The question I hate the most

I had an epiphany the other day:

I HATE the question: "Are you dating anyone?"

It's pointless. It adds an unneeded pressure to dating. Or when I say, "No," the inevitable questions come up: "Oh, why not?" or "Well, are you at least liking someone?" or the worst: "I don't understand why you're single!"

Truth of the matter is that I haven't found anyone worth spending my good time with. I'm absolutely open to the idea of dating, but I'd rather spend my time doing the things I want to do; putting an extraordinary effort into finding someone to date is not what I want to do.

I find that often people ask this question as an "I'm curious what you've been up to because I never talk to you" type of inquiry. The fact of the matter is that this is my personal business. If we're not that close, I'm either going to give you a 'yes' or a 'no' and I don't want to elaborate any further. But you will ask me to. If we are close, and you ask this question, you should already know the answer. If I am dating someone, you will know. Most likely, when I decide the time is right, I will introduce who I'm dating to you, and you will know. There's no need to ask the question.

That's all. For now.

2014 Horoscope

I don't really believe in horoscopes, much like I don't believe my Dream Dictionary, but every so often things 'come true.' I found my 2014 horoscope to be interesting, so I wanted to post it and them later in the year review it. Voila!

(Source: Horoscope.com)

Personal and Social Life in 2014:

The Universe has plotted a way for you to reveal more of your inner self to your friends and family, but you'll be getting something in return! From February 10 through February 12, the Moon in Cancer will be trine Saturn in Scorpio, meaning that difficulties within the home will be ironed out through the use of your own personal wisdom.

The level of familiarity you might have with friends, acquaintances, and neighbors might be equally unnerving and exhilarating. But don't worry! You'll be getting something out of it as well.

And with the Sun conjoining the Moon in Cancer, you'll be able to retreat with no guilt when the outside world gets to be too much.

The important thing to remember is every bit of information you receive this year will helpful to you. Mostly this will involve how to handle or talk to difficult people, which will be worth a lot to you, both in your daily life and your career. Keep your eyes and ears open!

Love in 2014 for Singles:

For the single Scorpio, you're going to be in something of a quandary in 2014. You may be unsure if someone you're seeing (or want to date) is interested in you romantically, but at the same time you can't see this person seriously interested in anyone else.

For the first three months, with the Moon's sextile with Venus in Capricorn strangely augmented by the Moon and Saturn's conjunction in your sign, mixed signals might be the best way to describe how your communications are going.

Still, while a lot of the responsibility may fall upon you to express your feelings more often, you can't always guarantee that these expressions will go how you want them to.

With Venus entering Pisces on April 5, you may be allowed to push limits a little, but this is more of an acceptable agreement than a true understanding.

Still, such connections shouldn't be sneezed at, since the Sun, Moon, and Venus in Scorpio on October 23 are going to open some new doors for you. Your romantic chemistry may be building in intensity by that time, or someone new arrives on the scene. It's a matter of what you choose to do with it and where you choose to go.

Career and Money in 2014:

With Capricorn being a heavy influence at the beginning of the year, capturing the Sun, Moon, Mercury, and Pluto, your year may get off to a work-heavy start! Before too long, however, you should settle into a routine while subtly planting the seeds for positive change within your work life.

Even if you're searching for work, your methods and ideas are apt to gain quite a bit of attention by your prospective employers. This year starts off with possibilities that almost leap into your lap, yet your success depends on how well you think on your feet once the offers are made!

If you play your cards right, you should be able to weather a quiet period of inertia broken by occasional storms. A Water Trine on March 11 gives you an additional boost in financial and career strength, but even with this, what you get out of it will depend on what you put into it. Give as much as you receive and you're apt to receive one and a half times as much as what you put in!

