About me:
Paula, 41, Business Analyst for the largest Natural Gas Pipeline Corp in the US. I work with their compliance department where I write technical manuals for software that help my guys do their field work. I train people on how to use our software and I also manage my department's sharepoint sites.
I'm dating Bob and have been for the last three years. We make a good team. We are each other's biggest cheerleaders. We're also a couple of three year olds as evidenced in this site:
Pig E. Bank Adventures.
He's been an incredible support system to me on my journey to becoming a healthy, happy and whole person again after dating the jackass and the jackass II. I've been his support system while he was dealing with his father's declining health and subsequent death. I took him home at Thanksgiving and he met my family - they love him and think he's da bomb.
I'm also owned by Simba, the apple head, lynx point siamese. Simba is by far the best cat I've ever had and pretty much my constant companion in life.
I'm a lot of things in my life - I read, I listen to a lot of different kinds of music, I bead, I crochet, I cross-stitch, I write. My biggest passion outside of writing is photography and this year I purchased my dream camera, the Nikon D80. Since then, I've taken an obscene number of
photographs, and I've had my first session as someone's photographer. At this point, I don't think the photography thing will ever be a full time gig for me, I like my job and the people I work with too much. And honestly, after being a contractor for 10 years, I love the stability of a full-time position. For right now, the camera is a way for me to explore the world.
I'm the happiest I've been in a very long time and I'm in a good place. I have tons of friends and an online support network who love on me and encourage me in ways that I never thought possible. But there is work to be done my people and this is what this journal is about.
First off let me say what this journal is not about. It is not about looking for the perfect body. It's not about obsessing whether or not I'm eating "Clean" food. It's not about what program is going to change my body the most.
What this journal is about is pursuiting my dreams and being healthy in all aspects of my life (personal, health, hobbies, and financial). It's about taking the lessons I've learned over the last 6 years since I began my journey to a healthier Paula and applying it to my everyday life so I move forward. I'm living in the moment so that I don't look back some day and say "God, I wish I would have ...". In my mind, these are the weighty matters in life and hence the name of my journal.
Long Term Goals:
1. Continue to improve my overall health. Diet and exercise are a means to an end for me. For me, being strong and healthy is not an option. My mother is 63 years old, diabetic, and on dialysis. She has a pretty sucky quality of life. I don't want to be her in 20 years. I want to be out, exploring with my camera and writing about what I see, find and experience.
2. Get my debt paid off by 2014. I'm tired of owing people money. This past year I've paid off almost $32K and want to keep that pace up. So I'm looking at ways to expand my income by selling pictures that I take, and taking pictures of folks in the Houston Area. I had my first paying photography gig right before Christmas and I'm pretty happy with most of the pictures I took. I also use coupons (still learning how to do this but I put just over $200 back into my pocket in December).
3. Write. I write pretty much full-time at work, but I also write on the web. One of the things I've done over the past year is focused on doing more blogged based stuff.
4. Photography. This is how I explore the world and I seem to have a knack for it.
5. Spend more time with my family. Since August 2007, I've seen everyone in my family at least twice in the last two years and was able to do it in such a way that I didn't go crazy in the process. I love my family, but there's a reason I live 1000+ miles from everyone. That can be frustrating at times, but it also saves my sanity.
My Personal Blogs on Various Topics
Confessions of an Office Supply Whore
Pig E. Bank - The Adventures of a Mild Mannered, Blue Piggy Bank
Paula's Picture of the Day
Weighty Matters - The Blog
Financial Freak
Paula's Clean Eats
A Little Bit of Ear Food