A Personal Blog.
When I say that 2008 was the best year of my life, I mean it was the best year of my life. I’m so glad that I had the chance to take pictures of my friends and stuff, because I look back and see these photos and go, damn. You guys are in for a good one!
First official month of 2017 has come to an end and what was once my birthday month, is now gone until 2018. With February around the corner, I wanted to share some of my favorite things this month.
So, here’s “10 things that exhibited some interest to me and kept me from dying of boredom this last month” list! 😀
This camera has been something that I’ve wanted for months now. I love taking pictures and capturing moments with friends and family, and I wanted a way to either keep them and put them in my journal or give them out to my friends and family to keep. It’s the one thing I wanted to make a habit in 2017, and so far it’s definitely been a good one.
A little fun fact: I was once the Ombre Queen before I decided to dye my hair all black for the past year. It was such a great change, but after a while, I did miss having some other color than black in my hair. Because of the build up of black dye I had in my hair, it was literally impossible to make my hair lighter without it instantly turning to a brassy red/orange color. It took me a while to get the somewhat desired hair color I wanted, but that’s a different post for a different day.
Ever since I started TNTH in the beginning of January, I’ve been on the blog site non-stop writing future posts and checking out the stats on published posts. In some sort of funny way, it’s becoming more of a reflex to go on my computer and check out the site, and it’s been a way to kill time during my month-long break.
So, I got my new laptop for Christmas because the one I previously had been not working anymore. I needed a new laptop before the semester started back up because these papers and thesis’ for my grad classes are nothing to joke around with. Before this became my “school” laptop, I regularly would use this everyday to watch videos and write-up blog posts. I don’t know why, but I’ve been obsessed with being on this all day, everyday. Sadly, it’s not going to be so easy to relax on it anymore because of school.
Last year, I used to carry around this big, pink journal and wrote something in it every single day for an entire year. I realized towards the end of 2016, my entries weren’t as thought out and entertaining like they once were in the beginning of the year. I still wanted to daily write, but I wanted to make it only when something was worth writing about. Lately, it’s been a book mainly for ideas and scheduling for TNTH, but it does have the occasional entry of an awesome day.
I’m forever on Spotify listening to music no matter where I’m going. I’m a Spotify Premium User, which takes care of the hassle of not being able to listen to what you want on your mobile device. I’m currently listening to A LOT of nostalgic playlists mainly because I’m not really into the mainstream music that is out unless it’s really good.
Another Christmas gift that I’m highly obsessed with. Typically, I’m not a perfume person; I just wear some body spray and call it a day. When I first sprayed this perfume on me, it literally stayed on my skin and on my clothing all day long which surprised me because nothing ever stays on me. It’s a new scent and my “beau” likes the smell of it too, so it’s a win-win situation.
This one is an oldie, but goodie. I got this at Target way back in November, and I still consider it as one of the best buys I’ve made. I still wear it in this cold weather with a lot of underneath layers, and it makes me feel like a 90’s kid all over again. This item will probably make its comeback in another monthly favorites. 😉 It’s just THAT good.
Another oldie, but goodie. I got this sweater in October, and although I can’t wear it outside that often because it’s too thick to put under a coat, I still wear it as much as I can. You can dress it up or dress it down; it still feels and looks great with whatever you pair it with. Maybe in the future I can buy myself another one in a different color, that’s how great this sweater is.
Because of my now color treated and bleached hair, I need to take extra precautions to take care of it so it doesn’t became too brittle and dry. With any type of bleach in your hair, your hair will show some damage. To keep my hair wavy and soft, I use these two products. The Quick Curls is like putting a softer, more gentle mousse in your hair. The curls don’t feel crunchy like regular mousse does, but yet a soft and moisturize texture. The Triple Moisture deep conditioner has been a holy grail of mine for years, back when I was a blonde. This stuff is amazing for both color-treated and bleached hair; it kept even the most damaged hair of mine soft and easy to manage. It’s definitely a must-buy for all my hair bleached obsessed readers!
And that’s pretty much it! Stay tune for next month’s favorites as I begin my journey to find some new favorites!
-Liz (:
Hey guys.
As I prepare for the tedious Spring semester (which I start tomorrow), I realize that my time for TNTH is going to have to be cut in half for the time being. For the past month since TNTH launched, I’ve been pre-writing blog posts for the upcoming month so that while adjusting to my new school schedule, I won’t have to worry about writing posts for the blog.
