News

1.) I bought a GRE book for the old test. I have not opened it yet. I also ordered flash cards online. They are not here yet.

2.) I have not registered for the test yet, although I have looked up test dates and I can either take it in town on July 19th, or two hours away on July 21st.

3.) I have not registered for a prep class yet, but I looked up the class options and one starts meeting once a week beginning next Tuesday and meets through July 19th, and the other doesn't start until the end of June, and meets twice a week until July 12th.The class is very expensive, but I believe necessary.

DILEMMA: My friend is having a baby out of state (Utah) and I am 100% committed to being there when the baby is born. The baby is due at the end of June/beginning of July and will be born naturally (hopefully) without an induction, so it could come at any time. If I have class twice a week, it's highly likely I will miss multiple meetings of the [very expensive and very short] class. If I take the other class (which meets once a week), I will have to begin it basically, uh... NOW, and if I took the exam in town, I would miss the last class because I would be taking the exam. Alternatively, I could complete the entire course and then take the exam out of town, 2 hours away on the 21st of July.

CONCLUSION: All of this freaks me out very much and it is all happening very fast for Emily and I don't know if I am ready for it. But I don't really have time to think it over. I have to JUMP if I want to do this before the test changes.

ONE MORE TIME: How do I know if I am ready for this?

More Options...!

I was talking on the phone with my friend Carmen yesterday and she started giving me a pep talk about the things I am capable of. I pretty much tuned it out. I really wanted to hear it, and I was trying to hear it, but I just couldn't "hear it." I don't know how to explain it any other way. The same thing happens when the therapist tries to validate everything that happened with Matt. (That it really was a horrible, terrible thing, and a HUGE deal. Sometimes I fall into self-doubt about this. Some days that sounds crazy [that it wasn't a big deal], other days, I wonder if I am playing the victim... I really need to be validated that it was a bad thing. Too many people told me to just pick up and move on but the experience was so traumatizing I can't. So hearing those words ["move on"] essentially just gave me more issues. Fantastic.)  I just can't hear it, or it doesn't sink in, or it goes in one ear and out the other. I really, really want and need to hear what everyone has to say to me, but it just doesn't go in somehow. Does that make sense?

Anyway, she was saying that as long as she has known me (10 years this fall) that I have always been doing and saying and making plans to do random and crazy and impossible things and then just doing them. That I'm a planner and I just make things happen. That with everything that has happened the last six years I have been progressively been beat down, but that I still stayed on top of it all, until it came to this. But she knows that I can still do it. I wish I could hear her say it again so I could really "hear" it.

After talking to her about school and stuff, and hearing about her plans to move to Philadelphia in just three months for her Master's in Public Health, I tried looking at schools again. This time it occurred to me to simply Google "masters, conflict dispute resolution."

I am so dumb.

Why did I not do this in the first place?

I thought Oregon was the only school with a program like this, and from looking at schools individually, it seemed like that was accurate. I was SO WRONG.

Here are some of the schools that have some form of Conflict & Dispute Resolution or Peace Studies Programs:

CA-Pepperdine

CO-University of Denver

DC-Georgetown University

GA-Kennesaw State University

HI-University of Hawaii Manoa

MA-University of Massachusetts Boston

MD-Salisbury University

MD-University of Baltimore

MI-Wayne State University

MO-University of Missouri

NC-UNC Greensboro

NJ-Montclair State University

NY-Columbia University

OR-Portland State University

OR-University of Oregon

TX-Southern Methodist University

UT-Utah State University

VA-George Mason University

WI-Marquette University

 
University of Notre Dame
Graduate School
Peace Studies


California State University Northridge
Mediation and Conflict Resolution


University of San Diego

Master of Arts in Peace and Justice Studies

Eastern Mennonite University

Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - Graduate Program

Harrisonburg , VA , 22802

George Washington University,The

 Master's Internationalist Program in the Peace Corps


 Columbia College Of South Carolina 
Master of Arts in Human Behavior and Conflict Management

New York University

Graduate School of Arts and Science

Program in Trauma and Violence Transdisciplinary Studies ----> I thought this was really interesting, and relevant. George Washington University,The

School of Public Health and Health Services

Graduate School

 
Arcadia University
Peace Studies
Glenside, PA


Champlain College
Graduate Studies

Master of Science in Mediation & Applied Conflict Studies

 Duke University
Masters degree
International Development Policy
Peace and Conflict Resolution  



WOW. Just... WOW. A lot, of at least some of the schools, particularly on the east coast focus on GLOBAL or international peacekeeping, which would not be my focus of interest. I found my interest synthesized best here:

Finally, you may want to obtain a master in conflict resolution if you work with social services or the family court system. In many instances, mediation is the preferred first step toward resolving issues in family court cases in order to avoid tying up courtroom time. Many individuals with a masters in conflict management also become members of, and certified by, the American Arbitration Association.

Best of all, did you see it? I checked those darn Colorado schools over and over and over again for a reason for me to go there without success. But I missed one. And apparently, it's the most prestigious one.  UNIVERSITY OF DENVER, Conflict Dispute Resolution Institute offering a Master of Arts program... You can read about just how flippin' awesome DU appears to be, (and how insanely competitive, even though I had never heard of it) right over HERE.  It also happens to be the oldest college in Colorado and in my opinion the most beautiful. It's the college experience I never had and always wanted. What a gorgeous old campus. And a big fancy school. It's a private school, but it's non-profit. I think it just officially became my dream school.  



