Tag Archives: metablogging

This post is GREEN according to my Blog Advisory System

This is sort of like a repost. I created the Blog Advisory System last December when I realized that my eclectic rambling style may catch people off guard.

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Blog Advisory System: Don't say I didn't warn you!

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Today is GREEN. Short and sweet.

Welcome to our new edition of HAVE FUN WITH GOOGLE!

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"Do you feel lucky, punk?"

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Or maybe it should be…

GOOGLE HAS FUN WITH US!

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I carry your heart with me

I have been giving this a lot of thought ever since I started getting readers/commenters who, more often than not, became friends:

Why do the relationships I have forged online with people I have never met often feel a lot more authentic, real and immediate than those in real life?

This was what Wicked Shawn and I talked about yesterday when we met for the first time.

Me: We have just met. Why do I feel so close to you already?

Shawn: But honey (in her sweet sweet Kentucky twang. *melting*) we have known each other for a long time!

She’s right of course.

Just because we communicate by words, over the Internet, it does not make the connections any less valid. People used to have pen pals. Did they feel embarrassed when they told their family and friends about their pen pals? Did they worry about being mocked when they traveled to meet their pen pals in real life?

In fact, y’all know me, what I really think, what I value, my fears, my aspirations, and yes, my neurosis, a lot better than 99% of the people I know in real life. You may not know the names of my husband and children, you may not know where I live or what my house looks like, but you know the “real” me. I am not saying that in my “physical” life I am walking around faking or pretending. My existence here as words in the Interwebs is the essence of my being. Stripped of all adornments.

Well, I am going to contradict myself: sometimes when I think about this whole thing, I see this as my essence being digitized and so I am seeing all of us running around like Tron… So maybe not stripped of ALL adornments because you know, we’d be all carrying a flying disc…

Here, I am not so and so’s wife. So and so’s mother. Weird Asian lady who lives next door. My odd co-worker I have to put up with. The woman who works for/with me. The person who could not pronounce “Doug” (Thank you all!). The person who also apparently cannot pronounce “Don/Dawn” but somehow can “Shawn”. etc. etc.

You get to know me before your judgement/impression/evaluation/or whatever it is that people do when they meet a person of me is influenced by any visual or audio cues.

And this is why when we finally met (and hopefully meet) each other, after the first 30 seconds of awkwardness, we are going to behave as if we have known each other, like, forever.

I just want to thank each and every one of you that has ever visited, commented or emailed me; you have contributed to my improved mental health and self-esteem. The therapy sessions are working, and they are free! Thank you for letting me mooch off of you… Sometimes when life gets me down, I think to myself, “Hey there are people who actually think I am fucking awesome!”

Case in point: Attending conferences by myself is one of my worst fears. Today I had to do so for work. First I was afraid / I was petrified/ But then something clicked: I remembered my “secret identity” as the coolest awesome ass-kicking hot babe that you somehow led me to believe. (Fine. So what if I made the avatar myself? You are a bunch of enablers a girl can ever ask for!) So I behaved as one.

I carry with me your blind faith in me like a protective shield as I go about my daily life.

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happy birthday, e. e. cummings.

Disclaimer: I look nothing like the avatar I made.

I Blog Therefore I Am. Corny yet true.

Moo Mini Cards

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I have been chosen to be one of the employees featured on the recruiting page for my company’s website. Not to be cynical, but I do believe that they intend to show the diversity within the company and that’s the main reason why I have been chosen: Asian, female, liberal arts.

So I had to write a short bio in the form of answering standard questions such as “Why did you decide to work for XXX?” (The answer I would have given if I were being 100% frank: Eh, because they hired me?) “What do you like the most of XXX?” (Eh, the fact that they did not fire me? In this economic climate, are you kidding me? Nobody should be complaining abut their company right now!)

I have standard responses to these standard questions of formality, naturally. However, there is ONE standard question that always throws me into a reality check and thereafter an identity crisis:

“What activities/hobbies are you involved in outside of work?”

I have no hobby.

Ok. That’s not completely true.

I have never had a hobby in my life. Other than reading and listening to music and watching movies. Yawn!

I don’t run.

I don’t sing or play any musical instrument.

I don’t cook.

I can’t sew for my life.

I don’t even scrapbook.

Anything that involves fingers I am bad at. Yes, smart ass, that includes giving a hand job to myself and others.

