Posts Tagged ‘thepsychobabble’

Oh StumbleUpon.com, you awesome provider of distraction, and enabler of procrastination….I think I love you.

So what is StumbleUpon? It’s kind of a database of sites that are rated by users, and then when you hit the Stumble button, you are sent to one of those sites.  You can also list your preferences, and see sites in certain categories. This also lets StumbleUpon to select from “like-minded Stumblers” when deciding what site to send you off towards. For more explanation, check out their about page.

If you’re interested in signing up, go to this page and register, or go to the main site and click the “Connect with Facebook” button (which only works if you already have a facebook.com account, just FYI) .

So you download your little toolbar and off you go! Your stumble button gives you a random site, and then you can give it a thumbs up (or down..or nothing!), share it on various sites (Facebook, Twitter, etc), view what other people thought of it, or leave a review!

This next part is actually my favorite. Say you’re reading a really awesome blog post. The kind that’s too good not to share. Just hit your little thumbs up button, and if it hasn’t been discovered already, you can add it to the StumbleUpon database! (Sidenote: It’s considered bad manners to only give Thumbs Up to your own content. But I bet you guys could have figured that out!)

It’s a really great tool, not just for discovering new content and info, but also for sharing things you’ve found, and encouraging fellow bloggers.

So give it a try! And come back and leave a link to your profile in the comments. We would love to see what you are loving:)

(And if you are interested, you can find me there as ThePsychobabble)

Hello, and welcome to Twitter 101, with your resident unqualified social! media! guru! Be sure to pay attention, as I am assigning homework at the end. ;)

So a few posts back, we looked briefly at joining twitter, and of course, you all rushed out and signed up immediately, right? Let me have my delusions, people!

And then your resident social! media! guru! left you hanging. *ahem* Moving on….

Now that you have a twitter account, you’re kind of wondering what the bloody heck you should be doing with it, no?

What should you be writing, or “tweeting”? Should you be promoting your own blog, and how often is it okay to link to it? Who do you follow? How do you GET followed? Who is @BJBritney and why does she keep offering to send you naked pictures?

All of these are very compelling questions. Let’s start with what you should be tweeting:

Anything you want.

TaDa! You may leave tips in the jar there.

What? Not helpful enough? *sigh* Alright. FINE….

Yes, you can say anything you want, and you should ABSOLUTELY be yourself! That being said, you might want to keep a few thoughts and uses in mind.

1)Think Before You Type Everything you say is at least semi-public

You can lock your twitter stream, so that only approved people can read your tweets. But you can’t control who those approved people might e-mail or tell your tweet to, make sense?

2) Be Original ReTweeting is awesome and annoying

Awesome in that it’s a good tool to spread a link or message that you really enjoyed. But if the vast majority of tweets coming from you are just things that other people already said? You’re going to see followers start to jump ship. Why follow you when they could just follow the people who said it in the first place?

3)Promote Your Writing/Store/Project, but you don’t need to do it 20 times in one hour.

Twitter is a great way to alert your readers (or buyers) that you have posted new stuff. But if you flood their twit-stream with your links, you risk annoying the heck out of them. Which is the opposite of what you wanted to do, right? Personally, I try to limit my linking to 2-3x per item. I aim for AM, PM, and then either one late night, or one the next day.

4)Seeking/Giving Support Twitter has been a virtual support network for many going through a hard time. To be honest, for me, this is one of the biggest draws.

It may seem silly now, but after using twitter for awhile, and connecting with people over it, you’ll find yourself tweeting about your craptastic day, and getting teary-eyed from the virtual hugs and supportive-ness being sent your way. And you, in turn, will see a frustrated tweet from someone, and have this urge to reach through your computer and make them feel better. It’s mind-blowing.

5)Don’t Take It To Personally If someone doesn’t reply to you, it’s likely not because they hate you ever-so-much, it’s more likely they’re busy, or missed your tweet.

As strange as it may seems, I have actually seen people complain that some big name blogger and/or celeb didn’t respond to their tweet. Never mind that the person is question has approximately 200,000 people following them, and @-ing them at any given time…

Okay, I think that’s enough to think about for today. If you have any questions about twitter that you’d like to see answered eventually, or any tips/hints you’d like to add, please leave them in the comments.

