Steven Sanchez, Jr.

These past few days, Dave and I received a pleasant visit from Corrie. She flew out here to visit us and we showed her around the city. It was good times, indeed! She was originally supposed to arrive on Tuesday, but because of flight complications, she didn’t arrive until noon on Wednesday.

I picked her up from the airport, and brought her downtown. The first thing I showed her: the office. Ha. Dave was at work, and so I showed her around my stomping grounds to kill some time. After I showed her the office, we proceeded to eat lunch. I took her to San Antonio Taco Company. I hadn’t eaten there in a while, and two tacos were the perfect amount of food. Dave joined us at the restaurant after he got off work.

From there we zipped of to the Nashville zoo. It was a lot of fun at the zoo. It had been several years since I had been to a zoo. It was a really nice zoo, too. It was really well kept, and the exhibits were really nice. There was even a bird that said my name! Ok.. maybe it didn’t say my name but its’ squawk sure did sound like it! Corrie’s got a video of the bird. I forgot to get a copy of it before she left. Hopefully she posts the numerous videos and pictures we took online.

After several hours at the zoo, Dave and I treated her to Cracker Barrel. *drools* Can you say delicious? I am in love with that place and firmly believe we need some in California. This time I had chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes, baby carrots, fried apples, biscuits, and sweet tea. Corrie got chicken fried chicken, and Dave got some country ham. The food is so stinkin’ good there!

When we were done stuffing our faces with heaven-sent-southern-cooked-goodness, Dave and I took her to Opry Mills. That was the massive mall that I talked about before. The, pretty much, Disneyland of malls. We spent a long while walking around there and popped in a few stores. By this time we were pretty tired – especially Corrie, because she had flown a lot.

We made our way home, but before doing so, we stopped for some Icees (even though they’re not as good as slurpees) and we rented a movie from RedBox. We watched Knowing – the movie with Nicholas Cage. It’s a sci-fi film. It wasn’t bad at all. It was an interesting story – and definitely kept me hooked until the end. It was one of the best selections available at RedBox that evening. We watched the movie, and called it a night!

Yesterday we did a lot; hence the absence of a post from me. We slept in a little, and then woke up and made breakfast burritos. After breakfast, we got ready and headed out to visit The Hermitage. The Hermitage was the home of Andrew Jackson, our nation’s 7th president. It was a really nice tour – I learned a lot, and the place was beautiful. We spent a good part of the day there. By the time we left, our legs were tired and sore from all the walking we did.

By this time, Dave and I still weren’t done showing her around. We then took her back towards downtown to Centennial Park. There we showed her Nashville’s replica of the Parthenon. It really is a feat and beauty to look at. Then from there we were hungry, so we took her to a bar for dinner. This is a have-to for Nashville. There is so much talent in this city, so we sat down, enjoyed dinner and some live-music.

Then, after dinner, we went for ice cream. On the way to get ice cream we showed her the main-area of downtown and some of the shops. After that, we took her to the bridge that goes over the Tennessee River. It’s a beautiful bridge. From it you can see the city skyline and LP Field and the land in the distance. We sat there for a while. While we were there, we even saw a film crew from House Hunters that airs on HGTV. We asked what they were doing and they told us they were getting a night shot of the city for the show. I’m not familiar with the show at all, but Corrie loves the show and was super excited.

By this time, we were super tired and ready to go back to the house. We went back to the house, and showered and enjoyed the rest of the evening at the house watching tv and talking. This morning we woke up early and were out of the house by 7am so that Corrie could catch her flight back to California. Dave and I dropped her off, and went back home, and back to bed. Dave didn’t have to be at work until 11 today – so that was really nice.

We woke up, grabbed a quick bite, and came into town. Dave dropped me off at the office, and I’ve been here for the afternoon shift. Tonight is a CD release party for our friend, Karen Waldrup that I spoke of in an earlier post. Funny story: this morning on our way into town, I saw she had a billboard on one of the major highways over here promoting her event. When I saw it, I yelled! I scared Dave, actually. But it was crazy to see that she had a digital billboard promoting her event. I thought it was really cool.

