the slack daily

Whoa.

Was Joey Lawrence looking for you? - Will

CATS ARE EVIL, or How I Twitter Through Anything

If you think you've broken your ankle*, I suggest you do it on Twitter.

 

 

Thanks to everyone who kept me company (and kept me laughing): Virginia, Caissie, Gene George, Nutcase, John, Miss Grace, LateandSoon, Mocoddle and finally NOVYSAN for realizing he was closer to me than Will was and picking me up and taking me to the ER.

 

*It was only a bad sprain. The nurse was shocked. I HAVE BONES OF STEEL.

It Gets Better.

He used to tell me that I smelled like diapers.

He sat behind me in nearly every class in Junior High due to the cruel nature of the alphabet. He whispered sweet nothings into my ear.

You're fat. You're ugly.

You smell like diapers.

I n Miss Stebel's homeroom I ran for Homeroom President. It wasn't the top job - that was Class Representative*.  I didn't think it would make me popular, but I thought it was something.  A position. Maybe it would come with a little respect.

He decided to run against me.

I ran a campaign. There were posters and 3-minute speech written on index cards. I wore a skirt and my hair in a bun and felt presidential.

He went up there and said "Vote for Me" and sat back down and continued his barrage of insults as I sat, smiling back the intense feeling of shame that I could feel radiating out from every pore.

He won.

...

He ran into someone I know recently.

He is balding and paunchy and imagines himself a writer.

He doesn't do anything even remotely writer-like.

When my name was brought up, he said "oh yeah, I remember her."

He would love to do what I do.

Maybe when he pops up, I won't remember him.

Life has a way of working itself out.

I'm 38 years old...and it gets better.

 

*I ended up winning Class Representative in Seventh Grade because there were no popular people in my class. I would go to Student Council meetings early so I could pick out my seat before the popular people got there. Because if I got there after they did, the only choice I would have was to sit down next to them. And then they would proceed to slide their chairs to the other side of the room. 

I ran for Vice-President of Student Council at the end of Seventh Grade, hoping still that I could change things from the inside. When I lost...again...I decided that I would stop concentrating on an group that truly didn't want me and start devoting my time to friends who did.

 

(Crossposted to my Tumblr.)

Whereupon I Ask You For Stuff But It Only Costs Your Time.

I said to Will last week I think I'm going to go to SXSW this year.

This afternoon I received an email from Tanner Kling of Retrofit Films to be a part of their panel

"Beyond Linear: The Next Generation of Webseries Storytelling."

(It looks cooler when it's all centered and big and stuff.)

But here's where you come in: you gotta vote for the panel.

I mean, you don't GOTTA gotta. There's no law passed saying that you have to vote for the panel. (YET.) And I guess people get annoyed when you ask them to vote for their panels but I always vote for everyone's panels but I've never asked anyone to vote for mine because I've never gone to SXSW (despite someone's insistence that they met me there.)

So...couldja vote? And pass it on?

The panel is here.

(You hafta register to vote. Don't worry, there are no chads involved.)

And while you're there and registered, you could vote for these guys too. I mean, it's on the way and all.

Merci.

ARGFest (In Your Rabbithole.*)

Yesterday, I returned from steamy Atlanta, GA where I ate ribs at Fat Matt's, drank Mai Tais while listening to Tongo Hiti cover Styx's "Come Sail Away," stole the Grand Inquisitor's fez, and entered into a relationship with a sock.

In a word? ARGFest!

 

I call this series "naked sock with naked (face) girl."

In-between drinking and eating and tomfoolery, there was much discussion about the creative and business direction of transmedia entertainment. It was a privilege to be in the room with players and practitioners, and my head is swimming with how to turn all of these ideas into reality.

I hadn't planned on going, but I'm glad that I did. A lot of my writing - especially the kids' stuff - is about community. Where are my people? Where do I fit? I showed up in the transmedia community post-Valemont like the proverbial new kid. HEY! HEY YOU GUYS! CAN I PLAY? Not only was I invited in their sandbox, but I was given a bucket and a shovel.

Thanks to Brooke for inviting me to be on a panel, and to any and all who I met this weekend.  I'll be harassing your inboxes soon.

*That one's for Brian & Jan.

(You may have to be logged into Facebook to see some of the photos linked above.)

What if All We Have to Look Forward to is a Bucket of Pig's Blood?

According to Jenny the Bloggess, today is Blogging Without Makeup Day,where bloggers, world-'round, post photos of themselves sans makeup.

To be honest, every day is Blogging Without Makeup Day, because I don't roll out of bed fully made up.
(And I don't blog every day. But we're talking about makeup here. Stay focused, people.)

My husband does not wake up to this:

Or even this:

I.R. Smart!

The slackmistress in her natural habitat looks something like this:

True to form, I didn't even brush my hair.

This is what it looks like without the cute dog to distract you:

I won't eat your children. PROBABLY.

But then I got to thinking: what's the point of this Blogging Without Makeup Day? Did I just take Jenny's word for it? Sure, it seems to be a meme, but what if it was elaborate ruse to get a bunch of (predominantly female) bloggers to post photos of themselves looking less than their absolute best? What if it was in fact a joke of Carrie-like proportions, and now all we have to look forward to is a bucket of pig's blood?

I pondered this conspiracy theory:

Wearing my pondering glasses.

 

But then I got distracted and forgot.

April Fools, Doggy Style

Follow DaisyJDog on Twitter here.

Always Forward.

