Easter/Palm Sunday/Spring

Kevin went to a different park. He sent me his location, and I went there. There are about five parks all “interconnected”. I walked far enough to eventually reach where I was yesterday. I also got a money shot picture of this cardinal. 

Here’s the trail. It’s a beautiful tree tunnel. 

Being Easter Sunday, I earned time and a half for both of my shifts. My religious background is complicated. My parents were Eastern Orthodox, who celebrate Easter based on a different calendar. Then when I was in middle school, they enrolled me in a Christian school affiliated with a baptist church. So I essentially left the Orthodox Church when I was 13. About every four years, orthodox and regular Easter falls on the same day. About every four years, it falls a whole month later. Two years out of every four years, it’s a week later, and that’s the case this year. So while yall were celebrating Easter, my mother was going to church for palms. 

I like when it falls on the same day. A week later is tolerable, and a month later is obnoxious. Although, the last time it fell a whole month later,

I observed both lents and lost 10-12 pounds. 

Last but not least, my phone decided to make me photo collages of my boy Alex. I love it. 

 

Walking Steps

I was doing great with reaching 10,000 steps a day.  I also would add my favorite arm/upper chest/upper back machines to it. On Thursday, we went to the park, and the water fountains were disabled. I should have known to stop what I was doing, run to the gas station nearby and get a bottled water. But I persevered, and once I was done with my workout I then went to the convenience store for water. Then I went home and had another bottle of water. I started getting extremely exhausted and had to lay down. Then I was sick as hell and finally managed to get to the bathroom to puke my brains out. I googled “throwing up after workout, and the cause was just what I did- exercising dehydrated and then chugging water afterwards. Dr. Google recommended a rest day. 

I have no idea how to exercise properly. I just have to learn as I go or research it online. I have always been surrounded by people with sort of a negative attitude towards it, and it has rubbed off on me in such a way that I have always thought “I can’t” do it. In fact, I was afraid a rest day would make me give up completely, but it’s supposed to be part of the plan. I took Friday as a rest day and then yesterday went hard again, this time with warm up and cool off. I went to this park during my six hour break and got my 10,000 steps.  I carried water with me this time. Most people would say my puking on Thursday is a reason to give up completely, but I just would prefer to learn from it.  I’m not going to turn into a gym bro that looks down their noses at people, but I also don’t want people who don’t do anything to insinuate that because they either  can’t or “can’t” that I can’t either. No doctor has ever told me I can’t. So I’m going to, because it helps a problem in my muscles that I can’t describe to anyone. 

Another great thing about this park is the benches by the water and the tree thicket. There is no workout equipment there though. If I want to write in the park, I can come here. If I want to do arm day, I can go to the one near my house. 

 

Split Shift Day

 It's the first of four split shifts, actually. During my 6 hour break, I did 3 more of the toilet paper and paper towel audits on the merchandiser app that paid $25.16 each. The three of them only took about 2 and a half hours with drive time. I could have done more, but they were out of the way. Then I went back to the HEB parking lot by my client’s home and worked on my book, The Child Advocate. I wrote out the main points of the SIDS training I received twice as a young adult.  I received it once while working in a daycare and once while working at the child crisis center. There is not going to be an entire scene of sitting through this training, but I am going to add the main jist of it somehow. The purpose of this book isn't just to tell a story, it's to raise awareness of a multitude of topics at the same time. But I want to sneak the awareness raising into the story telling. 

One of the stores I did the toilet paper job at was a Family Dollar. I was the only “customer” in the store (put in quotes because I didn't buy anything.)  

One woman was closing out her register, and another, younger woman was starting her shift, presumably with a new till. The older woman was standing over her till and just having an absolute meltdown, cursing shit fit because something wasn't adding up. Every time she yelled and/or cursed, I jumped because I thought she was yelling/cursing because she noticed me taking pictures. The younger woman was just standing at her register unbothered. I wanted to browse their cheap cosmetics, but decided not to. I just left when I uploaded the job. 

Tomorrow, I have a lot to blog about regarding news stories. There are several news stories that are bothering me right now, including but not limited to Joseph Duggar’s nasty ass and his ditzy nasty wife. I regret that I used to watch their show in the early 2000’s with my first husband and gawk at them. With another son admitting to the same thing, it's now a pattern and no longer “one bad apple”.  The Duggars have more than 40 grandchildren, and imo they ALL need forensic interviews by an advocacy center. All 40-whatever. No exceptions. 

