A Milestone: 100th Post. 100 Things On My Bucket List (In No Particular Order)

1. Run a 10K
2. Run a marathon
3. Manage a bra store (of non-matrix sizes)
4. Own a bra store (of non-matrix sizes)
5. Own a chain of bra stores (of non-matrix sizes)
6. Make the Bonus for $800+ on a consistent weekly basis at WHBM in 2016 and beyond
7. Provide Self Esteem workshops on a regular basis for at-risk girls
8. Move to Carmel, Indiana (if it suits)
9. Finish my Bachelor's in Business Management by 2019
10. Write a book
11. Publish a book
12. Visit Niagara Falls
13. Have $10,000 in my savings account
14. Have $25,000 in my savings account
15. Have $50,000 in my savings account
16. Have $75,000 in my savings account
17. Have $100,000 in my savings account
18. Have no credit card debt when I retire from the military
19. Have no debt at all by the time I'm 50.
20. Fully implement the Kondari method of decluttering
21. Learn to shoot a pistol
22. Learn to shoot a pistol with accuracy
23. Take up archery as a regular hobby
24. Learn belly danicing
25. Learn ballet
26. Do either (or both) well
27. Get back to drawing and sketching
28. Learn to knit (again)
29. Go to Scotland
30. Take a Uniworld cruise
31. Go to Hawaii
32. Go to Ireland
33. Go to Prague and visit the Naprstek Museum
34. Write notes regularly to my friends
35. Send birthday cards to my friends
36. Write my memoirs
37. Get to know my SIL better
38. Learn to ride a horse
39. Learn to ice skate
40. Attend a Britney Spears Vegas concert without breaking the bank
41. Paint on a canvas
42. Create a book of photographs of a not-so-well-known photographer (love you Dad!)
43. Learn to waterski
44. Grow a garden
45. To make my house completely mine and in my taste.
46. Go to Harry Potter World in Florida
47. Be a tourist in Chicago
48. Be a tourist in D.C.
49. Take a cruise to nowhere
50. Drive a Camaro
51. Take up yoga
52. Be a tourist in Seattle (again)
53. Navigate a glider
54. Be a tourist in Jackson Hole
55. Stay at the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, CT
56. Be a tourist in Providence, RI
57. Visit San Francisco again
58. Visit Las Vegas
59. Spend a week at a nice beach
60. Grow a garden in my back yard
61. Read all the books in my home library
62. Fix the attic
63. Finish installing flooring throughout the house
64. Install new carpet in the master bedroom
65. Repaint the exterior doors
66. Fix the kitchen door
67. Install new windows in the attic
68. Learn to golf
69. Visit Ground Zero
70. Visit the Holocaust Museum (but not on the same day as Ground Zero)
71. See the Spruce Goose and Queen Mary
72. Visit friends whom I haven't yet met in person
73. Visit family whom I haven't seen in years, decades even
74. For my other blog to become a well-known and recommended resource about bras and bra fittings
75. Learn to ride a motorcycle (and actually get out of 2nd gear)
76. Be an extra in a PG-rated movie
77. Meet Hugh Jackman
78. Find a career that I love so that I don't have to "work" another day
79. Find love again
80. Help someone change their life for the better
81. Help ten people change their lives for the better
82. Help 100s of people change their lives for the better
83. Find more worth in the real world
84. Make it through the next four months on night shift (always feels like it takes forever)
85. Fix up my bicycle so that I can ride it more often
86. Be more positive
87. Complain less
88. Do more good things
89. Do more for others
90. Be more selfless
91. Know that life
92. Isn't incomplete
93. If you can't
94. Make a list
95. Of a 100 things
96. That you want 
97. To Accomplish
98. In
99. Your
100. Life

This took more than a month to create.  I better get started.  :D

Who is Nichole?

So many facets to me.
How do I describe myself?  It's made difficult when some attributes, traits, characteristics contradict each other.  A true Gemini, I guess.  :D


