Posts from — September 2014

So I’m obviously a complete and utter liar since I said that I would never remind you about #MicroblogMondays again, but really, if you want to blame someone, blame Loribeth because she is the one who sent me this brilliant article.

If you’re not going to click over and read it, it basically says that people who write, even a small amount, reap health benefits.

No matter the quality of your prose, the act of writing itself leads to strong physical and mental health benefits, like long-term improvements in mood, stress levels and depressive symptoms. In a 2005 study on the emotional and physical health benefits of expressive writing, researchers found that just 15 to 20 minutes of writing three to five times over the course of the four-month study was enough to make a difference.

I am guessing when they talk about writing for 15 minutes, they do not mean throwing out flippant Facebook status updates.  They’re talking about a blog post.  Even a microblog post.

One study found that blogging might trigger dopamine release, similar to the effect from running or listening to music.

So… yeah… it matters to me that you do this.  Not just because I’m a selfish bastard who now looks forward to Mondays because I know I have a solid block of posts to read (vs. the weekends when my feed reader is bare, bare, bare).  I want you to do this because it could impact your overall health and emotional well-being.

Writing could very well save your life.

Tomorrow marks the fourth #MicroblogMonday, and hopefully, by now, it is becoming a habit. (Because I swear, one day I will stop writing these reminder posts!)  Thank you for participating and giving us a tiny glimpse into your world. Even if you don’t accomplish another post this week, you at least know that you got up one. And you did it before the week really began.

So at some point between Monday morning and Tuesday morning, post a brief update. It can be as short as 1 word (“blech!”) or as long as 8 sentences.  Actually don’t get hung up on the length. Micro just means small. Anything you’d post on Twitter or Facebook, or an image you’d post on Instagram… that’s all this is.

So… see you tomorrow with your mini post.

And in the meantime, do you feel different emotionally on the days you write vs. the days you don’t write?

I posted about this on Twitter and Facebook because it has been on my mind lately.  Most of the twins’ friends are out of car seats.  My kids are still in boosters and will be for a long time because the recommendation (well, it ranges between recommendation and law depending on where you live) is 4 feet 9 inches or between 80 – 100 pounds.  My kids are nowhere near those stats.

It is — of course — a social minefield with other kids (mostly because kids need to find something to tease every other kid about — if it wasn’t their size, it would be their name or how they walk or what they bring for lunch): being the smallest kids in the class.  They’re not, there are a few kids smaller than they are, but they’re amongst the smallest.

This isn’t really something that concerns me deeply.  As I said, if it wasn’t their size, kids would find something else to tease them about.  I care a lot more about their safety than I do about wrapping them in virtual cotton balls so their feelings never get hurt.

But it made me think about this boy from childhood whom all the other boys called Smurf.  It had clearly bothered him a lot.

I ended up Googling him just to check that he turned out okay.  While it’s hard to really know much from a picture or two, he seems to have a great job and live in a fun place and every photograph shows him with a huge smile.

So I’m going to go with the assumption that all will be fine for the twins too.  Even if they are sort of smurfy right now.

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Yes, this is your weekly reminder to back up your blog, social media accounts, and email.

And a specific one if you use Apple products: back up your devices BEFORE you download the new iOS!

Seriously.  Stop what you’re doing for a moment.  It will take you fifteen minutes, tops.  But you will have peace of mind for days and days.  It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

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And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “Introducting the New to the Old” (Bits and Peaces)
• “One Year of Autism” (The Adventures of Chicken and Ham)
• “Exhausted” (Handpicked Miracle)
• “The Arrival of Lilah and Olivia Rapp” (Searching for Our Silver Lining)
• “Customers or Patients? What Happens When Doctors See Markets Not People” (Silent Sorority)

Okay, now my choices this week.

Outlandish Notions has a post about writing under a pseudonym, but moreover, how her pseudonym is as much a part of her as she gave part of herself to become the name.  Two lines drew me in: (1) “There’s no way, I think,  for any single voice to represent all of a person. We cannot translate ourselves onto the screen as whole, complete beings.” and (2) “This space is nominally mine, but without you, it would be bare and sterile.”  Both an important reminder that no one can contain their whole self on the screen as well as the fact that we all play a role in the life of a blog.

Family Rocks: The Life of Peg has a post about perspective; both the good and bad that came from losing her sister.  The post is breathtaking; as in, it literally took my breath away as I read it.  Her world shifted, and she writes of how she used to see things and how she sees them now.  She writes, “I am a different person due to the accident.  Some good.   Some hard to handle.”  I am so glad she wrote this post and helped me understand her world.

Lastly, it was likely to happen if I’m hosting and reading #MicroblogMondays, but I once again have several I’d like to highlight.  Constant in the Darkness has “Understanding” which blew me away.  I had chills down my arms.  Invincible Spring has the sobering “Family of Four” about the invisibility of loss.  And “The Epiphany” by Serenity Now (the last microblog in that space!) gave me a lot to think about.

The roundup to the Roundup: My kids will never be out of their booster seat.  Your weekly backup nudge.  And lots of great posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between September 12th and 19th) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.

Fine, it’s far from realistic: a boy posts a story on his brand-spanking-new blog and suddenly it goes viral and donations pour in from all corners of the Internet to help them pay for their dog’s surgical bills.  He’s able to Google his name and see that 2,876 people have read it.  But really, Jojo Moyes tenuous grasp on how the Internet works aside, she digs down into the soft heart of why people blog in her book, One Plus One.

