2018 in Review

I should post at least once in 2018, right? ;-)

This was a good and bad year - the same can probably be said of most years.

We said good-bye to our sweet Clyde-dog on October 8, which was by far the worst part of the year. He was almost 14 years old and he was so very loved. He still is. I feel some peace knowing he and Cus are together, waiting for us in Heaven.

We also had some great experiences in 2018. We adopted Jim, our Great Dane mix puppy, on July 7 from {San Antonio Great Dane Rescue}. He is timid and and shy, but filled with love and excitement for life. He was 80 lbs when we adopted him - he's probably close to 100 now, but I don't think he'll grow much more, though he is still quite slim.

We were able to adopt a giant dog because we bought a house! We closed on our home on April 23. It's in San Antonio and we love it. The neighborhood is friendly and walkable. The house is small (for Texas - it's actually over 1700 sq ft) and secure and has everything we wanted. We just spent our first holiday season here and it was warm and lovely.

Our house is on the newer side, so there's not much that has to be done to it. We would like to finish painting all the rooms (everything was stark white when we moved in), and spruce up the kitchen to be a little more our taste, but we can take our time and do it when we feel like it. I love that.

We were able to sell our camper really easily and painlessly (we are so grateful for this) because our decision to sell it overlapped perfectly with a friend needing to buy a temporary home. It was a perfect win-win for all of us, and he's been in it for about 6 months now. He'll be back in his house soon, but he plans to keep it for camping trips with his kids.

We had a family wedding in June. My oldest niece, Danielle, married her sweet fiance-now-husband in a beautiful ceremony up in New England. It was so hot for that part of the country, but the heat couldn't keep us from having so. much. fun.

I got an amazing double dose of family this summer when my youngest niece, Hannah, came to visit us for a week. We had the best time and it was so hard to let her go home.

I'm looking forward to 2019 for a lot of reasons. One of those reasons is that I'm going to be a great-aunt! My niece Renee and her husband are expecting their first baby in the spring and I am so so so excited. I already love going home to visit my family and our new addition will make it even more exciting.

Wishing everyone a happy and safe New Year's Even celebration, and a wonderful 2019!

Color Analysis: Four Summers

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I discussed {here} that I think my Season is Summer, but there are four Summers that I could be. {Jen Thoden's website} breaks down the four types of Summers really well. They are:

• Pure Summer 
• Tinted Summer
• Toned Summer
• Shaded Summer

Per Jen, the four Summers are described as follows:

*A note about the photos: If you're thinking that some of these don't seem to match the criteria for the Season they're grouped with, I agree*

Pure Summer
þ ý Hair is likely light brown with an ashy tint. -> Brown, yes. Ashy? I don't think so. See discussion here.
þ Eyes are cool and typically blue.
þ Can wear brightest and coolest colors of summer color palette
þ ý Can’t tolerate warm colors -> I'm not a 100% sure what this means. I have an orange coat that I looooove and think looks great on me. If it's a warm orange (aren't most oranges??), then I don't necessarily agree with this. 

Pure Summer celebrities via

Tinted Summer
þ Eyes are light and bright and typically blue
þ ý Skin is pink -> Yes, although I think my skin is pinkish, leaning neutral.
ý Hair is blonde
þ ý Light, cool and bright -> I don't think my overall coloring is "bright."

Tinted Summer celebrities via

Toned Summer
ý Soft and neutral -> I think people with overall neutral coloring means their hair, skin, and eyes are all similarly colored, which isn't true for me. 
ý Ashy blonde to brown hair -> I don't think my hair is ashy. See discussion here.
þ Eyes are likely a soft grey, grey-blue or grey-green
ý Overall tone is soft -> I'm not 100% sure what this means
ý Light, neutral and soft

Toned Summer celebrities via

Shaded Summer
þ Hair is typically dark
þ Eyes are soft and cool, like grey, grey-blue or grey-green
þ Skin is neutral
ý Deep and soft -> See my explanation {here}.

Shaded Summer celebrities via

This seems like a close match between Pure Summer and Shaded Summer, but I've got to give it to Pure Summer because of that "deep" description under Shaded Summer. I also think the girl in the top left of the Pure Summer photo has the coloring that's closest to mine of all these people. So I'm calling it: Pure (aka Cool) Summer.

