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Monday, February 16, 2015
Surprise
This is what I find after letting a 3 year old play with my phone during sacrament meeting...
Saturday, February 7, 2015
Whateve's
I have wanted a dog of my own since I started grad school, many moons ago. I have often come up with excuses why I shouldn't get one as of yet, some of them are legitimate such as not having a job. But others less so like the fear of them getting old and dying or thinking that I would always get one with my husband.
Recently in my concerted efforts to take better care of myself emotionally I've decided it's okay for me to finally get a dog. Yes, I know it's going to be a lot of work for a single person but I know it will be worth it to see their little tail wagging when I come home and to get all of those doggy kisses and snuggles.
So now it's a matter of timing and finding the right dog...ha...that's very applicable to many different situations in my life right now. But I am very excited and very happy that I have overcome that emotional hurdle of giving myself permission.
So next week I'm going to check out a dog that I've been eyeing on the Stray Rescue of St. Louis website from a shelter that just so happens to be near my work.
In other news I am just now realizing how busy I am actually going to be over the next few months and it's not going to be fun. I work full-time in a firm and teach 2 afternoons a week but that means I have to work late every night. Then I have two callings at church. One is the YW President which doesn't entail a lot since there are only two girls who have never come to church, so it's more of an outreach calling and being involved in Ward Council. The other calling is co-chair of our Stake Single Adult Program. Let me tell you...FML.
I have always prayed to know how I can help others but re-vamping this Single Adult Program is going to be quite the challenge. Just to give you a little snap shot of what I am going into: there are over 820 Single Adults in my stake alone. I have recently become acquainted with the leaders in the three surrounding stakes and learned their process, for better or worse, and have come to understand that they get maybe 20 people out to the activities and maybe 30 to the "dances." So let's do a little math here...say there are on average 700 single adults per stake (ours has 820). 700 x 4 = 2800 people. If 20 people show up per activity that's only 0.714% of your targeted group. If your budget is something like $1,500 per stake, $1,500 x 4 = $6,000 total which doesn't sound crazy if you have even a quarter of the people show up to activities. But the same group of 20-30 people show up every month (yes, they do a minimum of one quad-stake activity a month!) which is less than 1% of the people you are supposed to be serving; that means you're spending on average $240 a year per person.
Spending an exorbitant amount of church funds on entertaining a small group of people is no okay in my book.
It's now the next night...
I went to a meeting earlier tonight with the leadership of the SA Program and it just becomes more and more apparent that this one of the reasons I needed to be back in St. Louis. As much as I would like to not be single I am making the most of the situation and am very happy that I am in a position where I can help rebuild this program and hopefully make a little impact in some people's lives...as painful, time consuming, challenging, and frustrating this is going to be.
It's the next night again....I keep on falling asleep while I'm trying to finish this post.
Anyhoo earlier I had a little mini-WashU reunion at SubZero Vodka Bar. The food was mediocre but the company was great. I then met up with some other friends and watched Avengers at the Science Center. I forgot how awesome movies are when they are big! I think I have a hard time suspending belief enough to enjoy movies especially if there are a lot of holes in the plot or technically things are not congruent. Soooo...I am going to work on that because there are a lot of movies that I have enjoyed for purely entertainment purposes because I had no expectations of splendor. I think I also get annoyed with seeing the same actors and actresses whose characters I can't buy because I cannot get over their public persona.
I'm falling asleep again so I'm just going to post this as is. Whateve's.
Recently in my concerted efforts to take better care of myself emotionally I've decided it's okay for me to finally get a dog. Yes, I know it's going to be a lot of work for a single person but I know it will be worth it to see their little tail wagging when I come home and to get all of those doggy kisses and snuggles.
So now it's a matter of timing and finding the right dog...ha...that's very applicable to many different situations in my life right now. But I am very excited and very happy that I have overcome that emotional hurdle of giving myself permission.
So next week I'm going to check out a dog that I've been eyeing on the Stray Rescue of St. Louis website from a shelter that just so happens to be near my work.
In other news I am just now realizing how busy I am actually going to be over the next few months and it's not going to be fun. I work full-time in a firm and teach 2 afternoons a week but that means I have to work late every night. Then I have two callings at church. One is the YW President which doesn't entail a lot since there are only two girls who have never come to church, so it's more of an outreach calling and being involved in Ward Council. The other calling is co-chair of our Stake Single Adult Program. Let me tell you...FML.
I have always prayed to know how I can help others but re-vamping this Single Adult Program is going to be quite the challenge. Just to give you a little snap shot of what I am going into: there are over 820 Single Adults in my stake alone. I have recently become acquainted with the leaders in the three surrounding stakes and learned their process, for better or worse, and have come to understand that they get maybe 20 people out to the activities and maybe 30 to the "dances." So let's do a little math here...say there are on average 700 single adults per stake (ours has 820). 700 x 4 = 2800 people. If 20 people show up per activity that's only 0.714% of your targeted group. If your budget is something like $1,500 per stake, $1,500 x 4 = $6,000 total which doesn't sound crazy if you have even a quarter of the people show up to activities. But the same group of 20-30 people show up every month (yes, they do a minimum of one quad-stake activity a month!) which is less than 1% of the people you are supposed to be serving; that means you're spending on average $240 a year per person.
Spending an exorbitant amount of church funds on entertaining a small group of people is no okay in my book.
It's now the next night...
I went to a meeting earlier tonight with the leadership of the SA Program and it just becomes more and more apparent that this one of the reasons I needed to be back in St. Louis. As much as I would like to not be single I am making the most of the situation and am very happy that I am in a position where I can help rebuild this program and hopefully make a little impact in some people's lives...as painful, time consuming, challenging, and frustrating this is going to be.
It's the next night again....I keep on falling asleep while I'm trying to finish this post.
Anyhoo earlier I had a little mini-WashU reunion at SubZero Vodka Bar. The food was mediocre but the company was great. I then met up with some other friends and watched Avengers at the Science Center. I forgot how awesome movies are when they are big! I think I have a hard time suspending belief enough to enjoy movies especially if there are a lot of holes in the plot or technically things are not congruent. Soooo...I am going to work on that because there are a lot of movies that I have enjoyed for purely entertainment purposes because I had no expectations of splendor. I think I also get annoyed with seeing the same actors and actresses whose characters I can't buy because I cannot get over their public persona.
I'm falling asleep again so I'm just going to post this as is. Whateve's.
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