Happy New Year Everyone!



Me and the boss!

 Well, I made it.  I finished out the year with a new position.  I'm glad I made it through.  After being mainly self-employed for the past seven years except for a couple of temporary gigs it was a real challenge.  Working was a challenge within itself.  No two hour lunches, no going into work until I felt like it, no taking off just because.  Gainful employment is worlds apart from self-employment.

Now there is a cause for celebration.  It is the last working day of the calendar year.  And for me it seems to be a milestone within itself.  All you totally self-employed people out there my hats off to you.  Those who are doing it and holding down a full-time job as myself, my hats really go off to you guys.  Its tough.  But well worth it intrinsically if not as financial rewarding as you would like it to be.  And for those who are really doing the dang thang congrats.

2013 here we come!  It just feels good to write that.  All this last day energy carry me forward and stay with me for the new year!  I need it and then some.

Make 2013 a banner year.  It will be the start of the year which will earmark the rest of your life.  Make the best of it. 

 

 My oldest grandchild (the boss) doesn't want me bring in my New Year's at Church.  I will go and pick her up and take her along.  It would please her more.  I saw last year someone else had brung a child to Watch Night service.  Seeing her grown into a young lady just reminds me of how the years do fly by.  Time is too precious to waste we need to make the best of every moment.

For those of you I dearly love I love you even more.  I plan to spend Watch Night at Church.  It is the Church where my great grandmother, great grandfather, grandfather, grandfather, all ushered.  I'll always consider it my home church.  I like to spend Watch Night in remembrance of my roots and praise God for all he brought them through and all he has done for me along my journey in life.  God is the great I am.  And thank him for all the blessings to come.  If I don't go to church all year I go to Watch Night service.  I start the year off right.  As always, what I do from then on is up to me.  God never fails. 

Afterwards, I'm heading over to the Ted Constant Convocation Center for the Watch Party there.  Hopefully it will still be in full swing.  If its free its for me!

Happy New Year.  Some of my goals for the new year are not outside the ordinary but I plan to make the year extraoridnary!

My grandma (photo on the wall) and my granddaughter in this picutre!

My granddaughter is a sweetheart! 

No Social Media Campaign - Do You Exist?

Well not too long ago I wrote about companies who pay good money for websites which rank very poorly.  I am happy to report a couple of company websites I had looked at now at least rank on some search engine ranking sites.  Since I feel embarrassed enough for them there really is no need to mention their name.

Now I have a second challenge.  The online world seems to be driven by social media.  The websites which get the most interest are the ones who seem to run the best social media campaigns.  Of course except the really big ones which have a world all their own.

My challenge to the non-social websites is to try and incorporate social media into your flow.  One of the first things I look for on a website I like nowadays is to see if they have a FACEBOOK or Twitter icon.  I want to see how they are connecting with other online folks.

I was thrilled when I had an opportunity to be followed by a major football team recently.  You best believe I went for it.  It's the team I predict to win the super bowl.  How awesome is that.  I'll save the bragging rights to that milestone for a later day.  But I will tell you they have an awesome social media front incorporated into their website.

Well I was always taught to not talk about folks if you can't do anything to help them.  Here is the help I'm offering.  There are videos and how-to's all over the web on social media.  There are tutorials on adding an icon, creating a landing page on FACEBOOK.  Additionally, if all else fails go find a Generation X person and ask them to lead your social media campaign.  I'm sure your webmaster would be happy to add a hyperlink for prospective, current, and past clients to see what your company is up to.

Don't believe me?  Just go Google your competitors, business partners, associations, guy next door (lol) and click thru to their website, FACEBOOK, and Twitter pages.  I'm sure you may agree they make it look easy.  Do you see the number of people have are following, liked, or subscribed to their social media campaigns.  Real live breathing prospects some of them?

Get social.  I don't mean stand around and talk to folks you already know and communicate with every day.  By get social I mean meet new folks.  See what folks think about your brand near and far.  Get ideas on what people are really looking for with your type of business.

At What Point Will You Realize?

I'm about to get on my bandwagon.  So if you don't want to ride it is safest to get off now.

We all reach those moments in our life (or at least I hope so) when we come to the inevitable conclusion that something doesn't work for us and let it go.  You know like those friends who you love dearly but you have grown up and grown apart.

One thing I find particularly amusing.  I'm not one who likes to tell people what to do.  I like for them to reach conclusions on their own so they can "own" their decision.