With that being said, after doing these posts for almost a month now, I am starting to realize certain content that I am posting is not working for my new school schedule.
The new schedule is up on the Schedule section located in the navigation bar. A basic description will be up there for readers to see, but if you want to personally know what I’m doing from here on out, keep reading!
This is who you supported and voted for on November 8th, 2016.
You support an incompetent man with absolute no knowledge about government, foreign policy, homeland security, and pretty much everything that qualities one to become the President of the States.
You support a racist, who believes that “walls” and “entry bans” against a stereotype of groups of people to “make America great again”, when really, that’s the most un-American thing one can possibly do.
You support a misogynist who thinks that “grabbing women by the pussy” is simple “locker room talk” when in reality he’s been accused for sexually harassing 12 younger women. You also supported his thought process of putting Women’s Rights to question as if women are not actual human beings that need a white man to tell them what to do with their bodies.
You support a man who chose a homophobic man as the Vice President, a man who still believes homosexuality is a sin and that “conversion therapy” (aka electroshock therapy) is the way to make homosexuality “disappear”.
You support a man-child, one who goes on Twitter to complain about protests and marches against his orders like a fucking 13-year-old boy, rather than actually run the fucking country? I mean, our best bet is Baron Trump running our country if that’s the case.
Saddest of all, you support a monster, which makes you a monster.
Ask yourself this question: Does my President (because he sure as hell isn’t mine) care about me? Am I a white, middle-class, straight Christian man? If I’m not any of those things, and all these executive orders are being signed that may affect me, KNOWING HE WAS GOING TO DO THIS, then why did I vote Donald Trump as my President and support his campaign?
My best bet, is that you couldn’t handle there being a woman President. You couldn’t handle the fact that a couple of emails tainted your mind, knowing that she has been involved in government for years, took on various positions of office, and was more qualified and put together to become the next President. I’m not overshadowing one scandal to expose another, but let’s be real now.
I have friends, because I go to a school in a borough where Republicans dominate, who support Donald Trump. If you are reading this and feel a certain way about what I say, at least you’ve acknowledged just how much of a dumbass you are and good for you for realizing that this is about you.
I am not one to indulge in politics; I am not qualified to get into every detail about this whole nightmare because I try my best to stray away from the negativity that comes out of it. It’s hard to not look and read about the reality about what’s going on in our world. There are protests at Airports because they are already denying access to Muslims from seven middle-eastern countries, even if they are a green card holder/obtain a visa. It saddens me to see shared posts about people, especially college students like myself, who visited their families at these countries for winter break, now knowing they can’t return to their normal lives back in the US because of this ban.
So, Trump Supporters – I have one more thing to ask of you.
Where are you guys? Those same “All Lives Matter” people who only chanted that when Black Lives were being threatened; where are you guys? Do Muslim Lives not matter? Mexican Lives? Women Lives? LGBT Lives? What happened to all of you guys?
You’re nowhere to be found at a time like this because simply, you don’t care to be bothered. “If it doesn’t apply to me, then I don’t need to worry about it!” Right?
Heh. I’m done with you guys. If you feel offended by any means necessary about the things that I said in this post, then your part of the problem.
I know this is a scary time to witness. You may feel like giving up and let this man ruin everything that America really stands for. It’s easy to throw the towel in and live each day in fear until 2020. You may feel like there’s no hope.
Please, take care of each other and take care of yourself.
Know that you have a voice for a reason. If you feel like there’s nothing you can physically do, spread the word to those who can. Let news outlets cover your story, whether if it’s completely bias or not, at least it’s being put out there. Be united with those who are determined to change and challenge the horrible things this man is trying to quickly do to our country. Talk about it, let your voice be heard by all means necessary. Let those who are primarily being targeted that you will help fight for them.
Be united in a world where unity will slowly diminish in these next four years.
Fuck those who tell you otherwise.
Oh, and one more thing for all my Trump supporters: fuck you.
-Liz.
We are in the year 2017. The 2010 decade will probably be forever known as the era that technology literally took over. We have smartphones, tablets, smart watches, smart eye gear, and smart pretty much everything. As a person who grew up into technology, it’s easy to feel like we’ve been sucked into this lifestyle. I mean, think about it: We grew up in an era where technology was big, heavy, and programmed to do one thing. A VHS was used for just VHS tapes, CD players only played CD’s, and cellphones were just devices that you use to call people outside of your home. It wasn’t advanced to be taken seriously.
