Where have you been all my life?

It's been a while since little ole me has been to Blogger-land. I know ya'll need catching up so here goes a list:

1) Finished up my second to last semester of college two days ago. All I have left is finals, next semester, and Im home free. Yippeee....
2) Ended the almost 2 year relationship with Alex back in October. It was a hard decision but our lives just were not going in the same direction.
3) Managed to work 4 different part-time jobs in the past 3 months and still barely have enough money every month. Good thing oxygen doesn't cost anything.
4) Started dating a new guy in mid-November. His name is Ben and everything is going great so far. I will be talking about him for a while to come I believe :)
5) Succesfully networked with a district manager with State Industrial Products, a chemical manufacturer based in Columbus, OH, and will start the first week of January as the new Sales Rep for the Nashville territory! A great job with an awesome company before I even graduate college, yeah!

I think that's about it for right now. Even though its only 5 things, they're all pretty major and are the reason I exhale deeply every night before I lay my head down. My life is exciting and very very blessed indeed.

Til next time...

A Little Political Rant (from a Conservatives POV)

Even as a Conservative, I stress belief in our Country and most importantly our Leader. I am a firm believer that if we operate as a country split in half over politics, we will present ourselves to the world as a broken land. We can have all the security in the world, but our we protecting our name as the United States?

Our Leader says he wants to speak to our children words of encouragement, focusing on staying in school. He wants to present himself as a Leader to everyone, not just adults. I feel this is important because the choices he and the lawmakers under him make will affect our childrens lives for many years to come.

So it comes down to this: If you think he might say something resembling propoganda, do you want your child listening to him?

In my personal opinion, I don't think he would dare say anything that would come across as what I like to call "Drinkin the Kool-aid talk." I'll go a step further and say that being this is a sensitive audience to speak to, that speech has gone through the editors and speech analysts more than the usual speech.

The important thing I see here is people need to learn how to speak to their children about what is going on in the world. I believe for children to be well-rounded, they need to be able to listen to a political figure speak, understand what their saying, and then make a decision for themselves. There needs to be dialog between parents and children, not just parents telling the children what they believe. I love to see parents and children having different viewpoints, it means that at one point, the parents let the children share what they thought and they didn't make the child feel bad for their opinion.

I am a child of this example family relationship, and I will forever thank my parents for their support.

If I don't post before Monday, have a great Labor Day weekend Bloggers!

French cousins and a trip to Europe

Have you ever tried to learn a new language? In high school, as a requirement, I was required to take a foreign language and I chose French. I never really knew anyone that spoke French, or if I would ever get to use it. The fact remained that it was a romance language, and it appealed to young Allyson. I didn't do too well in this endeavor, but I retained very very miniscule parts from this class.

Well you know how you should really pay attention in class when you think it won't make the difference? Well to make a long story short, my beautiful and intelligent cousin Brooke moved to Switzerland earlier this year to practice her science as a Doctor of Audiology in Geneva. I can hear what you're thinking, seriously, people actually do that? I know, I thought that myself. Brooke is a force to be reckoned with and aint nothing standing in that girls' way.

So I find myself intrigued, and upon a very expressive invitation to visit, I am tentatively planning a journey to Geneva, Switzerland sometime next summer (tentatively based upon my May graduation). I'm pretty excited about this trip and I hope to add a detour into Austria to do the Sound of Music tour. Talk about a dream that can really come true.

Back to my spat about paying attention (especially in French class) I find myself wanting to polish up on my French skills. Here I go using Google translator to converse with my cousin, which I encourage by the way, it will only help me brush up on my old French courses. It's definitely a change from learning to earn a grade to learning to communicate with someone you love.

Have you tried to learn a new language for a purpose other than just the challenge? I would love to hear your techniques.

Until next time, keep me in your thoughts. So far 18 hours ain't so bad on this girl, but crazier things have happened.

Bonne nuit,
Allyson

Really? 18 hours?

On Monday I turn my life over to MTSU. This semester consists of 18 hours, of which 2 classes are night classes and one is an online course. Whoo hoo. I'm also going to try to hold down my work/study job, a cleaning job at a local salon, and working on maybe a new restaurant job. That one is still in the development stages. If I don't think about all of it then I don't freak out about it. Just do it. Nike.

