A New Adventure for Jackie - It's called "Not Moving"

Today is the first of a new month... September. I came home a year ago on the 5th from my yachting venture. I can't believe that a whole year has nearly passed! Wow!

I will have been working at KSRM for 11 months by the end of my employment. My last day is September 15th and my feelings on the matter are now mixed. I am very happy with my decision to leave, but am also going to miss aspects of my job.

I absolutely love the Production in my job. Creating ads is a blast. Sometimes getting to work with the sales representative to form a great idea for an ad is so fulfilling! Sometimes, we'll have someone record an ad but you have to walk them through it - reading one line at a time until each line is read in a manner that, haha, IIII think sounds good :) Let's just say that for a 30 second ad, I once recorded someone for 25 minutes. I then had to piece together this 30 second ad by finding the good sentences from the 25 minutes of recording. The client I have in mind was really worried when she left because sh wasn't sure how it would sound. When I called her with the completed ad she was so happy! That, my dear friends is a very good feeling :)

Really, when it comes down to it, I really just LOVE the production. I'm not a fan at all of 6am, though I have discovered I'm pretty darn good at pretending I am. I always find it humerous when I'm texting Cam during my morning show letting her know how incredibly tired and miserable I am and then a split-second later I get on the air "Wow! What a beautiful day! I am so glad to be hanging out with you this morning..." Oh my... it's silly.

Well, my last day is on the 15th. I have a few options for when I leave - options that include:

• moving/not moving,
• renting/not renting,
• working/not working for a couple of months.

I have pretty much made of my mind for the first option. This is odd because it's the first time between Cam and I where she wants to leave, and I - Me - Jackie Palm - want to stay put.

It's so expensive to move! Plus, boy is it a hassle! I am so ready for stability. This year, I think that I may decide to decrease how aggressive I am with my loan payments to provide myself with a little more peace of mind. My friend Alexis who was living here in Kenai for the summer was telling me about a studio apartment in Old Town Kenai for only $400/month. It's conveniently located, small so I don't have to keep up on a large amount of space, and though not exactly inexpensive, not ridiculously over-priced, either. Plus, it doesn't smell.

Hmmm.. Maybe I've already made up my mind for the renting as well. I have house-sitting gigs up until Thanksgiving. I think I will try and rent one of those lovely studio apartments when that time comes around, or perhaps wait until January.

I am currently looking for new job prospects. The office where Cam works is looking for a receptionist/secretary. That is the type of position I am looking for and will therefore apply. I'm trying to fix my resume so that I look good for an office position. Haha, actually, with no training, that's probably the position that comes the most naturally to me. I love computers. I love answering the phone... and believe it or not I LOVE organizing. I may not like organizing my own stuff, but when it comes to paperwork, oohhhhh boy!

I'm taking a Microsoft Access course right now. I'm only a week and a half in but I LOVE it. A few years ago I would not have enjoyed it but right now, I'm thrilled. "Let's see how many tables I can create!" "What relationships can I make between these tables??" It is a blast!

It's super funny because maybe I should have known I would like this type of thing when I was little. I never really liked school, but I always LOVED getting new pencils... and pens... and paper!! Such excitement! Haha.. I love it.

Of course, we'll see if I like doing it in a work setting. I think I will. I'm looking forward to my new adventure of staying put :) This'll be a neat, new experience :)

Take Everything in Stride

It's nearly the end of May. I've been here since September 5th, so let's see - that's going on nine months in only a couple of weeks. To be honest, it hasn't felt that long.

I've been working at the radio station now for seven, going on eight, months. It's been a blast. Listener responses have gone from A. Who is this girl, and why is she in Radio? to B. Jackie, I hear you on the radio.... to C. Jackie, I listen to you every morning on the radio, and finally, to D (which is wild) "I'm your secret admirer..." silence... "Oh don't worry, I'm not a stalker..." -- Actual conversation with a caller this morning.. humorous, and yet still odd, haha... now that I think of it... I really wish I recorded it.. Would've made an excellent show liner.. Darn! Haha!

Starting last Saturday, I became the late night host on the FUSE, 106.9 FM.. It's the rock station in our group. Everyone knows it's me, even though I use a fake name. It's very hard to disguise my voice but I do deepen it.. almost sultry, but not, haha. It's kind of fun because it's like I'm on stage again, acting a part. People wonder why I change my name when it's obvious I'm Jackie. Nobody seems to understand that the part I play on the FUSE is not the personality I want the real me to come across as. Sure, I like the music, but yeah... I think at least my family understands, and that's what's important.

