Jean Eng Blog

It’s hard to believe that the last time I posted was weeks ago! Where does the time go? I’m not really sure what I’ve been doing over the past weeks that’s all that interesting.

I took my youngest niece to the circus two weekends ago! We had great seats and I took a bunch of pictures but I’ve yet to upload them to the computer. It was the Ringling Brothers circus and they did make a mention about how photos are allowed but they are for our own personal use and not commercial. I wonder if putting them on my blog would be ok?

My niece stayed with me practically her entire spring break and she had a cold. I was just finally starting to get over my sinus infection from hell and tada…struck down with the kid germies again! Actually I think everyone in the family got some variations of this cold. It’s going around, it’s probably the flu virus of sorts… I had the fever and the body aches, then the coughing, stuffy and runny nose, etc. How fun

Maybe two and a half weeks ago, I was really obsessed with researching airbrushing and supplies. I was going through a “what am I doing with my life” thing and that weekend, I just so happen to catch Deepak Chopra on one of the pbs channels that was running a membership drive. Deepak is awesome! His lecture this time was called “The Happiness Prescription” and I always get something out of those kinds of programs. My favorite still has to be Wayne Dyer….mostly because I’m way more familiar with his material as I’ve read, listened, and watched tons of his stuff.

Watching Deepak Chopra on tv made me think about my life again…I often contemplate my life and what exactly I’m doing with it anyway but this time, it was like I was meant to listen to the messages Deepak had for me. So I love art and creativity and decided that the “maybe one day I’ll look into learning how to do airbrushing” was just delaying my own happiness. Sure I have a host of “projects” I’ve started and hadn’t finished, too many to list. I have a lot of things I’m interested in, maybe too many!

So I did a ton of research on airbrushing and I love reading forums, there must be a forum community for every single topic one can conceive. It’s amazing how the internet, this virtual world we connect through has joined up millions upon millions of like-minded individuals from all over our planet, sharing ideas, thoughts, learning, teaching, connecting…

After extensive research, I have picked out the airbrush I want to start with along with all the supplies I would need. The only problem lies in the compressor I was looking at and how very limited space I have to actually do the airbrushing itself. I’d like to in the future incorporate airbrushing techniques to the ceiling murals I paint…especially in creating those wispy clouds I so adore. Sure it all can be part of my business expense but I still have to fork over the cash initially to get all the gear.

Oh btw, I have figured out that I absolutely LOVE GEAR! I am a firm believer of stuff! Whenever I get involved in some new project, it’s almost like the skies the limit on getting set up with the right equipment, aka GEAR! Perhaps THIS is the reason I don’t have a ton of money, I spend it all buying “accessories”. And I love things to match, like a complete set….my motto…”If I’m going to do it, I’m going to do it right the first time”.

There is probably some psychology to my behavior and I’ve given it some thought as well… I won’t go into it too much but I think part of it stems from not having much growing up when I was young….and how my interests were never really acknowledged, let alone nurtured. So as I get older, I find myself giving to myself the stuff I want to pursue the things I want to experience. Make sense?

So I was all ready to buy my airbrushing gear when I got my hospital bill from when I went to the ER in denver. HOLY CRAP is what I said when I saw how much that freakin bill was. My heart literally skipped a beat when I saw it. I was expecting ……. ….. far less than what I saw. It is inconceivable to me how expensive going to the Emergency Room is. For a couple of hours in the ER where they looked at me for maybe 15 minutes total and took some blood and urine from me, my bill was almost $2500!!

Ok, I am NEVER going back to the hospital again unless I’m having a baby. Being I’m self-employed, I don’t have insurance so this was a big chunk out of my own savings, ugh! Of course, when I was working a 9-5 and had insurance through work, I never got sick…ever!

What gets me is that they wanted all that money for just the hospital room. The doctor had a separate $350+ bill and my lab fees were like $40 bucks, I was shocked my lab bill was so low…but now I see them gouging me on the room itself. It is absolutely ridiculous, you’d think they cut me open or something for that kind of money. What they did does not justify $2500! AND I wasn’t even cured during that visit, all the lab tests came back ok and they couldn’t figure out what was causing my pain. I can’t even imagine what my bill would have been if I had agreed to have a cat scan.

Anyway, I’m off the subject here….so I got this big huge gigantic enormous bill and decided that airbrushing is gonna have to take a seat at the back burner for now…but at least I know exactly what I’ll purchase once my cash is flowing again.

This is not turning out to be such a “quick” update as the title suggests…what do you know, I’m writing a long post..haha

So after some minor disappointment and reevaluation, I have decided this last week and a half that I need to be somewhat more organized with my life. I tried to order new refills for this organizer I have…yes I know it’s already one quarter of the way done with the year….and it seems the usual place that carried the refills doesn’t have them anymore. Maybe they are sold out, maybe they just discontinued it, your guess is as good as mine. Online, I would have had to pay $25 plus shipping for the refills and decided to screw that.

That’s when I started thinking about the one piece of electronic device I don’t own…….a PDA! People who know me knows that I’m fanatic about electronic gadgets! I pretty much own every little electronic device a person could possibly need, well at least for my own needs. I have computers, laptops, wifi running through my house, cell phones, mp3 players, GPS, digital cameras, digital voice recorders, DVR! If it’s rechargeable, I love it. If it’s got a remote control, I love it. I even bought a blacklight (during my blacklight research obsession) that can be turned on and off by a remote control…haha My room fan is remote controlled. I think if I had the money, my house would be totally hooked up with the highest quality sound and entertainment system along with major security that could be controlled via remote control, laptop, cell phone, etc. Perhaps the electronic stuff is sucking all my money away….hmmm

So the only thing I don’t currently own is a PDA….which my boyfriend finds to be somewhat out of place. He thinks it’s funny that for someone who is sooo into electronic devices, do not own a PDA. Yeah I’m not sure how I dropped the ball on that one. I had an old organizer about 15 years ago that I would put addresses in but then I stopped buying those round cell batteries for it. I think I’ve just been a scribbler for the past decade. I jot down stuff on post-its all the time, make lists of stuff on back of junk mail envelopes, calender pages, scraps of paper. The only thing I hardly wrote in was my paper organizer (day planner)…maybe because it was too big and bulky to carry around with me all the time.

Wow, it’s 5am already, I have got to wrap this one up and get to bed! So I did the research for the right PDA and my brother tried to tell me that the PDA phones are the latest craze but I just don’t want to take on the added expense of them with getting a data plan, I pay enough for my cell service already. After much research, I decided on the Palm TX! I have been anxiously waiting for it to arrive and it suppose to get here tomorrow! I have also purchased another 2GB SD card for it since the prices are dropping so much! I got some screen protectors for it along with a nice leather vertical flip case which I hope will arrive this week.

I also picked up a new set of Sennheiser Earbud headphones, hopefully these will fit better in my ear. I have many pairs and none of which stays put. When I paint murals, I like to listen to my Sansa MP3 Player and it’s annoying when the ear piece falls out all the time. I hope the sound quality is good on these too!

By the end of the week, I’ll be all hooked up with my new PDA and accessories….hopefully it will help me be more organized and keep track of what I’m doing and all my contacts! Once I use it for awhile, I’ll give a better review on it but there are already tons of raving reviews for this PDA! Can’t wait til the UPS man is here!! Bring me my goodies!!