by Tracy on October 18, 2009
Or, this is why they call me two-sides Tracy. I always look at *both* sides.
Recent photo of me. My I am dorky looking. And askew, definitely askew
In the interests of radical transparency, I think it’s only fair I list the reasons I would not be the perfect choice for good mood blogger so that the people can make a wise decision.
- I wholeheartedly believe that the best way to be a happy person is to develop a sincere love of Air Supply. It’s about letting down your guard and allow yourself to really feel. Until you can do this, you have walls, my friend, and a walled person is not a happy person. Some people feel this is judgmental and unreasonable. They have walls, too.
- Cats and kittens will never be mentioned in my posts as a source of a good mood unless it’s because all the cats on my street decide to move to Toledo. You can’t really blame me for this, they like to congregate in my driveway and give me a dirty look when I want to park.
- There’s that inordinate obsession with canned meats.
[click to continue…]
by Tracy on October 17, 2009
Or, I told you, my mom can COOK!
Chapchae
Chapchae is one of my favorite dishes traditionally served at large Korean dinners for special occasions. When I was growing up, my mother’s Korean church would have a huge Korean Thanksgiving feast. Most of the women and some of the men would dress up in their hanboks (traditional Korean clothing) and there would be so much food. My mom would fill a huge picnic cooler full of cooked rice to bring and spend days making all sorts of yummy food for the banquet.
There are a lot of steps involved in making chapchae but the end result is worth it. This recipe makes quite a bit, so be prepared to eat it for days or share with friends and family. I don’t think it freezes well because most of the appeal is in the crisp texture of the fresh vegetables and the noodles would get funky. You can certainly scale the recipe down and add or subtract amounts to suit your own tastes.
This is an excellent recipe for vegetarians, it’s delicious without the meat and substantial enough to make a light meal. The only ingredients that might not be easily found at a regular supermarket are the sweet potato noodles and dried mushrooms. You could substitute fresh mushrooms, although I like the chewier texture of dried in this dish. Sweet potato noodles are available at most Asian groceries, but if your local shop doesn’t carry them, I’ve used other varieties of glass or cellophane noodles (such as bean threads) with great success.
If your supermarket has an excellent fresh salad bar, I see nothing wrong with cheating and buying some of the vegetables already sliced to save a bit of prep work. [click to continue…]
by Tracy on October 14, 2009
Or, I shouldn’t be given so much responsibility
If you don’t know what Google Wave is my friend Omar wrote a really good article to explain.
I woke up this morning to find an invite to Google Wave in my inbox. Better, I got to nominate 8 people to receive invitations, too. Now, I have no idea how this works, if they automatically put folks that were nominated on the short list to get an invite or if there is a screening process or what. Although you know, I don’t think that they can be looking at potential members that closely as I got an invite before my husband did.
Not that I am trying to rub it in or anything.
Of course, I had to invite my husband first, so that’s one down. But, you know, he’s always busy with “work” and Wave is useless, USELESS to me if I don’t have people to use it with that actually make time for me at all hours and are HAPPY to talk to me about my very important stuff so I invited the 6 people who are in my main email conversation gang. We already bullied them all into getting Gmail because we were afraid they’d stop accepting our emails once they figured out we can spit them out at the rate of 20-50 an hour.
I wish I were exaggerating, but no, between the 6 of us we can put out hundreds of emails on just the topic of jeggings alone. Never mind the acres of conversation on what that bitch did. And if you are that bitch, you know you were wrong for that. So wrong.
Clearly, I NEED them to get an invitation to the most wonderful innovation in online communication since Gmail. I know you are reading this Google so please, please, please let my friends in today so we can be cool together. Thank you and thanks for giving me so many opportunities to learn how to get whiter teeth! YOU ROCK!
Seven invitations down and one to go, which is where I am totally and completely stuck. Do I give it to my brother OR my sister OR my dad OR my mom? One of my fellow bloggers? Life coach Tim so he can snort at it? Random person on Twitter?
I mean, because I don’t want to waste it on somebody who won’t use it and I don’t want to give it to somebody and somebody else finds out and they start badmouthing me on plain, old-fashioned email and I don’t want to give it away and then not have any.
