Chit Chat: Celebrity Encounters, Fitness Wins, and More

Ever wondered what it's like to bump into a celebrity at Starbucks or experience a near-disaster while installing an air conditioner? Join me on "Blogger with a Twist" as I share how these unexpected moments added excitement to my life. Alongside these stories, I'll take you on a journey through my fitness achievements, including the 14 pounds I've shed since joining Planet Fitness in May. We'll also talk about my blog's fresh look, improved mobile experience, and lightning-fast speed—all updates that have kept me super busy!

But the surprises don't end there. I'll recount my surreal visit to the Otherworld exhibit in Philadelphia—a fantastical experience that's like stepping into another dimension. Plus, catch the behind-the-scenes scoop on my latest blog post about the Down Home Diner and my strategies for boosting traffic via Pinterest. Wrapping up, I extend my heartfelt gratitude to each of you for your unwavering support. So grab your snacks, kick back, and let's catch up on all the exciting updates in my world. Stay blessed, stay positive, and be safe—peace!

Blog post: https://phillyblogger.com/down-home-diner-a-great-spot-with-delicious-food/

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:09

Hey you guys, my name is Brooke and welcome to my podcast blogger with a twist. So on my podcast you guys can find topics about lifestyle, rants, story times about my life or anything else I find interesting to talk about. So if that sounds like something you would like to know or hear, then you know what to do Subscribe, tell your family, friends, grandma or whoever about my podcast and, last but not least, sit back, relax and let's get this episode popping. Hey you guys, and welcome back to a brand new podcast episode and happy belated 4th of July. So hopefully you guys out there had a great 4th of July, whether you celebrated on an actual day or you waited until the weekend. For me, I did end up working on 4th of July, which for me was time and a half, whoop, whoop. And as far as the weekend, I ended up hanging out with one of my oldest friends and that was pretty much it. I don't know, maybe because I've gotten older, I just I don't really feel the need to like really celebrate 4th of July like that. But anyway, besides that, I thought that for today's's episode I would do a chit chat and basically catch you guys up on my life and anything else interesting that has been happening, because I feel like my last episode that I uploaded was back in May, like around around the beginning of May, so it's been over two months. I want to say and again, I'm sorry, life, of course, always gets in the way. So, um, that being said, grab your snacks or whatever you like to eat and let's get this episode popping. So, as far as my health, you guys, specifically my weight loss journey, everything has been going good. I have officially lost 14 pounds and I am so excited with my progress.

Speaker 1: 2:41

So, for those of you guys that don't know, I started going to Planet Fitness back in May, even though I signed up for my membership in April, and I know it took me a couple weeks to even get started, but I had to kind of go when I was mentally ready, ready to go, and so being on this fitness journey has really taught me a lot so far. It's definitely taught me that going to the gym is very much, is very much, a mental thing, more so than a physical thing. You have to mentally encourage yourself that, hey, you need to go to the gym. You may not feel like it physically, but mentally it's like you have to be your own cheerleader, because a lot of times for me when I doubt myself or be like, oh, maybe I shouldn't go to the gym, when I actually go and I work out, I feel way better. So I guess for me, getting from point A to point B is where I kind of struggle sometimes and I feel like a lot of people can relate to that. When it comes to working out, like mentally, just getting yourself motivated to go can be a daunting task. But let me tell you, once you you work out, you will feel better.

Speaker 1: 4:09

Also, another thing that I've learned from going to the gym and staying consistent is I like the results. I like how my body is looking and it's definitely has given me a higher level of confidence, because for a long time I did not like how I looked in the mirror and I barely wanted to show any skin. But, baby, now that I have been working out and your girl is looking more toned and defined, I love showing a little bit of skin. So definitely getting that boost of confidence has really kind of helped boost my self-esteem a little bit. I just have been loving the experience and I definitely will continue and I definitely feel like going to the gym is a lifestyle change and it's a good one.

Speaker 1: 5:02

I know right now I go about three to four times a week. Sometimes I'll go two times a week, but one day I do want to try to do about five to six days a week. Um, maybe, like I said, maybe one day I'll get to that point, but for right now I am content with the pace that I'm going. So if you can take anything away from this part of the episode, if you want to work out, definitely go work out. Like I've said before, make sure you work out for yourself and you are losing weight in a healthy manner. For me, I try to aim for about two pounds a week, three at most, but I don't try to go too crazy. I don't try to go too crazy with the weight loss because I want to lose the weight off in a manner where I can kind of keep it off, because I feel like sometimes when you lose weight too quickly, like I've said before, no-transcript. So that is update with my weight loss journey and everything.

