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Jack

Another Little One in My Life

March 13, 2011 by Jessica 20 Comments

First of all, how cute is that little face!?  Recognizing, of course, that I’m 100% biased.  My brother and his wife had their son Jack Yates this past Thursday, making me an aunt again.  Their daughter Zoe is 16 mos. and I also have a niece through my husband’s brother.

You would think that by my mother getting a new grandchild, this would sate her appetite for babies, but instead it seems to only increase her interest.  And honestly, we’re getting to that point I guess.  I’m almost 31 and Alex just turned 38.  We can’t just keep saying “2 or 3 years” as people have started adding things up and have begun to realize we’ve been saying “2 or 3 years” now for 2 or 3 years. 

Have a baby is actually #101 on my 101 Things to Do Before You Die list.  And be rest assured, when it is actually decided that we’re going to start “trying,” you will not be told.  Somewhere along the way, having a baby became a very public thing.  Did people forget HOW you get babies?  You are essentially asking me about my sex life.  And God help me when I actually get pregnant-the personal questions about bathroom habits and having complete strangers touching my stomach.  Eck.

So while this event may account some for my absence this week, it was also partly a self-imposed sabbatical.  Over the past two months, I’ve slowly come to the realization that blogging (writing posts, commenting on other blogs, etc) had slowly taken over my life.  Following 87 blogs that are regularly updated in addition to trying to do 2-3 posts a week meant I was blogging about 2 or 3 hours every night.  I’m trying to cut down on the number of blogs I follow, or at the very least, not feel compelled to read and comment on every one.  And I didn’t feel at all guilty for not posting anything for 5 days.  So expect fewer posts. 

After all, for a blog about living, I can’t spend all my time writing!

So, to have babies or to not have babies, where do you stand on that question?  How much time do you spend blogging?  And feel free to tell me that my nephew is completely wonderful. :)

Life Management, Miscellaneous
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the-principle-behind-fishing-for-compliments-fishing-for-compliments-precarity-youth-society

Fishing for Compliments

March 8, 2011 by Jessica 22 Comments

So by now you probably noticed some changes.  I hemmed and hawed over changing the layout of my blog as I’m a creature of habit (Duh. That’s why I do the list. Otherwise I’d be the most boring person ever) but when WordPress started rolling out some premium themes, “Headlines” caught my eye.  When we changed my work blog to the ”Headlines” layout and I got to play with it a little bit more, I was further sold on it. 

I like it…I do.  And any problems I’m having with it, I hope to have ironed out in a few days.

But I don’t like is that you can’t do a custom header.  So now my kick-ass specially-designed-for-me header is relegated to logo status…so I’m not sure what I’m going to do about that yet.  And it’s made a lot of my photos all wonky; I’m going back and forth on spending considerable time fixing older posts or just cutting my losses and making sure all posts from here on out are formatted correctly.  The tags at the bottom of the posts are making the rotator weird; I feel like if I knew how to write CSS, I could get rid the tags.  I’ve been thinking I needed to learn anyway.  

So…what do you think?  I had my old layout for 2+ years and it was very much ME.  This is a little swanky and I’m not sure it’s really my style.  But change is good sometimes…

Miscellaneous
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Thing to Do #94: Get Something Named After You

February 12, 2011 by Jessica 26 Comments

Number 94 on the 101 Things to Do Before You Die list is “Get Something Named After You.”  I had actually been thinking about getting a star named after me for awhile.  I had even already written this draft post.  But then Living Social offered to purchase a star registry for $20 this past Thursday (normally $65) so I felt it was a sign (pun intended).

I chose the name WolfRam because that’s mine and Alex’s little nickname we created for ourselves (he’s a North Carolina State fan, who’s mascot is the wolfpack and it’s well documented that I’m a UNC fan, which, of course, are the rams).  The star date I chose was June 6, 2009, which is our anniversary.  And I chose the star to appear in the constellation Taurus, as that is my astrological sign and my tattoo. 

I guess technically, it’s not really named after ME, but I didn’t think naming a star with just my name was very creative.  And since I’m about the least romantic girl in the world, sometimes it’s nice to do something with a little bit of romance. (I can’t take that much credit; I had to look at my calendar to confirm the date of our wedding anniversary.)

I’ll get my official certificate in the mail next week, which will include a map of stars with mine circled.  Now I’ll have to try to complete #77: Learn Astronomy and Read the Night Sky.

