Tag Archives: New Years

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The New Year is Coming for Us All

I remember back as 2020 was approaching, I had some atypical optimism of how that was going to be a great year. I very quickly learned that what I was feeling was probably more impending doom and I was lying to myself with how that year ended up. 2021, it was going to be my oldest son’s year. He would get all those fun senior activities, filling out scholarships and college applications, getting accepted to his first choice school. Then, a fun graduation. He didn’t get all those fun senior activities, which apparently he was thrilled about. But, he did get into his top choice school so there’s that.

In 2022, I’m going in with trepidatious optimism. This could be my year. This could be a fantastic year for me. It could also go very wrong. I never go into the New Year with that “New Year, New Me” crap. If I wanted to change something about me, I’m not going to wait. I’ll just do it. I don’t believe in resolutions. Those are just lies that we tell ourselves for about a week before forgetting the whole thing. I do go in a little hopeful of a fresh start. For instance, I’m hoping that this is the year where I get at least a single parking spot in front of my house from the apartment people who don’t feel like using their parking lot. Which is honestly, much closer than walking from my house. Maybe I get that wish this year. Doubtful though, because they own our street and we have to just suck up the fact that I can’t use my driveway sometimes or that my guests have to park at the end of my street to visit me. /endrant

The thing is that you could let the fear of the New Year take you down, you could let it inspire you to make that change you’ve been wanting to… or you could just view it as another day. It doesn’t matter. The New Year comes for us all. We are just living out whatever fate it brings us. Hopefully, it has decided that we’re all due a little big luck. Maybe I hit the lottery, the housing market finally cools a bit, and I can move out of this house. Maybe people will suddenly realize that the “conservatives vs. liberals” is just something that the politicians use to control us, so while we’re all bickering like toddlers about it they can do whatever they want without us noticing. Maybe people will learn to be more open-minded to other’s beliefs and accept others for those beliefs. There’s a lot of possibilities. That mostly won’t happen because people are only going to get worse and I have no faith in humanity left especially after these past few years.

The New Year is coming for us all. We can either change what we put out in the world or we can stay the same and nothing happens. There’s always a choice and maybe this new year is the year we finally make the right choices. But I do want to wish you and your families a very Happy New Year.

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C’Mon 2019

Happy New Year!

The new year always brings in a hope for a better year than the last. Professionally speaking, 2018 was a decent year for me. My blog is getting more attention, so thank you to the readers who have joined us this year! I released my first children’s book, which has been well-received by the ones who have checked it out. (Shameless plug inc…: Check out my “Where to Buy My Writing” section on the sidebar to get a physical or eBook copy of “Dear Child” and find my other books.) I may have failed at NaNoWriMo this year in the sense of the actual challenge, but I did get 25,000 words for some solid bones for my next novel. I started a stream, which consider the times is starting out pretty decently.

Personally speaking, 2019 has been a bit of a rough one. Things going wrong like car issues, dental bills, and expensive home repairs did put a sour twist on my year, especially since those came right around Christmas time. Those are the breaks with adulthood though. You win some, you lose a lot. But my family is alive and happily together, so I really can’t complain. I lucked out with my immediate, extended, and “married” family, especially with a husband like mine. Who understands I don’t need fancy things for my birthday, but knows I love sweet, thoughtful gestures like having one of my favorite Food Network personalities (Justin Warner) tape a Cameo wishing me a “Happy Birthday”. Unfortunately for him, now he’ll also have to get me the cookbook I’ve been begging for. Fortunately, my husband is also a huge fan and seemed just as excited over the whole thing. My birthday is in 2 weeks, but my husband can’t keep a secret about presents to save his life.

I don’t make resolutions for the new year. I never keep them, that is if I even remember them. But I will discuss what I hope for this year, at least on a professional level. I hope that my blog continues it’s upward momentum. I hope to hear more from my readers. I will finish my new novel, even if that means waiting for NaNoWriMo again to bang out another 50,000 words. I have a few ideas for more children’s books that I will be working on, which I’m more excited about than I thought I would be. But that’s not all on my agenda. I am considering options like adding a podcast and/or a comic strip to my site. Both of those would be really fun to do, but we’ll see if it’s feasible. If I can start making the same amount from my own work as I do my freelancing ghostwriting gigs, I’ll have significantly more time to dedicate to these other projects. I will be continuing my stream starting tomorrow, with the amazing new updated look the husband designed for me a few weeks ago.