...But how am I ever going to get there with my undergraduate GPA. looming behind me? Let me tell you, it's not good.  All of the schools also require some type of testing as well, but it varies. Some of the schools will take my old LSAT score, which is fine. But DU, and many of the other schools are going to require that I take the GRE. Which in the past has totally freaked me out. (That thing has MATH on it!)  It's the combination of my undergrad GPA and my GRE score that are going to get me into school here. Like I said, my GPA is nothing to brag about;  overall undergrad GPA was 2.889, with my upper division GPA coming in at 3.1 or 3.01, I forget.  Not impressive for graduate school. My high school GPA was 2.89... Sadly consistent.  I wish I could go back and care about grades... I always just did what needed to be done to get things done. The only classes I really tried in were Math- and that's because I was TERRIBLE at it. I worked really hard for C's, maybe a few B's, and definitely one A in a remedial Pre-Algebra class I "tested" into even though I had already passed Pre-Alg in junior high just fine. (Always my weak point. I'll pass the class and fail the placement exam every time. Did the same thing when I went to college. Back to Pre-Alg! WTFreak? I passed Geometry and Advanced Algebra just fine people, stop giving me placement tests and I'll stop failing them!) So, given my GPA, this means I'm going to need a fantastic GRE score... or go to a school that will take my LSAT score, like University of Oregon. The GRE really intimidates me and is a huge amount of work, commitment on top of my already crazy schedule and let's face it, mental problems. lol I would have to start working on it soon too, like, now. Scary.


For those of you that have taken the GRE, or had spouses or close friends take the GRE... how has it gone? What's your advice or recommendations about it? The test will be changing as of August and they will be making dramatic changes. I read an excerpt about it in a Princeton Review book and they flat out did not have nice things to say about it.  They don't think it has been done well, or sufficiently tested, and the exam has been lengthened from 2.5 hours to 3 hours, 40 minutes. Sort of a dramatic difference. They've also changed the scoring. From a 1600 total  point scale it will go to a 170 total point scale. (Huh?) So now I'm in a bit of a straight... Do I test in the middle of July under the sturdy old testing system,  meaning I have approximately 6-7 weeks to prepare? Or do I have faith in the new test, and can test in, say, September or October. 


Which is the right choice?


And again, is this the right choice for me?


Gotta say again, finding the U of Denver thing was SUPER exciting... That the school was so beautiful and historical... it was just everything I wanted was amazing. But the average undergraduate applicant (coming in from HS) is in the top 25% of their class. That was definitely not Emily. I need a GRE that dazzles... Can I do that in July? Can I do that at all?  If I take the GRE I have more choices in schools to apply to... But it's alot more for me to take on. And is this the right path? Now I feel maybe like Oregon is where I'm supposed to go. But is that because I've been working on trying to give up the CO idea? Or because I want to be by my Mom?


I can't even tell you how annoying it is to be an insecure, wishy-washy, freaked out person after never having been that way. I don't feel confidant in myself or my abilities anymore,  especially my decision making abilities and I need a lot of reassurance. (This is the therapy kicking in here.) I'm so grateful for therapy for helping me recognize this change in myself, and of course I understand that after such a huge shock and deception such as my experience with Matt, questioning my judgement now is only natural. It will take time for me to trust myself again. But right now, I need a lot of feedback and just, well, help. But where do I get that help outside of this blog?


For some reason I haven't wanted to talk about this much with the friends and family I do usually speak to on a regular basis, which is odd. I've just been talking about it here. Apparently, you are a privileged bunch. My dad, whom I am really close to and talk to just about every other day or so, doesn't know anything about it.

My First Fusion Video

For the last couple of months I have been secretly filming clients on and off with mixed success in the hopes of being able to begin making fusion videos.  A Fusion Video is a combination of still photography and short video clips, typically set to music. It is just beginning to become "the new thing" in wedding and portrait photography. I love doing slideshows on my website, but they are a TON of work because I really do sit there and figure out what order I want the pictures to be in the slideshow, and at what points in the music do I want this slide to be showing up, etc. (It's a sickness, lol).  You can see how doing video would make this much harder!

After practicing shooting video in manual, meaning, manually exposing the video like you would a film camera, setting for aperture and shutter speed, ISO, white balance, etc during these live sessions, WHILE simultaneously shooting my photography stills (seriously, I was shooting on two different cameras, sometimes one on each hand holding down buttons at the same time!) I finally got some footage that was cute enough to use and incorporate into a fusion video. I had some other footage from an engagement session I did awhile back, but the groom kept LOOKING AT ME. He drove me crazy. He just stared at me. I have a million shots of his bride looking loving at him, and him looking at me like a deer in a headlights because he was so self conscious of the camera. By far the worst subject I had ever had in 6 years of doing this. I would have 2 seconds of cute video, and then he would look at me like he was dying and ask if we were done yet. It was terrible.

Anyway. I would love and appreciate it if you would all head over to my work blog and check out the video I made and leave some nice feedback for the couple! I guess the groom is pretty embarrassed about being filmed (LOL) even though I think he looks great, and I of course would love to have some feedback too! I did a bad thing in posting this video on a Friday afternoon of a holiday weekend because no one has seen the video! They are all out of town! I am trying to figure out how to repost it on Tuesday when everyone comes back...

Here's the link! I would so appreciate it! Thank you!  http://eheizerphotography.blogspot.com/2011/05/bless-rain-mike-sara.html

I am not alone (and you are not either.)

I have therapy in the morning and it has me reflecting on last week's session. After 8 months of weekly therapy my therapist finally disclosed something personal about herself/her family. Her husband's grandmother was in my position. She was married to a man who used to go away on "business trips" for periods of time. In reality, he was going off to be with his other family. He had two families, two wives, two homes. Neither had any idea. She didn't tell me any more than that except that it wasn't the wife's fault. There was something wrong with the husband.

We also talked alot about what could be wrong with Matt, including several personality disorders. I may talk about that another time. Right now I want to talk about US.

Driving home from that appointment, for the first time since I found out the truth about Matt, I felt lucky. Over and over again people have told me,

"Well, at least you're not pregnant."

 "At least you didn't get married."

"You should be happy it didn't go further."

And I never felt grateful, or glad or relieved about any of those things. I just felt so terrible and awful about what had happened. I felt cheated out of the children I thought we were going to have and the wedding and marriage and life I had planned with him. Driving home after that session, for the first time ever, thinking about that woman who had been in my shoes, and had even lived my life further than I had, marrying him, carrying his children, living in his home... I finally felt LUCKY. I felt so relieved that I hadn't lived that. That I hadn't had gotten pregnant, or had babies or married him, or shared a home. I felt so lucky. For the first time. The first time in all these months. It didn't matter how many times people grabbed me and told me I was lucky; I didn't care, I didn't believe it. Hearing her story, hearing about someone, finally, someone like me, in my shoes, I felt the connection between us that I had been longing for and I got it. Without hearing any emotion on the part of my therapist, who merely conveyed a couple of sentences of fact; I could fill in the story with my own emotions and that woman's pain. I knew how she must have felt. I knew her pain. And I felt so blessed that I had found out the truth about Matt before it was too late for me. And I cried...