Ok, so what do you think of these “Get a Star Named After You” thingees?   Like, who put these companies in charge of the Universe?  And do you think this really counts as completing this thing to do?  Like, I feel like I need to EARN it.  And by earn it, I mean do like all the other big shots and make lots of money and give it to a school so they can name a building after me. 

Either way, a building or a star, this is better than having something bad named after me.  Like if you cope with feeling out of control by cleaning, you call it pulling a “Jessica.”

What would you like to have named after you?

Life Management, Miscellaneous, Nature
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How many life listers do YOU know?

February 10, 2011 by Jessica 22 Comments

I spend a good amount of time on the interwebs trying to find other life listers, and I feel that I’ve done a pretty good job so far.  From just Googling around to looking at commenters on your blogs, I’ve accumalated a list of about 60 that I follow and comment on often.  The ones that post regularly are in my ”Other Life Listers” blog roll (to the right –>)

But I realized I had never asked you guys for suggestions!  Look at my blog roll and let me know if you have other people you follow/know about that you think I would like (and don’t know about!).

It is my dream to have us all be one big family.  Life Listers Unite!

EDIT: Thanks for the suggestions!  Based on your suggestions, and then “leads” from those, I’ve already added 32 new blogs to my reader.  Geez…where I am going to find the time to follow 90+ life listers!?

Miscellaneous
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Halfway through NaBloPoMo

January 15, 2011 by Jessica 9 Comments

I’m really not digging writing a post everyday.  After this month is over, I’ll be able to say I did it one time and happily go back to just posting 2-3 times a week.  For a blog about 101 Things to Do Before You Die, I just don’t know if it makes sense.  How much can you really talk about that relates to your life goals?  And how vain is it to think that what you have to say is significant or meaningful enough for putting out there every day?

I do enjoy writing on my blog.  It gives me a creative outlet and makes me accountable for writing regularly.  But doing it every day has turned it into work.  Its not fun and I definitely don’t think these posts have been quality. 

Oh well, just 15 more days…

Miscellaneous

Housekeeping Already?

January 6, 2011 by Jessica 9 Comments

First of all, I’m sick.  Not the greatest way to start off 2011.  It’s mostly just a cold, although I’ve noticed as I get older, colds seem to be worse and tougher to get rid of.  I tried to cut it off at the pass and stayed in bed all day Monday but I actually feel worse today than I did yesterday.

Second of all, I’ve followed my husband down to Savannah this week/weekend; he’s working and I’m exploring.  I originally had planned to get an earlier start on the road this morning to begin touring the city this afternoon, but the cold was kicking my butt and slowed my start.  I’ve never been to Savannah, although I’ve lived in the South all my life.  I look forward to seeing a bit of the town and maybe even visiting someone…but that’s a surprise I hope to share with you later.

And finally, almost a week has gone by in the new year and I haven’t cooked my first dish yet.  Between being sick and a 4-day weekend out-of-town, it just hasn’t worked out.  No matter.  Things come up.  I figure as long as I have 52 dishes cooked and on the books by the end of the year, my goal will be met.

So how’s your first week of 2011 going?

Miscellaneous
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I Never Knew I Was a Tiffany’s Girl

January 5, 2011 by Jessica 8 Comments

You’ll just have to believe me when I say I couldn’t care less about designers, or even fashion in general, I guess.  As I type, I’m wearing a Kim Rogers sweater (popular with the 55 and over set at your local Belk’s), a button up from the Gap Outlet, and the pants are from the Isaac Mizrahi line at Target.  Even my shoes are from Payless. 

I also don’t wear jewelry, outside of my engagement/wedding band.  So I can’t really determine at what point I became obsessed with owning something from Tiffany’s.  Maybe it was a desire to be a little bit more like other girls, the pressure to fit in.  Perhaps it was to see for myself what all the fuss was about in opening a blue box. 

But if I had to guess, I think it would probably be that I had always considered owning something from Tiffany’s to be unobtainable, out of reach for some small town girl only once removed from the trailer park.  Discovering that I could, in fact, be given some terribly overpriced (albeit exquisitely designed) silver earrings in a blue box caught me by surprise. 

And then the obsession was voiced.

