores seem to have things again and I’m not really eating bread that much. But as far as artistic hobbies go, I never really have had those before.

I have heard interviews with people talking about how they don’t know if they have hobbies and if that’s a good thing or not. And I feel the same way. If someone asks me what I like to do, I have a small list of things. I like to read, watch tv, go to the movies, go to see musicals, and go to Disneyland. Most of those things are not things I can do right now. And while I know that having a hobby could help to fill my time, I don’t have a pull to do any specific hobby.

I’ve tried to pick things up from time to time because they seemed interesting. I thought adult coloring books seemed like fun a few years ago, but I never really got into them. I did discover an app for my phone that is like a coloring book that I like, so I started to do that more. When I was younger, I did some needlepoint projects, but I was never very good at them. I remember wanting to be better but also not being motivated to try harder. It was something I thought I should be better at and I’m not. That idea was frustrating.

When you see so many people on social media doing new hobbies, it can be hard not to be tempted to find those supplies so you can try it too. I’ve only had one thing this year that did that to me. I discovered some cool videos on cake decorating and using frosting to create things and I thought that might be fun to try. I already had the frosting tips and I found a recipe online of a fake frosting I could make that wouldn’t go back. It’s not tasty so you don’t eat it, but it’s the right consistency to practice with. I got the things I needed for the recipe, and then I never got into it. I do think I should try the decorating videos and I know I’ll do it eventually. But the excitement about trying it was gone once I had everything I needed to do it.

And that’s what scares me about trying hobbies. I don’t want to spend money getting things and then never feel the same push to try them. And there are a million ways I could spend money on introductory kits for hobbies. So while I would love to find something to help fill my time a bit, I don’t want to waste money.

I know there are some things I can try that I either have the supplies for or don’t need much to try, but it always comes down to motivation. I know that sometimes I will be more motivated to try and that’s when I should go for it. I don’t want to force myself to try a hobby when I’m not feeling up for it. I need to get a list going that I can look at in those motivated moments so I can take advantage of when I feel that way.

But I also know that there is no requirement or expectation of me to start a new hobby during this time. Sometimes, it’s just too stressful or overwhelming to do much more than get through the day. But it would be nice to have something to fill my time when I’m craving something to do. So hopefully, I’ll find the perfect combination of something that doesn’t cost me money and I want to do and I can test out that as a hobby. Maybe it will stick and maybe I’ll hate it. But I should at least try.

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An At-Home Labor Day (or The Unofficial End To A Weird Summer)

Posted on September 8, 2020 | Comments Off on An At-Home Labor Day (or The Unofficial End To A Weird Summer)

I think most people will agree that Labor Day is the unofficial end to summer. Some schools don’t start until after Labor Day, but I think most start before now. But even with school starting before Labor Day, the long weekend still seems to designate the end of summer for so many people. I think the 3 summer holidays are the markers for summer. Memorial Day is the start, the 4th of July is the middle, and Labor Day is the end.

Even though LA is experiencing the worst heat wave that I can remember, it does feel like we are out of summer and heading into fall. But at the same time, I don’t feel like we had a summer at all. I know there were people who went out and did more things than I did, but so many things that are summer traditions in LA didn’t happen this year. There were no shows at the Hollywood Bowl. Beaches were closed for a lot of the summer, and when they reopened things weren’t really the same. Most restaurants were closed for the summer. And even though it’s safe to do things outside, most outside things that would have a crowd didn’t open. In a way, it doesn’t feel like this summer existed.

I’ve been feeling this way for a while. We are almost 6 months into being told to stay at home and it doesn’t feel like time has moved. I feel like my life has been frozen in time since March. I do feel like others have moved on and I’m the only one stuck, but I know that’s just what I’m seeing on social media. Most of us staying home aren’t posting about it. The few who are not staying home are the ones posting. So the posts I see are from the small portion of the people that I follow who aren’t staying inside.

I know that having a summer spent inside my house was for the best. I have been very lucky with not getting sick or even worried that I could get sick. I didn’t have any moments where I got the call that I was around someone who tested positive. I know a lot of people who weren’t as lucky as me. I have so many friends who tested positive, even if they thought they were doing all the right things such as wearing a mask and only leaving their homes for essential errands. I know people who have died. I know more people who know someone who died. I’m glad I took this seriously even if I feel like I lost my summer.

