C.J. Sullivan's Blog, page 10
July 23, 2014
A Definition of Family
Sometimes family is blood. Sometimes blood isn't family. Sometimes family isn't blood.
Make any sense?
I think the people in our lives who return our love and don't use, abuse, or take advantage should be considered family. Whether you share similar DNA or not makes no difference, in my opinion.
Today in class, my students had a discussion about adoption. I informed them after the discussion that I'm a big proponent of adoption, that my little brother was adopted, that my newest siblings are adopted. One student asked if I'd adopt internationally, or if I'd discriminate, and I said, "I'd adopt from anywhere!" Because to me, we're all human beings, and that qualifies us to be family.
Now, if you've got a blood relative who is a horrible person, I think you should have equal rights in considering them Not Family. People who say they have a moral obligation to blood are missing the point. And they're causing themselves a lot of grief in the process.
Life is too short to be manipulated and taken advantage of, all in the name of "family."
So I say, choose who you take on as your family. Make it the people who bring love and joy into your life, and screw the rest.
Make any sense?
I think the people in our lives who return our love and don't use, abuse, or take advantage should be considered family. Whether you share similar DNA or not makes no difference, in my opinion.
Today in class, my students had a discussion about adoption. I informed them after the discussion that I'm a big proponent of adoption, that my little brother was adopted, that my newest siblings are adopted. One student asked if I'd adopt internationally, or if I'd discriminate, and I said, "I'd adopt from anywhere!" Because to me, we're all human beings, and that qualifies us to be family.
Now, if you've got a blood relative who is a horrible person, I think you should have equal rights in considering them Not Family. People who say they have a moral obligation to blood are missing the point. And they're causing themselves a lot of grief in the process.
Life is too short to be manipulated and taken advantage of, all in the name of "family."
So I say, choose who you take on as your family. Make it the people who bring love and joy into your life, and screw the rest.
July 20, 2014
Kindle Unlimited & The Divided Trilogy
Hello, everyone! I have just discovered this evening that The Divided Trilogy has been selected to be part of Kindle Unlimited, which is sort of like Amazon's version of Netflix. I'm not totally sure how this works, but from the looks of it, if you subscribe to it for $9.99 per month, you can get access to something like 600,000 different titles to choose from. And right now they're doing a promo now where you get the first 30 days free. So if you're interested, or you already have Kindle Unlimited, please give my epic angel trilogy a try! You can start with book one!:
July 13, 2014
Some Awesome Aquarium Pics from Today's Excursion!
The Windows Phone has such a great camera! Here are some pics I took when Drew and I went to the Dallas World Aquarium today. Enjoy!
July 5, 2014
Have a Relaxing 4th of July Weekend!
I hope everyone's getting some R & R this holiday weekend. It's the first 4th of July weekend in 3 years that I haven't had to work! So I've been enjoying it immensely. We went out to Joe Pool Lake yesterday and had a nice time with some of Drew's extended family, and I brought along a couple of mine.
Chillin'
Taking life very seriously\
"Cheese!"
Madre e hijo
Chillin'
Taking life very seriously\
"Cheese!"
Madre e hijoJune 13, 2014
Sweet Gift
This is on an envelope from two of my students where I volunteered the past 6 months. I am so grateful that they were so considerate as to think of me, especially being so kind as to buy me a Visa gift-card when I don't know what their financial situation is. My heart is happy that I have had students like these :)
June 7, 2014
May 22, 2014
3 Stages of Zinnias on my Plant
It's so neat to watch the stages of growth when you garden. Here's one of my zinnia plants and the three stages that it's currently displaying:
May 17, 2014
Fun at Dallas Comic Con!
Man, I ran into so many fantastical beings at the Dallas Comic Con! Here are but a few...
Who wouldn't want to hang with a Ringwraith?
Chillin' with Chewy
Krystle and I found some live Ewoks!
Groovy skulls
Not sure who the girl is. Oops!
Then we got to see the Nightmare on Elm Street reunion cast Q&A panel!
Characters (L to R): "Nancy," "Tina," "Marge," and "Freddy"
Robert Englund, who plays the infamous Freddy Kreuger
Fun tid-bit: as we were driving in downtown Dallas, trying to find our parking lot, we passed Elm Street. I nudged my husband and made some crack about seeing the cast from Nightmare, and as it turns out (according to the panel), Wes Craven named the movie after that very street because of what happened with JFK. So there really was a connection!