Student Loan Update

Last year, we paid more than 13 times (!) against the principal of Chris's student loans than we did in 2015. Also, in 2017 so far, we've already paid more against the principal than we did in all of 2015. I discussed our methods {here}.

We're down by almost half from where we started last year. It is such a good feeling!

Color Analysis: Ashy Hair

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The Beauty Department {describes ashy hair} as having a "smoky-looking silver-y sort of color. Doesn’t matter if the hair is super light or super dark because it’s just about the hue that the hair gives off."

Ashy hair tone comes up a lot when {discussing seasonal color analysis}, so I wanted to know if my natural hair color is ashy. I just don't know if it is. It kind of looks like the color of girl's in the middle row all the way to left. But I really don't see anything smoky or silvery about my hair. If anything, I may see some gold-ish, redd-ish undertones.

Any thoughts?!

Color Seasons: Summer vs. Winter

I've been fascinated with the idea of seasonal color analysis for a long time. A couple of years ago I stumbled on the 12-season color analysis. Using some online quizzes and photos of like-seasoned celebrities, I decided that I was a Bright Spring.

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I've been operating under that assumption for quite a while, buying really bright, warm clothes and coloring my hair a warm, dark brown to cover up grays. 

Recently, I started reading about the newer 16-season color analysis and realized that I had probably made a mistake in self-identifying as a Bright Spring. Apparently, springs have warm undertones (i.e. yellow-y or peach-y). But I'm pretty sure I have pink undertones. Because of that, I realize that I am most likely a Summer or a Winter. WHAT?!

I found {this website} that has a pretty good quiz and description of the 16 seasons, and I've been using it to try to really narrow down my season. This is what she says about Summers vs. Winters:

Summer’s are LIGHT and COOL. You have pink undertones. Do you have blonde hair with blue eyes? Do you have soft grey eyes with mousy brown hair? Cool blue eyes or green-grey eyes? Ashy brown or blonde hair?

Winter’s are DEEP and COOL. You have olive or blue undertones. Do you have dark hair? Clear blue or violet eyes? Are your eyes cool brown to dark brown? Maybe your eyes are dark cool hazel? If you have dark hair and blue eyes, you are also a winter.

Here's a photo of me from about 9 years ago. I chose it because this was before I started coloring my hair, my hair is long so it's really visible, it was winter, so I don't have even a hint of sun on my skin, and I'm not wearing a lot of makeup. I think this is a pretty good representation of my natural coloring.

Here is a photo from last week. I have a hat on because I don't want my hair to be confusing, but I thought a recent photo was important. 

And then here's a close up of my eye to get a good idea of the color. 

Ok, so...
þ Light and cool -> I think so. See my discussion on "deepness" below.
þ Pink undertones.
þ ý Blonde hair with blue eyes -> I do have blue eyes but my hair is not blonde, though it was when I was about 7 and under.
þ Soft grey eyes with mousy brown hair->The center portion of my eyes are a grayish blue and I think my natural hair color is mousy brown.
þ Cool blue eyes or green-grey eyes ->Yes, blue eyes that are leaning cool I think. 
þý Ashy brown or blonde hair -> I definitely don't have blonde hair and I don't know if my natural color would be considered ashy? {I don't really think so}. 

ý Deep and cool -> I don't think my coloring is deep. On {this website}, the author describes deep as  having "heavy pigment." My current hair color, though pretty deep and rich, is not my natural color. My skin definitely lacks pigment. My eyes are obviously light. 
ý Olive or blue undertones.
þ Dark hair
þ Clear blue or violet eyes -> This one is tough for me. Obviously I don't have violet eyes, but my eyes are blue. I think "clear blue" tends to mean a brighter blue. The outer ring of my eye is much darker. As a general rule, I think they're right in between "clear" and "soft." 
ý Cool brown to dark brown eyes
ý Dark cool hazel eyes
þ Dark hair and blue eyes -> This one really throws me off! Even when I don't color my hair, it is technically dark. But I don't really think it's dark enough to push me over into Winter.

Based on these criteria, I'm leaning toward Summer.

There are four types of Summers though, so I'll discuss which specific one I think I am next time.

