For Ben

Does a certain movie pop in your head when you see this?

The Shade of Green

Money has been on my mind a lot lately.

I wish I had more of it so that I would be able to do more things.

I have always wanted to travel ever since I could remember. I loved the thought of having money to travel all over the world and to stay at nice resorts located on beautiful beaches. But recently I desire money in a different capacity. Missions.

I want to travel to all those places that I've dreamed of going all my life, but as a missionary for God.

There is quite a list:

Morocco
Tanzania
Uganda
Rwanda
Kenya
Egypt
Israel
Lebanon
Costa Rica
Jamaica
Dominica
Brazil
Fiji
Australia
France
Italy
Austria
Germany
Greece
Italy
Spain
Russia
India
Sri Lanka

I've wanted to travel to many of these places for vacation but some I feel I need to travel to for mission purposes. I realize I probably won't make it to all the places I have listed, though it is nice to have goals written out.There are so many unreached people throughout the world and I know I can't do it all but my heart goes out to every one of them.

Back to the money issue.

I recently came back from India and I still miss it so much. I long to go back so badly but why can't I go back? Money. Even though a huge chunk of the required amount for mission trips is from donations, there is still quite a bit that has to come out-of-pocket. I won't be able to go back to India for another 2 years probably. Even longer for me to go to Africa (my second most desired place to go). It kills me that money is the reason for the delays.

But then I have to honestly think to myself...what if I did have all the money that it takes? Would I really use it for the right reasons? A couple years ago I would have probably said "No. I wouldn't." But now, after my experience in India...I have a passion for the lost and the unreached. If only I had the money to just pack up and go to these places to share Christ! I would do it in a heartbeat.

Maybe having less, is God's lesson to me. It's so much more humbling and moving to know that you don't have enough and then God provides in miraculous ways.

Sleepy

I woke up at 3:00 this morning...wide awake. Finally at 4:00 I fell back asleep but when my alarm went off at 5:45 I woke up feeling completely thrashed. Why? I went to bed early last night...for once! But it's not just this past night. I am constantly tired. I don't know why.

Erin has come in to our apartment MANY times and found me completely dead to the world on the couch. She's even tried having conversations with me but I don't wake up. I fall asleep so easily when I watch movies with Ben, but it probably doesn't help that he gets off work at 10:00pm every night and being the geniuses that we are..start a 2 hour movie and then I wake up the next morning for work confused as to why I'm dragging.

Even on the weekends I feel so exhausted and I just don't understand why. Some people say I should go to the doctor because it could be mono or something like that. I really don't think it's that. I don't have any of the other symptoms that come with those. At least I don't think I do.

Right now as I sit at work, my eyes feel so heavy. I feel the strong urge to crawl under my desk and take a little siesta.

Zzzzzz.......

Tag! I'm it

1. Go to Wikipedia and type in your birthday, month and day only.
2. List 3 events that occurred on that day.
3. List 2 important birthdays.
4. List 1 death.
5. List a holiday or observance. (if any)

Birthday: September 7th

Events

#1- 1921, In Atlantic City New Jersey, the first Miss America Pageant is held.

#2- 1979, ESPN makes its debut.

#3- 1996, In Las Vegas, Tupac Shaker is shot several times after attending a boxing match. He later died in a hospital on Sept. 13.


Birthdays

#1- 1533, Queen Elizabeth I of England

#2- 1936, Buddy Holly


Death

#1- 2006, Robert Earl Jones (father of James Earl Jones).


Holiday

#1- 1822, Brazil's Independence day (from Portugal).

Bond

I have never been much of a Bond fan. I've watched several Bond movies in the past but never really understood the facination people have with them. My mom LOVES Bond movies...especially the ones with Pierce.

On Thanksgiving weekend this past year, my family + Ben stayed in Sunriver. While we were there Ben and I joined my sister and her husband to go see the new Bond movie, Casino Royale, that had just opened in theaters. Tara and I were practically drooling the whole movie. I think Daniel Craig was an excellent choice for the new Bond. Tough, muscular, intense, and humorous. A great combination for Bond.

I admit...I'm now hooked on Bond. At least this one.

Casino Royale recently came out on DVD and I was one of the ones to rush immediately to the store to pick it up, of course...the 2-Disc Widescreen Special Edition. I just can't settle for anything less.

I watched it twice this last weekend, including all the special features. :) I'm officially a Bond Fan.

I Prefer the Casket

"According to most studies, people's number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Death is number two. Does that sound right? This means to the average person, if you go to a funeral, you are better off in the casket than doing the eulogy."

~Jerry Seinfeld

This is one of my favorite quotes of Jerry's. Probably because it is totally me. I HATE public speaking. I always have and I probably always will.

