I’ve been busy this week working on a website redesign project. I finally got to the point where all the components are working with each other, and now I’m importing the content from the old site. It’s very exciting.

I love code. There are times when I am so stressed because something is not doing what I want it to, but after I fix it, I think back and realize there was this rush amidst the stress. It fascinates me how letters, numbers, and characters translate into patterns and colors.

Call me weird, but I love typing – the clicking of the keys beneath my fingers. When choosing a new keyboard, I’m very particular. The keys can’t be too quiet, else I’d unconsciously hit the keys harder, trying to obtain that reassuring clicking sound. So what I love about webdesign is how much of it involves typing. Photoshop is one thing, but there is something geekishly fun about opening up notepad to solve a problem in the layout.

So, due to the fact that I was tied up with this project all week, I haven’t read many blogs, but the following are my favorite posts, in chronological order.

–>Blame Monopoly! @ i pick up pennies

–>Jesus Tree @ Desiring God Blog

–>I’m Still Learning What Not to Wear @ (In)Courage

–>The Homemakers Haven: Thinking of Mary @ A High And Noble Calling

–>Making Much of the Teacup @ Tea & Cookies

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I ran across a lot of good blogs this week, and know I read some really good posts, but now that I look for them, I can’t seem to find them. Had I known I wanted to make this post, I would’ve starred them in my reader or added them to Delicious. I should do that regularly anyway. Well, anyway, here are my favorite posts from the week:

Christmas
1913 Christmas Card @ Bell Whistle Moon
Advent: Standing in the Middle @ Desiring God Blog
Free “A Christmas Carol” Audio Book @ The Freebie Blogger
Simplifying Christmas @ A High and Noble Calling

Other (for lack of a better category)
Fellowship Matters (or… does it?) @ Reflection of the Times
Should We Lie to Our Spouse? @ Life’s a Peach
Truth and Culture @ Lyrical Theology

Have a wonderful weekend everybody, especially those of you who have to work.

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Dalits are on the lowest rung in the Hindu caste system, which was put into place 3,000 years ago. The Indian constitution outlaws the caste system, but just as with racism here in the States, it still exists and the result is still visible.

They are considered less than human in their society and are forced to live separate and not participate in social life, and are thus banned from schools and temples. The occupations they hold are those considered ritually impure, such as street sweeping, latrine cleaning, and disposing of dead bodies.

“Every hour, two Dalits are assaulted, three Dalit women raped, two Dalits murdered and two Dalit houses burned, according to the Human Rights Education Movement of India, yet only one percent of those who commit crimes against Dalits are ever convicted” – GFA Dalit Facts They are the majority of people you will find living in the slums of India. You can read more about them here.

They seem to be a people without hope, but this is not true because God loves them and values them. Gospel for Asia has a ministry devoted to helping the Dalits. GFA is touching the Untouchables by teaching the adults to read, giving the children an education, and planting churches. Plus Dalits are standing up for themselves and speaking out for their own rights, including Meira Kumar, who is not only the first woman to be elected to the Indian Parliment, but also the first Dalit.

I don’t want to sound like an infomercial, even though all the information contained within was obtained from GFA or Wikipedia. I
was not compensated in any way for this post. I just wanted to raise awareness about an oppressed people group that have been heavy on my heart.  When I heard that today was Human Rights Day, and that the focus this year is anti-discrimination, the Dalits immediately came to mind.  If you want to support GFA in their ministry to the Dalits, you can make a one-time donation or by sponsoring a Dalit child through their Bridge of Hope program, where they provide children with education, nutrition, and medical care.

If anyone knows any non-monetary ways of helping, such as letter-writing, please comment so myself and others can know. Let’s put an end to the discrimination that the Dalits face every day due to unethical social structure in India, Sri Lanka, Nepal and elsewhere.

Note: The pictures contained within this post are not necessarily of Dalits, but any that were tagged with “India” and “Poverty” on stock.xchng

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The theme at Heads or Tails this week is “one” or “won.” I want to make ONE change to my lifestyle this week.