For one of the first times since August, I wasn't alone. Even if I was only hearing someone else's story, someone else who probably wasn't even alive anymore... I wasn't alone. Other women have stood with me, and that provided enormous comfort. There is no support group for women like me at Kaiser or at the women's shelter. Hearing this story or one's like it is all I get. And there aren't many. In fact, there are just about none.

On this blog, more than one woman has reached out to me and said that they experienced things similar to what I have gone through. Most of you have not gone into any detail as to what happened to you. If you can, I would like to encourage you to share your stories in the comments (Feel free to leave them anonymously if you need to.) or to send me an email at auntyem4@yahoo.com . I share my story every day... Knowing I'm not alone... I can't tell you how much it helped. If there are more of us out there, it helps. It really does. Please share your story and what happened. Please.  It would mean so much, and HELP so much.

Thank you.

Wordless Wednesday: Laying down in Traffic

I recently went to Washington DC to photograph a wedding. The night before the big event, the couple and I went to Georgetown to do some portraits to get them out of the way before the wedding and I ended up laying down in the middle of the road with my head in traffic and the bride's sister ended up trying to hold her body out to protect me from being crushed to death, and once I stopped almost-dying to get the shot, the sister took these pictures of me with one of my spare cameras (which was set on manual focus unbeknownst to her, and she didn't know how to change it, lol, but I still think she did very well!). I really appreciate people taking pictures of me when I work because I don't have any record of me during this time of me as a photographer because I'm always behind the camera!

I like this first picture best because I don't look fat. :)

You can also see my hair, which I accidentaly dyed black and then un-dyed by washing my hair with PEROXIDE all day long before this shoot before lightening it to the below color. In the grocery store recently, I found out one of the dyes I used was RECALLED because the wrong dye had been put in the box and mislabeled! :-O

These pants are several sizes too big for me and they are constantly falling off me. So they are always sagging when I lift my arms too high. But they are so comfortable and they always fit right out of the dryer so I always keep them around.

Back to School

In order to get my $800 discount on my new Photoshop CS5 that I had to buy for my new laptop, I had to register for a college course. Last Monday at a few minutes after 7pm, I registered for Elementry German at the local community college/junior college. I've been wanting to take German for the last two years and haven't been able to get into the class and it's only offered fall term, but this time, ta-da! We shall see if I am able to cope being in such a group setting with my current problems. I have alot of anxiety about it at present but am trying not to think about it. I'd actually really rather take French because it would be much easier for me, as I took it in high school, but it's been so long, everything just seems vaugely familiar- a whisper and a song. I've longed to take up French again for several years as well. French however, is only offered on the main campus, where one must commute, purchase a parking permit, wander around on campus, the whole bit. German is taught off-site just around the corner from my house, across the street from the dog park actually, so no commute, no parking permit, no wandering around a big campus.

Hmmmm. Thoughts?

Meet me on Monday

1. What is your favorite bagel flavor?

When I nannyed for my first set of identical twins, Emily Nicole and Grace Kathleen, their mom used to buy Jalepeno bagels (not jalepeno cheese, and not the kind of jalepeno with the sliced rings all over the top- not tacky-ish... these were SOPHISTICATED Jalapeno bagels!) from somewhere that were SO GOOD! They were a little spicy, but not so spicy that the babies couldn't have them. I would toast it for them with real butter and OH MY was it SO GOOD. I still remember how good those were and I used to hope the girls wouldn't eat them so I could have them. SO GOOD. AH! I have looked high and low for those darn bagels but I have never been able to find them anywhere. I think they were Rayley's brand, but the Rayley's by my house doesn't carry them. I don't know if I have ever gone hunting for them at the Rayley's she used to shop at but maybe I should try that... It's been years and years... those babies are well through elementry school now, but WOW those suckers were GOOD!

**Edited to add** I used to like to take the butter and the cream cheese and mix it all together and then spread it on the bagel piping hot out of the toaster so it would all melt together and be nice and gooey. Because if you just put the cream cheese straight on there alot of times it still stays cold, but if you whip it together with the butter, the little fat moelcules spread out everywhere and the whole thing just melts and goo-i-fies. Oooooh, it is so good. Try it. It's naughty!

2. If you had an extra $100 right now, what would you spend it on?

I'm boring. I'm a money hoarder and I would put it in my bank account and save it, or put it towards bills or student loan debt.

3. What is the last thing that you felt guilt about doing?

I did a photoshoot in Livermore today, and on the way home I drove through Stockton, and I don't know if I am just blind and never noticed in the 100 other times I have driven through Stockton, or if it's new, but I noticed a KRISPY KREME sign as I was driving home on the freeway, and I got off at the next exit, flipped a U, got back on the freeway, and marched right in there and bought a piping hot box of a dozen glazed doughnuts. WHY DID I DO THAT?  The only other time or place I have had Krispy Kreme in my life is in Utah because we don't have a store in Sacramento anymore and I wasn't interested in it when it was here- I had never had one, so I thought the hullaballoo was ridiculous. Then my friend took me there a year ago and now we have a little problem. Because you know who is going to eat those 12 doughnuts? ME and THE DOG.

4. Soft serve ice cream or hand dipped?

I think soft serve. I like melty ice cream. Specifically, I like McDonald's cones. They are low fat (or claim to be) but they are just a nice vanilla flavor, and are so fatty and creamy and melty. They are delicious! When I have ice cream at home I am constantly pouring milk in it to make it runny.

Oddly enough, I prefer all ice cream to come in a cone, not a dish. This is probably why I like soft serve. Because if I have to put milk in it, I can't put it in a cone.

For the record though, I do enjoy ALL ice cream and will eat any and ALL offered to me.

5. Are you allergic to anything?

Yes.

Cleanliness.

