Category Archives: communities

February 17, 2009 · 7:33 pm

Taxicab Confessions Revisited or Putting the Social in Social Media

taxi

A quick aside, sorry for no Time to Cry Tuesday this week… had not time (to cry).

Back in October we had this wild experience in a cab with a driver who claimed to be Doug Ingle from Iron Butterfly. Go ahead and read that link, I will wait.

Ok, so a couple of weeks ago I received a comment on that post from someone named Ryan who said that their dad had the same experience. Small internet.

Today, I did my usual afternoon stat check (that is what we bloggers do to validate ourselves now and then) and I saw that there was an inordinate amount of hits on that very post. Linking to the source I was led here where sure enough there are others with the same story, and my post was linked about halfway down.

So this guy tells this story all the time. Maybe all of us that have been in his cab need a Facebook group. Or not.

Seriously, this is one of the greatest things about blogging. The internet gets smaller everyday. Things come full circle and people find others who have had the same experiences.

The social in social media.

On that note I will let you all know that this weekend I was lucky enough to meet two of my original blog friends, or as my family likes to refer to them, my imaginary friends. Shouting out to Wendy and Liz, who I am pretty sure I could have gone to summer camp with in another life. These are two women I am proud to say I am now REAL friends with. Or friends IRL (in real life) as they say in the blogosphere. For those who are fearful of meeting people online I can say beyond a shadow of a doubt, neither one of them is a psycho OR a creep.

Oh, and we are not dating for those who think that is the only reason to meet people online.

Haven’t had enough of me yet? You can also read me at 50-Something Moms Blog.

For photo enthusiasts, visit Leaving the zip code, photos from outside the comfort zone.

4 Comments

Filed under communities, friendship, humor, women

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , ,

February 11, 2009 · 10:36 pm

Hanging babes

hanging_dolls1

I am not sure what to say about this picture. Nope, I did not take this at the trusty art supply joint where I found the bustier purse, Ricky Martin lunchbox and tacky Marilyn Monroe painting, although these cuties would have fit right in there.

These scary little vixens were hanging (literally) in the local Rite Aid that used to be Eckerd (which I never called it) but was Genovese first. Of course I still call it Genovese, I am old school that way.

So there I was, talking to Danny’s 4th grade teacher in Genovese – mind you he is in 11th grade now, small town. We are chatting away about this and that like fed exing valentines to the girls away at college and all sorts of school district gossip.

And then I spotted them.

The metallic hair on the chick on the right must have caught my eye. I stopped in my tracks and said, ” I MUST take a picture of these”. And she was all, “you carry a camera?” sort of what is up with you crazy lady. There I was down on one knee getting a good angle on them and don’t you know she jumped right into the fun and said, “make sure you get a good shot of the combs that their heads are hanging from”. Wow, hadn’t noticed that.

The whole product line is pretty freakish. Who designs this crap?

And it is quite obvious I can ramble on about any topic on earth.

Haven’t had enough of me yet? You can also read me at 50-Something Moms Blog.

For photo enthusiasts, visit Leaving the zip code, photos from outside the comfort zone.

2 Comments

Filed under absurdities, carry a camera, communities, danny, humor, products

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , ,

February 3, 2009 · 12:26 am

Time to Cry Tuesday – Sunrise, Sunset

sunrise_sunset

The title of this post is for my brother. This is how I will be able to tell if he is reading. What, it’s not all about me and my blog?

When we were growing up my mom had a friend with a beautiful singing voice. At every Bar or Bat Mitzvah she would get up and sing Sunrise, Sunset with the band. As you would expect, all of us kids would roll our eyes, giggle a little, suffer glares and shushes from our parents and fidget our way through to the end of the song.

Years later, at my brother’s wedding, she got up and sang it again. As young adults the eye rolling was replaced with a wink, we had long since learned to stop fidgeting and our parents were way too busy full out weeping to worry about the likes of us.

Fast forward a quarter of a century. (this, too, is for my brother – everyone loves to think of themselves as being married for any fraction of a century, right?)

This past weekend I attended the Bar Mitzvah of a friend’s child. But this was not just ANY Bar Mitzvah. This, my friends, was the celebration of the last of the First Thursday children coming of age. The First Thursday group has existed since the month he was born, he is our measure for the length of our friendship and as you can imagine, he is our little mascot of sorts because of it. (surely every 13 year old boy would love to be referred to this way.)

