Kim Kardashian

Because I maintain that my blog is all about me (and it is), that means you won't get topics that hold no interest to me to discuss.

Basically I'm not going to write about things unless I actually care enough to put the effort in to learn a little bit about it& make it decently interesting. With that said I basically do not care about any celebrity (except the 8 kids Jon& Kate had cause they are cute). I am, however, making an exception for Kimmy K. I blogged about her before .. I think I mentioned how she loved my style.

Now, this post is sort of about that poor dead baby and about how her mother got off for killing her. I don't have any desire to hate on the mother and I'm sure there's 1,000,000 other bloggers who have already done so sufficiently. No.. I want to talk about Kim& her role in this. Or, more specifically the fact that she was slammed for tweeting about it.

Oh Kim.

You shouldn't weigh in on things.

Now ..as you can see by the crazy retweets, this was a popular thing she posted. Most people ripping her to shreds because her father got OJ Simpson off (side note- I had no idea he was her dad). Now, I'll be honest. I can find no use for Kim Kardashian. Seriously .. I'm sure she's a nice girl but I'm not one for being infatuated with others (please exclude Kobe from this statement), especially people who do nothing of note (aside from being on the Ellen Show).

Now, I did some research& found out Kim was 13 during the OJ Simpson case. I'm sure she had grand delusions of the world and that caring about her father's job was probably about as high on her list as any other 13 year old. AKA not very.

So yes. This is my post saying to the general public- imagine if you were never allowed to speak on anything that your parents hold different opinions or actions on. Plus ..it's Kim Kardashian. Does one really expect her to recognize her hypocrisies if there are any? Yes, her father helped OJ Simpson beat the charges .. doesn't mean she can't think whatever the hell she wants about the event and any other event no matter how similar or different.

PS Keep an eye out for my new workout DVD.

That's right ..Kimmy& I teamed up ;)

Tracking!

So.. I am obsessed with tracking things. I need to know how many calories I eat in a day. I need to know how many miles I am running / biking / whatever a week. I enjoy having these things because I like seeing my progress. I am such a narcissist.

So, since I know you're all DYING to be as cool as I am (right ..right?!), I have decided to compile a list of the best places to track things you do in life. Remember a while back when I posted that I finally got some type of smart phone? Well it's an Android. Go me. My favorite thing about it (aside from compulsively checking Twitter) is easily that I can track my eating instantly.

My first place that I started tracking my intake / exercise with was MyPlate and it is fantastic. It's part of Livestrong.com and has every. food. ever. So that's pretty great. You know what isn't pretty great? They only have iPhone& Blackberry apps. Stupid Livestrong. Why the Android hate?! Jerks. Gosh.

So, instead I had to search and search and search (aka I selected the first app that came up ..so if you have better suggestions lol) for one for my phone. I finally settled on MyFitnessPal! It's actually really good ..I had half expected it to be sucky just because I loved MyPlate so much. It's pretty great. Plus, they are feeling the Android love baby. Oh and also, even if I had an iPhone or Blackberry? It infuriates me when things I can use for free online suddenly need to be bought with cash in an 'app store'. Brutal. So MyFitnessPal gets major points for being free.

So, that's where I track my calories and sometimes I log my fitness in there as well. I have discovered, however, that DailyMile is about 1,000 times better than those food journals. It's fabulous. I've only just discovered it about 6 days ago, but man I LOVE it. It tells you how many miles you clock per week, you can create routes and you can find your friends on there. Sadly, as you will see from my screen shot, I have no friends. LOL!

It's pretty fabulous and I think it's probably one of the best ones because I have noticed it being mentioned a lot on the running blogs I read. I swear that once I survive the Cabot Trail, I'm getting back into running. Maybe I'll do the 10k in the Fiddler's Run? I'll have to wait& see if I even survive the trail ahaha

Oh, and lastly .. I LOVE my bike computer that tracks my speed and distance covered and my crappy heart rate monitor. I am in desperate want of a Garmin though. Actually desperate want doesn't accurately describe.