Thoughts:

I've been conflicted with how I want to handle 2014. I have a fear that it's going to be a hard year and have thought that perhaps I need to switch things up with friends and be less social and do more to achieve my other goals. Just last night I had a conversation with a friend on a couple projects that could potentially be good for me financially and for my career path. It's kinda weird to think that something long-lasting can come out of the things I do, because my life so far has happened in 'phases.' Within the phases of my life (high school, college, texas, 'year of new,' and 'year of solidity') are sub-phases (concentrations on different friend groups, interests, traveling urges, state of happiness, etc). I've seemed to close doors on most of those phases where there isn't any bleeding from one phase to another. While the end of 2013 seemed to pressure me to close the 'year of solidity,' I'm finding that even though I have new goals and want to have different priorities, some of the things I accomplished in 2013 are bleeding into 2014 in a way I didn't quite expect. I feel myself growing and I do hope that 2014 won't be heartbreaking. My horoscope is interesting in that I feel that it's addressing some of my concerns and (if it 'comes true') gives me hope for being successful this year.

Okay. That's all I have to say about that. Ciao!

2013 Recap - Concerts

List of the concerts/bands I saw this year:

• 2/1/13 - Macklemore and Ryan Lewis
• 3/1/13 - Passion Pit
• 3/1/13 - Passion Pit DJ Set (they never showed up but we saw Youth Lagoon there)
• 3/9/13 - Cotton Jones
• 3/23/13 - Imagine Dragons, Atlas Genius
• 4/3/13 - Cold War Kids
• 4/13/13 - Sublime with Rome, Air Dubai
• 5/2/13 - Alex Clare
• 5/19/13 - Gold Fields, The Neighbourhood, Atlas Genius, Capital Cities, Airborne Toxic Event, Jimmy Eat World, Of Monsters and Men, AWOLNATION, Silversun Pickups, C2C
• 5/20/13 - Vampire Weekend, Of Monsters and Men
• 5/24/13 - Capital Cities, Gold Fields
• 5/30/13 - The Neighbourhood
• 5/31/13 - Atlas Genius
• 6/2/13 - Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Alabama Shakes
• 6/17/13 - A Silent Film
• 6/22/13 - The Mowglis, Trampled by Turtles, My Body Sings Electric, Hunter Hunted, Dada Life
• 7/31/13 - My Morning Jacket, WILCO, Bob Dylan
• 8/17/13 - Blitzen Trapper, Cold War Kids
• 8/29/13 - One Republic, Sara Barrellies
• 9/9/13 - Ra Ra Riot, Caveman
• 9/14/13 - Lumineers, Family of the Year
• 10/9/13 - Bronze Radio Return
• 10/16/13 - Anberlin
• 10/20/13 - Atlas Genius
• 10/23/13 - The 1975

My 25th Birthday

11/6/13 I'm always terrible at recording special and significant days, so I decided to write in this blog for the time being. This post will likely be posted late. Or maybe I'll just update it as things happen (because I recently learned such a thing was possible).

Right now I'm half-way through my birthday and it's already been amazing and since I don't know when I'll get around to writing in my actual journal, I'm going to blog some of the highlights, because this is definitely my best birthday yet.

Things I was looking forward to by turning 25:

• Saving hundreds on car insurance: Literally, I saved almost two hundred dollars on my auto insurance by turning 25 and having one of my speeding tickets finally off my record from 3 years ago. There's a hilarious commercial that helps illustrate this, and my 25th birthday happens to fall on a Hump Day. So I am quite happier than the camel in this commercial:
• Being able to rent a car without extra fees: I will celebrating this on a trip to New York next week. I always hated paying extra for car rentals and I'm quite ecstatic about this. 

Silly moments from last night:

• Last minute decision to go to a Spurs/Nuggets game with Heather. Go Spurs!!! (they won!)
• My friend Brian had called me in order to give me his phone number, but I accidentally saved his name under the number of the guy who I picked up the bball tickets from. I had sent this guy a text inviting him to my birthday karaoke party tonight and we ended up having a conversation, which I thought was bizarre because Brian was at dinner with my other friend. It wasn't until we were trying to meet up with them after the game that I realized I had the wrong number saved the whole time. Awkward!!!