In the meantime, you see that Mr. Linky below? That’s for your homework assignment. I want to hear what/why/how you use twitter. Do you use it for keeping track of friends? Promoting your own projects? Is it your support network? Go write it down, post it and then come back and link up so we can see what you’re using twitter for!

I’ve blogged, off and on and at various sites, for over 7 years. (I had to stop and add that up. Now I feel a wee bit old) Most of those were just the outpouring of messy, angsty teen/young adult emotions and thoughts into the world. Of course, being a angsty teen/young adult, I didn’t tell my mom about my blog. Gawd. As. If.

Nowadays, my blog is still the outpouring of my thoughts/feelings and a chronicling of the ups and downs of life. But now that chronicling my life doesn’t involve detailing parties, sexual encounters and skipped classes, I felt a little safer giving my mom the address.

Naturally, that means that nearly every relative knows of my blog now. Eep. It’s a lot of pressure. Pressure to write WELL. Pressure to present myself and my family in a half-way decent light. Sometimes I’m not sure that it was the best idea to share the existence  and location of my blog.

On the other hand, it is a great way to for the family to keep updated on the wee ones, and the craziness of our lives, without my actually having to phone everyone every time something happens.

Obviously, I’m undecided as to whether or not sharing your blog with your family and real-life friends is a good idea or not. Blog “experts” will tell you to keep it separate. Or to share it. Depending on who you ask.

But I’m not interested in what the self-proclaimed experts have to say. I want to know what you do/would do?

To tell or not to tell, that is the question! Leave us your thoughts in the comments.

Twitter

I know a good chunk of you already use twitter. I know this because I harass follow you, and you follow me and we’re a happy family, with a great big hug and a kiss from me to you, won’t you say you…er, sorry. Acid flashbacks.

Anywho…Twitter. It’s a like a micro-blog. You have 140 characters to share your thoughts, feelings and emotions. To connect, inspire, amuse and infuriate. That can be kind of intimidating. Until you realize that people are tweeting things like:
“I had poptarts for lunch!”
and
“I’m tweeting from my TOILET!”

But be not afraid, my dear ones, for you see, I am merely a few seventy followers away from the random number I pulled from you-know-where magical number that will bestow upon me the title of Social Media Guru!
So CLEARLY I am qualified to help you navigate the sea of random thoughts, profound quotes and spam that is twitter!

Today’s lesson will be brief.
How to Be A Twit
If you are already on twitter, this is where you get to skip to the end.

Go here

Fill in your desired name. HINT choose wisely. Use your blog’s name, or your normal screen name (i.e. Mine is @thepsychobabble, because that’s the name I use EVERYWHERE!) I prefer to use just one name all over teh internetz. It solidifies my reputation for people to know I’m the same here, here, here, and everywhere else. Plus, I totally feel important when I google myself then. Moving on….

After you’ve signed up and signed in, head over to the Settings link at the top of your screen. Once you’re under settings, go ahead and select Profile. This is where you build your, well, profile. Go ahead and put in your fake name and pretend location (or do like I did and say “Bring it stalkers!” and use your real info. I know. I’m a moron rebel)
Upload your photo while you’re here, too. (Almost done for today, I swear)

Then follow this link here, and hit the follow button.

THEN (last step, I promise!) come back here, and leave a comment with your new twitter ID, so we can find you amongst the sea of tweeple.

Whew. Who knew being a Social! Media! Guru! who’s only qualification is having both a twitter AND a facebook account was such hard work??

Share your twitter ID in the comments! Also, does anyone know the pay rate for Social! Media! Guru! ? Because I think I’m getting shafted here.

I’ve been struggling for over a week to figure out what New! Interesting! thing I could share with you all. I started about a dozen drafts, just to scrap them in the end. Isn’t blogging FUN sometimes?

So instead, I’m going to tell you about my currently very full house. There’s me, and the husband. We have a 4year old daughter(Miss Question) and a 2 year old son(Truck). We also have a 120lb lap dog (or so she likes to think) and a cat who is convinced that he’s a dog. My brother-in-law is also staying with us, for the moment. They all drive me nuts, in a good way. But I’m not going to talk about them right now.