Well, unfortunately I wish I knew some of those people I see with breathalyzers in their car.  You know the gadgets they have to blow into before their car will start.

Recently I was talking with a buddy of mine.  He was sharing a story with me about a woman who he may or may not be intimate with.  I didn't ask.  I felt sorry for him that he has to have friends of that caliber.  On second thought I sure as heck he is getting something other than drama.  He told me when she comes to visit she can't leave.  Or course I inquired.  It is unlike his character to entertain overnight.  I always looked at him as a very focused success driven individual.  When they go out and have a few drinks, she has to sober up to be able to blow into the gadget in her car for her car to start.  TMI (too much information)?  Yes!

Well, that made me recollect a story a family member was sharing with me recently about a man who is undergoing the same type situation.  They go places and it is his car and she doesn't drive so either if he drinks too much or drinks at all the car won't start.  Or he can't take the risk of trying to start it based on the consequences he'll face.

Folks, is it just me or does alcohol have some magical ingredient I somehow missed.  Now I have drank a glass of wine of occasion.  I was 32 when I drank my first alcoholic beverage.  No let me take that back, I was much older I was around 30 when I went to a club for my mother's 50th birthday party.  I wasn't a drinker so I didn't drink at all that night.  I've had a few drinks or two since that time.

My underlying inner thought, since apparently all they needed was definitely a listening ear was at what point do you realize you need to just stop drinking?  To get to that point they must have been behind the wheel of a vehicle drunk driving.

I will admit the stories of how law enforcement was able to determine they were intoxicated were really.  So funny I don't remember enough of the details to recall it.  I was laughing uncontrollably.

I'm sure there are things people get really perturb about that I do.  Admittedly I eat a little too much, exercise way too less, and put on too much weight.  Maybe I should be charged with a task like having to exercise twenty minutes before my debit card would work for me able to be able to buy dinner.  I want to lose weight.  Maybe that's the difference.  These folks apparently just don't want to stop drinking.

Acknowledge it and move on.

We Used to Play Pretend

My age is really beginning to show.  I remember days before Christmas we would often times pretend how we were going to be on Christmas Day once we opened our gifts.  How we would act excited if we saw a gift we weren't supposed to see before Christmas.  How if Santa was real we would pretend we were sleep so he wouldn't put coal in our eyes.

We knew the lists we had given to Santa.  We used to exchange stories as to how Santa would get in the house to deliver our gifts and place them under the Christmas tree since we lived in a two-story home with no chimney.

The excitement, expectation, and joy with the thought of things to come would make the festivities more exciting.  We would verbally exchange our wish lists freely with our friends and family.

I'm not being bah hum bug but a conversation I had with a child I was reading to as an act of kindness earlier today made me stop and wonder were did all the excitement go?  It made me come to the conclusion that children don't take the time to pretend anymore.

She was being tasked to read a book.  I told her to make reading more exciting by bringing the book to life.  Read with excitement and imagine or pretend she was reading to a classroom full of students with her being the teacher.

Well, I ended up reading the book to her.  Thankfully, it was a Dora The Explorer book written in the pattern of familiar nursery rhymes.

I shared with her to spark her interest in reading, if she seeks out books along her interests it will appeal to her more.  I went on to share with her my oldest daughter used to like rap artists so I purchased her magazines with her favorite artists and she pasted their posters all over her room walls.  She kept up to date on all the hip hop news.  The underlying blessing was that the more magazines she received the more she read.  Oh she can tell you the history of a lot of music artists.  Who they married.  How many times they were married.  How they got their start.  It created dialogue. 

My son, well he loved cartoons.  He would be the first one up every Saturday morning to watch cartoons.  Thus, I would buy him comic books.  He really liked the super heroes.  He couldn't wait to read the latest comic books and share the stories of the super heroes with me.  National Geographic was his favorite television program.  Often when I walked past his room if he wasn't playing a video game he was watching National Geographic.  In fact, he watched it to the point to where it was nauseating.  Thus, I bought him National Geographic magazines.  Years later I could tell what interested him most was the scientific aspect of what was happening on the show and what was being read in the books. 

My youngest daughter was more eccentric.  She liked reading materials from medieval times.  Those where the types of shows and cartoons she enjoyed watching as well.  But it made her a literary genius.  The child scored in the top 2% on national literary tests.  She ended up receiving a mad number of scholarship offers even though she didn't take any.  She receive monetary scholarships for her trade, interior decorating.  She would always tell us she was going to Paris France for college to be a fashion designer.  She lived in readings.