I just don’t want it to be over. I don’t want to have none.
I might get more, I might not. Dangit, I just don’t know what to do. What do I do? Because I don’t want to know what will happen if I make the wrong choice. I’m just not that strong, my friends.
While I try to figure this out, please take a second to vote for me again. I’m already up to 174 votes. So many thanks to those that voted and helped spread the word through Twitter, Facebook and email. It’s humbling and exhilarating to know how many people are willing to help, if you just ask.
And if you make a good case for yourself in comments, I might be persuaded to hand over the last invite. Or I might not. As you can see, I’m pretty attached to it. Also have no idea if it helps or hurts to get a nomination from me, so it’s a gamble.
by Tracy on October 12, 2009
Or, if the possibility of a rambling post with no point doesn’t draw you in, I don’t know what will
Kir and I saw these folks dancing outside of Winchester Farmer's Market Yesterday. A guy handed me a card that said you can hire them for parties. It's not a party unless you have a motley collection of dancing characters!
The first order of business is that I have a problem and I’d like your help with it. See, I’m going to be asking you all to vote for me in the Sam-E Good Mood Blogger competition but since I just started the whole Copyblogger Internet Marketing for Smart People email course I have no freaking clue how to do it.
Because I could just ask, but this is a 5K a month gig, y’all! I need to be snazzy!
My default mode is self-deprecating humor of the neurotic variety, but I’m wondering if this is the right time to bring out the whole “confident” persona I’ve been working on? It’s kind of risky, so maybe I should stick with what I know but at the same time it’s been known to backfire on me and people think I actually mean “oh shucks, don’t vote for me, vote for the people that really deserve it” when I say it. I know, bizarre, right?
So please tell me how to best to convince you that I would be the most awesome mood blogger that ever blogged and we will proceed from there.
By the way, my pals Sean and George are also going for this job. They are remarkably low drama, which is a shame, because I think the best way to get people interested in this contest and voting is to make it a total trainwreck with blood and guts everywhere and the last person standing wondering if it was all worth it. And then they’d get the check and be all like “Awww heck yeah!”
Maybe that should be my slogan – Vote for Tracy – Happily Instigating for your Reading Pleasure since 1974!
Meanwhile, we’re eagerly waiting for entries for our Scary Product Contest. I’ve been promised some good stuff, so don’t let me down!
Also, I was joking when I posted on Hunter Nuttal’s site about writing a book called “Trample not the Mind Ninja” but am slowly coming around to the idea that the world kind of needs me to write this book. I’m toying with the idea of doing it for that NaNoWriMo but instead of it being a novel, it will be about the project I pitched to life coach to the stars, Tim Brownson.
Okay, here’s what we’re going to do. I see Tony Robbins is getting his own show.
Also, I see that shows featuring one snarky English judge are VERY popular.
Also, people like competition.
So, we are going to pitch the idea of Life Judge to all the networks. It will be me (I’ll be the slightly daffy “nice one” also I am Asian so I add diversity), you (the English one) and John (hope he doesn’t mind being the “Randy” of our group). And we’ll have contestants come up and tell us their life stories and we’ll choose I dunno, 8 or something and put them in a mansion and FIX THEM. Sort of like biggest loser, but instead of losing weight, they will be losing FALSE BELIEFS and gaining INSIGHT.
And if we can’t fix them, we’ll EXPLOIT THEM.
Everybody wins on Life Judge, even the screwed up famewhores! Especially us!
So you can see, even if I don’t win Good Mood Blogger, I’ve got a lot up my sleeves. But still, you should vote for me because even if I don’t win, I want to get more than 4 votes or I will start to doubt myself and the rest of you will have to put up with it. I’m talking 2000 word, majorly introspective emails on a daily basis here.
(was that one good? Too needy? Arrogant? I NEED direction here people!)
Finally, if you haven’t already, check out my review of How to be Rich and Happy and my interview with the authors, Tim Brownson and John P. Strelecky
by Tracy on October 9, 2009
Or, we’ll all be winners! Just by participating!