I sat down and took stock of my life, how I spent my free time. (Not) surprisingly, I have been devoting my free (and not so free) time to Social Media. Twitter and blogging.

In the beginning it did concern me: what am I trying to get out of this blogging thing? It naturally bothered my husband as well since the time I sat in front of the computer meant the time I was not spending with him and the kids. But he came to realize, as I did, that writing my heart out is a great way for me to self-medicate. It is a wonderful way for me to release to pent-up tensions. The bottled-up need for this closeted drama queen to say, “Look at me!”

For what it’s worth, at the risk of sounding like an egomaniac, this is also my “craft”. It is something that I created. Every time I rattle out these words and hit the “Publish” button, I “made” something. These words, for better or worse, are mine. And mine alone. It feels good. I have also learned to do this for myself. Me alone. It feels liberating once I drill that into my blogging soul.

As you are probably tired of hearing, I will be flying to BlogHer, a conference for women who blog. I am a blogger. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

For the next few days I will be live blogging here through my tweets: You can find the live blogging posts below right above this one. I thought it would be fun to share what I am seeing, feeling and thinking at this crazy crazy event. I hope to meet you if you are going to be there; I hope to meet all of you, if you would like to be met that is, one way or the other sometime. You never know. This is a small small world. And insane too.

Interview with my child: “Why I don’t like blogs”

Mom: How do you like blogs?

Child: I hate them.

Mom: Why?

Child: It is very annoying to me because my mom is being spoiled and wasting time instead of doing something useful like reading a book.

Mom: Why do you think it’s a waste of time?

Child: Because it is like a computer or Facebook and it is wasting time, not like doing something relaxing like eating lunch or doing work.

Mom: Do you think doing my work is relaxing to me?

Child: No. Because doing your work is something you have to do.

Mom: Do you not like my blogging because you feel I am not spending time with you?

Child: Yes. No. Maybe so.

Mom: What if I say this is my hobby and I really enjoy doing it?

Child: Life’s not fair. Deal with it.

Mom: That’s all?

Child: That’s all. I wanted it to end in a funny way.

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"Oh My Blog!" is the new OMG!

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This post is brought to you by Just Humor Me who shared her new OMB! Award with me. Thank you, Diane! There are rules associated with this award:

A. doing a video blog (vlogging)

B. writing a blog post while in a state of intoxication (drogging) or

C. blogging about your most embarrassing moment (embarraslogging)

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Originally I had this evil scheme of making begging Mr. Monk, my 7-year-old, to vlog for me since he’s been having a lot of fun with Flip video. I made the mistake of forgetting to use bribes not easing him into this idea, instead I ASKED HIM NICELY.

“No.” He said without even giving it another thought.  “Here’s your pencil and paper. Go!”

“What?”

“Well, you want to interview me right? Ask me questions. I answer. You write them down. Don’t you know anything about interviewing people, MOM?!”

What did he mean? Writing stuff down longhand? I haven’t done that since, well, grad school!

“How about this? How about if I write your answers down on my blog?”

“What?” He sounded rather indignant, sensing entrapment. “You want to write about me on your blog. Again?”

At the end, the exhibitionist in him won the battle.  In fact, I made the mistake of pushing forward with my REAL question:

“Do you not like my blogging because you feel I am not spending time with you?”

After he gave me the deliberately ambiguous answer which spelled out, to me, the real reason behind his discomfort with my new obsession “hobby”, he was rather upset.

“You ruined everything! I want ‘Life is not fair. Deal with it.’ to be my last line! Because I really want it to end in a funny way!!!”

So I manipulated the interview script to give him what he wanted.

“Good. Now can you print it out for me?” He couldn’t wait to show it off to his brother. “Look! These are my words!”

Later when we were getting ready for bed, he penned a poem calling his brother a Computer Geek and a Facebook Freak. Nice I know. But hey, we encourage artistic creativity in this household!

“Mom. I know what I want to be when I grow up. I want to be a writer!”

So… Who is a future blogger in the making?!…

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It is extremely hard to decide whom to pass on this award to since all of you are wonderful bloggers. This may be a tall order: Anybody up to give VLOGGING a try?

Vagina-blogging? I guess we have all (except the handful of male readers I have… I am a sexist now too, I guess…) been VLOGGING all this time.

