JustinMar.com: The official website of Justin Mar

Yes, I know. I've been slacking these past few days. It's really hard to keep up with blogging everyday when you have a busy lifestyle. Also, I also have to show that I'm still human and have a life other than sitting in front of a computer blogging all day. =) The past few days have been slow at work but eventful back at home. We've been occupied with a lot of important issues to be addressed. Nothing bad in particular to my life, but to a friend that is close to us. So we're just trying to offer some mental support to this specific person who is dear to us ("us" being my anonymous girlfriend and I). We're just trying to help her piece back her life together. For those who know who this person is, then you can understand. On Saturday night, we and a few friends decided to meet up in San Francisco's North Beach for coffee and conversation. It was nice to be out in the crowds enjoying the company with friends. We had coffee and delicious desserts at...

The weather is nice and there's nothing worse than being at work. In the car business, we're not busy until we have customers. We just sit here and wait. Gas prices, rising interest rates, and the beautiful weather somehow scared all the customers away. The life of a salesperson is not the greatest. You only make money when there are sales. If there are no sales, then you don't make any money. In my case, I keep myself busy with projects to work on just to pass time. As much as I hate to say this, the heat does make you rather lethargic. I thrive on being busy. It makes the day go by much faster and there's more gratification that you have purpose in your job. Although, it's good to have slow days once in awhile. I would like to cherish these slow days, because it gives you time to relax. It's just unfortunate that we have to sit here waisting the day away when the weather is so nice. A reoccuring thought of wanting out of the car business comes up whenever it...

so take off all your clothes. Whenever it's hot (weather wise), I think of the hip hop song by Nelly. The weather here in Richmond, CA is averaging in the range of 86 degrees. I'm so glad I can sit in an air conditioned office. I feel really bad for those who have to do labor in this intense heat. Honestly, I enjoy the hot weather, but hate working in it. The key is to hydrate and put on heaps of sunblock. The air quality has been terrible too. Tomorrow is a "Spare the Air" day so I believe that BART runs free all day. Not much going on in the life of Justin. No big events and just need to work on a few personal goals. The continuing goal of getting healthier is a big feat. I'm surrounded by co-workers who live off fast food. I shouldn't wait until my health escalates to something catastrophic in order for me to have my wake up call. A prime example should be learned from my father. He has a heart attack in his early forties, and it took a heart attack for h...

Today was the last day of my "four day" long vacation from work. I definately needed the time off and I'm really sad that it has already come to an end. It was nice to have the ability to sleep in, relax, veg out, surf online, do laundy, run errands, and ponder about what I want to do with my life. I surprisingly was able to accomplish all the items I had on my to do list and still have time to relax and rest. Life is great. It was a rather unproductive day. I slept in until 11am, shaved my head, showered up, watched television, and met up with my parents for dinner. Since it was my last final day off, I really just wanted to relax. There's a lot going on. For example my great aunt just passed away on Father's Day. I just saw her on June 6th and she looked in good health for her ripe age of 87. She wasn't in tip top good health, had to take everything slow, and she did have the braveness to do her routine walk around Clement Street with a walker. A very strong...

Today embarked a day spent with man's best friend. Man's best friend can be anything, but most commonly, Man's Best Friend is his Dog. Mickey's permanent home (for now) is back in South San Francisco. When I have time off, I try to take care of him at my place. In my prior post, I mentioned about being way too tired from work, now I was fortunate to have FOUR consecutive days off! It was just a fluke on how our work schedule panned out. In my favor and I'm not complaning. I decided to take Mickey for a nice walk. The weather has been beautiful for the past few days. Since I had nothing better to do for the day, I decided to get a good walk and spend valuable time with my dog. The East Bay Regional Park District reserved an area entitled, " Point Isabel Regional Shoreline " as a park enjoyed by dogs and their companions. The park consists of appoximately 23 acres of land to freely walk your dog. The nice aspect of a dog park, you can walk your do...

I tend to find myself burnt out on many occasions. It's probably from being overworked. I work long hours, eat at late hours, and don't get much sleep. It doesn't take rocket science to figure out that I need to take some time off to relax. You can tell that you're over worked when you are drained and barely have enough energy to even want to eat dinner at 9pm when your last meal was at noon. My eating schedule is terrible. No breakfast, lunch is eaten sometimes at 3pm, and dinner isn't until I get home at 8:30pm (sometimes later). The other drawback is the fact that I work on weekends too. When people are out enjoying the beautiful weekend weather, I'm stuck in a office pushing paper, and selling stuff to our customers. This is my ritual for all of the week. Then on one day of the week (sometimes two) I'll have time to myself. The drawback is the fact that my only day off happens to be on a day when everyone else is at work. Someday, I hope to find myself o...

