Wow! September is here and the Fall is coming; ready or not! I’ve been working on cleaning out my basement from items that we were going to use to make an apartment, but we’ve since changed our mind about that. We have doors and shower doors, a toilet, furniture and other random items stored away that we just simply no longer need. I’ve been working hard on getting these things out the door. But the majority of these are bulky and heavy. I’ve used up all of my arm muscles over the weekend getting some things out the door and onto the curb. One good thing is that we’ve found a home for the baby items that we no longer need. That makes me happy, that they have gone to a home who needs them.

Today is Monday and I am swamped at work. It is the end of month and at this time the IT team is working hard on getting items to go live for next month. As a BA, I need to ensure the business teams are happy with the results. This time around unfortunately, they are not. Please don’t kill the messenger…me. The developers did what they could, but it wasn’t what business was looking for, and I am the one to bring the bad news to both parties.
The rest of the day is all about preparing for product launches for tomorrow. I have four items launching and a lot of content to post on the site. I don’t have a preview page for this site, so I will have to test everything in the morning after they are live and our partners can see everything. I am currently working with the IT team on getting me a preview page, but nothing so far.
Today, I continue to work past 5PM and to until 5:30 and that is when I take my dinner break. We eat dinner; pasta with chicken, and then clear out and wash the dishes. I then go ahead and take out the garbage to the curb as tomorrow is garbage day in my neighborhood. Then I get right back to my work laptop and continue working on my product launches for tomorrow. My family goes out for a drive and I stay in and continue to do my work. It’s 9PM and my family has come back and I am still working on my product launches. There is so much content and images to add to the sites that I am still working on them. Then there are always the people who fill out the paperwork incorrectly and I have to decipher what they are looking for me to do and hopefully I post the items correctly. The teams are no longer online and I can’t ask them what they mean with what they sent, at this time of night, so I have to figure it out. I’m getting way too used to figuring out things and guessing what others want. I’m becoming an expert at this, I think lol.
At 9, I pause my work and hang out with the family for a little while and prepare everything for tomorrow. I prepare the coffee and the get the ingredients: flour, sugar and yeast, for tomorrow’s fresh bread. I get all of the ingredients from the cupboards and my husband puts them together to make the bread. Teamwork! After a little while, we say our goodnights and I get back on the work laptop until 11PM. While I am working, I am listening to Marie Forleo’s book Everything is Figureoutable. The book is just about that, you can figure anything out. Put a little effort into it and you’ll get it. By 11:30 I can’t do it anymore. I get on my pj’s and go to bed.

Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday have been a blur. So much work and catching up on everything at work. The product launches took a lot of work. The other requests got left behind and these days were for catching up. I then also needed to fix postings for the launches that I did. Some were me that messed up, some were the teams already making updates to the items they provided the day before. So I fixed everything that needed fixing and all added all of the other items that were on my backlog. My goodness, I am tired. Mentally drained. It’s not hard work, but it sure does take a long time to do it.

It’s Friday and where has the week gone? I have been working my tail off this entire week. Starting way before 9AM and staying online until way after 5PM. On Tuesday, I stayed on to do work until 11PM. On Wednesday, it was until 9PM. I can’t wait until the Labor day weekend. I will have a day off to relax or do something around the house that I need to do. Like the weeding or cleaning up in general. Today, I’ve been doing more and more work for the product teams as they need a lot of content posted on the sites. Some of the teams have projects in mind and I am working hard on getting these taken care of. First off, I have to decipher what they are looking for and then talk to my development team to get whatever it is that was requested. I hope I’m doing this right. Today, I finish at 5 PM and log of at 5on the dot. Today, I will not work any longer than that. I need to break so I don’t burn out at both ends. I then have dinner and then go out for a drive with the family. I need some time to distract myself from work. Too much work will turn my head into mush. No need for that.

It’s the early hours of Saturday morning and I log on to my work email and get a couple of things done so they don’t get left behind. After that we go do our shopping. We do this in the morning hours so we won’t encounter many people at the store. By the time we get home with our groceries, it is almost noon. We clean everything off with gloves and bleach and then placing the items in a deep corner of the basement for quarantine for a couple of days. My little one has her gloves on too because she wants to help as well. We put everything away and then go ahead and have lunch. Lunch consisted of a bunch of salads. Not the green stuff, but the pasta salads and shrimp salads kinds. Thank you mother-in-law for bringing those. This is a good idea. A delicious mid afternoon lunch with the family. Now we are all relaxing after a hectic morning.
Meanwhile, I am trying to figure everything out that my daughter needs for school. Like her log in information and how to get into google classroom. I’ve sent an email to her teacher asking about books. How the kids learning from home will get their books for the school year. And also asked about a schedule. The teacher is going to get back to me soon. Hey teacher, school starts in a few days what is going on? Guess this hasn’t been planned yet. lol