Nicky explains why he wrote a blog post in a moment of anger (page 329):

For those awful few days, at least, writing it down and putting it out there had actually helped.  It had felt like he was telling someone, even if that someone didn’t really know who he was and probably didn’t care.  He just hoped that someone would hear what had happened, would see the injustice of it.

When I was little, I’d say, “I’m going to tell my mum,” even when I knew the transgression wasn’t big enough to get adults involved.  It wasn’t that I wanted her to solve it; I didn’t even really want her to get involved and possibly get me into more trouble (the sort that comes after you rat someone out).  I just wanted to tell her, to know that someone other than me knew this… thing… this big, furry monster of a thought that was weighing down my chest.

I just wanted someone else to carry that monster too.

And then I grew up.  I still confide in my mother and consider her one of my best friends. (Wait… mums aren’t supposed to be friends with their kids… Screw that: I’m friends with my mother and I like hanging out with her.)  But at some point, I started confiding in my peers.

I remember the first time I unloaded a big dark secret to a peer.  We were sitting in the back seat of my car, eating a car-picnic lunch that we picked up at Sutton Place Gourmet.  My heart was pounding, thinking about speaking the words aloud.  And then once they were out, there was such a sense of relief.  Why hadn’t I done this sooner?  Telling a story.  Confiding in someone.  Making them hold the monster-y thought too.

And then there was blogging, and now there are many people out there, holding my monster-y thoughts while I hold their monster-y thoughts.  That’s the reality of monster-y thoughts: when you have multiple hands holding them, they get seemingly lighter.  Much so that you have the energy to hold other people’s thoughts as well as your own.

Later in the scene, she also sums up well that first moment when you fall in love with the Internet.  That moment is what keep me coming back to the Internet, even when my cynical side only sees the dick pics and obnoxious Facebook status updates.  It creates muscle memory, so your fingers keep typing.  She writes (on page 331):

His heart was doing something strange … He wanted to laugh at the magnificence of total strangers.  At their kindness and their goodness and the fact that there were actual people out there being good and nice.

Because buried underneath the clickbait and the infuriating stories and the disappointing stats is that truth: that the Internet allows us to be our best selves and to feel other people’s best selves.

I could not have gotten through years of infertility without you guys.

Last week, JK Rowling revealed the form her Patronus takes —  a pine marten.  Which is so adorable that I’ve stopped coveting the rabbit that lives in our backyard, and now I’m coveting my very own pine marten friend who will chillax with me while I write.  Nerdist also reviewed several characters’ Patronuses, and you can see the complete list on the Harry Potter wiki.

Of course, it makes you wonder what your Patronus would be.  Pottermore is getting a Patronus quiz soon, though I imagine that it has a limited number of options, so we’ll all end up with the same Patronuses.  Whereas the animal world is large and varied, and our real Patronus may not be included in that algorithm.

You know, our real real Patronus.

I realized that I have no idea what my Patronus would be.  No clue.  No animal pops to mind.  I mean, there are animals I like, and animals that mirror my personality, behaviour-wise.  But still, I don’t even have a short list of possibilities.  Whenever I get my Hogwarts letter and finally learn how to create a corporal Patronus, I will be shocked to discover my animal.

Whereas I wasn’t surprised at all to learn that I was sorted into Ravenclaw.  I imagine most kids aren’t that shocked by their House placement when they come to Hogwarts.  The four Houses are all associated with certain personality types, and you generally know yourself.  While I’m sure there were disappointments from time to time, there was no one who continued to sit on the chair and say to the Sorting Hat, “Wait, are you sure?  Because that doesn’t make any sense.  I thought I’d be in Gryffindor, but you put me in Hufflepuff.  And I’m actually kind of a bitch.  I mean, brave and all of that, but I’m really a mean girl.  Are you sure you meant Hufflepuff?”

Which begs the question: are people surprised when they discover their Patronus form?  Or is everyone just thrilled to see their little protector running around in front of them?  Does anyone express disappointment: “Really?  I’m a seal?  I kinda sorta hate seals.  I thought I’d be a fox.  Or a goat.  Or something other than a seal.”

Do you have an inkling of your Patronus form?  And do you think anyone knows that sort of thing beforehand, or do you just get what you get and you don’t get upset?

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

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We watch Doctor Who every Saturday night, and Sunday morning, I go on the blogs and see what other people thought of the episode.  I tend to read other people who love the show as much as I do.

Last week, I ventured into the comments on a post, which was a mistake.  The people were tearing apart the episode, pointing out what they thought were unrealistic aspects of the plot.  (Uh… do these people realize that Time Lords don’t exist?  And the Tardis isn’t real?  Fiiiiiiiiiiiction.)

I don’t want to pick Doctor Who apart.  For me, the show is successful simply because it makes me happy.  Doctor Who makes me happy for a full hour.  To me, that is the mark of success: did you change one person’s mood for the better?  Yes?  Then your creation is a success.

So rather than complain about something, tell me what makes you happy?

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Are you also doing #MicroblogMondays? Add your link below. The list will be open until Tuesday morning. Link to the post itself, not your blog URL. (Don’t know what that means? Please read the three rules on this post to understand the difference between a permalink to a post and a blog’s main URL.) Only personal blogs can be added to the list. I will remove any posts that are connected to businesses or are sponsored posts.

This week’s list is closed.  But come back next Monday for a new list: