The Cali Life

I thought it would be easy to tackle this one first because all the other blog post ideas are not as clear as stating what I did to my hair and what happened to it. On Sunday last week, I washed my hair and then I braided it to stretch it out. Then on Tuesday, I put it in a bun. My mom came on Tuesday so I let her twist my hair. When my mom twists my hair, it just seems to come out so much better than when I twist it. She used this  as she twisted. I showed her the two different textures in my hair that I attributed to heat damage. She blamed it on the braids staying in my hair too long. And then I showed her how easily my ends just break off my hair. She also blamed that the braids. I don't think it is that simple. On Sunday, after a camping trip in which my hair was layered with ash from a very warm fire, I decided to wash my hair with the twists in . First, I prepooed with  , after which I sprayed with water. Then I sealed with   and . I covered my head with a sh...

Yo! So I plan on writing a blog post about Testimonies from Christians and the World, Asking for a sign, the prodigal son and all that stuff all wrapped in. I just need a powerful quote to tie it all together. You will be getting that posted soon enough. Look out for it: "I don't have a story!": The Power of the Christian Testimony. Also, I got to finish this PBS documentary about Malcolm X because it is off the chain. I'm going to have to  write about it in parts because it's so good and there's so many nuggets of goodness in there to expound on. Might have to watch it again just so I can catch all the nuggets: Here's the video if you want to watch. Also, I got to break down my hair. It's about that time. Look out for it in 1 - 5 days...

I will comment more later but I think it is important that people watch this.

As I was reading up on the skills needed for children within special education categories to transition into adult living, I came across the need for those students to develop self determination. I read up on self determination and realized, with shock, that I lack self determination skills. Of course, I then tried to label which special education category I fell in. SMH. The case of an amateur trying to diagnose. On Sunday, I watched a program called  "Unhooked" on Hope channel. Enablers was the theme of this specific episode and Nadine, my friend was featured. She spoke about how she did not have clear limits about what she was or wasn't willing to do and because of her willingness to please, she allowed people in her life to indulge in self destructive addictions.  The commentator mentioned that people need to be able to set up boundaries. As I watched, I realized that this was a major feature of self determination: realizing one's limits and being aware of what yo...

I've decided. I am celebrating Kwanzaa this year. I've made my decision. You know why? I let you know more about that later but Kwanzaa ain't bad. There's not one pagan celebration of the sun/moon/devil connected to it, although it does celebrate the harvest which can be connected to the celebration of harvest in many pagan/heathen/Wicca cultures. Hmmmm.... Look more into that later. But for right now, I'm marking down Kwanzaa in my calendar. I'm gonna celebrate the stuffing out of Kwanzaa this year. This don't even got anything to with race, although it would seem like that would go along with my recent train of blogs.  But Kwanzaa just seems great right now. I'm going to do it. Nest Blog: Why am I going to celebrate Kwanzaa?

So I'm watching this clip from the Hannity show on the FOX news network. Tell me why people act like their dumb? Here's the clip: My Analysis I definitely understand what he's talking about and I'm not going to sit here and lie and say that I feel all lovey-dovey about a black man getting with a white woman. But if that's what you wanna do. do you. Love is love and I cannot judge. I'm not hating on random strangers, especially Tiger Woods who, like may other biracial people of status and acclaim decide not to claim being white. So I'm not mad at dude for marrying a white woman. Let him do what he wants to do. He is not accountable to me nor is he accountable to the black community. He lost the accountability when he decided he was not black enough to be considered black. And even if he was black  to me, I am not Jesus so I can't judge him. When OJ married that white woman and got himself in trouble by killing her ( we all agreed that he killed he...

I'm going to pause and talk about the regularity of the digestive system, specifically the bowels and their movements. Remember when I made a list of all those checklists that would help me be healthier inside and out? Well, it's safe to say that I have not been keeping track of those things. Recently, I haven't been able to drink a lot of water.  I definitely drank more before moving to my new place of residence. I broke my water bottle and I keep losing my plastic ones. So I've been slacking on the hydrating my body front.Within the house I live in, I've been eating oatmeal mixed with fresh fruits and soy milk almost every morning, thanks to the consideration of my host dad.  That oatmeal has been very good for my dehydrated bowels which have been producing fewer movements per day but consistently at least once everyday. Unfortunately, some mornings, I do not have oatmeal and on those days, there is a marked difference in my bowel movements. Lets just say, I...