Until next time.
Stay safe.
-Isabel

It’s been 23 weeks and counting. As for today, I decided to take the day off. I am a little burned out from work and need a day to recharge my batteries. So a Monday is as good a day as any to try and relax. But, who am I kidding, I can’t relax, I have a little one. Hopefully she will be with grandma and do her homework this afternoon and I will do mine. I have been working on getting my certification for Agile Project Management using SCRUM and need to study a little more. I took a mock test over the weekend and got an 80 on it. Not bad, but I’d like for my score to be better. So this morning, I am studying for my certification with achy muscles and all. Yesterday, I took care of the backyard by weed wacking around the house and practically the entire back yard. When the batteries were recharging for the machine I would sweep the patio to get all of the weeds, and and sticks our of there. Then, I decided that it was a good idea to clear out some of the things from the basement. I want to make a little more room for my little one to have space to play. We have a bunch of things that we were going to use for projects that we never got to do. Like doors that we took out from the main floor and saved them as we were going to fix up the basement and we would need doors for the renovation. Well, they have been in the corner of the basement for some years now and we haven’t made any partitions and we’re probably never going to need those doors. They need to go. I notice we have a couple of old computers down there too. We haven’t thrown them away yet because we need to clean them out first but just haven’t had the time. Hopefully this week we will take the time to fix the problem and get rid of them.
Oh yeah, I still have a bunch of baby things in the basement like a crib, changing table, high chair and a few toys. I’d like to get rid of them but would like for them to go to a good home as they are still in very good condition. If you know of anyone who might need these things, please let me know and we can set something up for pick up. I also have pregnancy clothes that are like new. The bottoms are size 6 and the tops are all larges. Again, if you know anyone who could use these, please let me know.
Today, keep on studying and reading over my notes and going through all of the Agile SCRUM information that I can find. I’ve taken a bunch of practice tests and have been doing very well. I’m thinking at this point I am ready to commit and take the actual certification. Stay tuned, I’m going for it!
So, I took the certification test and I did not do well. The questions were mostly situational, such as if you are the SCRUM Master and one of the developers is unhappy, what do you do?! Good question, we did not go over this in our class. We went over the processes not the actions. I’m so bummed out about this. I don’t understand, I did so well on the practice tests how could I have done so badly on the actual test. I am feeling very down right now.

It’s Tuesday and I am still thinking about the failed test and continue to feel down about it. I get up just in time to get to work and am trying my darnedest to lighted up, but I keep on ruminating about it. Should I get a rubber band and put it on writs? Every time I get a sad feeling about this thing, just snap it. See how red it gets today? Some Fifty Shades of Gray going on, on my wrist today lol.
As for work, it’s all about conference calls and catching up from yesterday. There’s a lot to post on the sites that I work on and I am so not in the mood. But, I’ve got get the inner strength to just do it.

It’s Wednesday and I have woken up early enough to have breakfast of some fresh, home made bread with butter; made by my husband and some delicious coffee. I am felling better today, I’ve eventually gotten over the facts of my failed certification and have decided to try and study some more by searching out situational questions online. We will see if I have the courage to take the test again. The only issue that I have with taking it again is that it is not cheap. Every time you take the test it will cost $150 dollars. It’s an hour test with 80 questions, so it’ll take about a minute or so for each question. The situational questions have a lot of words to read. About a paragraph of a situation and then another paragraph of multiple choice answers. And some of them are trick answers. Have to be very quick about it.
After I have my breakfast, I get to work. I have a lot of items launching on the sites I work on and a lot of content to post.
At the end of the day we take a drive out to the sporting goods store as my husband needed to make a purchase for work. We stay in the car as he goes and does the shopping. Once he is done, he shows up to the car with a baseball bat, some balls and a couple of mitts. Oh my good Lord, what have you done? He thinks that teaching our daughter how to swing a bat and hit a ball are a good idea. He says its good for coordination. Don’t get me wrong, it’s fantastic. But if my little one is anything like me, it’s not going to work out so well. I played soccer and have some coordination with my feet. As for my hands and arms, I am useless. Once I played catch with a friend and he threw the ball right at my face. I luckily put the mitt in front of my face to cover it, all scared and such. And BAM! The ball went right in the mitt. If the mitt wasn’t covering my face I’d have a broken nose. That was the last time I played anything related to baseball. Scared the hell out of me. Now daddy wants me to play with my little one. I don’t want to be responsible for a broken nose or limb. God help me!

