Personal

I learned a lot in my first experience in a leadership role. This list, by no means exhaustive, are the learnings I took away from the experience:

I'm interested in a new watch. This will be my daily wear. Thought I would document the process until I arrived at a choice.

How do I define forgiveness? Forgiveness is addressing my past. It is separating my ego from the facts. It is changing my story into reality. It is accepting that an injustice occurred and coming to terms with it. It is learning to stop hurting myself long after that person did and restoring my dignity and self-respect. It is giving myself permission to stop suffering and to let go. It is reconnecting with myself and the world I am in.

Introduction
I have organized and executed the details of my daily life for some time now much like you would run a business. This didn't occur suddenly but has slowly evolved over time mostly by the necessity of maintaining my responsibilities and a desire to accomplish my life goals in a timely manner.

I've often debated the pros and cons of this system but I've concluded that it is better than having no system at all.

Pros:

Introduction
I'd like to cover some notes I have on designing a functioning kitchen. Generally my goal is to implement a kitchen that maximizes availability of ingredients; efficient, safe and fast cooking; and food quality.

This requires a well planned, , organized and intentional kitchen.

Your kitchen can be divided into three separate sections: food storage, food prep/cooking and food presentation. There is a flow of raw goods into the kitchen and after being worked on flowing back out of the kitchen in the form of prepared dishes.

I signed up for a seminar for those interested in purchasing their first home. I've seen my coworkers attempt a number of different strategies: buying a condo, buying a home and investing out of state. Let's see how those strategies stack up. Note: Income and expenses were estimated with a single individual making $100k/yr. I also used a pretty healthy down payment as most of my coworkers are a) in their 30s and b) have had ~10 years of professional work experience that includes stock options. This does not reflect my income or savings, which may be higher or lower.

6 ways to travel in Iceland, from the most benign to the hard core:

1. ($$/*) Stay in Reykjavik the entire time.
2. ($$$$/**) Stay in Reykjavik, take day trips with tour bus companies.
3. ($$$/***) Stay in Reykjavik, but rent a car and explore on your own.
4. ($$$/***) Drive all or part of the ring, staying in hostels and guest houses.
5. ($$/****) Drive all or part of the ring, camping.
6. ($/*****) Stay in the interior.

Some tips for staying in Iceland:

At the behest of a friend I took the "Love Language" test. It is an attempt to score how one expresses love and (without awareness of such) how one expects to be loved (iow how they feel loved).

The results:

7 Words of Affirmation
10 Quality Time
1 Receiving Gifts
4 Acts of Service
8 Physical Touch

Each has a maximum score of 12 points.

I have always found the shipping options at the USPS confusing, so I did some research and made this chart to help.

I was unemployed from the period of December 2009 to July 2010 (or as I like to call it my summer vacation). I've been working or studying my entire life. It wasn't until the layoff that I had any real freedom to pursue my own interests and desires. Not wanting to waste this time I decided to keep busy. Sometimes it was work. Very hard, disciplined work. Sometimes it was challenging. But mostly it was fun. And always it was rewarding. I wanted to make this a time to be remembered and create a template for life when I landed a new job.