How my fun side business gave me an Impostor Syndrome Flare-Up

Flare-up. Cue the herpes jokes...or is that just my weird brain?

I started selling lipstick online because I like the product and I thought it would be fun. I have a regular job that is my actual career, that I went to school for. Yet, this random little hobby-job has ripped open some major anxieties that I've kept tamped down for a loong time and it's really made me think.

When I was in high school, I was class president. I was captain of the volleyball team, and editor of the yearbook. Those roles were all really hard for me, and didn't really provide me with the growth they probably could have because I couldn't see beyond the (bad) stress they made me feel. You can't make everyone happy when you're in a leadership role and I always want to make sure that I'm making everyone happy (believe me, I wish I could not care about this). Instead of focusing on my wins, I focused on my failures. I tend to see things in a very literal, black-or-white, right-or-wrong way, so my 18-year-old self took away from these experiences that I wasn't suited for leadership or decision-making. I'm almost 35 now and I still believe that, even if it's hard to admit. It's meant that, at work, I've just let myself stay comfortable and haven't really pushed to try to manage projects or jump into leadership roles as much as I should, and my {Impostor Syndrome} has stayed pretty well hidden.

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Then, this lipstick. I love this stuff, so I thought it would be fun to sell it and get a discount on it so I can have all. the. colors. I started a Facebook page and kind of assumed there wouldn't be much interest. But there has been! And a normal person would be excited. But not me. Nope, I'm nervous. Nervous that the wait times to get the lipstick are too long and my friends and family will hate me. Worried that they'll buy the lipstick, hate it, and stop loving me (if my sister is reading this now, she's saying "Oh my god, she's nuts!" - she is not wrong :-)). Worried that I bought too much inventory and won't be able to sell it all and then I just suck at life.

I realized when all these fears came bubbling up that I can deal with it like I did when I was in high school, and just close up shop, since I obviously can't deal with even the smallest amount of stress. Or I can try to learn from it. Because, at the end of the day, this lipstick business is not going to affect to my life. It's not my job. No one is going to hate it. My family's not going to stop loving me for any reason, unless I murdered someone or something. They'd probably still love me even then. Even if I did order too much, I'll eventually use it because having more colors is why I started selling it in the first place.

But you know what is going to affect my life? My real job. My career. And if these anxieties are affecting how I approach my hobby-business, I know they're affecting me at work, even if it's more subconsciously than anything else.

At my job, I really prefer when I do work for another Project Manager. Just do the fun, productive stuff. Leave the decision-making, the tough calls, the money issues, and the potential to get into trouble to someone else. This is a very safe position and it's fine, I guess. Not everyone can or wants to be a leader. But the thing is, I really do want to. I like the fast-paced, busy-ness of managing projects. I get bored very easily and I prefer to always be on the go. But I let the fear of all that stuff I just mentioned hold me back. I hate making mistakes and, when you make them as a Project Manager, they're a lot more visible than when you make them as just a regular employee.

When you were a baby you tried to walk and fell down every time. Were you a walking impostor? Who are you to walk!? You can't even do it! It's absurd! - Kyle Eschenroeder

I'm not 100% sure how to get past this. I like {this article that I found on LifeHacker about overcoming Impostor Syndrome}. I think actually getting my thoughts down is a good first step. But what next? Probably the most important thing is to remember that my family loves me no matter what. That is not actually true of my bosses, so I can't use that one at work :-) But I can keep trying to do a good job at everything I'm doing. I can keep working toward the professional certification that I will be ready for next year. I can kill it at the Board position I just took with a professional group here in San Antonio. After that? We'll see. A few baby steps at a time.

2016 Year in Review: Books I Read

January

Shadow of Night - Deborah Harkness

February
Book of Life - Deborah Harkness

Devil in the White City - Erik Larson (audio)

March

The Cuckoo's Calling - Robert Galbraith

The Nightingale - Kristin Hannah (audio)

April

The Silkworm - Robert Galbraith (audio)

Career of Evil - Robert Galbraith (audio)

June

Fates and Furies - Lauren Groff

October

Wilde Lake - Laura Lippman (audio)

The Lace Reader - Brunonia Barry

December

Adnan's Story - Rabia Chaudry (audio)

The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt (audio)

Politics and Facebook: Yea or Nay?