Side Jobs

 I got a comment yesterday asking what my side jobs were all about. Well, I heard about one or two of these apps about 7 years ago on a subreddit called beer money. Then I heard about the rest as time went on. I did them as side jobd for a while, then when the pandemic hit, I did them as my main source of income because they paid so well. Keep in mind that they paid extraordinarily well during the pandemic, because no one wanted to go in and out of several stores. Then starting in 2022, the pay started decreasing steadily and by the end of 2022, I got a “real job”  which is fine, because that real job is where I met my husband. 

There used to be this mutual understanding among people in the forums for these, that we wouldn't be referring our friends and family, because that would mean fewer projects for us. I don't think that matters anymore in 2026. No one really depends on these anymore. The good paying gigs do come around every so often, but it's rare. 

The apps are Field Agent, Murchandiser (formerly EasyShift), Ivueit, Observa, GigWalk, and Premise. Premise has literally nothing anymore. Field Agent will only pay $2-$3, but I keep it for the free meals and free items +$3. Observe is average. Ivueit is for real estate investors and mainly wants pictures of landscaping. Merchandiser is the most intense. Merchandiser used to be EasyShift which paid you to go into stores and take pictures of certain aisles and displays. Field agent does the same thing. Like I said in the last post, though, you gotta keep it discreet. Some store managers and employees get nervous if they see someone taking pictures and might even ask you to leave. On Merchandiser, you might see very high paying liquor display audits. These are harder to do incognito, because liquor stores are smaller with more attentive staff, and they 100% will tell you not to take pictures. However, it's easier to be discreet at Specs. Specs is larger with less attentive employees. I generally do non liquor display jobs and liquor only if it's a specs location. 

Also on Merchandiser and Observa are jobs where you do actually go speak to a manager and have to ask about back stock on a certain item and check their handhelds. Also on Merchandiser, there are actual merchandising jobs where you build displays. There is a lot on there from frito lay. My husband asked yesterday why don't the frito lay reps do those. I don't know, but my guess is because they don't like going to family dollar or dollar general. 

Between March of 2020 and December of 2021, I did these in nine states: All over Texas of course, because that's where I live. Also Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Southern Illinois and a little bit in Memphis. Before I met my husband, I was on again off again with an old high school friend in Arizona who was a single dad of two. I went to see them often, trying tovaee how much I could make on the way there and back. Another time, I needed my birth certificate and literally did these all the way to Illinois where I was born, because they were not shipping it. In July of 2020, I did very high paying coca cola beverage audits all over Arkansas. I made a killing. I also went through Arkansas on the way to Illinois. Another time, I just did my own little personal tour of Oklahoma while doing these. Same with Louisiana. Other times, I would go out to do some nearby and keep taking the next one and the next one and the next one, only to have a super long drive home. My mother yelled at me often to plan my routes better. I would do that, and then when I got to my farthest point, they'd send me a route offer for even further that I couldn't refuse. 

My favorite memory is calling her and her sounding anxious asking “Where are you?” I said, “Missouri.”  she thought I meant the Houston suburb of Missouri City only 25 miles from her house. I had to admit “No. No I'm in the state. Of Missouri.”  

This whole experience was a big lesson in finding myself and the beginning of my healing from severe panic attacks that started happening when I finished college in 2014. Now that my husband is on them, he wants to do more of the ones where you have to speak to a manager, because he's used to doing that with the inventory service. It's only a side hustle now, but comes in handy often. 

Trainer

A few days ago, my husband Kevin also signed up for the merchandiser app. Today I took him to a kroger where he did a toilet paper and paper towel audit for $25.17. This is technically a mystery shop and the employees aren't supposed to know what we're doing. I have been doing these jobs since 2018, so I know how to look discreet. My husband, however, was standing in the aisle looking like this: 

 

I stood to his side with a cart to block the pharmacy’s view of him. He let me take the first few pictures to see how I do it discreetly. Then he finished the job himself. He only had to redo one picture due to the top of the aisle being cut off. He said I am a good trainer.  I know I am!!! I used to train new people when I worked at the childrens museum. 

