Posted in Rants, tagged Facebook, Home, Housewife, Manhattan, Marissa Meyer, New York Magazine, Sheryl Sandberg, Skype on March 19, 2013 | 8 Comments »
Image via CrunchBase
Sheryl Sandberg wants us to Lean In. Marissa Meyer wants us to come in (to the office, that is.). New York Magazine wants to reignite the Mommy Wars by re-branding them as being between those who lean out and those who lean in.
But the truth is, the distinction between leaning out or in, working in the home, from the home, at an office, virtually or not at all…it’s all moot. There is a whole new category of working woman: the digital housewife. (more…)
Posted in Charity, tagged Beccarama, Emergency department, Emergency Rooms, Facebook, Infant, Julia Beck, Linda Grant, Mom Trends. SelfishMom, Pediatric Emergency Care, RBaby Foundation, Rebecca Martin, Sweden, Twitter, United States on May 5, 2012 | 1 Comment »
I know it’s hard to believe, but sometimes being a blogger brings things that are even better than swag: like the ability to participate in this year’s R Baby Foundation Gala. Before I say anything more, look at this:
Yes, that’s me, looking all earnest. But it’s kind of hard not to be earnest about this charity, because what they do, is work to make every emergency department in every hospital equipped to treat babies. You probably thought they already were. I did. But they aren’t. And how’s this fact? Babies born in the US are twice as likely to die than many other developed countries, including Sweden, Japan and Spain; the United States is ranked 36th among 196 nations. That is sad. And wrong.
But this is the statistic that really gets me: Children make up 27% of all emergency department (ED) visits, but only 6% of EDs in the U.S. have the necessary supplies for pediatric emergencies.
Six Percent. That means 94 percent of the time someone takes their baby to the hospital, that hospital is not fully equipped to take care of them. Not equipped to take care of a baby. Think about that. Scary.
So that’s why I’m involved with the organization, and with the Gala this coming week honoring my friendand tireless advocate Julia Beck. I’m joining other bloggers like Esti Berkowitz, Amy Oztan, Jessica Shyba, Melissa Chapman, Linda Grant, Nicole Feliciano, Rebecca Martin, Jennifer Perillo, Rebecca Levey and many more to help raise awareness about the charity…and the babies.
You can help, too. First, Sign the petition to improve pediatric care. Then,
Follow us on Twitter
https://twitter.com/#!/rbabyfoundation
Follow us on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/RBabyFoundation
Grab our blogger badge: (it’s at the bottom of the home page)
http://www.rbabyfoundation.org/
Read and share our tips
http://www.rbabyfoundation.org/resources-3.php
Join us for our 5 star gala:
http://www.rbabyfoundation.org/fivestargala.php
Donate
http://www.rbabyfoundation.org/about-donate.php
We’re talking babies here, people. And as someone who comes from a family where once, long ago, a baby did die, I know the lasting effect it has on a family. No family should have to deal with the loss of a child because a hospital isn’t prepared. Don’t just read this and shake your head. Click the links. Donate. Don’t let the babies down. -
Posted in Humor, Social Media, tagged Facebook, Social media, Twitter on February 29, 2012 | 2 Comments »
Only some of you will “get” this. But for those that do…it was a surreal moment when this message came through:
On a more serious note – I actually think it’s kind of a good reminder that Social Media is terrific, and I love it, and I’ve written about how much I love it more than once. But it’s still all run with a computer program. Sp no matter what Facebook thinks. No matter what info it sells to its clients – messages like this one prove that these services don’t really know us.
I find that oddly reassuring.
But Twitter - Beccasara and I are together CONSTANTLY. We talk constantly when we are not together. We DM each other all day long. We have KidzVuz together, and The Blogging Angels, and we’re actual friends. So seriously, Twitter, get with the times!
Posted in Charity, tagged Africa, AIDS, Antiretroviral drug, Bono, Facebook, Her Bad Mother, HIV, Mom it Forward, One Moms, Selfishmom, Sub-Saharan Africa on December 13, 2011 | 6 Comments »
I took this last Christmas in Kailesha, South Africa
Think about all the time you spend sending messages. There are the obvious ones – like the emails, the texts, the tweets, the Facebook posts. And there are the not so obvious ones – like the message you send your daughter every time you complain about your weight. Or the message you send your neighbor every time you’re too busy to look up from your cell phone to say hello. The message you send to the government every time you vote. The music you listen to sends a message; so do the clothes you wear and the car you drive. We send messages all the time.
So why not send a message that can make a difference?
