Recording Us

I suddenly feel like I don't have much to say on here as I probably post too many short and random thoughts to my facebook status. Facebook is a curse sometimes. It makes us too aware of who we are in front of other people. I'd like to teach myself to get back into reflecting personally on here and not so publicly there.

I had an interesting conversation with Jon the other night over dinner, about how home videos of "growing up" have such a different feel to them in these days of social media applications and the publicity of self awareness. I recall the old videos I've seen of my mom's side of the family. My grandmother riding a bike in the parking lot next to their home in the late 60s with the kids being silly or running away from the camera.. hula hooping, laughing, playing ball.. with no audio. I love those films.

We have a nice video camera. I think we've (Jon) has so far used it on a Kennedy launch in the past year. Otherwise we've done no video (and little still photo) record-keeping of our lives as a married couple before having children. We still have plenty of time. I'd like to remedy that soon.. but not in a way that makes us feel like we're exposing our lives to social medias as it's being recorded. (Because people ACT differently when they know what they're doing will be viewed by the masses.. and I don't like that.)

I'm not really sure how best to do it, actually. It might be easier once we have our own new place to talk about and to own. But here are my ideas of how I plan to create and how I imagine our home movies to best represent the nostalgia of past times when we go back to watch them in the future:

• Audio is sometimes weird to me. Moving images with an appropriate musical score is increasingly more nostalgic than voices for some reason. Or maybe I'm just not fond of my voice.

• I'd like to learn a simple video production program very well so I can edit and put color and soft lighting effects to the films to create a unique visual. I really like the lighting and softness of this photo:

• And I'd really like to storyboard a creative film piece once we get pregnant. Stop action :•) but done impressively and not cheesily somehow.

Essentially too, I'd like to be more creative together Jon and I. We both have our creative areas that would come together nicely in a worthy effort such as this. I'm looking forward to trying to plan and produce it together.

Room Semi-Rehabs

I'm not sure how well you can tell the differences between the two rooms we worked for about 5 hours organizing last weekend, but standing in them they feel a LOT better.. check it out:

Bedroom, Before. | Lots of bookshelves, and about 5 ft. of wall space for sewing.

Bedroom, After. | Much more open walls and about 13 ft. of wall space for sewing! We moved the bed toward the closet (behind where you would be standing for this point of view) about 6" which, magically, made a ton of difference. We also moved all the music media to the other room.


Spare Room, Before. | Our little "thrift store." Lots of piles and little floor space... Yes that is the ceiling of Jon's Saturn, haha (he's re-fabricking it ...re-fabricking? ).

Spare Room, After. | Still a little pile-ish, but it's now limited to the perimeter so there's room to get to things and space for my photography and other things, yay!

"When you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything." - George McFly

The Pursuit Of Silence In A World Of Noise

Interesting article about the noise in our world, on NPR:
Click here to listen (13 minutes).

No House Go

Well the house we were stalking is on the NO list now. Our friends can't rent it. They want to sell, and we can't afford to buy. POOPy! However, it was mentioned to Jon yesterday that the very first one of their properties we looked at about a year and a half ago (or more) may become available for rent with the option to buy. (This is the one that had some need for repairs, but had a very favorable visual, layout and space.) It's probably $1k/mo too.. but no numbers have been shared with us.

We drove around last night looking for desirables in the area we like. We found 2.. one being way out of our price range, I found after calling for info today. The other I suspect to be the same, but am waiting to find out about it on Monday.

It's looking more and more like in order to find something with the space we need, we can only afford dumps.. or nice places in dumpy neighborhoods. *Steam!*

If only I could put up with our current situation for another year or 2, so we can pay off our student loans, then save up for a friggin' down payment for a good house in a good 'hood with the right amount of space for our needs... BUT I CAN'T! It's so frustrating! We could probably cut the wait considerably if we could save more on all the gas I use up for my stupid drive every day. Boy what we could save if I worked from home all the time.. minus what we'd need to spend on internet that works good. At least we're getting a break on rent this month from having a hole in our shower... encouraging?

Do Things With Friends - Even If You're Busy or Tired

Depending on your personality, you may or may not feel the need for an often-there, same-sex friend. I used to have a number of these, and it was nice. I don't anymore, and it's not as nice. When I'm busy I don't think about it, but when I'm not and just feeling like it'd be nice to hang with someone I don't see every day, I wish for one. There's a number of people I know that I'd love to hang out with on a regular (weekly, every other week) basis, but people are busy, and other things are priority over their friendships I guess.

Why don't we make more time for our friends? Why do we seclude off when we get married, get older, when we multiply, etc? Not all of us do this, because (from the aid of Facebook allowing us to monitor others' lives without really making an effort to) it's obvious that groups of friends do still get together regularly. But not all of us do. Some of us may desperately want to. Others of us couldn't care less. And others of us do care but are unaware of those looking for them to be around more.

I wish we lived down the street from some of our friends here. It seems like that physical proximity would make a lot of things much easier. Suddenly people become more available when your place is easier to get to. It's true, it seems.

Just some thoughts: Tell people you want to hang with them. Be more open to people telling you they want to hang with you. Realize it'll do you good, even if it's not in your routine. I think as we get older, busier, more tired, what have you.. we come up with reasons not to keep certain human connections with those we're not related to. If you submit yourself to the idea of stepping out, you'll find you were glad you did.. AND it'll give you energy, to cure your "busy" or to cure your "tired".

I'm starting to take action. A girl's night had been started among gals at church, which I took lead of when it started to fizzle about a year or so ago. I'd like to do something every other week with it, but sometimes I just don't have the money to go out that often. I'd love to host my home, but I feel like I can't effectively do that where we are. People who live downtown are less interested in a trip to the boonies I think. So I feel like to really get this going may partially pivot upon our move. I'm looking forward to getting it going more regularly though.

I'm doing something!

My Husband & The Earth's Gravitational Pull

We were driving to McKay last night (so Jon could find a financial read and I could get Invasion of the Body Snatchers, ha).. but the best part of the trip was the conversation he started on the drive there...

"So, supposing you could dig your way from one end of the earth to the other, and supposing you could dig through the center of the earth without being burned alive.. and supposing that, while most likely you'd come out in the ocean on the other side, it wouldn't phase the other hypotheticals of this idea... you would fly out the other side, and fall directly back into your hole. Since gravity is at the center of this scenario, you'd continue to keep falling back through the center of the earth and coming out both sides for a time, with the energy of your fall decreasing slowly as you go. Eventually you'd end up stuck at the center of the earth since that is where gravity is pulling you toward.."

(click image to view larger)

My question was this:
"What would happen to you if you were in the exact center of the force of gravity? Gravity isn't just a downward force there.. it's a coming-from-all-directions force, as shown by the green arrows. How would this not-downward but all-surrounding force affect the human body? I bet you would physically age better if you lived in the center of the earth."

Noted: Conversations of this nature are one of the things I absolutely love about who we are when we're together :•)

Holy Moly Ads!

I think I can fit a FEW MORE messages in this crampy email layout, don't you?
(Don't worry, they will find a way to do it.)

This file is one of 157 or more that I have to change the messaging on, between February and April. Oh man. For each week during that span, there are 10-15 different versions for different states.. AND some states have Kmart versions too! All I can say is, at least they're not doing all the states every week, sheesh. I'm looking forward to May 1, and the end of this campaign.