Four Months in Four Loads

I have approximately four more loads of laundry to wash and dry before tomorrow morning, so this seems like the perfect opportunity to talk about boys, travel, podcasts, and tigers. We definitely don't need to discuss why I have four loads of laundry to do in the first place. That's what Laundrybook is for.

The past four months seem like a blur to me. Things on the job front have been unstable for the first time in my working life, and I'm only now realizing how much that has affected my confidence in searching for new freelance opportunities and moving forward with related career plans. Meanwhile, I've been participating in more #winetoreach events with my new Internet friends, spending more time with my family (and more time outside with books), eating healthier, and dubbing Ben Franklin my spirit animal. These are all pretty great things, and they've definitely helped me from becoming Queen of the Useless and Unnecessary Pity Parties. (Because really, the job stuff will work itself out, and it's a blessing just to have a job around here.

Also, my little brother graduated from Columbia College in Chicago with a degree in screenwriting and being awesome.

Other really cool things that have been keeping me busy:

• Planning a trip to Anaheim, CA, for VidCon 2012. I get to hang out with many of my favorite Twitter/YouTube friends, and I am crazy excited. The agenda includes a day at Disney, a night of go-karting, a girls-only pillow fight, so many glittery Katherine (@purekatherine) hugs, Ashley (@writetoreach) watching me sleep, Pham (@phampants) rolling his eyes at me, and a lot of ducking and running away when I see famous YouTube personalities face-to-face.
• Planning a date with Ian (@Dutchface) while he's in the States. (Eee!) After months of chatting on Twitter and then iMessage, we're excited for real hugs. And punches. (From me. Ian doesn't hit ladies.)
• Tiger Thursdays. (Tigers don't hit ladies, either.)
• Emailing Katherine twenty times a day about crafts, apartments, and crafts that we would like to use in decorating our future apartment. I don't know if she was serious when she first suggested moving to Chicago and becoming roomies, but it was a brilliant idea from its inception. We even have plans to bug the apartment as a means of gathering content for a weekly podcast, and Katherine had the brilliant idea to get a place with a third bedroom, dedicated to crafts and a vlogging studio set-up.

I've also been listening to podcasts on a pretty regular basis at work and at home (as well as editing the first episode of Men with Skirts, my new podcast that will be launching in July). Podcasts I truly love: You Look Nice Today; Back to Work; Bob and Dan Cast; and My Brother, My Brother, and Me. Podcasts I always mean to listen to but have fallen super behind on: The Talk Show (Mule Radio version), This American Life, and Bullseye. And then there are the boring podcasts I listen to because they provide me with insider tips about budgeting or computer hacks or whatnot, but I don't want to give away all of my secrets in one post.

(Keep it secret. Keep it safe.)