Technology nowadays does more bad than good in society in my opinion. You have elementary school kids who were born into advanced technology, having iPhones has their first official phone (Mine was literally the equivalent to the Nokia phone). Where technology is more addictive than ever, it’s hard as a young adult to try to focus on things that aren’t technology based or social media based.
I’ve tried to quit multiple social media platforms over the years and I always ended up going back because that’s just how my mind is programmed. As a young adult, my free time is spent scrolling through Instagram and Snapchat seeing what everyone else is posting because that’s the routine we are all used to.
As a person in their 20’s, it feels like I don’t have a sense of identity outside my social media persona. That’s where we all go wrong. It’s normal to be a teenager obsessed with all these different social media platforms because you don’t have many worries in the world as a teenager yet. Most teenagers don’t even know where they’re going in life yet, and most of them haven’t officially identify themselves yet. In other words, they follow the trends and what their friends are doing.
That’s not acceptable being in college trying to get your future together.
So, how do you gain some sense of identity in a world where your identity is hidden behind a pixel profile picture?
I can go on for days on the things you can help your social media addiction or prevent you from making it worse. I can admit I have a problem; my iPhone is constantly glued to my hand from the moment I wake up to the moment I go to sleep. It’s hard to detox from it, but if you moderate what you’re doing and feeling while on your social media accounts, I believe that being on your phone 24/7 is just a normal thing, especially as a young adult.
But no matter what, always take care of your well-being before anything else. If you need to gather your thoughts and self, then take the time away from social media. Be by yourself. Take in your surroundings. Reinvent and find yourself in a world of personas on social media. Live your 20’s like you’re turning 30 tomorrow!
-Liz (:
I was at my sassiest when I was four years old.
1998 is probably the earliest year that I can remember. I had just turned four years old, and the typical person starts to remember things when they turn four, and 1998 was that year for me. A lot of new and exciting things happened that year: I was now four, my aunt got married that summer, and I started Pre-K that September.
I was one of those kids who loved going to school on my birthday. I used to love having my teachers and friends wish me a happy birthday, and we always used to have little classroom birthday parties. The best part of it all was the birthday kid use to get the birthday crown with their name on it. That night, I guess I wore it all day because I was that type of child.
My family and I lived in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn in a little house. It was a little house, but it was the first and only house that I lived in. My sister’s bedroom was connected to the living room, the kitchen and bathroom were small, and my mother’s room seemed huge to me. I don’t remember where I slept, but it was probably either on the couch or with my mother. We lived next door to a girl named Sara. She was a 12-year-old girl who was more of good friends with my older sister, who at the time was 8. Downstairs, another Asian family lived there, who had two kids around my sister’s age as well. My sister was the popular kid on the block. Their mother used to make the sickest BBQ chicken, and whenever she made them, I wasn’t to be found for hours. Literally my weakness.
We were genuinely a happy bunch. Of course I was too young to know if they were any problems or issues, but from my four-year old perspective, life was good. I like to describe my 4-year old self being the younger version of who I am now; I was bubbly, sassy, cute & innocent. I mean, despite me being 19 years older than my 4-year-old self. Although my friends were sometimes my friends, my sister Megan was truly my only friend. Like the little sister I was, I wanted to be just like her, play with her friends and do things like her. Like the older sister she was, she never liked it. It took awhile for her to accept me, but 19 years later me and my sister are closer than ever. I wouldn’t want anyone else to be my sister other than Megan.
Megan introduced me to the Spice Girls in 1998, and ever since I was obsessed. Me and my sister loved would beg my mother to go to Blockbuster to rent the VHS of their movie, Spice World, which was the greatest thing at that time. As I got older though, I realize just how weird the movie really was, but it’s still a classic. We used to record their televised concerts on VHS tape, every picture we took we threw up the “girl power peace sign”, and we had all the possible Spice Girls merch we were allowed to have.