Speaker 1: 6:18

The next update is about the blog. So one of the main reasons why I have not been really podcasting is because I've been working on the back end of my blog and just trying to make it more mobile friendly and faster and making sure the images are compressed and everything that it takes to kind of, you know, basically run a blog or a website, and I am happy that now it's finally looking the way I want it to look. It's been a journey Okay, it has been. I did upload a fairly new blog post about this diner that I went to here in Philadelphia. It's called Down Home Diner and it was the day that I had jury duty. So if you guys want to read the backstory about that and my thoughts about the food at Down Home Diner, I will leave a link to that blog post in the description of this episode. Also, I have been trying to use Pinterest more frequently to help drive traffic to my website because I felt like I haven't really been doing it in a while and it just feels nice to be making fresh content for you guys, because I felt like over these past couple weeks I've been so focused on the back end things of the blog and trying to make sure that everything looks good and optimized and stuff like that that I have not posted any fresh content. So happy about that, and so that is the update with the blog.

Speaker 1: 8:01

Um, next update is I did meet somebody really cool at my job. So, as a lot of you guys know, I work at Starbucks and every once in a while we have celebrities that do come in. So I think it was either last Sunday or the Sunday before last. So this particular day let me tell you number one I even for I forgot that I even picked up a shift, okay, so I was late to work. That was number one. Number two we end up having to close the store early because two of our closers couldn't come in. One of them ended up being sick, I guess from some food they had cooked the night before, and then the other closer had to deal with some other stuff, and so we ended up closing the store at, I think at like 3 30, so it was around I want to say maybe about like two something and this tall black guy walks in and when he was walking up to the register, I kept thinking in my head is this Terrell Owens?

Speaker 1: 9:11

Now, if you guys don't know who Terrell Owens is, he used to play on the Eagles, he's also been in a couple of tv shows, and so in my head I wanted to ask him was he Terrell Owens? But I didn't want to be salty so I kind of didn't, I kind of kept the question to myself. So when he got to the register, I said hello to him, I took his order and then he pulls out his phone to scan his Starbucks app to pay for stuff, and Terrell pops up. So I was like are you Terrell Owens? He was like, yeah.

Speaker 1: 9:48

So after he said that a part of me wanted to ask for an autograph, for a photo, but I was at work and I had a little bit of a line behind him, so it just I felt like it wasn't the right time to be honest with you guys, and so he did end up meeting up with this young lady that was already inside of Starbucks and he was sitting with her. So after I got the line down, and maybe about 25-30 minutes later later because I think at this point I think it was about to close in like an hour or like in like, or like in 45 minutes I had walked over to the end of the bar and Terrell said something like oh, I can close for you guys, I can, I can close, you know, I can work because he had realized that we was actually closing early today, I just I said something like uh, I don't think you can. I mean you already do enough. You know I'm not the managers. I mean it would have been cool if he did work behind the bar at Starbucks, but I mean. So that was a really cool moment.

Speaker 1: 11:04

And then afterwards, later on that day, after I got off, after I got off of work, I did tell my boyfriend, which he thought was really cool, and I told my mom and of course, my mom was like why didn't you get his photo? Why didn't you get an autograph? I guess for me, I just kind of felt like, when it comes to celebrities or athletes or anybody that has some type of fame, sometimes they don't want to be bothered with a bunch of questions or autographs, they just want to breathe. And on top of that, the young lady that he was there meeting up with I don't know if that was his daughter or his wife, girlfriend, family friend, I don't know but I just felt like he was there to meet up with her. And you know, I just want I didn't want to be rude, I guess that's the best way to say it because I remember there was a lady that had came into Starbucks a couple months ago I forgot her name. She is an actress because I've seen her also on commercials and she had came in with her son and she appreciated the fact that I wasn't asking for photos. And you know how when people see a celebrity, they get all crazy and they get starstruck and you know, she just appreciated the fact that I didn't act like that. So I guess, like I said for me, I just let people breathe. I guess, like I said for me, I just let people breathe. Now, granted, he was very friendly so I could have asked for a photo, but and it is what it is, but it was still a really cool experience overall.