Please guide me.

The last few years I have been so lost. Intermittently I have found my way, or thought I have begun to walk the right trail back to the road I'm supposed to be on, only to find myself lost in the woods again for one reason or another.

My biggest "hiking disaster" of course was while I was with Matt. We made lots of plans both together as a couple, and I made lots of plans based on the future I planned to have with him. I put things on hold, searched for employment around him, looked into schools around him...

Maybe the "higher purpose" was so I could have a longer break before going back to school. I don't know yet. I don't know why.

I have really had alot of pull to Colorado the last year without any real reason why. I've done as much research as I can and there aren't any graduate programs there that interest me. (Other than law school, which is not an option at the moment.) I've felt confused as to why I would feel such a strong draw to this place without any rhyme or reason other than I like it, so I looked at some apartments and houses online anyway, and they were just terrible. Awful, horrible little dumps. (Sorry, but it's true.) All of them were like that. I looked in several cities and they were all like that. It wasn't at all what I had pictured when I imagined the state and it really dimmed that light very quickly tonight. I want a better quality of life, not a worse one. Ick. (No doubt there are beautiful houses and safe, affordable neighborhoods Colorado, but I was not drawn to that for some reason, and for good purpose too. I need to move for school, and I can't find a program there right now...I don't need to be shown that right now, as much as I would like it.)

Which makes Oregon all the more easy to swallow. (Maybe that's why I had to be fixated on Colorado? So I could reject it and further embrace Oregon?) Being turned off by Colorado so suddenly made me much more interested in Oregon and made me more solidified with this plan of applying to their Conflict and Dispute Resolution program. But as I type this... I feel scared. I don't feel ready for lots of changes. Filling out an application sounds exciting right now (Filling out school applications is always fun, don't you think? lol) but, actually doing the work, and leaving my safety net here sounds... very scary at the moment. And right this second, I'm not ready to go. But I don't have to go right this second. (Breathe.) This would be a new life for me, and moving on. Not being stuck in the same place, doing the same thing anymore. Sacramento has given me alot, but... I'm not sure where it is I belong now.

What is my path?

30,000 Foot Freak Out

My trip to DC didn't exactly start out so hot. First of all, I spent the two hour drive from Sacramento to Reno crying hysterically and wishing I could drive into a tree or off a bridge. But I didn't because I "didn't have time." Seriously. That was the thought I had. I didn't have time to drive off a bridge because I would miss my flight. Right. About an hour into my drive I realized I hadn't been taking one of my anti-depressants (Celexa) which sort of cleared up as to why I was thinking those thoughts and why I was crying so much, and I started kicking myself because I didn't have that medication with me so I wouldn't be able to take it for the next six days either. Great. It's the only medication I take once a day so it's easier to forget... I'm back on it now, and luckily, I seemed to settle down once I was on the East Coast and I was careful about taking my other medications right on time, which I'm sure helped with my mood.

I had pretty much calmed down by the time I got the airport and really forgotten all about my break down in the car by the time I got on the plane, right up until they closed the cabin door and a man in his twenties with an ipod plopped down in the center seat beside me. (I was in the window). My whole body instantly tensed up. I began to shake. It had never occurred to be that I would have an issue with this or I would have to anticipate an issue with something like this. Before I knew it, I was trying to breathe my way through a full-out anxiety attack and trying to decide if I should make a run for it right now as the plane is starting to taxi down the runway with this man who is absolutely terrifying me sitting next me, brushing up against me, making me jump every time he touches me, making me feel dirty and disgusting... I feel so violated... just so dirty... I want to get away. I have to get away from him... Or if I can get through the next 15 minutes until we hit cruising altitude so I can ask the stewardess to reseat me on this completely full flight. I start frantically popping my head out of the top of my row to make sure there aren't any other empty seats while my chest starts heaving, trying to keep my crying as quiet as possible, trying to keep myself from just totally losing it.

Finally I pressed myself flat against the window, shuddering and crying until the the blessed seat belt sign clicked off, at which point I ordered him and the woman on the aisle seat out, threw myself out of the row and ran to the back of the plane where I burst into tears in front of the flight attendant, whom I'm sure probably thought the plane was being taken over by terrorists or something. But oh, no, it's just crazy Emily having a panic attack because she cant handle sitting next to a guy on a plane for 4 hours. I finally got the words out between all my chokey sobs (just like a little kid) and she just promptly fiddled around in the cupboards for a second and ordered me to "Drink this and Take this" and handed me a cup of clear fluid and some pills. I followed orders and stood in the back of the plane while the flight attendants talked over a private radio about what was going on, found someone to change into my old seat, moved my bags, came back to check on me, found my cup empty, refilled it, told me to drink it and once I did, said I should sleep the rest of the flight.

I had started to calm down about this time; I had been standing in the back of the plane with my head between my knees for about twenty minutes but I started to feel kind of woozy. It was about then that I realized that the flight attendant hadn't just given me any old drink. She'd gotten me drunk and drugged me. OH. That's what that stuff was. OOPS. The pills? Dramamine. The beverage? White wine. Tasted like flat 7up. How I spent the rest of the flight? Drunk and drugged.  Those flight attendants sure do know how to get hysterical passengers to sit down and hush up. Which I did. I spent the rest of the flight passed out in an aisle seat next to two little old ladies planning a trip to Turkey. When I came to HOURS later, the lady next to me leaned over, asked it I was okay and feeling better and chatted excitedly about her trip. I mostly forgot about the whole thing after that.

[shudders]

You can bet I was pretty darn careful about where I sat on the next three flights I took the rest of the way out there and then on the way back. (And carefully sniffed every other drink they gave me... lol Um, drinking alcohol was really not on my plan, nor am I supposed to consume it with all the medications I'm on anyway!)

Video Reunion with Charlie (Wordless Wednesday)

Charlie Brown Bagel sitting on the porch watching the hail.

