Posts Tagged ‘writing’

12 ways to Check your Lemons

Posted January 30, 2012 Life, Mom Media No Comments

Donkey balls.  I suffered sat through basketball practice and wrote this whole post, then my stupid wordpress app deleted the whole thing. Grr.

Pretty much, it was to say two things.  (Only 2 because I am feeling sick and dealing with a rather annoying weather-related headache.  Stupid barometric pressure.)

Number one:

I think one of my main jobs, as a 3-dayer-for-life, is to educate others about breast cancer.  I may be falling down on this job, just a bit, but today I came across this awesome graphic that does this beautifully.  Before you peek, could you list 12 signs of breast cancer?  I’m not sure I could…but I think this graphic will definitely keep the signs in my head.

 

Click on the image to enlarge

 

Number two:

I’m still searching for your input on topic ideas for my audition.  Although, I’m beginning to think I am asking just to stall the actual writing.  I mean, I don’t have a great idea in my head, but I do know that bitching about it isn’t going to make the audition piece write itself.  {Note to self: stop futzing around and just write already.} {Response from self: Ok, damn, lay off.}

(Side note: do other people use the word “futzing?”  My mom has all sorts of words like this, from thingamajig to doo-gee-wap, but it occurs to me right now that it might be a “mom” word, and not a world-wide known word.)

Alright, I’m off to bed…

Check your lemons!

 

Help Wanted

Posted January 29, 2012 Mom Media 4 Comments

 

Here we are, nearing the end of January, and nearing the end of this month’s NaBloPoMo.  I’ve done pretty well, I’d say.  I missed a few days here and there, but I think I’m going to go ahead and call it a win.  Mostly because it’s my blog and I can do whatever the hell I want to.  So there.

The next question is, do I sign up for February?  That’s a tough one.  I don’t want to have to blog every day – because that can be a pain in the ass – but it does, at least, make me write something.  Hopefully more kick ass somethings, than so-so ones.

Also, since I have this audition for Listen to Your Mother coming up, I’m going to need to write something good to preform.  And right now, I don’t have a thing.  Nothing.  At all.  Not even a topic.

Yeah.  {Screwed.}

This is where y’all come in.  I wanted to ask you all, what do you think?  Which of my posts do you like?  What topic should I discuss?  Anything I’ve written so far that you loved and I can build on?  Anything that was incredibly lame?

 

 

 

I really need you to help me out, dammit!

See this is the point that I always get stuck at: the starting point.  I look at a task and I get overwhelmed and I just can’t move forward.  House is a mess…don’t know where to start…don’t clean the house.  Huge project due…don’t know what to do…don’t do the project.  Got to get healthy…overwhelmed…don’t do anything.  Audition to perform…don’t know where to start….NooooOOoooooo!  Not again!

If I can’t even figure out what to write, I guarantee I won’t finish starting this whole big mess. And that is just not an option at this point.  I found a way to push outside of my normal safety zone, and I’m determined to go through with it.  Win or lose, I want to give it a great go.

I guess this is where February’s NaBloPoMo might help.  Perhaps I’ll treat every day as a mini writing session for the audition.  (Don’t worry – I want it to be in my voice, so I will still do my best to be funny and relatable and maybe even poignant too.)

Now, just tell me what the hell I should write about!

No, seriously, leave a comment.

Now.

Pleaseandthankyou.

 

 

Blogging is hard, mkay?

Posted January 24, 2012 Mom Media 6 Comments

Oh Lord…

8 more days of posts to write.  8 more days of funny to bring.  8 more days of ideas to squeeze out of my mind.

NaBloPoMo January 2012
Really?  I don’t think this ol’ betty has got 8 more days – even if we all got together and prayed really hard.  (Not to mention that it would be really selfish of me to ask y’all to pray that I write good blog posts for 8 more days in a row when we could all be wishing for much more important things.  Like world peace.  Or for a united nation, no longer torn apart from politics.  Or the end of those really annoying radio commercials in which two people talk to each other in a “nonchalant” kind of way in order to repeatedly tell us a phone number to call.  “What number did you call, Betty?  Was it 888-your-mom?”  “Yep, 888-your-mom.”  “You said 888-your-mom, right?”  “You’ve got it, Norma!  888-your-mom!”  Yeah. That. Lets pray to end that.)

Anyway, regardless of praying, today I am low on interest and feeling burnt out.  And now, while I really do like her posts and love how she runs NaBloPoMo, Melissa had to go and have this to say…

“You’re participating in NaBloPoMo, which means you need to drag yourself to the computer whether you want to or not. I know that sitting down in front of the screen is hard, but I promise you, you’ll feel better once you do it. It’s like exercising: sometimes it hurts to pull on the shorts and sports bra, you sigh loudly as you drive to the gym, and you pretty much want to cry when you step onto the treadmill. But you feel so damn good when it’s over that you can almost forget that you need to go through this again the next day.”

…which made me want to throw my laptop at her.

I mean, for me, most of that is accurate.  Drag to the computer? Check.  Sigh loudly as I drive to the gym?  Check.  Cry on the treadmill?  Hell yes that’s a check.  Feel so damn good when it’s over that I almost forget all this pain?  Um, hells to the em effin no.  Not at the gym, and not when I’m writing.