I love Romantic Comedies.
I don't like gore movies.
Hugh Jackman is my favorite eye candy.
I'm proud of the fact that I've made it through this career in the Air Force
I hate that it has augmented some of my not-so-nice personality traits and caused me to sacrifice other aspects in the name of conformity.
I'm quite loyal and have been known to continue to try to be friends with people even when they don't deserve it.  But there are times where I'm still feeling a level of betrayal by those who have taken advantage of my generosity many years ago.  Ironically, I still wonder if they think about me and know how much they affected me.
Then there are those whom I've done wrong to and yet I don't get why they're still so upset.  I think that blindness is a self-preserving thing so that I don't have to think about the friendship that I've lost.
I love Haagen Daas chocolate ice cream
I hate how often I eat it.  lol
I think my eyes are my best feature.
I hate that my legs aren't as good as they used to be.
I love a man with a hairy chest.
I love a man with strong legs.
I'm not attracted to thin men.
I'm not attracted to overweight men either.
I get crushes every once in awhile but don't often act on them.
I look forward to my time being my time next summer.
I look forward to being a full-time student again.
I wish I could ride my bicycle more often.
I haven't loved unconditionally in more than a decade.
I think I've forgotten how.
I have a kinky side.
But I love the vanilla in me too.
My favorite song is "The Rose" by Bette Midler.
My favorite book is "The Wild Rose" by Doris Mortman
They are nothing alike despite having similar names.  lol.
"The Wind Beneath My Wings" makes me think of my mama.
I love to dress in beautiful clothes.
I love pencil skirts and high heels.
I love when a man whom I'm attracted to admires how I look.
I would love to know love again.
I sometimes wonder if I'll get married but I also wonder if I actually have any desire to do so.  Really, I'd like to just love and be loved.
I'm straightforward; often to the point of being tactless.
I like to try new things and will try pretty much anything once.
Although I will if I have to, I don't like to do things by myself.
I bought my first house at age 23 and had to get a second job to pay the mortgage.
I bought my second house at age 30, six months after getting another "second job".
I love driving across country.
I love driving almost anywhere.
I've driven cross country more than once.
My goal is to have driven to or through every state in the CONUS.
I don't like being alone.
But I don't feel like I'm lonely.
I want to love again.

The Effect of Nightshift on My Life

     I definitely have more time for introspection and whatnot when I'm trying to make it through an overnight shift.  Anything to get me through 12 hours.  In this case, I have only seven hours to go for this evening.  The new job at White House/Black Market is going really well.  I love to see the new products that come out every couple weeks and to have our customers come in and the team be able to play dress-up with a real, live person is so much fun.  There is still a lot to learn but the skills that I'm learning will make me that much better, for sure.  To get someone in the fitting room and help them find an outfit (or three or six) that makes them feel more beautiful than they already are is an awesome feeling.  To make an income while doing that is just a bonus.  To also be able to refer customers to my favorite (non-matrix sized) bra and lingerie store, Buttercups, just adds even more fun to the mix.
    So, between the full time Air Force job, the part time VS job, and the part time WHBM job, there's not much time for anything else.  I do get a few spare hours here and there to attend a gathering, meeting, or chanting session with my Buddhism group, which is awesome.  Because of those commitments, I'm really selective on how I spend my time outside of those things.  I don't waste it with people whose company I find distasteful.  I don't waste it doing things that are unenjoyable--dentist and doctor visits are unavoidable unfortunately.  I can only hope that those whom I do choose to spend my time with realize that I carve time out of my schedule specifically for them.  And I'm glad for their company when they choose to make time for me in theirs.
     Part of my ponderings this evening...the first date that hasn't yet happened.  It's been delayed a couple times because of unavoidable yet understandable life events--on each side of the equation--which makes me wonder how it's going to go even more.  He's a good looking fella with a common sense brain in his noggin.  Fairly tall but not so tall that he would tower over me even in my 4" heels.  Although I don't know his life goals just yet, I know he's ambitious and has plans for his future--always a plus.  I've known him for a few years and I don't think he's ever made an inaccurate assessment about the folks that he knows and works with.  He's firm but fair.  Funny yet serious when the situation calls for it.  And I'm intrigued to learn more about him.  I'm looking forward to seeing how well we interact in a more casual setting. 

