Author Archives: Christine

Have been listening to this book by Chandler Burr on audible. First, audible has been frustratingly crashing lately ever since the latest update came out. It crashes after a minute or so. Finally I figured out it happens right after the library refresh. So I stop it before it finishes and was able to listen. But what a pain! I wrote to the developer from the app and heard nothing back. Oh well.

This book is about the processor making perfume, and he followed the whole process of making “Lovely” by Sara Jessica Parker for Coty. Most of it is fascinating except the part that he lists the formula. He has presented SJP as a very down to earth and nice person who took a serious and hands on role in the making of this perfume. This peaked my interest and I went and searched for it and finally found it in Kohl’s. Tried it and it was pretty good. So I ordered one from Amazon because it’s much cheaper there. It actually smells better than it did in Kohl’s. And I like it a lot. The only thing is that it does fade quite quickly.

This inspired me to go online and searched for the popular perfumes. And also found the fragrancex site for very reasonable prices and ordered some sample sizes to try, Light Blue by Dolce & Gabbana, Alfred Sung by Alfred Sung, Miss Dior by Christian Dior, Gucci (new) by Gucci, Lolita Lempicka by Lolita Lempicka. Never tried any of these and am quite excited for them to arrive.

In the mean time, I tried Miss Dior Cherrie in Shephora and loved it and bought a bottle of it. I guess I will smell good for a while. Never really found a perfume I really liked before, I think this one is the first. Hope I will like some of those I ordered too.

It actually made me looking forward to the next morning to put it on after the shower. That’s something knowing that I hate mornings and takes forever to wake up every day.

Lots of practices for the cha cha routine before hand, the result was not as good as I hoped for. Oh well. It’s been a while since I did Latin and I have lost some of the disciplines I learned. The body took a beating though during the day. Video taping on a tripod sistting on top of a coffee table is not an easy feat. I had to reach up to the camera and pan it as the dancers moved across the floor. Sometimes zoomed in and out as needed. The shoulder and arms got tired after a while, and I did it for a few hours. In between the solos, I took pictures. So by the time my solo came close, I was already exhausted.

So it took me a couple of days to recover from the fatigue. I was actually aching all over and needed to stay in bed for a couple of days. That’s getting old for you!

I finally recovered and had the time to process the photos today. There were tons of them. Took me the whole day to get them cleaned up and uploaded to picasaweb. I can spend a lot more time on them if I wanted to. And I wish I have done a better job at shooting too. Still need to practice more with my camera.

Will need to do the videos next. That will take even longer time. Technology is great but it’s also time consuming.

For some reason, work has been a challenge lately. Not only the official work with Peter but side jobs with the studio too. Actually, Peter has calmed down this week. He sounded more reasonable and less aggressive or demanding. I told him I have lost sleep over his project, he told me not to. If we have to live with the current setting while trying to find a better solution, that’s ok. That gave me a bit more breathing room. I’m still frantically trying to locate a ip camera viewer that would provide true full screen and nothing else viewing of the camera. Not too much luck yet. Most of them are for controlling and recording or motion detection. Not just for viewing. Very frustrating.

Studio just hired a new “Marketing Director”. Nice title. I saw her once a few weeks ago and already could tell she has a personality that I may not like to work with. And sure enough, she emailed yesterday a word document and asked me to put on the homepage. I tried to be polite and suggested that word is not a good format to put stuff on the web. Rod made a pdf file out of it. I’m still stuck with just a pdf file. The easiest way is to put a linnk to it but I know it’s not what she asked for. If we want to put a pdf file on Joomla, there is a plug-in we have to install. I kind of suggested that to Rod, he acknowledged that indeed he will need to install the plug in if we want to embed the pdf on the homepage. But he suggested putting a link to the file also. I thanked him and did it. The incoming Director sent back and email informing both of us that she is “very, very versed” in Joomla. And showed a link to a site she said she made with Joomla. I am irritated that she didn’t pick up the subtlties in the email and the polite push and pull. She stepped right in and announced that she is an expert. I emailed the owners and suggested that I send her the log ins so she can go right ahead and implement what she wants. Haven’t heard back from them yet. I would be happy to turn it over to her so I don’t have to deal with her. I am less and less tolerant of arrogant people who shows no respect and basic courtesy to others.

It would be really nice not having to answer to anyone else but myself. Work on my site and photos and do or choose not to do anything I want. Make my own decisions, work hard on the problems with no time limit and not have to waste my energy on something others deem important that means nothing to me. I really don’t work well with demanding people. I am not one of them and have a hard time dealing with them.