So, tonight we’ll go to that release party, and then who knows what the weekend has in store. I need to start packing my things together. I say that now, but in reality – I won’t do that until the day before I leave. *shrug* At least I’m being thinking about it already. But, that’s it. Happy Friday!

Would you rather be unable to stand up for yourself or never know when to back down?

This week – another more serious question. Yet again, it continues to stop me in my tracks and really make me think. I’m thinking about experiences I’ve had in the past where I’ve dealt with the issue of wishing I would have spoken up, or wishing I had bit my tongue. A lot of these instances occurred this past year during my presidency at FPU and dealing with so much unnecessary drama. However, I don’t want to get into that. Maybe that will be another blog idea. It would be real juicy. Ha, I just may.

One thing that I have definitely struggled with for a long time, and have been working towards, is the ability to speak up for myself – or to speak my mind. I think for this question, though. I would definitely have to choose the ‘never know when to back down’ option. This is mostly because being able to speak my mind all the time is a trait I desire to have. With this trait, I imagine I would hurt feelings and say hurtful things in getting my point across. But that is where the beauty of forgiveness comes in. Also, maturity. Being able to discuss things through as mature adults, without letting past things hurt a relationship.

So that’s where I stand. The button is below, where do you stand on this question?

Today I was watching the tele, and I skipped past a show on the Travel Channel. They were going through Vietnam. I got really excited when I saw the show on TV. I saw glimpses of the city that I remember from my visit during the summer of 2008. I spent three weeks there and travelled, pretty much, the entire country. We spent a week in Northern Vietnam, a week in Central Vietnam, and a week in Southern Vietnam. The show was centered in Hanoi.

Hanoi was where we spent our first week there. In Hanoi was where we took the picture here. This was a tomb of Ho Chi Minh’s body. He was a huge leader in Vietnam’s past. So, they have created this tomb to honor him. We had the privilege of going into the tomb and seeing the actual body. To me, it looked fake. The body was preserved way to well. But oh well. It’s the idea that counts, right?

Now, the food in Vietnam – it was so fresh and tasty. It consisted of a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables. Fish was another big part of the diet. But this particular dish was one of our firsts in Hanoi. It was a simple, yet very refreshing cucumber and tomato salad. It was especially refreshing because it was super hot and humid in Vietnam.

We also got to visit a pottery village, where a ton of pottery is hand made, then exported or sold in local tourist shops. We even got to tour one of the pottery making buildings. This building was at least five, maybe seven, stories tall. Each floor had a different stage in the pottery’s life; molding, painting, drying, etc.

We visited Sapa, in Northern Vietnam. This area was beautiful, and the home of a lot of the Hmong people in Vietnam. They lived in these mountains/hills and we took a hike one day and got to see their lands first hand. The area was breath taking. It was just beautiful. This picture really doesn’t do much justice to it, but it was the easiest I could find among my 2,000+ other pictures from the trip.

Alas, and my favorite part of the trip: Ha Long Bay. This bay was beautiful. It was a bay, and in the bay were thousands of these limestone islands. We went out on this beautiful three-leveled boat for just our twenty person group. We had the whole thing to ourselves, and were treated first class. The sights were phenomenal and just the experience was so amazing. We spent one night out on the bay on this luxurious boat.

There was so much more we were able to see and do on this trip. It was an experience I am super glad to have had. It was my first trip to another country (I’ve been to Mexico, but we just walked around the border.. so I don’t really count it). This trip was many of my firsts, actually – the biggest one being the first time I had been on a plane. Yes. My first plane experience was a 13-hour flight. It wasn’t bad at all. I survived.

I could go on about this trip forever, but honestly don’t have the energy to do it right now. I’ve got a video uploaded on my Facebook that does a good job at summing up our trip. It is close to 15 minutes – so if you’ve got time to spare, go check it out there!