A week ago I was in Washington DC shooting a wedding for a friend from high school's cousin. Since I was out of town for 6 days, my poor sweet doggie had to go to the kennel for that time. It was his first time being boarded. When I went to pick him up I put my purse and camera on the floor and taped our reunion! I knew he was going to wigg out when he saw me and BOY DID HE EVER. This also has to be the most embarrassing, unflattering, ugliest video of me ever and makes me feel so fat and I look TERRIBLE! UGH! What happened to me since Christmas? Anyway, try not to look at icky me and where I almost flash the camera, and look at my dorky doggie instead.

(Wordless Wednesday always needs an introduction!)

Pretty Pretty Please?

My photography business was nominated by several clients for a contest by a local news stations yearly "BEST OF" contest. I was nominated for "Best Photographer!" So exciting right! Well, the contest ends this weekend, and I am totally going to lose. lol Mostly because, I haven't marketed the contest like other people have. They are doing giveaways to get votes and individually emailing people and begging them to vote, and I don't like soliciting directly like that, or "paying" or bribing people to vote for me. BUT, I am totally fine with begging in a GENERAL sense on my blog!!! :D lol

SO, if you haven't already, would you PLEASE vote for me? You don't have to live locally here in Sacramento and I would SO appreciate it! I so won't win, but I would LOVE to be ranked, and I think you have to make it to the top 10 to be ranked. Spread the word, repost on Facebook, share on your blogs... anything you can think of! I would so appreciate it! My mom has been shameless! I don't feel like I can do it, but you can! lol

THANK YOU!

Meet me on Monday (Peanut Butta Freight Train)

 
1. Crunchy or smooth peanut butter?


I like both, and it kind of depends on what the purpose of the peanut butter is. To each just straight out of the jar, I like crunchy. It makes it more like a whole snack because you have to chew it. (I am VERY into chewing things. lol Okay, that's funny, but I swear I am not making a joke. Like, I could live on Slim Fast Shakes if I could chew some portion of the meal...)  When I cook with peanut butter is should be smooth, and I like smooth. I guess you could say that since I am a bonafide peanut butter lova, I am not picky and enjoy it in all forms. You know what would be a good idea? A peaut butter TASTING! We could have a peanut butter party and do a taste test of all the brands and kinds! OOOh! How fun would that be?!

...I think my peanut butter issues are starting to surface.

Here's a peanut butter pie recipe I know you are DYING to try. I went digging for this online after watching "The Joy Luck Club" one too many times and staring at that pie in that one scene... torture.

http://adventuresinemilyland.blogspot.com/2008/07/emily-is-posting-recipe.html
And here is my attempt at Java's (NGO) peanut butter eggs, or Reester Eggs, as I call them. I modified both recipes to my liking. :)

http://adventuresinemilyland.blogspot.com/2010/04/reester-eggs.html

2. What is your favorite color Rose?

Hmmmm. I guess it would depend on the bouquet. Roses really aren't my favorite flower (I love hydrangeas, lisianthus, peonies, rununculus, poppies, etc... FLUFFY flowers!) but I like them, and I would love to receive them. In FACT, I went to church in Virgina last week and they gave all the adult women roses. But the people I was staying with offered to take it back to the house to put it in water and I forgot about it and never saw it again. :( I only got to hold it for a couple minutes.

Oh, I feel sad now.

Oh, right, colors. Um... My favorite used to be the fallish colored ones- yellowish orange with the reddish tips... when I was a little girl I loved "sterling" which is the purple/lavender rose. Now... hmmm. I am having such a hard time! What colors do roses come in again?  Uhhh... Red is beautiful. I dunno, maybe the fall colored ones?
3. Do you remove your shoes when you walk into your home?

I flip 'em off across the room. Is that the same thing?
4. What is your favorite season?

Fall. It is the season of anticipation and new beginnings for me. Thats my favorite. I liked being teased with things to come I guess!
5. Approximately how many hours a day do you spend blogging?
Ugh, on my work blog, on the days I do blog, it can take me 4-6 hours to do a post. WHY? Because of the re-sizing of the images, applying the watermarks, creating iage storyboards in photoshop, sometimes touchups because stuff looks funny resized... redoing things because it doesn't work. Then after you finish the images, you upload them, and write the post (although I try to do it at the same time and usually do.) It's hours. It's a time suck for sure. Sometimes I can do them faster, but blogging is time consuming when you're doing designing as part of the post. For awhile I was doing sooo good and had a bunch of posts pre-scheduled, but that ran out. :(

Conflict & Dispute Resolution

I've been looking at graduate schools all over... I really would like to go to school in Colorado. I just have this fixation about living there. I don't know why, I just do. I looked alot at Utah too, as my second choice. But there just aren't any programs that interest me. I went through every major college's website and went through every graduate program they have, and nothing. I keep coming back to University of Oregon's Conflict & Dispute Resolution program. There just doesn't seem to be anything like it. And, I was just looking at it again, and it's under the School of Law. How about that?

School of Law

Conflict and Dispute Resolution

Graduate Director: Tim Hicks

Graduate Contact: Ellen Laing

Location: 330K

Website: http://conflict.uoregon.edu

Degrees Offered: M.S. and M.A.

Current # of Students: 15-25 cohort; 35 master's students

Program Emphasis: The Conflict and Dispute Resolution Master's degree program is structured to prepare a new generation of scholars, practitioners, and educators to rethink traditional approaches to conflict. Grounded in dispute resolution theory, the program combines broad interdisciplinary training and opportunities for individualized study and skills development. It equips its students with a mastery of skills and expanded perspectives in conflict resolution, from theoretical, practical, public policy, ethical and professional responsibility orientations. In addition, the conceptual knowledge and practical tools gained from this program will allow students to meet today's challenges with new answers and better questions.

Admission Requirements: Completed application, GRE, LSAT or GMAT score report, 3 letters of recommendation, personal statement, recent academic or professional writing sample, current CV. Note the we do not have absolute cut-off scores for the GRE, LSAT or GMAT. Rather we look at the entire application package and make our admissions decisions based on the whole picture. As part of the application process, we require a phone or in-person interview.

Minimum TOEFL: Toefl 575

Fall Admissions: 27 master's students

# of GTFs: N/A

From the program's website:
 
Our program is structured to provide you with the firm foundation during your first year from which you can then specialize during your second year, whether you want to help deal with the social consequences of climate change or work with other environmental and public policy issues, work in the international arena, in the corporate or non-profit sectors, in the community setting, in peace and reconciliation contexts, with interpersonal and family-based conflicts, within the justice system, or in some other area of the conflict resolution field.