It’s Thursday and I have been on a hunt to give away the crib and changing table and other baby items that I’ve had in the basement. Believe it or not, it has been a little bit of a challenge for me. There are some great organizations that will take some of my things, but not all. Plus they need for the items to be delivered. At this point in time, I don’t have the means to make a delivery. So I went another rout and put it on facebook in my community. Again, people are only interested in a couple of things. I can’t seem to be able to get rid of all of it. I’m having a lot of heart trouble with just leaving it out on the curb. I have this fear of: whatever you want to call it, that people will take the items from the curb and then try to sell them. I don’t want that. I’d rather they go to a home that needs them.
So good news. There is someone from my community that could use the baby items. This makes my heart happy. We have communicated on facebook and this person is willing to come pick the items up and best of all, to me, she actually needs them.

Yay Friday! I have been working very hard on getting rid of stuff from the basement. I am very content that today, someone will be picking up the items that I have stored away for a while. All of it is outside and ready to be taken. I am so happy that I’ve found a home for these I can’t even tell you how many happy feelings I have right now. I know I am a strange one, but this type of help gets my heart with happy feelings. Maybe this is something that I should pursue during my spare time. I will look into it. Do you know of any organizations where I can volunteer, preferably from home. I am still quarantining from this crazy virus.
As for work, there is a lot to do. Very busy these days working on both my marketing and business analyst jobs. Both are taking up a lot of time. I am also looking for courses for Business Analyst and I can’t seem to find any. I’ve reached out in LinkedIn and can’t seem to get anything yet. Any ideas?
At the end of the day we go and play pokemonGo and do a couple of raids. We got home early as there wasn’t much going on out there. Maybe its due to the weather, since there are hurricanes in the south and poor weather up here in the north. 2020 is a mess.

Until next time.
Stay safe!

-Isabel

It is Saturday and we are still in quarantine. My daughter and I hung out all afternoon at home. It was hot outside, so we opted to stay in. Not to her account. She’d like to go outside instead and play soccer or anything else for that matter. But it was in the 90’s and it was way too hot for us to be out there playing. Inside, we read a story and then painted a rock. Her Godmother gave her a painting set with a paintbrush, a few rocks and a few colors to paint these rocks. She painted one of them all white and then couldn’t figure out what else to do with it and told me that she would finish it another day. We then went to the basement and played golf with her little plastic golf set. She plays golf like the girls play field hockey lol. Once she got bored with golf, we kicked a small ball back and forth for a little while. But this was not the same as being outside and running after it, so she got bored with that quickly as well. We put the ball away and then played with her toys on the carpeted area of the basement. I wanted her to read some more today, but she wasn’t having it. So we played a little more in the basement then we came back upstairs for water. She then got out her crayons and started coloring her Hello Kitty coloring book while I went to change the sheets on the bed. All the while, my husband was watching TV and falling asleep on the couch. He has hard days during the week, so we let him rest on the couch for as long as he needs it. Besides, he woke up early this morning and made us all waffles and coffee. Of course we’re going to leave you alone. You’ve done enough already today honey.
In the late afternoon, my husband, daughter and mother-in-law go out for a drive. We do this often to get out of the house for a bit. I stay back today and tell them that I need to stay and study. I am working on taking my SCRUM certification and need to study and take some mock tests. I do just that this evening. I read the SCRUM Guide online and then search to see if there is anyone out there that recorded the guide so I may listen to it for a second time. Low and behold, there is. I love the internet! Not only does it give me a job, I work in Internet Marketing, but all sorts of good things are out there. Especially ones that I am looking for to help me with my studies. I also love the internet because it lets me keep in touch with my family and friends. It is especially fantastic in this time of covid, where you can’t be around anyone. Six feet apart to me is a few miles away…in your own house and me in own bedroom/office. So, not only am I reading the SCRUM Guide online, I am also reading and re-reading my notes from my class. If you’re interested, Nassau Community college has Workforce Development Training courses. Look for Project Management section and you will see that one of the course is for Agile Project Management Using SCRUM. They do not pay me to advertise, by the way. I simply think they are good courses to take. Since covid, they have been doing the courses online. This particular course that I took was all online. The professor used youtube to conduct the course. It was great for me. I did not have to commute back and fourth. After work, I had dinner with the family and then got online at 6PM and the course went on until 9. These courses are only for a few weeks and the professor was great. Seriously, I do not get paid to advertise this. I simply had a great experience.
I also too Lean Six Sigma course at NCC. I will be honest though, having been certified in Lean Six Sigma-Yellow Belt hasn’t gotten me further into my career, yet. But maybe, just maybe, kept me at my job. I also took this course at Nassau Community College in the Workforce Development Training. The beauty of these courses is that there is no test at the end. It is considered adult education and no test is required. The only testing is the certification, if you’re interested in having it. And, like everything else in life; it costs extra.
I needed a break from my studies and looked at social media and got bored. No one is doing much nowadays and I can’t live vicariously through anyone this year. Most years people go on vacations to parks or exotic locations and I love to see their pictures. I am always happy for my friends wen they get to get away. This year most people are home and all that can be seen are pictures of kids in their pools. My daughter wishes we had a pool, but I do not. It is a lot of work to maintain a pool. Those who have one know what I’m talking about. Sorry little love, no pool for us. These kids won’t be laughing so much once mommy and daddy tell them they have to stay home when school starts. Or some parents are going to go the hybrid way, where the kids will go to school for two days and do schooling from home for three days. All by keeping that social distancing of 6 feet apart. Maybe there are parents out there that say, forget this and are homeschooling their child this year. As for us, we’d like for our little one to be at home. She really misses her friends and her cousins, but we’re going to sacrifice this year and stay away from everyone.
Tonight I am having trouble sleeping, so I continue to study my notes and am thinking about recording them on youtube or just simply my phone. This way I can listen to them as I am doing chores, or maybe at work when I am doing mundane type of work that I don’t need to think. If I like the results, maybe I will share them with the world. We will see.