Also new, I've been promoted to Production Manager and to PSA Director. Fancy titles but it's not that much cooler. A bit of a pay rise is included so of course that's welcomed. Currently, it comes with a couple more hours of work each day which I could do without but am convinced that once I get things organized and in order, I will at least be able to shorten my days from 10-11 hours to 8-9. That would be ideal. Truly though, it's exciting. It gives me a bit more power.. a say in things. It gives me the chance to get things in such an orderly way that when the next person comes into the station they'll be able to go "Oh, that's how this is done..." and go from there without anyone needing saying a word. You know me... something new, it's exciting, so I just gotta keep it that way.. everchanging and evolving to something better and better... contstantly improving. Haha, hey, it's good to have a goal, right??

The summer sun is a blessing and problem all wrapped into one. It is so much easier to wake up at the un-Godly hour of 4:30 when it is already bright outside. It is also, however, so much more difficult getting to bed at a respectable hour to wake up at the un-Godly hour! Oophta! When I started working at the station I kept saying "This going to bed at 10 business is absolutely ridiculous!" Well! I still do, but now I mean to say that 8 o' clock is pushing it! Haha, my friends all have to put up with me on Friday night being barely there, and on Sunday having to leave around six. They're getting used to it now, and don't give me such a hard time. I'm just finding that in order for me to be NOT cranky consistently, I need sleep... and not sporadic. Haha... it's an interesting change..

**Note: Now Erik.. don't get too excited! Haha! When I get the chance to go to bed at midnight and wake up at 8, I take it! Which is still so odd! Because I do that on Friday nights/Saturday mornings! Gahh! It's like I'm growing up or something!... to accept 8 hours when I could get 11 or 12?? Who does that but respectable people?? .. :-) Craziness..

Tina and Erik have been home now since Sunday, but I have yet to see them! I talked to them on the phone a couple days ago and it seems they are the busiest people I know for having just got here. Wow. They never fail to impress me. My plan/hope is to be able to get started working with Erik at the site starting next week after I get out of my day-job. I'm not ready to put any hard-plans down yet cause I still need to talk to Erik about what needs to get done and such, but tentatively next week I start my real job. Radio is now. Fishing is forever.

This Saturday I was hoping that Chris might do the Skyline Traverse with me. It's 1.5 miles up Skyline and then 9.5 miles across the ridges of mountains at 3500 ft all the way to Fuller Lakes and then you come down the the parking lot there. Chris is the only person I really trust doing it with, honestly because... I don't know. When he looks at a map and says we need to go this way, I will say, OK and not fret. If I were to go with any of my guy friends, I am convinced I would constantly doubt... They're just gonna have to prove themselves. Until then, Chris is number 1 in my book.

Chris is, however going to do Juneau lakes on Saturday; mountain biking with some guy he met at work. I have a couple of buddies that are camping at Fuller Lakes on Friday night and spending the day on Saturday. At first I thought I might camp as well but I chose not to for various reasons. Instead, my tentative plan is to climb Skyline Saturday morning, maybe enjoy a peaceful packed lunch on top, and just chill, enjoying the scenery, then fall down Skyline as gracefully as possible... drive over to Fuller Lakes, hike up to meet the guys, eat some of their fish and then go home. Haha, I think I'll be sore on Sunday..

Haha, to make matters worse, the church I'm attending is doing their first hike of the summer on Sunday to Russian River Falls. Hmmm.. A nice warm-down from the other two. Let's be honest, here... Skyline's going to kick my butt.... Feel those thighs burning? I can! And I'm laying in bed! Ohhh dear... ;)

Besides work, fishing season fastly approaching, and the plan to do some hikes this summer, I don't know what my plans are! :) I'm sure I'll have all the free time in the world.. haha or not. But I can't imagine spending it any other way.

I'm glad I'm here. I'm proud of myself for the progress I have made on my loans, and am pleased with my work at the radio station. I think I've made healthy lifestyle choices for myself but know that I still have a lot more to learn. I've enjoyed the steps I've taken so far. Sometimes they've been a little rough, but I've learned a lot about myself along the way. Life is good.

Love you guys TONS and will see most of you in only a month or so. Woof :)

Jacks

By Request.... :-)

I didn't realize that it has been nearly four months since I last wrote. The fact that six months have passed since I've returned from my yachting is mind-boggling, really. It's odd because the "season" is starting again down in Florida so I've been getting emails from agencies asking if I'm interested in this position or that. A captain I once interviewed with actually called and asked me if I was interested in a deckhand position on his yacht--of which I turned down, obviously being that I am definitely still here in Kenai.

