Carly's Ramblings Blog - Style

Return To Base Camp, Robin Williams, Motivation & My Job

Today's blogs....

Oh, it really is nice to be home....

30 Day Blogging Challenge – Survival Camp

Day of Rest ?? – August 12, 2014
Norb and I are giving you the extra time to work on your reviews... if you have finished them all then write how you relaxed today at camp.

I have found my way back to base camp today. Getting lost out in the wilds of Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York states was a little whirlwind - but lots of fun. Being back home in Southern Ontario is lovely. I can have coffee whenever I want (my husband is not a fan of hot caffeinated beverages) and not have to worry about when we are going to stop for washroom breaks on the long drives. I loved our adventure - roller coasters at Cedar Point (the fastest was 120 miles an hour straight up!), shopping in a less tax or no tax on clothing zone at Grove City in Pennsylvania and an easy 30 mile bike ride along the Leigh River Gorge between White Haven, PA and Jim Thorpe, PA. Lots of driving, though. I managed to only do my blog for the 30 Day Blogging Challenge as I had some computer issues. All is well now, I am at base camp with my laptop.

I may still work on some reviews as I did short pieces and poetry yesterday and did not do the reviews to the level that I like - I only averaged around the 650 word mark, instead of 1500 words.

I also have to catch up on my PDG Alumni Challenge - I was in the lead before I left, now I am in second place.

Blog City – Day 162 August the 12th in the Year of 2014

Today the actor/comedian Robin Williams passed away. What are your feelings about his work? How deeply are you affected by a celebrity death? Is there a particular celebrity whose passing would/has cause(d) significant grief? If this prompt too depressing for you, tell me about your favorite celebrity, dead or alive.

I find this hard to believe - only 63 and he is gone. Apparent suicide, I read. That is so sad. On would think he had everything, but I think he had a lot of demons. I think he had some addictions as well. My husband read up some stuff to find that his neighbours thought him a great guy, but we really don't know what goes on below the surface of a person's life. I just find suicide a cop out - I realize life may be really hard and feeling unmanageable but God does not give you what you can not handle and if you are off the path you can come back... but sometimes people can't find their way and what they believe in is not strong enough to save them. It is just so sad.

I really liked Robin Williams. A man with ADHD that made it work for him. I preferred his standup comedy, though rough, was so great. His 'golf' routine was hilarious.

Here is the clip - explicit language.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcnFbCCgTo4

As for his acting. I preferred his comedic roles. Mork and Mindy was clean, and funny. As for movies... I enjoyed some of them. Dead Poets Society was good. Good Morning Vietnam. Some of the thrillers, like Insomnia, I did not like... though he probably did a good job.

The man had character to spare and he will be missed.

Welcome To My Reality – Week Thirty – Four

3. Some days we are less motivated than others to write in our blogs. What motivates you to blog? What type of prompts inspire you to type the longest entries? What rewards encourage you to keep putting up new entries each day?

I find if I have a streak going I will continue... with our holidays this past week - my husband and I took off for five days - I have struggled to get the time to write. My Surface 2 tablet is not great at allowing me to cut and paste so although I blogged entries into my 750words.com website I was unable to paste the writing into my blog. I did write a few sentences so that there was a blog each day, but I think I missed one day. My 3 month streak on Blog City is blown but I will get back to it. With Welcome to My Reality I made sure I had five entries before I left and I will probably get my five entries in this week as well - leaving in the middle and coming back at the beginning of the next week has helped in that regard. With my 30 Day Blogging Challenge I may have been late for an entry and put one entry as a sentence (I can copy and paste what I originally wrote now that I am home) but it is an unofficial month. The challenge this month is 'survival camp' with interesting things to do like port raids and reviewing our blogging friends. Love it.

Some days I do feel a little unmotivated... the streak keeps me at it. But I also find the prompts often take me down venues I never expected and writing to find out where it takes me is also a motivating factor.

I often find myself blogging so I have something to contribute and then to read my fellow bloggers points of view. Blog City and 30 Day Blogging Challenge encourage making comments to your fellow bloggers and I find that motivating - to be part of the community. I have met some great people this way.

Some days I start off slow and find myself carried along - the concept of showing up to write often propels me.

Welcome To My Reality gives me 7 prompts to choose from and I enjoy that as well. I can pick the one that works for me that day and some days the prompts from all three work together for a nice blending. Of those seven I can usually find five that work for me.
I would not say what really inspires me because I have actually surprised myself - picking a prompt I thought was weak and been moved and motivated as I write or picking a prompt I am thinking is fabulous and finding my writing dry that day. You just never know... so you show up and 'open a vein' - I believe that is a Hemingway quote (but don't quote me on that).

Here's some investigation on that quote...
http://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/09/14/writing-bleed/

6. What's the hardest thing about your job? This can be a paid or unpaid job. If you don't have any kind of job, what's the hardest thing about being unemployed or retired?

The hardest thing about my job is not knowing; not knowing where or when. I am a supply teacher... so although, I may get the summer off I also make no reasonable income and if I did not supply a lot during the school year I am not able to claim unemployment insurance. When September returns, unless I am lucky enough to get a long term occasional teaching position, I will probably not get any supply work until the end of the month. That is three months of little to no income. I do work with a special services client that I have had for nineteen and a half years but not much else.

I never know from day to day if I am working or not. One week I may get half a day, the next week nothing or the week five full days. There is no consistency and I am at a different school every day. One day I am in kindergarten the next I am in grade 6. Some days I don't even know what grade I am going to be teaching and some days I thinking I am doing a primary grade and the school will switch me to a junior class. It is the not knowing that plagues me.

If I am not working, I have plenty of time to write. If I am working, I work around the schedule. If I am lucky enough to get a long term occasional position I work extra hard because I am trying to impress and do a great job so that when hiring time comes up a Principal may remember me and think 'I'll give her an interview'.

I am lucky that my husband has a good paying job. I also find that I go more 'green' in the summer. I drive very little and walk or ride my bike to most places I need to go. I get to spend time on my writing.

I have taken other jobs but I find once I go back to supplying I have to keep asking them to reduce my hours and then I am back to evenings and weekends. For a time, I had a full time long term occasional position and was getting too many hours at Walmart. Any 'free' time I had was spent planning for my students. By Christmas I found it too much and let my Walmart position go... only to find out the teacher would be returning in January.

Having my own classroom, my own school, my own students would be wonderful. I would belong somewhere and with that I could contribute to the whole school community. I would have consistency and routine... from there I can work in time for my husband and my writing. I would also have a regular income I could count on and that would make budgeting a whole lot easier.