Saturday, December 17, 2011

Take a Flying Leap - Sky Zone Indoor Trampoline Park Atlanta - WEEE!

I promise I WOULD have jumped on the 36,000 Square Feet of Tramponines at Atlanta's new Sky Zone indoor trampoline park, except I was terrified I'd jack up my knee right before Christmas. Either that or I'd never be able to heft myself out of the foam pit.

There were old people like us, say over the age of 30, or 40, (or more), who dared to leap and toss dodge balls or jump and dunk basketballs.

I did the next best thing to jumping and took a friend and four teens who went NUTS with the leaping. The best part? An hour of jumping tired the kids out so that they were ALMOST quiet on the way home.


 

Saturday, December 10, 2011

Friday, December 09, 2011

Welcome Returning Sailors Home through Live Streaming Video

It's not a Sailor's Life for Me!: Saturday 10 November 2011 10 a.m. the USS George H...: Saturday 10 November 2011 10 a.m. the USS George H.W. Bush returns to homeport in Norfolk, VA. The Navy LiveStream Channel takes family and ...

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Blogger is not a dirty word

It's not a Sailor's Life for Me!: Blogger is not a dirty word: After reading Captain Luther's message to "Families and Friends," comments were decidedly for or against one version of the truth. Fence rid...

Thursday, November 10, 2011

It's not a Sailor's Life for Me!: Veteran's Day 2011

It's not a Sailor's Life for Me!: Veteran's Day 2011: As noble as it can be to honor our fallen veterans, it's also honorable to protect and speak out for those who are actively serving our coun...

It's not a Sailor's Life for Me!: Chamber Pots and the Space Age

It's not a Sailor's Life for Me!: Chamber Pots and the Space Age: When the United States Navy was first formed, hundreds of years ago, sailors did not have space-age, vacuum toilets on their ships, but this...

Tuesday, July 05, 2011

there once was a time...

I haven't posted here in a long time, although a decade ago, I had a strong presence on this blog. A decade ago, when Jeneane Sessum brought me in to help her get Blog Sisters rolling, there seemed to be so many societal and political issues that we couldn't wait to discuss. Just, for example, check out the posts on this blog in July of nine years ago, when we were really rolling.

Of course, blogging was relatively new then, and those of us women who jumped on that band wagon were usually ones of strong and well-versed opinion who, while we might be moms and wives, opted to share, in this blog and in our own, less of those parts or our lives and more of our more intellectually creative and adventuresome pursuits. We questioned; we challenged; we ranted.

How times have changed in so much of the blogosphere!

Except the same issues still exist to plaque us as women. Yet somehow our voices have quieted. Maybe, with Facebook and Twitter etc. etc., there's just too much noise out there with which to compete.

But the same issues still exist, and I am motivated here to share a situation and discussion going on in several blogs and even on youtube.

Beause I'm a feminist and a humanist, because I still, on occasion, rant, I invite you to start here and link backward to discover what young feminist, humanist, atheist, and skeptic Rebecca Watson has stirred up among those who still think deep, blog wide, and rant fearlessly.

We used to be thinkers here on Blog Sisters -- thinkers and critics and fearless ranters. What happened?

