BQOTD: Can You Be Friends With Someone You've Not Met IRL?

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With the World Wild Wild Web out there, more and more people are getting exposed to strangers.

OK..that didn't sound right. Let's try again.

With online message boards, blogs, etc... people are virtually "meeting" people that have similar interests that may live across the state, country, or world. They may never meet IRL ("in real life"), yet they may learn things about each other, each other's families, work, likes, dislikes, etc...

So, this brings us to the BQOTD:

Can You Be Friends With Someone You've Not Met IRL?

Um, yeah!!!

Proof:

When John and I got engaged, I joined The Knot. The Knot is a huge online wedding planning site with a chat board for every imaginable topic related to wedding planning (and beyond.) I gravitated towards my "local board" (the Boston board). I got helpful advice on wedding planning and vendors local to Boston.

I also got my first taste of the dark side of online chat boards.

I saw how mean people could be when they were hiding behind a "screen name" (it was often discovered that someone would create multiple screen names and could be perfectly nice in one thread, but nasty in another.)

However, the positive outweighed the negative (someone even GAVE me four Bruins tickets!) and I stepped outside of my comfort zone and met these "strangers" IRL at a GTG (that's "get together" for those not familiar.)

An outing to a Red Sox game was planned for the group.

(There was a segment in Red Sox broadcasts where the onfield reporter would go into the stands and interview someone deemed "not your typical fan," thus the t-shirt slogan.) (Sorry I didn't iron it. :)

Clever, eh?

I had a great time and keep in touch with a few people from that group via Facebook. (And, they're just as helpful now, years later, as they were back on the chat board. One offered to teach me to knit and lets me know if Golden Retriever puppies are available from a friend of her family. I can still ask them questions about local places/services and know they'll be happy to help...and vice versa.)

Once you get married, the next chat board in the natural progression of life is The Nest. The Nest, similar to The Knot, is an online planning site for home buying and other "married life" topics, i.e., cooking, money, health, relationships. (There's a completely separate one for having children, The Bump.)

When we were looking at houses in late 2007, I decided to join The Nest. I figured I'd poke around on the local Boston board there, but I don't remember posting much there. Somehow, I was drawn to the Decorating & Renovating board (fondly known as "D&R.")

I got help/advice on house layouts, paint, bathroom fixtures, washing machine brands, etc...

That "etc..." consisted of laughs.

LOTS of laughs.

Some will find it crazy, but I found myself spending lots of time (maybe too much?) posting and responding to posts that didn't necessarily have to do with buying a house.

I found myself getting to know those that posted in D&R.

We each had "signatures" (text/photo/links at the bottom of each of our posts/responses) that helped me to get to know fellow posters.

I'd see a Golden Retriever in someone's signature and start asking questions, sharing pictures, etc...

I'd see a sports logo in someone's signature and start asking about their team.

The drama soon started up on the Board (same nonsense that happened on the Knot...and in some cases even nastier) and a subset of us decided we'd had enough but wanted to continue our friendship via an online format. (I say "we" but I think it was a few people that spearheaded the move. I'm sure someone will correct me. :)

Our group of 15 moved to Google Groups.

We were able to post/chat without trolls butting in and causing drama.

While we kept our screen names from The Nest, we shared more private details about our lives with each other during this time. (We even had each others' addresses, as we did ornament exchanges, sent cards for occasions, etc...)

Over time, two people dropped out, leaving us with 13.

Then along came Facebook.

We would not only be "friends" on Facebook, but we would move our group there, as well. (One stop shopping!)

The odd thing about moving our group there, was that now our "real names" were staring us in the face.

On The Nest and in Google Groups, we referred to each other by our screen names (often names, often words/numbers) and for me, it was hard to start calling these people I'd gotten to know by their "real" names. (Occasionally I still throw out a screen name to see if anyone's paying attention.)

All of this is to say, that YES, you absolutely positively can be friends with someone you've not met IRL.

Our group of 13 lives in 11 states (soon to be 10.)

We're single (yet in a committed relationship), married, divorced, remarried.

We're parents, stepparents, aunts.

We're teachers (a lot of us are!), librarians, bakers, Tupperware saleswomen, legal assistants, businesswomen, graphic designers, musicians, and more.

We've been there for each other through births and deaths, marriages and divorces, bad jobs, illnesses, miscarriages, going back to school, graduating, moving, getting a pet...and just about any other major life event that you can think of.

We encourage each other.

We give advice to each other (sometimes unsolicited :)

We disagree with one another.

We make each other laugh.

And while four of our current group have met each other IRL (one member even attended the wedding of another member!), the majority of us have not.

We do joke about a GTG at the Mall of America or Aruba or Las Vegas and when one of us hits Powerball, we expect this to happen.

Until then?

We'll continue our friendship of almost eight years just the way we have been!