I don't think Facebook and politics mix, but I'm wondering if I'm in the right here. Should Facebook just be for vacation humble-bragging, filtered selfies, and an annoying barrage of photos of your kid (or dogs, in my case)? Light-hearted and non-argumentative? My automatic answer is "Yes!" but every time a controversial tragedy occurs, or during pretty much any election year, I'm forced to re-think my position. And - good grief - this year's election is a controversial tragedy, so Facebook is just spilling over with obnoxious posts. 

My knee-jerk reaction is to hide people and I do stand by that. I want to like the people who are my Facebook friends because they're either my family or my actual real-life friends. I don't want their terrible political opinions to cloud my judgement of them. But before I triumphantly click Unfollow and rub my hands together in victory,* I usually do a bit of grumbling to myself about how I'm hiding them because Facebook is no place for politics or something in that vein. But then I thought tonight, Why is Facebook no place for politics?

If I had to argue in favor of politics on Facebook, I would say this: political beliefs are really important to a lot of people and are in many ways defining of self. So if we want to be more in tune and in touch with the people around us, we should understand and accept them as a whole person, including their political leanings. 

Sometimes passion overtakes good judgment too. I have first-hand experience with this. Occasionally, people post stuff that's political and I either really agree or strongly disagree and I lose all control of my faculties and I comment as though my body is controlled by an other-worldly force ;-) I have even made political posts in my eight-plus years on Facebook.  

Because what we label as political in nature is often fundamental to our belief system, like the way someone feels about abortion or gay rights. We make these things abstract by calling them political topics, but they're not abstract. They affect actual lives. If a Facebook friend posts something pro-life or LGBTQ-supportive or Black Lives Matter or Blue Lives Matter, it may be because they feel a deep moral connection to the message behind the post. If you don't like it, you can always hide them, so why shouldn't they post it?

Well, I can also readily argue that too. At the elderly age of 34, I am fast becoming old school on the topics of politics, religion, and money: I really think there is almost no situation in which it's appropriate to discuss any of them in mixed company, as they say.**  I didn't always feel this way, and used to talk ad nauseum about politics, but two things have changed. The first is that I see almost nothing as black and white anymore because age gives you perspective (or at least it should). The second is that I loathe the idea of making people uncomfortable*** and in mixed company, there is little chance that you will encounter complete homogeneity of beliefs.

Plus, if you think abortion should be legal because overpopulation and child neglect are huge problems, it doesn't trump the opinion of the person who thinks it's murder, you know? And their opinion doesn't trump yours. Both beliefs are valid. The only people who need to hear you bitch about it are your representatives in Congress (and SCOTUS - so, right now, that means the voting booth in November).  

I guess that's what it comes down to for me: what do political oversharers on Facebook think they're going to accomplish? To an extent, some or all of them may feel like they'll change hearts and minds. I guess that's a noble goal and I totally do it when I post animal rescue-related stuff, so I get it. But I also think there's an element of something more, something I can't put my finger on. A moral superiority? A desire to align yourself publicly with a large, popular movement? A desire to spite people that are part of a movement you don't like? Intellectual one-upmanship? I don't believe those are good reasons. 

Ultimately, I think my personal line is: respectfully and judiciously posting about politics is ok (ish) and I'll probably keep you in my feed.**** Ranting, rudeness, incendiary comments, and an excessive number of political posts are not ok and will get you blocked by moi.

And for the love of all that is good in the world, use words that are actually words***** and please edit everything you post on social media, be it political or not, for grammar and spelling. Please. 

*Wait, why am I even on Facebook?

**I would define mixed company as a big group containing people of various backgrounds and reasons for being there. Like, a church service may contain people of various backgrounds, but they're all there for the same reason and it would be weird to omit discussion of religion from a church service. Your cousin's kid's birthday party? No one came to listen to you blather on about the source of the national deficit. 

***Sometimes it's part of life and you just have to, but your desperate need to rant about who should be able to use what bathroom probably isn't one of those times. 

****Unless you consistently use poor grammar or complain a lot or put up one of those statuses where you vaguely allude to a situation, obviously inviting 

inquiry/jealousy/sympathy, and then refuse to answer when people ask you about it. 