Video Blogging. Anybody up for it?

Bueller? Bueller?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEXfASbPbDM

Vote for the Best Just Posts of 2009!

First of all, an apology…

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Now on to official business…

Alejna over at Collecting Tokens and Holly at Cold Spaghetti host a monthly feature called “Just Posts for a Just World“: monthly roundtables of blog posts written on personal blogs that, in words of one of the founders, “speak to the same thing – the lifting up of our planet and all that inhabit it.” Anybody is welcome to submit a blog post that “reflects or informs others on social justice issues” to the panel. Posts included in the past have come from bloggers that I have come to know and love and who are also frequent visitors here: Amber, Mary Lee and Velva.

After much sorting and reviewing and evaluating, the Just Posts panel has finally decided on the nominees for the Best of 2009 Just Posts. This is a collection of some of the best blog posts on social justice issues that you could conveniently find all in one place. Please if you have time (ha ha ha I know…) do check out the posts, and vote for your favorites if you wish.

Now regarding the someecard I posted at the beginning… one of my posts, All things on cable TV considered, I wish my hotel had porn… is nominated for the Humor category. This post however is not a plea to buy your votes. I really believe that if you have found value in my blog, for sure you would appreciate the posts nominated for this award. I am really honored to be included in the company of such wonderfully-written and well-argued posts. And I am going to proudly display the button here. Peace out!

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Roses are Red, Violets are Blue, Cashews Are Nuts…

And so are YOU!*

* Tis said with love and affection and gratitude…

This post is a belated thank-yous to many of you who have bestowed me with love and support and honors.

Chris over @ Vintage Christine (whose subtitle “I’m not old, I’m vintage” has become my battle cry) sent me a surprise Valentine’s Day gift box.

It went down like this: her cat sat on a card with my name on. Cat nip, my friend. Cat nip.

Valentine's Day Surprise from Vintage Christine

Thank you, Chris, for the wonderful surprise! I would like to tell you that yours was the ONLY Valentine’s Day present I received. But, my lovely husband beat you to it by putting away the Christmas tree without me asking. (Truth be told: I almost got an orgasm when I came home on Valentine’s Day and saw the empty spot where the Christmas tree once was… He does know me very well. Probably too well for our own good…)

Andrea over @ A Little Bit Rock n Roll tagged me in January THIS YEAR to learn “10 things about me”. I am more than 10 kinds of crazy, that’s for sure, but I digress… The first thing you need to know about me is I WUV YOUR BLOG.

A Vapid Blonde @ A Vapid Blonde and Magda @ I’m Just Sayin’ both shared with me the “I LOVE YOUR BLOG” award that they themselves have deservedly won. Thank you, ladies! And, at the risk of sounding like a valley girl, I love you crazy women on the coasts. I do!

I LOVE YOU BAAACCCKKK!

To accept this award, apparently I also need to tell you something about me.

Elizabeth, or “Mrs. Darcy” as I like to secretly call her inside my head, @ The Sky Is Falling also shared with me her award, “THE CIRCLE OF FRIENDS”.

You complete me. Yes, all of you!

To accept this award, I have to tell you 5 things that I enjoy…  This is easy.

Sex

Sex

Sex

Sex

Sex

Well, usually that’s not how it goes down over here. So my second best choice would be:

A clean house. (Preferably not by me)

Shelli @ Shaking the Tree gave me a two-fer:

Thank you Shelli! I especially love the “50 Cents” award as I consider his story of rising from a drug-dealing youth to international renown to be rather inspiring.

Randa over @ Sometimes I Even Amaze Myself passed along a beautiful award… Thank you, Randa! Now I also need to tell you 7 interesting things about myself.


I am truly honored that y’all see enough in my irreverent ramblings to stop by my little piece of therapeutic heaven and actually listen to what I have to say, let alone sharing these awards with me. Thank you so much.

Seriously, guys. There really is not that much about me that’s exciting. Whatever I have, I have been letting loose here on this blog. Are you sure you are not bored already?! So after I have done my math and drawn up a Venn diagram, in order to follow all the rules, I will share with you 5 things that I enjoy and 5 more things about myself.