A belated Christmas present arrived today (we’ll hurridedly skip over the part where my employee opened the package although I’ve very sweetly reminded her numerous times that I receive personal items at work and to please stop opening the mail).  Pardon the photo but I was off to a meeting when I discovered the package and was able to contain myself briefly to take a photo of it on my backseat before opening.

As I opened the box, I did actually marvel at the bow.  I wonder how long it takes someone to learn to tie a bow like that?  Inside was the little Tiffany’s pouch and inside of that were my Elsa Peretti Teardrop Earrings.

I know I said I don’t wear jewelry very often but I HAVE worn earrings before so what happened next was…confusing.  I couldn’t figure out how to put them on.  I used my car mirror, but all I could figure was that my ear lobes were too fat. (GREAT!  The one thing on my body I had honestly never even thought about and now I have a complex about my fat ear lobes.) 

More tugging and making my ear really red showed what the real problem was: my pierced holes are not large enough for the earrings to pass through.  Or maybe that curved hoops don’t go in my ears very easily. 

I’ll save you a long, and rather gross, story that involves a flashlight, a Sharpie, and rubbing alcohol, and ends with the earrings successfully in my ears with only a little bit of blood and now TWO exit holes in my right ear. 

And I can’t show you photos of the earrings IN my ear because they are really bright red and swollen right now.

But I’m a Tiffany’s girl now!

Excitement, Miscellaneous
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2010 My Blog in Review

January 3, 2011 by Jessica 5 Comments

I got a report from WordPress about how my blog did in 2010 and I thought it was kinda cool.  Plus, there was a button to click to turn the report into a post and I thought this was an easy way to get another post on the books for January :)

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

Healthy blog!

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.

Crunchy numbers

Featured image

About 3 million people visit the Taj Mahal every year. This blog was viewed about 47,000 times in 2010. If it were the Taj Mahal, it would take about 6 days for that many people to see it.

In 2010, there were 108 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 197 posts. There were 176 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 92mb. That’s about 3 pictures per week.

The busiest day of the year was October 8th with 894 views. The most popular post that day was Thing to Do #16: Get into the Guinness Book of World Records.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were networkedblogs.com, facebook.com, mail.yahoo.com, mail.live.com, and 101thingstodo.co.uk.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for piercings, 101 things to do before you die, piercing, things to do before you die, and 100 things to do before you graduate college.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

Thing to Do #16: Get into the Guinness Book of World Records October 2010
14 comments

2

Thing to Do #75: Get a Tattoo and/or Piercing-The Piercing September 2009
2 comments

3

102 More Things to Do Before You Graduate September 2009
4 comments

4

MTV’s List of Things to Do Before You Die February 2010
5 comments

5

101 Things List September 2009
9 comments

Achievement, Miscellaneous
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NaBloPoMo for January

January 1, 2011 by Jessica 7 Comments

This isn’t in the 2011 Goals but I’ve never written a daily blog post for a month solid, so I thought I’d try it out.  The most I’ve ever done is 12 in one month; I usually tend to do maybe about 2 or so a week.  Really that isn’t that much compared to plenty of other bloggers that post daily.

Thanks to Miranda, I found out about NaBloPoMo.  Similar to NaNoWriMo, its a site that offers moral support, inspiration, and the camaraderie that only marathon blogging can provide.  NaBloPoM0 also offers writing prompts for days you may not have much inspiration to write about.  I’m going to try to write about items related to the 101 Things to Do Before You Die list as often as possible; reviews of movies, books, and beers should take up several posts.  But on days when I’m out of things to say, I may have to revert to the prompts.

So here’s post #1 for January.  Only 30 more to go (geez, I should have done this in February, what was I thinking?)

Miscellaneous
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Jessica’s Favorite Things

December 21, 2010 by Jessica 8 Comments

I don’t consider myself an inflammatory person.  I dislike confrontation and usually keep my opinions to myself (at least around people who aren’t close friends or family).  I do have a brash and dry sense of humor, which has led to misunderstandings when people thought I was being serious, but a rule of thumb is that I don’t like to say unpopular things.  I’m breaking that rule today by coming out: I don’t like Oprah.

GASP, right?

I’m sorry, but I don’t like her.  I haven’t for a long while now and have copious reasons why.  She’s terribly self-important and seemingly has fooled an entire nation into believing she is the most gracious and benevolent person in America.  Who else owns their own magazine and puts themselves on the cover every month?  Who else would host a Black and White Ball under the guise of celebrating women of color and be the ONLY person to wear red.

