Back on Tour!🎸

Hey Everyone,

So last Sunday we had Easter here in Timor, and the way I celebrated it was by hanging out with some friends in Dili and picking up some things that I'd been sent. The list of things I had to pick up was getting overwhelming, and so I thought by heading to Dili to get this done I could get two birds stoned at once! I ended up picking up; a Care Package from the Family (Love you guys!💗), a Kindle that one of the staff was kind enough to foti on over from the states (Thanks again!), a Guitar (see pictures), some coffee and a whole bunch of stuff. I would say that trip was a major success and one that was necessary to keep my sanity and help me to relax. This has however been the first time since IST that I've been back in the capital, and I'd say with PDM coming right around the corner that this was a good timing.

As I said I picked up a guitar in Dili, so recently I have been practicing to hopefully get confident enough to play some songs fairly well by the end of the summer. I know it will be a hard journey, but this has been something I have been wanting to do for a while. Amongst the other leisure time activities I have been engrossing myself in, I have found time to continue working on my programming skills. While I would not call myself a programmer of a certified hacker, I would probably classify myself as a Green Hat who is starting to feel more comfortable with his abilities. I have been learning a bit of Python in my free time and plan on trying to learn a little C as well in order to understand some lower level code. Along those lines as well I have been speaking to one of the PC staff (Shout out to you!) about giving a training on computer security and how to handle malware infections on your own computer and others computers. I'm super excited for this because it will give me some new experiences in manipulating VMs in order to show what a typical scan would look like and how I go about detecting and getting rid of malware that I find. Shout out to MediCat which is a Live CD I've been using as of late. I normally try to shy away from the big Live CDs and stick to a Linux Distro running Clamav, but this tool caught my eye being the spiritual predecessor to Hirens Boot CD and after seeing everything that has been packed into this labor of love I now plan on using it for all of my Windows repairs (at least when I'm able to get it too boot).

To switch gears I have been feeling more comfortable here and have been trying to keep a fairly normal schedule to make my time here as productive as possible. Although some nights this seems to been easier said than done, I do feel confident in my placement and have a bright outlook for the next couple years. Recently my Org decided to apply for Farmers to Farmers which would see us having another U.S. Volunteer here for a while, which will be exciting! Although I wish they would have let me know about it more than 2 hours before they wanted me to fill out all the paperwork. I am still excited and look forward to planning the need's analysis the we will have to complete before finishing up the rest of the paperwork. There are a few plans that are hopefully coming down the pipeline, so I'll make sure to keep you all up to date with what's going on here.

I suppose I should get this post out now, I have to finish planning the training I want to give and still have to think about what to say on here next time!😂 I love all of you and hope to hear from all of you! If anyone want's to get a hold of me you can always message me either in the comments below or privately. I actually might add a contact form on here for anyone who's interested, but that's a plan for another day. Until I post again, I'll leave you all with this!

“Without music, life would be a mistake.”

~Friedrich Nietzsche

Much Love,

~BW

Rock and Roll Star

Hey Everyone,

So this week has been pretty easy going. I've been planning classes and preparing to write a grant for CDB, but for the most part life has been pretty slow. I will say however I am extremely excited to go to Dili in a couple of weeks because I plan on picking up a Guitar which will be very fun to learn. I've been wanting to learn guitar for a while, so I decided since I have a lot of downtime here that I'd pick one up. Beyond that I'm planning on picking up the kindle one of the PC staff is picking up in Australia (thanks again if you're reading this!). I also heard from a couple people that they liked to see the quotes from last week, so I'll add a couple more here for you all to check out.

I was goaded by the pro-independence fighters. One man said to me, ''Autonomy has lost... You must give us your home and land because our homes have been burned by your friends." I answered, "My house and land aren't political, people are political. If you want a house find an empty government building, I won't give up my home." I was attacked by the man's son and friends who broke into my house. They tried to get me out: "Leave quietly. If you don't we'll strip you naked and throw you in the fire." I reported the incident to Interfet... ...but after they left, my house was taken apart, all my plates and glasses were smashed and my furniture, cupboards and wardrobes, were taken. For whom I don't know. I let it happen because these are the consequences of struggle.

~Fernanda dos Reis Araujo Vila Verde, Dili District, 1999

After attacking Manuel Carrascalao's house on 25th April 1999, the militia accused my son of keeping weapons and arrested him. We were taken to the Caicoli Village Office. I watched them beat my son and others from RT 1 Caicoli till they were a bloody mess. Some were stabbed. Some were in so much pain they cried to die. I was so upset I screamed at them to kill them rather than continuing the torture. We were both released that afternoon but others were not. Around May 1999 the TNI found an apelo (a Falantil donor's card) in a friend's home. They asked who had given her the card and she said I had. The TNI took me to the Babinsa in Caicoli village. They mocked me by saying that a woman is of no use in politics, can never become a leader and could only ever be a servant in the forest for Falintil. In other words my only use was as a Falantil concubine.

~Fernanda Soares Liquica and Dili Districts, 1976-1999

These are some extremely powerful stories and are humbling when I think about the ease to which I can live my own life in this time of relative peace. I just hope that these stories can help others gain a better understanding of the struggle the people of Timor have gone through. Because although these are historical accounts, the effect the war had on the people of Timor is real and something that will have a ripple effect for generations to come.

To bring it back to a lighter topic I was able to find the garlic bread in the pictures below a few weeks ago, and that was a wonderful surprise to find here in the land of rice and cassava leaves. I also found this Disney garlic which I think was a wonderful move by the Disney cooperation 😂. These small things keep me feeling chipper when the stress of working in another country weighs on me. I've also found an arcade out here in Baucau which was a cool thing to find, so I can only hope to find time to visit it soon.  I haven't been to a legitimate arcade for years even living in the States!

Well this has been a good stress reliever today, I look forward to writing up the next blog post. Before I sign off though I want to bring attention to the last photo I posted and tell a short story. A week ago I was walking back home from work as usual thinking about if I wanted to pick-up some apple's at the Loja down the street or not. It then hit me that I had never looked up on this path home for the last 3 months I've been here. So upon looking up I discovered a sight that was as eye opening as it was breath taking. I saw Foho Matebian (or the Mountain of the Spirits of the Long dead) it was named this because of the Timorese that were killed there during the resistance fighting. I will link to a blog I found from a Timorese describing the stories he heard as a child (http://karaudikur.blogspot.com/2017/07/foho-matebian-my-favorite-stories.html). So as I do always I'll talk to you later and leave you all with this.

Grit is that 'extra something' that separates the most successful people from the rest. It's the passion, perseverance, and stamina that we must channel in order to stick with our dreams until they become a reality.

~Travis Bradberry

Much Love,

~BW

Much to do about Training

Hey everyone,

Sorry once again for the long gap between posts, but these last two weeks have been so busy that I've had little time to think about my post let alone type one out. That being said there have been a lot of goings on during IST that I'd love to talk about!

The first this that comes to mind is the Chega Exhibition, which if you ever find yourself in Timor- Leste I 100% endorse going to as it is a wealth of knowledge about the revolution of the Timorese people from the Indonesian occupation. Now you can always do your own research using the Chega books, which I also recommend, but one thing that I want to share are some of the stories that were on the wall in the exhibit.

On 13 September Commander 'B' of the Darah Merah Militia came for my daughter, Ana, a pro-independence supporter. I tried to go too but they wouldn't let me. Before going Ana whispered, "Mama, 'B' has come for me. I will die for sure." I waited all day but she didn't return. About 5 o'clock ‘C’, a militiaman, showed up and said, "Mama, don't wait, she is dead." I didn't want to believe him and said, "Show me her body." He answered, "This is the first time I've seen Ermera people kill a woman." Witnesses told me she was raped then murdered. Someone else, who was with those that took Ana, told me that 'B' and his younger brother 'D' killed her. A few days later, on 5 November, one of my children, a Falintil commander, came with Ana's clothes. Her clothes were found in an unmarked grave in the middle of the Ermera forest.

~Ines da Conceicao Lemos Ermera District, 1999

In 1977, as a social democrat Fretilin, I was arrested by another faction and locked for a week in a pigsty! In 1979 I was arrested in Ulu-Usu by battalion 202. About 500 of us Fretilin pioneers were imprisoned. Many had their throats cut. They clubbed us, kicked us and submerged us in a water tank. I was given electric shocks. In 1981 I was held again and electrocuted till unconscious. In 1983 I went to Military Police headquarters in Balide where I was hung upside down for five days. I still have leg problems. In 1983, 69 of us were sent to Kupang, only 14 returned. In 1984 we returned to Balide Prison. In 1986 I was in Becora Prison with a 3 years sentence. In 1992 I was locked in a dark cell for 3 months and tortured. In 1993, I was forced to swear an oath and to drink blood with youth from 13 districts. In 1994, 1987 and 1999 I was again arrested and tortured.

