October Blogging Challenge:Our Current Playlist -Day 14

October 15, 2015October 15, 2015 trippintwins3 Comments

Music is an important part of both of our lives. We are known to fly to cities just to see a concert. We are lucky that we live within driving distance to Nashville, TN. Our playlists are always eclectic, but favor pop and current country.

Out favorites at the moment:

1. Taylor Swift-what can we say? We’ve seen her 3 times in concert and absolutely think she’s a genius songwriter.

2. Ed Sheeren-We’ve seen him twice live and he’s just adorable. “x” is one of our favorite cd’s ever.

3. Kelly Clarkson-Top 5 singers we’ve seen live with a heart of gold. Her covers are innovative and mostly better than the original artist versions. The girl can sing anything! Her smashup of “That I Would Be Good/Use Somebody” is a favorite.

4. Vance Joy-I didn’t know much about him until he opened for Taylor this summer, but he blew me away. I quickly bought every song from “Dream Your Life Away”.

5. Paul McDonald & Nikki Reed-“The Best Part” and “I’m Not Falling”. Totally blew me away. Don’t know if those two will continue to collaborate, but they should.

6. Matchbox Twenty-Well, we are early days Matchbox fans and a hard core Rob Thomas fan, but we are partial to their early stuff. Nothing better than “Hang, 3 am, Black & White People, Real World”

7. Bleachers “Strange Desire”-Probably read about this in an album of the year review list because it hasn’t been in the radio, but definitely a favorite at the moment.

8. Keith Urban -Probably seen him 3 or 4 times and he gives one of the best concerts out there. He’s got a song for any mood.

9. Jewel “Picking up the Pieces”, is a new favorite. Collabs with Dolly and Rodney Crowell make it even better. Still love “Spirit”, but glad she released new music that showcases her songwriting and vocal talent.

10. James Bay-“Chaos and the Calm”A coworker introduced us to him earlier this year, but we love him. Favorites are “Hold Back the River, Let it Go, Move Together”

Throw in a little Eminem on the more frustrating days and that is an average day of listening at the office.

October Blogging Challenge

What/Who Inspires You-The Fighters and Colbert- October Blogging Challenge-Day 11

October 12, 2015October 13, 2015 trippintwins1 Comment

When we think about our life and the people who have inspired us, several people come to mind. My mom, my mom’s mom, my uncle who passed away from AIDS, or ARC, all the people we know/who have known who have fought cancer, the ones we knew that passed away too early from Cystic Fibrosis, and Stephen Colbert.

We have experienced our fair share of loss in our relatively short life. It’s an interesting fact of life we don’t share with a lot of people we interact with on an everyday basis. These experiences have absolutely had a major impact on the way we view our life.

We watched as my mom held our family together, took care of us and never missed a day of work while watching her dear family members fight and subsequently loose their battles. We watched our grandmother keep everyone together while burying 2 husbands, 2 kids and several close family members with grace and humor. When we lost her suddenly a few years ago, it changed our extended family dynamic forever. She was the glue that managed to hold everyone together.

We have always admired Colbert as a comedian, but recently even more so from the interviews he’s given recently on grief and suffering and how he’s managed to lead a successful and happy life. It is rare that we have an honest conversation about death and suffering in the media. Colbert has opened up that opportunity. He spoke both in the GQ interview and with his conversation with Vice President Biden about the importance of accepting suffering and not being defeated by it. We absolutely relate to how he closed the GQ interview with how everyday “we are volunteers”. We are! It is absolutely our choice how we interpret and react to things that happen in our lives.

We live our lives with the awareness that we have several angels looking out for us, and the knowledge that life can change in the blink of an eye. We do get caught up in the small things, but generally only temporarily. For we truly know that people are fighting much harder battles on an everyday basis. These are the people that continue to inspire us.

Alabama · Goals · October Blogging Challenge · travel · Trip Planning · Work · Work/Life

10 Things You May Not Know About Us-October Blogging Challenge -Day 10

October 11, 2015October 11, 2015 trippintwins5 Comments

1. Our passion is international events politics and religion. Growing up in the south, we were raised not to talk much about these subjects. Now, with the right group of people, these are subjects we can debate for hours.

2. When we have a bad day, I run to the closest place that offers good cheese fries. It’s a coping mechanism from my college days. Tara likes to go have a cold German Hefeweizen. Hey, they are both cheaper than a shopping spree.