Instead, I’m going to introduce you to someone who has a very special place in my home. He has a name, I just haven’t found out what it is yet. (Mostly because I’m too lazy) I suspect that he is the owner from before us.

We found out, weeks after we bought the place, from our very blunt little old German lady neighbor, that he was a cancer patient, who relapsed, and was told his ticket was up. So, in the words of the little old German lady, “he went and he hunged himself over there, he did.”
But the house is nearly 100 years old, so it could be someone else. (Although for some reason I can’t shake the feeling that it’s a male.)

So, personally, I call him Charles. Mostly, Charles is a quiet guy, just hangs around the place. He used to hang out by the television set a lot, but since I set the bookshelves up in the living room, he’s been spending a lot of time over there. Or, I think so anyway. The cat and the dog went from staring at the wall above the (turned off) television, to staring at the space just next to the bookshelf. And of course, the downstairs bedroom, which is just off of the living room.

The downstairs bedroom is a strange room. But safe. We slept in it for nearly a year. But it’s always a good 10 degrees (Fahrenheit) colder than the rest of the house. When we moved in, it was early spring (which is still cold in Wisconsin), and I just assumed it was poor insulation. But the difference is still there in the summer. Now that my brother-in-law is sleeping in there, he claims to have been woken up by something disturbing him.

However, with two attention-whore pets in the house, I’m not convinced it was Charles who woke him!

The one thing, the only thing, that Charles does that drives me batty is resetting my thermostat. It’s like living with my father. At first we had an old thermostat, one of those dial ones? So when we kept discovering that it was winding up at set at 60, instead of 68, we assumed it was a bad spring. So we replaced it with a digital thermostat.

Yeah. I still get up some mornings to a freezing cold house.

But I figure that if that’s the worst I have to put up with, then Charles is welcome to stay. At least I don’t have to wash *his* dirty socks.

Do you have any ghost stories to share? Do you believe the paranormal is a bunch of hooey? Let me know in the comments!

Lu had a wonderful intro on Monday that let us peek into her clean and organized brain.
Unfortunately for you guys, that means it’s MY turn to introduce myself, and let you peek inside my head. I’m sorry.

Summer is coming up. The season of swimsuits, shorts and bare feet. I dread this season.

Not because I realize I will probably have to shave above the knees to wear shorts. And not because I’ve had two kids and feel compelled to buy the swimsuit for insecure women like me, with built-in tummy control panel for Extra! Slimming! effect.
Not because it’s hot and humid, and pants will quickly become optional around our house.

No, it’s because no one thinks twice about my sock issues during the winter.

During the winter, it’s COMPLETELY normal to walk around with socks on constantly. I mean, I live in Wisconsin, for chrissakes. It’s cold up here. Even wearing them to bed doesn’t get me that much attention.

But when it’s ninety degrees (Fahrenheit) and humid out, people look at you funny. It’s not like I’m wearing them with sandals (even I won’t cross some lines), but I constantly have socks on.

I won’t go outside barefoot, not even to hang the laundry.
I hate going to the beach, because then there’s sand in my socks.
I have really nice carpeting in my living room. Thick and soft and squishy. Truly luxurious in every way.

And the feel of it against my bare feet drives me bonkers.

A good night of sleep can be ruined by a lack of clean socks (I change them before bed, because who wants all the ick from running around all day in their bed?? I also change them in the AM after a shower. And I’m not sure why I feel the need to be all, “See? I’m crazy, but not icky!” for you guys…). The feel of the sheets and blankets against my naked feet is too disruptive.

But it’s all good, because I recently found out that socks can help both men and women reach for the stars in bed, and who doesn’t enjoy a good orgasm?

To summarize what we’ve learned today: The key to a good sex life is to take your pants off, and put your socks on. And that sort of behavior is encouraged at my house.

You’re. Welcome.

Since I shared such a weird quirk, AND an important sex life improving tip, I’d really like to hear from you. What’s your strange habit? Leave it in the comments!:)

Hello and welcome!
We’re gearing up for BlogHer@Home 2010, and wanted to introduce ourselves and give you a little heads up on what’s going on around here.