It is with great pride that I announce the first annual IHMMB Scary Product Contest. I’d be nothing without scary products like canned pupa and chicken in a can and I’m overjoyed – overwhelmed even – to be able to give back to the blogging community by hosting this award.
The Contest
Find and photograph a product that is scary in a weird, unusual, wacky sort of way. This post or my Museum of Snack Foods are examples of the kind of scary we mean. Post the photos and any descriptions on your blog with a link back to this post and leave the URL of your entry in comments. If you don’t have a blog, you can post on Flickr and leave the photo URL in comments.
Judging will be based not only on the inherent creepiness of the product but creativity in presentation and description. Go wild! Make a diorama! Stop motion video! Write a play! Make a collage!
The Judges
Since I can’t possibly make a decision this big all by myself, I’ve enlisted the help of many judges.
David of Blogger Dad I’d like to give extra props to David because he not only gave me the idea he also designed the logo!
Sean of Writer Dad
Margaret of Nanny Goats in Panties
J.D. of I Do Things
Ron of Clark Kent’s Lunchbox
We’ll be visiting all the entries and might just stumble, tweet or link your post on Facebook or our own blogs if it’s particularly good. We don’t want this just to be a contest, we want this to be a community building exercise. What does that mean? Danged if we know, but we highly encourage participants and spectators to go around to all the other entries – leave a comment, talk some smack, kiss some butt, whatever seems to be the thing to do at the time.
Because I’ve found that the surest way to form a bond with somebody is to ask them “What the heck is THAT?!?” And really isn’t this all about the friendship and community? Because I have to tell you, I’m providing the prizes myself out of my revenue and it shows!
The Prizes
First Prize will receive a I Hate My Message Board t-shirt as discussed in this post and only now going into production. It won’t look exactly like my crude rendering, but the same idea. And also a genuine
Cheeseburger in a Can mounted in a Lucite box with an engraved faux-brass name plate declaring the owner the winner of the First Annual I Hate My Message Board Scary Product Contest.
And of course bragging rights.
3 Runners Up will receive a random food item of my choice. Could be limited edition Pocky, could be those fish n’ cheese sausages I’ve been putting off forever. The real prize is the anticipation.
Official Rules
- Contest open to anyone, anywhere but if I can’t send you the prize because of customs regulations or other shipping problems, we’ll work out an alternate prize.
- All entries must be 100% your own photos and text. You can not use other people’s photos or text.
- All entries must have at least one photo and text to describe the item. You can do more than this, of course. We encourage you to go crazy!
- Absolutely nothing that involves cruelty to actual animals or people. We reserve the right to toss out any entries we find offensive or degrading.
- Link back to this post in your entry, either with a text link or logo button (provided below).
- Post the photo and description on your blog or your own flickr account and post the url in the comments of this post.
- We can’t accept entries by any other method than comments on this post.
- You may enter as often as you wish but each entry must be a separate blog entry/flickr photo and make one comment for each entry.
- Contest closes 11.59 PM CST October 29, 2009
- Winner will be announced by 11.59 PM CST October 31, 2009
- Winners will be notified by email, please comment using a valid email address that you check regularly. If we can’t reach you by 11.59 PM CST November 7th, we’ll give your prize to somebody else.
Suggestions
- Creativity counts for a lot
- So does enthusiasm – if it’s a tie-breaker, we’ll go for the person who helped us spread the word.
- Judges aren’t supposed to be bribed but you know I bet they’d be tickled pink if you offered.
- The more people participate the more everyone benefits. Who knows how many cool blogs and/or photographers this contest will introduce us to?
- Visit the other entries! Have fun!
- You can share your photos in our IHMMB Scary Product Flickr group (but still make sure you leave your url to your entry in comments)
- Join us on Facebook or Twitter - we’ll be sharing the judge’s current favorites and our own scary finds.
- If you like this contest, share it with friends. Any tweets, stumbles, sharing on Facebook or other social media is very much welcomed and appreciated.
Feel free to use the large graphic at the top of this post to share word about this contest, or you can use this button sized one:
