Pomp & Circumstance

Time to throw the caps in the air again since officially yesterday I was notified my Bachelor of Arts in Geography & Urban Analysis was posted at California State University Los Angeles!!!!! My diploma will arrive the end of April. Woohoo!!!! Extremely happy even the morning after :-D!

Accessed my online class yesterday and it's being taught through ESRI's website. I like their training module and classrooms. I found my text for my on campus class for half the price than at the bookstore. Just have to find the rest of my drafting tools. Nice to have the week going well so far.

Spring Time

You know its spring time when the bulb flowers start showing up. I took this recently when I went to check out the campus last week and get my bearrings on what part of campus my classes will be at. Its a good thing I did too since it took me a few hours of driving around the city to find it. On a different note, I met my landlords and they're really nice. They don't have a problem with Maggie visiting and she can come as often as I want. Yay :-)! When I was looking online Thursday for some class information between doing loads of laundry, I came across a research paid internship opportunity that I'm going to inquire about (had to register for access to the site this morning). It would be great if I could do that in addition to what I will be doing. So we shall see what I find out.

The Gluten in Communication

Gluten is what makes things stick together. Being able to communicate well is what keeps things together in one way or anther and for most that is what keeps relationships 'sticking together'.

My recent post about frustrations caught some people's attention. I admit I was having a difficult day that day and things were irritating me more than they probably should but we all deal with stress differently and not all stress is bad. Sometimes the bad stress turns out to be good because it pushes us to look at things we're doing differently and change. I'm happy that the person who made the changes stepped forward and apologized. Thank you. Like I said in my email back though, it's better if we can work together than against each other especially when it is for a good purpose like the family quilt blog.

On a different note, someone's dogcation is coming to a close sooner than expected as the owners apparently have shown up next door. When I opened the door this morning and looked out and saw their car..I was like 'uhhhhh cross your legs Maggie & hold that thought while I get dressed and we go sneak out to the car quietly to go to a park' :-D lol! Yeah sure she can visit and she has been but next week is going to be crazier than normal with classes starting, house & pet sitting for M (C's dad), and I don't need to have the owners wondering anything they shouldn't. Besides, I think she misses her dog friends at Grandpa's :-). I'm going to plan for her to come back again sometime next month or early May to visit again.

Frustrations

So as it was explained to me late last night, I should not start all conversations off with "hey, how was your day?" because apparently it is annoying to some. Argh, the frustrations only start there as I logged online this afternoon to find out that what I had tried to be helpful with over the past several months of keeping up the family 'webblog' for the quilters...well, it has been yes, rearranged and no one actually was asked to do that. It would have been very much appreciated if I was included on the loop of the changes (since I've been doing a lot of legwork with sending out the QGN every month and then adding stuff to the blog).

I'm done with all of it. It's just too frustrating to me when people do that.

Those points being made..the day has slowly gotten better but it has definitely been a quiet one. I have heard from my best friend more today though which has been really nice :-).

More later as time is running out on the library computer.

New Eco Way of Doing Things

So I started a new blog lol...yeah I know, like how many writing projects am I going to have right? Ummm I'm innocent (halo supporting horns look). Anyways, y'all should check it out. Went and found the college yesterday and I am glad I did because it was not easy to find. Bremerton is not the easiest city to navigate in that is for sure! Finally got the software for the internship digitizing work I'm doing running smoothly and will be able to do some later today. If not we have to figure out a way to add the software to my computer. The boss lady is trying to find all kinds of ways to utilize me to get work done ( I might be helping with tagging elk or working with the fish hatchery folks? I don't know..but I'm sure it will be entertaining).

Enjoying all the sunshiney moments we keep getting :-).

OMG we have sunshine! Woohoo!!

Oh you have no idea how happy I was to wake up this morning and look out my windows and see sunshine! I looked at Maggie and said "look we have sunshine lol no more rain and having to get the moss & twigs out from between our paws/toes" and her response was several tail wags :-).

We are headed for a walk on one of the local trailheads this morning. I also have a date with the gym later ;-). I've been doing a lot better about drinking water and eating my fruits & veggies every day too. It's amazing how much better food tastes when it is healthy for you. I came across a book called "The Raw Truth: The Art of Preparing Living Foods" and ordered it from TRL. I came across it in the Oly Co-Op. Can't wait to read it.

I heard from the SDNR and yes we are confirmed to still meet on Friday to go over the project. I will be meeting with SDNR (Skokomish Department of Natural Resources) and MCD (Mason Conservation District) to get the details, shake hands, figure out what they hoping I have for skills er I mean wanting me to learn :-D/expand on, and go to the project site. Should be an amazing day! I just learned that they are looking for the project to be similar to what the Nisqually Tribe did recently on a project they had. You can check it out here.

I have officially moved up 2 slots on the waitlist for my second class and hope that continues. I am actually looking forward to returning to school in a few weeks. Sure hope I do well and can get everything done to have my GIS cert by next spring to go with my BA.

Paws for a Picnic

Maggie is on a dogcation and we're having a really good time. Thursday we went on a 2.5 mile hike over a 500 foot elevation gain, most of which was in the first half of that loop at Twanoah State Park just up the road from my house, in the pouring rain. Saturday we went to see cousins, a quilt store, two parks and have a Jewish picnic lol ;-). Apparently my dog likes Challah bread with hummus as much as I do and we also had fresh strawberries and water.

This picture is from watching the sunset over Capital Lake while we were walking around it and then back to Marathon Park while there was a break in the rain before heading home.

I got the internship after all but it's with the tribal natural resource department as the majority of the project is with them and not with the county conservation district. There is the opportunity for more work and they will be having me start as a non-paid intern with the opportunity to eventually be hired on in a paid position! I'm totally excited about that as you could imagine. Meeting with folks next week to find out more details. Classes start at the end of the month toward my GIS cert with OC for in the evening and I'm looking forward to that too.

NeoGeo Stuff

New word for the night as I was puruising through sights for geography work I came across this term "neogeography" and thought ..'neo what?' I looked it up and it is the combination between cartography and online blogging. I was like "oh wow that is really interesting"! Then I started thinking about what I really want to do which is biogeography and was thinking 'neobiogeography'..'neogeography biogeography'..hmm wonder what that would be like ;-). I went looking more and came across another term "geofence" and was again thinking what the heck is that. It is a virtual boundary on a geographic region.

So I went to one of my sites I check for jobs/internships (The GIS Jobs Clearinghouse) and oh my goodness I came across an awesome internship position opportunity that is still open until March 11th that I definitely would love to have. It's even a PAID internship for $12.50/hr and it's in Illinois (which could be interesting....been there once..it was alright) but I that was an amazing find. I'm so putting in for it. Keep your fingers crossed that they really want me for the spot :-). What is really nice is that the deadline is the day AFTER I register for my classes for spring quarter which I will be starting to take my autocad classes. They are looking for someone preferable with autocad experience.

Been spending lots of time walking dogs this week and in some very interesting weather too (rain, hail, sun, wind, any combination of the above). Friday probably going to go get the boat so I will get to drive the truck back from the other end of the peninsula while the guys drive the boat back down the Canal. Never a dull moment ;-).