raloria

It's been a long, tiring week, my friends.

I watched SPN 13x22 and enjoyed it...I think. But I wanted to get it watched so I could go on Twitter and not worry about being spoiled anymore. But the whole time I was watching the ep I kept thinking "Somebody please KILL LUCIFER ALREADY!!!" - but it didn't happen. *sigh* Anyway, I think I need a 2nd viewing so I can be more level-headed and objective about the ep. 'CAUSE I REALLY WANTED LUCIFER DEAD ALREADY! Grrrr!!! So sick of his whining and complaining and manipulating. /rant

Oh, and I've got my full-speed internet back so....happy times!
And I managed to not do the few things I can do with slow internet. Fail!

Anyway, I was hoping after watching the ep and seeing the trailer for next week's season finale that I'd have a clue as to what's going to happen and...NOPE! Still no idea! *heavy sigh* Another week of trying to figure it all out and failing. Goody.

Okay, looking forward to a relaxing Friday (finally!) and semi-relaxing Saturday & Sunday: Resting my sore shoulder, catching up with online things, doing my ep review, and hopefully doing more capping...'cause that's my thing. ;)

Last month I had grand plans to join in on this month's Inktober. Failed at it last year and I wanted to give it another go. Well, life had other ideas, as my first week of October was a very rough one. So much for plans.

Lately, I really haven't had the time or energy to do anything artistic. It's been making me feel a little antsy and tonight I decided enough was enough and I was going to do something no matter what or how simple.

So I grabbed some Mermaid Markers by Jane Davenport and drew simple squiggles and loops in one of my art journals. I really like the results. It's not overly complicated, it doesn't have any meaning, it's just colorful lines on paper and it only took me a few minutes to do. So maybe I haven't been able to participate in Inktober. Doing these pages made me feel better - just like that. :)

Hello, my friends.

Sorry for being away for the past several days after my emotional Tired post last Thursday.

I want to thank all of you who left me such caring and supportive comments on that post. It means a lot to hear from you when I'm crashing and burning. There's the SPN Family and then there's my LJ Family and it's so nice to know you're out there. *hugs*

I want to begin by apologizing for indicating in that post that I was the only one with a busy and exhausting life. That wasn't my intention at all. All of us struggle with our lives and things we have to do, long hours, family, drama, etc. I know this. I never meant to make my troubles more important than any of yours. I'm sorry if I offended anyone.

The only way I can try to explain that Tired post is that things just piled up on me all at once and due to me being tired and drained from the day, I wasn't able to shake it all off like I often do. And even though I did think a lot before making that post, I made it without thinking everything through and let my emotions run away from me. Never a good idea, but I'm human - it happens. I felt hurt and I wanted to put it out in the universe - not that it really helped me because it didn't. Yeah, sometimes sharing doesn't help one heal. But it seemed like a good idea at the time.

I also didn't intend on staying away from posting here on LJ for more than one day. But the hurt feelings and the message from a friend spiraled me into a mini-depression. It also got me thinking long and hard about all sorts of things in my life, and for that I am grateful. So as difficult and painful as the past few days have been, I've emerged with a sort of plan and I'm ready to get back to my online life again. Btw, I never really left...I was lurking around on LJ the whole time.

And I can't promise that this sort of meltdown won't happen again. As I said, I'm only human, and I sometimes let my emotions dictate my actions instead of common sense.
Thank you again for those of you who said you enjoy my daily posts. It means so much to hear that. ♥ :)

And now for something totally non-SPN.
Hey, it happens around here.

In preparation for VanCon, I've been trying to up my make-up game. I've never been into make-up much, but felt recently that I needed to add more so that maybe I'll look a little better in photo-ops. Yeah, I know...tall order. So there's certain gals on youtube that I've been following and learning from and thought I'd share them with you. :)

RachhLoves - Rachel is a Canadian beauty guru and well, she's adorable and funny. Ok, I really think all Canadians are sweet and adorable and nice. It's a thing. I could be wrong, but I haven't met a bad one yet. Anyway, Rachel's videos are entertaining and very informative. Oh, and watch out for references to "Editing Rachel" - hilarious! She covers some other lifestyle things besides makeup, so check her out.

