I love technology and how technology is making everything so much more productive and efficient. Check out this video dissertation on Web 2.0. Imagine if you had to read a dissertation on this. I’m sure it would not have been as engaging or compelling.
I wanted to share with you this great opportunity to change the course of the lives of low-income students this summer. I’ve been volunteering with College Summit as a writing coach since 2003, and the 4-day workshops have been some of the most moving experiences of my life. If you find it rewarding to play a part in something bigger than yourself and want to help low-income students achieve the dream of making it to college, this should be right up your alley.
College Summit is an award-winning national nonprofit strengthening the college-going culture in low-income schools and communities. 79% of students who attend a College Summit workshop enroll in college, and 80% stay in college.
Each summer, College Summit calls on hundreds of summer volunteers—alumni, college/graduate students, young professionals, community leaders, and high-level executives—to help talented low-income high school students enroll in college. At intensive 4-day residential workshops across the country, volunteers coach students through the college transition process. Commitments range from four days to multiple weeks during the summer, and stipends are available for some positions. If you are interested, please visit www.collegesummit.org and click on “Join Us” to view detailed role descriptions and complete the online application.
It’s hard to describe to people why I do the things I do, why I am passionate about the things I am passionate about, and why instead of being in the business world, I am choosing to make a difference in the lives of youth.
Troy Camp is really where I discovered my passion for making a difference, and recently I got the winter newsletter with a link to this TC PR video. It may not have any significance to you, but the video reminded me so much of where I came from, even though I am not in it. It’s great to see that Troy Camp is going strong, and will soon have a celebration for its 10,000th camper!
Check out the video:
By the way, I’m going to Thailand on vacation for the first two weeks of March. Yes, it is that time of the year again. March 6 will mark 5 years since the car accident, and it is time to get out of the country, get out of the comfort zone, and evaluate how I have been doing in life.
Regarding the previous birthday present post, it’s not that I’m not thankful for the gift. I totally think it was a cute gesture, and I completely appreciate the thought. I am merely observing the huge intergenerational void that exists when giving presents.
So everyone, calm down. You can still buy me presents. Haha. I won’t write a nasty post about you, promise.
Since my birthday falls the day before Jesus’s, my parents usually have a Christmas Eve party, and they invite all of their friends and neighbors over to celebrate. It’s usually a cute little event with lots of excellent food. [Side note: my brother made this awesome chicken cordon bleu]
Anyway, I don’t expect people to bring me presents, even though it’s my birthday, because A) I don’t really know them and B) having a Christmas Eve birthday means it’s overshadowed by another big event and I’m used to that. But apparently my parents told them that it was also a party for me (complete with cake and all!), so I was not expecting this cute little elderly couple to bring me a present. The couple, my parents neighbors, must have been in their late 60′s or early 70′s.
I first picked up the package and opened up the attached card, and knew that this must have been a very special present because their handwriting was all cute and elderly-like. You know what I’m talking about. The cute old people writing that’s all shaky and arthritic. God love old people and their cute handwriting. But I can just imagine them sitting there writing “Happy B-day” for 5 minutes. Either way, I appreciate the sentiment in just the card alone.
And now for the main event: the gift. let’s just preface this by saying that I was so amused that one of my parents’ guests would actually get me a present in the first place, so it didn’t matter what the present was. Curiosity came over me as I unwrapped the package, and revealed a…
Portable CD Player!
It was so awesomely hilarious!!! I don’t know what I was expecting as I was unwrapping the present, but I sure know that it was not a CD player of any sort.
Things running through my head:
So I decided that when I get older and when I feel the need to give presents out, I will give out books because those are pretty universal… unless, 50 years from now books are replaced with digital books, which is actually very likely. Alas, I love technology.
Other gifts of note: my parents got me a blood pressure travel monitor for my birthday! Haha, I’m not kidding. And yes I’ve been using it.
I love this time of year. 