I occasionally dabble in eating healthy. I got a free book on eating fiber and I have made a few green smoothies in my lifetime. It’s hard, because one, fresh food never stays that way in my house for long. I’ll buy fruits and vegetables and then forget about them. Two, my husband is picky and anti-healthy. He wants red meat, greasy foods (everything fried with lots of butter), and white bread. The only salad he likes is Caesar. There is hope, as he does like broccoli and spinach (when fully cooked). He will buy whole-grain white but won’t eat the chunky wheat bread that I like.

My problem is that I lose focus too easily. I need to make one small change at a time and stick to it. I usually go gung-ho on something then desert it after a week or two.

I was going to make exercise the change this week. I won in the marriage department because my awesome hubby modified one of the Dance Dance Revolution pads to be more sturdy. The soft home pads slide around while dancing and sometimes lose response. DH cut up old closet doors and used duct tape, rug tape, and a plastic roll of something he got from Walmart (not sure what it’s called). It’s now easier to use and more like the arcade version. Of course, one advantage of the home version is that the sliding makes you work harder, so when you go to the arcade and play the real thing, you dance like a pro. That is no longer relevant, as I don’t frequent arcades anymore.

I want to utilize DDR for an indoor exercise option. We bought me a bike several weeks ago, but then found it’s not as easy as we thought it’d be to fix DH’s bike. We are still waiting until the local bike store has the necessary part in stock. There is a pool in our apartment complex, but it’s too cold for that, so DDR will have to do. There is a workout mode even.

However, I’m sick and DH is fighting sickness, so I think this week, our one change this week will be in the eating more greens category, which is most easily accomplished with green smoothies. If you can consider having to clean the blender every day easy. At least all parts are dishwasher safe.

The first step towards green smoothies, though, is getting to the store and buying fresh spinach and anything else we might want in our smoothies. Being sick, that doesn’t sound too exciting right now. I am going to be dragging myself to class tonight, so I can drag myself to the store tomorrow, right? Especially when it’s for a good cause (getting better) as opposed to class (review night – booooring).

Here’s to healthy living!

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I only do light decorating, and it’s all centralized in the living room, save for some poinsettias I stuck in the bunk couch in the den because I didn’t know what else to do with them and didn’t want to put them back in the box.  There are also two smaller trees: one in the dining area and one on the tv.  I hung blue lights around our living room window and the kitchen divider and put a basket of apple spice potpourri under the big tree.  Overall, it seems to fit us.  I wouldn’t be up for much more, since it takes so long to unwrap all the ornaments and unfold the branches.  Yes, I have an artificial tree.  It’s too messy and expensive to have a real tree.  We have pine Febreze to “make up” for it.

Prayer

I don’t have any particular devotionals or activities that me and my husband do to keep focused on the true meaning of the season.  At the same time, there isn’t a lot of hustle and bustle to distract us either.  I purposefully don’t overdecorate, not only because I don’t have the patience for it, but I don’t see a good reason for it.  This helps us stay focused.  We celebrate lightly and sometimes we forget it’s even the holidays (is that too much on the other end of the spectrum?).  Besides the trees, our lives aren’t that much difference in December that the rest of the year, except there might be a bit more Christmas music playing.

I’ve also just been introduced to advent this year.  I’ve always thought it was a Catholic thing, but when my church set out candles I decided to research it.  I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s a good thing – the holiday solution I have been searching for to make Christmas more than the commercialized holiday it’s become.  We don’t celebrate advent at home, but we do enjoy the readings they do at church.

Prioritize

I don’t struggle to stay focused on the important things during the holiday season anymore than during the rest of the year, which is plenty.  There is always something fighting for my attention, and so far December’s actually been easier than November since I was laid off last month.  I prioritize by making lists per category of things to be done (blog, kitchen, house, etc) and then compiling the most pressing into a daily to do list.  I have a tendency to want to incorporate a schedule into the list, but I know I won’t stick to it, and I get discouraged when I don’t.  Plus it’s much more satisfying to be able to go through the physical action of crossing something off my list than to simply notice I accomplished a task in the time I estimated.

Planning

“This time of year usually calls for extra baking, holiday shopping, party planning, and gift wrapping.”