"The vast ignorance..." I live with white people right now in California. Older more mature white people have sense and even though they may believe something ridiculous about black people, they have enough sense to keep most of that crap in their heads (even then, some ignorance leaks out). Unfortunately, I am among younger people all the time and they say things like, "I like your kind of black people then regular black people." (this child speaks in reference to the fact that my heritage is Caribbean, specifically Grenadian.) I do not even believe he under stands the richness of Caribbean culture and how it has defined me as a person, nor does he not understand that I better associate with "regular" black people over white people. He probably saw a video of some Rastafarian men and thought they were cool.   The joke mentioned about how I can only see your teeth on the dark was almost close to n-word status. Or the big teeth/smile that all white peop...

I bought  to get some moisture back in my hair. Not to say that my hair was not moisturized but I love this product and I couldn't test my hair any more on things that I was not sure about. Safe to say, I'm a product junkie.So I re-twisted my ended last night with the product and I am content :)

Quite recently, I was speaking about having to wake up early in the morning in order to get a ride to the school. I was definitely hurt when someone responded and said that I was always complaining. Every once in a while, this person has hinted that I whine and complain. I was annoyed because to be quite honest I would love to use this person for a character comparison. Unfortunately, I actually like this person, which is why it hurt when I heard this person say this. Which made me think: Does this person even want to be around me? They don't respond to my texts and they give me strange looks. Unfortunately, I do complain but not in the spirit of being mean spirited and pessimistic. But mostly in the spirit of needing something to talk about. It annoys me that my life is only summed up in the amount of things I can complain about. It annoys me that I am not joyful enough to be better.Help me Jesus to be better. Phillipians 2:  14  Do all things without grumbling or disputing, ...

So I  pre-pooed my hair with  , mixed with half a pack of     , a good amount of   (which turned the whole mixture green), a generous amount of  , combined with a generous amount of   and a dab of  . All of these products smell great. But I'm honestly trying to finish them off before I go home and also I wanted to use all my products with silicones and parabens so that I could use my sulfate shampoos (hehehe) . So I mixed them together and I left them in while I finished watching  "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids". Youtube is a wonderful place. Then I washed them out with a mixture of  because I have it and   because I have scalp issues ( by the way scalp is itching right now,grr) . I brought this in the bathroom but I neglected to bring a conditioner (scary, right?). Wrong! After I washed out everything, I started parting my hair for twists. Then I sprayed each individual section with my mixture of ...

I was watching this video. In the video, there was this guy who was saying that light-skinned girls are more attractive than dark-skinned girls. Here is a link to the vid:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1PxfMiWKtg I couldn't watch the whole thing because while I respect his opinion and his logic, it was till depressing. I deal with insecurities and I ain't all there yet. Back to the vid.  Apparently he was being accused of being color struck but justifying his preferences by saying girls who got to have a man with money are not labelled at being money-struck or girls who got to have a man who lives on his own are not labelled as mother-struck. I had to agree with his logic because not only does he have a right to a preference, I feel his preference is more acceptable to me because he's not locking out a whole race. I cannot stand black men who say they are not attracted to black females because to be quite honest, it makes their mother and sisters feel bad. LOL. ...

O Jerusalem, wash your heart from wickedness, that you may be saved. How long shall your vain thoughts lodge within you? Jer. 4:14  I read the story of Jeremiah's pleas with Jerusalem and Judah before their captivity to the children yesterday. Later that night, I prayed for God to wash my heart or to help me wash my heart. I definitely experienced a strength exchange today. Where there was weakness in falling to temptation, there is now JOY in accomplishment. It's so funny how God works subtly to woo people back to Him. To woo me back to Him... always. Until all of a sudden there is joy and answers to prayer and duty and purpose.  "I am determined to have live with no chains."- Fred Hammond