Happy Mothers’ Day, Mom
My mom is amazing.
She is a wonderful example of motherhood.
She taught me big lessons about love and friendship.
She encourages me to be my best in everything I do.
She keeps me laughing all the time.
She is beautiful.
She is there as a shoulder for me to cry on whenever I need her.
She reminds me that there are always other ways to look at a problem.
She continually teaches me what true generosity means.
She is absurdly proud of my successes.
She has always stood up for me.
She reminds me that smiling makes all the difference.
She has a silly, infectious laugh.
She made me noodle soup and tuna sandwiches all the time when I was a kid.
She took me to countless dance classes and sports practices and supported all my interests.
She cheered me on in every performance and game.
She is a legend among my friends.
She loves me despite all the billions of times I was (and am) a pain in the ass.
She is a woman I will always look up to and admire.
She’s my mom, and I love her.
Today’s Honey: May 8, 2008
As promised, Today’s Honey is the quilted leather edition. I can’t get enough of this, so I might just have to blog about handbags exclusively from now on. I honestly haven’t decided if that statement is serious or not yet.
Behold my favorite new purchase–the Burberry Montgomery bag in black:
A Tiny Taste of PodCamp NYC 2.0, Amandalana Style
I met Alana Taylor, of Twitter song fame, on Saturday at PodCamp NYC 2.0. She whipped out her Flip and we made a moment. Check it out:
Haagen-Dazs Helps the Honey Bees
Social Honeycomb cares about honey. Honey comes from bees. And apparently, the bees need our help.
I recently came across a campaign by Haagen Dazs called Help the Honey Bees. This didn’t sound like your typical awareness campaign so I poked around the site a little. Apparently there are a lot of forces working against honey bees, and this in turn affects many of the foods we eat, including, of course, my guilty pleasure of choice–ice cream.
A few interesting facts from the Help the Honey Bees press kit:
- Honey bees are responsible for the pollination of more than 100 crops, including fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds, providing 80 percent of the country’s pollination services
- Honey bee pollination directly results in about $15 billion worth of fruits, vegetables, nuts, and agricultural seeds annually in the U.S. That does not include the role that honey bee pollination plays in providing the seeds that are planted for forage (alfalfa and clover, etc.) that are eaten by our livestock and end up on our plates as meat, or as dairy products
I never knew honey bees were so important! This Haagen Dazs micro-site represents an interesting cause marketing/PR campaign for an issue most people probably never think about. You can easily learn about the bee crisis, see what’s being done, find out how you can help and play around with some fun bee-themed features at the same time. This awareness-raising campaign seems genuine, and positions Haagen Dazs as environmentally-minded and responsible beyond the brand just wanting to sell more tubs of ice cream. …Mmm, ice cream…
Even if you hate ice cream and don’t care if the foods you enjoy are ruined by the plight affecting honey bees, you may enjoy the whimsical “Make a Bee” section of the site. It’s reminiscent of the Become an M&M campaign, where you can customize a honey bee and send it through “bee-mail” to a friend.
I think this is an interesting cause-related PR campaign. So get out there, buy some ice cream and save some honey bees. …Mmm, honey…
Today’s Honey: April 20, 2008
I came across this video on Yianni Garcia’s blog and thought it was absolutely fantastic. Alana Taylor is definitely a rockstar in my book.
Lyrics:
When I wake up in the morning,
The first thing I see,
Is an e-mail in my Gmail,
Sayin’ you’re followin’ me.
And next thing you know,
I’m followin’ you,
Not everybody does it,
But me and Scoble do.
Chorus:
Cuz Twitter beats Facebook any day,
140 characters is all you need to say.
Cool thing ’bout Twitter is you meet new people,
You even get to stalk the famous ones too,
We’ve got Veronica Belmont from Mahalo Daily,
Barack Obama and Hugh MacLeod, too.
Chorus
Twitter’s like a family,
As long as you’re not spamming me,
We keep in touch, we share too much,
And @garyvee meets up for lunch.
Chorus
But be careful with your iPhone…
Don’t DM the whole worldddddd!
Chorus
PicLens is Enhancing My Photo Viewing Experience
Social media evangelist and friend Bryan Person (formerly known as Bryper) recently turned me on to the Web browser add-on PicLens. I’m generally a fan of toolbars, buttons and widgets that make things flashier and/or easier to use, so I checked it out. As someone who takes a lot of pictures and finds herself turning up in a lot of pictures on the Web, I was curious to see what this app could do. And I agree with earlier reviews–it’s pretty special.