We’ll play this all by ear, but I look forward to seeing you guys on this journey with me. As usual, I will announce any new projects here or on my social media pages. You can follow those also on the sidebar there. My Instagram is a little bare, but I promise I’m trying to social media better. I wish all of you an amazing new year and thank you for making last year so great for me.


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Random Thoughts 2014

Now that the holidays are over, it’s officially time to get back to business. Today, I will focus on the first “Random Rants” post of the year. A new year is supposed to be about new beginnings but let’s face it, it just feels like another day. You can go to bed with good intentions for resolutions to wake up without even bothering to try. The fact is that any day you wake up is a second chance to make a change in your life.

Now, onto the rants of the year.

It’s POT TIME! Well, if you live in Colorado anyways. People opposed to this say it will encourage people to smoke pot. Seriously? Pot is easy enough to get, and if people want it they’ll get it. Legalizing pot is not going to make a swarm of people who wouldn’t normally smoke it automatically decide they love drugs. What it will do is increase tax money into the government instead of being pocketed by possibly dangerous gang members. What it will do is make sure someone with a dime bag won’t spend the same amount of time in jail as someone with 10 kilos of coke. You’re not encouraging pot smoking any more than legal booze encourages drunk driving. Bonus: Did I mention free money to the government to possibly go to the schools and improve our declining school systems?

Duck Dynasty, the family of bigots? This isn’t newsworthy or even particularly shocking. They are Southern, super conservative Christians that were raised that way. Are they bigoted?  Not my place or anyone else’s. If you’re a real Christian there’s only one person who can truly judge. It’s crazy and has gone on long enough. I’m actually tired of hearing about it on the news. And, for the record the argument of free speech was only intended to protect a civilian from the government not a civilian over another civilian. And if you’re really shocked by this, you must’ve really dropped your jaw when you found out Paula Deen, an old woman from the South, dropped the “n” bomb. Find something actually newsworthy like troops losing benefits so people can sit around and play the PS4 on hard-working Americans dime.

Puffing With Kids? States are considering laws that prevents parents from smoking in a car with a child on the premise of the second and third hand smoke are dangerous for children. People opposed this state the government is over stepping control and it crosses a line. People have liberties, right? Last I checked, you can’t drink and drive.  Should we allow that since anything else is an attack on basic rights of humans? Laws like this exist because people are inherently stupid and must not realize the idiotic things they do and how it affects others. They make laws like this because people lack common sense, just like there are laws against driving under influences or anything else that seems like you should just know better.  Think about how much time is taken off the road to find a cigarette and then lighting it. I bet that math equals sending a text while driving, and texting while driving is illegal. That must be an attack on civil liberties too. The fact is simple: you want lung cancer, or any other smoking related disease that is your personal choice. That isn’t your child’s personal choice to possibly get asthma or worse because you couldn’t last a 5 minute drive without lighting up. And standing next to a “smoke free zone” sign with a lit cigarette hanging from your lip makes you look stupid, just saying.

PS4, why?! I really just wondered why you bothered to release a game system and only like 4 other games to go with it and several months before more are released. This seems like poor planning. I just needed to get that off my chest.

I hope that if you believe in this New Year hoopla that you accomplish your resolutions and get your new beginning.  For everyone else, remember when writing your checks out that it is we 2014. It always takes me until May to remember.

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And to All A Happy New Year

I hope everyone enjoyed whatever holiday they did or did not celebrate last week. It’s not my place to judge, nor is yours. My family enjoyed a fun-filled and very Merry Christmas. While I sat and complained about wrapping up presents for a 3-month-old baby, and spent several hours of my life wrapping presents and baking cookies, I couldn’t help but to think “why do we go through all of this”. Does it really matter how well I wrapped that present? In about 3 seconds it’s all torn off, and you see the 10 minutes you sat wrapping it go down the pooper. It seems like a waste of a valuable resource: time. Oh… and trees.

I think it’s a standard that we sit around, consciously or otherwise, and reminisce on the year we’ve had. So, I’ve decided to compiled my own personal year in review in my life. And I’ve decided to share it with my lovely readers.