I have to get up in front of people this weekend and talk about my India trip and how it impacted me or a story that sums up the experience...in 2 minutes. Yes I know, 2 minutes isn't that much to get all worked up about and it's not worth getting nervous about. But I WILL get nervous! If it's anything that has to do with getting up in front of people...I would rather be 6 feet underground at that point. Plus, how can I possibly describe a trip like this in 2 minutes. I wouldn't even want to do that. It leaves too much out.

So, if you want to come and listen about the team's India experience, 7:00pm on Saturday is when it will be.

Off to dig my hole...

Yoga Fun

I recently joined my roommate Erin in regular yoga sessions. We do it in our living room, in front of our TV, to DVDs with instructors who stand on beautiful cliffs in Hawaii. As if the amazing scenery will help relax and easy the pain of the abnormal twists and bends they put us through on these DVDs. I complain now...only because I'm really sore. :o) I really do love yoga. It is truly relaxing, minus the mantras and a-uhmmmm chants. You don't realize how simple poses can really work muscles when you hold them for long periods of time and really focus on working a specific area of your body. Balancing during some of these poses can be both beneficial and humorous. The instructors make it look so easy and fluid as they roll from one pose into another. Me?...not quite so graceful. I'm sure I will get there, some day.

Various Poses:
Mountain
Triangle
Warrior 1 & 2
Standing Forward Bend
Downward Facing Dog
Full Boat
Bow
Wheel
Bridge
Cobra
and Erin and my favorite....Corpse Pose

There are many more poses but these are the ones that stick out in my mind. Probably because they attribute directly to my current aches and pains. My hamstrings curse the Standing Forward Bend. And my poor abs are so cramped from the Wheel Pose and the Bridge Pose. I'm hoping my body will heal soon and these moves will become a little bit easier and more enjoyable. :o)

Namaste

Work Frustration

I am the commission accountant for an insurance brokerage firm in Portland. With that comes a lot of stress and frustration, but for the most part I enjoy it. I know that what I do is important for the company.

Well..yesterday was just one of those days that I HATE my job.

I work on commission statements all day long. Our company receives statements from health insurance carriers (HealthNet, Regence, Kaiser, LifeWise, Providence...etc.) that contain client payment information; such as, name, policy number, agent who represented them and therefore gets commission off the client, client's plan name, premium, and percentage of commission of the premium that needs to go to the correct broker for that client sale. There are around 50 different agents that are affiliated with our company.

Once I get the statements, I have to enter this information into a complicated computer program called Captiva. It is supposed to be the latest and greatest accounting program for businesses like ours. But it is new..and there are some glitches in it that we need either fix or just get used to. Because of the complicated program...one statement can take me 6-8 hours to enter and reconcile, some take me 1-2...just depends. Our company receives well over 40 statements a month. All the statements that are received in the beginning of the month need to be completely entered into the program by the end of that same month.

Well, yesterday our company's main accountant told me that Captiva is printing out the reports incorrectly, so the total of the statements aren't reconciling to the total amount of the commission check received for that statement. She gave be 5 statements back....to redo. That's over 10 hours of work, based on the certain statements she gave back.

I about died. It's not that I'm entering information in incorrectly because all of my statements reconciled perfectly. I've never given an incorrect statement to our accountant. The only thing I can think of is the actual program is messing up...or the person that took over my position while I was in India for a few weeks did something unintentionally that messed up its calculations. The point is...I have to go back and redo work that I know is correct and I just can't figure out why it's not working.

I'm off to go do some number crunching!

Night with the Girls

Bridget, Pama, Erin, and I all went to the Rascal Flatts concert Friday and we had a great time. I love nights out with the girls. We always have so much fun. Erin and I met at Pama's house and caught the Max at Quatama. Then Bridget hopped on at Sunset and we all made our way downtown to The Rose Garden.

Our seats were located right in front of the suite level. So we had the really nice food, the bar, and nice carpet floors. Not too bad! Jason Aldean opened up the night with a few songs. He's a fairly new artist, so there was only one or two songs I recognized. Then the crowd went wild when Rascal Flatts finally came to the stage. From then on it was a lot of singing along, little dancing in the cramped quarters we were in, clapping, and laughing. Great time.

Afterwards we fought our way through the crowd to get to the Max stop. We decided to hang back and catch one of the later rides to avoid all the people. We made a split second decision to jump off right at Rock Bottom to get some food. After we had some food and drinks, we realized that there was only one last Max ride left before it shut down for the night and we needed to get ready to jump on.

Well, we made it. At 1:18am..the last ride came but it didn't pull away until around 1:30 for some reason. In the mean time we enjoyed a nice puking show from a girl that was completely wasted on the Max.

Our stop was at Sunset but we all, but Bridget, needed to go on to Hillsboro. Bridget was a sweetie and said she would take us all back to Pama's and then she would turn around and head home to Salem. Thank you Bridget!

That was our night. We had a great time, we made it home safe, and looking forward to future concerts with the girls.

Love you guys!

Concert Tonight!!

RASCAL FLATTS CONCERT TONIGHT!!!!


so excited :o)