Until next time.
Stay safe!

-Isabel

I can’t believe it… 22 weeks and counting. This covid business has taken everyone for a loop. From the sounds of it, we won’t be going back into the office for a long time to come. I’m ok with it. I’d rather stay home and be safe, than go into the office and potentially get sick.
Over the weekend, we did absolutely nothing. I was going to take care of the weeds in the back yard on Saturday, then I got to playing littlest pet shop with my daughter and did not get to go outside and work. With that, I planned for Sunday to get out there and get the weeds cleared. Well, on Sunday it rained and rained so we stayed inside. We played pokemonGo remotely all morning. As we were throwing poke balls around, we were also preparing a nice Sunday dinner. We had lamb and rice. There was enough sauce to cover the lamb and rice and enough left overs for tomorrow. Now we can have leftover pulled lamb sandwiches. The house was a little hot, but it smelled fantastic. As for me, I don’t really appreciate lamb meat. I don’t like the aftertaste that it leaves in my mouth, it’s too gamy for me. I do love that sauce though, it is really good. I smothered it all over the rice and the little bit of lamb that I actually tasted. It’s good meat, but then there comes that aftertaste. Ahh, no good!

It’s Monday, and I am up early. My husband is getting ready for work. My daughter and mother in law are already up and we all have breakfast together. My little one likes to help out daddy in the morning to make his cooler for work. She likes to hand him his water bottles so he can place them inside his cooler. My husband prepares the flour, butter, ferment and sugar every evening so we can have fresh bread in the morning. My daughter has a slice of that warm bread with butter or sometimes peanut butter. She drinks her milk and he drinks his coffee. It’s a nice ritual they have together,
I’m not always up at this time in the morning, but today, today I woke up hungry and wanted some of that warm, fresh bread as well. So, I am up early and having breakfast with the family. After daddy goes to work, I change into my workout clothes and go for a walk. I do a little bit of running today, but not much. I’m not motivated enough to run much today. Once I am satisfied and sweaty enough with my walk, I then do my other exercises and then hit the shower. This months soap is a pineapple and lavender scented. I love pineapple, it is my favorite food and I love the scent. Lavender is great as well, so soothing. After the shower I get dressed and make the bed. Decorative pillows and all. I look at the clock and still have enough time before my morning conference calls for work so I make sure the mail is taken care of. I’ve ordered a belt for my husband from Amazon and it hasn’t even been a month and the belt is already ripping. So I contacted amazon and they are willing to give me a refund. In the time of covid, mail is everything for us here at home. We get practically everything delivered. And if there are any returns, through the mail it goes. After that chore is done, I still have time before my 8:45 conference call and I do my nails. I clear off the light pink chipped color that I currently have and exchange it for a summer pink. The color that I choose is clumpy, not good. I’ve have had this polish for a long time and it is time for it to see the garbage pail. It is time for it to go. I clean out my nails with polish remover and pick out another bright pink color that I have in the pile of many color. This one is good and I am happy with the results.
Shortly after, I have my 8:45AM conference call with a team from Vietnam. It is 9PM their time. They are hard workers for being on so late at night. This team is sometimes also requested to be on other conference calls later in the day. So these people sometimes are on calls at 10 or 11PM their time, and it about 10AM US time. I hope they get to start their day later than the regular 9AM start on their end. I’ll have to ask them this one day. Since this team is offshore and have a heavy accent, I am having a hard time understanding the majority of what they are saying. One of the gentlemen that are on the call; I can not understand at all. I’m sure I will understand him, eventually, but for now, I am lost in translation.