I own the Sigma. I covet the Garmin.

So a few questions:
1. Do you guys track your fitness / nutrition? If so, what do you use?
2. Do you know any rocking biking blogs?! I need one :(
3. Do you own a really good heart rate monitor? Care to weigh in?
4. Do you bike?! I'm dreaming big here.

Smart phones!

Sorry for my lack of posting yesterday ..I was planning on writing one last night while watching the Lakers game. Instead, I ended up at Steel City. It was ..interesting.

So -big news: I entered the world of smart phones. I'm pretty sure I was one of the last people around to still have a flip phone. So, off I went the other day to purchase a new, smarter phone! I got this one:

So, basically an Android. Which means that no one has ever heard of it probably. But it's cute. And it does what I want ..except it won't sign me into twitter. Which is disappointing. So, seeing as I've spent the last few days playing with my phone& generally being busy+ tired, today you are not getting any kind of clever post.

Read: There will be no pathetic attempts at photoshop in this post. I'm sorry. Here, enjoy this instead:

Isn't that cool? If you have a smart phone (and let's be honest, now that I've bought one ..I'm pretty sure EVERYONE has one) ..you can scan that beauty and it will take you to my site via your phone. But you're obviously already there in some form, so I'm not sure why it matters.

I'm pretty sure there is a clever marketing scheme behind this, but like I said. I'm lazy& tired so you're really not getting anything entertaining me from me today! I will be back later this evening to post my photos of the day (HOW do I keep falling behind? Man I'm bad at this).

So my day so far has consisted of the following:

1. Sleep in until 9.30 when I got a wake up call from the boyfriend. Then go to the chiropractor. My regular guy was gone away, so I had to see a different one. It was so exciting.

Or not. Then I went to the mall& bought some Easter treats for my boyfriend. I'm hoping he'll come over later when he gets home& we'll paint some eggs. I am truly a 10yr old at heart. I can't help it ..Easter is so much fun!

For now, I'm laying here watching the Real World and finding QC codes that I can scan on my phone. I have seen these stupid codes for forever and my poor slide phone did not do anything with them. I'm so excited. I also have a barcode scanner to tell me if I'm getting a deal or getting ripped off .. and a calorie counter and more games than you can imagine!!

PS if you are like me and getting on the smart phone train WAYYY late... get an Android of some type. Apps are mostly free. Even lots of the same ones you'd pay for on an iPhone. Sucks to have an iPhone. Mine is way cuter AND costs less money. GO ECONOMICAL FINANCE DECISIONS!

Winter in spring

The title perfectly describes Cape Breton at this current moment. It's snowing .. it's cold .. it's windy .. did I mention there was SNOW?! The perk to the sucky weather today is that it's 12.52PM and I have already accomplished so many things! I will provide a brief overview and some details on the more exciting parts.

Haircut
Went to Rena at Hair Solutions. She was super sweet and it was a really laid back place. Had a few laughs, solved my hair issues, got bangs AND it didn't even cost me that much money! It was great and really perked up my mood. I now have lots of energy and am feeling better about the fact that it's freezing cold out. Mostly I'm just super happy that I have a hairdresser who can actually style my hair! Welcome back, fabulus curls :)

Contest
So, my blog contest only has today+ 3 more to enter! Hope you guys are planning on entering at some point! Don't forget the 4 ways to win (blog, comment, tweet, facebook) and also, all parts of the blog prize have been compiled and are just awaiting me to take their photo! I am trying to decide to how to best photograph them to show them ..I will be uploading both them& my photo of the day later this afternoon!

Silly String
I also bought 2 cans of this stuff. What I am going to use it for remains to be seen! Mostly I just want to spray someone or something with it ..I'm not picky. Contemplating covering my puppy in it, but can totally see that backfiring on me and ending up with a dog covered in silly string that I can't get off. LOL. He would hate me for the rest of his life. So I figure I'd spare him and just silly string something else. Just not entirely sure WHAT yet!