5 things I enjoy that may or may not be within my easy grasp, am obsessed with, and/or covet (in addition to sex and a clean house):

  • The ocean (or more accurately, staring at the ocean)
  • Toblerone
  • The smell of oncoming rain shower on a hot summer day
  • People watching (preferably in a sidewalk cafe, even better if in Paris…)
  • Bubble tea (No, Elly, it is NOT ok to mention “Pearl Necklace” to me when I am telling you how much I enjoy Pearl Bubble teas…)

5 things about me (in addition to me being Chinese and ALL THAT this tiny fact indicates…)

  • I am certifiable anal retentive. I cannot relax until the dishes are done, the floor has been picked up, and “things” have been put away. I have been known to wake up in the middle of the night to clean up the house. That being said, I only need everything to be off the floor. So what if I have 3 hampers of clothes waiting for me to fold? As long as the clothes stay inside the hampers, I am fine with it. I am a Hypocrite when it comes to housework, I guess.
  • I am obsessed with multi-tasking and efficiency when it comes to housework. I NEVER EVER walk through the house without picking up and putting away anything. I actually plan the next piece of dish I will wash as I am doing the dishes. It is hard to explain. You need to be there.
  • Things that have profound effect on me in my youth: Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood, Wim Wenders’ Der Himmel über Berlin and Hermann Hesse’s Demian (Yes, I am Cliche Himself… Don’t judge…)
  • I have attempted suicide in high school. No. I really did not want to die.
  • I can make myself cry on demand. If we see each other, I can demonstrate for you. It’s really amazing.

(HOLD THE ORCHESTRA!)

As a reward for sitting through my lllloooonnnnggggg acceptance speech, I will present the

I GIVE GOOD BLOG award

The best name for a blog award. Hands down.

JennyMac over @ the immensely popular Let’s Have a Cocktail really surprised me when she presented me with this award last… ummm, eh, huh, hmmm, December… (I am very embarrassed… I got distracted by all your wonderful blogs. So stop judging me!)

Following the rules, I get to pass this award along to four wonderful blogs. This is rather difficult since I know way more than four blogs that deserve this award. I have been agonizing over this since last December and I am driving myself crazy over this! No wonder Simon Cowell is always so grouchy. The pressure. Ah, the pressure gets to you…

After making the heart-wrenching process called “drawing names from a hat” (since I do not have a cat like Chris does…), I shall pass this gorgeous, sexy award to the following four hot steamy sexy blogs:

A Little Bit Rock n Roll

Brilliant Sulk

BugginWord

The Sky Is Falling

As the rule for the award dictates, I shall go mix up a cocktail for myself and I hope you will be able to do the same. I hope too that you will be able to find time to visit these blogs mentioned above and I am pretty sure you will like what you find there.

Thank you again for the support you all have shown me. Knowing that you are out there really makes my Tron-like existence rewarding and ironically, my life in flesh more bearable.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you…

I was thinking since I am all over the map going from warm fuzzy pictures of my kids smiling like angels to crazy ass inappropriate jokes and cursing to crazy ass all-out ranting on people/events/things that piss me off. I either have ADHD or Bi-Polar, I realized, or as my husband would gladly tell you, “Insane in the Membrane”. I was thinking, perhaps I should create a Warning System for my blog.

Straight from Homeland Security

Don't you wish there is such a system for everything in life?



I really like how Homeland Security did the color coded chart because, as we all know, homo sapiens (“Not that there’s anything wrong with it.”) are visual animals. Really, when I see the ORANGE color at the airport, I become appreciative and understanding of the 1-hour wait at the security line. When disaster strikes, nothing is going to get my fat ass moving faster than seeing a RED flag waving in the air.

Won’t it be cool if I have a Warning System for this blog, before you start reading a post, you would know what to expect:

Blog Advisory System: Don't say I didn't warn you!

Blog Advisory System: Don't say I didn't warn you!



Of course, after an hour of working on my Blog Advisory system, I realized that no Advisory System is going to reach the goal of MECE: Mutually Exclusive and Collectively Exhaustive. Mock ye not. This is something the McKinsey & Co. consultants live and die by. And they get paid big bucks for being anal retentive. No shit. For instance, it worries me that the heartless dicks and grouchiest bitches amongst you will need a special warning such as this one:

Danger Ahead

lolCAT

Well, like I said, don’t say that I didn’t warn you…

Know thyself. Be thyself.

It is 2:03 am. I am all of a sudden wide awake.