Tuesday came and went quickly. Just work, work, work.

It’s Wednesday and I wake up with a raging headache and hungry. I ate some home made fresh bread, made by my husband of course. It is delicious with a little bit of butter. Also, coffee! Best tasking coffee! Eating something and drinking a cup of coffee made my headache go away. I then went right to my conference calls starting at 8:45AM. Then another at 9AM.
I have no motivation today. Usually my early morning conference calls wake me up a bit as everyone is really nice, but today it did not work. So, I take a break from work and take a quick shower. This woke me up, especially the lotion of exotic coconut on my skin post shower. It reminds of the beach, a place that I haven’t been to this year and am not planning of getting out there while covid is around.
As for work, it’s been a little slow as our backend content management systems are not working right now. We are waiting for the developers to take care of this. I feel bad for them as this has been an issues for weeks and they can’t seem to get it to work. So waiting and waiting to getting back on.
In the afternoon there is a meeting for my daughter’s school about covid and their plan for this years school year. They are planning on going the hybrid way. Two days in school, three days remote. They mentioned that bathrooms will be cleaned twice a day and classrooms will be cleaned in the evening. As for my family, we are not comfortable with this. I’d rather my daughter go to school remotely for this year, or until covid is no longer. We may need to the homeschooling rout. Has anyone ever done homeschooling? What are your thoughts on this?
In the evening we play pokemonGo. Tonight we have raid hour and we do all of the raids that we can. We get some shiny characters and some that are 98%. All in all it was a good night for pokemoning.

It’s Thursday and I get up within 5 minutes or so before my first conference call. My call is with a team from Vietnam that I am having issues understanding what they say. The accent is a bit thick and I am trying really hard to understand. Meanwhile, I take notes of what I can understand. Mainly things that are nonsensical but I try. The next conference calls that I have this morning gives me more work to do. This is actually fantastic. The more work I have the better. Of course I don’t want to be overloaded but having things to do is a good thing for me at this point. To me, it means I am valuable to the company and the team trust that I will get it done.
I am exited to day that my company working on a Professional Buddy program with the local University and I am very exited to volunteer. When the email came out to ask if anyone was interested, I right away, answered with excitement. I am looking forward to mentoring a college student. I wish I had a mentor when I went to college. I’d probably be doing something else with my career.

It’s Friday and I finally get my behind to the treadmill. It took my mother-in-law to wake me up. Yes, I have an alarm clock and yes, I had hit snooze on it. But the fact that someone took the time to wake me, gave me the motivation to actually move my body from the bed to the treadmill. On the treadmill, I walked for about an hour and ran only for 5 minutes or so. I would have liked to have run a little more but I did not have the motivation this morning.
As for work, there are conference call after conference call. This has been my day. Busy, busy!
I am loving Pharrell Williams – Entrepreneur (Official Video) ft. JAY-Z. This video is everything right now. Listening to it over and over again.

Until next time.
Stay Safe!

-Isabel

It has been so long since I have seen the office. I kinda miss it. Actually, nah, I don’t miss the office. I miss my friends and the camaraderie that we had while at the office. But I now have new coworkers as I have switched jobs from Marketing to IT. It has been a slow transition, as I am continuing to do Internet Marketing work as well as Business Analyst work. I will eventually transition from IM to BA but not yet. We are still trying to figure out who will do the work. And it hasn’t been easy.
At home, we’ve been working on getting my little one to read and write as well as math. As for math, she loves it. Reading is not her thing for now. We are working hard on it, but not yet. We’ve had to take some toys away so that she’ll know we mean business when it comes to her learning to read. She’s getting it.
We’ve been playing pokemonGo as a family to keep us distracted during covid season. We stay in our car and play the game in the safety of our Nissan. My daughter love it. She loves all of the characters and the fighting and the way that they faint. So, my husband had the great idea of getting a book of pokemon. It looks like a comic book to me, but it is a large book and she is very interested in finding out what it says. So she is trying really hard to read it. Ah hah! We figured out how she’s going to finally learn to read. Good find daddy!
Meawhile, I have been working on cleaning out the basement. I have a bunch of tubs filled with clothing that I realize, I will never wear again. They are sizes small and extra small for when I was in college and running cross country. I used to run for three hours every day of the the week and was as skinny as a rail. So no, those clothes will not longer fit me. So I have placed them all in a bag and will be donating them. Actually, now that I think of it, I may just give them to my niece. She is just about my height now. I’ve been 5-foot nothing since I was 12 years old. Didn’t grow after I was 12. Very odd. I used to be one of the tallest people in my class in elementary school and then, I turned 12 and everyone grew and I did not.
Also, in the piles I found clothing of when I was pregnant. I was saving these for the next pregnancy. But that is not going to happen. One and done, as they say. So I’ve cleared out a couple of baskets from the basement and am ready to clear out some more things. I’d like for my little one to have a space where she can play with her toys. The living room is not so big and we’d like to keep it clear. I love a neat and clear room. Having too much stuff everywhere, including toys makes me all sorts of anxietal.
Today is Sunday and I wanted to get outside and clean out the yard, but low and behold, it is raining. It doesn’t look like it is going to stop any time soon. I will have to entertain myself in some other way. My family and I entertained ourselves by playing pokemonGo and did a bunch of raids remotely. Hey, it’s something to do on a Sunday afternoon. For dinner, we had lamb and rice. I am not a big fan of lamb, but the family loved it.