Yes, number 18 has now become a man. Funny, but he still looked so young to me. Until the video montage looped its way into my line of sight and I saw all those kids frozen in time as they were when they were small.

Then I looked back on the dance floor and caught a glimpse of my sweet *J* (not Jana, this is my other J) in that beautiful blue satin dress the color of her eyes, of *N* and *K* in those drop dead sequin numbers with the high heels that would surely cripple the likes of me. And *V* dancing up a storm as if the whole damn world was her living room and she had it by the balls.

That’s when it friggin’ hit me. Like a ton of corny, OMG-I-have-surely-become-my-mother bricks…

I could have been singing the lyrics to Sunrise Sunset in my head.

Haven’t had enough of me yet? You can also read me at 50-Something Moms Blog.

For photo enthusiasts, visit Leaving the zip code, photos from outside the comfort zone.

3 Comments

Filed under communities, family, moms, parenting, teenagers, Time to Cry Tuesdays, Uncategorized, women

Tagged as , , , , , ,

January 27, 2009 · 11:30 pm

Fur Coat and Cowboy Boots…

fur_coat_cowboy_boots

…on an eight-year-old?

Whenever I think I have seen it all in this crazy little zip code I call home, someone comes along and surprises me.

I was out to dinner at a low-key brick oven pizza place with my boys this evening. We were enjoying our dinner, with the guys pretending to listen to me but really watching soccer on the TV over my shoulder listening intently to me and hanging on my every word.

Suddenly, the little girl at the next table stood up and with all the attitude of a truly privileged little monster self-assured super-model, she swung her little fur coat on and pranced out on her little be-booted feet like she owned the place.

Hey twentyfour, money town has nothing on this east coast version.

The other highlight of dinner? Paulie from Rocky was sitting at the next table!

Gotta love this town.

(an no that is a not a picture of the kid silly, she was wearing a short fur jacket and much hipper Frye boots)

Haven’t had enough of me yet? You can also read me at 50-Something Moms Blog.

For photo enthusiasts, visit Leaving the zip code, photos from outside the comfort zone.

Leave a comment

Filed under absurdities, communities

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

January 25, 2009 · 12:32 am

Plinky?

plinky

Ok, everyone who reads me knows about my love affair with Twitter, right? Well tonight, perhaps I cheated on the little bird for a moment or two, I signed up for Plinky? Yeh, I know the name is a little annoying. Kind of like peeing a slinky which conjures up all sorts of painful symptoms and flashbacks of a bad urinary infection I had back in college.

Oops, I digress, for a change!

I heard about Plinky on Twitter so you could say I am cheating but it is twitter’s own damn fault for giving us the mother of all freedoms of speech. My fellow blogger @DarryleP sent out a tweet that cracked me up:

“Help!  I am finally starting to understand Twitter—so can anyone explain Plinky??”

Of course I had to find out what she was talking about so I went and signed up. Lord knows I don’t have nearly enough online addictions!

So here is the deal. This sucker just launched this week. Plinksters, I am giving you some link love and promoting what I think will be a lot of fun. Good luck to you and I hope this is your brass ring:

Plinky is here.

Friends, today we’re proud to announce the launch of Plinky, the little bundle of joy we’ve been gestating for oh so many months.       

What is Plinky, you ask? Well, in case you haven’t already jetted over to plinky.com to check it out, Plinky is a service that makes it easy for you to create inspired content on the web.Every day we provide a prompt (like a question, or a challenge) and you answer. Depending on the prompt, your answer may contain photos, maps, playlists and more. You can easily share your Plinky answers on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and most other major blogging services.

While I am sharing all this link love I surely must not forget to tell you to read Darryle P at i never signed up for this and her really fun new project click for clutter. Oh, and her adorable sun is at UW with Miss Jana, that small internet keeps rearing its crazy head at me! (BTW, you can still contribute to Jana’s Dance Marathon. Just click the link to her name above).

And Twitter, no worries, you are still my first love.

Haven’t had enough of me yet? You can also read me at 50-Something Moms Blog.

For photo enthusiasts, visit Leaving the zip code, photos from outside the comfort zone.

6 Comments

Filed under communities, products, twitter

Tagged as , , , , ,

January 4, 2009 · 10:51 pm

Sorry Pal, this Jew is Not for Jesus

Only on i could cry but i don’t have time would a post about Jesus follow one about Childbirth Orgasms. What can I say, I have range!