Note to self: Listening to PRI Selected Shorts podcasts while cleaning the house is a sure way that your mind will become overactive and that you will have trouble falling asleep.

I will pay for this indulgence: lying down on my Therapy Couch and talking to you all, my imaginary friends, (I am going to start calling you Soren Lorensen I think…) soon since I have a 6:30 am flight to catch and I have not packed yet. Coming here has clearly become a serious addiction. I carry this urge at my throat to write something down all day long. I am afraid to open my mouth lest a scream may come out.

I often panic when I am made aware of this since it feels so similar to Narcissism…

Someone very wise, probably wiser than Confucius since she is female (and Confucius was obviously not) and women rock because of our uterus, that I have had the privilege of meeting through this little patch of heaven I call my Therapy Couch (or hell on some bad days I won’t lie to you) told me that she could tell that “blogging is both a creative outlet and just outlet” for me.

She was right. When I first started doing this, I really did not expect anybody to come by and get into a conversation with me. I saw this as a different medium of talking to myself since I have been doing that inside my head for a long time. Why not? I simply jotted down whatever came to my mind. No self-censorship. And no editing either, to be very honest with you.

It felt like liberation from Facebook. From the potential for censure by family, friends, colleagues. It felt like liberation from Twitter. From the bondage of 140 characters. And it felt like the earth after rain. It felt good.

When I began to have supportive friends who stop by on a regular basis, to check me out and make sure that I am still operating in a socially acceptable manner, I was flattered yet incredulous. “Surely they have mistaken me for someone else, or something else.” With that self-congratulatory realization of “OMG I have fans” came the burden to please. Or at least, since I have no mental filter once my mouth starts running, the fear for offense. The desire to please everybody, nay, the compulsive need to please everybody is one of those soul-killers that I am trying to escape. I am afraid I may have lost my way.

At the risk of sounding like I am trying to recast myself as the cliche in I’ve Never Been to Me… I am getting back on my journey to understand myself better. The peeling of the onion. What is more important though, is that once I find myself, I really need to just be myself. Perhaps the being and the finding happen at the same time.

So…

Dear Soren Lorensen,

I hope you will stay. But if you outgrow me or the other way around, I wish you the very best.

As always, a pretentious rambling such as this will not be complete without a quotation from a famous, yet just a tad out there, writer. Preferably by e. e. cummings. Here it is.

To be yourself

I comment therefore I am not doing what I am supposed to be doing…

November 30. Yeah baby!

I am finishing this NaBloMoFo with a special edition of “I Comment Therefore I Am”…

Unknown Mami

… because it is Monday. And Monday, especially Monday after the long Thanksgiving weekend, absolutely sucks ass, especially if you work in an office…

In this edition, I will share with you how I abuse my privilege as a reader and commenter of blogs…

Eat me

Eat me



The Sky is Falling asked her readers this question:

So, if you were making a list of “Dat’s Some Funny Shit,Yo,” what movies/TV/books/blogs/etc. would you include? What has informed (or malformed) your particular brand of humor? What falls in the category of Sorry, I Just Don’t Get It? Any deal-breakers (for example, “If I found out you loved/hated __________, you would be dead to me.”)?

She had no idea what she had done: it’s like dangling fat dripping meat to a hungry cougar. I totally took the bait. So I commented at 8:14 PM:

Hey, the jokes made me cry and smile at the same time. {{{hugs}}} if hugs from strangers over the internet are not too creepy for ya. We are a family of cracking “inappropriate” jokes at “inappropriate” moments also. I eagerly clicked on all 4 YouTube links and realized: I need to spend some time watching them so I can test my love for you! So, I will be back. Also you left us a homework at the end. Maybe we (your loyal readers) need to write posts in response to this question. 🙂 Promise: I will be back.

p.s. You are making it very difficult for me to tend to my motherly duty. Your posts all make me think too much and I am now constantly distracted! LOL

An hour later… I wrote some more:

