A Little Treadmill Action

Admittedly I have been a slacker this year when it comes to working out. I know my body feels 200% better when I get in some serious cardio and weights but me being lazy has preferred to sit on my butt and come up with a million excuses of why I haven't been to the gym.

Finally on Friday morning I hit the treadmill. Was I nervous? Of course. Not knowing if I am about to pass out can bring on some bit of anxiety. Nevertheless I laced up my sneakers and hopped on the treadmill. The poor treadmill hasn't been used in so long but it was just like I left it, ready to kick me in to high gear.

Here is what I ended up doing on Friday:

Minutes 40:03

Distance 3.273 miles

Calories 530 calories

Carbs 92.7

I was proud of myself. I did take 3 breaks to hop off and grab some water at the end of each mile. It is a work in progress but I have to start somewhere. On Saturday here is what I did!!

Woo hoo!!

Today was a rest day, thank goodness.

Giveaways!!!

OMG everyone is feeling so very generous.. I have missed quite a few giveaways already but finally have a little time to sit down and take the required steps to enter (like it is really so hard). So be sure to check back often as I will be posting on some of the fabulous giveaways I come across. To make your life easier they can all be found on my new Giveaways page as well. How AWESOME is that.

Ends Feb. 20, 2010-- If you have not tried Konad and want to then get in on this awesome Giveaway from Tips On Nails. You will have everything you need to get started and get addicted!! Konaddicts enter too!! (more info here)

Ends Feb. 20, 2010-- Need your everyday polish fix? Daily Polish will do it for you. With 10 bottles of polish to be had for 1st place(and folks there is a 2nd and 3rd place too) you will be a happy camper. (pics and more info on the Giveaway page)

Ends Feb 28, 2010-- Miss P is closing out the month of February with a giveaway stocked with glam from MAC, NARS, Revlon and more... (pics and more info on the Giveaway page)

Ends Mar 1, 2010-- Jellynat, love that name, is thanking her followers with her very 1st giveaway!! (details here)

Ends Mar 5, 2010-- Yardstick 4 Lunatics has some goodies to share in a 120 follower milestone giveaway!! (Check out the loot!!)


ENDED--

Ends Feb. 14, 2010-- This one ends today so hurry up and get your entries in, Babbling Brooke has a whole slew of items of for grabs. There is also a second place prize as well. (pics and more info on the Giveaway page)

A New Gem for the Collection

Anytime I go to my office which is maybe every 4-5 weeks I stop at the beauty supply store to look at the polish colors. I know they won't have new colors but I won't lie in 4-5 weeks time my eye may catch a new color that I may not have noticed before. And so it was this week when I perused the selection of colors.

My new find is Kleancolor Purple Mist.

Yea!!! I am so happy I found this. My daughter doesn't like it but I am fascinated by it. What do you think?

Your Wait Time Will Be 43 Minutes

What has customer service come to these days. I am currently on the phone with customer service for the City of XXXX and after going through an automated menu three levels deep I am finally transferred to the correct line telling me there are 4 calls ahead of me and my approximate hold time will be 43 minutes. WHAT.. how is this okay on any level. Mind you this is a follow up call because what needed to be done has not been done has and it is 2 months later.

My gut thought is that the city budget only allows for a certain number of people to fill these positions. Okay so we can point to the money factor. Budget is an issue everywhere so why not try to maximize what you do have instead of complaining about what you don't

The problem is mass inefficiency. I have called the city so many times on various things and it is just the most inefficient you can get. Once I spend the 43 minutes on the phone I will have someone answer, let me get two words in, and then transfer me to the next queue. I have had so many robots answer the phone that don't want to do anything but transfer to the next queue it is pathetic. I actually got hung up on by one of these people because at the height of my frustration I called her a robot. I didn't yell and I do admit that it wasn't the nicest of things to say but sometimes if they would just listen and let common sense prevail it would be so much easier not to mention efficient. But no, I guess some things are too easy.

