Site of the Week - Booking Buddy

For the past month I've been toying with the idea of moving to California. I finally narrowed down my locations to the San Diego and Los Angelos area. Sadly, flying clear across the U.S. gets quite pricey. Not only is it not worth it to pack my furniture and send it over, it's also ridiculously expensive to take a four day train ride that's twice the price of flying. My only feasible option is to stuff all I can into two medium-sized suitcases, one carry-on and a bookbag and hop on the cheapest plane.

Luckily, I came across this site called Booking Buddy. You enter in your travel dates, to and from airports, number of people, type of trip and hit search. It will come back with 12 different travel search sites to compare prices. Some of which included are the big site like Priceline, Orbitz and Expedia. They suggest clicking on at least three sites to find the cheapest fair. Once you select a site, you can customize your package by adding a hotel, car rental and other things.

Now, instead of going to all these different sites and reentering your travel info, you can go to one place and enter it once. I've found some pretty decent flight and hotel packages at Cheap Tickets. There are other sites like this (Shermans Travel) but Booking Buddy seems to have more travel sites at their disposal.

Before I do any ticket purchasing I still have to find a person willing to take a roommate with no job but savings to burn. Wish me luck!
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Now playing: Justice - D.A.N.C.E.
via FoxyTunes

Brand Spanking New Animation!

Weirdest thing happened yesterday. I sat in front of my iMac and starting working in Maya (an animation program). 13.5 hours later I made this: Logo. All my blood, sweat and tears from half a day created that. So weird, because usually it would take me longer to create it.

I had this idea to create an opening logo sequence for my sorority Theta Nu Xi Multicultural Sorority, Inc. Something to add to the beginning of videos being made. I sat on this idea for like almost 4 months and it finally bloomed.

Finding an easy way to create the butterfly was a nightmare, but once I figured it out the ball started rolling. The butterfly flapping its wings was surprisingly simple. The only thing that annoyed me was the grass effect. At first it wouldn't render, then when it did, the grass wouldn't appear behind the Theta Nu Xi symbol. Makes no sense, but I'll clean it up and toss it in my demo reel.

Expect to see more!!! :)
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Now playing: Alvin and the Chipmunks - How We Roll
via FoxyTunes

Site of the Week - Geni.com

Geni.com - The Family Tree Site

My mother is one of 10 brothers and sisters. You can only imagine how big our family is. My sisters and I have always talked about putting together a family tree but never got around to it. We’ve even tried Ancestry.com but found that you end up sifting through endless articles, newspapers, and records from decades ago. Since most of my family members were born in Haiti the site wasn’t a big help and it was expensive.

Then I found this site: Geni.com. You add yourself, your sibling, parents and it builds from there. Instead of trying to figure out how a person is your third cousin or great aunt, just enter who they’re married to or who their parent or sibling is and it figures it out for you. Pretty simple stuff, huh? It also color codes the profile cards (blue for male, pink for female and white for the tree creator).

In addition to adding names, you can upload pictures of family members to their profile page and invite them to join and add to your tree. It’s an awesome site to record family events like graduations and births as well as sharing videos, pictures and family links. It also sends weekly emails to members who have joined the tree on events happening soon (For us it’s mostly birthday reminders, which is super helpful). Plus, if someone else has a tree whom your related to, you can link trees and start a forest. Plus plus, it has a map showing you were family members are located. Plus plus plus, like most sites now, you can add the tree to your Facebook, MySpace, blog or other site.

It’s a great way to start a family tree and have others do the rest of the work for you. It’s free, easy and not as messy as a scrapbook. Check it out. If there’s another family tree site, post it up.
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Now playing: Alejandro Jimenez - Que bonita bandera (Club Mix)
via FoxyTunes

Belated Tunes Tuesday

Hey everyone. Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Haven't been feeling very well, but I've bounced back with a new post.

"ABC" - The Pipettes

“ABC” is a cute song about a guy who knows everything about astronomy and science but nothing about women or sexual satisfaction. The beat in the song reminds me of the chase scenes on Scooby Doo. :)

These ladies are a British Indie-pop group formed in Brighton, England back in 2003. They have one album “We Are the Pipettes” and various UK and U.S. singles. The Pipettes have had various members coming and going but things have seemed to settle down. The current vocal ladies are the Saunders sisters, Gwenno and Ani. As well as their all-male band “The Cassettes”: Monster Bobby on the guitar (also a singer/songwriter/promoter), Jon and Seb Falcone and their drummer Alex White. Seems if you’re a friend or sibling, you’ve got the hook up.