As I have mentioned before, I have become a bit of a Twitter addict. For those who are unfamiliar with Twitter it is sort of a cross between a social network, like Facebook, and Instant Messaging, like AIM or ICHAT. And for my parents and in-laws, sorry about speaking in a foreign language in this post.

The other night on Twitter someone wrote that they were being followed by @jesus and they better watch what they say. I thought that was simply hysterical and ‘retweeted’ that comment. Not long after, I received an email that @jesus was now following me! The best line of all in the bio is ‘what would Jesus tweet?’

jesus-tweet

Oh Twitter – opportunities for all! This is a group of Christians trying to spread the word. Hey, G-d bless. But fellas this Jew is not for Jesus, so if you don’t mind, nothing personal but I will not follow y’all back. K?

A little further investigation tuned me in that there are many godlike twitter accounts out there in the twittosphere: @god, @jesus_christ, @baby_jesus, @almighty and there is even @thejesusgeeks and jokesandjesus.

Here is are some funny tweets I uncovered during my search: “Is it me or should @jesus have more than 13 followers?” Or how about this one, “I unfollowed @God the other night, don’t think @Jesus will help either. ; )” On Christmas, this one went out, ” @jesus, happy birthday big guy!” And my favorite one of all “Wow. @greygoosevodka is following me! F’in awesome! But it looks like I lost @jesus (*yikes).

Ok, all kidding aside here. I find this all a little off color. And kind of sticky. This has got to offend the more religious Tweeters out there. Then again, all is fair game in the world of social media I suppose.

Oh, in case you were wondering, to give the other side equal time, @satan is on Twitter too.

Can’t make this stuff up!

Haven’t had enough of me yet? You can also read me at Mid-Century Modern Moms and at 50-Something Moms Blog.

For photo enthusiasts, visit Leaving the zip code, photos from outside the comfort zone.

3 Comments

Filed under absurdities, blogging, communities, humor, religion, twitter

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

October 13, 2008 · 8:55 pm

Time to Cry Tuesday

Wow, Tuesday again? Jeez, I could cry but I don’t have….

Ok, that was lame. Sorry.

I thought a lot about what belonged here this week. Since the last TtCT I have spent a lot of time with family and community for the Jewish holidays. This time of year leaves us Jews all sorts of reflective.

I could have written about the moving sermons given by our clergy (fabulous, actually). Or some of the touching moments with my family. Or how hard it is to have a holiday without our dear sweet Jana-girl. (there we all go, tears are starting).

But there was one incident that stood out this week for me. I have already shared it with a few of you so if you want to go get a cup of coffee now and come back tomorrow I will understand.

On Yom Kippur evening I was near the entrance of the synagogue greeting congregants. (Over-volunteer job #10,000: Synagogue Board Member). An elderly gentleman that I have known for many years came into the lobby with his tie undone. He has not been well for the past few years yet he always makes the effort to attend services. He looked agitated and was asking if we had seen his friend who he asked for by name. With kindess and grace a man I was standing with gently guided this man off to the side and offered to help him with his tie. He had a calming way of helping him with the dignity and compassion that he deserved.

The beautiful thing about this story is that the helper was not someone I would have expected this from. This was a genuine gesture of caring that was so in the spirit of the holiday that it took my breath away. Just a simple act of kindness that made all the difference to someone who has suffered so much.

People will surprise you.

3 Comments

Filed under communities, friendship, religion

Tagged as , , , , ,

October 6, 2008 · 9:11 pm

Time To Cry Tuesday – Life Cycles

Wow, hard to write down all that I have witnessed since the last Time to Cry Tuesday.

In one week in my little world a baby was born while the elderly man next door died leaving his wife of 65+ years. I attended the funeral for the dad of a dear friend and went straight to a Bat Mitzvah celebration for the daughter of another.

Talk about the cycle of life!

Are all these things simply coincidence? I surely think not.

Within the context of the turmoil of our times it is grounding to think that the micro can still balance itself out in some bittersweet way.

(I know what you are all thinking, you have never seen such a short post out of this big mouth. Sometimes you can say it all in a few words. Rarely for me, but this time for sure).

3 Comments

Filed under communities, Time to Cry Tuesdays

Tagged as , , ,