Labor Day was spent pretty much like any other day the past 6 months. I stayed home. I tried to keep myself busy. I found things to do so the day didn’t drag on too much. And because Labor Day is all about unions and workers’ rights, I took some time to be grateful for my union and all the benefits we have in this country because of what unions have gained for everyone (like 40 hour work weeks and weekends off). 3 day weekends don’t mean much to me normally since I have Mondays off work. It means even less to me now that I’m really not working at all. But I am still going to appreciate what the day means and that’s what I did. And I tried to not be too upset that now it feels like the summer ended and that I didn’t get to experience it at all.

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Trying To Prevent Zoom Fatigue (or Not Sure If This Is A Pandemic Problem Or Not)

Posted on September 4, 2020 | Comments Off on Trying To Prevent Zoom Fatigue (or Not Sure If This Is A Pandemic Problem Or Not)

When the pandemic started, so many aspects of life changed quickly. Not all the changes were things that were unfamiliar to us, they might have just been slight changes to things we are used to. For example, standing in line at a grocery store is a change, but not a drastic change. Same with trying to only go to the grocery store once a week (I guess there are some people that always did that, but I wasn’t one of them). Those little changes were odd, but not things that threw me off too much. I might have had a bit more stress and felt panicky over things, but there was enough familiar with it that I felt better. I’m sure a lot of people had to adjust to working from home, but that was the easiest thing for me since I always worked from home. But for my friends who never did, they still had enough familiar things that it didn’t feel that different.

But then there were a lot of things that we never used or didn’t use that often that are now things we use a lot. Netflix Party did exist as a browser extension before the pandemic, but I never used it until we were all isolated. Now, it’s a weekly part of my life and I love it! I can see myself using this for a long time, even after the pandemic is over. And I have only seen Netflix Party as a positive thing. I guess there is a negative with not being able to watch on my tv and having to use my computer, but that’s not a huge negative to me.

And while I have used different forms of video chat in the past, I have never used it as much as I am right now. It is funny how Zoom became the default video chat service when there are so many others that have been used before. But Zoom is now almost the generic name for doing a video chat, no matter what the platform is (Zoom is like Xerox now). I know I’m not on Zoom calls as often as many people are, but I’m on them at least once or twice a week. And honestly, being on video calls that often does stress me out a bit. I have no clue how my friends who work 9-5 jobs that have to be on Zoom calls the entire time do it.

A friend of mine who was posting about Zoom fatigue (which is a real thing) was explaining why Zoom calls are so much more exhausting than in-person meetings. When you are on a Zoom call, you have no clue if someone is watching you. You don’t know if someone has their screen in speaker view or gallery view. You don’t know if they are focusing on your video or someone else’s. And always feeling like you might be watched but never knowing is so tiring and a big reason behind Zoom fatigue.

For a long time, I have covered up my webcam. I do this for a few reasons. I don’t want to accidentally turn on my webcam if I don’t want to be on video. I know that some people can hack into them (although I do have security measures on my wifi, you never know), and covering my webcam was something I saw in paperwork for my business insurance. I used to just use a little piece of a post-it note to cover it. I never really used my webcam so the post-it was on there for a long time. And if I did use my webcam, I would just cut down a new piece to replace it. Before the pandemic, I think I would use my webcam maybe once every 2-3 months.

But now, I use it all the time. And I wanted to be able to cover my webcam for the security measures that I was worried about before but I also wanted to cover it for Zoom calls. I know you can turn off video on Zoom, but if I’m going to be jumping in and out as a speaker in a call, it’s just easier for me to cover my camera and not to turn it on and off a lot. So I started looking into better ways to cover the camera than a piece of paper. And fortunately, my search was over almost as soon as it started when I saw there was a cheap and simple solution.

I didn’t realize that webcam slide covers were common and popular. On Amazon, there are dozens of listings for them. And they are pretty much all the same. The differences seem to be either if they are black versus color or how many sliders are in a package. I picked one that had a few sliders in it in case I made a mistake putting it on my laptop or if I ever had to take it off and put a new one on. But so far, I have only needed to use one of them. It was super easy to put on my computer and it doesn’t affect being able to close my laptop or anything else.