Until next time.
Stay safe!

It’s Monday and I am sleeping in. No getting up early, No running just sleep. My head is on fire and I am not in the mood. Today is not the day for hitting those types of goals.
I am however, looking for inner peace. I have been anxietal at just about everything and I have decided that inner peace may be the way to a better outlook on life. I’ve been looking for inspirational inner peace quotes on google, where else, and found the following “I have no desire to argue with anyone, I choose to walk away because I just want peace.” Another quote that I like is: “Never be in a hurry; Do everything quietly and in calm spirit. Do not loose your inner peace for anything whatsoever. Even if your whole world seems upset.” by Saint Francis De Sales.
While I am not looking for inner peace I am listening to Business Intelligence for Dummies. I have been given an opportunity to be a business analyst at my firm and I am working on knowing all about the subject. Business Intelligence and business analyst aren’t exactly the same, but I am learning nevertheless. Over the weekend I was watching videos on youtube about the subject of being a business analyst and learning some more about it. Interesting stuff. Being a BA is being the liaison between the business team and the IT teams. I will basically be the middle person between the two. It should be fun! At least I will make it as much fun as I possibly can. That’s what I do, I make my jobs, as terrible as they may seem, fun for me. I tell myself that this new adventure is going to be a good time and I forge forward and make it as such for me. I don’t know about anyone else, but for me it’ll be a good time.

Happy Tuesday! So this morning, my husband decided that the way to help me to wake up was to call my out my name and then shout, WAKE UP! It scared the bejesus out of me. But I sure got out of bed fast. Thanks husband, I think! I then took a sip of my coffee and looked out the front window to see if the cute fawn were outside munching on the grass. They were not. I haven’t see them is a few weeks. I hope they are ok. After that I got on the treadmill and ran for about 20 minutes. I did not do my full 30 minutes, not sure why, but I am tired today. But I did continue on the walk for 3 miles. I am thinking of doing 5k street races and need to be able to keep up for that amount of time. That’s not necessarily my goal for now, but I am keeping it up to 3 miles per day. My goal is to run for 30 minutes at a faster pace. And maybe, do a 5k under those 30 minutes. That is my goal for now. I want to be able to do that by the fall. After my run and my other exercises I get to my dear coffee! My husband places the coffee inside my jirushi thermous and it stays hot for the entire morning. I use french vanilla creamer on my coffee, that my husband was so kind to get for me from the grocery store, yummy! Thank you, husband!

It’s Wednesday and I am up and early. My husband decided that it would be hilarious to wake me up by screaming WAKE UP!! at 5:30 in the morning. He didn’t even start by saying my name first this morning, he went straight for the call. He must of been in a hurry this morning. But it worked, because, it sure work me up right away! I was initially mad at him because I thought that he would wake up the house, but then thought it was funny as everyone was already awake at that hour. Does no one sleep at this house?!
Him scaring the hell out of me this morning was like the bugle being played at the air force base to wake up the soldiers lol. So now that I was up, I get dressed and make the bed then I right away went to do my product launch for one of our large printers. The team only provided me with the information to post on the site a couple of days ago, so here I am up and early doing the work that should have been done last week, I am doing it on the day of the launch. The teams do that often and I comply. In the end, it’s just another product launch.
In the evening, we needed to bring our family car to the mechanic as the air conditioner stopped working. I don’t know what it is with air conditioners but they never seem to work out for me. My little car also does not have air conditioning. It has been fixed multiple times and it continues to break. So now the family car is at the shop and we are using my little car to go pokemoning in the afternoon. So here we all are in a car that does not have air conditioning. The windows are all down and the hot air is coming in. Also, the muffler in the car has broken in half. So the car has no AC and it is loud and sounds like a race car. My daughter was having a ball with the craziness. Since the windows are all down, she thought that our hair being all over the place due to the wind was hilarious. She also thought that the car being really loud was also very funny especially the way that it was being driven. It really does sound like a race car. We are having a heat wave in Long Island and it was really hot in the car. So again, no AC, widows down, loud muffler and all of us sweating; we were all laughing at our misery. We were all truly having a good time and laughing the entire time.

