Monthly Archives: May 2008

Looking For Advice From Those More Experienced

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The other day, I was asked to speak on my area of expertise for a DVD that will be handed out at upcoming networking and training events.  I’m not so much worried about what I have to say (though I am hoping I can do so without a plethora of “ums” and sound confident – you’d think that years of being a DJ and teacher I could at least talk clearly and professionally, right?).  Right now, I’m more concerned with what to wear on Tuesday.

It’s going to be conducted in front of a green screen – so blues, greens and aquas are out.  I think I’ve heard once that you shouldn’t wear prints.  But other than that, I’m at a loss.   Should I go more “professional” or will I do fine with a classic look of jeans and a tee?  Or maybe a nice blouse or cardigan set? Should I wear black and call it a day (we all know that I have tons of black) or should a wear a color that I know flatters?  Pants or skirt or just screw it and go with a dress?

HELP!!! I’m really a bit out of my element here. Anyone with more experience with this have any ideas???

Then I had some great news again yesterday.  I was invited to take part in an online radio talk show.  This is kind of cool.  I need a decent, professional-like photo for this.  The hubs can easily take and edit the photo, but I don’t really know, again, what I should be wearing or where we should take it.  I need to do this today since they want it up on their site prior to the June 9th show.  FWIW, we have Griffith Park nearby, so an outdoor shot is easily doable, but it’s hazy and overcast and we don’t have any lighting tools.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

It Doesn’t Mean I Don’t Appreciate Him

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But I just had to throw the flowers away.  I waited until last night to tell him so he wouldn’t be surprised.  He knows that they’ve been messing with my allergies this whole time.  I just couldn’t take it any more.  So when the early blooms started dying I told him that I was going to toss them.

So sad too since they still looked so pretty.  I was tempted to just pull out the dying ones and keep the rest. But then I remembered that the mere touching of the beautiful (and the dying) flowers would likely make the allergies worse still.

But I still love him and I still appreciate my flowers.  I even have photos to remind me of just how beautiful they were.

Here’s to non-sneezy, non-teary eyed days…

I Wasn’t Expecting That: Take II

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Holy Cow!  I was just contacted by one of the networking groups I joined.  First they asked me if I could be their expert at the next meeting, but I have my friend’s wedding that same weekend.  Well, he just responded back to me now inviting me to be their expert on a DVD they’ll be distributing at their local events.

How amazing is that?!?!?  Definitely not something I would have ever expected.  Now I wonder, can I be eloquent under pressure????

Not What I Was Expecting

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But wow!  I just had my first, full-fledged phone call with a public relations gal.  She was pitching me her clients (and one of her best friends) and wow, they’re some fun and interesting women.  Now I have to sit down and figure out just how to reach out to them and utilize their expertise for my site.  We’re talking a cook and multiple cookbook author, skin care line creators, kid clothing and bath products, you name it.

I’m also reaching out to a batch of authors that I’ve recently become aware of.  Hopefully I’ll get some cool interviews out of it.  I have to say, without blogging, I don’t believe I’d have learned about so many new products and new authors.  Totally awesome!

I’m really excited.  It could even be giveaways galore! This is an amazing opportunity I’ve got. Now I need to create a plan on how best to present it to my membership.  Whew! It’s amazing what can happen when you focus and well, just ask.

And speaking of good authors with some great advice…have you heard about Wear Clean Underwear?  It’s a book on estate and family planning – half story, half guidebook.  Perfect for moms and dads to use to ensure that they’re doing all they can to care for their kids should something happen to them.  It’s not the easiest topic to talk about, death, but it’s still something that needs to be done.  So check out her book – if you buy now, I believe she still has some amazing gifts ($1000s worth) available with proof of purchase.

Life Lesson: Don’t Rush the Season

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Logically by now, we should all know this.  But really, how exciting is it to see the first fruit of the season?  Walking through the farmer’s market, I get so excited when the first strawberries appear or the first peaches.  The other day at the grocery store, it was the first of those crazy addictive mini watermelons.  So of course I had to grab one and officially start my summer addiction.