I’m back! Sorry it took so long since I have StumbledUpon almost all of them, and tweeted 2 of them! LOVE Eddie Izzard. (Confession: I only watched him on YouTube. We have no cable. And we don’t watch that much TV not because we are snobbish but because we have no time) I was also distracted because I found him pretty… That clip is funny as hell. “We stole countries with the cunning use of flags.” Bloody BRILLIANT! I want to go around and say “No flag. No country” now. I love the Strong Bad one too. (Confession: have never really watched the Homestar Runner show EXCEPT the Strong Bad email sections) I actually saw Louis CK when he was on Conan O’Brien. LOVED IT and then told everybody I know that travels frequently. Yes, we bitch about air travel all the time. I did curtail my bitching afterwards. Now I say to myself whenever my flight is delayed: “At least I am not travelling with my kids.” Being a parent does give you life-changing perspectives. LOL. I have to confess: I was not laughing at the Muppet Danny Boy clip. Sorry! BTW, I checked my StumbledUpon and saw that I had “favored” a Jackass clip. OH NO! But it’s the one where they dressed up as pandas and ran around in Tokyo. I liked it because they were clearly idiots, and the clip shows, at least the way I interpret it, that the Japanese have a great sense of humor and a great deal of tolerance for stupidity as exhibited by foreigners, i.e. they are our guests. We shall not laugh at them, but rather, laugh with them. I told you: I need to write an entire complete post to answer your question. Good one though!

In her other post, “If You Drink At Every Parenthetical in this Post, You Probably Should Not Drive” (by the way, isn’t this an awesome title? And of course I commented on it…), she asked her readers yet more questions. I think she has a death wish by Comment Hogs or something.

I haven’t told my sister about this blog. What do y’all do about the whole anonymity issue? Do you have a chosen circle? Are you totally incognito? Reasons for/against?

I absolutely rose to the occasion and commented THREE times.

NOVEMBER 25, 2009 5:21 PM

I love the title of this post. I need to stop by to say hi, but I need to go focus on Mr. Monk since it’s his birthday. BUT I will be back ’cause THIS topic hits right at home. From your loyal reader aka NOT Love Greg*

NOVEMBER 25, 2009 8:07 PM

Short answer for now because I need to clean up the house and put together a grocery list for Thanksgiving… Parents-in-law flight arrives tomorrow at 9 am! I am anonymous not because I am afraid of stalkers (Not that famous yet so no need. LOL) but because I am worried that someone from work may chance upon my blog and then the whole company would know. I don’t talk about work still since I am paranoid. I really want to complain about being the only woman in my office sometimes but I refrain from doing that now since well, just in case. A few of my very close friends who I can trust know about my blog. My husband knows but does not read it often. Sometimes I wish he didn’t since I wanted to complain about him really bad often… None of my family knows. Well, my side does not read English. My husband’s side… Well, let’s just say my MIL is a devout Catholic and my FIL thinks Fox News is the greatest (for which we have made fun of him and he’s ok with it…) They are really very nice and very kind and they treat me like their own daughter. We get along fine since we do NOT talk about politics or religions. Again though, I don’t complain about people in my life really JUST IN CASE. Any passing complaints directed towards people that you do care are best left unwritten. That’s my take. Because you never know when the written thing is going to come back and bite you…

If you do tell your sister about this blog, and if she does want to start her own blog, you two should think about hosting a blog together. This way it will definitely ease the burden of having to write a post every day (or even every other day). That being said: I don’t know how you would deal with “popularity contest”, “competition”, and “jealousy”. I am human, and I am bound to feel jealous if my sister’s posts are more popular than mine on the same blog… Think about WHAM! as an example… 😉

(Sorry for bad grammar and yet another long comment!)

p.s. Totally dig stream of consciousness writing.

NOVEMBER 25, 2009 9:55 PM

OK. What kind of SHORT answer was THAT?!

There you have it. Oink. Oink.

* The “Love Greg” joke requires the reading of this post Creepoid vs. Bitch for which I also left a long comment. Totally worth it, my imaginary friends.

Just Award, Or, I can’t think of a witty title so early in the morning*

Iloveyourblog_thumb_thumb_award

Through this blog, I got to know a lot of crazy people who likes me for who I am, which is kind of ironic because I am staying anonymous on the Internet with this “persona”, therefore technically they don’t really know WHO I am. Even more ironic, and I am not sure if you put an irony on top of another irony whether that makes it NOT an irony any more or whether it just means I am a lousy writer, is that this anonymity affords me to be honest, free to be who I am. Really, I am just wary of people at work finding out how emotionally unstable I really am since I do try to keep a professional demeanor in the corporate world. So the mask is the real person.

