Given that I’ve been busy fundraising (i.e., pulling my hair out!) and haven’t had much time to come up with any interesting new blog posts, I thought I’d do a post on Leap Day. February 29 only comes around every 4 years so here’s an off the cuff poem about Leap Day to brighten your day, make you smile, or at least make you scrunch your forehead…
Leap Day, Leap Day where did you come from?
Leap Day, Leap Day where is your home?
You arrive every 4 years and soon you are gone.
You remind some of us of lizards or frogs
And others of leaping antelopes, hogs or dogs
But some of us wonder why the heck don’t we have the day off! Aruni Gunasegaram, February 29, 2008 11:45 a.m. CST
Happy Leap Day everyone! May the extra day bring you one special day closer to achieving your 2008 goals. 🙂
Those of us who live in Austin, Texas love talking about how great it is here. On top of the perfect ‘winter’ weather (it’s 7o degrees in February), great people, and great tech community, we have a top ranking state university (The University of Texas at Austin) and awesome Twitter members. 🙂
Yesterday, we took the kids to see the UT Austin Longhorn football team practice in the morning. Hook ‘Em Horns! The weather was around 6o degrees and because it was a morning practice there weren’t nearly the amount of people there that my husband said were there at the one evening practice he went to before. Our son loved getting close to the players and our daughter had fun rolling down the hills. Our son held his hand out as some of the players were moving from one practice field to the next and they touched his outstretched palm which made his day! He gets his love of college football from his dad. I’ve been known to watch a game from time to time. We then went to Shady Grove for lunch which is near Lady Bird Lake and enjoyed the sunny day by eating outside.
For dinner we met up with some Austin tweeters who I had never met before except of course for Connie Reece who got me started with blogging and probably first told me about twitter! Oh and Thom Singer who we have known for several years…well before I forayed into blogging. We met at Waterloo Ice House on Loop 360 and at 7:00 pm and it was still 70 degrees! The kids had a blast playing on the playscape and in the sandbox.
The Austin Tweet-Up was organized by Kim Haynes for Susan Reynolds and Bryan Person who were in town visiting from DC and Boston. It was great fun meeting several people I’ve gotten to know via tweets on twitter and meeting new people in Austin. What is it about those magical 140 character tweets?
For some other write-ups on the Austin Tweetup check out Kim Haynes’ and Thom Singer’s posts, here and here.
My sister-in-law, who lives in Mexico, forwarded me this email from Luis Molinar who she knows. I thought it was simple, powerful and compelling enough to share on this Valentine’s Day 2008.
Photo by Sandy Blanchard. Bulbs by Michelle Campion
Hello Dear One’s,
Knowing that for us to grow and heal from old wounds that keep us repeating our limited patterns that may say no to the universe, we some times need to take risks. I’d like to share this writing about taking risks in one’s life, to see if you’re living in fear and not taking risks, but stuck in your old patterns and consequently not living a happy and content life.
Risk
To laugh is to risk appearing a fool.
To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.
To reach out for another is to risk involvement.
To express feelings is to risk exposing your true self.
To place ideas and dreams before a crowd is to risk ridicule.
To Love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.
To hope is to risk despair.
To try is to risk failure
And at the same time risks must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, is nothing.
He/she may avoid suffering and sorrow, but he/she cannot LOVE, LEARN, FEEL, CHANGE, GROW and LIVE.
Chained by his/her attitudes he/she is a slave.
He/she has forfeited his/her freedom.
Only the person who RISKS is truly FREE.
*********************
So Dear One’s, how Free are you???
Luis Molinar
HeartWorks, Inc. ToltecHeartWisdom.com
Being the busy family that we are, we eat out now and again. When we go to kid-friendly restaurants they generally give us papers to color on and crayons. The paper ranges from a single sheet with fish or puppy dogs to elaborate booklets with tic-tac-toe games to word puzzles to fancier fish or puppy dogs. I assume they recycle the paper, but what do they do with the crayons? In 99% of the cases, they are brand new and are barely used when we leave them on the table (because we already have a million at home). I hope they are given to some kids or schools who could use them.