Here's a good example of Rachel's videos. Some great beauty tips and hacks. I really need to try that hack with the coffee filters. "Over-prepared all the time!" Hee! Me, too, Rach. ;)



Tati - Another big favorite with a very soothing voice and excellent make-up advice. She tests new products, shows you not only expensive products but the more affordable drugstore ones, too. I love her boyfriend, James, as well, who sometimes gets in on the action. They're so cute together!

Here's a great video example from Tati: Best drugstore makeup under $10. Right up my alley!



Kathleen Lights - She's a bit younger than the other gals I watch, but Kathleen has some great beauty product advice.

Here's one of her latest videos: July Favorites. I just love watching "Favorites" videos.



Honorable Mentions: Jaclyn Hill, Zabrena, Jessica Braun, Thrift Thick, and new finds: BeautyWithEmilyFox and Sarah Therese.

If you have any beauty gurus that you watch on youtube that I didn't mention, I'd love to hear about them. Just let me know who they are in the comments. :)

*uses perfect icon for this post*

You think you're going to have a productive evening, finally get some items marked off the growing To-Do List and guess what?

Nasty headache time! :(

Took me hours to get rid of it, even after taking some meds. Sheesh. Still feeling hints of it every now and then, but it is better thank goodness. It was bordering on a migraine. OUCH! Napping a bit while listening to youtube videos seemed to do the trick. Thank goodness they don't eat away at my internet data anymore.

Watched more of The 100 before the headache really took off. I am so hooked on that show now!
Still working my way through Season 2, but I'm getting there. Up to episode 9!

Oh, and I'm going to watch last night's Chicago Fire as soon as this youtube video is done. Anyone else watch that show (or The 100)???

Also been totally devouring Felicia Day's book and I'm halfway through. Read some of it every day. :)

Ok, I'll leave you back to your day/evening now. *hugs*

There won't be any Just 'Cause post today due to more RL drama overnight. Flisters, you know of what I speak. Yes, it's happened...again. *sigh*

Earlier I did post caps of Jensen singing at A14 and I also updated my 10x22 Promo Caps post with caps from the Extended Promo. So be sure to check those out. Sorry I can't link you to them since I'm posting this from my phone.

Posted via m.livejournal.com.

Sorry things went kinda dark around here for the past couple of days.

Without going into too much detail...I was in a bad headspace for Wednesday and most of Thursday. I mean the negative talk was running rampant big time and it was pretty scary. I even went on Twitter about it, which I never do. I never talk about such personal problems publicly like that, but for some reason I needed an outlet and Twitter was easy and handy.

So I'm making this post public because, well...I guess it's out there now anyway. And I hope I don't regret making this post because this is not an easy thing for me to talk about, nor is this a new problem to those who've been on my Flist for a while.

Sorry if I scared anyone over on Twitter. Yes, the suicidal thoughts were there, the ideas were there, but as usual, I didn't follow through. It was tempting though, just not strong enough.

I won't go into what set this off because I'm not totally sure, but I believe I am better now. I feel better anyway. I guess eating candy bars and watching some inspiring videos on youtube (along w/some J2 con videos) helped some. As bad as this spell was and whatever you want to call it (depression, a blue funk) I'm just grateful that I came out of it because when I'm in that place, it's bad. Like I-can't-see-anyway-past-this bad. So I'm thankful the veil has lifted, so to speak, and I'm out on the other side because I don't like being in that place, but I can't simply climb out of it either.

As for LJ, I'm still going to take it easy today and just do the Just 'Cause post and get back on track next week. After all...I've got more caps to post, darn it! There's 2 sets all done and waiting in the wings.

So I'm sorry for being such a downer. I know most of you are used to me being all upbeat and positive, so this might have some of you hitting the de-friend button. If so, I totally understand. Most of the time I'm okay, but every now and then I'm...so very not. I try not to let it leak onto my online life, though. So I apologize for that.

Thank you for the kind comments on the Just 'Cause post yesterday. They meant a lot. *hugs*

Yep, VanCon is officially over for me. Took off my Gold Ticket bracelet today. *sigh*

Spent most of today sleeping off and on in between unpacking and re-organizing things.
On the other hand, it's nice to simply "veg out" and relax for a day after days of go-go-go.

