Author: mrsartis

I am not a risk taker. I’m a play it safer. Hard core. I don’t take chances. But I’m about to take a big risk, do something potentially stupid, and hope it doesn’t blow up in my face.

My nonprofit job has officially come to an end. I’ve been looking, but honestly, even the things I’ve applied for, I’m finding I don’t really want. I want to focus on grant writing. It appeals to me for about a million reasons. And it’s something I think I have a lot of potential to be good at.

Former boss told me I should just do it. Get a website. Put myself out there. I won’t get experience if I’m not doing it. Of course I raised questions and expressed doubts. That’s what I do. I’m a realist. But he thinks I should do it. And so does The Boy. And increasingly, so do I.

I talked to my manager and DM at the store–there are no full time positions open right now (which figures, but I don’t begrudge the girl who got the last one, she’s my friend and she needs it). But because I’m a ‘valuable part of the team’ and I’m flexible with both schedule and ability I’ve been given a raise and the promise of a solid schedule of hours through the holidays, and they will re-evaluate in January. Which sounds good to me. There is some solid money to be made in grant writing if I can get started. The really good part is that I am working on a contract with a friend who runs a nonprofit to do some work for her organization–which would be great to get me started.

I might be turning down some other options, passing up some things in effort to give this a shot. The Boy is behind it because we can work with my income from the store coupled with his income in the mean time (we really just need to get through a couple of months before I’d start seeing income from this other avenue). I’m at do or die time, though. I have to decide if I’m going to try to take an established path or forge my own. And as scary as it is, I think I want to forge my own path and see what happens.

Like Jillian Michaels says repeatedly in Unlimited you need to be able to clearly visualize what you want. I can see this. I can see myself running in the mornings, working–reading, researching, writing–then heading to the store for a shift. I can envision myself driving to meetings in different parts of the state during my off time from the store, and spreading my business cards through every possible networking opportunity. I can see it happening. Which I guess I should take as a good sign. 🙂

Last week was interesting. Food & exercise were horrible. But work was good…

I’m officially done with the nonprofit. I worked for them Monday and Tuesday, with a few bits on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, but now it’s officially over. My former boss came over on Friday night with a six pack. We talked, caught up, talked about possibilities, laughed, had a few drinks, and then we packed up what was left of my home office and put it in his van. He told me he misses working with me. I told him I miss working with him, too, and that the last couple of months were really tough. We hugged. Promised to stay in touch. He left. I cried. He’s a really good man and I do miss working with him.

The store is scheduled to reopen this coming week. We put it back together. We’ll put the finishing touches on it tomorrow. It looks like nothing happened. I get that that’s the point of rebuilding, but compared to what it was even on Monday, compared to the rest of the plaza we’re in, and after everything we’ve been through the past two months it is really amazing and moving to be back in our beautiful store, ready to open our doors to our customers.

The job search is in an interesting place, but I have options–at least at the moment. I don’t have any official rejections yet. Which is something. And I’m getting good hours at the store, which is good. It will help in the meantime. Which brings me to…

Workouts for the week!

Monday 10/31: 2 miles; Jillian Michaels Yoga Meltdown Level 1

Tuesday 11/1: Yoga Booty Ballet–Basic; Yoga Booty Ballet Abs Level 1

Wednesday 11/2: 2 miles; Jillian Michaels Yoga Meltdown Level 1

Thursday 11/3: Yoga Booty Ballet–Basic; Yoga Booty Ballet Abs Level 1

Friday 11/4: Jillian Michaels Yoga Meltdown Level 1

Saturday 11/5: 3 miles; Yoga Booty Ballet Abs Level 1

Sunday 11/6: REST

You know how they say if you want to make God laugh, make a plan? Well, God was laughin’ real hard at me this week…

Sunday was almost miraculous. I was hoping to time my re-entry to running to coincide roughly with @RunStaceyRun’s marathon debut. Turns out I did so almost perfectly. I left my house around 7:40 and her stats say she crossed the start line at 7:39. I call that pretty effin’ awesome. First run back felt good.

Monday, I get up. Work, a lot, from home. Troubleshoot. Clean out my closet between emails (‘cause multitasking is how I roll). Go for my run around lunchtime. Cut it a little short because I was just feeling bad, figured my feeding schedule is off and I’m probably just hungry, so I go home and eat. And I still feel like poo, in fact, even worse. So I lay down on the couch and moan for a bit. The Boy comes home and confirms that I have a fever (thermometer? What’s that?). I lounge the rest of the evening.

Tuesday, I wake up, still with a slight fever. I work from home, resting as much as I can so I can make it to the last session of my grant-writing class. I refused to miss this class. So I rest, drug myself up good and head to class. Come home around 10pm and crash again.

Wednesday, I get up, again with the slight fever (please mind that my fever is very mild and cyclical, I’m cycling between normal and low-grade fever. Not good, mind you, but I’m not exactly burning down the house either. And the only symptom, other than the fever, is that I’m tired as all get out). End up going to my boss’s house for awhile to work (as one of the computer programs I most need is not working for me and with only a month or so left to this job there’s no reason for us to pay for any assistance or new software). I feel okay. I go home, work some more, but lay low. And in the evening, crash.