Happy Birthday to me! Here is my Golden Year in pictorial review.
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An extra December pic because it’s my birthday!
I realized today that I have been stressed without even realizing it. Some symptoms that just happened today:
Emotional eating
I inhaled a gigantic meal at our local favorite Jamaican restaurant, Back-A-Yard, in about 7 minutes. Usually, I can’t even finish the entirety of a jerk salmon combo plate in one sitting and would have to save half of it for later.
Migraine / Headaches
As I was driving and running errands, my eyes kept squinting at the abrasive sunlight, which normally would have been fine. Then my head started to hurt because of the light sensitivity.
Twitching
My eye and my scar has been twitching for the last 2 weeks!
Fatigue
Although I feel like I’ve been getting adequate rest lately, I felt thoroughly exhausted, especially when my students arrived with their bustling energy in the afternoon.
The really bad thing is that I’ve been feeling this way, and the stress has been such a normal part of my life that I didn’t even realize anything was wrong.
My big event is tomorrow, BUILD’s 4th Annual Holiday Sales Bazaar. Last year’s event was a smashing success, and I have no doubt that tomorrow’s will be fantastic also. All of the details are covered, mostly thanks to Alison, incubator program assistant, so really I have nothing to stress about. My body, on the other hand, just doesn’t seem to get that though.
Why do these get paired up frequently?
I’ll start with the bad.
Four weeks ago I had a terrible cold, and I was so sick that I took a day off of work, which I don’t ever do. Because of the terrible cold, I called my assigned doctor’s office to set up my very first appointment ever with Dr. Vasquez. His earliest workable timeslot was three weeks later. Needless to say, my cold was a moot point by then, so Dr. Vasquez just gave me a routine physical.
A week earlier, at my aunt’s house in Tracy, she checked my blood pressure (three times out of shock), and it was a whopping 155/110.
Alarmed, I made sure to bring it up to Dr. Vasquez, so he took my blood pressure, and was also shocked at the 156/108 that he got. He said that a normal guy my age wouldn’t get higher than a 130/90. I asked him what the implications were, and he said that high blood pressure could lead to strokes, heart failure, kidney failure, and other unpleasant things. And because both of my parents have high blood pressure, I probably have it too solely from genetics, and the only thing I can do is take blood pressure controlling medication for the rest of my life.
I don’t like pills, and the thought of taking a pill every day for the rest of my life starting at the young age of 24 is…stressful.
The doctor and I came up with a “compromise” because I insisted that I did not want to take pills for the rest of my life, and that it may be a dietary issue or something else. I have to take out sodium from my diet as much as I can, and he would re-check my blood pressure in three weeks. If my blood pressure is still high, then I have high blood pressure caused by genetics. If my blood pressure is lower, then the good Lord is watching over me and my blood.
Wish me and my blood some luck…
Now the good news.
Despite the bad news, and my odd current health condition, I had decided earlier in the year that I was going to run across the Golden Gate Bridge. So on Sunday afternoon, after a delightfully relaxing day of sleep and cleaning, I drove with Jed to Golden Gate. He came along to take scenic pictures, and provide moral support.
The day was sunny and gorgeous with plenty of tourists around, and the run across the bridge didn’t seem that long, especially with stunning views of the Marin headlands, Alcatraz, SF bay on the first leg, and beautiful scenes of the Presidio, Chrissy field, SF cityscape on my way back across. During my run and after my run, I couldn’t help but feel lucky to be living in such a beautiful and friendly city.
Remember how I made a New Year’s goal to run across the Golden Gate Bridge? Well it’s almost the end of the year, and I have not done that yet.
In preparation for the run, I decided I would run a little bit here and there, and today I ran a whole 3 miles!!! This is big! I’d never run 3 miles in succession before, and you know what? It wasn’t that hard.
So now I feel like I’m ready to run across the Golden Gate (it’s approximately 3 miles long), and will probably run it either this weekend or next… weather permitting, of course.