*****"ur" is not an English word and means neither you are nor your

Book Review: Fates and Furies

Don't worry about spoilers. I don't care enough to include any.

Fates and Furies - Lauren Groff

Plot: The book is split into two parts, Fates and Furies. Fates follows Lancelot (ugh) Satterwhite from birth to death, with the largest chunk of the story taking place over the course of his 30-ish-year marriage to Mathilde. Furies does the same thing with Mathilde, though much less linearly.

Thoughts: First, a little story. For some reason I feel like I've written this anecdote on the blog before, but I can't find it so here it is (possibly) again. When I was in high school, I took a class called Peace Studies. One of the things that Mr. Vennell, our teacher, stressed was that when we didn't like something (like a book or a movie), we should say "I didn't like it" or "I didn't think it was good" - but not "That movie is bad." I've always really appreciated that rule because it's true that opinions vary and art can be good and can be enjoyed by other people without me liking it. 

That being said -  this book is bad. So, so, so bad. But it's critically-acclaimed, it was Amazon's 2015 Book of the Year, and it was President Obama's favorite book of the year - AND I DON'T KNOW WHY. 

The smug pretension of the writing kills me. KILLS ME. Her main characters are called Lancelot and Mathilde. Please. And we can't just call Lancelot's mother Mom or Ma or even Mother - it's Muvva. WHY?!? There are all kinds of little bracketed asides [you know, cause just writing a normal sentence is too plebeian]. 

It's almost physically painful to read the dialogue because it's so stilted and unrealistic. It's kind of like if robots performed scenes out of Dawson's Creek. And then there are the plays. Lancelot becomes an insufferable, famous playwright and we're subjected to portions of his works. 

My grade: F-

Who would I recommend it to: A prisoner who is stuck in solitary confinement and, in the very truest sense of the phrase, has absolutely nothing else to do with their time. It would help if the person is in prison for a really terrible, violent crime so that I don't feel bad that they have to suffer through this book. 

P.S. If you want to read a funny, much more insightful and detailed review of this terrible book, check out this one on Goodreads. Here's a preview: "To the contrary, Fates and Furies is the antithesis of a literary masterpiece. The only expectation it defies is that of one expecting to read good literature. It is dazzling only in its level of insipid ludicrousness." Bahahaha!

On Student Loans

The main goal of our tiny living experiment is to pay off our debt, which mostly consists of student loans. I wanted to talk about paying down our loans because I think everyone has different experiences and it probably largely depends on who holds your note. 

Chris's student loan is with ACS. They are a notoriously terrible company that people just can't get away from because they buy loans from more reputable banks (this is what happened to us). So you could refinance to get away from ACS, only to end up right back with them when they buy your note. 

For years, we've been paying the minimum payment on the loan because we trusted that the payment was structured such that we could pay it of before we were 100. But once we dove into our pay off plan and I started using the Snowball system, I wanted to make sure that all the extra money we were paying was going toward principal and not just pre-paying interest for the next 60 months. 

Here's a concrete example of how much ACS sucks: when we decided to make this loan the first one we paid off, we called ACS to make sure that extra payments went to principal. We got a customer service representative who spoke very poor English (not knocking him because he obviously speaks at least two languages, which is at least one more than me, but I am knocking ACS for employing customer service agents who can't serve customers). He may not have understood our question, but he straight up told us that all extra payments would be applied to principal. Uh, no. It turns out that ACS doesn't accept principal-only payments. 

So, I did some research and found this blogger who had encountered the same problem and had developed a pretty smart (and actually very simple) solution:

So let’s say your payment is due on the 15th, you make your usual monthly payment. On the 16th, call them and make the additional payment. Because no interest has really accrued in the one day since your monthly payment, every penny you send will go towards principal. I have done this and it works.

Yes, it does work. Interest is accruing daily; in our case, it's about $7.50 per day. You'll get the most bang for your payment if you make it on a day when no interest has been allowed to accrue, or maybe only a day's worth has accrued. 

I've been using this method for the last 6 months and it's actually amazing. In 2015, only 22% of what I paid to ACS went to principal. 78% went toward interest!!

78% went toward interest!!

