Thursday, November 20, 2014

So I'm being laid off

Yesterday I was given my 30 day notice at work that they're laying me off. My entire department is being relocated to another state and everyone I work with is out of a job right before Christmas. There is no relocation option for us, there is no being transferred to another department. If we wanted to stay with the company, we'd have to apply for jobs just like every other person out there. Sure we might get special consideration and be fast-tracked through the application process, but there was no guarantee.
Now me, I'm not too worried, I've always been one to just go with the flow. I have faith that things will work out ok, at least for the near future. I'll be "working" until December 19th. After that I get 10 weeks of severance pay. Beyond that, I've got money available from my father's estate. It's not the ideal situation, but with cost cutting and creative money management, I'll be ok for a while.
I do plan on looking for another job, but I gotta stick with it here till the end to make sure I get that severance money. Of course, while I'm getting severance pay, I won't be able to collect unemployment. It makes sense, I'm still getting income. At the same time, I'll be unemployed.
I've got a friend who says his company is hiring. It sounds like a pretty decent gig, but it pays less than I'm making now.  I think I could live on a smaller budget, especially once I get my last credit card paid off. It would be a significant drop in pay. Of course, I can't be sure that I'd even get that job.
So what's my plan? For now, I'm just gonna ride this out, till Thanksgiving. After that, I'll shoot my resume off to my friend, post it up around the job sites, network, etc. Then I'll hope for the best. I'll start applying to other jobs as well, but really, what company is going to hire someone right before Christmas?
Once my 30 days (29 as of me writing this!) is up and I'm not working, I'll be focusing on YouTube again, increase my daily gaming videos. I may also start a daily vlog talking about my job search and such.  Outside of that, there's a lot of resources out there that can help me earn some small amounts of cash. I could setup something on Fiverr, maybe start turking, and could always pick up some temp work on Craigslist.
Course, what I'd love to have happen is finding my way in the YouTube world. Nothing would make me happier than to be able to earn a living from making content people love to watch. I have ideas and plans on what I can do to improve. I have new series I want to start, as well as some old stuff I'd like to pick back up. There's a lot of games I have yet to play that have been sitting on the sidelines waiting for me to have time to play them.
And now comes the time when beg and plead for your help. Nah, I'm not gonna do that. I'll make it. If I have to I'll work two or even three jobs. I'm not going down without a fight! But, with saying that, I'm not one to turn down a helping hand. So, let me just drop you this link. . . . Munchmo on Patreon

Tuesday, November 18, 2014

So the diet is working

It's been almost 3 weeks since I started actively tracking my food intake, and I couldn't be happier with the results! I know it's not much, but so far I'm down about 5 pounds. It might all be in my head, but I actually think I can see it. The best part is, I'm not starving myself, I'm not restricting what I can eat, I'm just taking a healthy amount of food, and spreading it throughout the day. I plan ahead, pay attention to what I'll be eating, and make sure it'll work.
I still eat Moe's on Monday (1200+ calories in a single meal) but I still keep within my calorie range. I ate Five Guys (1300+ calories in one sitting) on Sunday, but I worked hard that day cleaning out my father's house and didn't go over. I still eat pizza once a week, but instead of eating half a pizza, I eat two to three slices. I still snack, almost all the Halloween candy is gone, but instead of gorging on it in one sitting, I controlled myself and only ate one or two pieces a day.
And that's the best part, these sweet foods I used to binge on are still there, I still get to eat and enjoy them, but I also get to enjoy them for longer, since I'm not eating too much at once. So, at the rate I'm going, I'll be down to my ideal weight (what I'm hoping for at least) in about 9 months; that is if I keep this up.
But wait! There's more! "What more could there be?" You ask. Well, how about exercise? Right now I'm not doing anything when it comes to physical activity. I live a very sedentary life. Most of my exercise comes from working at my my father's house once a week. I'm sure it helps, but I also know there's more I could be doing.
Now, I tried this before, daily workout for 30 minutes, in the hopes of losing weight and feeling better, but nothing changed. At that point I was a bit blind to the truth about losing weight. I didn't change anything else, still had all the same bad eating habits, so I saw ZERO results.
But now, I think I'm going to give it a go, and of course, since I'm a gamer and a geek, what better workout than getting back into Wii Fit? The real question is, do I just do this for myself and all that, or should I find a way to stream it or record it? Would anyone actually be interested in seeing that?