I returned from MIT's Story 3.0 conference with my brain in bits like buckshot. I'm still trying to assemble the bits and pieces as we look towards to future of story.  The Center for Future Storytelling - a part of MIT's Media Lab - is a place I want to set up camp. A bunch of technologists and scientists and storytellers and entertainment professionals and forward-thinking brands gathering together to discuss stories and they are evolving as technology and the audience changes? Yes, please.

I love speaking in public. I was on speech team in high school, people. SPEECH. TEAM. (Scroll down to 1990, Special Occasion Speaking.) But i made a rookie mistake of practicing with my analog notes (aka paper) and then switching to using my computer at the last minute instead. 

I know better.

Alas, I was a wee bit more disjointed than I would have liked as I lost my place on the screen, and then scrolled to catch up. I think I managed to get my point across, or else I was enthusiastic enough where people thought there must be something to this. Thankfully, chatting with the attendees over the next 24 hours, I was better able to elaborate on some of the points I brought up during my part of the presentation. 

I was frustrated, but I was there to listen and learn and share my experiences. What I knew, what I learned, and where I thought we were going.

Always forward.

I returned on Thursday, and Friday morning found me at the vet at 7:45am to drop off Daisy J. Dog, who was having her cancerous lump removed. Since hemangiosarcoma is a cancer of the blood vessel cells, it was important to remove the lump along with the area immediately surrounding it, as well as some lumps that were found under her mammary glands.

The more they could remove, the better chance we have at kicking cancer's ass. So they were aggressive. Daisy returned to us Saturday morning with ten inches of stitches on her belly and minus three nipples. The saggy skin on her belly - a reminder of her earlier life as a breeding dog before someone threw her out like garbage - was gone. Daisy's gone Hollywood and finally gotten that tummy tuck.

Always forward.

She's got a pain patch on her hind leg and tramadol that needs to be given every eight hours. Last night was her first night at home. She spent it a little confused and out of it, which makes her a little whiny, or else not feeling any pain at all, which means she wants to scratch her belly with her hind leg, not caring that it's like Frankenstein's monster down there.

I banished Will to the couch so he could get some sleep (I can grab a nap during the day if I have to) and spent the night getting up every thirty minutes to comfort her and make sure she didn't rip her stitches out (since she scratches with her hind leg, the cone is of little use to prevent this.)

A few sleepless nights could buy us years. I'll take it.

Always forward.

March 27, with her ProCollar.

A Gap $50 Gift Card for Your Most Embarrassing Clothing Story...

The following statement can now be found on my About Page:

Full Disclosure: As of July 2009, I am a Gap Brand Enthusiast. This is different than a Gap Band Enthusiast, as I am a fan of the Gap Brand an not the Gap Band. No disrespect to Gap Band fans.As a Gap Brand Enthusiast, I am not paid nor required to blog about Gap merchandise or functions. However, on occasion I do receive free merchandise for my own personal use as well as to give out on my blog. These blog posts will always have the hashtag #gapborntofit and will be categorized as such.

I have been wearing clothes from the Gap since the 70's. The only disclosure statement I have about that is that their jeans make my ass look good, and I will always say that for free.

On Thursday night, I had the pleasure of assembling women for all blogs of life together for a Gap Born to Fit Party at the Gap 1969 Pop-Up Store on Robertson Blvd. It was a night of sangria and laughing and, as I told everyone who walked in the door I invited you to a party where you have to take off your pants. 

We were all different shapes and sizes, as women have a tendency to be, but the one thing we all had in common is that we all left with a pair of 1969 jeans that made us feel like rockstars.

I'll write more about that when the photos come in. Also, if I managed to figure out the technology correctly, I even have a livevlog from the dressing room. It's like BetheMarriage, except pantsless.

Actually, it's exactly like BetheMarriage (which is on tonight at 8pm PST, by the by...)

But thanks to the folks at Gap and Brand About Town, I have a $50 gift certificate to give away! (And there may be more where that comes from, so stay tuned.)

All I want is you Most Embarrassing Clothing Story.

You must post this story in the comments (or you can post it on your blog with the hashtag #gapborntofit) but you MUST return here and comment with the link to the blog. I will be using a random number generator to pick the winner from the comments. This contest closes on Wednesday, August 19 at 5pm PST.

You ARE allowed to post more than one story to enter more than once - you can enter TWICE but they must be separate stories in separate comments! (2x is the cap, though.)

I don't qualify, but here's my Most Embarrassing Clothing Story after the cut.

P.S.: I Love You (Internet)

As I mentioned in a previous post, I've been writing. A lot.

When I'm not writing* I have a tendency to imagine other things I could be doing. Because I am a nerd, this usually involves things like trying to remember that totally funny thing I meant to Twitter or emailing Will to ask him if he remembers that totally funny thing I meant to Twitter or creating new blogs about things Daisy says or other brilliant ideas that are so awesome I can't write them down here because someone may steal them spawning a million-dollar industry or wondering if telling that gangbang story at that meeting with that agent was a mistake because even though I've never been a part of a gangbang or seen a gangbang you have to call it a gangbang story because there was this one time my husband told me this story about this party he went to and a gangbang broke out doesn't have the same ring to it. 

I don't think to shut off my brain. I drink to slow it down.

*Which means I'm eating, sleeping or peeing.**
** I don't poop. I am a delicate female flower.***
***That's a lie.****
****The not pooping part, I mean. I am a delicate female flower, you assholes.*****
*****You're not really assholes.******
******Wouldn't an asterisk blog of postscripts be awesome? Don't steal that and make a million dollars, you assholes.*******
*******You know I didn't mean that.********
********I meant the asshole part.