3. We both struggle constantly with our career choice. We like the challenge of the work itself, but can’t stand the political nature/arbitrariness of the decisions that are made on a constant basis.

4. We do not mind revisiting some places over and over again. Our goal isn’t to see the world, but to have as many experiences as possible in the places we enjoy.

5. I will search far and wide in each city usually to buy handcrafted earrings. I probably have 150 pairs of earrings now. Tara does not have any particular thing she buys on trips.

6. Our favorite food anywhere is Mexican. The best we’ve had so far is in Los Angeles, Chicago and our hometown.

7. We both were born with an eye defect, which is a fairly common birth defect in premie’s. We had eye surgery when we were 3. We still have bad eyesight, which seems to bewilder people. While I wear glasses everyday, Tara usually wears contacts.

8. Looking younger than we are has as many disadvantages as advantages. We fight to be taken seriously in the workplace and get carded everywhere, which is just annoying.

9. We have only had 2 main hairdressers throughout our life. Even going away to college and moving to VA didn’t change that. We’ve been going to our current one consistently since we were in 9th grade.

10. We are both Big city and small town people. We can be comfortable in any city of any size. We both debate between staying where we are and moving on to a bigger city. Still up for debate.

October Blogging Challenge · Uncategorized · Work/Life

October Blogging Challenge-7 Life Lessons I’ve Learned This Year-Day 7

October 8, 2015October 11, 2015 trippintwins2 Comments

This is an ironic day for this topic. I’ve gotten the news my organization will not support me to go to Grad school even when people with lesser qualifications were selected in the past. I am disappointed, but know if I really want to achieve something, it is possible if I work hard enough. So, here are the other lessons I’ve learned in the past year.

1. Life is unpredictable-A really good friend’s cancer diagnosis took a turn for the worse earlier this year. We went to see her for what was supposed to be a goodbye trip. Seven months later, she’s still fighting and living her life.

2. Life is What You Make of It-Life is a series of choices you make and your reaction to them. When you learn this, your perspective changes. I can choose to stay stagnant or I can choose to keep evolving and growing. It’s my choice.

3. Working Overtime is Rarely Worth It-You rarely get out of what you put into things after hours. I worked 36 hrs of overtime the last 2 weeks and I feel every hour of it. I’m still tired and stressed.

4. Blogging is Hard Work -I’ve had a great time and learned a great deal the last 8 months, but it’s felt like a second job at times. It’s tough to work all day and stay motivated to write well enough to keep reader’s attention.

5. Travel is Therapy & Education-I have never been to therapy even when I probably should have gone, but travel has been a great substitute. It’s served to calm me, clear my head, and led me to discover new things about myself. It is the best investment I’ve made.

6. Kindness Matters -You never know what someone has been/is going through. You do not have to agree or even like someone to be kind.

7. When People Show You Who They Are, Believe Them!! -I’ve experienced this lesson over and over again in this life. People rarely change and it’s pointless waiting around for them to.

October Blogging Challenge · travel · Trip Planning · Uncategorized

October Blogging Challenge-Travel Pet Peeves-Day 6

October 7, 2015October 11, 2015 trippintwins2 Comments

When it comes to traveling, my goal is to relax and enjoy my time. There are a few things that tend to hamper my experience. These are some pet peeves I often encounter while traveling:

1. Airlines overselling seats-it’s too often I show up to listen to attendants all but beg passengers to take a voucher so the plane will not be oversold & can take off on time. Get a grip. This is a terrible way to treat customers and should be banned.

2. Overselling Rental Cars-Recently, it seems that it’s becoming a more common practice to oversell car rentals. I’ve shown up, waited in exceedingly long lines and told along with others that our reserved car type is not available and won’t be for an exceedingly long timeframe. Unacceptable.

3. Last minute gate changes-trains or planes. Nothing like reaching your destination on time to learn that you are now in the wrong area.

4. Baggage fees-I despise these increasing size of carryon luggage try to cram in the overhead bins and the tug of war over overhead storage room that it has created.

5. Tourist vs. Traveler’s argument-trust me, it does not matter. One is not better than the other. As long as the individual enjoys their travel experience, that is all that matters.

6. The inevitable questions: Are you twins? How old are you? Do you have the same birthday?” If I had a penny for the number of times these questions have been asked together, I’d be a millionaire multi times over. Doesn’t matter where we go, we get the same questions.
What are some of your travel pet peeves?