Today, I’m participating in One’s 12 Days of Change: 12 ways to give back and change the world, without getting on a plane, without too much strain or disruption of your own life, without writing a check. Each day of the campaign, a ONE Mom blogger will announce a simple action you can take to make the world just a little bit better. So far, there have been posts from SelfishMom (not so Selfish after all, is she?), Upper Case Woman, The Culture Mom, Coast to Coast Mom, Mom it Forward Love that Max, and Her Bad Mother (not so bad, I’m guessing). I’m day nine, and my mandate is this: to get people to take a moment to send a message to people on the front lines of the fight against AIDS – to the people working the combat and control the disease in Africa – to let them know that they are appreciated and not forgotten.
It’s simple: leave a message of thanks or encouragement in the comment section below, and the kind folks at One (yes, that’s Bono‘s organization) will deliver the message to the people battling the disease every day.
I’ll start: Here’s my message:
Be proud. Because look what you’ve accomplished already:
These are encouraging, wonderful statistics. And they send a message. A message that you have been working hard. A message that it’s working, that fewer people are getting sick, fewer babies are born sick, more people are getting the medication they need to live long, full, lives. So be proud. Be strong. Be assured that your work is neither in vain, nor taken for granted. You are making a difference in the world.
Now it’s your turn, readers. Your kind words to these health-care and aid workers can make a difference, too. So leave a comment. Tell these people you appreciate them. Then tweet out this post and tell your friends to do the same. Because wouldn’t it be nice to make a difference by making someone feel good? By showing someone just how many people over here care about what’s happening over there? (Remember, it won’t just live on this blog, One will deliver it to AIDS workers in Africa.)
After you leave a comment, encourage others to do the same by tweeting out this:
! @hip2housewife is sending messages of thanks to those fighting AIDS in Africa. Click over & add yours. http://ht.ly/7X96P #12daysofchange
And don’t forget to leave your own message. One Voice can make a difference. Why not let it be yours?
Posted in Social Media, Uncategorized, tagged Clever Girls Collective, Facebook, how social media changed my life, Internet Marketing, Social media, Social network, Twitter on June 21, 2011 | 17 Comments »
Thank you to BING Social Search for sponsoring my post about social media. I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity, as I do.
How many social media junkies does it take to change a light bulb?
None. Their backlit keyboards are all the light they need.
Come on, admit it. You can identify. There are times when all of us social media junkies forgo “the real world” for the virtual one, and find our way by the light of whatever screen we can get a hold of. But who’s to say that’s a bad thing?
For nearly 20 years, I worked as a writer/producer in what I not-so-affectionately call “the armpit of television” – creative services. I wrote and produced :30 second spots for Lifetime “She thought she had everything…until…” helped launch HBO Family: “TV that won’t make you blush,” watched countless hours of baseball games from the 1970’s for ESPN Classic “Are you Old School?” I even worked at “A Current Affair;” Katchung! I always thought that eventually, I’d come out of the armpit and into the light. But I never did. Writing promos never lead to anything other than more promos and more and more. And while I had my TV friends, and was part of the relatively small NYC TV community, I never felt connected.
When my kids started Kindergarten I stopped working (backwards, you say? Long story, I answer.) And that put me into a different kind of pit. One which I was struggling to claw out of, to find some vestige of my former self…my any self. Full time motherhood made me feel rudderless, like I was sinking into a pit of nobody-ness. Even the old TV armpit was looking good.
Social Media changed all that. Four years into blogging, I have a huge, supportive community of women who love to write, women who get that being a mom doesn’t mean that’s the only thing you are. Women who I may never have met, but who are my friends. I have a voice, an identity – I’m Hip to Housewife, and I’m out of the pits. (more…)
Posted in Social Media, tagged Facebook, For Your Consideration, Humor, Melissa Leo, Online Communities, Social media, Social Networking, Twitter, twitter humor on February 26, 2011 | 6 Comments »
There are hundreds of social media experts out there, and thousands of rules. There are SEO experts who will tell you the rules to follow to optimize your blog’s visibility, Twitter experts who will explain rules of how to get more followers, Facebook aficionados who know the difference between a page and a profile, and the rules for using each.
And hidden among those 1000′s of rules are the ones that really matter: the social media truths. No rules. No “what to do’s.” Just the plain, unvarnished, indisputable truth about social media.
Social Media Truth #1: If you sit down to Twitter before you go to the gym, you won’t make it to the gym.
Twitter is a big, giant time suck. By the time you realize an hour has gone by, you’ll no longer have time to go to the gym. And depending on who you are, that’s either an excellent excuse, or a big bummer.
Social Media Truth #2: There is such a thing is TMTI: Too Much Tweeted Information. No one wants to read your Tweets from the bathroom, or from the bedroom, for that matter. No one needs to be tweeted from the delivery room between contractions. And do you honestly think we need to know the gory details of your yeast infection/athlete’s foot/other gross affliction? No. We don’t.
