Less Hustle More Coffee

Was very happy to get to sleep in yesterday. I mean even George got up first and made coffee and took both dogs out and made their breakfast. It was a rainy and grey day.

I immediately ignored my to do list and dove into working on my video project for Hot Springs. Much to my surprise, 8:30 turned into 12:30 in a blink and I’d not even had breakfast.

I stopped for lunch as I was all through editing, which involves getting the lighting adjusted, cutting out extras in the clips, cropping and adding “Ken Burns” to the videos I’d taken in vertical form (a habit I can’t seem to break), applying Ken Burns to my photos so they zoom over correctly, adding special effects and placing music, adjusting sound, etc. And the last thing I needed to do was add titles and upload.

So I fixed myself a nice little turkey sandwich with olive oil mayo, spinach leaves, cheese, and sourdough bread (Pepperidge Farm – one big slice cut in half). And I added leftover tortilla chips from the night before. I love a good tater chip kinda crunch on a sandwich. I’ve not eaten many sandwiches lately just trying to stay away from bread, but after finding this bread – it is soft, and fresh, doesn’t feel like leather in your esophagus. Here’s a pic of my sandwich. It’s just bellowing with goodness.

Watched some You Tubes yesterday on technical stuff. And then mid afternoon I was hungry again b/c of course this sandwich was my breakfast, lol. So I had a little thing of leftover spaghetti and ate that.

I watched Sister Wives – yes I just threw all my important to do’s out the window, except for laundry. lol. I just did what I wanted to do. Create and watch, create and watch and learn. I’m just inspired by the videos and I want to learn to do them and get better at it. I told George I had a new hobby and I think he sarcastically said “greeeeeat”. I’m not sure if it was sarcastic or not but it didn’t sound like an excited greaaaat. I have a hard time getting in any of my hobbies daily. I only really get to have a stretch of time on the weekends and can get further into them when we are not out running around everywhere – and that is why the Pandemic has been good for me. I get to be home doing some of this stuff.

So I went to watch the next sister wives show on our cable TV – it’s on TLC. We pay booooo coo oodles on our cable bill. And dang if they didn’t want to charge me $2.99 to watch the next episode after that. Well, heck no. Keep your dang show to yourself. I can watch a whole lot of other stuff I’ve already paid for. So I just VOTED NO to that. I’m not going to pay extra just to see a show I watch. I’ll just pick a new show. I hate it. I enjoyed them but “bye bye”. I’m not paying for it. I am not sure if it gives you so much time to watch it before you have to pay? I have Comcast/Xfinity and they are on TLC. Normally it’s free. It let me watch to a certain point and then tried to charge me for the next show. So…..no!

So I rebooted the laundry and then opened up all our packages from the last weekend’s shopping (vitamins, clearance tops, toilet paper finally came in, and the Target order). And then I came in and decided to finish up the Hot Springs video and upload it to YouTube.

There is some confusion when I go to save and upload. Apparently iMovie saves it as you go along, which is good. And I learned last time to save to the file first instead of just directly uploading to YouTube. So I had created a Hot Springs Weekend file on iMovie and also the project was in a folder called “My Movie”. It’s really confusing me where my movie really is. lol

I think only one clip was in my Hot Springs Weekend folder and the My Movie was what contained my movie. (I think). So I renamed it where it was to Hot Springs Weekend b/c well, that is what the project was. Only I think I was supposed to wait until I exported it to name it. (I think). And then uploaded and got errors in the uploads with references to problems at the first point of error in which I had a clip at :16 right off the bat. So I replayed the video and found that spot and noticed that ALL of my video clips had turned black and would no longer show anything but blackness. I’m not sure if renaming it corrupted anything or not. This did not happen to me last time. At first I thought it was just one that had corrupted itself somehow so I reloaded that clip in. One clip I couldn’t find anymore in my files to drag over to the project so I cut it out completely. And then I realized that ALL the clips had gone bad just as George came and told me dinner was ready. Arghhhhhhhhggggggaaaahhhhhh!

I wanted to cry. I had spent upwards to 5 to 6 hours on this. Yes it was fun hours but you would at least like something to show for it. Have since spent more hours in research. I obviously have learned a lot, but I think I’m at the point that I’m dangerous with it. Going to bed last night having done many searches to figure out how to fix, I only found one or two and it seemed more complicated to resolve than just starting over from scratch. But I just thought if iMovie has glitches then maybe I want another program even if I have to buy it. So I spent some time looking at Movave and Final Cut Pro. Final Cut Pro is mainly a professional video software and an upgrade to iMovie and iMovie is throwing me curve balls, I think Final Cut Pro would send me over the edge. So I just don’t know.

Going to bed I was so disgusted, disappointed, and time is so precious to me that I felt like I’d wasted my time. I’d really like to talk to someone who uses iMovie and get some tips OR talk to someone that has another software that they feel would work better for me. I was loving iMovie but it definitely has some quirks. I also get really confused about the files on iMac. I think I need to watch some YouTubes on that. I was told this would be a problem. I love my iMac but it’s taking some time to get used to. The photo/video files are not “clean” and I struggle looking for the photos and clips I need. I have them in my Hot Springs file, for example, but they are all over each other like a virtual puzzle piece if I need to increase the size of the thumbnail so I can see. So l am not happy about this. I like clean and organized files.