It’s Thursday and I have gone on the treadmill but did not run today. Today, I walked uphill for over an hour. I figured I’d change my routine a little bit so that there will be some sort of a nice change. I get bored doing the same things over and over again.
Apparently, my boss understands my feeling of being bored as I am no longer working in marketing. I’ve been a marketing senior specialist for over 10 years at my firm. But, now I have began to transition working as a business analyst. I have never officially done this type of work before but it seems like I will be able to tackle it. My boss would like for me to take a course or two on this and I am grateful for that. If you know of any good courses for business analysis please share this with me. Meanwhile, I will continue to do product launches and other marketing aspects of my work until the transition is complete. So for another two months or so, I will be wearing a few different hats at work.

It’s Friday, my hair looks great and I am feeling great. I left my hair in a big braid over night and this morning I have beach waves. I like it! As for work, it has been a very busy day with wearing a few hats. I’ve had a morning filled with meetings for my new position and the afternoon filled with work for my marketing position.
In the evening we go out for a drive in mommy’s race car and we continue to have a great time in our misery. It is hot and muggy but my daughter thinks that our hair being all over the place due to the wind is hilarious. By the time we get home, we all need a shower since we are all sticky and our hair needs a good washing. But prior to that, we have some ice cream to cool off. It’s been a good day.

Hi there thank you for reading!

Happy Monday! This morning, I got my running in bright and early. I did my 30 minutes of running and a total of 3 miles with walking. I then, did my sit-ups and push-ups. I’ve added the push-ups to the routine as my arms are getting flabby as I age and I need them muscular. I then took some time to take care of my plants. I took a water jug outside and watered the plants that so desperately need it. It was due to rain all weekend due to the tropical storm that we are getting, but it didn’t rain at all by us. Instead, it was hot and humid. I then took my warm shower and got to my affirmations. Below is one of my favorites for the day.

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Now, it’s time for work. While doing my work, I am also listening to The Scrum Fieldbook: A Master Class on Accelerating Performance, Getting Results, and Defining the Future by J.J. Sutherland. I am working studying SCRUM for Agile in Project Management and figure, I’d listen to the experts on how it works. Southerland says that people can’t “literally multitask” I agree. He also says to not “confuse on being busy to being done.” I can use this on my personal life. Busy work does not mean that you are done.
I have already taken a course in Nassau College and am now studying to take my certification on SCRUM for Agile Project Management. On mock tests, I have been doing pretty well, I’m continuing to study so I can get certified. Listening to this audiobook is helping me to learn some more on this subject. The book is also quite entertaining too. The author was also a reporter for NPR and a he is a great story teller.
I pause for lunch and had plain Greek yogurt with honey on top. The honey on top was delicious! I get this from my husband who got this idea from his mother. So good!
I have so much to do for work that I only take a few minutes to scarf down the yogurt and get back to my bedroom/office and continue to add content to the websites that I work on.

It’s Tuesday and I was awakened at 5AM to be with my husband for a little bit. He then leaves for work and I tell him to have a nice day at work. I then go back to bed. I am sleepy today and my body is achy, I need some rest. So, I am scrolling through Instagram and looking at pretty pictures of vintage homes and decorations and then I fall back asleep with the phone on my had. This morning I did not have any dreams, just blissful sleep. It’s usually have funny, wild dreams during short naps but not today. After my nap, I get up, make my bed, get dressed and am now ready for work. Thank goodness we finally got an air-conditioner in the bedroom/office. It is hot out there and working iin the bedroom/office with the window open can become a bit suffocating during hot and muggy days. I thank the Lord that I still have my job and we are able to afford the luxury of cool air.
I’m in the need of courage today, so I turn to Instagram and find this encouraging quote from BOSSBABE: “It takes a certain type of courage to believe in yourself and actually realize that you have something to offer that no one else in the world does.” Another encouraging quote is from Erma Bombeck; “It takes a lot of courage to show your dreams to someone else.” And one by Steve Jobs that I also like; “Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow know what you truly want to become.” I feel that my gut and intuition are usually correct, but I tend to always second guess myself. In the end, I become unsure of what my original gut feeling really was because my mind and my heart are wrestling each other. My heart always wants everyone and everything to be great and beautiful, but my gut is always stepping back and defending the heart.

