Amy Middleton Loves New York

Life is so funny and it’s going mission-fast right now. Everything I do leads to more I could be doing. Emails needing responses are slipping to page 2 of my inbox the day after they were received. I’ve never been one to complain about email, but I just can’t keep up.

 Wednesday I unsubscribed from every newsletter that came in, which was a tough decision because I like to spend a few minutes learning every day. Investing basics, words of the day, fly lady, web design, email alerts in all forms–I kissed these daily reminders goodbye. When nonessentials pile up, they take more time than I can reasonably give to them and they become clutter. And I need to let clutter go.

I still don’t think I’m accomplishing enough to justify the amount of time I require to work on “my stuff.” I probably extend the information gathering stage far longer than is needed. I am encouraged, though, by an observation I recently read in a documentary book by  Barry Hampe on the learning process: Good problem solvers spent a lot of time just playing with whatever it was they were doing. I like that, and it rings true to my experience- which is probably why I like it.

I need to devote more time than makes sense to the essentials for the next six months, and I have more “essentials” than I probably should right now. They are all working together and I don’t know how to let any of them go. As for anything that is not related to my church calling, documentary, bike trip, or pursuit thereof (which admittedly covers an awful lot of territory)…I’m unsubscribing.

5/5- first bus tour of NYC
5/6- first misdemeanor
5/7- first time i’ve owned a charged ipod
5/8- first font purchase
5/9- first itunes purchase
5/10- first purchase at Fairway Deli/Bar
5/11- first public posting of quicktime lingo:

AdMan

don’t know if that’s the best way to post it, but there it is for now.

i’m also in the process of getting some chatzkies up on cafepress. if there’s anything you’d like to see up there, please email me. surely it’s fairly obvious by now that i’m a slave to requests.

next thing you know, i’ll be driving a pink catalac and trying to sell you amway or something. but right now i really am hooked on cafepress, and not just in the addicted, hit the refresh button and see if i made more sales kind of way. the idea that people out there want to buy my stuff is very…validating. and strange and incredible. the $1.27 i’ve made off my two sales so far is kind of fun, but really i just love that people have seen my work, and two of them liked it enough to pay for it. awesome.

if you want to sign up to start selling on cafepress, follow this link so i’ll have referred you. then find five more people…ha ha, just kidding.

last night i was wondering if i had made any more money on my cafepress shop, and hillary said i was starting to remind her of the “chocolate milk lady” :

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Inexpensive Hot Chocolate

I watch for sell-by-today sales on the half-gallons of chocolate milk. Yesterday, I found some. The regular price was $2.19, but each half-gallon had $1.50 worth of markdownstickers on it. So, mine cost 69 cents per half gallon or $1.38 per gallon. I poured off a cup from each, and then froze the rest in the original containers.

Now, when Winter arrives, I can thaw the chocolate milk, pour it into mugs, and heat in the microwave for hot chocolate.This offers great taste, very little mess, and no fuss. If the kids have a cup in the morning and another cup in the afternoon, a half-gallon will quickly disappear.
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yes, yes, i did invest in a $60 Premium account due to a $0.26 commission. but see….eh…Steve Holt!