We’ve all heard that saying. Once you learn how to ride a bike, you never forget. I experienced the sensation ‘of riding a bike’ for the first time as a parent this weekend. Our 5 ½ year old son rode on his own. He and I were both exhilarated! I’m not sure who was more excited.
He hadn’t got on his bike since last year due to Holidays and weather and us being busy. Plus since we are city-folk for some reason we don’t seem to have a lot of time to practice bike riding.
On Saturday he saw his dad go for a bike ride and he wanted to go. I told him I would take him later that afternoon. We got him geared up and on his bike. I walked next to him and held the handle bars for the first runs. Then I slowly let go and held onto the back of his shirt. He kept telling me not to let go but then slowly I let go and he didn’t realize it. I told him “you are doing it on your own!” He started laughing, talking, and smiling until he rode up on someone’s driveway and stumbled off the bike. He did it several more times on Saturday and then again on Sunday, where he went even further.
He “got it!” Now his mind and his body know what the sensation is of riding on his own. There is no looking back. I felt so proud and the image of him riding away from my outstretched hand will forever be etched in my brain. Oh and fortunately in a digital picture and also in a video. 🙂
“It’s like riding a bike.” Right now I’m hoping starting another business, raising funds, and all the other fun stuff I’m about to do is like riding a bike. Some things are easier and you know what to focus on and what not to but there are so many moving parts that maybe if I just keep repeating in my head “It’s like riding a bike” I won’t fall down as much or I guess I’ll be able to pick myself up faster and get right back on!
In case you missed it, here is the hilarious video about Bill Gates’ last day at Microsoft that was shown at his final keynote address at the Computer Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas yesterday. I think it’s so great to see his fun side! As an entrepreneur, I am in awe at what he has accomplished in his lifetime and even did a post about a prior appearance of his with Steve Jobs a while back.
The video stars Brian Williams, Steve Ballmer, Matthew McConaughey, Robbie Bach, Jay-Z, Bono, Steven Spielberg, George Clooney, Jon Stewart, Kevin Turner, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Al Gore, and others. Thanks to Long Zheng for posting his own video and helping me find a link. Here’s the link to the YouTube video that will hopefully show properly below (its been off & on again).
I don’t really like making New Year’s resolutions. However, I’m making an exception this year because I figure I’ll try something new. Maybe I’ll even make quarterly resolutions! This is the first year I’ve had a blog which means I can now write them down and let my readers hold me accountable. So here it goes.
Business Goals
Raise funds for Babble Soft. I will finish the business plan, refine the pitch, and set up meetings with angel investors.
Establish additional nanny partnerships and other corporate partnerships that lead to increased revenue and revenue opportunities. I have to make hundreds of calls, send hundreds of emails, set up meetings, and close deals.
Identify and become a member of at least 2 organizations that will help build my network to reach our customers. If you have any suggestions on what organizations to join I would love to hear them!
Convince some great companies to advertise with us. If I can demonstrate a significant increase in users (SEO please work!) of our applications, I believe those advertisers who want to reach new parents and caregivers that are breastfeeding, bottle feeding, changing diapers, taking medicine, pumping, and trying to get some priceless, precious sleep would be *extremely* interested. Plus with our planned new applications that audience widens and deepens.
Find great people to help make it happen! Must find great people. Must find great people! Key team additions needed are 1) Experienced Senior Product Manager with strong technical skills to manage products from design to implementation to market and 2) Experienced Internet Partnership, Social Media & Ad Sales Manager (does such a person even exist?). Must find great people!
Personal Goals
Lose 5 pounds. I will eat less and exercise more.
Take Yoga classes. I will locate, sign up, and attend classes. Anyone have any recommendations for instructors in the Austin, Texas area?
Laugh more. I will find more funny and fun people to hang out with. 🙂
Be less concerned with what other people think. This will probably be the hardest one for me to accomplish and the hardest to measure. Worrying about what people think of me, my decisions, my company, my appearance, my parenting, my words, etc. sometimes unduly stresses me out and takes up way too much energy that should be devoted elsewhere. I’m not alone in this issue. I’ve seen many bloggers write about it but more women than men which may be a result of our society or more likely Oprah. I will work to drastically reduce the negative self talk in my head. I think Yoga will help me with this goal.
My Personal Goals are mostly in my control. I decide what to eat. I decide when/how to exercise, etc. I decide when to pick up the phone and sign up for a Yoga class.
Achieving the Business Goals, on the other hand, are less in my control. I can do everything right but if the angel investors don’t understand or care for the market or market need I’m addressing then funding sources might not be available. If the stock market crashes and everyone quits investing then, c’est la vie. If the funding doesn’t come through then I won’t be able to hire great people, etc., etc. I believe I have the most control over establishing additional partnerships and joining organizations but that’s what I believe right now on January 1, 2008. As the Internet has proven, things change at the speed of each new thought!
What are your goals? Feel free to leave a comment here and/or leave a link back to your blog to where you posted your 2008 thoughts.
If you’d like to see if I meet my goals (or even heckle me – I don’t mind as long as its funny and helps me with my Laugh More goal 🙂 ) subscribe to this blog’s feed and share your wonderful thoughts with me.
Erin, my husband, and I went to the Duran Duran concert at the Austin Music Hall last night. It was fabulous! They played just a few songs off of their new CD but spent most of the time on their classics like Rio, Save A Prayer, Girls on Film, Wild Boys (one of our son’s favorite songs), etc., etc. They didn’t play Hungry Like the Wolf (which is our son’s other favorite DD song).
We didn’t have MTV growing up so I didn’t get to see their videos very often. I’ve seen more of them now because Erin bought their video collection a while back. I always thought it was cool that a few of Duran Duran’s videos were filmed in Sri Lanka, which is where I’m from.
Erin said one of his entire room wall’s was filled with Duran Duran posters back in the day. He was a huge fan. I think he said he even had some jacket that looked like the one Simon LeBon used to wear. After seeing the videos again, I finally understood why Erin dances the way he does…which is almost exactly like Simon. My sister had posters of them on her wall too. I am embarrassed to admit now that I had a poster of Michael Jackson on my wall. I know. I know. Don’t tell anyone.
Sara Bareillis was the opening act and she has a great voice! The Austin Music Hall is still under construction and we were fortunate to get there early enough that parking was not a problem and since it’s first come first serve seating we got front row balcony seats! The only drawback about being in the front row section of the balcony was that we were not supposed to stand. There were a few times we just had to stand and clap because Duran Duran entered the stage or began playing one of their songs and the security guys didn’t seem to mind. Overall I don’t think they were worried about this crowd because my guess is that over 90% of the people there were over the age of 25…maybe even 30. And of course us old folks don’t get too rowdy!
There were several nearby bars so we had easy access to reasonably priced mixed drinks. Plus the bathrooms didn’t get too crowded which is a bonus. We got stuck in the parking trying to get out so we got home a bit later than we thought, and fortunately our babysitter for the night didn’t have any curfew restrictions so she didn’t turn into a pumpkin after 11:00 p.m. 🙂
A few of the blogs I read have been posting recently about the power of positive thinking & action as well as how we can be entrepreneurs and still have work/life balance. I hope to be part of that group who can prove this is the case.
Shane & Peter did a post called 2008 goals: scare yourself where they state “In 2008, we are going to gross a million dollars and still have a life.” They make a compelling argument and I believe they have a really great shot at getting $1 million in revenue in 2008 given their attitude. In the comment thread, I asked them what they mean by ‘have a life?’ and Shane said they will be doing a post on that soon as they figure that out as well. Personally, I think I’m still a bit too nervous to scare myself by stating my 2008 business goals out loud and on this blog just yet!