~Antonio Tomas Amaral da Costa (Aitahan Matak,) Viqueque & Dili District 1977-1999

These stories are hard to hear and heart wrenching to think about the pain that this country has endured not even a few decades ago. Some of the stories in this exhibit are pretty graphic, but if you guys would like me to post the other 3 I have just sound off in the comments. If any of you do get the opportunity to check out the whole exhibit though I fully encourage it.

Another thing that happened during these last couple weeks was finding out that there is a group similar to the Boy Scouts of America here! I was extremely excited to see this since I was an active scout back in the day, and I'm looking forward to working with them and finding a way to connect their program with some scouts in the states. That being said if any of you know a scout who would be interested in getting their International Spirit Award, or similar badge I'd love to help! Just send me a comment or contact someone who can let me know and I'll work with you all to try and set up some activities.

Other than that the training was full of classes and useful information that was a good kickoff to the next nine months of my service. Out of it all though I think being able to spend time with my fellow PCV's was a great break from the work at site, and I look forward to being able to meet up with them all again soon. If you are reading this as a prospective PCV I cannot stress enough how important the bonds you will form with other PCV's will be to your sanity and ability to serve as effectively as possible. I may be forgetting to include a few things, but if you all have any questions to ask you know where to put them (down below), so I suppose I'll be leaving you all again until my next post. So until then, I'll leave you all with this.

"My belief is that we were put into this world of wonders and beauty with a special ability to appreciate them, in some cases to have the fun of taking a hand in developing them, and also in being able to help other people instead of overreaching them and, through it all, to enjoy life - that is, to be happy."

~Robert Baden-Powell

Much love,

~BW

Rainy Days

Hey everyone,

This week has been fairly rainy, but still hot as per the usual. I have also been free as far as work goes, it's been just English classes. So because of this I've been trying to find some things to do like the dialogue project I'm working on and making a new format for the images on my blog. I will be putting it here first and then if it works well I'll be updating all the other posts to use it. On a side note however, I'm wondering how you guys like the new comment section, I decided to switch it out because Google's comment system wouldn't let me reply to comments on my own site. Let me know what you guys think, I'm thinking about doing a few changes on here, so it would be nice to hear everyone's thoughts.

I've also been doing a bit more reading which has been nice. "Born to Win" has been a book I've had on my shelf for a while, but now I actually have the time to read it. Transactional Analysis is actually the subject I want to focus my Ph.D on, so this book has been good at fusing that field of study with Gestalt experimentation. Speaking of books I'm also planning on getting a Kindle, but unfortunately they don't ship to Timor, so if there is anyone who lives near here who reads this, hit me up!

The third picture here is from the new class my counterpart wants me to teach. It's been alright starting this class a little after my first class because I can reuse old lessons in order to save time and my sanity. In all honesty I've never taught English to adults before, let alone adults who speak a foreign language to myself. Props to anyone who does this for a living or has gone through teaching people who speak a different language from you, because it is incredibly easy to become self conscious about what you are saying.  I've asked my students and some other people I see most days to correct me if they hear me speak incorrectly, but I'm wondering if they are reluctant to do this because I'm still new and they feel like that would be disrespectful. Regardless I can tell my Tetum has been getting better and better which is definitely helping me express my ideas better.

Also this week is the 10 year anniversary of the Peace Corps having a group in Timor-Leste. So if you are from an earlier group and would like to make a comment about where the program has gone since then or about your service in general, reach out to me in the comments or through Facebook and I'll make sure to send your comment to the Peace Corps TL Facebook Group. 

Apart from those things the last few pictures are different thing's I've eaten through the last week. 😂 It's been a long week, but with IST coming up in just a couple weeks the last 6 months have seemed to just fly by. I can only imagine how fast these 2 years will fly by without me realizing it. So this week I'll be leaving you with a quote about how important it is to use that time wisely, so until next time let me leave you with this.

You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individuals. To that end, each of us must work for his own improvement and, at the same time, share a general responsibility for all humanity, our particular duty being to aid those to whom we think we can be most useful. 

~Marie Curie

Much Love,

~BW

Discovery

Hello Everyone,

So this week has been pretty eventful, at least for things outside of the ordinary. I have been having class every Monday as always, but this week I've also had a Peace corp interaction. Yesterday I had a couple of people stop by to drop off some extra bug spray and to check out my room to make sure mosquitoes can't swarm in there.  Lately I've been using Soffell which is a lotion based bug repellent that has been great.  Mosquitoes haven't been the biggest concern here, but I am definitely keeping the last time I applied repellent in the back of my head.

On the note of my room I have finally broken down and bought a new mattress, which was one of the best decisions I've made since being here. I can't stress enough in you are at a Peace corp post and you are sleeping on a foam pad (like I was), then find a way to get a mattress.  I have been sleeping much more soundly and I've been feeling better after I wake up in the morning, so that idea to buy a mattress from the TL8s was a 10/10 in my book!

Classes have been going well and I've slowly been finding my groove in how and when to plan my classes. The occasional feedback from my students, juxtaposed by their scores on my placement test have kind of honed into the general starting place for my English classes. On top of that I have the first dialogue of my Tetum Dialogue series translated and am having a few people check out the phrasing to see if it's understandable. This is pretty exciting because hopefully it will get my students and others involved in the process of speaking and listening to English conversations in different environments.  The first movie I'm using is Infinity Wars and it will hopefully be a good kickoff to this project. I'll make sure to keep you all updated on the results of this endeavor.

The pictures below are kind of random, but they are all in order at least. The first one is of an insect that Badinas and I discovered that we are both convinced is a new species, so if anyone want's to throw money at us for discovering it we'll be in touch.  Otherwise if you know what it is, we would love to know. It was super weird and loved to jump around, so if you can tell us what their name is in the comments maybe we'll try to make contact next time.  The next three pictures in all honesty were fillers I took of the office because I knew I had to post today, but they look cool right?! The last one is the bed I bought which definitely set me back, at least until my travel reimbursement comes in from the Dili trip. It just means I'll have to haggle for all of the Red Velvet ice cream bars I get. lol

It's been a pretty nice week and I'm glad to have this outlet (the blog) because I feel not only accomplished after this, but also I feel reset, like I'm ready for the future. I look forward to my conversation with Osseo Sr. in a couple weeks, it'll be nice to give some more goal 3 back to the states. Well, this is the part of the blog where I say I have to go, but thankfully until I see you next time, I'll leave you with this.

Happiness, true happiness, is an inner quality. It is a state of mind. If your mind is at peace, you are happy. If your mind is at peace, but you have nothing else, you can be happy. If you have everything the world can give - pleasure, possessions, power - but lack peace of mind, you can never be happy.

~Dada Vaswani

Much Love,

~BW

A Holistic Approach

Hey Everyone,

You guys are going to love this one, I went to Dili recently for a S&S meeting and didn't take any pictures. I'll make sure to take some next time, but for now I have a few including one from me planning my English lesson on ABC's and 123's. It's been interesting planning lesson's because I definitely don't have a process down (at least not one I'm sticking to). I have found however that I am good enough at improve and public speaking that I can run through these lessons without needing to stick tightly to my lesson plan (#humblebrag).  Chilling with my friend's here in Baucau has been great and I'll give a shout out to my friends in the Foho! 

I went to the PCMO during my trip to Dili to check on my health (mostly relating to weight I've lost) and I found out I've lost almost 30 lbs.! I'm actually under 200 now which is a strange thing because not only are my pants all baggy, but I've also found myself not recognizing myself in the mirror. Mum, I'm feeling great though and she said my blood test came back showing I'm getting all the nutrients I need, I just need more calories.  Over all the trip to Dili was a great chance for me to meet up with some friends and reconnect a bit before my actual reconnect in March.

Besides that fun stuff (and the pizza I had witch made me extremely happy) I've just been doing the same ol' thing I do every week.  I got to my taxes and have been discussing a way to to use my microphone here. At this point I've had a lot of interest in a dialog series I'll be hosting on Sound Cloud and embedding here for anyone to use.  It will be a three part dialog that will be English-English then Tetum-English and finally Tetum-Tetum. This will hopefully be a nice tool for my class, but also I'm hoping it can be something future PCV's and PCT's will be able to use when trying to learn English or Tetum. If you have any ideas, or if your looking for some kind of resource I can help create let me know, because I'd love to help bring that to Timor. I've also been thinking of recording my English lesson's, but that is still tentative because dang that would be a lot of work to tack onto my 8-5!