The files that are on my computer versus the cloud is a little confusing. I never know where I’m saving things. It may be both. But I’m loving the big screen and the apps and everything else for the most part.

So this morning, I’ve moved from “disgusted” to just plain “put out”. I feel like iMovie has let me down and my hopes and new hobby has crashed and burned.

Having been through these things before, I know it won’t be long that I will be above the curve again. And will figure this out. I’d really love to get that video finished. I really don’t want to start over. I really need to understand what happened so that never happens again. But today I kinda need to focus on a few other things. But my mind will OBSESS over this video and I’m relentless in that way. I will not be satisfied til I figure it out. So I know it will be only a matter of time. But that is the problem. Time. This new hobby is definitely a time suck. And will likely be an expense, as I know I will be wanting more “tunes” and “sound effects” and will end up joining that program that is about $100 something a year to access. Yeeeeeahhhh. But that will be “my golf”, lol. It’ll be “my concert tickets, my movie tickets, my entertainment” and might even be “my shopping” if it keeps me from thinking about what other clothes I need. Don’t need much if you are sitting in your chair creating videos, lol.

Next comes the added iPhone microphone for talking into video made with iPhone and the gimmel and a Canon camera with the microphone wind protection thingie – but I’ll probably get that for myself as a retirement gift. Then the Go Pro camera with mount – also at retirement – for travel pics. Yes I intend to travel somehow. With or without RV. But we already do a lot of exciting things to video, I just have to get around this learning curve.

So a bit of a set back for sure. A huge disappointment and yet not a lot of information out there on this issue. So I’m not sure what is next.

Will I just try to find the clips and fix? It looks like one I fixed last night has already turned to black again.

Do I just freaking start over? I can’t even….

Or do I put this project on the back burner and start another?….Not this weekend for sure.

Or do I just watch some more videos?

Or do I dive in and just get something like Movavi? Or Final Cut Pro? Need to do more research first.

I will try to be responsible today and do the more urgent things that need to be done though. And play later. I might sneak in a few things I want to do today.

But first more coffee.

I have too many projects. Am I the only busy at home person during COVID? Everyone else seems bored but the more I’m at home (which for me is only on the weekends) well and at night but during the week, the Hubster and I are pretty much doing together time b/w 6:30 and bedtime – so the only self time I get after I get home is during happy hour – maybe 30 minutes after I sneak in laundry rebooting. So the more I get into the projects, the more I create lists of to do’s for myself. Much of which I rarely find time to work on. And they remain on the list for weeks. Eventually get them knocked off though, but you know, I post my to do lists on here all the time and how many times do you see the same ones?

I guess it makes us feel special in life to seem busy. Last weekend I created a to do list on my calendar for this weekend. It has 17 items on it. I’ve done two things on it. Laundry and iMovie. One has created more “to do’s” and sucked about 7 hours of my weekend so far. And it wasn’t laundry.

So in light of that. I should NOT work on the most difficult things first. I need to work on some “low hanging fruit” and some “quick hits”. Otherwise I’ll feel like I’m growing in a technical sea of “I can’t get anything done”. I know I’ll figure this movie thing out. It’s too important to me. But I need to go and see about normal life.

I was going to work on the blog some but was also discouraged there a bit. I’ve gone from like 150 views a day to like half. I try to remember I am mainly writing for me – this need I have to write and vent about my life, my feelings, my frustrations, my desires. When people read it – it just fascinates me. I can’t imagine anyone remotely being interested in my daily shenanigans at attempting life. But it inspires me on I guess. But I DO KNOW that every spring and fall – as the seasons change there is a resurgence of energy where everyone springs into action and does more than just sit and read blogs. lol And also just before holidays. And I know that our country is opening up again all over and that has been exciting for some. But I chose not to work at the blog – making signatures, working on my “About me” section and trying to connect it to the You Tube and integrate that. I need to focus on a few other things I guess.

So I’m gonna work really hard at getting the house blessed, the laundry done, ironing done, and get ready for the work week. The dogs still need that bath they never got and I need to work on the next shower steps, I need to do a devo this morning or on line church service. I gotta look at the date for going to see Mom around Mother’s Day. Need to order a Mother’s Day gift. Gotta see when Katy and Cody are coming so we make sure we are here. Oh and I need to order a vitamin container so I take some of the supplements across the day. I have to figure out which ones will be best taken at what part of the day. Everything turns into a “personal study”. I’m so detailed. I’ll be googling to see which ones are best in the morning or bed time, etc. LOL. Geez, always something that requires research. I need to hire a research person just to live. LOL

Ya’ll take care! Are you going to resurge out into Public yet? I’m really not wanting to do much of that. I already have to work. There is enough risk there. We had an employee at Kroger here to test positive for COVID. It’s not the one we go to. It’s the big one close to the interstate where the mass of our town is. We live further out and there is another one we use. I like Publix though. We go there more often. It’s smaller, less folks in there. But I think everything opens up next week in Nashville and across Tennessee as far as restaurants and retail. AT half capacity.

Roger hung out with me for a bit yesterday. I took his pic. Mainly he’s a Daddy’s boy.

And that is a wrap for today!