The next post on their blog was written by a guest author, Jarkko Laine, called bring people with you – a recipe for small business revolution. He says: “I challenge you to count the successful entrepreneurs who have been able to maintain a healthy work-life balance.” Jarkko proclaims that in order to stay balanced you must bring your family, your friends, your world, and yourself with you.
Pearl at Interesting Observations also set a goal to make it to the front page of Digg with her Best 101 Lists post. She made it (yay!), her server crashed for a bit, but now she’s back up and running! I am working on making many more friends like those mentioned here in the blogosphere to achieve my front page of Digg goal one day next year.
To sum this post up, Liz Strauss has started a series of posts about thinking and how we can and should change our thinking and free ourselves of the limits of old thoughts. I joined the conversation at Change Our World: Think Our Way Out of the Box, came back for Personal Identity: Who Are You Really?, and followed on at Positively Me. Since she said it so well, I will leave you with an excerpt from her last post:
“I’ve been thinking about those sentences in our heads.
They were useful once I’m sure – those sentences in our heads that tell us how to act and who we are. But some of them are woefully past their “sell by” date and still they play over and over. It’s time to stop paying attention.
…
I see folks who let one sentence, one event, define their entire life while they sit with the power to set it aside and chose a new path.
…
It’s my life. They’re my thoughts. I’m tossing out the ones I don’t want. I don’t need negatives anymore. It’s the positives that move me forward.
How else will I become positively me?”
On her post, I said I would make a list of positive thoughts and negative ones and burn the negative ones…to delight the pyromaniac in me! 🙂
My husband and I went to see Enchanted this weekend without the kids. I was a bit skeptical at first, but it ended up being a very cute, funny movie!
I initially suggested Stephen King’s The Mist, but my husband said The Mist looked too depressing, and he was already depressed because the The University of Texas at Austin Longhorn football team lost to Texas A&M’s Aggies this weekend, so he didn’t want to see it. He then suggested we see American Gangster with Denzel Washington. I said well if The Mist is depressing then how is people killing each other (on the streets of New York back in the day) not depressing? He said that he didn’t think that kind of action was depressing. After some annoying discussion, we settled on Enchanted. I think he would tell you he liked it too even though it might be considered by some a teenage girl, chick flick.
Enchanted is an attempt by Disney to bring a little bit of realism into its fairy tale stories. I think many people now feel (and know from experience) that things don’t always work out like they do in fairy tales. The princesses don’t always find their prince (or vice versa), princesses can rescue themselves in many cases, princes need rescuing too, princesses and princes come in all shapes, colors, and sizes. My high-level observations:
Although Princess Giselle quite obviously had a life full of privilege and wanted for nothing except a handsome prince in a place where ‘happily ever after’ was the norm, when faced with adversity she adapted. When rats, pigeons, and cockroaches heeded her call for help in New York she flinched a bit and then said ‘oh well, I’ll take what I can get’ and went on singing. She was also able to make fabulous dresses out of curtains and blankets at a moments notice (quite a trick because there was never a sewing machine in sight!).
Patrick Dempsey who plays Robert, a divorce attorney, seems to play characters who are as close to a real-life Prince Charming that you can get in this day and age! Kind, caring, good-looking, smart, rich, etc. He also plays Dr. McDreamy (a.k.a. Dr. Derek Shepherd) in Grey’s Anatomy where he is pretty much Dr. Meredith Grey’s prince charming but she doesn’t know how to accept him in that role.
Prince Edward was portrayed as a slightly slow, kind hearted guy. I found this curious because Princess Giselle was smart and he was as they say ‘a little behind the eight ball.’ Maybe they did this to illustrate that a true princess not only wants good looks but smarts too. Interestingly, he left back to fairy tale land with Nancy, Robert’s girlfriend (who they didn’t give us any reason to believe wasn’t smart) when both of them lost their loves to each of their loves. A bit confusing but this part of the plot lent itself to the ‘happily every after’ goal of the movie.