Sadly, it sucked.  It wasn’t sweet.  It was all mealy and dry.  It was a major pain in the ass to even slice up.  Not fun and not tasty.  Not to mention, a totally waste of $3!  Such a disappointment.  During the summer, I blow through two of these babies a month for like 3-4 months.  They’re that good!

My lesson: don’t rush the season.  Luckily, I can take advantage of the farmers markets and taste most of my fruit before I buy.  I can walk away when that peach tastes more like nothing than like peaches.  Don’t believe the hype.  Just because things are in the store (and might even be priced decently), don’t waste your money if it’s not yet the right season.

Friends

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I’ve been thinking about friendships a lot over the past few days.  I’ve decided that honestly, I’ve got the best group of friends that a gal could ask for.  That includes my old friends, my new friends, my online friends and my biz related friends.  Each and every one of them are just wonderful.

In the past six or so months, I’ve really had some awesome support from my friends.  When I went through that crazy stalking shit, they were right by my side.  When I started my own biz, they were there to support me.  And now that my friends are going through some things of their own (separation pending divorce, new business jitters, being up for an entreprenurial award) you better believe that I’m right there for them!

I think my favorite part of friendship is when we can get together (or over the phone or blog or email or whatever) and just share ideas.  To just talk about what’s going great or might not be working in our lives or our business, and share those out-of-the-box ideas…awesome. Nothing can pump this gal up more than chatting with her friends.

A week or so ago I reached out to a newish, biz-related friend (a fellow LWLer).  I had a question about being an expert (Millie) at our upcoming LIVE event.  When she replied to my email, she not only addressed my particular question, but she also said that I should give her a call because she had some ideas about my business.  She had unsolicited ideas to help me make my business a success…Come on, how great is that?!?

I think it’s a great thing when we can all stop thinking about others as our competition and just show support when we can.   There’s more than plenty to go around.  I like to tell folks all the time that if they like me, they’ll like my friends.  Expanding on that, if you like the way I do business and help you, then you’ll also like how my friends do business and help those they know.

There are so many little things in life to be grateful for.  At the top of my list…my friends!

Let the Festivities Continue!

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First, I should be honest.  I’m a birthday whore.  I believe that birthdays should be at least a full week long.  So that means the birthday girl, or boy, gets to do the sort of things that they want to do, eat at the kind of restaurants that they want to eat at, for at least a week.  Yes, I’m one of those.

Of course, I kind of make matters a tad worse since well, our anniversary is mere days before my birthday. So technically, I usually celebrate my birth-a-versary for just over a week, usually from weekend to weekend.  Needless to say, we’ve been a bit busy lately.

Thursday was our actual anniversary.  We just stayed in and enjoyed my slightly dry, but very flavorful, braised short ribs and a kickass bottle of wine.  For the record, next time, I’ll use all the same ingredients, but use the crock pot instead.  As it was we didn’t eat until nearly 9:00PM since I kept waiting for that “fall off the bone” I was advised would happen in that hour of simmering.  Not!  It was nearly 2.5 hours of simmering and still not tender.  Oh well.  It was still tasty.

Friday we typically go out to dinner with one of my husband’s oldest friends (and one of my favorite shopping buddies!!)  She had a hellish week so she decided to work from home and well, chose the non-shower, hanging out in her PJs approach to work attire and just wasn’t up to join us for dinner.  Instead, we headed out to Hermosa Beach for some Pedones Italian.  Very yummy.  From there, we walked along the beach a bit.  Very relaxing.

Saturday was a pretty low key day.  We headed out to the Farmer’s Market in Pasadena and grabbed some brunch at Magpie’s in La Canada (our typical post-Farmer’s Market hang out).  I think we’re there nearly every week.  I love their greek chicken pita and salad and their chicken, mango and papaya salad.  So good.  The hub’s pretty much always orders the breakfast burrito with chorizo.