Today
You know that saying about today being a gift, that's why they call it the present or something? Yeah, if I wasn't so lazy I'd look it up. Well, I was thinking about that the other night at work ..and wondering how much truth was in it. Keep in mind, my evening at that moment was not going particularly well. My first thought was to think about how awesome my gifts have been from immediate family and friends (amazing) and those who got gifts for me because they wanted to come to my party / had to for some reason (less than amazing and also more abundant). Then I started thinking about about my days. Some moments are amazing, while most of the day is basically incredibly ordinary. I think these people might be onto something with this thought. So, my end thought? Each day probably is a gift, however most gifts are disappointing.

New Music
Hopefully you will all love this song as much as I do! It's really sweet& cute. I also noticed a crazy trend with my music ..I obviously love male singers way more than female ones. The only female singer I ever put on here, I ended up retracting my like of her song due to her stupid behavior. Way to go, JG. Ruining female artist's chances of being discovered as the next big thing via my blog. I hope you reform your vulgar tweets because of this consequence. So, for now I will continue my trend of beautiful songs sung by guys :) Enjoy!
Oh, and also ..sorry for the weird video that accompanies this song, but it was the best version I could find of it. I am amazed I could even find it!

3,041+

YES! Thank you absolutely everyone who viewed my blog. I have gotten 240 page views today .. exceeded my 3,000 goal by 41 (last time I checked) and there's still lots of time until the day is over! You guys rock :)

So I heard that a great way to increase traffic to your website is to start something called a Blog Contest. This is where you offer a prize for people to win if they decide to enter the contest. I think I'll hold my very first blog contest right now, because you all have been so great to get me to my goal for the day!

So, my tasks for the day have just gone from lazing around to setting up a blog contest! Who knew .. this is a big moment. Let me start with an outline:

What is the prize?!
It is magnificent. You will LOVE it. I will update this shortly with a photo of your prize ..if you should be so lucky to win! Until then, you will wait on the edge of your seat for the big announcement.

Rules& Regulations
So, in order to win my magnificent prize, you have to do at least ONE of the following:
1. Comment on this post
2. Tweet this post
3. Facebook this post
4. Link this post to your own blog

Now if you happen to really, really, really want to win this prize, you can do all four of the above mentioned things to have a grand total of FOUR entries into the draw! Don't say I'm not awesome.

The contest will run for SEVEN days (1 week). It will start the minute I post this blog and will continue until April 1st. I know, that's April Fool's Day, but I promise a winner WILL be selected and really will get a prize in my first official blog contest! No jokes being played on you!
If you are selected as the winner, I require one thing; contact me ASAP with your contact info. Imagine if someone wins this who isn't my mother, Garret or one of my girlfriends!

PS Mom, Garret, girls - if you win, I don't need your contact info ;)

Winning
How very Charlie Sheen of me, no? Except I actually mean winning the contest, not twitter.
How will I select who wins? It will be 100% arbitrary. I'll use a random number generator to select a number. Everyone who enters will be given one .. and then bam! If you're lucky enough for that generator to pick your number, you're going to be the very first official blog contest winner for HalfPastWonderful :D

Now, if you DO win .. there are 2 things I'd love to do. The first is a Blog Interview with you, because hell, if I'm going to succumb to all things cliche about blogs I may as do the interview thing. BUT more importantly .. I would LOVE a photo of your prize proudly displayed in your home.

*Please note, neither of these things are required. They would simply be the icing on the cake.


Alrighty, so now we've got that whole contest thing taken care of. Best of luck to everyone who enters. Which you may as well do if you're reading this ..I mean, you're already here. All you have to do is comment (which, by the way, you don't have to register for ANYTHING). Approximately 23 seconds of your life, from start to finish!

So, I enlisted my friend Kelly to help me decide on a prize. Her suggestion was good but involved me being there personally, which started us talking about my international visitors (hi, guys! You all rock) and lead to this gem:

Kelly says (2:53 PM):
fascinating..
And one from the arctic
I should probably count as Russia hahahahahhahahahaa

Oh, Kelly! You make Sarah Palin proud :)
Alright, I hope people play along with me and enter into my First Official HalfPastWonderful Blog Contest! It will be fun if you help me make it be :D

PS check back for updates, including my photo of the day& a hint at the prize!