Living here is hard, adapting to life here is hard. I never take the fact that I have a plane ticket back home on deck, but at the end of the day I look at what I'm doing as an investment in the person I will be in the future. Someone who I can trust to commit to something he plans. Someone I know will stick to their guns when the chips are down. Someone whose personality and happiness is tied to something that extends past their living situation.  I'm doing this for my reasons, but if you are reading this and have a different situation then I have some unfortunate news. Nobody can make your decision for you...

We grow up being able to rely on others to make the big decisions for us, usually our parents, but sometimes our teachers or just relying on an external locus of control to blame our circumstances for the choices we chose to ignore.  This injustice is unfortunate because it trains us to look for advice and other peoples answers to our situations. The thing is though that we are all in charge of our futures, each person is able to make the decision that would be best for them. This can be a liberty and it can be a freedom, but it can also feel like a curse because often to open a door we need to close one first.  I hope this helps you, but at the end of the day your choice will be your own and the only thing you can control after you make your choices is how you feel. Stand behind your decisions, make them yours! Don't let anyone make your decisions for you! Don't let someone take your life away from you! I'm making my decision to stay here because it's a choice I made and one I choose to stand behind. 

If you are going through something or have to make a choice that will affect your future, I hope only that you make the decision that is yours. rarely are things black and white enough to where you can know if you made the right choice, but one thing you can know is if YOU made the decision or if someone made it for you. I got to go plan a Saturday and Monday English lesson now, but until next time I'll leave you with this.

Happiness is a choice. You can choose to be happy. There's going to be stress in life, but it's your choice whether you let it affect you or not. 

~Valerie Bertinelli

Much love,

~BW

Community Visits

Hey everyone,

So the reason there are so many pictures here is because I had an exhilarating adventure with my work. We took a trip out to some of the Eastern communities we work with and I was blown away by the beautiful scenery and the wonderful people we met. The trip itself took about 3 hours to the point where we would have to go off to each community of which we visited 5. All together the trip took the entire day and required a lot of walk, climbing and traversing uneven (rocky) terrain. I was extremely tired by the end of it, but glad to have gone through that experience since it gave me a lot of insight into the work my organization is going with the communities in East Baucau.  Thankfully we were able to make it back home before it got dark, but the trip was a long one.

This week I also helped one of one of the fellow volunteers in the breakfast club with a computer issue trying to get a printer driver to work over internet speeds slower than DSL. It was a fun challenge, but the food I had there was some of the best I've had in a while (Thanks for the food B, you're an incredible cook!).  I've also been trying to work on some computers here without having the appropriate equipment, which has become somewhat of an interesting challenge. However, I can't wait until my tools get here from the states.

This week was wrought with highs and lows, which is something you should expect if you're planning on joining the PC. It may seem obvious, but imagining yourself lower than you may have ever been is an important thing to think about.  It's also a good exercise for anyone who is about to go through a challenging period in their lives. Are you someone who doesn't handle sickness well? Are you someone who would give up when things get bad? Do you thrive in the dirt? Being able to make sure that you won't give up in the face of difficulty is important to being able to finish a challenge. One thing I can say though is that the PC will stretch your tolerance to uncomfortable and difficult situations.  

I've been behind in my posts recently which has been for a lot of reasons, but just know that I don't plan on stopping this blog. So if you check this regularly or have been wondering why I haven't posted yet, just know I will be putting something out soon enough. I can't wait to see you all again, so until next time I'll leave you with this.

We are a nation of communities... a brilliant diversity spread like stars, like a thousand points of light in a broad and peaceful sky. 

~George H. W. Bush

Much love,
~BW

Part of the Community

Hey all,

It has been a few days since my last post, but that's because I wanted to talk about my first actual lesson here. The class went pretty well and I'm glad people in the group are enjoying my teaching style, at least from what I've heard so far. Before the first class I did a quiz with all of my students to find out their levels in English and it seems that most people are at level 1 (Elementary). This is actually ideal because I can introduce English lessons without having to wonder if everyone already knows what I'm talking about. However this also plays the opposite way as well, because I rarely know if everyone is understanding what I'm trying to convey or not.