Looking Forward While Also Looking Back

     I revisited a couple posts from this year and they got me to thinking...about love...about choices...about choices in love.  :D  This short one Nostalgic About Love had me reminiscing about those fellas whom I gave my heart to and why things didn't work out.  In every instance, it was geographical distance that had us going our separate ways.  Every man that I loved was a good man.  I don't have any negative emotions towards any of them.
     My first love, Scott...summer of '91 was the beginning for us.  I loved him with everything that my 15 year old self could.  I remember spending time at his house and he at mine.  We went to the Big Fresno Fair and held hands while we walked around.  He was always chewing Trident gum so, needless to say, his kisses tasted like mint or cinnamon most of the time.  With him, I heard death metal for the first time.  I'm not a fan but I think of him every time I hear that, uh, music.  His mom didn't really like me.  Or...she didn't like my mom and displaced that dislike onto me.  She was kind of a snob.  They were well-off and my family wasn't.  That didn't stop me from loving the hell out of Scott.
     Then there was Eddie.  Eddie was a man.  Although, looking back now, I'd be kicking my own ass and threatening some serious stuff to him.  He was 23.  I was 16.  We dated for more than a year.  I gotta admit, he was kind of a rebound.  The boy who had taken my virginity had dropped me like a hot potato to go back to his baby-mama (my best friend, to this day, calls her "chicken legs" lol) after he was done with me.  A month or so later, there was Eddie.  Looking all grown up...to this, very much a teenager, girl.  Despite our age difference, he treated me really well.  I think, though, I was just too enamored to see the real him.  He was a drug user, probably a drug dealer, and is now dead as a result of his lifestyle.  So much potential, wasted.  We broke up when he went to jail.  Go figure.  That was summer 1992 to summer 1993.
     The next time I shared my heart was in 1994.  In the fall of that year, I started seeing a fella that I had been crushing on for a couple years.  Actually, me and two really good friends had crushed on him for years, all through high school.  He graduated in 1992 and had dated another girl for many years but, for reasons that I don't remember, they broke up.  We started dating a few months after I graduated.  His family was awesome.  They still are.  I keep in touch with all of them still.  Even him.  Hell, I'm even friends with his wife on facebook.  We were together for more than two years.  We opted to go our separate ways after I got orders to McChord in Washington state.  The distance would have prevented us from seeing each other often and long distance just isn't easy, especially when you're barely 20 and 22 years old.
     Although I dated a few folks over the next few years, nobody really had my heart again until 1999.  George was a med tech at the Army hospital near McChord.  I remember when I met him--during a sick call visit--his pick up lines were: "So, 'Naprstek'.  Is that your married name?" and "Wow!  You have the bluest eyes."  We were together about six months and then he separated from the Army and moved back home; ironically, to California.  lol.  That one was a little harder to deal with only because he move home (and out of the house that we shared) at the same time that my best friend move halfway across the country to her new husband's hometown in Iowa.  February 2000 was not a good month for me.
     It was another four years before I weeded through more bad apples and found someone worth opening myself up to.  I met Damien while he was dating a friend of mine but it wasn't until 2004 that we began dating, long after he had broken up with her.  We talked future.  We talked marriage.  We talked his upcoming separation from the Air Force.  We talked often after he moved back home in September 2004, six months after we'd got together.  Until just after New Years.  I had flown to Iowa to spend time with my bestest bud for New Year's and he drove down from his hometown in Nebraska and we spent the week together while also hanging out with my BFF and her family.  Come April, I couldn't hardly reach him on the phone.  By August we were broken up.  Partly due to the fact that he'd been "cheating" on me but, really, because of that hurdle called distance.  It's hard to maintain a relationship when you've seen each other once in eight months.  He's now married and has a rugrat or two.
     I think that break-up really took a toll on me though because there has been nobody since Damien that I've had a relationship with and who I gave my heart to.  I don't know if it's that I've thrown myself into a busy schedule.  Or that work is just so (insert adjective here) that it's sucked the life out of me.  There have been a couple attempts.  Dated one guy for three or four months back in 2011 but he turned out to be selfish, self-serving, and just plain not that nice.  Had a crush for a number of months last year.  Nothing came of that--the fella just wasn't picking up what I was putting down.  Now, there's another fella whom I've made plans with, twice, that had to get rescheduled.  Frustrating, yes, but I'm kind of okay with it.  Mainly because he doesn't make me feel anxious.  I don't feel like he's purposely not contacting me.  (You know how some people just play that stupid game?  Yeah, I don't get that impression from him.)  From all the years that I've known him--our paths have crossed often in the past three or four years--he's always been a straightforward and upfront guy.  I'm looking forward to seeing where this goes.  The time between when we last talked and when we next talk is full of delicious anticipation.

Disagreements...As A GrownUp.

Eventually, you realize that not everyone will agree with what you have to say or the way that you do things.  And there is nothing wrong with that.  You will also realize that some people have thinner skin than others.  That is their issue, not yours.  Many folks in today’s generation are part of the “everybody gets a ribbon” mindset and this is going to be a detriment when it comes time for them to survive life.  In “life” not everyone gets a ribbon just for participating.  Not everyone is going to be your friend either.  That shouldn’t even be a goal.  Do you know how much more convoluted your life would be if you tried to acquire or maintain everyone as a friend?  I don’t even want to imagine.