This morning, I was browsing the web a bit. Did the usual routine: Facebook, Myspace, email. Then I continued to watch a few Youtube videos on photoshop tutorials. After that I went to visit Woot.com. If you’re not familiar with Woot, they sell one item a day for a usually very reasonable price. Today they’re selling a 52″ tv for $1200. The cool thing about Woot, too, is no matter what you buy – the shipping is always $5. So if you buy the tv today – you’re only going to pay $5 for shipping. It’s a pretty sweet deal.

A while back Woot started another related website, Shirt.Woot.com. Here, as you may have guessed, they sell one shirt a day! On this site, the shirt is always $10 and has the option of free standard shipping or $5 overnight shipping (which isn’t bad at all). Now these shirts are designs sent in by users. They are unique shirts, for sure. I’ve been tempted to buy one or two since Iv’e known the site.

However, on today’s visit to Shirt.Woot.com, I saw a banner for another website. After seeing this banner, I was only curious and had to click it. I was scared, though. I wasn’t sure exactly what kind of website it was going to take me to. The picture is the banner that I clicked. Upon my clickage and after the site loaded, I was relieved. The site wasn’t bad at all. It was just a bunch of shirts being sold for $6!

I looked through them all, and although there were several offensive ones, I also found a few that I wouldn’t mind buying at all. They were hilarious. A lot of the ones I considered buying were one liners from Flight of the Conchords, and then a few other random shirts that make me laugh.

But, there we have it. Today I’m sharing a website with you. I’m doing well. Nashville’s great. Now I am off to practice on Dave’s keyboard.

Yesterday, while perusing through my rapidly growing list of bookmarks, I came across a site that I had bookmarked a long time ago. I revisited this site, and found myself chuckling like a little kid for a good while. What is this website, you may ask? It is called “Things to do when you’re bored – a bumper list of pointless timewasters”

The reason I found myself laughing so hard when I was reading through these is because I have had a lot of free time lately. I then went to picture myself doing these things while sitting in the office. I dunno, just doing any of these while sitting there. I could only imagine what I would look like if somebody were to be watching me.

Anywho, I just thought I’d share some mindless entertainment with you guys. I’m sure you’ll get at least a laugh or two out of the ridiculousness of this site.

As for the rest of my day: chicken tacos and Carrie Underwood at the Grand Ole Opry. Tomorrow, I likely won’t post, as I haven’t on past Sundays, either. So, friends – until Monday!

Fumanchu – no go.

Coffee – too sweet.

photography – going strong.

Time in Nashville – coming to an end.

Friends visiting – legit.

This morning, while sitting in the office, I came to several revelations. Granted, these aren’t any grand or extraordinary revelations. Just things that are going on in my life right now; at this current moment. ((And for the right now, right now – I am really critical and judgemental of what others wear. Maybe it is because I’m just chilling in the office, watching people. But lately I have become really critical. Yes, I subscribe to GQ magazine, and like to think I know a few things about how to dress. But why would you wear a red and black horizontally striped shirt with blue and yellow plaid shorts? [like the guy who inspired this tangent...] Ok. enough of this))

Alas, revelation one: My fumanchu. My mustache and goatee that wouldn’t connect to create a fumanchu. I wanted to grow a fumanchu so stinkin bad. I haven’t shaved pretty much my whole face except my neck in hopes that my fumanchu would grow in nice and thick. Several unshaved weeks and a full, thick, dirty mustache later: two bald spots at the lower corners of my mouth. Sad day. Yesterday I shaved off my mustache. I contemplated shaving off everything but my mustache, but I don’t think Nashville would be able to handle my mustache. Therefore, yesterday I shaved off the ‘stache.

Numero dos: My coffee is too sweet. This morning I wanted to switch up my morning beverage at the office. Instead of my Triple Grande White Mocha, I went with a Grande Cinnamon Dolce Latte. Don’t get me wrong, it is a tasty beverage. However as I reached the bottom of the cup, it was too sweet for me. It was just too much of a good thing. This beverage, for me, would be perfect in a tall size. When I first started ordering the White Mocha, I realized the same thing. It was too sweet. So I started adding an extra shot, and it became perfect. Maybe I’ll try ordering the Dolce Latte with an extra shot. Or maybe just get it in a tall. A similar instance that I have found when the beverage is better in a smaller proportion is the Salted Caramel Hot Chocolate. *drool* That one is soooo good, but so rich. I can only handle that one in a tall size. I also highly recommend that drink. So tasty on a nice cold winter’s day.