We had a lot of fun. Glad we got to go!
Who wouldn't want to hang with a Ringwraith?
Chillin' with Chewy
Krystle and I found some live Ewoks!
Groovy skulls
Not sure who the girl is. Oops!Then we got to see the Nightmare on Elm Street reunion cast Q&A panel!
Characters (L to R): "Nancy," "Tina," "Marge," and "Freddy"
Robert Englund, who plays the infamous Freddy KreugerFun tid-bit: as we were driving in downtown Dallas, trying to find our parking lot, we passed Elm Street. I nudged my husband and made some crack about seeing the cast from Nightmare, and as it turns out (according to the panel), Wes Craven named the movie after that very street because of what happened with JFK. So there really was a connection!
We had a lot of fun. Glad we got to go!
May 16, 2014
Spring Update 2014
I haven't posted in a while.
I know.
I'm sorry.
But I've been busy doing this...
And this...
And going on long walks with this guy...
I'm gearing up to start teaching at the ELI in a couple of weeks, and while I wait, I'm trying to get my garden set up and get in the habit of doing some daily Spanish. I've also been catching up on some reading - specifically Wizard's First Rule by Terry Goodkind. It's one of those brick-sized fantasy books that I've been waiting for a little break like this to read, and I'm enjoying it.
What are you all up to this spring? Gearing up for summer next month? Got any groovy plans? Leave me a comment!
I know.
I'm sorry.
But I've been busy doing this...
And this...
And going on long walks with this guy...
I'm gearing up to start teaching at the ELI in a couple of weeks, and while I wait, I'm trying to get my garden set up and get in the habit of doing some daily Spanish. I've also been catching up on some reading - specifically Wizard's First Rule by Terry Goodkind. It's one of those brick-sized fantasy books that I've been waiting for a little break like this to read, and I'm enjoying it.
What are you all up to this spring? Gearing up for summer next month? Got any groovy plans? Leave me a comment!
May 2, 2014
A Little Peek into my Personality
Every now and then I come across a decent personality test. Here are the results of one I took this afternoon that are pretty accurate!
Your personality tendencies in a nutshell...You are very dependable and almost always follow through with your commitments. You value different and aesthetic experiences more than the average person. You are calm and logical for the most part, but some things worry you more than others. You are typically respectful toward others and dislike confrontation. You show some tendency toward being outgoing and sociable. YouJustGetMe.com 's guest psychologist Dr. Peggy has a little more, uh, informal interpretation of your traits...
To always be responsible and dependable gets too heavy at times and you just have to shirk it all sometimes of and do something that is wild and crazy, like going to sleep WITHOUT brushing your teeth. Come and do your worst, dental bacteria! No one is arguing that you are not reliable; it's just that you differ from your very high conscientious peers in that you also have some streaks of impulsivity and can make some spontaneous decisions, rather than lumbering through all of the alternative scenarios. Maybe you're disorganized (God forbid), or perhaps you like to leave your dirty socks all over the house (the horror), or you're a procrastinator (that's the worst one of all). Whatever is the case, you are not conscientious to the extent that you bore people with your stodgy ways.
Your scores indicate that while you are clearly a non-traditionalist, there are some aspects of your personality that are rooted in the comforts of the mundane. You may value artistic expression to the extent that walking through museums full of antiquities is your favorite thing to do. Perhaps you revel in the abstract and the unknown. Yet, you also shake your head in wonderment as to why some people choose to live their lives or decorate their bodies so non-traditionally. At times, you may also find yourself fixed in certain ideas, even though you pride yourself in being open to novelty and creative thinking. In the end, all this suggests is that you take a pinch of convention along with a scoopful of whimsy in your drink of choice.
To quote the Hershey chocolate company, "sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't." That pretty much sums up your score on the trait of emotional stability. There are times when you feel such intensity of emotions, mostly negative, that you just want to lie down and spend the day thinking about how you can score Prozac. In other contexts (like when you are on your meds), you feel just fine - calm, happy, ready to face the day. The emotions cancel each other out and you look like you are dealing with life fairly well statistically. Another possibility for your middle scores on emotional stability is that some things push your button more than others and when your buttons get pushed, you stress and freak. What's that I hear? Is that your mom calling? For the most part though, you are the epitome of grace under pressure.