. 

Using the new method, 76% of what I've paid this year has gone to principal and only 24% has gone to interest. The great thing about this is that the amount of interest accruing each day will go down as the principal gets smaller. 

I don't know how other loan companies structure their payment plans. I hope most of them aren't shady as hell like ACS, but it's worth looking into if you have student loans that you feel like you're never going to pay off. 

Book Review: Career of Evil

Note: This thing is filled with spoilers. Proceed with caution.

Career of Evil - Robert Galbraith (Cormoran Strike #3)

For background on the Cormoran Strike novels and my thoughts on the first and second books in the series, check out this post and this post.

Plot: A severed leg is sent through the "post" (I just love British words for things) to Robin at the office she shares with Strike. It is a woman's right leg, severed at the exact same location that Strike's is and there is a note in the box containing Blue Oyster Cult song lyrics. The lyrics are meaningful to Strike because his mother had them tattooed on her abdomen. Based on the brutality and sheer lunacy of someone cutting off a person's leg and sending it through the mail, coupled with their knowledge of the tattoo, Strike narrows the suspects down to three people from his past: his stepfather and two men he arrested while a member of the British military police. 

Thoughts: This book is much grittier than the previous two and does not start out slowly like they did. It opens with the stalker/killer following Robin through the streets of London and thinking hateful thoughts about Strike. So, yeah, that's another thing -- while the narrative is third-person like the other books, this one has chapters sprinkled in where the narrative focuses on the thoughts of the killer. I don't love this for two reasons: I don't always like POV changes because they can be really jarring but, more importantly, his chapters are so dark and creepy. Kind of makes me wonder what other disturbing things are rattling around in old JKR's head.

Ok, that sounded negative, but overall I was enthralled by this book. It was extremely engaging and the mystery was set up such that I kept changing my mind as to which of the three guys was going to turn out to be the killer. I also considered strongly that it would be none of them, but some other person that we hadn't heard much about. 

As with The Silkworm, I "read" this book via audiobook and cannot recommend that route enough. Robert Glenister is just a really talented narrator. 

Favorite part(s):

1.The mystery! I changed my mind about 100 times when it came to choosing who did it. [SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER -- TURN BACK NOW IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW THE KILLER!] I knew pretty strongly that Kelsey's sister was "It," but I also thought Strike would have recognized Ray as DL when they met face to face.

2. I really, really liked getting to know Robin more and learning about her back story. I was underwhelmed when she [SPOILER] decided to go back to Matthew, but I guess that leaves more dramatic plot options for the future. 

3. Strike and Robin's travels through England and Scotland were cool. I spent a lot of time looking places up on Google Earth as I read. I also loved all the different accents. Those Barrow-in-Furness accents were not easy to understand. Of course my man RG nailed them. 

4. Shanker's involvement in everything. He's not a good guy, but he helps both Robin and Strike to do-the-right-thing, as it were (of course he's got to be paid but -- baby steps). I also love how blindly loyal and protective he is. 

5. [SPOILER] Strike rushing to the wedding and then crashing around and making a scene cause he's a big bull in a china shop. 

Least favorite part(s):

1. [SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER -- TURN BACK NOW IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW THE KILLER!] Maybe it's just because I've never experienced something like this, but I have a hard time understanding how Strike didn't recognize Ray as DL when they met face to face.

2. In the first scene when the killer is following Robin, he is thinking about Strike and calls him "Cormoran" in his head. But the original label on the leg box was addressed to "Cameron." Obviously, the killer knows his real name, so why the incorrect name on the address?

3. As usual, Matthew is a bottom-feeding asshole and I hate him. When he erased Strike's message...

4. Just the generally disturbing plot elements. So much violence or the allusion to it, especially sexual violence and child abuse. That is always hard to read. I think the great storytelling makes it worth it, but it's still tough. 

5. What's up with Strike being such a weirdo misogynist? Robin's not an anomaly for being hard-working, nice, cool, and sane, but he acts like shes the only woman he's ever met who is. He's particularly hard on his sister. I hope JKR gets more into the background of his misogyny in future books. 

My grade: A

Who would I recommend it to: Mystery-lovers who can get over the creepy inner monologue of a serial killer.