PicLens puts a little “play” button on images you find within certain Web sites, like Google Images, Facebook, Flickr, MySpace, etc. When you click the little button, it transports your browser to this alternate universe where photos are much more amazing than they are with the average, everyday browser. Note: if a photo is small (think thumbnail size), the button will take up most of the picture. If you don’t want to PicLens it, make sure you click on the corner or edge of the photo so it doesn’t enable the PicLens app.
So, say you clicked on a friend’s profile photo within Facebook. PicLens now takes you to what they call a “3D Wall” of photos related to the one you clicked–in this case, your friend’s other photos in the album. From there, you can zip around, look at things up close, play a slideshow, search for keywords and generally have a very rich photo viewing experience.
Now excuse me while I go PicLens it up with the 1,336 photos currently filling the BS08 Flickr group.
Today’s Honey: March 29, 2008
Love and technology.
4×4 Pseudo-Secrets for Social
As I told John Wall, a little kidney infection isn’t stopping me from showing up at Blogger Social, which is only a week away now. I plan on being out in full force, wearing my obnoxiously sequined dress and painful strappy Enzos, ready to see and meet some super socialites. Tim Brunelle recently tagged me with the 4×4 meme in preparation for next weekend. So I’ve been sitting here, wondering if there are even 16 interesting things about me that I can share… Here goes:
4 Things I’m Proud Of
1. When I was 12, I heard about a junior high in Oklahoma whose school was trashed by a tornado, and they were trying to raise money so they could still have some big school dance. Since I knew I would be totally devastated if my big middle school dance was canceled, I saved my all babysitting money for a month and sent a check to the school.
2. I pulled off a big surprise dance number at The Dance Place, Inc.’s Susan G. Komen Benefit in November 2007 and also raised $1,150 on behalf of the studio for the cause.
3. I was able to graduate a semester early (with a job waiting for me!) from college with a strong GPA in a notoriously tough school.
4. I returned to dancing en pointe only four months after I broke my ankle/leg in three places. I’m TOUGH.
4 Countries I’d Like to Visit
1. Greece
2. India
3. Spain
4. Brazil
4 Albums That Defined My Adolescence
1. Brand New- Deja Entendu
2. Fiona Apple- When the Pawn…
3. Britney Spears- …Baby One More Time
4. Alanis Morissette- Jagged Little Pill
4 Things That Scare Me
1. Heights
2. This Under Armour commercial
3. Walking alone in the dark
4. Thriller movies, i.e. this.
I don’t tag people with memes, so that’s all, folks. Did you learn anything new about me? See you next Saturday!
What’s in Your Social Media Handbag (… or Man Purse)?
Not sure if you’ve noticed yet, but I’m a girl. A girl who is into “girly” things. Things like glitter, makeup, shoes and shimmer. Yet, here I am, hanging out in this dude-filled social media world and working in the tech PR industry. Spaces not exactly known for their sparkle and lip glossiness. And that’s more than fine with me, but in my opinion–and I know at least a few ladies who would agree–there might not be enough metaphors that capture how we chicks think (read: shop and accessorize).
So, here it is. Not a social media tool kit, not a social media tackle box, not a pair of social media Wrangler jeans. Me? I have a social media handbag, thanks.
In my social media handbag, the essentials are my Twitter, Facebook, ooVoo, Skype, del.icio.us and Google Reader. These are like my phone, T pass, credit card, lip balm, license and keys. Every girl has her essential items she needs to survive away from home–the things you use all the time and can’t live without. But then you’ve got the extra stuff that you just like having with you. You don’t always take these things everywhere, but you usually have them around just in case. For me, that’s Flickr, Utterz and Seesmic. My mini mirror, tissues and umbrella. Guys, I know you sometimes wonder what the hell we need these handbags for, but trust me, girls get what I’m talking about. And I mean, this could be taken in a variety of ways depending on your accessory personality–you could have a social media man purse, social media evening clutch, social media fannypack…
Girls, this is how I conceptualize my social media “stuff.” I’m a visual thinker. And I like pretty things.
What’s in your social media handbag?
Today’s Honey: February 6, 2008
Roisin Murphy’s stage presence is confident and subtly sexy. She performs her song “Sinking Feeling” with a jazzed up energy that is cool and infectious. Thoughts?