Germinating Memories - Social Media Hindsight

I have an interesting view of mommy blogging because I started blogging in 2001 as a mommy before there were 'mommy bloggers.' While early blogging was therapeutic, the best thing I got from the experience were a gaggle of great friends I still have today. And what I will always have from the experience are great memories.
REMEMBERING THE CAR-VAN
Back in 2007, Dodge ran a campaign to get mom bloggers into their new 2008 Dodge Grand Caravans, and I was lucky enough to be one of the few moms to plop my then-9-year-old and her friends into the coolest van on the planet for a week (she remembers it as a month) for free courtesy of Dodge and Matchstick Marketing, which named me one of Atlanta's 50 most influential women bloggers. [shut up and stop giggling; I clean up nice.]
We LOVED having that van. I blogged the experience not because they told me to or required it, but because it was so much fun taking preteen girls around town as they sat at the table in the back and squeeled with delight that I had to write about it.
I am laughing out loud just now remembering how Jenna kept pronouncing it as "car-van" instead of Carivan.
SO WHAT DID DODGE GET OUT OF IT?
In using our experience for their early social media marketing efforts, Dodge didn't convert a sale; they didn't gain a spokesperson. Nor did they make me famous or give me money.
They did something way smarter - they gave my family a memory.
They gave an ordinary mom a cape and made her a super hero and she didn't forget.
They gave an ordinary kid a ride through time she never forgot.
And they made that 9-year-old a fan before she even knew enough about cars to care.
CUT TO 2011...
Even though the video is still on YouTube, it was four years ago. Next year she-who-loved-the-car-van-most-of-all will be driving.
This passage of time is most interesting of all because:
1) I am still driving my same old car I was then. It's turning 10 years old.
2) I am looking to buy a car next week.
3) After scouring car lot after car lot, sitting in Infinities and Flexes and Sequoias and Explorers and Elements and more, I still hadn't found "the" car as of yesterday.
4) Jenna came car shopping with me yesterday, saw the Grand Caravan from a distance among hundreds of other cars, and ran to it like an old lost favorite blankie -- she peered in the tinted windows and yelled: THIS IS IT! THIS IS THE 2008 DODGE CARAVAN WE DROVE FOR A MONTH!
5) I said, no, a week, not a month. She said, YES it was a MONTH, and according to her imaginary wish clock it was. And she was sure it might even be the same van, even though I'm pretty sure it wasn't.
7) I am going to test-drive it (re-test-drive-it?). I half expect to see old McDonalds fries she left under the seat.
8) I am really considering buying it.
DECONSTRUCTING SOCIAL MEDIA PROMOTION
I have learned several things:
It felt great to be valued.
It felt even better to be shown value.
Mommy bloggers, they never really wanted you - they came for your babies.
If you want a customer later, make a memory with them now.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Jak is a rockstar - here's the proof!

Jak's first EVER "concert" - not bad after four lessons!!

they are growing up too fast!! and Jak is a rockstar!

Here are the three terrors at the Natural history museum in Oxford during February half term.

India is trying to outscream the dinosaurs!!

India won....

and Jak gave his first ever guitar performance two days ago!!!

they ae growing up so fast! and Jak, the budding rockstar!

Here are the three terrors at the Natural history museum in Oxford during February half term.

India is trying to outscream the dinosaurs!!

India won....

and Jak gave his first ever guitar performance two days ago!!!

Saturday, February 26, 2011

What to tell your kid about dying, when you don't believe in heaven.

(cross-posted at Kalilily Time)

Your eight-year old can't go to sleep because he's crying so hard. He's crying so hard because, he says, he doesn't want to ever die and he doesn't want anyone he knows to ever die because he doesn't want to be alone.

You don't really believe in "God," and don't believe in heaven. You're not religious, and the Golden Rule is about the closest you come to embracing any doctrine, although you try to pass along a moral and ethical code that you hope he understands and continues to live by.

But what about "after?" What about after this life? What do you tell your eight-year old that will calm his fears without outright lying?

What you do is write a book that explains who and what we are in a way that will address his fears yet still be in the realm of what might actually and scientifically happen. ( After all, Carl Sagan thought so.)

And you call this book Spark.



Go over online and read through Spark -- and see if it's the answer you're looking for.

Monday, February 21, 2011

Puzzle Pieces of Social Media: Twitter, FB, Blogging

Puzzle Pieces of Social Media: Twitter, FB, Blogging

When I started blogging back in 2002, there were still many people who would say, "You do WHAT?!" when I said the the word "blog." I remember driving to work one day and hearing someone in 2003 say the word "blog" on the radio and knowing it was the first time I'd heard someone in the mainstream media talk about it. Of course, back then most of the people in "MSM" were making fun of blogging and bloggers, or saying derisive things. The 2004 elections pushed blogging out there to the forefront, but still, even then there were so few bloggers compared to now.

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

The History of the Universe as Told by Wonderwoman



The production of an independent film, titled above, depends on the filmmakers raising $10,000 by the end of the month. As a Wonder Woman fan since 1957, I'm looking forward to seeing this film, and I even donated. You can too.

This is how the filmmakers describe their project:

The goal of the film is to explore how female heroes have fared in popular culture. We're using Wonder Woman as the central figure in this story, as she's the rare example of a female hero who doesn't require rescue and determines her own actions and adventures. The film not only serves as an inquiry into our evolving values about women as agents of strength, authority and leadership, but also reminds us of our common need -- no matter our gender, race, class or sexual orientation -- for stories that tell us we can all be heroes.


