Wine trip contest!

I've been talking about wanting to travel and plan a trip somewhere random this year. The possibilities are endless with where I would go. Perfect timing for Wine Enthusiast magazine to send me trips that I can enter to win! I know the possibility of actually winning is tiny, but a girl can dream, right?

In order for me to get more points, I have to post a bunch of links. Here they are:

Main Contest Page- you should enter too!


Destinations include:

• Rioja, Spain (Check out their Rioja wines as well) I want to try the Bodegas Roda 2001 Cirsion Red- SO BAD!
• Danube, Austria (here's the list of their Austrian wines) They do a lot of sweet white wines, which aren't my favorite, but I'm willing to try anything :) 
• Stellenbosch, South Africa (The list of South African wines is impressive). Looking to try some nice red there. The one that stands out the most is the Boekenhoutskloof 2003 Cabernet Sauvignon.

They also have Monterey County, but I live really close to it, and I really need some real traveling soon.  It would be amazing to win any of these trips though. It would be a great way to start my life after graduation. Bring my camera along and do what I love best- travel, wine, and photos.You guys should check it out. You never know!! :)

A New Year, a new...everything!

So, technically the year started 22 days ago, but who's really counting?

I decided recently that it's time to get my crap lined up in a row (like ducks, only different). I will be graduating (not that I feel like it really counts since it's just my Associates degree) after this semester concludes. Why am I finishing after just a few years, you may ask? Pretty much because the school I attend is a leech, sucking the life and money out of me and every student that doesn't have mommy and daddy footing the bill. They are seriously expecting me to pay the same amount as I would for medical school, but I'm in art school... I just can't justify it. So, what do I do about it?

I leave. Ha.

Hopefully with a kick-ass portfolio and contacts for that "real job" I keep getting told I need to have. Now, on to figure out what I want that to be, and then how I might possible reach that job. Honestly, the only thing I am afraid of when it comes to leaving school are the horrific bills that will come back to haunt me. I'm a survivor (and I hope you have that song in your head now), and I can mold myself to be anything I need to be in order to make it through life. I can be a receptionist, a retail clerk, a bartender, etc. So far, I haven't been the happiest at any of these jobs. That's mostly because they aren't at all creative. I end up being really good at every job I've had, but they don't make me feel really good.

What do I do to get on this path of getting paid for my creativity? Well first of all, I need a goal. I think I have actually figured out that I want to work with wine in some way. I love wine. I love how it tastes, how it smells, makes me feel, and where it grows. Vineyards are so therapeutic. I seriously considered going to school to become a master sommelier before I settled on the idea of photography being what I wanted to do to be happy in my career. I asked myself a few months ago, Why can't I do both?

So that's my next step: figuring out how to do both. I think I will try a few things. First, I've been looking at wine magazines, trying to see what kind of work they have there so that I might actually be someone they want to hire. Second, I would love to just work at a winery. Even out in the field (literally), picking grapes or something. I feel like my photography has been way to forced since I have been in school. It's grown, but it's definitely not things I really enjoy doing. I feel like taking a break from forcing myself might let the creative juices start flowing.

Anyone have any other crazy-awesome ideas for me to get on the path of payment for the love of photography and wine? I'm open to any suggestions. Now, time to be the wine-o I am and go buy a bottle of red. Cheers!

Update, smupdate.

Well... I kind of died off on the updating... again. :-/

We made it safe! We are moved in, living with my friends, Kim and Andrea, in their dining room. It's a bit tight with all of the stuff for our whole house in there with our big blowup mattress. It's mostly just motivation to find jobs and our own place.

About the job... I had an interview at a bar/restaurant today and am going to the second interview tomorrow to meet the owner. Let's hope and pray I get this and Rob gets a job asap so we can find a place. We are kind of feeling like a burden on the roomies right now, even though we haven't been here long. Not much to report. Classes are alright. Summer fun, I guess. At least they go by fast. :)

Road Trip!

The journey west has begun! We left on Monday... a bit later than we expected (like 6 hours later). We packed the uhaul so we wouldn't kill my car along the way. That took forever. We headed north through Kentucky and headed west toward Colorado Springs, CO. I got to add 5 new states to my "Places I've been" list: Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, and Kansas. Kentucky we got rain, nothing crazy. Indiana was the real fun. It was the shortest mileage-wise, but so long time-wise. We got a flat tire right inside the Indiana border. We had to wait about an hour before we got it changed. Then, our battery died and the tire guy didn't have jumper cables in his truck. He came back another half hour or so later and got us going again... then we almost ran out of gas. Talk about fun! It really was the best situation considering the circumstances. Then we were off again. 

We landed in Colorado Springs yesterday evening and Rob got to see his family. We will be leaving tomorrow and heading south through New Mexico to see more of his family in Sante Fe and Gallup. 

After that: Flagstaff, Phoenix, Vegas, Yosemite the SAN FRANCISCO!! Can't wait, and I'll keep you posted :)

Déjà Vu

Well, here I go again. This time I'll be dragging (I believe willingly) my boyfriend to the wonderful world of San Francisco. We leave NC on Monday and plan to make many stops along the way, camping some and hotel-ing others. Pray my baby blue Otto (a.k.a. Kia Spectra) can make this long and treacherous trek across the great states pulling a trailer (mostly small) full of goodies from home. We'll be stopping to see friends, families, and bath tubs along the way. I hope you all are ready!!

Ready or not, here we come!

SF Adventures To Be Continued...

...in January.

I can't afford to be in SF this next fall, so I am staying in NC through the winter (yay snow....) and will try to save up enough $$ to head back in January/Early February. I finally got a bartending job here, so I gotta keep it for a while for experience and the cash. Sorry, no fun stories for a while. See you on the flip side!

You haven't been missing much

Well even without a job, I haven't really had time to post. School is wrapping up and I am working on final projects. Since Spring Break, I have pretty much been doing school-related things. I did end up going to bartending school with a friend here from AAU and I'm hoping to get a job with that. My little sister had her baby last week. A beautiful baby girl, all healthy and cute. Other than that stuff, my life hasn't been very interesting and I don't have much to report. I hope everyone else has been good! lol