Thursday, January 31, 2008

My Chaos

Big decisions need to be made by tomorrow.


Oh joy...









...not so much.


Monday, January 21, 2008

A Storm's A Brewin'

I know I should be worried, but right now I'm just not. I can't explain it. I feel like the disciples on the boat with Jesus, and while he was asleep, a great storm came and the disciples feared for their very lives.

There is a storm going on all around me. No money. No Job. No direction. And some days I freak out like the disciples and cry out to God: "Master! Master! I'm going to drown!", hanging on for dear life. And other days, like today, I'm just kinda here. I don't feel peaceful. But I know that it's out of my control. I can't force people to hire me. I can't force money to fall into my lap. I can't force anything. God knows what's going on. He is not asleep. He knows.

"Where is your faith?"
Luke 8:25a

Monday, January 14, 2008

30 things I miss about home

Tiana and I were sitting on the couch discussing things that we missed about home, so I decided to write them down.


1)Aladdins Eatery- I could really go for a chicken chili with feta and Cheddar, chicken mishwi salad, or kafta plate

2)Chipotle (or Mexican food in General)- Chicken burrito, umm umm good, or any number of other Mexican foods that I miss so much

3)Teresa's Pizza, Rascal House, Papa Johns (or any pizza place) - Buffalo wings, Large and X-Large pizzas (that are actually large) with tons of cheese and toppings and cheezy bread

4)Fridays & Applebees - good food at a lower prices, great atmosphere, i miss i miss!

5)Olive Garden, Macaroni Grill - Calamari, the real kind and yummy Italian food!

6)Coldstone Creamery - because it's just genius. Ice cream hand mixed with cake and brownie and other goodness. You can't lose.

7)Egg Nog-There's none to be found here

8)Hunan East, Lee Wah's, and even Amazing Wok Chinese Food - cause Chinese food in NZ is just gross.

9)Bombay Sitar - the best Indian food that I've ever had

10)Grums- The best subs. Ever. Jimmy Johns is pretty good too.

11)Wings and fried chicken places. KFC, Popeyes, Mr. Chicken, BW3's, Whitmores... Nuff Said.

12)Birthday Cakes. Cream cheese icing or normal butter cream icing. Yum...NOT Sponge cake like here in NZ! Yuck!

13)Yellow Cheddar cheese, and monteray jack, colby, peper jack, etc cheeses that don't exist here.

14)A & W cream soda and root beer, for floats and overall goodness.

15) Canada Dry Ginger Ale, and Clearly Canadian flavored water.

16)Ice Cream sandwiches

17)Starbucks on every corner, seriously

18)Bookstores- Barnes and Noble, Borders, with a cafe inside

19)Movie Theaters and $1 movies - I never knew how good we had it until I paid $15nzd here.

20)I miss my DVD player and Record exchange discount movies, and Region 1 films

21)Libraries where you can rent movies and books and music for FREE

22)Apartments that automatically come with refrigerators and washing and drying machines/facilities, and heaters

23)Current seasons of TV shows- I sick of being 6 months behind America, not that I watched much TV at home

24)Unlimited Broadband

25)Free Mobile to Mobile calling and free nights and weekends--oh, and being able to use my cell phone

26)Driving on the right side of the road, and the wheel being on the left side of the car

27)My art pieces and my easel

28)My Nintendo 64

29)My Keyboard

30)My Bed- so soft and comfortable


So yeah. There's a lot I miss about home. There's tons more I can add. However, when I go home, they'll be a lot I'll miss about New Zealand too. Go figure.

Sunday, January 06, 2008

Freedom!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I finished working at The Warehouse yesterday. I am extremely happy. I, well...um...hated it. Completely. There is nothing that I can think of that I will miss...except, perhaps, the paycheck, though since I only worked Saturdays and some Wednesdays, there isn't much of a paycheck to miss.

I don't get it. People were annoyed when I said that I didn't like my job, but they're the ones who asked me how I liked it. What was I supposed to do, lie? I was thankful for having a job, but c'mon! As if I was supposed to LOVE standing on my feet for 9 hours with one half hour lunch, and 2 unevenly spaced and sometimes forgotten 15 minute breaks! As if I'm supposed to love the monotonous job of scanning item after item and dealing with crabby customer after crabby customer and the questions of "Where are you from?," "Do you like America or New Zealand better?", and, "Are you staying forever?" about every 5 mins, which, I must say, after being here for 8 months, gets kinda old. And my "supervisors" who, if I so much as breathed an extra breath, tell me to "get back to work" or "look busy" no matter if the customer I was serving just left .000000001 seconds ago, or if I'm trying to help a lost child get to someone with an intercom..a.k.a. one of the supervisors. Ha!

People try to tell me that my job isn't that bad. Well, it ain't that good either. It just means that the person who's telling me this has a higher enjoyment for this kind of work. Or that working at the Warehouse is 1mm up from worse work. Or it probably also means that they're not working the job that I am so it's all talk. Hmm...

I've come to realize that I don't like working in retail. It's not particular stores, or stores in a particular country, it's just the retail. In fact, I don't like retail or office jobs. I like art. I want to do art. Is that so hard to understand? My mind isn't mentally stimulated in retail work, and most office work is incredibly dull to me. I'm an artist!! Too much time spent on the left side of the brain could easily kill me! But I figure, in choosing between finding another retail job, and doing temp work in an office--they're both horrible, but temp work tends to pay more. So temping, here I go.


I'm broke. Under $100 left on my credit card, barely any money in the bank, and bill after bill due. I'm up a creek. Whatever that means. Anyway...prayer please.


But God is still good.