Despite all the twists and turns, everyone still lived ‘happily ever after!’ Until of course Enchanted II comes out. 🙂 Overall it was a fun movie that had me smiling throughout mostly because of the impossibility of it all!
I often thought how cool it would be to serve on a high-profile jury someday. I was selected for jury duty several years ago when I lived in Dallas but only once was I able to show up at the courthouse. I sat outside the courtroom, was never called in, and then dismissed. Maybe they figured I would be too opinionated! I traveled extensively for my job back then so I was usually excused.
I’ve been called to service once again. This time the process is different. My term started in early November, and I am supposed to be available through the end of the year. Each week I call a phone number and they tell me whether or not I am to report the following week. So far my panel has not been called for service. It would be an interesting learning experience if I am called. However, when you are running your own business (and have two young kids) it is pretty hard to drop everything to serve on a jury when you tend to be one of the big reasons things keep going in the early days. I think you can ask to be excused if you are called on a day that would dramatically interfere with your business. I’ll find out if that’s the case if I end up facing that situation.
I wonder if they will one day hold virtual trials with virtual jurors who have their virtual world avatars?
Our 2 1/2 year old daughter is now officially day-time potty trained! Knock on wood. It’s been a few weeks without any accidents so we are crossing our fingers that we can now move on to the next stage of our parenting lives. My two (and only) posts where I mention potty training are here and here. Correction: I did also mention potty training on my Are We There Yet? When Will We Get There?! post.
Now for a couple of interesting, recent posts on Boing Boing related to toilets and potty training to liven up your day!
Etsy seller Vital makes a variety of toilet-tank decals, from this jellyfish to manatees, SCUBA divers, catfish, and bicycles, drain-plugs, Vespas and skeleton-keys. Link (via Cribcandy)
BB reader Bill Bliss, who shared some cool photos from Ghana with us earlier this year, says…”I was in Greece recently, and in the Agora in Athens there’s a museum. There’s an artifact in there that I just had to take a picture of! It’s a potty training seat made from clay (partially reconstructed, from the looks of it). Who knew?”
I don’t have time to watch a lot of TV but one of the shows I do watch on a consistent basis is Grey’s Anatomy. I know it’s a night time soap opera of sorts. I know it’s not a real depiction of life in a teaching hospital, and I know that most doctors aren’t that good looking, but I still get caught up in the drama.
In the November 1, 2007 episode, Dr. Cristina Yang said something quite simple yet quite profound to Dr. Meredith Grey. First a little background for those who do not watch Grey’s Anatomy. Dr. Yang is a brilliant surgeon who expresses little to no emotion. It’s clear her entire goal in life is to become the world’s best cardiothoracic surgeon and nothing will get in her way. She is very direct with people and she rarely takes time to listen to other people’s problems. It’s all about her and she has recently been faced with experiences that are making her evaluate her approach to life.
Dr. Grey is also an outstanding surgeon with serious relationship/personal issues. Her dad left her when she was a kid partly because her mother was cheating on him and partly because she was so focused on her career. Her dad never came back to see her. He married another woman and had two kids with her one of whom is Dr. Lexie Grey, who has just found her way to Seattle Grace hospital as an intern. Needless to say Meredith and Lexie have an awkward relationship.
Meredith’s mom, Ellis Grey, was intensely focused on her own medical career and was a highly accomplished surgeon and pretty much resented that she had to take care of Meredith. She often told Meredith that she did not want to have children and consequently was extremely critical of everything Meredith did (or did not do). So now Meredith has tons of personal issues but somehow has won the heart of Dr. McDreamy (Dr. Derek Shepherd), whose character in the show is one of practically a saint among men because he is there for Meredith no matter what she does or says!