Our big sales event is over and now I have time to blog again. The last six days have been very brutal on all of the staff. As I mentioned earlier, we had a sales team from the SMART AUTOMOTIVE GROUP do a sale with us at our store to clear out our used cars. Basically, they send out a large direct mailing flyer to a group of individuals who fall within a specific credit score criteria, the customers come in for the event, and then we sell them a car. What's different is the fact that they take over the whole operation and we just assist them. They bring in their own sales managers, closers, and sales staff that incorporates with our staff. We were able to sell at least over 35+ cars in just five days! The have the sales talent and strong bank ties to get credit challenged individual driving in cars! Some of the staff individuals from the Smart Automotive Group originate from Louisiana. One guy is from New Orleans and went back into the car business because he lost his restaurant f...

Damn!!! As much as I enjoy blogging, I've just been too tired to even turn my computer on at night when I get home. I have been working at least 13 hours every single day since Wednesday! We're having a huge used car sale blowout at our store. Selling at least ten cars a day. This should be a good month! Good for my wallet too! I'm also on this liquid diet. Trying not too eat too much fatty foods. Just been drinking soup and tons of vegetables. Hopefully this will help me lose some weight. I'm not really fat, but I can lose a few pounds to be a little healthier. Been noticing that nature does not call as often. There aren't much solids that have to exit! Too much information, right? So when this sale decides to settle, I'll be back to share some great stories. Just to give a teaser... I got to work with some fun people from the South. Southern people with southern accents. More to come.

June 5, 2006 (I'm a day behind) embarked my two year relationship anniversary with my special loved one who wants to be named anonymous. Those who know me know who this person is. We basically started the day early by having breakfast at Bette's Oceanview Diner in Berkeley on 4th Street. I had their daily special of Frittata with cherry tomatoes, feta cheese, and basil. It also included homestyle potatoes and toast. My anonymous girlfriend had two eggs. Breakfast was great and it's a small friendly All American Diner with a giant piece of pie hanging from it's ceiling. Secondly, we drove across the Richmond/San Rafael bridge to hike Muir Woods . The drive down to Muir Woods was really fun. I love two lane roads that constantly twist and turn! It makes the drive fun....especially when you can downshift and accellerate into the turns. The only downfall was having to follow a grandpa driving his big Cadillac. We arrived at Muir Woods early enough to get front door parking...

A fellow co-worker recommended that I try one of his favorite Mexican food restuarants in San Leandro. The name of the restuarant is, "San Gaspar" at 201 East 14th Street. I'm a huge fan of Mexican food and I must say that this place ranks way up on my top places to eat. The food is very authentic. It makes Chevy's taste like ultimate gringo food. Wait a second...Duh, Chevy's is gringo food. The portions at San Gaspar are generous and the prices ranges at around $7.95 for an entire dinner plate....with rice, beans, and all the traditional fixings. It looks like a hole in wall from the outside, random mexican beer posters, some cultural wall fixtures; although the dining area was very clean and the service was excellent. I ordered the #4 from the combination dinner menu. It consisted of a chili relleno, taco, and enchilada. The refried beans were the best! It had all the flavor is tradition homestyle cooked Mexican food. I will definately return again to this pla...

I watched a movie today that basically has me be a bit scared about the future of our earth. It has been common for me to not even think about how bad we pollute and increase global warming. Especially from everyday appliances, the cars we drive, and tools we use....until now. The movie that I watched today was entitled, "An Inconvenient Truth" which is a political documentary by Al Gore on the global climate change and the consequences that we have ahead of us. He is promoting the importance of humankind by going city to city and addressing the increasing global warming effect. It's does have a bit of hidden political bashing, but in good taste, of George Bush Jr. and his large stake in the oil business. The biggest scary issue that he brought up was the melting of Greenland and Antartica. It's slowly melting away, and from increased global warming, the melted ice can raise the seas up to 20 feet higher. He showed CGI images of shores spanning the continent that c...

We live in a society of status cars, designer purses, designer shoes, bling jewlery, big homes, and huge debt! Everyone would like to live the life of the Rich and Famous, but is it worth it? Sure, if you can afford it. There are so many hardworking individuals out in the world that are stuggling to live the life, keeping up with the Jones', and they're living in huge debt. Being in the car business, I see a lot of individuals who max out their credit cards, and still want to buy that gas guzzling SUV they cannot afford! I'm not sure what the statistics are, but a good majority of Americans are filing bankruptcy like it was going out of style. I constantly see CREDIT COUNSELING commercials for people who just continue to spend. It's terrible for companies that have to absorb these losses of uncollected money, and people still get to keep the goods. I would almost consider this a crime. I'm sure banks and financial institutions try to collect as much collateral as th...

Is there something in your life that you are attached to that is very difficult to give up? Do you own something that has some personal value that is irreplaceable? I'm sure that everyone can answer "yes" to both questions. It's human nature to be attached to someone or something. Even nature (animals) have some form of attachment to their belongings. It's also human nature to be sad when you have to let something go or see it disappear. I'm sure that everyone encountered an experience where they had to say good bye to a close friend; whether the cause of the departure was by death or simply moving away. Can you remember the feeling of emptiness, sadness, pain in the heart, or simply "why does this have to happen?" All of the sudden happy memories of the past pop in your head which make your sadness escalate even worse. The bottom line...is the feeling of good ol' sadness eats you up! To my fellow blog readers...no one died, nor did I lose anythi...