Sadly, I go through this nearly every day. Be warned, this is not work or kid safe, but it is funny…
If the Real World Were an Online Community
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Category Archives: work
It’s 2:30 and I’m Still in My PJs
Ack!! In my defense, I’ve been busy, busy, busy. My site had some malaware issues so I’ve been dealing with that over the past couple of days. Let it be known, I am the beauty, not the brains behind our website and tech-crap is not my strength by any means. But I can fake it with the best of them!
But really, I’m all sorts of proud because I managed to find the offending image and handle it myself. Granted, it didn’t involve anything more complex than contacting the ad agency we use regarding the four new ads that all launched on the day our challenges began. They were then able to isolate which ad it was and wam-o, blam-o it’s fixed and malaware begone!!
So now I’m sitting here after finally managing to inhale some hot dogs (gotta love those Hebrew FF hotdogs and Wonder light buns – yum!) and taking a moment for myself before I jump back into work related stuff. But first, I must get out of these PJs (they’re really not all that comfortable, even as they get bigger as I get smaller, so I’m thinking it might be time to ditch them), put on some real clothes (you know, yoga pants and a tee) and head on over to ‘bucky’s to pick me up a non-fat, pumpkin spice latte!
Happy Hump Day Everyone!
I’ve Gone Blog Wild!
What’s not to love right? You get to babble on about whatever topic happens to be on your mind, or you get to profess to being an expert at something, anything and people read it. On a good day, people even comment on what you’ve written. Sadly, those days seem to be too far and few for my tastes, but hopefully moving to this new URL will help give me a jump. I promise, I don’t bite and I won’t invalidate your thoughts – I’m good like that. Honest.
Thanks to Andy Wibbles and his book, Blog Wild, I’m learning so much more about the blogosphere. More importantly, I’m learning how to use a blog to enhance your business (more on that another day). But better still, I’m learning that you can use a blog as your business site instead of designing a full on website. This has me very intrigued, let me tell you. This is definitely something I’ll be exploring in more detail over the next couple of weeks.
Not only do I enjoy writing blogs, but I also enjoy reading blogs. I love poking around from blog to blog and having that voyeuristic peek into someone else’s life. I haven’t gotten around to updating my blog links yet (though it’s on my list of things to do and will hopefully be done before this goes live), so until then, I thought you might like to check out a couple of my favorite blogs to frequent.
CityView – a friend of mine writes this blog. She’s super busy starting up her own photography business and might not update as much as some folks prefer, but who cares. She’s a talented photographer and she has a lot of whimsy in her photos. She also shares some fun sites from around the web.
How About Orange – speaking of sites that CityView likes to share…she led me to this crafty gal. Check out the post around her condo, she’s got some style. She tends to kill her plants, but that doesn’t stop her from trying again with a new batch. For that inner CraftyGrrl you’re hoping to embrace, she’s got quite a few fun tutorials on her site as well (just in time for the holiday season *hinthint*)
Mighty Gal – I’ve been a fan of her Mighty Goods site with all the fun gadgets and what not. But I have to say, I like reading about the day to day stuff. And for those of you that seem to hit the occasional brain-fart when trying to come up with a blog topic or something fun to write about, check out her No One Cares What You Had for Lunch: 100 Ideas for your Blog. It’s just got enough to spark those writing cells up again.
ljcblog – yet another crafty gal. Though this one loves food – especially fun foods – and travels a lot. She’s always got a fun story, a new product or some great photos to share.
Mom-101 – I found this blog just a month or so ago when researching the recent Blogher conference. While mommy blogs typical aren’t my thing (child-free here), she’s got a wealth of knowledge on a variety of topics. She’s really knows a lot about the blogging world. And you know what? She makes being a mom sound fun (sometimes exhausting, but rewarding and fun).
Snarkspot – What’s not to love, it’s Jennifer Weiner?!? She sounds like everyone’s best friend and her day to day stories just crack me up. Even if I didn’t love her books, I’d have to love her blog.