This is the first birthday that I think I'm truly celebrating to its fullest extent. I did a good amount of planning. I'm having two parties so that I can celebrate on my actual birthday but also on the weekend when it's more likely that people can come out (but interestingly enough, I'm having a higher turnout for the mid-week shenanigans). I got a bunch of my freebies and am taking advantage of that. Then I also am going out and getting free stuff from the places I go. I can use my "birthday card" but had a sad realization today when I drove to work that I couldn't use my birthday as an excuse to get a good parking spot. That was disappointing when I still had to go through the same trouble. 

I feel so overwhelmed with all of my birthday shout-outs already. I feel so loved and I seriously love all the people I know. SO MUCH LOVE! 

Alright... I'm going to be leaving work soon to go to a dentist appt so I'll continue this a little later! 12:30pm

2012--The Year of New

As usual, I've been terrible at blogging. This will be my first post in this blog and I want to highlight my past year and get ready to move on to 2013.

2012 was not the easiest of years for me. I didn't go through anything particularly difficult, but it took a lot of emotional setbacks to finally get me to a point where I am happy and content. As I look back, my theme for 2012 is "The Year of New." Here's why:

• New State/City: I moved out to Colorado at the end of 2011 but I consider my new-ness to be encompassed in the year 2012. I lived in Westminster for the first few months of the year. Nothing too significant happened during that time. I snowboarded a LOT... which was also something new I had never done before. 
• New job #1: The first month or so that I lived in CO I spent looking for jobs. I didn't really care what my job was as long as it was somewhere within the administrative or accounting world. I started working temporarily at a plastic manufacturing company in Boulder. After a month or so, I was offered a job and took it. It felt nice to be able to be secure in a job, even if it wasn't exactly what I wanted to do. 
• New City #2: About a month after securing my job in Boulder, I moved there. I spent a total of 2.5 months living in Boulder and as beautiful as the city is, I had a hard time living there. I had about 4 friends in CO at the time--none of which lived in Boulder. I had a lot of alone time and spent about half of my time in Boulder unpacking then repacking. 
• New City #3: During the month of May, I knew I needed to look for a new place to live because I needed to be out of my apartment in June. That first weekend in May, I determined to spend the entire time in Denver. I had a friend that lived downtown and figured that I would stay with her. That Friday night, I wasn't able to meet up with her but met up with another friend and went out together for the night. We met a group of people at the Giggling Grizzly, our first stop, and ended up hanging out with them for the rest of the night. It was such a fun time but we ended up going to bed at 4 or 5 in the morning and had to be up at 8 to move our car. After grabbing breakfast, I went on a search for a park that I could take a nap at. That's when I recalled this park called Wash Park. I went there and slept for a couple hours and when I woke up I realized that Denver was the place I needed to live. I spent the rest of that day and weekend looking at places to live and making new friends. The people in Denver were so much more outgoing and welcoming than they were in Boulder and I still feel that way. I moved to Denver at the beginning of June and have absolutely loved it ever since. 
• New Job #2: Right at the end of May and just before I moved to Denver, I was offered a job at the University of Colorado Boulder, which is where I am still working. I had applied to the University back in December/January and didn't get offered this job until May. When I was asked to do my phone and in-person interviews, I wasn't really looking for another job, but I participated in the interviews because I didn't want to lose the opportunity. I remember my in-person interview, meeting with my (now) supervisor and knowing that I would thrive really well in the environment and with the people. I was slightly shocked when I was offered the job because it felt unreal. I knew what I wanted, but I had a hard time making the decision to quit my old job. I quit at the end of May and started this job in June. I have absolutely loved it. 
• New Phone: The day I started my new job, I went to the mall after work just to browse and wandered over to the Verizon kiosk. I knew I was due for an upgrade in August so I decided to look at phones to get an idea of what I would want later. Come to find out, I was already eligible for my upgrade and ended up getting a new phone on the spot. I love everything about it except the fact that I'm forced to text on the touchscreen. Since then I have texted people significantly less! 