Where In Time Is Carmen San Diego was the computer software that made them leave the t.v.'s, games, and computers in their own room to congregate and compete against each other at the computer in the kitchen.  They used to joke me that there was a computer in every room other than the bathroom.  It required them to at least read the screen.  A lot of times on a whim they would get on a computer because it was there.  I had the computers loaded with academically inclined games and software to spark their imagination and promoted creativity.

Children need something to believe in.  As parents, it is our duty to support the interest of our children as much as possible.  Something things are easy.  It may just take a little pretend on our parts to help our children realize their dreams and opportunities.  Of course, we can lead a horse to water and we can't make them drink.  Wasted potential is a casualty of many situations.

I was just thinking today, wouldn't it be nice to be able to have some type of technology or stat report to look at to see how much of what I would always express to my children hit the walls or if they actually internalized it.  My guess would be a lot of mothers would love to see that solved right in line with the common cold.

I remember many days when my grandmother would tell me I'm not talking to the walls I'm talking to you.  She would always accuse me of daydreaming.  Then I would start dreaming (if I wasn't already) to be grown living my own fabulous life.  Pretending got me through a lot of nagging sessions with the foresight that one day I would be grown and on my own.

My other acts of kindness will probably include my taking her with me to show her reading has a purpose in life.  I'll let her write all the sticky notes.  I wonder does she like to write?  It'll probably be too much like work as well.

Oh well,  happy holidays.  Don't bite off more than you can chew.  Be kind, even if it is play-play.  Now if you know the terminology "play-play" you're probably just as old as me.  lol

I've been nice all year!

Hey Santa I've been nice all year!  I know it is the time of year when you are looking over the who's been naughty and who's been nice list twice.  Look over my efforts very carefully.

As you look over that list I'm sure you will agree it has been one of the best years in the last seven years for me.  I came out of my shell. 

I've communicated more with my adult children than I have in recent years.  I've been getting hugs and kisses and I love you mommy from my oldest two a whole lot lately.

My youngest child, well she lives with me along with her family.  I've been very nice.  I come home and I go back to my room.  I play my online games and I don't bother a soul.  Thankfully I've been so nice I got a laptop from a friend the screen on my baby (laptop) was fading away.  So you can cross laptop off my list for my being goo. 

I've gotten a new coat, new boots, new something extras, so I'm good with gifts.  Because I've been so nice I've been showered with gifts all year long.  Prayers go up to the most high blessing come showering down.  Of course, especially when you're nice.

I am writing to say thank you Santa for all the gifts and gifts to come.  I'll have cookies and milk by the live tree.  See I felt I deserved a live tree this year because I've been so nice.  A live tree helps to keep up the momentum.  The scent is invigorating and encourages me and the kids to continually to be nice. 

Oh by the way, I hope we use the same measuring stick when it comes what nice really is.  Well, I'm judging not that I be not judged.  I'm believing.
Happy Holidays!

Your friend Lynne

How Tragic: Unspeakable Pain!

My heart and prayers go out to the victims, families, and friends, of the Newtown, Connecticut school shooting.
 

My heart goes out to the victims of Newtown, Connecticut and their families. A terrible, horrendous, unspeakable tragedy causing unspeakable pain.

Lord I pray these families are covered with the peace to make it through this difficult and trying time.  A senseless tragedy that cost the lives of the world's most innocent citizens.  They were so young and had so much more to look forward to.  Heal the hearts of their friends and playmates whose young lives will for ever more be impacted by the day a gun man shattered their innocence.  Let your peace, mercy, and grace cover them and surround them in the seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years to come.
The grief these families are suffering is unimaginable.  How do you go and love after a time as horrific as this?  An incident like this tears at the heart strings of so many.   This is an event a great majority of the world will need to heal from.  It is one incident grown men don't even want to discuss because of how deep the pain hits.

As the President stated when expressing his condolences, an excerpt from the New King James Version of the bible,  Psalm 147: "He heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds."   Yes our hearts are broken.

It's hard not to feel bitterness, pain, helplessness after an event of this magnitude.  Below is a gospel song I heard on the radio one day on the way to work.  Thankfully I was able to find it on YouTube.  I listen to it any time I am feeling down due to circumstances outside of my control.  It is important to keep loving no matter how tough things get.  Bitterness can consume the soul if you let it.  There is no testimony without a test.  Unfortunately, with some tests it feels like you've been thrown through the fire.  However, Yet Love!  Without a doubt it's easier said than done.