Sorry, I’m a wee bit excited. I finally launched my new site – goal #1 for 2016, CHECK! I’ve been working on it behind the scenes for some time now, but hadn’t been able to put the finishing touches on it quite yet…until tonight. Behold, my new YGR site with my blog, information about Birmingham Girls Club, Birmingham Dance Walks, and my services – technical consulting and social media – all under one pretty purple and green roof!
Please look over the site, take it for a test spin, tell me what you do and don’t like about it, and let’s tweak this puppy! As a special thank you for being loyal readers (and in honor of this LOVELY month), I’m offering a deeply discounted one hour technical consultation called “Date with Your Site” where you can ask me anything you like or have me help you with an issue (or ten! Whatever fits into an hour). You can read more about the special here.
Now for the side-by-side comparison:
Old site
New site
Muuuuuch better. Let me know if I can help you with your site!
I recently flew (on a plane) for the first time in many, many years. To say I don’t like to fly is an understatement. I DON’T fly. Period. I drive everywhere, including up and down the country to WI and back to see my family.
With my new job came new responsibility and one of my goals for this year (the big 4-0) was to fly again. I knew I *may* have to fly this year with the new job, but it wasn’t a given. Until they told me they were sending me to a conference (which I am VERY grateful for). Being terrified of flying and also going somewhere new, I stocked up on the Xanax (thanks, Doc!), got some breathing exercises from my therapist, and hubs dropped me off at the airport armed with a dragon and a kiss.
Let me tell ya, Xanax is WONDERFUL! I wasn’t nearly as nervous as I would have been and I was actually excited to get on the plane, headed for new land. The flight was non-stop (oh, I wasn’t taking any chances on my first foray back in the friendly skies) and it wasn’t bad at all. I hate takeoff the most – after that, I’m pretty good and landing is fun b/c I CAN SEE LAND. lol.
My first time in Las Vegas was everything I had hoped, sans the walking. I’m pretty sure I walked more during my week in Vegas than I have in any other time in my life. It was painful (plantar fasciitis), but worth it. The conference was amazing, the mountains were gorgeous, the Strip was alive, and I had some of the best food and saw the best show (twice). You can follow my adventures on Instagram under the hashtag #VivaRossVegas.
There are some awesome & crazy people on Fremont Street!
Now, the plane ride home was not as glorious. I came home with way more than I went with so I had to buy some extra luggage to lug all my chachkies in. In my panicked packing frenzy of trying to stuff everything into bags, I accidentally packed my Xanax into my checked bag. I didn’t realize it until I got to the airport, checked in, and went to have a bite to eat and take a pill. No pill. Don’t panic, Sherri. Just have a cocktail (or four) and call it a day. The cocktails worked a little magic until our flight was delayed over an hour because “a passenger has a medical issue and we’re going back to the gate.” Aggghh! By the time we actually took off, I was my old, neurotic, nervous self rocking back and forth in my seat with my hands holding my earbuds as far into my ears as they would go and my eyes closed tight. I really looked special. Thankfully, the sweet veterinarian sitting in my row offered up a plastic stress dog that, when you squeeze him, his eyeballs pop out. What fun for a crazy person! I squeezed that dog so hard his head nearly popped off. Takeoff was rocky (for me), the trip was ok, and I was happy once we started to descend.
All in all, a very good trip and yes, I will fly again. With Xanax. And probably other things. But hey, I reached my goal, marked that off my bucket list and my ‘To Do at 40’ list (along with walking around Vulcan), and BOOM, I lived to tell about it. All that to say, you can do anything you set your mind to. I *could* have driven to Vegas (and seriously mapped out the road trip when I was first told I was going), but I put my extra large big girl panties on, took a few deep breaths, and flew off into the sunset singing, “Viva Las Vegas.” Join me next time!