Connie has been most gracious and has told me that I can stay with her whenever I need but for the past 3 months I have been able to consistently house-sit at various places. It has been extremely convenient that my big boss decided to go to Hawaii for 2 1/2 months and left me in his place, RIGHT behind the radio station. It takes 2 shakes of a lamb's tail to get to work... Not bad, not bad at all..

Unfortunately, John get's back on Wednesday, so I have to have all of my stuff out by tomorrow. I have a place in Sterling now with a dog named Chino. She's really sweet (lab/australian shepherd mix) and extremely high energy, go figure :-) The place in Sterling is nice but I've been spoiled for the last 6 months with a very small commute. Now I'm back to 30 minutes until the 23rd. I'm still working on April.. Not sure where I'm going to be just yet.

I've been enjoying myself pretty thoroughly since the beginning of the new year. We have no benefits here at the radio station but really... we kinda do. We get a free membership at the Fitness Place in Soldotna. For about a month and half I was going daily, which was really great and then I got sick and coughed every single time I exerted any energy at all which took me out of the working out for 2 weeks and then I guess I never got back in..

All is well, however because I'm still having a blast cooking healthy meals (within my budget of course, haha!) and have picked up dancing and an amazing and fun hobby. It's swing, and it's amazingly wonderful. We've got some guys that are completely into learning and I've got a ton of music from Bob Bird now so we order Instructional DVDs online and so far we've learned quite a bit! I'm really looking forward to this summer when we'll be able to have outdoor dance-offs/BB-Qs!

On Tuesdays and Thursdays I go out north to go swimming with some from the Baeten family. I go hiking/skiing with Ben on occasion and Brian is now teaching me to play the guitar. The Baeten family is quite large so I will understand if you cannot remember all of the names but... here we go. We're all really interested in learning more dance and Phil Morin has given us the go ahead to go to use the green room at Nikiski High to practice while he's there with his dance troupe. So Brian, Bethany, Brandon, Brianna and I will be going to work on our mad skills :-)

After we dance/swim I typically go over to their place, have dinner and we either dance some more or play some music. It's a lot of fun. Yesterday at the Bogards we had 3 guitars going and goodness, there's some real talent around! I played my one mastered song :-) hehe and then just harmonized with Brian, Adam and Ben. It was a blast for suresies. My instructor told me that I have to have my other song memorized by Thursday, so I'm gonna have to work on that this week..

I've realized that I am very much a "Yes-man." I know I know how to say no but I don't do it very often. I need to learn to prioritize my responsibilities and also to not over-extend myself because really, when I do that to myself, it typically affects other people when I find out that I can't really do what I said I could... and then I get super frustrated with myself. So, working on that... Anyhoodle.

I was just hired in Kenai at the Legislative Information Office as a Reserve for teleconferencing and such. It'll only be on some evenings and some weekends. It works out well with my radio work schedule--not so much with my playing schedule, however. I figure that every little extra bit of money I make, though I can put straight into my loans so I can skidaddle outta here even sooner! Right now I'm on a 3-year plan with loans and then a 2-year plan on top of that to get some money in the bank before I head out. As long as I keep doing what I'm doing, I'll be set and I can only see one thing that might interfere with my plans, but I don't see that happening anytime soon, so I think I'm good... and I think that was a run-on sentence? hehe

If I was talking to you, I guarantee you that I would go into great detail on each and every aspect of my life haha and that's probably why you are all pretty thankful that you can get the basic run-down right here:-) You want more info? haha doubtful.. call me :-) I get off work around 3.

One more thing I find necessary to mention is this... On Saturday I was hanging out at my friend Jake's house when some other girls came in--all sisters. I had a blast talking to Maggie about country music and all sorts of stuff while Jake and her younger sister, Molly were downloading music to Molly's ipod because apparently she had some trip to Italy she was going on.. For some reason no dots were connected at first. Finally by the end of the night, it clicked! "Wait! You're leaving for Italy?? " "Yes" "For choir??" "Yeah!" "Ohhhh my goooshhh!! You're gonna see my cousin, Maya Chay!!" "Oh yeah! She's your cousin?? Yeah, and I think her younger sister is coming, too... uhh.. Fr-uhhh" "Freya!! Yeah, they're both giong! Oh my goodness, I cannot believe you're going to see my cousin's in just 3 days!"

I honestly felt like I was gonna cry.. It was like you guys were so close... but not! I almost walked up to Molly and gave her a biggg huge hug to pass on to you guys but realizedI didn't know Molly at all, haha. I really did almost cry, though! I miss you guys SOOOO much and I cannot WAIT for you guys to come home.

That's all for me right now. Eventually I may post some more photos, mostly from Wam-bam the Cam Cam :-) Alyeska and dancing and such:-) Love you guys, Woof

Jacks