Social Media Truth #3: If you tweet, or update your Facebook status during your child’s basketball game, you will miss him or her sinking the final basket to win the championship game 37 to 36.
It always happens when you’re not looking.
Social Media Truth #4: If you pity-like someone on Facebook, they will write inanities on your wall EVERY DAY forever and ever. And since you’re the kind of person who pity-likes people in the first place that leads me to….
Social Media Truth #5: If you pity-like someone on Facebook, you will never have the heart to unlike them, no matter how annoying they are.
You FB liked that annoying guy from High School because you felt guilty for still thinking of him, all these years later, as “that annoying guy from high school.” Now, he’s that annoying guy on Facebook. Nice work.
Social Media Truth #6: If to you, getting poked only means someone said hi via Facebook, you’re on Facebook too much.
‘Nuff said.
Social Media Truth #7: Your virtual friends will always be there for you…because they don’t have to be anywhere for you. They can be wherever they are. If they had to show up, you might find out they aren’t as “there” as you thought they were.
It’s the existential social media truth. Eat your heart out Jean Paul Sartre.
Social Media Truth #8: If you can find the octothorpe on your computer without looking at the keyboard, but you don’t even know what the word octothorpe means, you need to get off social media for a moment and get to a library. Read a book, dude. Seriously. (it’s this thing “#” by the way)
Social Media Truth #9: Unless you’re tweeting to raise money for a charity or awareness about something essential to the betterment of mankind, asking people to “please RT” is the social media equivalent of Melissa Leo’s ill-conceived “For Your Consideration” Oscar ads.
Social Media Truth #10: If every time anything happens to you, your first thought is to post it, tweet it, or Facebook it, you need to get out more.
If the only people who care that you won a Nobel/got engaged/had a baby/baked a cake are virtual friends, you’re gonna be really out of luck when you need actual people to show up for the Nobel ceremony/baby shower/birthday party.
Social Media Truth #11: If you chose a profile picture that doesn’t look anything like you, this will backfire.
How will it backfire? You will meet people, and immediately see the “I thought she was better looking” look on their face. You will show up somewhere and someone will say “I thought you were younger.” You will start to think you really do look like the profile picture version of yourself and be gravely disappointed when you see a picture of your real, true self.
Social Media Truth #12: If, one day, you (or a friend of yours) post embarrassing pictures of you on Facebook, that will be the day every person you ever knew will decide to find out what ever happened to you. And they will think that what happened to you is that you turned into a horrible lush too stupid to realize that once it’s up on Facebook, it’s there forever.
Got any more Social Media truths? Lay ‘em on me!
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Posted in Aging, tagged Facebook, French Woods, memories, old friends, procrastination, reconnecting, Stumble Upon on July 30, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Humiliating though it may be, I’ve only just discovered the joys of procrastinating with Facebook. Oh, I know all about procrastinating with Stumble Upon, or Snood, or obsessively checking my email. But this Facebook thing – well, it’s brough time-wasting to a whole new level. Plus, it’s made me realize that everybody I’ve ever known knows somebody I know. Really. Six degrees of eat-no-bacon! Jewish geography hits the internet!
I have found SO MANY people that I haven’t seen, thought of, or heard about in DECADES.
And now that I’ve found them…..well, I’m not quite sure what to do.
There is definitely a SERIOUSLY HUGE OMG factor. Especially the camp people. I discovered that there is a Facebook group for French Woods Festival of the Performing Arts Alums from the 1970′s. Whoa. Yes, it’s been THAT long. And yet there are quite a few of us still waxing poetic about our camp days. What does that say about us? That we’re the theatrical equivalent of HS Jocks who can’t let go of the big game? ”Remember back in ’76 when I played Mary Poppins? The crowd wasn’t expecting such a performance, but I had them from the get-go!” You can almost see the scotch in my hand and smell the cheap perfume in the air.
Or maybe it’s just plain old nostalgia. For me, it has been, all joking aside, kind of thrilling to hear from people I haven’t seen for more than 25 years. People with whom I spent every summer bonding with as we put on show after show. Camp was the only place I was in the “popular crowd,” and man, did it feel good. If we’d been allowed to pick a lunch table, I would have been with the big shots. Being able to sing was like being on the cheerleading squad: instant cred.
But I’m kind of worried — what if we can’t get past “how’ve you been for all these years I never once thought of you or you of me?” What if the OMG factor is all there is? Will it spoil those memories if I meet these people today and the magic is gone?
I don’t know — but I think I’m gonna have to find out. The “Middle Aged French Woods Reunion Party,” or the “If you’re old enough to have worn tube tops Party” or maybe just the “Damn it was Fun back Then” party.
Yeah, I’d go to that.