Numero tres: my photography. It is starting to take me places. I can remember as a child, I always loved cameras. I loved taking pictures. Still do. Now that I finally have my baby that I’ve dreamt of for so long, I’ve been able to do some quality work. (I am going to say this, though: the camera does not make the pictures. it is the photographer who captures the moments, which  make great pictures. You don’t need a fancy schmancy camera to get some quality pics) I just really enjoy my Canon Rebel Xsi because it is so versatile and I can manipulate the settings to capture some cool pictures. The day before I left on this summer adventure, I shot my first wedding with friends Sarah and Jason. It was a ton of fun, and I surprised myself with what I captured! On our trip, I’ve taken my camera out on several instances and again have surprised myself. My latest endeavor was just two days ago. I did a photo shoot for Dave. We took some pics that he can use for his upcoming Myspace music page and just so he can promote himself here in Music City. These came out pretty stinking legit! I also have two photo gigs lined up for me when I get back home. One is a beach wedding with Sarah. The other is a post-wedding photo shoot. I’m really excited. I’m starting to build a legit portfolio. I’m really excited about this. I am excited to see where my photography will take me.

The last two points, I’m going to merge together, because they are pretty much the same thing. My time in Nashville is coming to an end. I’ve got two weeks left. But, in these last two weeks, a lot is going to happen. A good friend is going to fly out to visit us! Who, you may ask? None other but Corrie H. It’s going to be a blast! She’ll be getting her Tuesday, which will be nice. Dave doesn’t work Tuesday, so we’ll have the day to show her around. On our tentative agenda, we have the Nashville Zoo and Country Music Hall of Fame planned for Tuesday. Wednesday Dave works, so I’m going to bring Corrie to the office, then we’ll take the bus downtown, and I’ll show her around down there. Thursday is up in the air. I’m going to propose Graceland, in Memphis. It will be a fun day-trip. Then Friday she leaves,  sometime. Depending on what time she leaves Friday, we’ll plan accordingly.

Also in my last few days here, I need to figure out how to ship a few things back home. I brought my George Forman Grill, and a knife set, and an air mattress. These are a few among maybe one or two other things I can’t remember that I’m going to need to ship home. It may be pricey, but it’s gotta be done. And, alas. These words have been the thoughts and revelations of my mind this morning. Today is Friday. The weekend is upon us. May you have safe adventures and fun filled happenings this weekend!

So my time here in Nashville is running out. I’ve only got about two weeks left here. It is kinda sad, really. I like it a lot out here and wish I could stay longer. It would be nice to be able to get a job and settle for a bit. Then when I get off work, we would go to the bars and listen to new and upcoming artists perform. I am a huge fan of Music City. But, I equally miss everybody back home. Too, I’ve gotta go back to finish my last year of school. Honestly, my schooling is the only thing bringing me back to California. But, who knows what’s in plan for my future. Maybe I’ll end up back out here after I graduate? Maybe I won’t? It’s all a mystery and out of my hands – that’s the beauty of it.

Alas, with my last few days here, we are going to be doing a lot of sight seeing that I’ve wanted to do and we never really got around to. Today we’re going to drive an hour south and head into Lynchburg, TN. What’s there you may ask? Lynchburg is the home to the Jack Daniels Distillery. Granted, I haven’t had many pleasant experiences with Mr. Daniels, I still would like to visit the place and see how it’s made. I looked at the website, and they still do it the same way that they have been making it for the past hundred years or so. Also, the tour is free! Ha, so why not?

Too, on the drive down there, I believe is some really pretty greenery. Pretty much any drive outside of the city in Nashville (and surrounding cities) is beautiful. Abundant green trees, green rolling hills. It’s really nice So, those are pretty much our plans for the day.