Where would I get three letters of recommendation when I have been out of college for...7 years and I work for myself, so I don't have a boss who can write a professional recommendation? Ideas?
 
I did hear back from the program and my LSAT scores are still good for my application. I have to double check and make sure they will still be good if I apply for next year too, assuming I apply in the fall before my score hits the 6 year mark in December. They said the program is just down the wait-list candidates so if I got in, that's all I would be offered, so basically, that would be a waste of stress and effort because a wait-list seat is no seat at all. Better to apply next year, and early, if I were to do this. Do I really want to do this? Am I interested in this? ...Definitely more so than anything else I can find, and I don't have any other ideas... so...? Is that how one comes to make a decision like this? Because there's nothing else? The program does make ALOT of sense with my personality, background and interests. It is very much in the right direction, and I find myself looking for similar programs at other schools, but it's just too unique. The next closest thing would be a cross between Social Work, Counseling and Criminal Justice- and Law... which is funny because those are all subjects I've considered pursuing higher education in. (Except counseling... although that is the ONE subject I have been told more times than I can count [prior to all my issues] that I should do, but I'm not interested. My mom has an MS in Counseling... yelch.)
 
What are you thinking?
 
Is Oregon for me?

Dog vs. Cat SMACKDOWN

I've been wanting to show these for awhile, but had trouble gettiing online and I have been out of town and SO BUSY. Here is Toulouse my little boy cat and Charlie Brown my Beagle engaging in their nightly wrestling match. in the first one it may look like Charlie is picking on Tootie, but if Toot doesn't like it, he can just run away. And trust me, there are plenty of times he just walks straight up to Charlie BB and smacks him on the head to get things started! lol Excuse the mess... why clean up when they're going to run all over it anyway?

Crashed Hardrive Recovery Horror

Late last summer, right before I found out about Matt, I had a hard drive crash on me. It was a 500GB hard drive and it was FULL, completely FULL of client and personal photos.

Luckily, there were only a few images that hadn't been backed up, most were just edits that were totally replaceable and I could do over myself.  (From two specific portrait sessions shot a couple days before the drive crashed. The negatives were all backed up, but not the edits I had done.)

I took the drive to a few places to try and have it repaired, not initially realizing the depth of the issue initially. I called the manufacturer first for help, then called a private tech to look at it, then went to a few computer shops. Each place gave me worst news than the last.

The bottom line was the mechanics of the drive itself had worn out and it couldn't boot up anymore. In order to recover the data from the drive, it had to be disassembled in a "clean room" in a lab. The private tech told me to watch it with who I took it to because he had seen people get quotes as high as $10,000 for that kind of work. He sent me to a couple of underground people he thought might be able to help, but unfortunately, they didn't have the capability to do it safely. (At least they were totally honest and upfront about it.)

After I finished doing all of that running around I exasperatedly threw it on the couch and washed my hands of it. (Plus my finances were in REALLY bad shape. I didn't even have income to pay my rent, let alone some huge repair bill. I was living off my life savings.)

Right around that time, I found out everything about Matt. Then you know, I'm like checking myself into like, psychiatric day care facilities for myself. Awesomeness.

Somewhere in here during the drive crash,  one of my clients/familiy member of a friend notices some pictures are missing from her wedding set. Oh, weird, right? So I go back through them, and guess what? Like, 100 of her pictures which were on that darn disc didnt load on to her website. And they weren't back up before the site crashed. Whereas everything else on the drive had been loaded online so it was backed up. Even if I hadn't burned DVD back ups of everything, I at least had everything stored online on the client's websites. Or so I thought. Well, now there were pictures missing. And they were on this flipping drive.

I went through my computer, recycle bins, memory cards, the website, other client's websites, everything I could think of looking for those darn pictures. And ACTUALLY I did find some of them. But they weren't the pictures the bride was referencing. I found pictures from the wedding in the recycle bin and on a memory card (even though it had been months some how they were still hanging around randomly) but not THOSE particular portraits, which fantastically enough happened to be the posed family and friends portraits. Ugh.

By this time I'm shooting weddings every weekend, in therapy at least 3 times a week and on enough medication to tranq a horse.  I so could not handle all of this. The drive got put on the back burner while I tried to figure out what to do.

Periodically I've called placed and looked up places but alot of places want to ship the drive off to labs in the midwest and it really freaks me out that something woudl happen to it. Not to mention all of the horror stories I've heard. From all the people that have already looked at it, I've already been assured over and over again the data is perfectly fine and safe and can sit there forever like that, it's just the machine that poo-pooed.

As we got closer to the holidays, I got another email from another bride who got married in 2009 and who we did a little trash the dress session the day after her wedding in Carmel. She was going through her master discs and websites and... guess what? The pictures were missing. We both started on this frantic search through everything before finally figuring out those freaking pictures are on THAT drive too! Are you KIDDING me? What's with all this stuff springing up after the fact?

Uggggggh.

So, things have calmed down some, and I am not as out of my mind as I was a few months ago (although I think we all know things aren't great!) so with some encouragement from my friend I got back on the horse and tried to work on this fiasco again.

I revisited the places I had researched the last few months, picked a couple, talked to them all, narrowed it down filled out some paperwork and finally got the darn drive down to their offices for diagnostics exams. They claimed it would take like 2 days.

Here we are a week later I finally get an email back. (Hello? What kind of customer service is that? I think I picked the wrong place!)  Well, diagnostics are done, they're going to recover it, but they won't start it until they have my go ahead.  Because, you know, I have to approve the cost and all.  They gave me a quote.

Are you ready for this?

Are you SURE?

Positive?

...

No backing out now, right?

Are you with me?!





$2,036.00


ARE YOU FLIPPING KIDDING ME?!