Your scores would suggest that you tend to be more agreeable than you are competitive. What does that mean? For starters, it means that you have a fairly strong tendency to believe in social harmony and cooperation. You are a nice person. You want people to get along and do the right thing - for each other, for the greater humanity. That's not to say that you are a total pushover, but that you believe in the niceties of life. This is probably why you are very popular with people and have many friends. The difference between you and someone who is very high in agreeableness is that you have a bit of an edge. Maybe you laugh when people fall down and hurt themselves, maybe you secretly occasionally think people suck. Whatever it is that's holding you back from winning Ms. or Mr. Congeniality, that's also what makes you more interesting.
I have a friend who can strike up a conversation with anyone: Nobel Peace prize nominees and winners, muppets, sanitation workers, perfect strangers, my crazy uncle Harry. My friend is a bona-fide extravert. Your scores indicate that while you tend to be extraverted, you also have some degree of reserve. Perhaps in some situations, you prefer to say less or maybe you have duct tape over your mouth. Either way, you may save your high energy for the situations when you have a need or desire to be "on" and your quiet moments for those with whom you feel most comfortable.
Your personality tendencies in a nutshell...You are very dependable and almost always follow through with your commitments. You value different and aesthetic experiences more than the average person. You are calm and logical for the most part, but some things worry you more than others. You are typically respectful toward others and dislike confrontation. You show some tendency toward being outgoing and sociable. YouJustGetMe.com 's guest psychologist Dr. Peggy has a little more, uh, informal interpretation of your traits...
To always be responsible and dependable gets too heavy at times and you just have to shirk it all sometimes of and do something that is wild and crazy, like going to sleep WITHOUT brushing your teeth. Come and do your worst, dental bacteria! No one is arguing that you are not reliable; it's just that you differ from your very high conscientious peers in that you also have some streaks of impulsivity and can make some spontaneous decisions, rather than lumbering through all of the alternative scenarios. Maybe you're disorganized (God forbid), or perhaps you like to leave your dirty socks all over the house (the horror), or you're a procrastinator (that's the worst one of all). Whatever is the case, you are not conscientious to the extent that you bore people with your stodgy ways.
Your scores indicate that while you are clearly a non-traditionalist, there are some aspects of your personality that are rooted in the comforts of the mundane. You may value artistic expression to the extent that walking through museums full of antiquities is your favorite thing to do. Perhaps you revel in the abstract and the unknown. Yet, you also shake your head in wonderment as to why some people choose to live their lives or decorate their bodies so non-traditionally. At times, you may also find yourself fixed in certain ideas, even though you pride yourself in being open to novelty and creative thinking. In the end, all this suggests is that you take a pinch of convention along with a scoopful of whimsy in your drink of choice.
To quote the Hershey chocolate company, "sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't." That pretty much sums up your score on the trait of emotional stability. There are times when you feel such intensity of emotions, mostly negative, that you just want to lie down and spend the day thinking about how you can score Prozac. In other contexts (like when you are on your meds), you feel just fine - calm, happy, ready to face the day. The emotions cancel each other out and you look like you are dealing with life fairly well statistically. Another possibility for your middle scores on emotional stability is that some things push your button more than others and when your buttons get pushed, you stress and freak. What's that I hear? Is that your mom calling? For the most part though, you are the epitome of grace under pressure.
Your scores would suggest that you tend to be more agreeable than you are competitive. What does that mean? For starters, it means that you have a fairly strong tendency to believe in social harmony and cooperation. You are a nice person. You want people to get along and do the right thing - for each other, for the greater humanity. That's not to say that you are a total pushover, but that you believe in the niceties of life. This is probably why you are very popular with people and have many friends. The difference between you and someone who is very high in agreeableness is that you have a bit of an edge. Maybe you laugh when people fall down and hurt themselves, maybe you secretly occasionally think people suck. Whatever it is that's holding you back from winning Ms. or Mr. Congeniality, that's also what makes you more interesting.
I have a friend who can strike up a conversation with anyone: Nobel Peace prize nominees and winners, muppets, sanitation workers, perfect strangers, my crazy uncle Harry. My friend is a bona-fide extravert. Your scores indicate that while you tend to be extraverted, you also have some degree of reserve. Perhaps in some situations, you prefer to say less or maybe you have duct tape over your mouth. Either way, you may save your high energy for the situations when you have a need or desire to be "on" and your quiet moments for those with whom you feel most comfortable.