Sure, sometimes it comes easily.  Sometimes I can laugh and write really easily and tackle that elliptical like it’s my bitch.  Hell, I can even be thankful I worked out/wrote from time to time.  But, around day 18 or so, blogging gets to be a whole different kind of beast.

This is more how I see it:

Moms, do you remember when you had your baby, and you saw it’s smiling cooing little bald head, and then your raging hormones made you forget about all the pain the little bundle of joy just caused you?  You forgot about the fact that at least half a dozen people saw your junk all in the air doing things that really shouldn’t humanly be possible.  You forgot that you pushed a semi-alien life form outside of a tiny whole in your body that shouldn’t have allowed even the smallest bit of that baby out under normal circumstances.  You forgot how much that really flipping sucked for the next few days while you bled uncontrollably or had never-ending pain in your nethers or how you couldn’t stand without yelping or how you couldn’t even freaking poop.

Well, now…you know how that same child stayed up all night long crying and not sleeping just because it freaking could?  And how that child threw a tantrum in the middle of the grocery store when you were surrounded by what felt like hundreds of other judgy moms?  And how that same child pushed every single one of your buttons and then it said something like, “you don’t do anything for me, MOM!”

And do you remember, how at those exact moments, every single horrific ache and pain came flooding back to your memory and you were all like, “OH HELL TO THE MUTHA FRACKING NO!  I SURE AS HELL DID BIRTH YOU, AND I HAVE THE VAGINA/STRETCH MARKS/PTSD TO PROVE IT!”

Yeah, that’s how I feel about writing.  Sometimes I enjoy what I wrote.  That baby is fresh and new and smells like powder and nurses easily and has the cutest little non-poop-stained onesies to wear.  Sometimes I re-read that post and think I did a good job and that I could do that again, easy peasy.  And that my next post would come out of me like like rainbows out of a unicorn.  Beautiful, poetic.  Awesome.

Other days, writing is like birthing a small elephant.  It hurts and it’s hard and the elephant smells horrifically bad and leaves nothing but giant loads of crap in it’s wake.  And afterward, I think it would be better for everyone involved if I were to pay my cat to walk across the keyboard instead of me trying to do it all over again. Because that post was lame, poorly written, and just plain bad.

Yeah, that’s how I feel about writing.  It a nutshell.

But, just for the record, I’m hoping the next 8 days will be less elephantine, and much more rainbows and unicorns.

Fingers crossed.

 

It’s NaBloPoMo, Bitches.

Posted November 1, 2011 Mom Media 4 Comments


 

Back when I started this version of my blog, I was all “hey, I’m gonna say what ever the hell I want to say and be who ever the hell I want to be and you can suck it if you think that’s lame.”

And then I fizzled out. I forgot that I didn’t need to write “frickin.” I mean, frickin’ has it’s place and all…but dammit, this is MY space. Not my kids, not my parents (big love that you’re a reader though, guys!), and certainly not some “sponsor’s.”  Why edit myself in a space that I created with the intention of being true to the “real” me?

I don’t need to write about crappy swag that I get at a conference. (Not to say that some stuff isn’t worthy, but really, why the hell do I need to write a diatribe on the “awesomesauce” fiber bar I just got – For FREE!?!  Exactly.)

I don’t need to wait to post until I have a grand sentiment to share. Because, lets face it, if you were waiting for that, it might be a while.  The closest I’ve gotten to that might be “Save the Hoo-Hah!”  (Not that I don’t have deep thoughts, but I’m guessing you don’t read blogs to find the meaning of life. If you do…ummm….good luck with that.)

I don’t even have to post on a certain topic. Sure, I love kicking cancer’s ass. And sure, I’d love to be a whole hell of a lot more healthy. And yes, I definitely write about motherhood – even though I hope the kids don’t read this stuff for a long, long time.  But I don’t need to box myself into one corner.  And I don’t need to post what I think will draw in the masses.  I just need to write.

That brings me back to NaBloPoMo – Novemenber is National Blog Posting Month.  And I want in.  I’m sure you are just as aware as I am that there is no way in hell I will be able to post every day like this event begs you to do.  However, I hope to use it to just go ahead and post something.  The best part about blogging is the “getting it off your mind” bit.  Or, at least, the “getting it on paper so I remember later since I have the memory of a block of swiss cheese” bit.

I want to write that I had a shitty day.  Not to scar my kids with my foul language or to make them think I loathed motherhood, but so that when they are mom’s one day, they will see that it’s not all puppies and kittens. It’s also surviving shitty days.

I want to write that I had a great day.  So that when they are teens they remember when mom let them stay home from school and hang out and just cuddle in bed and giggle.  Not just that I’m someone who wants to ruin their lives.

I want to write when I want to cry.  Because sometimes that makes me feel better.  Especially since I have the tendency to keep it in til it boils over, which is never pretty to those on the receiving end.

I want to write,  just for writing’s sake.  Let my fingers do the talking while my brain just says “Ahhhhhhh, that’s a relief.  Now there’s finally room to breathe.”

Yep, It’s NaBloPoMo, bitches.  Buckle up.