Speaker 1: 12:49

What else? I did go to this really cool exhibit about a month ago and I do plan to write a blog post for it and post the pictures and stuff. I just haven't gotten around to writing the blog post for it, but I went to this exhibit called Otherworld and it's here in Philadelphia. I don't know how long the exhibit is actually going to be open for, but if you guys want to check it out, I'll leave the link to their website if you guys want to buy tickets, but I'm trying to find the best way to describe what it is. It's basically an exhibit that represents a mixture of art fantasy. When you go inside, you definitely feel like you're in this different dimension dimension and you can go into these different rooms and it's just out of this world. I guess you can say so if you have kids. It's definitely a fun exhibit to go to. I feel like even if you're an adult, it still is something fun to do. So if you want to check out a new exhibit here in philadelphia, definitely check out other world.

Speaker 1: 14:05

And then, what other updates? Well, this actually happened not that long ago. I had went to ShopRite to buy a new air conditioner because they were on sale for like $99. So a couple of days after I got the air conditioner, I had my boyfriend help me put into my window. Now, mind you, I live on the second floor in my house, so originally I was going to try to put in the air conditioner myself. Originally I was going to try to put in an air conditioner myself, but, knowing that I can be clumsy sometimes, my biggest fear was that this air conditioner was going to fall out the window, and then I got $99 down the drain. So, to play it safe, I asked my boyfriend to help me out. So he came over and you know everything was going good. We had everything in a window, everything was good, like I said.

Speaker 1: 15:02

And then me, I guess being like a little perfectionist I decided to try to move the air conditioner like over more to the right. Tell me why the whole air conditioner went out the window. Now, thank God my boyfriend has quick reflexes, because next thing, you know, my boyfriend's, like Brooke, grab the air conditioner, grab the air conditioner. So the air conditioner, I'm happy it was plugged into something, because if it was not plugged into anything, that thing would have fell right onto the ground and would have broke. So I have like this, uh, what do you call it? The um, it's like a little thing that you plug into your wall outlet and also it has, like other outlets that you can plug things into it.

Speaker 1: 15:47

So I had the air conditioner plugged into that, along with my fan, my, my isolating fan that stands up, and my roku. So when the air conditioner came out the window, my fan got knocked down the front. The front part of it fell apart. The roku thing came out. Now I got this air conditioner hanging on by the cord and I'm praying, as we're pulling this thing up back inside, that the cord does not snap. That was like my biggest fear. I'm praying please, cord, be strong, do not snap. But thankfully we was able to get the air conditioner back up inside the window and after that I learned my lesson. I stopped trying to move things because my boyfriend told me Brooke, just leave it as it is. But no, I had to go start moving things around and then air conditioner went out the window. So it was definitely a Lucy and Ethel moment and I really wish I had on tape because it was just crazy. And, mind you, my mom she was downstairs sitting thinking the kitchen where my window is that, where was putting the air conditioner in is literally like right below the window to the kitchen. So my mom heard it drop. So yeah, that was my whole fiasco with the air conditioner. Lesson learned okay, listen to somebody when they're trying to tell you something.

Speaker 1: 17:23

And then the last update is I did go see the new bad boys movie, bad boys 4, and let me tell you guys, I really enjoyed the movie. I have already seen it twice. The first time I went to go see it by myself and then the second time I took my boyfriend. But when I tell you the action scenes were just so good and Armando, oh child, he is fine. I mean I know I got, I know I got a man, but I'm just saying he is fine, he is fine okay, and I didn't know Guyanese until was until I looked up his like information. So I know there were some people that definitely did watch bad boys for Armando's character because he just, oooh but anyway, anyway, um, if you haven't seen bad boys, definitely go check it out if you like. If you like movies with, uh, really good action scenes, definitely go check out bad boys. I definitely felt like the acting was definitely on point. And let me tell you reggie's character from the third movie he definitely upgraded, definitely upgraded, my boy upgraded.

Speaker 1: 18:37

But yeah, I think that's all of my updates, you guys. And so thank you guys again. So much for tuning into this episode and just still rocking with me, even though I'm a terrible podcaster, and hopefully you guys enjoyed this chit chat and you enjoyed hearing about my latest updates and just my journey of fitness and learning, a new level of confidence and just my latest life adventures. So thank you guys again, and you guys are amazing and you guys are amazing. So, you guys, that will conclude this week's episode. If you enjoyed it, like I say in my intro, definitely subscribe, share the podcast. If you have any questions or inquiries, all of my information is in the description box of every episode and other than that, you guys, stay blessed, stay positive, be safe and peace.