It’s now Wednesday and it’s humpday. I can’t wait until the week is over so I can sleep in on Saturday and Sunday. Until then, I woke up early helped my husband. Had some home made bread, that he made…delicious! And then, went for my run. I was able to complete my 30 minute run once again and that made me happy. I hate the beginning of my workout days; like having to change from comfy jammies to workout wear, going to the treadmill and turning it on. It’s a process. But afterwords, it is awesome. I absolutely love the way I feel after I’ve accomplish my running goal.

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While working, I’m now listening listening to Catch 22 by Joseph Heller and am laughing out loud. After a while I had to turn it off, I couldn’t work and listen to the satire at the same time. And then it was a Rihanna song…work, work, work, work, work!

It’s Thursday and this morning I slept until I couldn’t sleep anymore. I still got up at 5AM to be with the hubby and help him with his shoes and socks but then back to bed I went and slept well. I did however have a strange dream. I dreamed that there was this girl that I was friends with who was being a total diva. Apparently, I used to babysit her when she was younger and now that she was older, we had become friends. And one day, she told me that she did not need to be nice to anyone because her family was rich and rich people were on point and did not have to be nice to others. So I spinned my heels and went right to her papa and talked to him about it. I said Sir I am sorry, but today will be my last day in this house. And then I went on to tell him what his daughter had said to me and he laughed at me! I told him that this is no laughing matter. He stopped laughing and put on a serious face then said that his daughter will never have any real friends if she has that attitude towards life. I then storm away from the room. Now, my conscious wants to see who this “friend” is. Is it someone I know in real life? A friend I’ve had in the past or present? Who is this girl who wants to be “on point” and not kind. So I go looking for her in my dream. I find her and I see my face staring back at me! It was me! Damn, I was mean and gave attitude to myself in my own dream. That can’t be a good sign. As for my real personality, I’m always looking for the best in people and always trying my best to be good and kind to everyone not mean and “on point,” whatever he hell that means. At least that is my goal. If I’m mean or nasty to you, I am truly sorry. That is not my intention.
As for work, I am working on finding new projects to do on my site. I realize that the site needs a clean up. We have a lot of old content and want to get rid of products that are no longer relevant to our dealers. So I send out emails to my IT counterparts to provide information so I can share it with our teams and the great cleanup can begin.
At the end of the day I study. And then study some more. I am copying my notes over again so I can retain the information. And quite frankly get rid of all of the paper work that I have. I am just about ready to take my Agile Project Management using Scrum test. I’ve already received my certificate for the class. Now all I have to do is get my certification and I am all set to go.

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It’s now Friday and I am refreshed as I have done my run and exercises for the day and took my refreshing shower. I then get to work. I am working on a project and feel like I am getting something really important done for my company. My boss wants me to be the business analyst I’m hoping that I get it right the first time and don’t have to go back and forth with business and IT on this one. We will see.
Turns out that whatever I did so far is not right or enough. Yikes! So I thought and though about what else I could do and I resolved on calling my mentor and asked her for some advise and if she could help me out. She said for me to talk to someone who has done that type of project in the past. I’d be better off talking to a particular individual as she may be willing to give me a hand. So with great fear, I had to read some encouraging quotes from my notebook before acting. I reached out to the person my mentor recommended via email for an introduction and to see if she can help me out. She answered me back shortly after and said yes she would help me! We have a meeting next week and hopefully she will be my savior for this project.
I continued to work throughout the day and going through videos on youtube so I can educate myself a little more on the subject for my project. So far, I’ve found fundamentals but no techniques. I will continue to search for these. Do you know of any videos or books that I can see/read/listen to regarding business analyst? If so, please share these with me.
In the evening, I decided to take a break from my stresses of work. The family and I went and played pokemonGo in town. We didn’t find many raids but did go for a nice drive to release our stresses away. During this pandemic we continue to stay away from others and not have any contact. We have our masks in the car, just in case there is an issue. But we are practicing safe distancing and will continue to do this until the pandemic has calmed down some more.

Until next week. Stay safe and healthy!

xoxox
-Isabel

It’s Saturday and I started my day off with placing the finishing touches on my weekly blog. If you’re interested, this week was Working from Home Week #17. This blog is basically my diary of my work weeks while in quarantine. They tend to get a little boring as it has become the same thing each and every week. I try to spice it up a bit with pictures and other things that I am doing besides running in the morning and working all day.

I am very exited today as today I have a team coming to the house and putting down mulch. I haven’t had mulch placed in our yard in a few years and it needs it badly. I have a few flowers planted and the mulch will make them look beautiful. This will also help keep the moisture and makes the yard look fantastic.

While they are doing that, I am cleaning the bedroom/office that I have been working in during quarantine. The sheets need washing and the bed needs to be made fresh. All the while, I will let the bed breath for a little while so the sleep smells can come out of the bed.