I’m not much of a baker because cooking takes up enough time as it is.  If we want dessert, we buy ice cream, but I try to discourage that and stick to healthier snacks instead.

I finished most of my shopping on Black Friday.  I just need something for my husband, and I’m going to wait until the last minute for that, unless someone has any good hiding tips.

We aren’t throwing any parties, so that just leaves gift wrapping.  I do want to do that soon, to make our tree look more Christmas-y.  We’ll probably do that tonight, as we probably won’t have time again until Saturday.  Plus there is a movie we need to mail for Swapadvd so we can wrap that at the same time.

Progress

The small project I will be tackling this week is cleaning the kitchen.  I’m really bad at keeping track of food in the fridge, so there is probably a lot of stuff that needs to be thrown out.  At least my husband already took care of the vegetable drawer last week while I was sick.  I want us to eat healthy so I buy fruits and veggies, but then we just end up eating quesadillas or out of cans.   Now that I’m home more, I should work on cooking real meals for the sake of health and frugality.

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I completely redesigned my blog and moved it over to Word Press. I love Google, so it was hard to leave Blogger, but there is so much more freedom with WP, and since I have my own hosting, I might as well actually use it rather than just have the domain pointing to my blogspot address.

I hope you all enjoy this new layout. I do plan to start blogging regularly. I don’t know how many times I’ve said this, but I’m unemployed so this time I mean it.

Things have also been moving along nicely with a project I’m working on. I’m almost to the tedious task of transferring over all the content (i’m building it on WP, and the old site is on Joomla), but hopefully it will be as easy as it was to move from Blogger to here.

Class tonight, so now I must return to reading the textbook.

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Why…

1. Do people complain about christmas music/decorations before thanksgiving?
I welcome it if it’s something I would like after thanksgiving, such as the music and eggnog. I’m never a fan of oversized baubles or blowup snowman or santa. But I love the greenery and listen to christmas music all year long.

2. Do people throw such a fit over people saying “happy holidays”?
I understand not everyone celebrates christmas. Even if everyone did, thanksgiving and new years are holidays that should be happy too.

3. Does calling christmas christmas even change that it’s been totally/commercialized?
I think many christians don’t have a problem with all the materialism as long as it’s called christmas.

4. Do people stress the true meaning of christmas?
What defines truth? This winter holiday is ever evolving, in name, practice, and all included in that. The Bible is the first way to find Truth. But what about for man-made traditions? At what point do we look to for the true meaning? Seems everyone starts at the part they like, be it christ’s birth or kindness to others.

5. Do christians fight so hard for christmas and nativity?
If christmas is about presents and the nativity scene is missing from public displays, does that change the fact that the Messiah did arrive? The nativity scene is inaccurate anyway. Aren’t there other things more worth fighting for?

6. Do protestants celbrate advent?
I thought it was a catholic thing. I’ll have to look into that this year. Maybe it’s a substitution/supplement to keep religion in our December festivities.

7. Is there no War on Easter?
I think that’s the most important holiday of the Christian religion. Anyone can be born, but only One died for our sins and rose again to sit at the right hand of the Father forever.

Thoughts?

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How to Be an Obsessive Fanatic
Author:Becky Grove
Date completed: October 7, 2002

When it’s your birthday, no one ever knows what to give you. You are being featured in something, but the writer — a close friend — doesn’t know what to put under “interests.” Is any of this sounding familiar? Then this is just what you should be reading. Sure, you have lots of interests, but no one ever seems to know what they are. This is because you don’t show it; you aren’t that enthusiastic about it. Reading this will help you show the world your love, because everyone has to be obsessive about at least one thing.

Before you start you need to choose something to obsess about. It can be practically anything, such as movies, music groups, singers, bands, TV shows, actor/actresses, or books. To make things simple, I am going to be talking about movie obsessions, but these steps apply to anything. When choosing a movie, make sure it’s a movie that you already love, or else it won’t be fun. Once you choose a movie its time to start on the journey to obsession.

The first and most obvious step is to watch the movie repeatedly. If you get an eye roll from someone around you when you turn on the movie for the hundredth time, then good job; you are on your way to obsession. One very important part is that you must own, if nothing else, a copy of the movie. The DVD, if available, is most desirable because of the special features. It is good to have a back-up copy on video just in case you lose your first video or the DVD, or if you leave it at someone else’s house. The back up copy can be something that you taped off the TV since it’s only going to be used in case of emergencies.