I have been trying to use what I've learned about teaching to help my students become comfortable in my class. The stigma of having a wrong answer here, or the fear on being incorrect is very real. My class has been a bit shy early on, so one of the ways I got around this was to show them that failure is the best way to learn. When we aren't afraid to fail we open ourselves up to more experiences and gain a lot more confident in being able to approach difficult situations in a healthy way.  I'm hoping that this idea can help them with our programs as well, because being willing to fail is extremely important in innovation. 

Some of you may have also noticed that I added a new page to my site that includes a few podcasts as well as some English resources for my students. If this can help you at all I hope you take advantage of it. I'm also going to put in a survey so if there's anything you want to suggest then it'll be easier for you! I've also noticed that a lot of my readers here are from many different countries so if you want a google translator built into the page let me know. Se karik imi hakarak tradusaun iha lingua diferente, hakerek nebaa iha fatin okos.

I have to go eat some lunch, but I'll be doing some work on the site later as well. I look forward to hearing from you all and miss everyone back home. You know what I say though, "Until next time, I'll leave you with this!"

Good, better, best. Never let it rest. 'Til your good is better and your better is best. 

~St. Jerome

Much love,

~BW

Teaching English

Hey all,

This week has been a little crazy, but let me give you all a brief overview. This last weekend a few of the TL8's went with us to the pool which was a great bonding experience and opened my eyes to what the next year might look like for myself and my friends here. So for that shout out to the Breakfast club. Then yesterday (Jan, 8th) I gave my first sudo-lesson to my org and gave out an exam to test their proficiency in English. The results turned out as I thought, gut it also yielded some interesting findings that I plan on using in my future lessons which will be happening every Saturday.

The Protestant church around the corner has also alluded me up to this point since I'm usually to tired to head over and take pictures after work, and I wanted to get this post out. Regardless the church is in major need of repair anyways, so we'll see if I do something with them in the future.  The 8-5 work week has kinda grown on me, and makes finding what to do everyday a bit easier, since I have a supervisor. That being the case I am also limited on the scale of my personal projects, since anything outside of work needs to be done solely in my spare time.

Oooooh, we also went to a beach party in Manatuto last Sunday which was pretty baller. I saw the ocean, heard a Timorese band try and cover early 90's-2000's classics so that was cool. The Ocean was beautiful and I feel like we had a really good bonding time as a group. I posted some of the pictures below, but for the most part we just ate by the beach. All in all though the view of the ocean was great, and I learned that my counterparts (and maybe most HCN's) love to take an overabundance of photos together. XD

This week has been good at getting me to look at the next few months and what they will look like with my organisation. It has also made me wonder how things will change over time. Neither of these are bad, but I hope for anyone planning to join the PC you take a step back and realize that 2 years is going to be a long time. I've already seen a few of my friends leave for many different reasons, but don't be upset with yourself if you aren't able to give two years of your life to this task. It's a huge commitment and as much as it's worth it, like most things that are worth it, this commitment is not an easy one.

Sorry to leave you all on a serious note, but I do look forward to sending out these posts whenever I can, they certainly give me a place to reflect on what has been happening. Let me know if any of you have something specific that you'd like to see for the next post, but until then I'll leave you with this!

Discipline is the bridge between goals and accomplishment. 

~Jim Rohn

Much love,

~BW

Update #2

Hey everyone,

This is just a basic update, because unfortunately I'm still sick. I've been resting often, but my stomach troubles still persist. I am in contact with my PCMO in Dili, but due to my symptoms they suggest I stay at my site and wait it out. I am pretty sure I know what I have, and if I'm right then I should be able to just wait it out. Regardless the holidays have been less than excellent.

This is a good lesson for myself and one that I hope any soon to be volunteers will take to heart. The lesson is that you will get sick, period. Don't be afraid of that fact, because it is something that is natural when you move to a new region for an extended period of time. Just know that the PC has your back, and you should always update your PCMO on the symptoms you are experiencing.

I just hope that this news doesn't upset my loved ones, and that you all know I have the situation under control (with the help of my PCMO). I will try to make the next post's on time it has just been difficult as of now due to my intestinal situation. 

I love you all and sorry for the lack of pictures in this post. However, until I message you again, I'll leave you with this!

"Riches do not respond to wishes. They respond only to definite plans, backed by definite desires, through constant persistence." 

~Napoleon Hill