“But Jessica, she gives to so many!”  She donates to get herself in the news and to further her empire.  She recently shut down her Miracle Network so that she can refocus her efforts on her ROUND THE CLOCK Oprah Network.  And when she recently received a Kennedy Center Honor, she was completely honest and told an interviewer that after all of her hard work, she deserved it.

So I’m not a fan.  But one thing I do enjoy is Oprah’s Favorite Things; not because I care what Oprah thinks is fabulous but because of the way the audience reacts.  Its become a pop culture phenomenon to see these people act like they have no sense-cry, scream, jump, and generally lose their minds.  And then even better was the episode of How I Met Your Mother last week when we found out what Barney’s Favorite Things were.  So really because I want to model my life after Barney, and less like Oprah, I was inspired to come up with a list of Jessica’s Favorite Things:

  1. Lushology Shot Glass Mold:  I could pretend to be at Minus 5 Ice Bar year round in the comfort of my own home.
  2. Yardley London English Lavender Hand Soap:  I don’t know what it is but I love this smell.  I buy huge bottles of it from Amazon and put it every soap dispenser in the house. 
  3. Bath and Body Cinnamon Stick Wallflower: This is the official scent of my house.  Whenever I travel somewhere else, I can still smell it in my clothes and luggage.
  4. Express Sequin Infinity Scarf: I’ve been wearing the hell out of this scarf since it arrived a month ago.  I feel like Elton John when I wear it.
  5. Chocovine:  I don’t like red wine, so when I heard about a red wine mixed with Chocolate, I hesitated to try it out.  My love for chocolate won out and I’m so glad I tried it.  Its more like a liqueur, down the Bailey’s route, and it actually has more alcohol than wine :)
  6. Damask Dinnerware:  A couple of years ago I became obsessed with houndstooth.  This year its damask.  I already have four settings of this pattern, but I’d like four more for the fictional dinner parties I’ll have one day.
  7. Crewneck Wool Sweater from Victoria’s Secret:  I keep buying clothes from VS, just to return them.  The color is wrong, it’s a bad fit, or it’s simply bad quality.  I’ve figured it out that I tend to buy clothes that this one model wears.  This past fall I purchased a sweater she was modeling and I fell in love with it.  Its simple: a crew neck, thin wool sweater in a charcoal gray, but it fits me so well, I’ve been wearing it at least once a week.  Every season I have a top that I wear so often, it tends to be the “official” top I wear in all of the photos taken during that time (two summers ago, every photo of me was in a pink, sequin tank top).  I went back to buy every single color they had, but alas, they are sold out.
  8. Ralph Lauren Flip Flops: I wear these starting in April to right around Halloween.  I got them at TJ Maxx a few years ago and loved them so much, went back and bought 2 more pair so that I would have them for years to come.  I’m officially on my second pair, although I couldn’t bare to throw away the first pair.  I purposely paint my toenails bright pink starting in April to match.
  9. Gap Red Captain Coat: As a rule, I don’t buy things full price, especially big ticket items.  But when I found this, I knew I had to buy it immediately because I couldn’t stand it if it sold out before I bought it.  It’s such a cheery color during the dreary days of winter and I always get complimented on it when I wear it.
  10. Elsa Peretti Teardrop Earrings from Tiffany’s: I really don’t wear that much jewelry.  As I write, I only have on my wedding/engagement ring.  And I’ve never been a girly girl who had to kept in blue boxes.  BUT I fell in love with these earrings when I saw them on an episode of True Blood this summer.  Sure, it was during a torture scene and they were getting ready to be used to pierce Pam’s eyelids, but they were still gorgeous.  Unfortunately, Santa has told me they are sold out until March.

If you are looking for other gift lists (although by now, it would just be gifts for yourself!), check our Miranda’s 12 Gifts of Christmas and Annette’s 11 Gifts for the Bucket Lister. 

Thank you all for following me this year in my adventures and I wish you much love and joy this holiday season.  I can’t say it any better than these words by Trey Anastasio and John Popper:

If it’s chanukah or kwanza
Solstice, harvest or december twenty-fifth
Peace on earth to everyone
And abundance to everyone you’re with

Excitement, Life Management, Miscellaneous
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