When just watching the movie doesn’t satisfy you anymore it is time to move on to the second step. The second step is to go online. There is a lot to do on the Internet, but at this point you are only doing two. One is to find all the pictures you can of scenes and actors from the movie and, print these out, set them as your computer’s wallpaper and screensaver, and save them for later use. Put the pictures you printed out in your notebook, on your walls, or wherever you would like them. The other is to find out all the information you can on the movie. This includes the names of all the actors, the other movies they were in, and official and fan web sites. Also, if it’s not included on the DVD, find out about bloopers, background information, and comments of fans or the director. List and print out everything you found. Save the links on your computer for future reference.

The third step is to buy the movie’s products. There are three different sets of merchandise to buy from. These are electronics, apparel, and miscellaneous. Electronics consists of copies of other movies the actors have been in, the soundtrack, and games that have been made from the movie, if any. Apparel consists of clothes, jewelry, buttons, patches, and backpacks. Miscellaneous consists of commodities to put in your car or room, such as: dolls, stickers, stuffed animals, board games, and key chains. Note from modern-day Becky: haha i’m such a girl. What about action figures and whatever else fanboys get?? Guess that falls under dolls… Some movies have a fourth set, which consists of trading cards. You should get these if the movie does offer them. They offer amusement and fun facts.

The fourth step is to attempt contact. Enter all the contests and sweepstakes you can that involve the movie. Be on the look out for local events involving actors from the movie. These two does not guarantee contact, but writing letters does. Write letters to the actors, and request an autograph. Since you are in the mood for writing letters, then write letters to the company (Disney, Columbia, etc.) asking for them to release the director’s cut of the movie.

The fifth and final step is to share your fondness of the movie. You do this by making web sites, screen names, and email addresses that has to do with the movie. Use the pictures and information from step two for your web sites. You also do this by joining numerous fan clubs, online groups, mailing lists, message boards, and street teams. That way, you can talk about the movie all the time with others who love it.

Now that you are an official obsessive fanatic there are some rules you need to follow. Those are to keep executing all that you learned, and make sure you annoy your friends and family by sleeping, eating, and breathing your obsession. You’re not going to get just gift certificates now that people know what you like.

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On top of salary, we get free rent and utilities. Medical insurance for $10/pay period. I’m not quite sure on the details of that, like if or how I would be covered. An additional $10? Full price? I have possible coverage I’m not even using at work. My boss will cover a portion. I don’t have a lot of motivation to search for a plan when I have a pretty good, free one through my mom. Even though i’m not a dependent, so i really should get my own.

There’s been some confusion about what the apartment is, because Nathaniel’s friend used to work/live there, and said it’sa 3bdrm. His boss called it a 2 with a walk-in closet. We have it figured out that the latter is correct, but the closet has been converted into a bedroom. I don’t know how that works, but I don’t care. Our current place is a spacious 1bdrm with a walk-in closet and i’ve gotten really attached and don’t want to go back to a broom closet.

We can have pets here! There is a white cat that has been following Nathaniel around at the property he’s currently at. He says that he’s been getting complaints from the residents about it meowing at their doors all the time. He keeps asking if he can keep it. I’m down as long as he is POSITIVE it doesn’t belong to anyone. How sad would that be if we took someone else’s pet. He says he is sure it’s a stray/abandoned. I also want to go to the pet store and see if this one beautiful gray Lynx/Siamese cat named Kiki is still there. We were there looking at rats and didn’t even know there was a cat shelter there, but there he was, staring at us with his big blue eyes and it was love at first site. We are also going to get a rat, which i’m most excited about.

So i’m not sure when we are moving in, just some time next month. Once that happens, our only regular expenses would be gas and groceries. We are going to upgrade our car insurance from the state minimum, but besides that, we’ll still be trying to live frugally to build up savings because we have no emergency funds or anything. Although we know that if something were to happen, the Lord will provide, and we have a spare credit card. ^__^

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