This summer has been just a season for me. I had my two classes that took up most of it, and I haven't really had the money to go anywhere other than Georgia a couple of times. I had really wanted to get to the beach, but that doesn't look like it's going to happen. Maybe later on in the year...maybe.

I haven't seen Alex that much, which sadly I'm getting used to. I'm sure we have a great relationship, but I'm now afraid that if we ever do actually live together, we'll be so unaccustomed to each other like we once were. I digress about the whole situation, because who knows what lies in the future for us. Maybe I will get that nice job in Atlanta. Maybe I'll get an awesome job here in Nashville and he'll find it better just to move back to Middle Tennessee. I don't see that ever happening by the way.

So, until Monday, I'm here at the cabin, crocheting and looking up funny videos on youtube.

Welcome to almost September.

Have you explored your career lately?

Yesterday I changed my major from Business Education/ Secondary Education to Business Education/ Non-teaching. This means that I don't have to do student teaching thus I can graduate in May like I had wanted to do from the get-go. But that also means I wont automatically be testing for a teaching license when I get done with college.

Ive come to the conclusion that I don't really want to teach high school after all. I figure its probably good that I figure this out now rather than in the middle of my student teaching. So where does this leave me? What career field do I go into now?

According to my new course layout, I have to take two upper-division Non-Business courses. I'm planning on trying to take those courses in Public Relations (which at MTSU is in the College of Mass Communication) and maybe something in Human Development (College of Education). Hopefully with those two classes I'll be able to figure out where I would like to try to apply for an internship in the Spring. Thats another thing. In lieu of student teaching, I'm doing an internship which I think is a excellent plan. Put me out there in the real world, hopefully make a stipend, and wish for a walk-on position after graduation. Now that would definitely be the cat's meow.

Usually change is scary but this change is making me feel better about my college career. I'm one of those subjective people who say that getting a good job depends on your inner abilities, not your GPA. I also believe that you can learn things in college, but a good deal of what career you're suited for depends on your attitude.

I think I would be good in Public Relations. I also think I would be good in the government sector. Lobbying congress would be right down my alley. Counseling troubled teens would seem like a good job (depending on the area I was living in!) I feel like with my new major, the possibilities are endless. I can't wait to see what my future career looks like.

What does your career exploration look like?

What have I been doing?

Crocheting dishcloths, that's what. At the beginning of the month I bought a bag full of 100% cotton yarn at Hobby Lobby with the intention of making dishcloths to sell in an antique store that my mother has a booth in. I finally got done with said dishcloths last Friday and delivered them. As of today, none of the sets have sold.

So basically I feel like I've busted hump to crunch out what I believe are really cute pieces of old fashioned kitchen necessity, and no one has yet to take a bite! They're cute colors...good and tight needlework....good at cleaning dishes for many years...

Maybe after a few more days of no bites we will re-evaluate the asking price. I will put my one semester of marketing classes to good use! Product- check. Placement-check. Promotion-check. Price- might need tweaking.

So as I'm laying here in bed in Georgia for the weekend, what am I thinking about? Crocheting dishcloths of course! I'm here for a wedding that my handsome Alex is starring in as a groomsman, and I had said that I will crochet the lovely bride some dishcloths. T-minus 1.5 days until said dishcloths are due and only two of the set of four are done and DOH!! I just remembered the twine I use to normally wrap around the sets as decoration is sitting on the table...in my house...in Tennessee. Oh well, no cute old-fashioned wrapping for this present. Maybe I'll luck up and find some ribbon around in this house in the next day. I really dont have the money nor the time to rummage around the local Michael's, Hobby Lobby, or Joann's.

I hope you have all had a productive and happy July. I'm ready for it to be over to be honest.

Blogging about 200 yards away from a computer

Blackberry is my new form is communication. I'm sitting in my finance class right now, and in a few steps I can be on facebook, twitter, myspace, etc. I think technology is about the coolest thing happening right now. I'll re-evaluate this when my cell phone bill comes at the end of the month.
On a different front, I'm avoiding television at the moment. If they're not talking about Michael Jackson, its the death of Steve Mcnair which happened just on down the road in Nashville. If its not on my Blackberry news application, I'm left in the dark and I'm okay with that.
So as we go into July I'm looking forward to many long summer days fixing garden vegetables and playing with my dog. I wish everyone obsessing about celebrities dying would do the same.