The Perfect April Fools Joke

 The inventory service tends to have busy and slow spurts. Kevin has been pretty busy lately, and today is his first of five days off. All day yesterday, he kept anticipating the bosses to let him know about something for the next few days, but by bedtime, the answer was still nope. Then at 3:00 am, we were both up with the cats causing ruckus. I told him that the manager called last night, and that he does have to work today. His face was immediately 😨.  He totally believed me. Then I said, “April Fools!”    He burst out laughing. He is *really* looking forward to five days off. 

As for me, I have two days off and then doing split shifts Friday through Monday. I'm not letting that change. If she texts me with some emergency, I'm just leaving it unread. If I don't click on the text, she wont get a read receipt. Then I can say I was asleep. I really need these couple of days off. 

The bedridden client I'm caring for now wondered where I was all last weekend because I was working with the temporary clients. She favors me, and that's good. But, I'm trying not to get too attached to her, because I don't think she has much time. She's not on hospice, but it seems like she will be soon. 

Yesterday, she was crying to me, because she was in the hospital when her husband died at home, and she wasn't there to hold him and tell him she loved him. That almost broke me, because I am absolutely dreading losing my husband. He's so much older than me that it's more likely. I reassured her that he did know she loved him. And that I was sorry. Then she started bitching about gas prices, but she doesn't go anywhere. So that was better. 

Then, she got a Facebook message from a scammer that had copied the profile and likeness of her granddaughter, asking her for $500 to fix her car. My client was asking me what “Zelle” was, and I was sus immediately. I despise helping elderly people with stuff on phones. And the messages from her granddaughter kept coming super impatiently. “Have u sent it yet?”  “I really need it grandma, can you hurry?” and so on. I asked if this was like her. She said no. I said it sounded like a scam. She said it was her granddaughter’s Facebook profile. I looked at the profile and the thread and her friends list. And it was clearly a scammer. 

Even so, she doesn't know how to use zelle or pay pal anyway and I wasn't about to show her. I pretended I didn't know either. 

She didn't completely understand and still thinks her granddaughter needs money. I'm exhausted. She wasn't scammed, so that's good, and maybe eventually her granddaughter will get $500 out of this. 

Exercise is Amazing

I’ve been pushing myself more than usual to exercise. This is mainly because the weight loss pill I was prescribed gives me a burst of energy lasting about 6-7 hours every morning. Unfortunately, a crash of tiredness then follows, but a caffeinated drink reverses that. The burst of energy feels nice, and the point is to use it to exercise. 

I’ve also usually described my anxiety as a certain feeling in my arms, legs, upper chest, and upper back. The feeling itself is not anxiety, but causes anxiety, I think. The feeling makes it super difficult to initiate movement. I have to really force myself to get out of a chair or out of the car, and so on. It makes me feel suspended, like my arms and legs are being held back. I think this has contributed to weight gain for me. This happened after I finished college. This muscle feeling happened, and the extreme difficulty in initiating movement caused gradual weight gain. Also when you have anxiety, everything is an emergency, and I personally kind of eat like it’s an emergency. If that makes me sound “fat phobic,” then please try to understand about anxiety and the fight, flight or freeze responses. 

Ever since I started taking phentermine, I have not had this constant emergency feeling surrounding food. I can eat just enough and be good for several hours, not even feeling hungry or anticipating what I should eat next.

Before the phentermine, I was only walking about 1,000-3,000 steps daily, even though my goal is 10,000. Last week, I hit my goal of 10,000 five out of the seven days. This week, I hit it all three days in a row now. 

Trust me, I am SORE AS HELL.  But the creepy Crawley muscle feeling that I've had since finishing college actually is cured by that soreness. It's hard to explain. The soreness is preferable. 

This morning, I went to the gym at 5:00 am and did 5500 steps on the treadmill. Then I went to the park at 7:00 am and did about 3,000 more as well as got on this machine. You push those with your arms, and it works your upper arms and upper abdomen. I completed my 10,000 steps goal by doing some side jobs (taking pictures in stores) and parking far away from the doors. I think this is a great way to heal the stuff I've been through the last 12 years. I definitely have “the high”  And the sore.