The former trio can usually been seen wearing polka dot outfits and coordinated dance moves when they perform. Even though some members seem interested in doing their own thing, what they put out as a group is pretty sweet. If you like this song or are looking for something more upbeat, check out their song/video “Pull Shapes” from their 2006 album “We Are the Pipettes”. Check out their blog on MySpace.
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Now playing: The Pipettes - ABC
via FoxyTunes

Site of the week - Spark People

Helllooo Sparkpeople.com...

I’ve been apart of Sparkpeople for over a year now. It’s a great place for keeping track of your goals.

When you first start, you’re given two options: create a weight loss program or live a healthy lifestyle without setting a weight loss goal. Then you’ll enter your info (weight/height), have your BMI calculated, and enter your target weight and date to lose it. If it feels you are losing the weight too quickly it will highly suggest changing the target date. Remember, it’s about losing weight the healthy way. Then you finish your profile and select a few other goals such as drinking more water, writing in a journal, getting eight hours of sleep for starters. After that you can start the Nutrition Tracker program.

The good thing about this feature is that each week they recommend meals for breakfast, lunch and dinner. There’s a whole list of items you can add if you’re tired of eating the same thing over and over. The meal plan is flexible enough to be changed to fit your taste and lifestyle. If they don’t have a product you’re looking to eat you can add it in manually. The only downside is if you’re having a home cooked meal, like a stew or stir fry, you may have to add the items of the meal separately.

The other feature is the Fitness Tracker (which I absolutely love). There are two options: strength training and cardio. Pick from a plethora of exercises with demonstrations included then select the days to work out and track the amount of time spent and calories burned.

After a month or so, I got tired of tracking my meals but I kept at the Fitness Tracker. It was great to see my progress in chart form and try out new techniques when I got bored of the treadmill and crunches. You can also enter things like heavy cleaning and yard work to mix it up. Burning calories doesn’t just happen at the gym.

The only hard part is actually remembering to go on the site and enter your calories. Well, that and finding the energy and motivation to work out. If you make a habit of it and really want to change your lifestyle, then it becomes apart of your everyday life.

Or you can look forward to moving up to the next trophy level. Enter meals, workout routines, answers polls, etc., to receive more and more points to get the next trophy level. It’s just another motivational tool. As you can read there are tons to do on the site including posting on the message boards and joining teams. Give it try!

Remember, even if you’re thin it doesn’t mean your fit. If you’ve done a walking tour and felt exhausted and sore afterward, you might wanna get in shape. If you’ve climbed a flight of stairs and felt winded, you also might wanna get in shape. Start the year off right and take care of your body.
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Now playing: Mason Vs Princess Superstar - Perfect Exeeder
via FoxyTunes

New Year Word Search

HAPPY 2009, Everyone! Hope you've left 2008 behind and your new year is off to a great start. Enjoy this word search I created to help pass the time this weekend.
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Now playing: Crooked Stilo - La Charanga
via FoxyTunes

Tech Thursday - iConnect

Have you ever wanted to listen to music in bed, but woke up to find that you ruined yet another pair of headphones? I’ve been there. That’s why a very close soror of mine suggested that I buy the iConnect. This item, not associated with Apple in any way, is a round pillow 10 inches in diameter with a small speaker in the center.

I got it at Bed, Bath and Beyond for about $10. It comes in a variety of colors, like the first generation ipod minis. When I got to the store only pink was available; green would have been really nice. The speaker cord is conveniently tucked away in a small hole and is about 40 inches long. The volume level is pretty good. You can either turn up your music player or use the volume dial on the cord. It doesn’t make the softest pillow, but it does blend nicely with your bedding. You can tuck it back in the plastic, see through carrying case it came in.

I've looked around and can't seem to find this exact product anywhere, but I did find something similar at JC Penneys and Target and eBay. Try it out and see how it works for you.
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Now playing: The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya - God Knows - Aya Hirano
via FoxyTunes