Crazy Aunt Purl – I’ve been linking my site’s blog to her for quite some time now, but only recently have I started to read it myself. I don’t know what I like more, that she can make sitting in traffic on the 101 funny or that she’s crafty? I’m bound and determined to learn how to knit, so you never know, I just might see her at the next Stitch & Bitch (she’s a local, Valley girl). Speaking of being local, she’s got a new book out and will be at the Grove Thursday, Oct 11th. I’m hoping to stop buy and get a couple books signed (hoping to do a giveaway on our site).
This is by no means my definitive list – I keep changing things up – but it’s a good list to get you started. Hope you enjoy these blogs as much as I do.
How Do You Prefer Things to Be?
In order to effect true positive change in your experience, you must disregard how things are – as well as how others are seeing you – and give more of your attention to the way you prefer things to be.
This will be my focus for today. I seem to have quite a few things knocking at my door and pulling me in different directions. But today, today I will give my attention to the way that I’d prefer things to be.
In fact, today, I’ll be writing that list. Heck, if a list can help attract a mate or a great job (really, I highly suggest it!), then why not use it to focus your energy on the very things you want to attract, right? The key is to focus and not let other concerns, challenges, issues or thoughts pull that focus away.
So what will your attention be on? How do you prefer things to be?
Practicing Gratitude
After having spent a wonderful, if not hot, extended weekend with the hubby, I’m thinking it’s time to show some gratitude (and maybe a little meditation later).
* I am so happy and grateful for my awesome husband and boys. They may sometimes seem to drive me crazy, but really, they’re the best.
* I am so happy and grateful for the change in the weather. Over the next couple days, it will be 10-20 degrees cooler!! I’m SO happy ’bout that. And of course, I’m thrilled to be sleeping in something cooler than 85 in the bedroom.
* I’m so happy and grateful for my work and my upcoming endeavors. Things are really moving along and I’m loving it!
* I’m so happy and grateful for my friends. I love being able to visit with them or being able to just pick up the phone to chat. It’s great knowing that we’re each others’ support systems. It’s good to know where to turn when you need support.
* I’m so happy and grateful that things are financially going along well. Of course, I’m open to anything that the Universe wishes to provide us with, knowing it’s for the good of all involved.
* I’m also so happy and grateful for the killer bargains I’ve gotten over the past couple of days. So much so that I just had to share them with others.
* Overall, I’m just so happy and grateful to just Be.
Screw Thursday Thirteen – Let’s Try to Podcast (not!)
I am not a geek. I’m just a cheap imitation of one.
No really. I spent all damn day between the tutorials and the actual editing of my CC interview with Megan Crane. Then the hubby comes home, offers to help with one little bit and the next thing I know, he wants me to totally re-edit from scratch because *this one* has better sound quality. So I did. And yes, I knew it would take me longer than the 10 minutes it might take him. Thankfully, I still had my time stamp notes.
Of course, when I was finished he basically just asked me why it sounded like content was missing (it was) and then complained that my editing sucks – all of course, leaving me on the verge of tears (to be fair, he didn’t say it “sucks” but you know, it still hurt to hear since I’d at it for 2 hours tonight on top of all.damn.day already). So I threw a very mature fit ranting that my first edit was much better and why couldn’t I just use the original one. I’m sure he didn’t believe me, but at this point we were left with two options; I go back to the original edit or he completely takes over and edits everything (or the third option, I just flat out lose it).
My stubborn, Taurean pride stepped in, of course, I and chose to go back to the original edit (since it wasn’t missing major chunks of content). So two hours later it’s finally good to go. Now of course, he needs to upload it to the server, then install a plug in on the blog and THEN, finally, I can post the damn thing and walk away. What a major event. I knew there was a reason I wanted to have a margarita with dinner and not that diet pepsi.
I have to be honest here, I’m just not sure it’s worth it. While I love the concept and the interviewing process, I just don’t seem to have what it takes for editing. My eyes, ears and fingers just don’t seem to want to work together (much like with video games). And sometimes I just have a hell of a time wrapping my head around technological crap.
And now it’s 1:10 AM and he’s got it up on the site. Only he of course doesn’t like the sound quality, so he’s doing a quick overall edit (for the second time, mind you – full circle back to the original mess that had me in tears…or so it might seem). I’m exhausted from being locked in the un-air conditioned room all damn day in this crazy heat taxing my brain. I just want a good book and my bed.