UPDATE- I should have looked at the time I called but I didn't so I will let you know that in the time I have been on the phone. I have eaten 2 bowls of cereal, gone to the bathroom, responded to a few emails, and started cleaning off my desk. Needless to say, I am still listening to the same elevator music and my neck is starting to get a little out of whack from holding the phone with my shoulder.

Okay so back to what I was saying about inefficiency. I think the easiest thing to do instead of set up 5 different menu options that lead you in circles cross-train your people. Most of the problems people call about are for billing or loss of service. Surely, they can set up a queue for people just calling to say thank you but I don't think that one is necessay.

Granted there are going to be some issues that need to be escalated to more experienced professionals but that is fine. If the first level of people are cross-trained to handle multiple types of calls and accountable for answering the question and solving the problem the first time that may cut down on a lot of the inefficiency that we the customer get to reap the benefits of.

RANT OVER...it 12:49 PM this post was started at 12:27 PM and I had already been on hold for at least 15 minutes!! I will be happy to come back and update when I am graced with the voice of a human.

UPDATE- It is 1:00 pm and I have a human!! But back on hold again.

UPDATE 2- At 1:08 after getting 1 issue solved and working on the 2nd issue we were disconnected.

A Little Konad TMI

So you saw the mani using China Glaze TMI (if not it is here). I feel like I always have to do a Konad for some reason. Even if it is a day or two later it feels like a brand new mani. This one was actually done on the same night but I never got to posting the picture.

To do this Konadicure I used Konad plate M36. This plate has a lot of dainty little flower designs and 2 cute butterflies. The white I used is Sally Hansen French Shell Shimmer in Naturel White.

This mani is some what blah to me but it has already started chipping so I think a new one is in order tonight (if I have time that is). Wooo hoo!!!

Baby-BOOM!!

I have been holding off on my snow post for fear it may depress me but I think I am stable enough to handle it. Maybe...ugh! Maybe NOT!! I am cringing already so I'll just throw something out there..expect lots of babies in 9 months!

If you don't know the DMV was pounded by an obscence amount of snow in the last 2 weeks. Schools were closed, heck everything was closed for a few days if not longer. Lots of people were off work, with out power. Hmmm... what's to do in times like these? You guessed it. With that being said expect a massive baby boom come the November, Decemberish time frame.

Trust when I say it won't be me cuz I ain't having no more babies but I am interested in checking out some statistics come the new year on babies born in the DMV.

That's all I have to say about that.

TMI

I am not one to share TMI but this I will share. China Glaze presented this polish with it's OMG collection. Each polish has a cute name based on today's text speak. When I got my hands on the TMI I also picked up FYI and OMG. All of these polishes are very shimmery and sparkly. I don't have all the polish lingo down but reading on several other blogs this is consider "holographic." I like holographic!!!

Here are the photos, on the left I used a flash and on the right, no flash.

This is 3 coats of polish. I probably could have gotten away with 2 but as if I see a tinge of white from my nail then I do a 3rd coat. This polish was very easy to apply. It seemed smidge thinner than the few other China Glaze polish I have used but it goes on with no issue. Each coat was nice and smooth with no need for touchups because of streaks or unevenness.

TMI is not in my I LOVE THIS COLOR pile but for sure in the hate it pile either. Next time I use it will probably be to stamp a Konad print instead of using with a base.

What do you think of this color? Love it, hate it?

My V-Day Gift To You..New Blog Pages!!

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!! Just thought I would throw that out there since today is Valentine's Day. Hope you are spending it however you want to.

I am slowly trying to add more to this blog and today I added 2 fun new pages.

The first new page will be a photo gallery of the pictures posted on this blog and since I don't always post all the pictures you may get some additional eye candy as well.

The second page is dedicated solely to GIVEAWAYS!!! Now these are giveaways that other bloggers and websites are hosting. It will contain photos of some of the prizes as well as links to the site.

So check the link bar at the top and check these two new pages out.

Hopefully you are enjoying the blog so far, please leave comments, it makes my day to read the feedback.