Sorry about the lack of posts, but I did warn you that things might get too busy for me. I was simply getting back to the hotel room too late or was too tired to get online outside of checking Twitter.

Flist, I need to catch up on your posts, but understandably I might not be able to leave too many comments.

Looking forward to sharing my photos with you all. I think I got a lot of great ones this year. :)
There's videos I need to upload as well.

I've still got pics and stories to share from VanCon 2013. Hope I can keep them all straight when it come time to post them. :P

Looking forward to seeing what you've all been up to. Just 'Cause posts will resume tonight/tomorrow.

Went to Michaels Saturday night for some usual craft/art/scrapbooking shopping. There were lots of sales signs about for 50% and 40% off of things. Lots of cool deals.

Now unless I'm shopping for something specific, I'm always looking at what's on sale and what's on clearance in a craft store. I only buy what I like or will use, but I'd much rather pay a lower price than full price. ;)

As I'm in the aisle of drawing paper here comes this Michaels employee...taking down all the sales signs! She was just ripping them off the shelves. I said something to her about it and she said it was because the sale ended tomorrow, assuring me that the sales prices would still show up at the register. Keep in mind they still had 2 hours until they closed. What was the point of removing the sales signs so early??? But before I could even comment on this, she was gone and onto the next aisle. Meanwhile, I was left wondering which paper pads were actually on sale.

What a stupid thing to do! Talk about discouraging someone from shopping. If I had wanted to buy anything more, I wouldn't have known if I was getting a deal or not! I wish now that I had spoken up. Would it really have killed them to wait until closing time to take the signs down?

And to top it all off...tonight I was checking out some of the purchases and find this:

- A Crayola set of metallic markers...with 2 gold colors in it and no copper. Lovely.
- A set of paint pens and the yellow one not only leaked paint all over my hand, but I can't even remove the cap! Grrrrr!

Both of these are going back to the store!

Granted, I shouldn't have bought the paint pens. They were a cheaper brand (Michaels brand, in fact) and I've already had this pen leakage problem happen with another cheap paint pen from Hobby Lobby. Shows that you can't skimp on some things. Guess I'll stick with Painter's Pens or the Sharpie oil-based pens from now on despite their high costs. *sigh*

Sorry about the ranting, but I had to get this off my chest. >:[

Ok, it's time to start answering your questions (thank you, btw) and I start with this one by daisychain1957:

When do you sleep Val and for how long, you post at all hours of the day and night?

I realize it often seems like I never sleep, but believe me, I do. My body actually LOVES to sleep. LOL More on this in a bit.

The short answer is that I usually do all my daily posts late at night or to be precise in the early hours of the morning before I go to bed. Then there are other posts that I set up to be schedule-posted later. Comes in quite handy when you want to post something right away because you have the time at the moment, but you realize it's a bad time to be posting something to LJ (like when everyone on the east coast of the US is still in bed).

I usually do my Daily On The Set post over at spn_ontheset first, then I do the SPN Goes Black & White or the Daily Fanart post (if it's the weekend or whatever), third is my SPN Name That Cap 4 Challenge (on Tuesdays & Fridays), and finally...I wrap it all up with the Just 'Cause post. By then it's 3, 4, 5, or later in the morning and it's way past time for bed. :P

But lately, my life has changed a bit and I'm having to get to bed a bit earlier (and wake up WAY earlier - UGH!)...so moving up my posting times to just after midnight is a real pain! LOL But I'll adjust somehow.

My body loves to sleep though, and I'm often taking naps so don't worry that I'm not getting enough my friends. Sometimes I only get 5 hours each night, but I inevitably end up taking a nap after supper. This is because I get sleepy after I eat. Unless I'm doing something more physical than websurfing I will nod off for an hour or so. Sadly, this almost always messes up me for sleeping later on when I should be in bed. It's a constant struggle. But usually I can sleep at the drop of a hat. I suspect some of that came from my college days when I sometimes had to grab a cat nap in a busy, noisy library.

I hope that answers your question. Sorry for getting long-winded. :P

Feel free to ask me more questions over HERE.