• New Friends: According to Facebook, I became friends with 241 people this year.. the majority of which I have became friends with since I moved to Denver in June. Denver is such a social city and it reminds me of college where people have so many connections with each other and the vast majority of people have moved here from other places (most common is the midwest). I feel very grateful for all the friends I have made and the super fun times I have had with them! 
• New Phone #2: In August I went on a camping trip and lost my phone--first time I've ever lost one. Luckily I got insurance on it but I didn't get a replacement for a week. Living without a phone was difficult but I survived.
• New Car: My poor 2001 Civic was starting to get old. I was ready for a new car and spent the month of September looking for a new one. I had to be precise with my timing because the money I received from my old car was being used to pay it off and I couldn't get approved for a lower interest rate on a new car without that. I sold my car at the end of September and was carless for 2 weeks. It actually wasn't too bad and I used my public transit resources to get around. Finally, October 9th I came home with a 2012 Honda Civic and I've been happy with it!
• New Experiences: 
• Concerts: LMFAO, Foster the People, Gotye, M83, The Wombats, Passion Pit, Skrillex
• First time skydiving in June
• Denver Cruisers
• Solo Seattle vacation
• New religion: I suppose not really a new religion, but after 2 years of contemplating my religious thoughts, I decided to come to terms and let go of the only religion I had grown up with. I did this in April and it was one of the most relieving things I've done. I felt so free to not be torn between the way I was living and the way I lived in my past. I still struggle with decisions because I have so much influence from my past. I struggle with questions that I no longer have answers to because I've only heard the one way. I still struggle with the idea of my future and family and how to teach my family morals without the same way I grew up learning them. I struggle with my innocence and inexperience because I feel I grew up sheltered and haven't been exposed to what others are very used to. I struggle still with how I want to portray myself as a person, because before everything was very black and white regarding right and wrong. I still struggle confronting and talking with my family and friends with my lifestyle. I feel like I'm still a good person but there's this stigma that comes along with those who have "fallen away" from the gospel and they won't find true happiness because they don't have the whole truth. I don't agree with this and feel that no matter what anyone believes, they will always have difficulties and hope and joy and sorrow. I know I'm a good person and try not to hurt other people. I may do things that I grew up being taught were 'sins,' but I no longer feel the same way regarding those and don't feel like I'm sinning or I'm a bad person. I still struggle with the place God has in our lives or my 'relationship' with Him. I will continue having these struggles but that's part of the stage of life I'm in, and I'll eventually figure it out! 
• New singleness: Back in the summer when I was thinking about all the new things I had so far this year, I was hoping that this point would be "New Boyfriend." I became single in March-ish and before that, I feel like I hadn't been single since 2008. While living in Texas, I was technically single for a long time, but I wasn't emotionally single except for about 2 months in the summer/fall of 2011. After being in relationships, I had forgotten how to have fun without that one person. I spent a lot of this year being disappointed in my lack of options for another relationship and finally a couple months ago was able to let go and find myself again. The problem wasn't necessarily my lack of options, it was me not allowing there to be options. I had some not-so-fun conversations with my emotional self and some other outside instances that hit me really hard, but I feel like these things had to happen in order for me to get where I am now, and I can truly say that I am content and ready to tackle the world, whether it's with or without someone else. 
• New hair color: About 4 minutes into my last hair appointment in November, I decided to try out being a brunette. I was looking to have a solid color for my hair and being solid blonde wouldn't have looked good, so I tried brown instead. It took me a few days to get used to it, but not that I'm comfortable with it, I like the brown a lot! 

So there you have it! My theme for 2013 will either be "The Year of Different" or "The Year of Solidity." In this process to figure out who I am, what I want to do, how I want to live, and who I want to be in the future, I need to get out of my comfort zone and do things I haven't done before and get started on the goals I've been putting off for a long time. I also feel like it's a time for me to take some of the things I enjoy doing and make better habits out of them--work towards something great instead of mediocre. I hope to accomplish a lot this year and do the things I want to do. I have no attachments and can do pretty much whatever I want. I need the courage to do the things I'm scared to dive into, but in doing so, I know I'll come out a better person!