You can donate as little as a dollar or as much as you want. $35 or more gets you a free signed DVD of the completed movie. Watch the trailer. You'll be hooked.

Monday, January 31, 2011

Gave Blog Sisters a Little Facelift...

Seemed since I was "dehoarding" my house this past month (should be done in about ten more months), it would be a good time to stop by and do some template refreshing to take advantage of Blogger's new template designs.

I've been reading some great stuff - keep up the great writing and sharing with the nearly 250 other women bloggers who call this place a home away from home, or sometimes getaway.

Monday, May 03, 2010

Operatic Verse

If you enjoy writing (or reading) limericks, you might have a good time with my latest Limerick-Off.

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Political April Fools' Day

April Fools' Day is coming up on April 1st, and you'll want to be prepared. After all, you don't want to fall victim to any political practical jokes. My Political April Fools Day limerick should help.

Monday, March 22, 2010

Addled Threats

Now that health reform has passed, are you all intimidated by Republican threats to do stuff they've been doing all along? (There's a limerick, of course.)

Monday, March 01, 2010

Snow in Austin...really!

Plumpest snow globs I've ever seen this far south. It was rather surreal. A bit like the 3" long rocket-shaped hail last winter. Extreme weather is thrilling. Scary. And it's going to get more extreme. Been through Missouri tornadoes, hurricanes, wildfires and earthquakes, desert floods, Austin floods, blizzards, mudslides, El Nino, La Nina, droughts, and forest fires. There's a wild joy in nature busting loose, even when there is real danger. Somehow the primordial elements seem more in the order of things, rather than say, a car wreck.


(Austin, TX, February 2010)

Notice how green it is, even though it's snowing. Reminds me of a March--gee, 17 years ago--when I flew to Austin from NJ to attend Paul B's last party. We had been through 23 separate snow storms since New Year's Eve, with ice still on all but the major highways. As the plane dropped into the old Mueller airport, something felt off-kilter. Once we dropped below the clouds, it was emerald green as far as the eye could see. There wasn't a sprig of green in Jersey. A lush 18 inch thick carpet of grass stunned my snow-accustomed eyes. Bluebonnets hadn't yet bloomed, but it was obviously going to be a bumper year. Much like this spring will be.

After years of relentless sunshine, heat and cold, withered plants and panting trees, Austin is a different animal this winter, metamorphosed by rain. Only in Texas skies can the color gray be described as vibrant. Light lends a different character to colors under the lowering clouds, intensifying and showcasing the metamorphosed earth. Moss covers live oaks like a coat of paint, contrasting with the wet, velvet black bark. Rainbows shimmer in the humid air. Gray glows argent, like burnished silver jewelry. Neighborhood cats, thick coats sprinkled with fairy dust, perfect muddy footprints trailing up and over my white car. A bird flutes a surprised, subdued query to unaccustomed early morning rain.

Grackle flurries restlessly prowl in the twilight, one eye on the dumpsters outside the eateries close to the river, one leg on trees perilously bending under the weight of tens of thousands of the buggers, moving like black schools of fish, pulled apart and collapsing together again like taffy, yet somehow  averting mid-air collisions and managing not to knock a neighbor off a perch.

New buildings loom over downtown like giant, shiny tinker-toys. Or maybe metallic mushrooms. The currently tallest one looks suspiciously like a flash drive standing on end. Folks coming to SX won't believe how the skyline has changed in just one year. There's something vaguely nauseating about how much building is going on, when news from other towns describes a completely different story. Where is all the money coming from? Who will populate the buildings? Will they fill as quickly as they went up? Will it be a repeat of the 80's, when the original "skyscrapers" went up, only to stand empty and forlorn for who knows how long?

Changes abound. Weddings and births, changes in circumstances. Can't control the weather, really can't control anyone but your own self. Wish life came with seatbelts. I'm gonna enjoy the ride anyway.




































What to do with teenagers when roller skating gets old? SkyZone!

As the mother of a teenage daughter, figuring out activities that give ME a break, are nearby, don't involve computers and cell phones...