Some of you may have participated in BHAH09. You might remember that this shindig was dreamed up by Jenn and Nic last year, when they realized they weren’t the only ones disappointed they were unable to go to the official BlogHer conference. So they whipped up an at-home party for all of us, complete with video chats, link exchanges and give-aways. And they did a stellar job, especially given the short time frame they had to pull it all off!

In fact, it was so much fun, that we decided we need to do it again this year!
Now, Jenn won’t be able to join us, because she saved her pennies and snatched her ticket to BlogHer’10 up right away. But we’ll forgive her this time, especially since she did such an awesome job re-designing the site, and is graciously providing technical support for BHAH10!

This year, I (@thepsychobabble) and @masmom are co-hosting the event. You can check out our bios, and learn a little more about us over in the About section.

We already have some awesome prizes lined up.  But we’re always looking for more sponsors! If you’re interested in purchasing some ad space, or providing a prize (or both!), contact us, on twitter at @blogherathome, or email us (info AT blogherathome DOT com) for more details.

We  also have big plans for the chat sessions and posts this year. You know how if you go to a conference, you’ll have panels on certain subjects? We’d like to do that here, too, for you guys via posts, vlogs and chats. But we need some ideas. So start thinking about what it is you want to talk about, and who you want to hear from, this year at BHAH10, because we’ll be asking for those suggestions soon!

We really enjoyed the video chat last year, but found that too many people on camera really slowed things down. Especially for those with less-than-high-speed access! So this year, the plan is to ask for volunteers, and have you do a little on-camera audition. If you’re interested in being on camera this August, and participating in the chat sessions, let us know!

We’re really looking forward to this event, and seeing our old friends, and meeting new ones. So get ready, mark your calendar, and grab a button to put on your site, to let others know where you’ll be this August 6^th and 7^th!

And don’t forget to subscribe, or check in often, as we’ll be posting things and updates from now until the big weekend!

Until next time,
Jen ThePsychobabble

BlogHer@Home was originally conceptualized and created just before the 2009 BlogHer conference, by Jenn (PrincessJenn) and Nic from My Bottles Up.

They were sitting around, having a drink (or three) and lamenting the fact that just about everyone in their Twitter streams were talking about the upcomming BlogHer conference in Chicago and what a good time they were going to have.

Not to be left out of anything involving drinking, fun, and swag, BlogHer@Home was born.

Within a month it went from a passing idea to a full blown twitter party with it’s own website and giveaways.  Nic and Jenn attempted to pick their jaws up off the floor at the number of people who were now talking about BlogHer@Home and ran with it.

Now, due to popular demand, BlogHer@Home is back for another year!

As some of the BHAH2009 alumni head to the BlogHer conference in NYC this year, the hosting of the 2010 party is being passed to two amazing ladies, Lu (@masmom) and Jennifer (@thepsychobabble).

We know they’ll do a great job and add their own flair and flavor to what’s sure to be the hottest un-BlogHer party out there!

About The Hosts:

Meet Lu, mother to her own hurricane, also known as her son Mason, and the queen of humidity down in South West Florida. She’s a lover of garlic and all that is slightly odd (which explains why she gets along so well with the rest of us!) She’s not a fan of the sugar-coated and would much rather you just tell it to her straight. Lu comes form the school of hard-knocks and graduated with honors. Underneath all that toughness, she harbors an arts-and-crafts kind of girl, a domestic at heart, and a love of community and friendship.  You can find more of her awesome (questionable) writing over at Jaded Perspective, her personal blog.

Jen is a mother, wife, student, future nurse, blogger, <insert your own title here>, who is easily amused by big words
Her sharp wit and barbed sense of humor masks a sensitive soul only occasionally revealed on her blog, The Pychobabble.  Deep down, she’s just an angsty goth girl just waiting to escape.

About the Founders:

Nic can be found at My Bottle’s Up! when she’s not running after her son, The Magoo.  A self describe passionate writer and tattooed liberal, you can usually find her with a very large glass of wine in hand.

Jenn shares her over-opinionated view and tidbits about living with a special needs daughter at Princess Prose.  She leads a pampered, over-indulged life with her geek husband and is fairly certain that the world revolves around her.