Better Late Than Never..Transdesign Haul

This arrived at my doorstep on February 1st. YOU: "Today is the 12th, what have you been waiting for?" ME: "I know, I know, I am a slacker!!"

Anyway, better late than never especially when it comes to sharing goodies. This was my first order ever from Transdesign. I have heard good and bad reviews pretty much split 50/50 so at that point you just have to see for yourself. Most of the negative gripes were about shipping costs more so than customer service so I went ahead and ordered from them.

WOOOOOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Don't you just love The Nail Towel? My daughter had me write that since that is where we do our nails and I just keep that towel on the table to protect the surface. I think the towel is one that I accidentaly walked out of the gym with anyway because I don't buy white towels. You can see all of my nail polish messes on there..LOL.

On to the goodies:
Seche Vite Top Coat- this box had some cute little heart decals in it for Valentine's Day
All the rest is China Glaze so from left to right:
OMG
FYI
TMI
Watermelon Rind
Pink Underground
Emotion
Side-Saddle
Fly
Adore
C-C Courage

I haven't used them all yet but the ones I have used are ...fabulous!!!

Will I Ever Get This Water Marbling Right

This is my third attempt to water marble my nails. The first try went pretty good (see here), but then the second attempt I just ditched all together. It just would not work. Here I wanted to do something Valentine-sie so I started with red white and pink. For whatever reason the red I was using was drying to fast on the water so I went with to shades of pink. Here is the result.

Could be better, much better, but it is a learning process. I will reiterate a few things I said in my previous blog post. Water temperature matters, you may have to test it a little to see what works best for the polish you will be using. Use Vaseline around your nails and on your fingers for easier cleanup. This time around I found that 2-3 drops of polish instead of 1 buys you a little more time to swirl the polish around before it becomes a film on the surface. And last but not least work quickly. Oh, and 1 more that I don't remember if I mentioned before or not, don't do this on your bare nails. In trying to do it I have found that having a colored base makes all of your other colors stand out much more giving a more vibrant and distinct design on each nail.

For the record the colors used for this were China Glaze Fly, China Glaze Pink Underground, and Revlon White on White.

Thanks for looking :-)

Side-Saddle Konad..Argyle

China Glaze Side-Saddle as the base,

China Glaze FYI for the design, Konad plate M60.

TA DAAAAA

Can You Ride Side-Saddle?

Riding side saddle looks cool and all but trust me I don't think I would ever try it. Being a little fearful of horses to begin with I think I will just stick to the basics, putting Side-Saddle on my nails. When I chose this color I was looking for a nice dark brown. I looked at a some polish blogs and looked through the China Glaze collection and opted for Side-Saddle.

Side-Saddle confuses me though. In a good way because I do love the color. When I opened the bottle for the first time I was shocked. The polish was purple. I knew I had done my research so I thought the wrong bottle or color was shipped. No, they got it right. Once it was applied to my nails it did look brown but don't get me wrong you could still see purple. I want to say it is a duochrome but it really isn't...oh, I don't know, just look at the pictures and you can decide.

Can you see the purple?

Wordless Wednesday.....Who Me?

I'm So Fly

Not really...lol.. but China Glaze Fly was on my nails last week and what a color. Somewhere in the pink, purple, magenta, fuschia realm it give a nice pop of color to your nails. I will say this photo does not do this color justice. It is a little darker. The picture on the right is closer than the one the left but after 40 some pictures I could not get my camera to capture it perfectly.

Pretty right. Not that this polish needed any help but I am a fan of Konad so I pulled out one of my new plates. The S6 with China Glaze OMG added a little silvery goodness to the mix.

Congrats to the SAINTS

This is yet another Superbowl where I didn't care who won. Well let me just say I wouldn't be upset either way. I summed my sentiment up by saying, "I want the Saints to win, but I don't want to see the Colts lose." You don't have tell me..impossible, I know. Watching the game I found myself cheering for the Colts even though I had no favorite for this one. Pretty much it is that I am so used to cheering for the Colts that it was the natural thing to do. The Saints pulled it off and won and I'm not mad at them. They were the better team.

