Someday....

I've said "Someday" long enough. If I don't forge ahead, "someday" is never going to come. I know it will be good for me but I feel so frazzled at having to juggle so many things at once. I know that after juggling for a while, I will eventually be able to put the non-productive things down that I despise to do and stick with the things I love. Then the juggling will no longer be work but will be fun and natural to my being. Right now, what I do, doesn't come naturally. I got into the information technology field as a way to support myself and my daughter. I liked the hardware end of it: taking apart computers, fixing them and putting them back together, but it seems like after the market flooded with pimply right-out-of-school geeky boys (and girls) the pay for that type of work went down. So I moved on to software support. Software support is getting outsourced at an exponential rate so I moved on to System Administration. Except system administration is really nothing more than a really technical secretary.

Now, I have nothing against secretaries; I've been one on more than one occasion, however I thought with all the schooling and training I had put myself through, I'd left the days of being a secretary behind. Obviously not. I am tired of babysitting adults who don't have the common sense of a rock. Doing this as a contractor makes it worse: not knowing if I will really have a job the next day, week, month, year. They tell me I will but I don't believe them. Hope for the best, plan for the worst. I just want out of this rat race altogether.

I am an artist. Plain and simple. Starving or not, I need to get back to what I am good at.

My Bonanzle site will still have all kinds of odds and ends on it but my Etsy site will have small paintings and clothing I've designed to fill the need of beautiful plus size clothing.

I have my first human to experiment on MWAHAHAHAHAH but she was a voluntary volunteer. She gets to keep the prototypes too. What the heck. She gets free clothes, I get someone to practice fitting clothing too and I get feedback on what she likes and doesn't like.

There is so much to do: work on my sites, work on my blog, I've signed up for Squidoo to promote my blog which in turn will promote my stores. I still don't have everything set up! Argh! This takes so much time and I wish I could devote an entire day to it but alas, I have to actually pay the bills some of the time so I guess I will drag my butt into work now and then.

An upcoming project of mine (which I will post pictures of as soon as I get it done) is to do some boot modification. I bought a pair of winter boots on clearance at a going-out-of-business sale. They are decent and they fit....for the most part. The one thing that bothers me is apparently my calves are too big for the boot when I stand up. The boots zip up the front. They won't stay zipped when I stand up. *SIGH* But, not to worry. I have a solution: stitch a button with a neck on each side of the top of the boot, then take a thick hair elastic and hook it around both buttons. This keeps the top together and, in theory, the zipper shouldn't fall down any more. We'll see.


Let me leave you with a recipe I developed myself:

Wendy’s Hearty Homemade Veggie Soup Recipe

1 can Progresso French Onion Soup 18.5 oz
1 can chicken broth
1 large Baking Potato, cut into 1-inch pieces
½ medium to large yellow onion (sweet or not), chopped into eighths
3 large carrots, sliced
2 long celery stalks, chopped pretty small (use leaves too)
1 tomato (medium diced)
¼ of a head of fresh cabbage chopped into approx 1” x 2” strips
4 bouillon cubes (chicken or beef)
½ tsp black pepper (NO SALT – salty taste comes from bouillon)
½ tsp garlic powder (NOT garlic salt)
½ tsp bay leaves (crushed) (optional)
1 tsp parsley
½ mini pasta shells (or brown rice)

(other alternatives to potatoes include: sweet potatoes, turnips, parsnips….pretty much any root veggie will work)


In a large pot (like a Dutch oven) add the can of French Onion soup and the can of chicken broth. Measure out four more soup cans of water and add that to the pot. Set on high heat.
Add bouillon. Stir. While this is heating up, clean, peel and slice carrots. By the time you have all three carrots ready it will be time to add them. Then chop and add celery. Heat until boiling, then lower heat to medium high for 20 minutes.
Add pepper, garlic powder, parsley, cabbage and bay leaves. Stir.
Turn heat down to medium then add the onion and potato.
HINT: Chop potato up ahead of time. Leave skin on. Put in a large bowl, cover with cold water and add 8 – 10 drops of lemon juice to keep the potato from turning dark. Cook for 10 minutes.
Now add pasta or rice and tomatoes. Set to simmer with no lid for 30 minutes or until liquid appears to have reduced by half. (Longer simmering is ok up to an hour but no more).
Total prep time: 15 minutes
Total cook time: 1 hour to 1:30
Servings: 10 – 12

This concoction is totally freezable for future use. Put in containers that protect against freezer burn and use within 40 days.

Optional: add other ingredients to taste or to use up leftovers

It's really not green, just the way the photo turned out.