So yeah, while I might appear to be a computer geeky gal, really, I’m just a poser. How sad is that?
Thursday Thirteen – About Me
1. I’m a Jersey Girl, born and bred, though you’ll rarely catch the accent.
2. You will generally only hear the Jersey when I’m either very drunk, very excited or very emotional.
3. I left Jersey when my family moved to GA my sophomore year in college.
4. The Atlanta, GA area is still my favorite place to live though I wasn’t nearly as social as I’ve been while living elsewhere.
5. When I was an undergrad, I couldn’t decide if I wanted to be an elementary teacher or a DJ.
6. I decided to go with being a teacher, but man do I miss being on air, even now, nearly 20 years later.
7. I taught 4th grade for 3 years in inner-city, Atlanta.
8. I pretty much hated teaching there – mostly due the lack of administrative and parental support and the lack of respect from the overall student population.
9. But I love the teachable moment – just not the lesson plan, teach the test sort of thing.
10. I went from teaching to working in the mental health field.
11. I’ve worked closely with substance abusers, domestic violence offenders and the developmentally disabled population.
12. While I enjoyed working with the developmentally disabled population the best, I also don’t feel like I was able to directly help my clients enough, yet often felt drained at the end of the day.
13. I still miss working with people to help them to get educated and to make positive changes in their life.
Can They Still be Called Mean Girls if They’re Now Adults?
I know it may look like I was being, like, a bitch, but that’s only because I was acting like a bitch – Mean Girls
A week or so ago I made some changes on our website. For some reason that I’ve yet to understand, folks freaked out – guess it’s that whole fear of change thing. But more interestingly, it gave the Mean Girls of our community just the sort of space they needed to stir up some trouble and look down on others. It’s recently come to my attention that these Mean Girls (no really, that’s how they refer to themselves!) needed to create their own space where they can privately laugh about others and well, just be mean.
Yesterday, I finished reading a book appropriately called Frenemies by Megan Crane. And of course, this book was about adult women and how there will always be That Girl – you know, the bitchy, perfectly coiffed, perfect boyfriend, perfect job, kind of gal that always feels she’s better than everyone else. Between the book and the recent activities on my site, I have to say that I just don’t get it.
I mean, can any happy, well-adjusted adult really be all that happy or well-adjusted if they can only find joy in being mean and looking down on others? Can acting like a middle schooler in their day to day interactions really help them find happiness and feel better about themselves? How can they not see that the way they treat others makes them look like horrible people? How can their husbands, friends, family and co-workers enjoy spending time with them? Does it really help them to feel better about themselves?
I’d think this is really just a small portion of the world, you know, an isolated incident. But really, many books have been written on the subject. There are books on how mean young girls are being towards each other and even books on how women sabotage other women in their lives. When does it stop? Is it really just about being the Queen Bee?
As cliche as it sounds, why can’t we all just get along? Why can’t we celebrate the successes of our fellow women? Why can’t we be happy with what we have and not define ourselves through the pain of others. Forget about that glass ceiling, we’re our own worst enemies (or so it would seem).
Me, I say the more the merrier and to each their own. ‘Cause baby, I’ve just got to be me!
From Inside the Inbox
Is it just me, or does anyone else get satisfaction from have all of your email messages read with nothing pending your attention? Or maybe it’s more like glee than satisfaction. The sad thing, I hate deleting mail. I always think that I just might need something, oh, I don’t know, in a year or so. Thank god you can search so easily with gmail.
Of course, I also like to be organized (now there’s a surprise I’m sure) and have about 10 folders going at any one time. Now if I could only get all my filters to work exactly the way I want them to. Then I’d be in email heaven.
Thursday Thirteen – Things that Make Me Smile
Thirteen Things that Make Me Smile
1. My husband doing his goofy, white-boy dance
2. My pupster smiling when he’s tummy up getting love
3. When our cat tries to snuggle with our dog
4. Reading praise for my website
5. Phone calls and emails from old friends
6. Reading a good book
7. Good chocolate
8. Finding a bargain
9. The first sip of a well-made margarita
10. Taking a great picture
11. A beautiful LA day after a rain
12. Tulips
13. Fitting into a smaller size