Thursday, November 6, 2014

More Vloggy Goodness!

So here we are, another week going by and more new stuff coming! I have so much to share with you. Right now I have 4(!) vlog videos just waiting to air. And not only that, but I've still got many more I have to put together.
One hits tomorrow, it's something special, possibly a one-time thing, but I'm kinda proud of it. It could become something more depending on how well it is received. If there's enough interest I might even make my first weekly series, who knows?
I've also got another video in the Inheritance series up and waiting to be released. This one will be a little different than the others. Plus I've got at least enough footage that I have to put together for another video about some of the cool things I've found in the house. There's still so much more work to do too!
I've got two (!) videos up and waiting for release now from my vacation to Nova Scotia not long ago. The ContentID hold on the one has finally been released so I think next Friday those two will be going live.
Then there's the videos I've still not put together, like the Atlanta Maker Faire video, and The Costumes of Dragoncon 2014. Not sure why these aren't happening yet, but I'll make time for them soon enough.
Plus, of course, I have many more ideas for videos and such, like my Maker series! I like tinkering, and I want to tinker with you!
But that's all the update I have now, so thanks for joining me today.

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Fitness, Nutrition, and Me

So lately I've been spending a lot of time thinking about my health. It's something that really jumped out at me as I've been working on cleaning The House and moving stuff out of there. I'm really out of shape. My work and hobbies are very sedentary; I'm overweight. It bothers me, but I don't ever really feel motivated to do anything about it. Lately that's been changing a bit.
Another issue I have is I get hungry too much. Not sure if it's normal and I'm weak, or I'm doing something wrong with my diet or something, but if I don't eat every couple hours (or if I eat WAY too much all at once) I get hungry. Maybe my portions are out of whack, maybe my diet just sucks, but over time I've been trying to dial in to better eating habits and it's still not helping too much.
Of course, I know my diet still sucks! I mean, I eat pizza every week. . . . like, half a pizza in one sitting. My portions are just out of control, and I think doing something about that will help. This is a gradual process though, because if I just cut back on the large portions without balancing it out with better foods throughout the day, I'll just end up feeling miserable and hungry all the time.
What I did was try to find some healthy, filling snacks I can eat when I'm hungry. One that I found that really jumped out at me was hummus and bell peppers, two foods I really love! I've also decided to try to eat more apples. So now, for lunch everyday I have a nice sammich, an apple, and later I snack on bell peppers with hummus.
Now, one thing I decided to do too was replace the condiments (mayo and mustard) on my sammiches with hummus, it really adds a nice flavor. I knew mayo wasn't all that good for you, and I've never been a huge fan of it, but only after doing this and comparing the nutrition information of hummus and mayo did I realize how bad mayo is! I get to eat twice as much hummus in a single serving and get less calories and half as much fat than mayo!
With this health kick I also decided I'm going to start actually tracking my food intake, so I signed up with MyFitnessPal to track my activity (or lack thereof) and my diet. Luckily, the pedometer app I use on my phone (Accupedo) already has a built-in connection to MyFitnessPal!
The next step, obviously, is to start being more active. Not sure how I'm going to do that, or when I'll start, but it will happen. First I want to get a better understanding of my diet.
So, if you've read this far, what suggestions do you have? What have you done to help your personal health lately? Got any good tips or tricks?

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Part 3 of The Inheritance is Finally Done!

And damn, it was a lot of work! I went through many hours of footage to put this together, and if I had it all to do again, I think I might have done things differently. I'm really proud about how the video turned out though, so I'm glad I put in all the effort.
Making this video has definitely given me some ideas for how to film future endeavors. I need to learn to be more patient when filming still or panning shots. A nice slow pan across a room can do wonders!
I've still got a lot more videos to put together. I've got a special video coming next week, plus I still have to get my Maker Faire video done, as well as put together a video from my trip to Nova Scotia.

Thanks again for supporting me!

Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Killing time at work

I'm really bored at work and can't find anything to entertain myself, so I decided to entertain you instead! Last night I finally finished going through hours of footage to make the next video in the Inheritance series. There's still some work to be done, but the bulk is completed and I'm so happy about that.
My October Lootcrate should be here today too, so expect another unboxing this week! I'm excited to see what kind of scary (the theme this month is Fear). I still have to wait till Nov 9 for my vacation video to be released from content ID.
On my gaming channel, you can expect to see something new soon. . . . I couldn't stop myself from buying Sims 4. After SimCity, I fear I will be disappointed, but I've watched Guude play it enough to see that it seems like a decent game, and I really enjoyed previous Sims games. I do feel bad for helping support EA.

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

New way to update

So I've setup an account at If This Then That! Hopefully, this will allow me to better take control of my social media presence. It seems that my Facebook feed from Twitter broke, and automatic sharing of Youtube uploads to Facebook have been removed. If you have any concerns or suggestions, please let me know!

Updates

I figured since I have this blog, I might as well use it, so here goes! First I'd like to talk about the blog itself. Originally it was meant as a way to connect with viewers of my gaming channel, but it didn't get much traffic, which is ok. Since then, it has become more of a way for me to make notes to myself.
I think, instead of just using it as that, I can also use it to "tease" upcoming things on my channels, both gaming and vlog. I'm not sure how regular updates will be, and I won't make any promises, but as you can see in my previous few posts, there are a lot of things in the works. I will go into more detail about them over time.
Now that I've talked about this blog some, let me talk more about my channels. I'll start with my gaming channel because there's not a lot to say. There are a ton of games I'm enjoying and a ton of games I'm looking forward to. As it stands I have a single track of programming, one video per day, each series once per week. This may change, but as it stands I don't have as much time as I did before. There are some games I feel like I really want to play more though, so some might get a boost in output.
You know what, I kinda forgot about Twitch. I haven't streamed in a while, and I'm sorry about that. I've been busy, I rarely have much time between when I get home from work and when I go to bed. Because of the way things are working with my Vlog channel, a lot of that time has been dedicated to sifting through footage, which I can't really do while streaming. Although, now that I'm thinking about it, I may be able to. I'll have to try it and see. maybe even give the viewers a taste of what I'm doing?
Now, onto Munchmo Vlogs! Right now, I have a problem. Youtube's broken content ID system is flagging royalty-free music I'm using. It might take up to a month for that to be released. I expect this is going to happen on every single video I upload that uses any sort of music. I'll try make sure I don't go too long without content, I'm planning on doing a channel update video soon to help with that. But this means I'm going to have to try to have a months worth of content scheduled at all times. Luckily, I've got some footage backlogged that I'm trying to get through. It's going to take a while, but once I finally get it all put together I'll be doing ok I think. It's just going to take time, and with all the other stuff I have going on, I'm trying to make it a priority without it having a negative impact on the rest of my life.
Lastly, I want to talk about Patreon. So far, no patrons. That's ok, I don't mind. I barely have any subs on youtube, so I don't expect to have much in the way of patrons. There's also the fact that my channel is only a couple of months old. I can understand people not wanting to support a new "artist" (Is that what I am? Is what I'm doing considered Art? I really don't know). But just because I'm new doesn't mean I plan on quitting! Just the fact that I've already gotten 20 subs on youtube in a very short time makes me ecstatic.
That's really all I have to say for this blog post, if you've made it this far, thanks for reading. I'll try my best to make sure I post here more regularly, so if you aren't already following me here, please do so!

Projects

  • On-Air sign
    • LED Matrix
  • Nerf  mods

Thursday, October 9, 2014

Vlog To Do

Cleanup (Inheritance)
Migration (Inheritance)
Treasures (Inheritance)
Costumes (Dragoncon)
NS (Adventures)
Cabot Trail (Adventures)
Maker Faire

Thursday, September 11, 2014

Vlog Notes

For next The Inheritance vlog:
  • clarify father's hoarding
  • explain history (collecting, hoarding, scifi)

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Elder scrolls info

Breton for Healing
Nord or Imperial for Tanking, Nord is better, but I like the idea of Imperial. looking at it again, argonian may be pretty good for tanking too. The increased healing received would be nice with a tank stacked with stam,

Saturday, February 22, 2014

Another idea, vanilla this time

A layer of leaves sandwiched between layers of fence.

Quick idea

Upright 3d cookie, realistic looking. One side you activate and the chips light up as the back does its work. The back is totally visable, where you can watch the process of the cookies being made. Maybe a minecart.

Monday, January 13, 2014