I went swimming after the short work today. Did 5 laps of free and 5 laps of breast. One to work my arms and one to work my legs. Will build it up with time. I get out of breath after the first 5 and need a bit rest between laps right now. I know I will get better and able to do more laps. Maybe for now, the goal is 10 for each. It takes about a minute a lap. Not that great but I don’t mind. I’m not training for competition any more, just want to get better fit.

Stretched tonight after dinner and rest. Stood at the top of the stairs and worked on my ankles like Tony said I need to. And tried to stretch my legs. It does feel good afterwards although it’s a bit uncomfortable during. I need to keep on doing it to get my body more flexible. Not just for dancing, but for my general health, too.

Still watching ballet movies. Fascinated. Their beautiful movement, their unbelievable flexibility, their exhaustion, their sweat. There is a silent determination on their face through it all. A will. A strong one. That’s what it takes to achieve. Human determination.

And yet a 40 year ballerina who’s retiring asked if that is life after all the grandiose moments on the stage, is it life?

OOOOh the frustratinos. Desparately trying to get the picture showing full screen with no border with the $300 software we bought for the camera. It is not there! It is in the free software that came with the bb-hcm735. I can change the color of the border to anything. So I changed it to black and hid it. But the expensive software we bought in order to get the high resolution doesn’t have the option. How come!

I have called their support line lots of times. They are of no help at all. They are courteous but they don’t have the knowledge or the ability to even put you in touch with the developers. One of them told me there is no way to change the border color on the free software, I found it by myself. One of them told me to go to this site to download the software in order to see the high resolution. Nope. It doesn’t give you high resolution. The next person told me to buy the $300 software, but not from them, I should go to where ever I bought the camera from. Okaaaaay.

Now the last person told me to go to their support page and submit an email for the border problem in the expensive software. They can’t contact the developer for me, they can’t because they are in different divisions. Really! what is a support team if they cannot get in touch of the development team. The customer has to go to the website and submit a separate email request? okaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay.

I really hate to disappoint my boss. And peter is so picky abuot how the picture is shown on the screen. He wants the picture to fill the whole screen and nothing else. Not a thing. And I can’t do it. Blue Iris has a border and the name of the camera showing. My web script that uses their on camera cgi can’t display live motion because it only refreshes every 3 seconds. Their single camera view from the control software doesn’t fill the screen and leaves a grey border at the top with a camera icon and a resize icon. oooooooooh the frustration.

Watched a movie about a young ballerina working her way to be a professional dancer. The hard work she put in, the sweat, the inhuman way of stretching her/their bodies, all inspired me. An effortless looking movement is the result of hours and days of hard work doing the same thing over and over and over again.

I got inspired to put in the effort to dance my best, to go exercise, to learn anything. You have to put in the time and effort and hard work if you want to be good at anything. Dancing, photographing, using photoshop. Everything.

There are hundreds of hours of quiet work behind an hour of performance.

Connie called and invited us over for an impromptu dinner. We brought some lettuce and a bottle of wine and I had a good night visiting with her and her neighbor Patty. Tim was a bit under the weather and he and Leo watched movies all night while us girls chatted and laughed and cooked and drank the night away. The poor men, and lucky us.

Went swimming, and it felt good. Of all the work out, I really like the swimming the best. When you are done, you feel clean and not sweaty. Going to connie’s for grilled chicken dinner. A good Sunday.

After Leo left for his hike, I was planning to go swimming at the rec center. But as I was getting ready, an old star seeing phenon appeared out of nowhere. When I was young, I would get this when I was hungry or tired. But I had a bit of gnocchi leftover from Bravo yesterday and I shouldn’t be low on sugar. But it happened and I had to wait it out. I watched the latest episode of Mostly Photo and that was rewarding in its own way. Now it’s after 1pm and my day just started so to speak. I can still go swimming and bring my camera too. BTW, I just ordered the 14-24mm wide angle lens, one of the must-haves in the bag of lens. One down and not too many to go actually. Now if I can put in more shooting time to improve my photography skills, that would be the perfect thing to do. I will. I am hoping to take trips and take as many pictures as I can in the future. I should be very well set in terms of lenses by then. When I retire, I would be able to go on seconds notice.

Yesterday, I was lamented over leaving for the Michigan Classic in Detroit. But I didn’t go. I went to Connie’s garage sale and had dinner with Sandy and Daniel. I had a good day, but I still didn’t take any pictures. I did have an ah-ha moment. I realize the importance of getting up and go do the things I want to do instead of taking the coward route and not do anything. I would be much happier if I just do it. I will have to remind myself to ‘do’ instead of regret for doing nothing the next day.