10 cool things that are blue

1. Clear blue sky on a spring day
2. Fresh blueberries on vanilla ice cream
3. The Twitter bird
4. Navy blue walls in my family room and kitchen
5. Sapphires
6. Crystal blue oceans
7. Cheese, bleu that is
8. Butler Blue II (see below)
9. A favorite pair of perfectly broken-in jeans
10. My hair -- I hope. Time will soon tell!

Shhh....quiet, please

It's quiet in here. The kids are asleep. The dog is asleep. Mike is at a movie. I had the television on, but the recorded show I was watching is over. All I hear is the tapping of my fingers on the keys and the hum of electronics plugged in.

I hate to sound stereotypical, but the older I get, the more I enjoy -- even crave -- this kind of quiet. If it weren't for the kids, the radio in my car might go for days without use. My kids seem to be able to filter out noise that I just can't tolerate. It's nothing for the television to be on in one room, a computer game buzzing and ringing in the next room, and a radio to be on two rooms over.

It's too much for me. I like to think that I'm a pretty good multitasker, but I just can't think straight when there is so much noise competing for my attention. Earlier tonight, on the way home from church, the radio was on and the kids were bickering and chattering in the back seat. We drove past a hotel and I suddenly had this fantasy of checking into a hotel all by my lonesome for the night, just for the quiet.

Sometimes I think I'd do well on one of those silent retreats -- though people who know me well, might disagree. My biggest challenge would not be the auditory silence. It would be the electronic silence.

I've gotten quite good and shutting off/out the noise that hits my eardrums. But I'm not so good at shutting out the noise that bombards my eyes and my intellect. The stream of Facebook messages, the endless collection of e-mails, even short 140 character messages on Twitter can take up some pretty hefty space in my head.

I don't really have a plan in place, but I do think that I'm going to try to build some more of that quiet into my days. Maybe just 10 or 15 minutes. No laptop. No phone. No circular parade of pontential blog posts rolling through my brain.

Just me. And the quiet. And the hum of silence.

How Facebook saved my son's ear

Yesterday, Charlie started complaining that his left ear was hurting. Because his complaint came about 10 minutes before it was time to walk out the door for school, I smelled a rat -- or at least a faker. I gave him a dose of ibuprofen and sent him on his way.

No word from the school nurse yesterday. No complaints after school. He played without hesitation in his basketball game last night. (We won! On to the semi-finals!) He didn't say another thing about his ear and I forgot about it.

Until 3:30am. When else do those things flair up? I was asleep on the couch, so I didn't hear him calling for me at first. But eventually he got my attention and was obviously feeling the pain. I gave him some ibuprofen, pulled out the heating pad, and laid down next to him. 30 minutes or so later, he was still crying out, so I gave him some cold medicine to clear out any congestion in his head. Good idea, Mom.

Except that 20 minutes after that, he was crying that his stomach was hurting. Probably from all that medicine on an empty stomach. Ugh. I sent him to the bathroom. Rubbed his back when he returned, and headed for my own bed after he finally fell asleep.

(If you're still waiting for the part where Facebook saves the day, stay with me. I'm getting there.)

I try not to run my kids to the doctor for every little thing. But I have a rule for ear pain, coughs, etc. : If it interrupts MY sleep, off to the doc we go.

We've been down the ear infection road plenty of times before, so I was pretty sure that's what it was. So this morning, before I even got out of bed, I called the pediatrician's office and made arrangements to bring Charlie in to the drop-in clinic. I told them we could be there in 20 minutes, which was a little short-sided, given that I wasn't even dressed and we live 15 minutes away from the office.

Charlie and I were ready to go when I realized that Mike had gone to work in the car where I had left my keys last night. No problem. He works about 5 minutes from home. I called his cell phone to ask him to run the keys home.

Ring! Riiinnng!  Riiiiiiiinnnnng! His cell phone was sitting on the charger in the kitchen. (It really doesn't "ring," but I can't remember what his ringtone is right now. Probably some Star Trekkian sound.)

Crap. I called him at work, marginally optimistic that I would get through the after hours answering machine. No luck.

Now what? The doctor's office hours on Saturday aren't very long and I really wanted to avoid a more costly trip to the urgent care.

Enter e-mail, Facebook and Twitter.

I knew that Mike would likely see a message there on his computer at work. So I sent three messages:

E-mail: NEED KEYS. Mike, I need the keys to take Charlie to the doctor. Hope you see this.

On his Facebook wall: You have my keys. I need to take Charlie to the doctor. Please call/come home.

To his Twitter account: CALL HOME. YOU HAVE MY KEYS.

Sure enough, about 5 minutes later, he called and said, yes, he had my keys and would come home. However, I must not have conveyed that I was in a hurry because 15 or 20 minutes went by and he still wasn't home. So back to the technology I went.

Facebook: Almost home? (I was trying not to seem naggy.)

Twitter:  REALLY need to GO! (Obviously a little more impatient.)

Within a few minutes, he was home. Charlie and I were off to the doctor where she had to dig a bunch of wax out of his ear before she confirmed that Dr. Mom was right -- ear infection.

So thanks to Al Gore, Mark Zuckerberg and anyone else who had something to do with the invention of the internet, Facebook and Twitter, Charlie should be feeling better soon and I hope to get some sleep tonight.