So now, when I’m on Zoom calls and don’t want to be watched (like if I’m eating or moving around my house), I can just put the slider over my camera and my screen on Zoom is dark. I’m still listed as a video call, but you don’t see any video. It’s such a simple solution for this problem and I’ve found that it makes my Zoom calls much easier to tolerate. I don’t feel like I’m being watched or that someone is judging me when I’m not the speaker. I feel like I have a bit more privacy while on calls. And it does all the security protections that I had with a post-it note but is much easier to use.

I have no clue if Zoom calls will be this popular for longer than the pandemic, but I know that I’ll be dealing with them for a long time. So I’m glad I have something I can use to try to keep Zoom fatigue to a minimum.

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Still Doing More House Projects (or Just Trying To Find Busy Work)

Posted on September 3, 2020 | Comments Off on Still Doing More House Projects (or Just Trying To Find Busy Work)

Since I’ve been staying in my house, I’ve done so many projects around my house. I’ve done some redecorating, I’ve done organizing things, and I’ve probably done more deep cleans of my house than would be necessary. Sometimes I do these projects because they are things that I’ve been putting off. Some of them have been to just change up the look of my house. And some of them are because I’m bored and have nothing else to do.

I have to be careful with the projects that I do just because I’m bored. If they are things that don’t cost me anything, that’s fine. But a lot of these projects cost me something because I’m buying supplies of some sort. And I don’t want to buy a lot of new things just because I’m bored. I know that I will buy some things when I’m redecorating my house, but I’m also really trying to use the things in my house in a new way that makes them feel different.

Doing projects has been a good way to have a sense of purpose on a day that I might not have anything else going on. I feel a sense of accomplishment if I do something and complete it. It’s silly how proud I can be of myself for some of the things that I have done, but at the same time, I’m going to take a win however I can get them these days.

I think I had a bigger desire to do projects a few months ago. That one was motivated by feeling bored in my house and wanting to have a different view when looking around my place. I have slowed down a lot with the projects or have found random smaller ones to do from time to time. And like I mentioned above, a lot of these projects are also about cleaning my house. My floors and surfaces have never looked better. Of course, I also am using the floors and surfaces as staging areas for other projects, so they can look a bit cluttered. But even if they are cluttered, they are clean.

And when I find a project that does cost me money, I try to be very aware of how much I’m spending and what I really need to get. For example, I recently spent some time online searching for some nice fake plants. As much as I would love to have real plants in my house, I’m not that great at keeping them alive. So fake plants allow me to get the greenery in my house without the potential plant murder. And there are so many nice fake plants online to pick from. Just like with so many things, if I had endless money I would probably buy a ton. But I wanted to keep it limited to maybe one new plant for now. I ended up buying a set of 3 small fake plants that I’m deciding where I want to keep them (right now, all three are in my kitchen window, but I bet I’ll move them a few times within the next week or so).

There are several more fake plants that I have saved online because I love the look of plants in a house. I want to get something to put on the floor near my tv, but I think it’s harder to find good fake plants when they are big without seeing them first. So far, I’ve only bought small ones online. But maybe in a month or two, I’ll change my mind about that.

I’ve also done a lot of organizing and cleaning of the random stuff I’ve had around my house. I don’t want to collect things that I don’t use, but I also struggle a bit letting things go because I’m scared I might need them eventually. But I have been getting better at that and then also organizing whatever I have left. It’s a process doing this and I’m taking small steps, but I have gotten a lot of stuff out of my house that I really don’t need (and either have it stored for donating or friends have taken things). This week, I worked on organizing my purses/tote bags/travel carryons. I pretty much only use one purse for my day to day life. I have a few fancy purses and a few other random ones. But I have a lot of tote bags and carryon sized bags. I went through them all, found the ones I haven’t used or don’t like anymore, and put up command hooks in my entry closet to hang up the ones I’m keeping.

I’m sure that I’ll find more random projects and organizing things to do this week and going forward. As I said, I need things to keep me busy and not just have my day be a nothing day. It’s probably a good thing I live in such a small house because there are only so many things I can do. I can’t imagine all the projects I could think up if I had more rooms to do them in!

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