God. I am so witty. So philosophical. So pretentious. I totally scream: Woody Allen Fan! And indeed, I am, my friend. I am.

Nancy over at If Evolution Really Works gave me the above “I HEART your blog” award. I am just going to assume the “heart” means “love” and not because she cries so hard when she reads my blog that her heart starts bleeding or something… It is really tempting to neglect to tell you that the award went to lots of other people, not just me. BUT Nancy made the “award ceremony” in SUCH a creative way, and many of the other blogs that she mentioned (including her own of course) I also adore and am secretly plotting to imitate a la Single White Female,(only that out of these three things, two of them don’t apply to me, but we will deal with that issue later…), THAT I consider it a crime to not tell you about the post in which she gave the award to me, and many many other blogs worth checking out.

I know there are English Teachers amongst you. You know who you are. I am sorry if you are screaming inside your head right now.You can flog me for botching the English language in the above paragraph when we see each other in person. Or you can zap me through the Internet.

This award comes with NO string attached, hence I don’t get to talk about myself. *sad*

I am going to pass the “I Heart Your Blog” Award onto a few wonderful bloggers whose writings help them deal with whatever life has thrown in their ways, and along the way, I get to share a glimpse of their lives and, even better, their interpretations of those moments captured through their writings.

Overly Obsessed with Minutiae is something unique. Stream of consciousness prose. First-person narration directed towards an unseen, mysterious, recipient. Heartbreakingly beautiful at times. The paragraph that got me:

“I tell her no, and she smiles and says That’s good, because I don’t think there is actually anything else that I could offer you! And this is how I feel about myself, now, all the time. I don’t think there is actually anything at all that I can offer you, or anyone.”

(From “Bloodless“)

The Sky Is Falling is a brand new blog, just started this month, in time for NaBloPoMo. Ever since I chanced upon it through the NaBloPoMo Randomizer, I have been religiously reading it every day. I don’t want to take words from her mouth, but you can learn more about her here. The thing that attracted me to her blog right away is her About Me description:

“I’ll tell you who I’m not: Kaiser Sose. Spartacus. Your father.” Perfect.

The post that got me hooked was “Not Included: Suzanne Vega’s ‘Luka’, Fetal Position“. You had me at Suzanne Vega.

Worn Ragged: Mommies on the Edge has a PhD in “medieval gynecology” (I am still not sure whether that is a stand-in for her real major. In the end, I had to admit that you almost need to be there in order to know that it exists…)  You will know that she is a great writer: satirical in a way so subtle, so dry, that if you don’t pay attention, you will miss it because it is at the same time sweet, by reading what I consider one of her best posts, Voodoo.

Our Little Peanut is a new mom’s conversation with her miracle baby. Miracle in the literal sense since she survived ovarian cancer and after almost all infertility doctors gave up on her upon hearing that she only had one chemo-treated ovary left, she found out she was pregnant. The reason why I point this out is because, without this backstory, it is hard to understand imagine the joy she now takes in every little thing involving the baby. Even at the most frenzied moments a new mom would certainly face, she manages to show, indeed, that every baby in itself is a miracle. I wish I knew better when my kids were babies to just enjoy their babyhood. Instead I was always wishing them to grow up faster. Faster. Now I live through her dialogs with baby Kai vicariously. Except of course, when poop is involved.

NathanRising also documents a new mom’s life with a baby. I sometimes wonder whether we would have turned out to be different mothers if we had the Internet, especially the blogs, to help keep us sane when our children were babies. And speaking of poop… Jen has no qualms in describing poop accidents. I appreciate her not romanticizing motherhood: poop is a common, and important, subject in any household with a newborn. Say it like it is. And you take the stinks with the sweetness wholesale.

* Or, so late at night. I started writing this post at 6 am this morning. It is 11:58 pm now. Same effect though. Still can’t think of a witty title. Witty is overrated anyway.

** Please: if your blog/style is not the kind for you to acknowledge the award on it, please do not stress. My purpose of mentioning your blog in this post is my way of letting you know, even some of you may not even read this, that you have a fan lurking in the cyber space, to say Thank You. That’s all. Let me borrow what Mrs. Blogalot*** says: “You just can’t keep a good blog down!” Or to yourself.

*** I am waiting for the creation of an award called “Women I would Run Away With” to honor thee.