10 Things

Happy Wednesday!

I want to write about something a little more interesting. I decided I was going to try to think of 10 things that not that many people know about me and share them with you guys. I definitely know I’m going to struggle to think of that many things. I’m not the greatest at inward speculation or whatever. (I should work on that.)

  1. I very much dislike shopping. Most people don’t even believe me when I tell them that, actually. Going to malls and walking around just is not a fun thing for me. If I need clothes, I prefer to order them online and I almost exclusively shop at Express. I know what sizes I wear there, their clothing is made well, and I love the styles.
  2. I love to learn. I’ve actually discussed with a few friends how I miss college purely because I miss constantly learning new things. That’s a big part of the reason I dove back into learning code–I like to make sure I’m always improving myself.
  3. I have a high pain tolerance. Weird thing to mention, I know, but it’s true. My physical therapist got onto me for waiting so long to seek treatment for my knee but I always just felt general discomfort, rarely intense pain. Apparently the “discomfort” I was feeling should have actually been registered as pain. Who knew?!
  4. The cold weather doesn’t bother me. It used to, then I realized I honestly don’t care much whether it’s warm or cold, all I care about is if the sun is shining. Of course, I generally prefer the heat, but it can be just as beautiful outside in 20 degrees as it can be in 90.
  5. Being organized is sort of like an obsession of mine, and I actually enjoy cleaning. My house, office, desk, closet, etc. are all insanely organized. I guess I like to take a minimalist approach to things. I clean and organize my closet quarterly and maintain a clean house at all times. (If I host people, my house is usually spotless again within 30 minutes of everyone leaving.)
  6. I wear a lot of black, but that’s no secret. What most people don’t know is why I wear so much black–I’m not really comfortable wearing colors. I just got comfortable dressing in as much black as possible and have fully embraced the fact that I typically come off as less friendly because of it. I don’t know why I am this way, but I’m trying to expand my closet’s color palette. (It’s a slow process.)
  7. Good lord, I love music. Half the time I choose listening to music over watching Netflix. I listen to so so much music and am always open to suggestions for songs to listen to. I may not like everything that’s recommended to me, but believe me when I say I definitely give them all a chance. Memorizing song lyrics is another thing I really like to do. It’s satisfying to me for some reason.
  8. I have a good and contagious laugh. My coworker and I will start laughing about something and shortly after, the entire rest of my team will be laughing just as hard, purely because our laughs are so amusing. (I never thought this until they told me. Regularly.)
  9. So another laugh related thing: I spit/drool out whatever I’m drinking at least once a day from laughing too hard. Just yesterday, I took a big sip of water right as my coworker said something inappropriate and ended up with water everywhere. It honestly happens without laughing too. I just tend to spill/spit/drool my drinks out of my mouth regularly. Don’t ask why or how, but if you can make me laugh hard enough, you might see it in action.
  10. Sunrise and sunset–the absolute best times of the day. I love watching a good sunrise/set and have an insane appreciation for them. I probably have at least 500 photos of the sun just doing it’s thing in my phone. In a perfect world, I’d have the time to watch each and every one every single day. They’re all just so stunning and unique.

Hope you enjoyed xx – A

Amateur Coder

Hey strangers!

I’ve been really really busy lately and have actually completely forgotten to blog. Work itself hasn’t been crazy, it’s actually been going pretty nicely lately. Good things have happened. 🙂 The thing that’s keeping me busy is my obsessive desire to learn new skills (and learn them well). As of right now, I’m diving deeper and deeper into the world of coding and trying to learn as much as possible about it.

I started learning CSS and HTML about 2 years ago back when I was in college. I took a Writing for the Web course that required me to learn those two languages through courses on Codecademy, after which I made this website as my final project. Obviously this site has come a very very long way since then as I’m constantly changing it, but that was what first sparked my interest in the language of computers.

Over the years I’ve added to and tweaked my site regularly, but that wasn’t enough. I wanted to learn more. A few months ago, I decided to go through the Codecademy courses on HTML and CSS again to refresh my knowledge on the subject. I only recently finished (It’s a lot of course material!) and am now in the process of transcribing my 150+ pages of notes on both languages. (I learn by writing, so I take very thorough notes.) Because of these refresher courses, I found that I desired the ability to control and edit my own personal site more than I was capable of doing before. Now that I have a much deeper understanding of HTML and CSS, I wanted to write my own code on my own website. In order to do this, I had to upgrade to a Premium plan with WordPress, which was an absolutely amazing decision. I was given freedom over my website’s CSS and was able to completely redesign and spice up my home page in ways that I never could before.

Senior photo of Anna
Check out my new home page!

Once I finish typing up my very excessive notes, I plan to take on the task of learning JavaScript next. I like the idea of getting good at these languages and being able to incorporate it into whatever jobs I look for in the future.
If anyone else has taken on learning coding on their own before, advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

xx – A

Happy Holidays!

img_9099Christmas was a few days ago and New Year’s Eve is in another 3 days. It’s that weird time of the year where there are just so many holidays and festivities happening and it’s rather overwhelming. I realized that, over the course of a week, I was going to be traveling between cities like an absurd amount. It’s exhausting and I am going to need some well-deserved down time after all the holidays are over.

Let me update you on Christmas really quick though since I honestly don’t have a lot of time to blog today. (I’m leaving work early so I can head to my best friend’s wedding that I’m in.) I went home last Saturday and stayed with family until the day after Christmas. I spent so much time with family and it was absolutely fantastic. It’s weird to think that if my plans to move away proceed as planned, the holidays will really be the only times I get to see my family. Now, I’m just two and a half hours away and can go home on any weekend, but once I move, it’s major holidays only. Weird thought. Oh well though, it’s still a long way away. We’ll see what happens.

Anyways, for Christmas, my favorite gift was my Bose QuietComfort 35 II headphones and they are THE BEST. They mute the ENTIRE world and holy moly they are a dream. I was literally counting down the days until I could start using them. Also, I killed it in my gift-giving this year. Just a side note.

img_9084

So this weekend I’m going to my best friend’s wedding, then I’ll be spending the new year in Austin. So much traveling. So exhausting. It’s fun and cool though, yeah. I’m not entirely sure if this blog has a purpose other than random ramblings. I promised myself I would blog at least once a week from now on though so this is what I’ve got this week.

OOH! Fun information, I am refreshing myself on how to code with HTML and CSS. I learned while I was in college but have pretty much forgotten since then. Once I finish my refresher courses, I’m going to take the dive and try to learn JavaScript. I really want to make sure that I am the best version of myself when I start job hunting in a new state. So yeah, that’s cool and fun and I really like learning new things.

xx – A