I think I'm having palpitations. I emailed him back to clarify exactly what they would be recovering for that amount. (It better be the whole freaking drive and not just the 100 missing pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!) I'm going to die. Earlier today I ran by the boarding facility for the dog, and I kind of made peace with everything for the cost anyway and that it was going to be okay and it would work out fine. Then I got a load of this number. But you know at this point, I kind of want to just chuck my credit card across the counter and be like WHATEVER! FINE! Charge me $2,036 to recover these missing 100 pictures. It was my fault for not double checking these two websites. WHATEVER! You gotta do what you gotta do. You gotta get the pictures back somehow, and how else am I going to do it? These people got the power. They have my drive, they're going to get it back so I have to do it.

But holy FREAKING COW.. how on earth am I ever going to pay that off?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's just so much freaking money, I just... just... I mean... Uhhhhhh?? There's nothing you can do about it.  You just throw the charge card at them and pretend it never hapened. I mean, what else can you do, right? It's so much, it's like, you can't... you can't even connect the dots intellectually to what that even MEANS. It might as well be a million dollars.  I just bought a brand new laptop with a 500GB hardrive, 4 years of McAfee, 3 years of warranty and home repairs service from Dell, yadda yadda yadda. $500. Are you KIDDING me?

I'm gonna go throw up now.

I just want to remember today.

Leader: Bin Laden Death To Usher In New Era Leader Says He Expects Better US-Muslim Relations

POSTED: 9:40 pm PDT May 1, 2011
UPDATED: 9:43 pm PDT May 1, 2011

LOS ANGELES -- A prominent Muslim leader says he expects the death of Osama Bin Laden to usher in a new, positive era of U.S.-Muslim relations, helping Americans to distinguish extremist terrorists from the mainstream Islamic faith.


Salam Al-Marayati, president of the Muslim Public Affairs Council in Los Angeles, told The Associated Press on Sunday night that the death of the "standard-bearer of terrorism" is "hopefully the end of an era of darkness" in U.S-Muslim relations.


Al-Marayati said some fundamentalist groups may try to seek retaliation for Bin Laden's killing, but he's confident that Bin Laden's demise marks the beginning of the end of terrorism at a time when democracy is spreading throughout the Middle East


Read more: http://www.kcra.com/news/27739736/detail.html#ixzz1LBKfQEas

Meet me on Monday

1. What is your favorite kind of muffin?

I think I'm with Java on this one... Blueberry! (I always gravitate towards the stuseul topping too, but really, I think just regular blueberry muffins best. I like that little sheen they get on top. So good! Which is why I never make or buy them... I'll eat them. lol)

2. What was the first car you ever owned?

OWNED-OWNED as in, bought, made the payments and paid off myself? My 2004 Toyota Corolla Sport!

My client made this parking cone for me at a recent wedding I shot. I even got to keep the cone! I call it my car's "party hat" lol

If we're talking first car that was "mine" but I didn't really own and the parents could seize at any moment? 1988 Toyota Van, and a 1988 Toyota Corolla. I did end up owning the Corolla actually. So maybe the '88 is my first. Oh, well, I already posted the picture. But, the '04 is the first I ever bought and paid for myself. :) AND still own!


3. Which TV Show were you sad to see end?

Road to Avonlea, and Roswell.  Avonlea went off the air in 1996, and Roswell was more recent, 2003 I think.
Still sad about both and I own the complete collection of Roswell and have slowly collected the Avonlea series (it wasn't available at first, and when it was only certain episodes and only on VHS... I got those, but now I have to switch over to DVD... Poop.) I do still love and miss  Designing Women , but thank goodness for late night tv! That show still cracks me up when I can catch it! lol


ADDED! How could I have forgotten? My beloved Sex and the City? :) A show that shocked and appauled me when I tuned in at first, but as the show was ending and I was a little older, I realized it was just about men, women and relationships, despite the title that so freaked me out as a college kid. :) I miss it! And I love the re-runs. It really makes me want to go back and work on my French too.

4. What is your lucky number?

24 My birthday is March 24th, and I always looked forward to turning 24, and so I think it must be my lucky numba!

 

5. Pretzels or Potato Chips?

Oh, gimmie the fried potatos. Come on. Is that really a question?

New Laptop=Productiveness, Lots of ?'s about School

My new cheapie, [but totally fancy] laptop arrived after I spent this week playing cat and mouse with the stupid FedEx guy and culminating in being forced to pick it up at the FedEx store at 10:45PM on Thursday, I finally got the sucker. It's a little weird, and the keyboard is like a desktop keyboard with a full number set on the right side, which would be great if I was used to a desktop, but since I'm not, it actually just makes me mistype on the board, and likely will make my wrist even more sore than it already has been because I will be resting it at an even deeper angle trying to use the touchpad. Awesome.

Anyway, I am now again mobile, and can blog, browse the Internet and shop Amazon and Etsy from my bed, the couch, the bath tub, the potty, whewhoo. lol

(Did I just say that? Oh well.)

In my productiveness, I have now discovered I am in massive debt for this month, and I am going to go to the poor house paying to have my dog boarded at the kennel 6 days, my car at the airport for 6 days, and driving 4 hours roundtrip with gas $4.30 a gallon to said airport to go to this wedding in DC this next weekend. Oops. I really should have thought twice about saying it was okay to fly out of Reno. Definitely cheaper for them [the people paying for the plane ticket, or least I hope it was cheaper after all this hassle on my end], but it is not going to be cheaper for me. I live 5 minutes from the airport here in Sacramento and if I flew out of Sac I could have gotten a ride so I wouldn't have had to pay for the gas or driven there, or stored my car so that's a whole lot of money saved right there. Although, my dog is still going to have to go to doggie jail I think and that's going to be a couple hundred dollars. (I think I might cry.)

(Over both the money AND him having to be locked up. I don't want him to have to sleep alone!)

Anyway, I didn't have any money come in in April at all and I bought the new camera, the new laptop, and I didn't realize I didn't have my Photoshop program disc anymore so goodbye $200 more dollars for that too. (Smack head.) [I bought the student version since it's $200/the regular version is $1000... oh and now I have to register to become a student in order to activate it!) I also had to pay a couple of several hundred dollar bills for advertising this month too. Let's pray they work!

Anyway, my new computer is telling me all kinds of "great" news with it being so convenient to look things up now. Grrr.

One of the productive things I did (other than add up bills) was email an attorney about Matt. That took a whole lot of hours to first find one who was 1.) a woman, and 2.) had anything remotely close to the right specialization, and 3.) write the email.

The letter was still full of mistakes.
Despite all of that, as we come up on the 8 month mark of "the day of truth", (or the day my soul died, either can fit perfectly depending on the day) this was the first contact I have sent out. It was exceedingly difficult to do, but I know it was the right thing to do and a step in the right direction. I hope that she can help me or help me find someone who can.

The other thing I did tonight was email a woman from a graduate program I had corresponded with shortly before I met Matt. The program is at the University of Oregon and is in Conflict and Dispute Resolution and is a Master's Degree. It's a newer program and is very small. Their requirements are pretty vague and I had written with her before trying to nail things down, but I wasn't ready to take action because I didn't know what I wanted. The last week or so I have been thinking about this and dreamed a little (yep, I said it, I DREAMED a little) about going to Oregon for a year (but apparently the program is two years so scratch that) for the program, and then applying to law school again after I graduated.

Wow, that law school thing really does not give up, huh?



I wonder why.






My little day dream was to move to Oregon first for a year, and then Utah after that. But then I kept thinking that was too much moving, and I don't like to move. But I think I have also come to some kind of conclusion, or at least, self-analysis that my problem with just picking up and moving somewhere is that there is no purpose in it. I moved to Sacramento for school. I moved back to Southern California, again, for school. How can I randomly pick up and move to, say, Utah, or Colorado without cause? No family there, and my business, particularly in Utah would likely seriously flounder. (Way too much competition at really bottom  basement prices.)

(Of course another thought I had this week, after my last post, was why do I feel the need to be around family anyway? They are better off on their own. Then nobody feels bad about living close and not seeing each other. If we live far away and see each other at holidays, maybe we will learn to appreciate each other more. We can hope, right?)

Anyway, the self-analysis made me realize that without cause I'm not really one to just pick up and go. I'd like to, but it really causes a level of discomfort that is just beyond me. If I'm moving, I want to move with somebody, a partner and make a collaborative decision together. Or, let's move for school, or a job opportunity/offer.  Since 2 of those 3 don't work, how about school?

So on my new computer I looked up graduate programs in Colorado. The first school I was drawn to was the University of Colorado at Boulder. I scrolled through their list of programs and "Law" was listed as a graduate program. I excitedly thought it might be a Master's degree. When I clicked on it though, I found they actually have a law school. Hmm.

I went through the other schools in Colorado that sounded nice and had nice pictures too (always a good indicator of a solid academic record and experience... a nice website and pretty pictures..) but nothing really jumped out at me. So I looked up the information for University of Oregon's Conflict and Dispute Resolution Master's program.


The application deadline is apparently May 30th for this year, and school starts in August. I actually could still apply for this year.  Wow.

Some Pros:
Get the Heck out of dodge
New place
Start over immediately
Start my continuing education now
Do something which *I* consider productive and valuable to society and my life (I don't feel that way about photography really. I try, and am trying, and I am doing better with how I perceive it, but it's not "a real job" to me, even now. Even being published on the covers of magazines didn't do it for me. I want to be successful at it, but there is something missing.)

Cons:
Leaving my therapist
breaking my lease
changing alot of things really fast
having to start over
having to move
how would I even move by myself?
I'm under contract for a bunch of weddings in September and October in Sacramento, how could I start school and focus on that if I had to be commuting back here? (That's exactly how I screwed up law school)
I don't even know if I could get in to grad school as it stands now with my undergrad gpa, no idea where to get recommendation letters... and an average LSAT score.


If I wait a year, and apply in the spring or fall or whatever for matriculation for the Fall 2012 semester,  there are pros and cons to that too.

Pros:
I should be more ready to break out on my own and I will have a year to prepare for it, think about it.
I can start advertising in the area around the school for my business and in Oregon in general and try to begin working up there so my business is more based up there in 2012, than here.
I won't have to break my lease
I'll be able to plan and anticipate
I will hopefully have already gone to court for Matt and have things settled.

Cons:
I have to wait yet another year of my life to start my life. I say this every year. I've been saying this since 2008. (When I left law school) When is my life going to start if I keep putting it off?
My LSAT score will expire and I will have to study and take the GRE or LSAT, which is a HUGE ordeal and undertaking.


But, is any of this what I really want?

I don't even know. I haven't known what I really wanted in a long time. It seems like whenever there is any bit of a hint of what I might want I jump on it... but then I hesitate. Because really, I don't know. After what happened with law school... I just lost so much of myself. And after what happened with Mat... well whatever was left... I feel like that disappeared right along with him. I was never the kind of person who wasn't sure. I always had goals, had a plan. I powered through my bachelor's degree in 3.5 years while my friends puttered around at 5 years, 6 years... I always knew. But not now. I wish I knew. I just need some direction...

Conflict and dispute resolution feels like a good fit... I've often been told over the years I should become a therapist/counselor/psychologist (much to my own personal horror and active gag reflex), both prior to all of this, and even now I still hear it, both by people who are aware of what's happened and by those who aren't. Conflict and dispute resolution is more mediation than counseling; coming to peaceable negotiable terms, rather than a continual exploration of feelings, which is something I could get behind. I like mediation, or at least, I think I do. It's also something that's used in the family court system, and could possibly get me in the legal arena without a law degree. Interestingly enough, CDR is within the law school at U of O, although it is not a law degree.

The only thing I wonder is, as I look at the program, my thought process is the same, "Well, I would go to school there, get the degree, and then apply straight to law school."

If I'm going to go to law school again, why would I spend $17,000 a year on a Master's degree, which, albeit would be helpful in my experiences as an attorney, but would also just add to my debt and may not be used at all? Would I really just be using it as a way to prove to the admissions councils that I was smart enough to conquer law school this third time? Is that really a wise decision and a reason to get a degree?

I don't know. Why do I keep going back to the program though if that's my only interest in it? I could get a Master's in anything; I could do it locally and cheaper and prove the same point to the admissions councils.

What do you think?