Howdy! Happy Hump-Day. Today is an interesting Wednesday, albeit a good-interesting. All morning (and night) it has been raining, and the temperature has been low. Right now it is 68°F outside and raining. It isn’t an ugly rain, though. It is a pleasant, steady rain. It is really kind of refreshing. I’m sitting here in the office, and it is nice to look out the huge glass windows that cover half the building and watch the rain. However, all this moisture has been driving my allergies a bit crazy. I need to get some allergy meds.

Also, here at the office, the elderly man I spoke of a while back (I can’t remember what I named him…) is back. He was the one who sat on all of the comfy chairs in rotation. He hasn’t been in here since the day I wrote about him. So, it brought a smile to my face to see him in here again. Ha, to be honest, I even took a picture of him today. I don’t know if I want to post it tho. It is kind of stalker-ish, actually now that I think of it. Never mind, I’m deleting the pic. Haha.

I don’t know what it is. I’m saying it’s the rain. It is just really making the office feel super homey today. I like it. All of the familiar faces were working today, too. Especially because the past few days, it has been subs, or people that normally work the later-afternoon shifts that I don’t normally see.

Yesterday I didn’t write. During the morning, I was trying to fix up my laptop. I’ve been facing some issues with it. Been getting a lot of stop-error messages. So I was doing some driver updates and what not. Then in the second half of the day, I went and did a photo session with Dave. We are starting to work on promoting him out here. I’ve created a myspace music page for him. I have the layout done, now I just need some pictures of him. I feel really good about the pictures I got of him. I’m really becoming happy with my photography. It makes me happy. I’ve only edited a few of the pictures, but they will be up  online soon.

It was fun, we went downtown to take his pictures. I was walking around with both cameras strapped on me, and I had my bag. As people walked by, it was fun to see their expressions. I mean, I looked pretty legit. I’m not gonna lie. Especially when we went onto the bridge, there were some high-school aged girls trying to do a photoshoot too. Simply said: we put them to shame.

But alas, without any further ado, today’s question:

Would You Rather wind surf on shark-inhabited waters or hang glide over a forest fire?

Haha, this question made me laugh. But again – another tough choice! I’ve never been either wind surfing or hang gliding. So I would probably suck at both. Lately Dave and I have been watching this show about freak accidents that people have experienced. Actually, we stopped watching it. Dave can’t handle the blood. But half of the incidents were related to shark bites/attacks. I am a fan of keeping all of my appendages safe and unharmed and unmarked, because I’m pretty sure that I would fall into the water if I chose the wind surfing option.

I’ve made my decision. I’m going to choose the hang gliding option. Here is my reasoning. I’m going to be gliding above the fiery forest. Now, I’m gonna get all scientific on ya. Heat rises. So, granted my hang glider is made of heat-resistant material, I’m gonna pitch the air-balloon theory. An air balloon uses hot air to keep it afloat. Similar to that, I will use the hot air to keep me higher and safely above the fires. Then once I glide over the rest of the fires, the air will cool, and I will come to a (hopefully safe) landing.

There you have it. Now, once again – I invite you to use the ‘comment’ link below and discuss what you would rather do!

Second post in the same day. What??

No, actually this really didn’t fit in with my other one I posted today, so I’m doing two separate posts.

Last night I wasn’t feeling so hot. I had a headache, and was just feeling really, really blah. Also, yesterday morning I had woke up with a stuffy nose. So, to hopefully kick whatever may have been settling in, I decided to get some Nyquil. I took it, and was in bed by midnight.

Man that stuff knocked me out. My alarm went off at 8, to make sure Dave gets up in time for work, and woke me up out of a dead sleep. Dave got up, and I stayed in my bed. After a few minutes, I decided I was going to get up, so I got out of bed and grabbed a glass of water. By this time, Dave was headed out the door. I made it back into the room, and ended up back in bed.