CONGRATS NEW ORLEANS SAINTS

One Day Konad

This Konadicure wasn't meant to only last a day but I guess I didn't wait long enough for the top coat to dry so the next morning I had all sorts of sheet lines and grooves in my nail polish. From far away you couldn't really see it but I just kept looking at my nails in disgust. Thank goodness I try to take most of my shots immediately after my manicure.

The base of this is China Glaze Pink Underground. For the white design I used the Konad M57 plate. This plate is a staple in anyones Konad collection. The white polish used is Sally Hansen French Shell Shimmer in Naturel (this IS how it is spelled on the bottle, promise) White.

I put a few hearts in one nail in honor of the upcoming Valentine's Day. This Konad turned out fine so I am a little irked that I ended up taking it off the next day.

HBO Original Programming...Temple Grandin

I have yet to be failed by HBO with their original programming. Be it the series that I follow or the movies, HBO continuously delivers content that opens your eyes to the world around you. Their latest movie, Temple Grandin, does not disappoint either. Temple Grandin is the story of a girl with autism and her struggles and ultimate triumphs.

Here is the movie trailer provided courtesy of HBO. Check this movie out if you can.

Trailer

One of Those Days...

How many times have you said to yourself "Goodness, it is just one of those days!!" Nothing seems to be going right and everything seems to be in a shambles. Not total catastrophe but just enough to have you teetering on the edge of what could be considered a disastrous day. Well folks, that is my day right now. So what else can I do but take a step back from the madness and try to refocus.

Working from home is not hard. I wake up come in my office and spend the majority of the day in there except for a lunchtime trip to the kitchen or a bathroom break. Now enter in spouse who decided to start working from home too. Total and utter chaos. If anyone knew how many times he has called my name or had me stop what I am doing to look at something I would give them a prize. I don't mind him asking but he really should not wonder why the other stuff isn't done since I was playing his personal assistant all day. Today my frustration mounted just enough that he decided to get out of dodge and go to the office.

Now I can actually try and get some of my work done. Thanks for letting me vent!!!

Closure or Lack Thereof

About a year and a half ago a friend of my family was tragically killed in some type of altercation. We are a few states away and not in touch with anyone else in his family so nobody would have intially thought to contact us with details of the funeral. It wasn't until the Monday or Tuesday after the funeral that my husband got an email filling him in as to what had happened. You know how sometimes you never forget where you are when you hear certain news. I remember my husband just standing in the doorway of my office telling me our friend had been murdered.

Of course I spent the next week constantly scouring the internet for more news, details, some type of charges to brought against the person who did this. I just kept going in circles like a cat chasing its tail but even though I couldn't find anything new for some reason I read the same stories over and over again. Perhaps I thought that I would find some sense of closure if I knew every last detail and commited it to memory.

I wish I was able to say goodbye to him more appropriately and the fact that I can't or just don't know how to really eats at me. Maybe just by writing this it will help my heart heal some but even though we didn't see him often or speak to him everyday he was our friend and I feel a tremendous sense of loss.

Rest In Peace Shawn

My First China Glaze!!!

Don't hate me for doing another pink mani already but with V-day around the corner I think pink or red is going to be it for the next few manis. I am about to let you in on a little secret..until yesterday I did not own any China Glaze nail polish. For most people China Glaze and OPI are somewhere if not all over their nail polish collections. Well now I have some China Glaze and the first one I used was Pink Underground.

The polish was a lot thinner than I expected it to be, not in a bad way though. For some reason I was expecting somethng else, not to sure what but a was a little taken aback by the consistency. It took 3 coats to get it just how I wanted but each coat dried in a reasonable amount of time so it didn't take forever.

I think the beauty of this polish is that is such a basic pink. I love it and yes, I know I say that about all of them but I'll tell you when I don't like a polish. I wonder why this is called Pink Underground. Duh, I get the pink part, it is the underground part I don't get.