Photos!

Okay, so double post. I'm currently enjoying a beautiful blue drink (thanks world, for not still having a ban on alcohol. Mostly just vodka) and have edited my photos. They are now ready to be uploaded. First, I have to give a shout out to Mom, Dad and Garret because they have ALL contributed to my favorite things: photos.
All of them pitched in with purchasing lenses, tripods, photoshop, lightbox and more! You three people are awesome :)

So, since my last blog was exceedingly long, I'll leave you with just my photos. Yesterdays' first. It's a photo of a book someone got for Mom and it's about stress. It's cute and made me smile. The photo didn't get all the words, but I still like it. Mostly because I like the book.

And now, for today. My photo is obviously my blue drink! I have no idea if it's a good photo ..but it's blue, has vodka in it and I'm drinking it. So who cares?! If you know me at all, you recognize my complete love for blue drinks. The love is so strong I taught a Cuban bartender how to make my drink. Take that, Cuba.

Oh, one bonus photo before I leave you folks. The Morning Mashup is, seriously, the only reason I bother going to classes in the mornings. They are hilarious and if you have satellite radio, you should listen to them. If you don't, I guess good on you for supporting the local radio businesses ahaha. So today, Nicole from the show tweets a photo of Nerds (alongside blue drinks, Nerds are another favorite!) and I reply saying as much. She tweeted me back ..aw, isn't that just the sweetest thing?! Here's her reply:

I feel so famous. Hahaha it did seriously make me smile, as lame as that is!

Hope your night is going as completely fabulously as mine! Really, even half as fabulously would still be pretty great :) Either way, embrace it. You'll never have this night again!

Sunday Afternoons

I had a glorious, glorious sleep last night. It started almost immediately after I submitted my post and lasted almost 12 hours. I guess the reason I have been feeling so crappy& chronically tired lately is because I was actually tired. What a novel concept! Who would have thought ..so for now, I'm feeling much better and wishing that I had of just been able to get such a long sleep about a week ago. If I hadn't been so tired, I would have run a 5k in Sydney today. As it stands, I'm going to get back on the fitness train tomorrow, for real this time! I'm going to restart Insanity and keep going for the full 60 days. I am promising this time.. no more slacking.

Okay, so aside from my good sleep& lack of exercise, today is gorgeous! The weatherman tells me it's cold out, but all I can think is:

HAPPY FIRST DAY OF SPRING :)

Or fall, if you live in the southern hemisphere!
The sun is shining, there are no clouds and it seems warmer than it is! What more can you ask for?! Oh yeah, that is stays this way! I want warmer weather and to enjoy some ice cream. I also want to get my motorcycle license.

Why, you ask? Yesterday Garret made the trek to Ingonish to pick up a motorcycle so that I can learn to drive! I'm so excited. Last night was my first official lesson. I sat on it, started it, shifted it out of neutral and into first (maybe?) .. let out the clutch and .. WENT FORWARD! Wooohoo .. I survived my first attempt at driving at motorcycle 4 inches! I also learned how to gas it while it was in neutral. I survived that as well (already doing much better than anticipated)! It was so exciting ..I can't wait to get a new leather coat and pants with studs on them. Also, to try to drive it outside of the garage. You guys just wait until you see me flying around downtown on my bike! I made Garret take a photo& send it to me so you guys could see just how awesome I am:

*Had to blur the background ..so many other bikes, couldn't tell what one I was on!

Isn't that awesome?! I love it. I don't even care that it's super dorky and Garret tells me it isn't very cool! Now, I need some suggestions for my awesome bike.
1. Name?!
2. Color?!
3. Decals?!
4. How awesome (1 - 10) is all this?!