My first time

People all around me were talking about it. On television, in the newspaper, in e-mail messages from people I know and people I don't. I finally decided I should do it too.

I was a little nervous, not knowing what to expect, hoping they would be gentle with me and not ridicule me for my inexperience. I shouldn't have worried.

Everyone couldn't have been nicer at my first "tweetup." (I'm talking about Twitter. What were you thinking?) I only recently started using Twitter (I'm @4thfrog for you tweeps out there) and am kind of learning as I go. I'm considering starting a Twitter account as part of our communications strategy at work, so I thought attending a tweetup would be a good idea.

I was right. I got some good ideas and learned a few tricks and tips from the folks at the table.

Basically, a tweetup is a casual meeting of Twitter users. I expected to find several nerdy types w/faces buried in Blackberries, iPhones and laptops. But what I found was some very normal and interesting folks, none of whom I would have pegged as nerdy. (Of course, some folks think I'm a bit nerdy, so maybe I'm not the most impartial judge.)

I met some people that I've been wanting to meet: @AmyStark and @NancyMyrland. Then I met some new folks that I'm happy to add to my Twitter follow list: @NilaNealy, @cballing, @theindywilsons. My friend @grumpo was also there, not grumpy at all, though a bit forgetful in not having my Diet Coke ready for me. (Yep, I've fallen off the wagon. But that's another post.)

Do you tweet? If so, have you been to a tweetup? It was really cool to take online acquaintances and meet them in real life! And quite frankly, I've come a long way in the last year.

Today may have been my first tweetup, but it won't be my last.

I did it (mostly).

I did it -- I managed more than a whole day without the internet. (Ok, I did sneak online on Mike's iPhone for a minute in the car today.)

I have to say that I am amazed at how often my mind went to, "Oh, I'll look that up online." From checking the weather to wondering what hours the bank is open to thinking about options for Charlie's birthday party, hopping online is really second nature for me.

Even my friend Beth called to ask me about basketball camp carpooling. Usually, we'd work in out via e-mail, but Beth said "I figured I'd better call since I know you're not checking your e-mail."

We went to Mike's parents for a quick visit to celebrate his birthday (which was yesterday). It was really freeing to be there without a laptop in tow. And when I was tired, I just went to bed. Instead of stopping to check my e-mail/visit Facebook/send a few Tweets before turning in for the night.

At brunch this morning, I was telling my in-laws about my self-imposed internet moratorium. Charlie suddenly got up, put his hand across his cheek so it extended from his ear to his mouth, and froze. I asked him what he was doing. He said "a cell phone pose." Get it? I said "self-imposed" and Charlie heard "cell phone pose!"

Anyway, I'm happy to be back online. The break, albeit brief, was good. But at least now I can easily figure out what tomorrow's weather will be.

Gaining momentum: BL Twitter-quest

Update on my Twitter-quest to get to the Biggest Loser finale. I'm seeing more tweets, thanks to some of you who have been kind enough to call attention to my efforts on your own blogs. You people rock!

Of course, Alison Sweeney & Jillian Michaels probably think I'm a stalker now...

Tweet me up, baby

+ + =

Ok, I am serious about wanting to go to the Biggest Loser finale and live Tweet/blog from there. I try not to get too whiny here about asking for favors, but today I am asking. If you Twitter, PUH-LEEZE tweet this:

@JillianMichaels @nbc @Ali_Sweeney send @4thfrog to live tweet/blog the Biggest Loser finale http://4thfrog.blogspot.com

If you already follow me on Twitter 1) thank you! and 2) you can RT the message above that I just posted.

Finally, if you are on Twitter, leave your Twitter name in the comment section so I can follow you too.

UPDATED to add: If you don't Twitter, but you do blog, I would kiss you if you blogged about my Twitter request. This is totally a long shot, but it would demonstrate the power of social media...or wishful thinking.

Confessions of a Technofraud

In the spirit of authentic communication, I need to make a confession. I am a technofraud. I am regarded by friends and co-workers as technologically advanced. They refer to me as the dotcom queen. And that’s fairly accurate. I can pretty much find anything on the web and use the internet as my first point of inquiry for any question at hand.

However, my techno prowess ends there. I attended BlogIndiana 2008 today and had to face that which I have known for a while. When it comes to communications technology, I’m quite antiquated in my knowledge.

So here I go…laying it all out here:

• I just gave up my AOL account a few months ago.

• When my kids put a photo on the background of my phone, I’m stuck with it because I don’t know how to change it.

• I don’t have a Twitter account and wouldn’t know what to do with one if I did.

• I only send about 10 text messages a month and am miserably slow at doing so.

• The concept of a smart phone makes me feel dumb.

• My Flickr is the TV remote control.

• My husband puts stuff on my iPod because I don’t know how to.

• The term “RSS feed” makes me want to order a pizza.

For the moment, the fact that I am a technofraud is my little secret (and now yours). But, my kids are going to quickly outpace me and realize my technological inadequacies, beyond the fact that I don’t know how to work the Xbox or Playstation, which is already well-known to them.

If you can help me jump with both feet into the 21st century, go ahead and send me a fax.