Wow, no sleep

I should have known better. I stayed up way too late last night. I think I finally laid down at 4:00, back up at 8:00. I will definitely be needing a good nap today. I have my dart tournament tonight and I promised I'd be there. I didn't go the Thursday before Christmas because I was still out running around, trying to get my shopping done. It should be fun though, as long as I can get some rest later today. At the dart tournaments we play 501, double out. And we draw names for partners. I'd say that I'm not a great player, but I'm not bad either. You would think I'd be great after playing for so many years, but I have on nights and off nights. I just can't be consistent. I don't know whey. There's some guys that won't play for 6 months and then come in and throw like it was yesterday. I don't get it. Lucky them. lol I'm not super competitive either, I just like myself to feel like I did a good job, whether I won or not. Some of the players are REALLY competitive. They get really mad when they don't win. Some players don't even want to be partnered up with them because it can be really nerve-racking. Dart night is pretty fun though. We play starting in October through May and then it ends for the summertime. Well, I'd better go drink some coffee. I sure need it.

Helping A Friend

So I have a friend that has his own DJ business. He does weddings, dances, teen events, corporate parties and all kinds of things. I think he even knows how to hypnotize people. Anyhow, I posted previously that he's had a pretty slow year. I know a lot of people are going through that right now. I also know that he doesn't have much of a presence online. If you search for him for terms that people would normally search in the local area, such as Wedding DJs Seattle or DJ Everett you don't find him. I found his facebook page after doing a little hunting, but I haven't ran across his website yet. He has a good website, but like many businesses it's not really optimized for any search terms. The only way someone would find it is if they had the exact website address. Many small businesses are in the same boat. They don't know any different. They pay all this money to have a great website built, but they don't know there is more work to be done to actually get it ranking where they want to be found. I'm trying to do this for my friend. I've been working at if for a couple weeks, after my day job that is. I have one main site which I'm trying to get ranked for the big city in his area. The term actually gets about 5500 searches a month. Right now I'm floating around page 3 so I have a bit of work to do. I need to get him to page 1 of Google. Then I created a bunch of smaller sites focusing on the smaller cities. These are doing great, many of them are on page 1, ranked in the first place. They just don't really get any search volume. If anyone did search those terms though in those particular cities, they'll find him for sure. It's a project, but if I can get him more business I am going to be so happy. He loves what he does and I totally envy that. I hate seeing him feeling like he needs to get a part time job making minimum wage just to make ends meet. If he just had some good online exposure, I'm sure things will pick up for him.

Still Trying to Nail Down Our Workout Schedule

So I would have thought that the holidays would have been a great time to get really into the working out and gym groove, having some extra time off. So I was wrong. I'm disappointed with myself. At the same time, I don't want to get too down on myself because I know I am going to get really committed. My boyfriend and I just need to nail down a schedule that is going to work for us. Whether we go in the mornings or after work, we need to have it planned out. What days, what times and just do it. We told our training we'd go 4 times a week. I thought that would be a good goal to shoot for. If we had said 6 days a week, then we would end up getting made at ourselves and feel like failures when we didn't make it that many times. With 4 days, it seems more doable, and if we go 5 or 6 times, that's just a bonus. That would feel like we did an awesome job that week. I'm just not sure what schedule is going to be better. I'd prefer mornings, because there are so many less people there. The evenings are pretty packed. If we were just getting on a cardio machine that would be different. With using the other machines though I don't think I'd like it when it was busy. Plus, I really don't want to look like a fool. I know we won't, but you can't help but feel that way. I'm excited though, as I've said before. We've been eating a little bit healther, and I've been trying really hard to drink more water, no soda. I can already feel the difference. It's amazing how drinking more water and cutting out soda can make a difference in feeling bloated. I normally feel bloated all the time. I don't feel that way near as much right now. Anyhow, the new year is going to be the beginning of a great weight loss journey. I can't wait!

A Good Friend Of Mine

Work is slow for everyone these days. I am lucky to have the job that I have right now. I've been with the company for about 6 years now. About 1-2 years ago they cut back quite a bit. Many people just in my department were laid off. I know my boyfriend has been out of work  for months at a time over the last two years. He'll be on a job for 2 months and then out of work for 4 months and that just seems to repeat itself. A good friend of mine from back home has seen his business slow down as well. He's a disc jockey for weddings, corporate events and clubs. I set up a site for him, DJ Everett, to help get him some more exposure in the local area. I think if he gets his name out there some more there will be a lot more business coming his way. Many small businesses need to look at getting more exposure online. That's how people do most of their searching these days. I know I don't pull out the yellow pages anymore. I go online and search for the businesses I'm looking for. Whether I'm looking for a local auto shop, the closest tanning beds, gyms, flowers, party djs, or anything, I go online to find it. A lot of small businesses don't even have a website and those that do have websites they still aren't being found. I'm hoping I can help my friend by setting up some sites targeted at those keywords people are really searching for that I can bring in some more business for him.

Finally Hit The Gym

So we finally started going to the gym! Horray. I am so happy that we finally got in there. We got a free training session since we were new members. I ended up signing up for a trainer which I'm really excited about. We're going to see her once a week. I wanted to have someone tell us what we needed to do. What machines to do, when to do them and when to change it up. I'm just trying to figure out what kind of schedule we'll do. It's so busy in the evenings, but getting there in the morning isn't easy. I'd like to get most of my workouts done in the morning, because then it will be done and over with. It's too easy to put it off when you don't go until the evenings. Plus, once I go to the gym after work then my nights pretty much shot. If I could just get in there at 6:30 each morning then I should be able to get to work at a decent hour. I'm excited about having a trainer. I had my first real session with her on Friday. Man oh man am I sore! We did a full body work out. I'm surprised though, my legs and abs felt perfectly fine. It's my arms though. Oh my goodness do they hurt. Not just a little sore, but extremely aching pain. ha ha. I need to get in there tomorrow to do the full workout again. I'm just hoping that the soreness eases off enough by tomorrow that I can do it. I've been taking tylenol, using icy hot and taking hot baths, but I don't know that any of it is really helping. Oh well, I know that is part of working out. If you're not sore, then your not working hard enough. I don't think I'll be quite AS sore though in the future. It's just because I'm so extremely out of shape. Can't wait though, I'm going to start losing weight and feeling so much better. I can't wait to have more energy too. I'm always so tired. Looking forward to having the energy just to do simple things, like going to the grocery store after work, or getting online to work on some of my sites. Right now I just feel like crashing when I get home. Sometimes I feel like laying my head down on my desk at work by 2:00.