Meredith almost drowned in an episode last season. She could have saved herself but instead gave in to her self pity and crossed over to the other side for a short while. Somehow she comes through after being unconscious for several hours and awakens to a different perspective and awareness of who she is and where she fits into the world. This perspective soon fades and she begins to involuntarily inflict her insecurities on those she loves and on those who love her once again. She doesn’t want to, but she does not know how to accept or give love because she was physically and emotionally abandoned by the people most important to her as a child. Despite these childhood traumas, most of the rest of the world would classify her as a functional adult (i.e., she is smart, has a career, has friends, etc.).
In one scene Meredith asks Cristina why she just can’t get past all of this stuff and move on now that she’s aware of her issues. Cristina says “being aware of your crap is not the same as getting over your crap. They are two very different things.” Meredith knows she’s right and stares off into space.
This post is dedicated to a good friend of mine who is dealing with crap of her own right now. I worry about her. I wish the best for her. I can relate a tiny bit with what she might be going through, and I pray that the gap between her being aware of her crap and getting over her crap decreases exponentially day by day!
On October 13, 2007 I attended the fabulous Play Bingo Ladies Luncheon benefitting the Center for Child Protection Agency. I was invited by one of my business Advisors, Janice Ryan, to sit at her table. I had a great time! I attended this luncheon once before as a representative of the Association for Women in Technology – Austin, but I had forgotten how much fun and how much money one extraordinary event can raise for the unfortunately numerous amount of children in this world who need protection. The Center for Child Protection’s mission is to reduce the trauma for children during the investigation and prosecution of child abuse cases in Travis County.
Here is a picture of us at Janice’s table. I am on the far right, Janice is to the right of me and her daughter is to her right.
Although no one at our table got the opportunity to yell “BINGO,” our table was randomly picked to receive gift bags from Dillard’s that had a nice toiletry bag among other things. I needed a new one for overnight trips. I also was randomly selected from a drawing that I had forgotten I entered when I first arrived and won a massage, a facial, and a book called Dancing Naked… in fuzzy red slippers by Carmen Richardson Rutlen. I’m not sure when I’ll have a chance to read the book, but I can’t wait to get that massage!
My mother was in town recently for a quick visit. She helped me go through my entire wardrobe and get rid of pretty much all of my pre-mommy and mommy clothes (up to 10 years old!) that were way out of style needed to go. We took literally bags and bags of old clothes to the Goodwill. She then helped me find and gifted me some really nice, new clothes. I had several moments of sticker shock as I saw how expensive clothes have become! I usually shop at Target, Ross, or Costco so you can guess how many times I said “Are you sure, mom?” And she said “Yes, I’m sure. Now is the time in your life to dress for success. You are only young once.” Isn’t she great!
One joke in our family is that I was born without the shopping gene. Growing up I was more than content to wear torn jeans and shoes with holes in them. My mother would secretly throw them away when I wasn’t looking which resulted in a few teenage tantrums on my part. I know she meant well, and she didn’t want other people to think she had a teenage daughter who dressed like a street urchin boy, but at the time I thought she was ruining my life. I’m sure that episode will re-run in our house in some form or fashion when our daughter hits her teenage years.
She and I both felt that since I was spring boarding back into the business world, I should have a few modern outfits to wear instead of my old Levi jeans and Target tees. 🙂
Now if I can only find those elusive, perfect shoes that are stylish yet without a “who can walk on those without breaking their back and tripping on the sidewalk?!?” heels to go with all of these nice new clothes….
Thanks Mom!
P.S. By the way, I admire organizations like Goodwill because their mission “is to enhance the quality and dignity of life for individuals, families and our community by providing job-related services for people with barriers to employment.” I like non-profit organizations that help create jobs. The Goodwill store sells clothes that are donated in stores that are staffed by volunteers and paid employees.
We’ve all heard that saying. Once you learn how to ride a bike, you never forget. I experienced the sensation ‘of riding a bike’ for the first time as a parent this weekend. Our 5 ½ year old son rode on his own. He and I were both exhilarated! I’m not sure who was more excited.
A few of the blogs I read have been posting recently about the power of positive thinking & action as well as how we can be entrepreneurs and still have 
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