1) Georgie Porgie, Puddin’ and Pie: Kissed the girls and made them cry. Well he hasn’t kissed any girls but he’s definitely made me tear up a little. Last year at Christmastime, I was able to announce to everyone in my family (I do include my awesome In-Laws when I say “family”) that there was going to be a little LaRochelle joining the world. At 2 weeks late, on the notorious day of September 11th, my baby son was born into this world. This is by far the biggest moment of happiness this year for me.

2) The Sparkling Jewel: Also this year 2 weeks prior to my little Porgie’s birth, a niece was welcomed into my family. She decided she wanted Porgie’s due date. Porgie, in the fashion of his father decided to sleep in. If a birth of a baby is always a blessing, what are two in the same family?

3) My Other Baby: My oldest son is having a fine year himself. He’s found himself put on student council by his teachers, adored by his advisors. My son also aced the English portion of his MCAS, and was found to be reading at a high school level. Not bad for a 4th grader. He also had his dream come true when Mommy finally told him he was going to be a big brother. He also got his first cell phone, and is growing into a fine young man. Did I mention he tested as reading at a high school level? /Pride

4) My Other, Other Baby: I took the plunge, and decided to publish my first short story. Even selling what I did was a proud accomplishment for me (to order your e-book for $0.99, click the link that says “Buy My Works”. You don’t need a Kindle, just the app on your phone or computer.) The worst is behind me now, because if I can publish one and not be too terrified anymore, I can do more. And I will.

5) And the winner is….: I’ve never voted before. Ever. I even watched other people as they did it, so I didn’t look like the “newb”. I survived the long lines, I survived the process without mocking it too much accidentally out loud. I voted, and while I’ll never tell who I marked off for president, I will gladly admit I went with Brown for Senator. I hope to vote again for him in the special election. The downside of voting? I’m competitive and I want my person to win. I think of it like a sports game. It’d probably be a lot more interesting if it were like the “Game of Thrones”. Finish the quote: “In the game of thrones, you __ __ or __ __”. Maybe the who process would be different then….?

It was a great year. Incredible, even. It was refreshing to have such a great year. In fact, I call onto fate or whatever controls destiny or whatever, and ask for a repeat. Not a repeat of having a kid, I’m not quite ready for that pain again anytime soon. (In fact, I’m still at the point where I cringe looking at him and remembering.) I hope that everyone has a great new year. The best part about starting a new year is the “fresh” start. You can change anything, and have incentive to do it by pretending last year didn’t happen, if that is what you wish. Don’t make a resolution you can’t keep though, it’s never good to start the new year with a broken promise.

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It’s a New Year

As the New Year’s countdown began, I could only think of one thing: why did Justin Bieber feel the need to ruin “Let it Be”? Even seeing the great Carlos Santana couldn’t save my horror and the feeling that the upcoming year was something that I should run from. Alright, I’m kidding… mostly. It was a disaster, but New Years is something more exciting than watching a teen idol ruin a classic. It’s really going to be exciting, I hope. So here’s my run down for the upcoming year.

1)      The year of the babies. I don’t just mean my up and coming fetus, but everyone and their sisters seem to be pregnant. My own sister included, (I don’t like using “in-law”, she’s my sister) with her child only due a few weeks ahead of mine as the count goes now. Exciting, they can practically be siblings. This is probably the biggest excitement of the year, becoming a mother and aunt again.

2)      Did I finally finish a book? Well book might be overstating it, at only 15,000 words it’s a mini-book at best. Hopefully in the coming weeks it’ll be up on Amazon EBook and I can finally say I finished it. This definitely ranks #2 on my list, which would’ve been my biggest accomplishment if my planned surprise didn’t surprise me first. Either way, that will hopefully not be a complete embarrassment and I can rest assured I followed my dreams anyways. Slowly crawling behind that, my short story collection will be up later this year finally, as I started work on that long before my precious novella. Don’t worry, when it’s listed for sale, everyone will hear about it.

3)      Anything else that comes my way. I appreciate surprises, like when I heard the Taylor Swift song for The Hunger Games movie. I suppose I’m still trying to adjust to my love of not just a country song, but one she sang. The best part of a new year is that you really don’t know what’s coming, and I’ll quote internet meme “Come at me, bro” to show my feelings for it.

I don’t believe in resolutions. I hate broken promises, and let’s face it, that’s all resolutions really ever become. I do believe in starting the year off with an open mind and an acceptance that this year might not be better than the last, hell it could be a lot worse than last year, but that it’s another year you’re alive to experience things. So Happy New Years readers, I hope the best for you.