Thursday, still running slight fever, I drug myself, head out to breakfast with a couple of my friends, come home work for a few frantic hours, then head out to meet with another friend about some freelance grant-writing work I’m going to do for her organization. I finally make it home and crash. Hard.

Friday I wake up. Fever intact. And I alternate sleeping, computer games, and Netflix all day. With lots of sleeping. The Boy comes home from work and what do you know Fever (it’s grown to earn a capital letter by this point in the week) is gone. And later? Still gone. And this morning? Still.Gone.

This morning, after a lot of sleep, we helped our friend move.

So you see how many of my scheduled workouts happened? Yeah, we’ll try again this coming week.

…breaks down to 3 hours/day x 5 days.

I’m pretty well sticking to this. I’m not going above and beyond for a job without a future. In order to move on with my life, I have to set–and stick to–some boundaries, and my biggest one right now is that I will work for a certain amount of time in a day, then I will walk away from the computer and be done with it. If I work more one day than the allotted 3 hours, that takes time away from another day. I will not work more if we can not afford to pay me for it, and if that means some work doesn’t get done right away, so be it. I can not be the beck-and-call girl for this organization anymore.

I still need to work out today. This Monday morning hit me HARD. It was HARD to get up this morning–even Matt snoozed twice. I’m re-working my running route to get some errands done at the same time (and it’s going to work out well, it will be a little over 2 miles by the time I’m done). 

Reserved my hotel room for the 2012 Cleveland Half Marathon this morning. Booyah. What up, king size bed? See you at the Hyatt Regencey, @RunStaceyRun!

I now have an actual 2 mile route planned for tomorrow. Then I shall come home, do yoga with Jillian Michaels and go about my day.

I know that in the end I need accountability, so, taking a cue from @RunStaceyRun, I’m going to post my workout plan for the week. Remember that I’m easing back into this, y’all.

Sunday 10/16: 2 mile run (completed 1.60 roughly…first run back, need to start looking at my routes again…)

Monday 10/17: 2 mile run; Jillian Michaels Yoga Meltdown Level 1

Tuesday 10/18: Yoga Booty Ballet Basic (love this! strength, yoga, ballet, and abs all in one!)

Wednesday 10/19: 2 mile run; Jillian Michaels Yoga Meltdown Level 1

Thursday 10/20: Yoga Booty Ballet Basic

Friday 10/21: REST

Saturday 10/22: 3 miles; helping my friend move = lots of heavy lifting

…cat marched up on my pillow about half an hour ago. Boo! That’s a serious no no (butts do not go where my head goes, and since his feet go where his butt goes, his feet can’t go there either!), but it got me up ahead of my alarm.

So I texted some luck to Miss @RunStaceyRun as she’s about to embark on the Columbus Marathon (her first!), had my pre-run toast (no need to be crazy, it’s going to be super short, like 2 miles), and am hydrating as we speak while trolling Tumblr.

Will get dressed soon and head out. Trying to time it roughly with Stacey’s start.

Good luck to EVERYONE racing (or even just heading out for a run) today!

Did a LOT of cleaning in the apartment today. Still need to tackle the storage area(s), but closet, bedroom, kitchen, and living room are much improved.

Half marathon training plan for Cleveland is mapped out in my planner. I know, I’m starting early, but after a hiatus I want to work my way in slowly. And I want to not only break 3 hours, I want to crush 3 hours. My training plan says I’ll finish in about 2:45. Sounds good to me.

Tomorrow will be my first run back from the hiatus. Fitting, since it’s @RunStaceyRun’s marathon debut, and she’s one of my running buddies. Everything is all laid out and ready, just need to set my alarm (not totally necessary, but I like to go at least earlyish, even though this will be a short run).

More tomorrow.

I feel so much better today, it’s crazy.

I talked to The Boy about it all when he came home. And it felt really good to just be a sobby, pissed off mess for awhile. Then we had some Schweddy Balls ice cream. Jesus God, Ben & Jerry found the cheapest rum in existence for those rum balls. It was good, don’t get me wrong, but that rum was CHEAP. I swear we drank better rum back in our college days. And last night’s episode of “Community” was awesome. Those things all helped.

I’ve done a little work today. Not as much as I should’ve, but what was necessary. BUT, I’ve tackled the mountain of laundry and the first part of my closet & dresser drawers. I have a half of a big black trash bag of clothes ready to donate. I just need to go through the stuff on the top shelf of my closet and the little drawers in the closet and I’ll be good. Then of course, comes the storage area, heaven help me. But it feels really good to be making progress in my physical space.

The Boy has a couple of pieces in an art show opening tonight, so we’re headed to Mass. for the evening, but I have plans to make tomorrow super productive as well. I want to get a lot done this weekend, make some strides to putting my life back together and take care of the things I’ve been neglecting.

I need to find something to eat. Other than Kashi Island Vanilla shredded wheat (which is the BEST cereal EVER. Expensive, but worth it).

Interview out of the way. It went well, but I won’t hear anything for at least a week, week and a half (the last interview isn’t scheduled until late next week). So fingers are crossed.

Lots on the agenda today, I need to do some work AND laundry. Fortunately it is early, still. More later.