Today’s writing prompt for #bloglikecrazy is “Why I blog.” I have been on GREEN for so long that often times I just ‘do’ and don’t think about ‘why.’ Lately though the BF, books, and my lovely Janes have caused me to stop more than once and ask myself ‘Why do I feel that way?’ ‘Why am I doing this?’ ‘Why does that make me happy or sad?’ The last one has weighed on my mind a lot lately, but in a good way. I feel as though I may be the happiest I’ve ever been in my life. You know how you hate to say something officially out loud for fear that it’s all in your head and it will go to pot justlikethat? But, I am slowly evolving my mindset into that we make our choices and our behaviors. We choose to react certain ways to certain people or situations and BF has been helping me see how I can positively change my reactions to situations with time and effort. To be completely honest, I fly off the handle and overreact A LOT. And actually, that might be an understatement. I tend to get heated and let very little things bother me in a very big way. I don’t know the root cause of that behavior (yet), but I am learning to recognize it and, when I think about it ahead of time, choose to react differently. I may talk to him about it or just simply let it go if it’s not even worth the breath. I am starting to “choose my battles”, as it were, but more importantly, I’m choosing what is worth hashing out and what just doesn’t matter in our life together. And – surprisingly – a lot of the stuff I let get to me simply doesn’t matter. That’s not to say that I don’t discuss or stand up for what I believe in, but so does he. We’re equally stubborn in our convictions, but that’s what I love about us. He has helped me realize my behaviors, think about them ahead of time (when I remember), and choose to live a happier life. It helps that he is the exact opposite of me in that he’s very easy-going and doesn’t sweat the small stuff while I am tightly wound and sweat everything. Still it works for us and that, in turn, has helped me learn and grow a lot in the last year. I don’t know if he’ll ever know how grateful I am to him for his patience, understanding, and gentle guidance when I get “girl crazy.” We both have our faults and we are doing a great job in learning the other’s, working with and accepting them, and helping each other where we can.
All that to say this, I blog because sometimes (most of the time), I write better than I speak. I hate confrontation and I also hate getting too sappy in person. I prefer to put it on digital paper. I express myself clearer and more eloquently in writing than I ever have face to face. I enjoy getting things off my chest on this blog, as well as share the latest and greatest in my world with you all. I’m still struggling a bit, internally, with what I want to do next goal-wise. I have ideas, I just need to cull them a bit and get them down. You saw my 4 short term goals for the rest of this year in yesterday’s post. In keeping with that, I worked out yesterday at Iron Tribe, am planning on going today after work, and will do a WOD (Workout of the Day) at home this weekend. I’m also going to count my volunteer shift working as the guest bartender at the Kitschmas opening tomorrow night at Naked Art as 1 of my 2 volunteer goals as I am donating all my tips to the Crisis Center of Birmingham and will likely be volunteering with them in the near future. Please come by Naked Art tomorrow night between 5 p.m. and 9 p.m. to say Hi, introduce yourself, let me pour you a free drink, get a FREE HUG with your drink, and start your holiday shopping at one of THE best stores to buy beautiful, unique, LOCAL art! Also, I started on my book yesterday so am doing well there. And I’m working on my next piece for Magic City Post which will, hopefully, be a story on the German Christmas Market coming up. I’ll be sure to let you know when I get it done and it’s published. As far as goals for the new year, I’m still working on those as well. But one that I KNOW in my heart that I want to accomplish is to set up a non-profit here in Alabama. I want the sponsors, prizes, and other vendors of Birmingham Dance Walk to be giving toward something besides just the wonderful people of Birmingham. I want them to be able to write their generous donations off and I also want to raise money with this non-profit to donate to other charities in our area that need help. I haven’t started the research on this, but I have a good idea of what I want and am going to start looking in to the paperwork soon. I want to give back and I think this would be a great way to start. If you have any ideas or advice on how to get this puppy started, I am all ears and would appreciate the help! You can reach me at sherri at yougotrossed dot com. I think it takes quite a bit of $$ to file non-profit paperwork here, so I’m still mulling that over too. I may start a KickStarter or Indiegogo to raise funds if needed. There are so many places in Birmingham that could use additional help…would you consider helping me help them? I would love your thoughts!
As always,
Love yourself.
Find peace inside.
Share happiness.