Saturday night though we headed on over to the Catalina jazz club to hear Marcus Miller (the hubs was also shooting the show).  I’ve heard Marcus play a few times now, both with Herbie Hancock and without.  Once again, it was a great performance (and I’m not even a fan of jazz).  It was the 10:00PM show, so once the show was over, and the chitchat with the band was over, we headed back home (nearly the only car left in the parking garage) it was pretty late – even for this late nighter gal.  Prince showed up briefly – and I do mean briefly.  He was there maybe for all of 2 minutes.  Not sure why he even bothered, but whatever.

Sunday we slept in late, well, after both a 6:0AM and an 8:00AM wakeup do to noises outside.  Hell, we went to bed pretty late as well, so sleeping in was quite lovely.  We just lounged around a bit, caught up on some TV (what did we ever do before the DVR?), and read some of Megan Crane’s new book (so happy to finally read it since she was quite excited about when I interviewed her last year some time).

Sunday evening was dinner at Lala’s Argentine Grill with the girls from book club.  Once again, I’m am so happy knowing that through book club I have one helluva group of friends. It’s so great whenever we get together, whether it’s one on one or in a small group, or at book club.  Really, they’re a great group of ladies that I’m so grateful to call friends.  And for the record, the empanadas and sangria are awesome!

Tonight we’ve got the Paddy Casey and KT Tunstall show at the Wiltern.  The hubs is actually out right now interviewing Paddy for his podcast (they already got the music session at SXSW in March).  He interviewed KT last year or the year before at Austin City Limits.    I believe he’ll also be shooting tonight since he was charging his camera batteries last night.  I was directed (ha!) to pick the hubs up at work around 7:00 so we should head over to the show tonight.  It should be interesting since we rarely see both the opening act and the main performer.  I’m really looking forward to it.

Tomorrow, my actual birthday, I’m cashing in my Christmas spa treat and getting both and hour and a half facial and massage.  I can’t wait!  Talk about being blissed out.  I don’t know if we’ll be doing anything else though since we’ve been so busy this weekend.  I’m thinking it might be worth it to just hang out at home for dinner (thai takeout??) and maybe do a fancy dinner out this weekend when there’s more time to relax.

So there we go…why I haven’t been around much these past couple of days.  I spent today catching up on email and running a few errands.  I’m considering treating my birthday self to a new blog design here.  I mean, this is all so drab and boring because I was hoping for something better.  Well, now I just might take matters into my own hands and make some magic happen.

On that note, I’m off to chill out for a bit before hoping into the shower to leave to get the hubs.  Hope everyone is having a fun week thus far.  As to day is Cinco de Mayo, feel free to raise up that margarita and have a birthday toast to me!!

I’m Just Going to Have to Suck it Up

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For the past week or so, my Google Reader has been on over-drive.  It’s not that there’s any more posts than usual to read – though thanks to Twitter, I have found some new blogs to follow.  It’s  more that I just haven’t really had the time or the desire to catch up.

Currently, I have over 450 posts sitting there begging to be ignored read.  And well, I just don’t think I can swing it.  I’m thinking that I’m just going to have to suck it up and just mark them all as read.  I’m sure I’ll most a lot of good biz-friendly stuff since that’s what more than half of it consists of.  But I can’t deal with the pressure and then the guilt of staring at those numbers day after day.

Consider them marked as read…

*whew* now we can start over again!

Anniversary Flowers

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These are the beautiful (if not overwhelmingly aromatic) lilies that the hubby bought me yesterday for our anniversary. Today, twice as many blooms are opened (making things even more aromatic still) than yesterday, and at least a good dozen flowers are still closed and not yet blooming. I’m sure by Sunday the bouquet will be amazing.

Happy Anniversary Flowers

Hmmm…I wonder if the lovely (if not overwhelming aroma) has anything to do with my allergies going insanely crazy today?