 If you look at friendships as a series of checkboxes of commonality, not a one will check every box but they should have at least one box checked.  I feel like you need to have at least one thing in common.  It’s the one thing that you can kind of fall back on when you’re exploring the personalities of each other.  My best friend and I, for example, we have a shared history and we each love her kids like crazy—obviously, her love for them is deeper and more enriched and more committed but there is still a common love for them.  The rest of our lives are very, very different.  BUT, it’s the shared history that makes it so that we can continue to grow and learn from each other.  Think of it like a “regroup” or a “recharge”—it’s the place that we come back to before venturing out again.

In some cases, where there might have been enough boxes checked, they become “unchecked” or, maybe, the wrong box becomes “checked” and you have to just let that person go.  An example for that:  I’d been friends with a woman for more than two decades.  Over the course of a couple months, a few years ago, we had a disagreement that resulted in her throwing everything that I had ever discussed with her—mistakes that I’d made, bad decisions, etc—in my face as a defense to me disagreeing with an action that she had taken.  This checked the “betrayal” box and I ceased communications with her.  I don’t take offense to someone calling me out on bad decisions—my best bud has done it many times when I’ve been a bonehead—but I do take offense if it’s done in a poor manner and, most especially, if it makes the person doing it a hypocrite.  Don’t use the same manner of my dumbassness to call me out.  You just look stupid and you totally lose the point that you’re trying to make.  Simplest example: Don’t say ice cream is bad while eating a vat of Ben & Jerry’s.

This logic can be applied to platonic relationships and intimate relationships.

The other aspect of it is that a total stranger can easily call out my dumbassness or pain-in-the-ass tendency and, provided they can engage in a grownup conversation, I will eventually come around to their way of thinking and concede their point.  I have gained at least two friends this way.  They gave me shit for something, stated the reasons why their point was (totally) valid, and I couldn’t help but agree.  When you’re a grownup, you realize that it’s okay to have disagreements.  Just make sure that your shit is straight before you call someone out on theirs.

260 days to go

I'm quite excited that the next chapter is fast approaching but I'm also feeling like I'm being sucked into a vortex of stress.  My health is starting to be a reflection of that stress, to the point that I'm not wanting to get out of bed some mornings.  I often force myself to do so.  Once I'm up and have coffee, I'm doing pretty well.  On my days off, I can distract myself from the upcoming changes by cultivating relationships and connections that will carryover into the next chapter.  However, the days that I have to work are the ones that seem to make me want to bury myself in the blankets.  Why is that?  Why do the migraines present on the days that I can least afford to have them?  Is it because I'm just so ready for the next chapter?  Does my immune system just hate my job that much?  Is my body recognizing that my current job is the biggest stressor with the biggest impact on my whole physiology?  Ugh.  It can't be good to endure this much stress for this length of time.

I just want to cry and sleep until Spring.

Internal Conflict Due To Personal Integrity

What happens when you do something that goes against your personal integrity?  When you’re filled with internal conflict?  You make adjustments.  I’m opting to post this on my personal blog rather than my “professional” one because I feel it fits more here than there even though the subject matter very much has to do with what my “professional” blog is all about—finding the perfect fit for everyone.  The conflict lays in the fact that I WANT to do just that: find my customers the perfect fitting bra.  But how much do I have to compromise in order to do that while also selling the products that are available at Victoria’s Secret?

Most folks know that VS bras don’t fit everyone.  Anyone with a band size over 42 can tell you that.  Or a cup size over DDD/F.  The difficulty lays in giving the customers their perfect fitting and then having to sister size them into a VS bra even though it may not be one that really, truly fits.  I also have to keep in mind that, really, not everyone wants a bra that absolutely fits perfect; one that meets every facet of fit: projection, band size, cup size, fabric, tactile feel.  Some folks just want one that fits pretty darn good.  THOSE are the customers that I will focus on.  THEY are VS’s customers; along with the ones who DO get a perfect fit in a VS bra.

The flip side: sister sizing a 28 band into a 32 may not always work but I’ll do my best.  Same with those customers who are a G cup: if we’ve got their sister size band for an DDD/F cup, I’ll have them try it.  They just may be satisfied with it.  Not everyone is as picky as me.  I’m on a quest for a perfect fit, even if it means ordering 136 bras and sending back 135.