I'll give you a hint for 4 .. the answer is 10 (incredibly awesome!). I'm so much a rebel that my mom even tweeted this:

Thanks Mom!! Definitely made me laugh out loud when I saw that ..too cute :) So, now .. what else is on the agenda for this day? Soon, I have to head to work where I will study for my foodborne test. If I get enough done there, I will write it tomorrow. If not, I'll write it Wednesday. Easy enough game plan ..as long as I don't get sidetracked by Buffy or Easy A! I am hoping for a quiet night -then again, I'm always hoping for a quiet night.

I also have to make myself some lunch in a few minutes and am busy wondering why I ate all the cake earlier. Baking is dangerous for my waistline. No more cookies or cakes for me! I am also promising to start eating healthier again. Such a slacker these last few weeks. Oops.

The only thing left to include in my post for this afternoon is TWO photos of the day, but I have to be honest; I'm not going to include them yet. I need to upload& photoshop them still. Too much work for me right now so on that note, keep waiting. I will add them later this evening when I get in from work.

Oh, before I leave this post go. I have one more thing to talk about:
Roll Up the Rim to: lose, in my case. I have yet to win a single thing on this stupid game. To make matters worse, Garret is constantly winning!! I think he has won 15+ times so far and I'm pretty sure I was there for every. single. one. So not fair .. Tim Hortons, why can't you pour my tea into a winning cup?! Just one .. I just want a free stinkin' tea. Please, can you make this happen before Roll up the Rim is over? Would really appreciate it!

So,for now, I am off to hang out with my puppy and make myself some lunch! I hope you all take advantage of this gorgeous day (or not so gorgeous, if that's your luck!)! At the very least, happy change of seasons boys& girls :)

TGIW!

Wednesday's don't get enough love from the world, despite their nickname Hump day! They deserve some more appreciation .. after all, their start symbolizes having survived the first of the week and their end symbolizes 'ALMOST WEEKEND!'. I like them :)
Today I bought a tea from Tim Hortons and guess what?! I forgot to roll up the rim :( I always forget. So frustrating ..not that I would have won anyway. Now, I want a tea that is made correctly (the last one was completely wrong. Still drank it anyway) and poured into a winning cup!

Aside from today being Wednesday& including tea, I had some classes& did a boiler room inspection (ps - CBU has the most immaculately clean boiler room I've ever seen. Okay, so I may have only ever seen this one, but seriously. Could eat off the floors!). It was interesting and afterward we celebrated completing it by going out for lunch. Any excuse to eat out, right?! Then I came home ..was going to hit up the gym, but it got canceled so I will just do Insanity this evening. I keep saying I'm going to restart it anyway .. today is as good as any!

So, now we have to talk about what is on my mind. Here is what is on my mind: annoying people. Not even casually annoying people. I'm talking people who, in their own minds, are the next greatest thing to ever happen to the earth. I recently showed a video of a singer singing a fabulous song. I still love the song. I loved it so much, I decided to follow her on twitter! Turns out, the vision I had of her in my mind was much better than the real live version of her.

Upon following her, I realized 2 major things:
1. She doesn't understand basic grammar
2. She's really annoying

This was sad for 2 reasons:
1. She obviously didn't write that incredibly clever& catchy song
2. I have to unfollow her

Also, I encouraged her to take her tweeting more grammatically seriously but typing out this gentle reminder:

It was clearly appreciated as I got this reply, in a snarky passive-aggressive I-recognize-your-tweet-but-will-not-direct-my-reply-to-you sort of way!

*Edited to protect singers privacy ..unless you're clever enough to either see the only female singer I've ever posted / can recognize this photo. LOL!

So, the moral of the story? If you are going to be passive-aggressive towards me, I will passive-aggressively blog about you. I will spare no one. It might even become some sort of weekly feature: Yvonne Explores Passive-Aggressive Humans.
Could be a thrilling look into the human psyche.

Until then, I will leave you with some questions:
1. Can you figure out this person?
2. Does passive-aggressive twitter behavior bother you?
3. Did it at least make you laugh?!

Last, but not least, ladies and gentlemen .. I present to you, my photo of the day! Enjoy :)