I was in bed until 12:30. Even here, I had to drag myself out of bed. I was so groggy and just wanted to lay there. Eventually I got myself out of bed, and I heated up some left over mac & cheese we had. I had that, and some watermelon. I watched TV for about an hour or so. Then I ended up right back in bed. I stayed there again until 3ish, when Dave got home from work, and woke me up from my sleep when he came in the room (he didn’t do it on purpose, though).

Again, I had to drag myself out of bed, but this time I went straight to the shower. I had slept way too much today. I had forgotton how much Nyquil kicks my butt. So now, post-shower, and post-15-million-hours-of-sleep, I’m feeling pretty decent! Now let’s just hope I can fall asleep at a decent hour tonight…

Actually, they were always there. They’ve just been pinpointed, and my strongest strengths have been identified.

On Saturday (just after I wrote) Dave and I went into town. We bought the third season of How I Met Your Mother (funny show, btw. Dave got me hooked).  After that, I wanted to go visit Opry Mills. It is a mall that I found online over by the Grand Ole Opry and a few other things. We got there. Dude. This place was HUGE! Opry Mills is a mall. Just to kind of give you some perspective, there was a Rainforest Cafe, Dave & Busters, Regal Cinema w/ Imax, two carousels, a trampoline/bungee jump thing, and a Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World. These were among the 50 million other stores. Here is a store directory of the mall, but the website does no justice to the actual grandeur of the mall.

Anywho, also in the mall was a Barnes & Noble. There I decided to purchase the Strengths Finder book. I was supposed to have bought this book several times now through my college career. In fact, here’s a confession: freshman year in JCC, we were supposed to buy the book and code and write an essay about our top strengths. At the time I thought it was dumb to have to pay for a code to take a test and find our codes. So I looked up the list of possible results, and picked out 5 that sounded like me and wrote my essay off of that.

So, I bought the book and later Saturday evening, began reading the book, and then I took the Strengths Finder Assessment. There were 130+ questions. The whole thing took about 30  minutes to finish. The questions were set up to find out where you stood on the spectrum. It gave you two kind of extremes, and as you picked a side that best described you. There was also a ‘neutral’ option. Also, while taking the assessment, you are timed on each question. You are timed because they want you initial, gut reaction to the answer. This way you don’t over think the question and divert your answer from what you would instinctively answer.

So, here we have it. My top five strengths were:

1. Empathy
2. Adaptability
3. Includer
4. Achiever
5. Woo

My strongest strength, being empathy, wasn’t really a surprise to me. In high school leadership I took numerous similar tests. I always received empathy-themed results. Here is how the book describes my empathetic qualities,

“You can sense the emotions of those around you. You can feel what they are feeling as though their feelings are your own. Intuitively, you are able to see the world through their eyes and share their perspective. You do not necessarily agree with each person’s perspective. You do not necessarily feel pity for each person’s predicament – this would be sympathy, not empathy. You do not necessarily condone the choices each person makes, but you do understand. This instinctive ability to understand is powerful. You hear the unvoiced questions. You anticipate the need. Where others grapple for words, you seem to find the right words and the right tone. You help people find the right phrases to express their feelings – to themselves as well as to others. You help them give voice to their emotional life. For all these reasons other people are drawn to you.”

Now, for the rest of my strengths, I’m just going to provide the shorter, two sentence descriptors:

• Adaptability: “Prefers to ‘go with the flow’. These people tend to be ‘now’ people who take things as they come and discover the future one day at a time.”
• Includer: “Accepting of others. These people show awareness of those who feel left out, and make an effort to include them.”
• Achiever: “Has a great deal of stamina and works hard. These people take great satisfaction from being busy and productive.”
• Woo: “Loves the challenge of meeting new people and winning them over. They derive satisfaction from breaking the ice and making a connection with another person.”

There it is, folks. These qualities are me in a nutshell. Now I’m going to read the report that they created for me and figure out how to utilize these strengths in my life. I mean, I’ve always known I’ve posessed these traits, but I am anxious to see what the report and the book says on how I can specialize in these areas so that I may excel in life.