Amanda was possibly Megan’s bestest friend out of her gang of neighborhood friends. Funny story, her and Amanda were friends for a couple of years, but Amanda had moved away before we moved later in 1999, and since then they never kept in touch. Four years ago in 2013, we went to Pennsylvania to see my grandparents, and we find out that Amanda lived about 10 minutes away from them. They reunited that night, and it was bittersweet just watching them catch-up and reminisce, and see her in complete shock when I wasn’t the 4-year-old girl she once knew. Things like that happen in movies, not in real life.
The only actual memory I remember happening in 1998 is the day that my aunt got married; July 11th, 1998. It was at some country club in Staten Island, and me and my sister were the flower girls and my mother was… I want to say the matron of honor. Yeah. I remember walking down the aisle with my sister during the ceremony. I also remember eating outside during cocktail hour. I also remember actually going inside the dance hall and dancing my ass off all night.
This has been the only wedding I’ve ever went to; I was too young to attend my Uncle’s wedding from my father’s side in… I want to say in 1997? As I got older and was able to understand more about life, I found out that my grandfather passed away a year before the wedding happened. I don’t know if anyone cried about not having him there walk his daughter down the aisle, but I can imagine some people did. I sometimes wish I was able to remember my grandfather, and sadly I have no memory of him. But I know he was great to me and Megan, and that’s all that matters.
It’s surreal to know that I can remember these little things that happened 19 years ago. I think that’s the importance of taking physical photographs; taking pictures on your phone can easily get deleted, and they aren’t something physical to keep around you for years on end. I’ve looked at some of these pictures for years, and I can sightly remember how life was like when that photograph was taken.
I’m so glad to have been a 90’s baby. I will forever loved how childhood was like in the 90’s.
-Liz (:
For some of us, classes begin in the next week. While most of us think we want to go back to school, some of us dread the stress that college brings into our everyday lives.
People deal with the stress of college in their own, unique ways. Some people wait to the end of the semester to get all of their papers and projects done, and other just stress 24/7 about the assignments. I’m definitely the latter.
With the stress of college, it’s hard to balance out the other aspects of your life such as your social, financial, personal, and love life. Just because you’re a full-time college student, it doesn’t mean you can’t have a life outside of it. I’ve known many people who ditched their social lives because of college, and as a young adult, doing that isn’t the ideal thing to do.
I survived four years of undergrad studies, and now I’m shooting to survive my grad studies. Here’s how I deal with the college stress that comes along every semester:
Whether you’re entering your first semester of college or your last, the college jitters exist for everyone. It seems like the work will be intense once you get your class syllabus, but ask yourself just how many times you said that about a class and it ended up being easy or just fine? The most important thing about college is being able to take care of yourself while taking care of your business. If you have experience simultaneously doing both during the semester, then you will be just fine.
I hope everyone has a great and successful semester! Cheers to the Spring 2017 semester!
-Liz (:
Sorry if some of the photos are blurry and there’s only a few pictures; I’m still learning the pros and cons of the camera and this was just my first roll of film. On a positive note, this was so fun to do today, and I can’t wait to continue documenting my adventures and explorations through this newfound hobby. Thank you for following me along on this journey.
-Liz (:
These weeks are just flying by already. January is about to end soon.
As I begin to prepare myself for yet another hectic semester of grad school, this week wasn’t that great to report back on. The closer we get back to the beginning of a new semester, the less that we do because we’re all trying to gather ourselves and get ready for our return. I know I certainly have.
Just like last week, I will be discussing some of my highlights for the week; the good, the bad, and the in between!
Here’s to the official last week of winter vacation! Let’s make the best of it!
-Liz (:
One of the hardest things to undergo in life is the aftermath of a friendship that either you or your friend decided to end. It’s not easy not going to that person anymore to gossip or share a good laugh, and it’s definitely not easy-going about your days not spending time with them.
I’ve dealt with a lot of friendship breakups, especially ones that were closest to me. At first, you feel like that person took a part of you away with them, but just like everything else in life, you learn to live without it after a while.
But with friendship breakups comes a lot of thinking and re-evaluating one self, especially if things ended abruptly. Sometimes, you may feel like you’re to blame, and other times you begin to resent your once-called “friend”. Either way, both sides of the lawn are not green in a situation like this.
So, how do you deal with post-friendship breakup emotions?
Overcoming something like this doesn’t happen overnight. It could take you a couple of weeks, or it can take you a couple of years like it did for me. Your friends are an extension of who you are, so be friends with people who are just as awesome and supportive like you!
-Liz (:
Letters From Liz. 