The Bloggess

The First, perhaps to become annual, Social Media Day


is today. Or so Facebook and The Bloggess tell me. And that alone makes it true.

I’m not so sure the advent of Social Media as a primary venue for human interaction is something to get all “rah-rah” about. After all, it can only lead to this in the end:

If it hasn’t already for some of us.

Not knocking the brave new world. I met my husband on the Internet, as some of you know, and many good friends exist only across time and space with the help of powerful satellites and Al Gore.

Just a caution I’m throwing out.

So, happy social media day. IM or text your favorite virtual friend. Tweet goodwill to all and update that neglected status bar for the hundreds and hundreds of people you’ll never meet.

But consider taking a walk and doing some Sun Salutations while you’re at it.

Namaste.

But Will It Play in the Bible Belt?


I haven’t been picked up for syndication via 50 something Moms in a while. It’s been bumming me out a bit frankly. I would like to say I write simply to hone my craft but the truth is I write to be read, and the more people who read me, the happier I am. Syndication is a chance to be more widely read and as I stated – I haven’t been picked up  for a couple of months now.

Three months. Not that I am counting.*

As I was reading a draft for Rob the other night, he remarked that I might want to tone down my language because I used the words bejeezus, hell and fat bastard. Just for effect and it was a funny. If I am going to mommyblog**, I am going to have fun with it.

“Why? I am just trying to be funny,” I was whining a bit because I don’t often try to be funny and succeed and because like most writers, I hate to cut what I think are good lines that work.

“Because I think it’s what’s keeping you from being picked up again. A lot of the papers that ran your early stuff were in the south. Not just Bible Belt but buckle and notches.”

Now I was confused. The Bloggess is more profane than I am – she posts kitty porn and holds discussions on Jesus’s sperm – and she lives in Texas. It doesn’t get redder or deeper in the pants than the belt that is holding up East Texas.

“When we were living in Kansas, Shelley liked to say that we weren’t just living in the Bible Belt but we were on its buckle. One time shortly after we moved there, and they still hadn’t figured out that our religious affiliation really was ‘none of the above’, a neighbor asked Shelley to help out with a school bake sale. They were driving somewhere together and the woman mentioned that she only baked for sales because she didn’t enjoy it. Shelley replied that she did and she sometimes baked just for the hell of it. And that was the end of that budding friendship.”

“Because she used the word hell?”

“Yep.”

“So I need to ask myself will this play in the Bible Belt from now on?”

“Only if you want to get picked up again.”

Which I do. Damn.

Um, I mean darnit. Or is that dang nabbit? No, it’s darnit. The other is Yosemite Sam.

 

 

 

*Three months on the 28th. Of course I am counting.

*Mommyblogging means exploiting the cute foibles of one’s loins for the entertainment of others as opposed to mentioning them in passing to preserve their privacy and/or dignity. I am endeavoring to exploit my womb and Rob’s loins as much as possible without throwing up on myself in disgust.

You Have a Friend Request


I have been on Facebook quite a bit this last week. I haven’t spent that much time there since I registered. Facebook was just a way to keep in touch with my step-daughters in the beginning. I really didn’t get the whole acquistion of “friends” thing. I mean, how can a person have 434 friends? Some of these people have to be acquaintances or simply networking connections, right?

Until about a week ago, I had about 25 friends give or take. Fewer than even my husband though in fairness to me – he is related to most of his Facebook friends. But after I discovered that a few of my fellow bloggers at 50 Something Moms were on Facebook and then started checking out their friends list…..it was all over. I went on a friend’s request frenzy. I now have 47 friends.

To be sure, I do “know” nearly all my friends. They are people I’ve met in person or via their blogs. Most of them I interact with if only virtually. Still, it’s odd. This new need of mine to reach out and connect and, um, network.

Rob had a glance at my list tonight and said,

“You won’t be able to use the “not knowing anyone” excuse to stay away from Blogher next year.”

Yeah, I know. How pathetic of an excuse was that? But I am very shy despite my online image to the contrary.

I read often via other bloggers, writers, writing bloggers, and blogging writers that using social networking is one of the keys to success. Facebook and Fuel My Blog are really my only form of social addiction, and I am not hardcore. I don’t know how to add the de*li*cious or Digg widgets to my posts. I think Twitter would force me to pay attention to my cell phone, and I am still not over being coerced into getting one in the first place by my late husband. It turned out to be little more than a GPS for my mother.

But do I aspire to be say – The Bloggess? She has like 400 and something friends. But Rob reminds me of some recent study that revealed that beyond 150 people, we become overwhelmed and shut down. This means that 350 of the friends on Bloggess’ list are taxing her mental processes to a point that could short-circuit her.

I don’t think I will ever have that problem.*

I do think that there is something to this networking thing though. In addition to my Facebook peeps, I have blogging comrades and have met writers and political pundits. I have even been allowed to blog elsewhere. Christina Katz, an author, blogger, and freelancer,** has a new book out titled, Get Known Before the Book Deal. I haven’t read it yet, so I don’t know if Facebook, or anything else for that matter, is part of the “getting known”. I think probably, yes.

So, wanna be Facebook friends? It could be mutually beneficial.

*Her fame or the mental collapse thing.

**And someone I know through her blog and on Facebook.

P.S. Please run over to 50 Something Moms today for my new piece, The Full Monty.