The Drafts Are Piling Up!

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I currently have nine blog posts in draft format. (One as old as 2012!!!)

Eek!

For someone who's a "tad" OCD and likes her inbox clean and tidy, having these drafts is a bit freakish.

You may be saying to yourself, "Why doesn't she hammer one of those posts out instead of writing this one?"

Good question.

This post doesn't require much brainpower -- I can write from the hip, so to speak. The others require thoughtfulness, some research, etc...

Maybe by putting them out here for public consumption, it will push me to write them sooner rather than later.

Or not.

Here are they (in order of age):

1. BQOTD: Can You Be Friends with Someone You've Not Met IRL?
2. Sisterhood: What Does It Mean to You?
3. Self-Diagnosed with Hyperosmia
4. Caribbean Queen
5. Four Facts
6. Books Read in 2014
7. The Toughest Job You'll NEVER Love
8. Reading Challenge Check-In
9. 50 States? 50 Blogs: Idaho

Regarding #6, I should probably hurry up before I'm TWO years behind.

Regarding #9, I'm a bit wary of doing this post. Immediately (and I mean, like the next day) after I did my last 50 States? 50 Blogs? post for Hawaii, the blog I featured disappeared. Yup. that's right. Normally I email the blogger after I write my post to let them know I've written it and that I'll be linking to their blog. I didn't even get a chance in this case.... Weird.

Semi-Charmed Summer 2015 Book Challenge

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While perusing the latest posts on blogs I follow on Bloglovin, I noticed a Summer Reading Challenge on the Semi-Charmed Kind of Life blog.

It seemed like a fun twist on choosing what books I read, so I've decided to give it a whirl!

You can find the general rules for the challenge at the link above.

Here are the "fun" rules/categories (with my first book chosen for a whopping 15 points!):

5 points: Freebie! Read any book that fits the general rules.

10 points: Read a book you have never heard of before. (Just go to a shelf and pick a book based on the cover, the title, whatever you want!) 

10 points: Read a book that has been on your TBR list for at least two years. (If you've had a Goodreads account for 2+ years, this will be easy to figure out. If you don’t, do your best to pick a book you’re pretty sure you’ve been wanting to read for years.)

10 points: Read a book that won a Goodreads "Best Book" award in 2014.

15 points: Read a book by an author who is completely new to you. Finding Nouf by Zoe Ferraris

15 points: Read a book by an author you have read before. (No re-reads for this one.)

15 points: Read a book with "light" or "dark" in the title. (Or "lightness" or "darkness.")

20 points: Read a book with the name of a city, state or country in the title. Edited to add: The place must be real, either current or historical, but not fictional.

20 points: Read a book with an animal on the cover.

25 points: Read a book that is part of a series with at least four books.

25 points: Read a book that is longer than 500 pages long. — Submitted by winter finisher Kristen from See You In a Porridge blog.

30 points: Read a book with an alliterative title. (All words in the title must begin with the same letter; no exceptions for articles or prepositions. Examples: Gone Girl or Nicholas Nickleby. Yes, this is tough, which is why it's worth the most points!)

Channeling Karen Walker

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For those of you not familiar with Karen Walker, she was a character on the late 90's/early-mid 00's sitcom, Will & Grace. Karen "worked" for Grace as her assistant in her interior design office. (Yes, "worked" is in quotation marks, as Karen did as little work as possible.)

Karen had NO filter.

Karen said what was on everyone's mind.

Karen didn't beat around the bush.

Karen was pretty hardcore.

Here are some of her witticisms:


"Wow, ten years of game night. What a milestone. Maybe you should celebrate with a suicide pact."


"Oh hey! Somebody got flowers. Or as I like to call them, poor people jewelry."


"The only other person I’ve apologized to is my mother and that was court ordered."


"Excuse me, lady, would you happen to have a breath mint? You do? Well, pop it in your mouth, woman. It’s not doing any good in your purse!"


"Well, you’re all boring and I’m fun."

Some days I wish I could be Karen Walker.

I guess I'll just have to channel her via this blog.

Here would be my Karen Walker witticisms (and they're not NEARLY as good as the real thing):


"You don't know how to use the Internet in 2015? Where'd you park your horse & buggy??"


"Is there a reason you're not putting your groceries on the belt? Are you waiting for a green light? Written invite?"


"I appreciate you putting all of your random and mundane thoughts into writing and sending them to me via text. Really, I do."


"Yes, Secret is a deodorant brand, but it's no secret that people like you should use it!"


"I wrote that email to waste some time I had on my hands. Feel free to disregard it and respond with something that will require me to write it again. And again."

Long Weekend Means Posting Two Days In a Row!

When it rains, it pours!

Literally (here in New England) & figuratively!

It's Patriots' Day here in Massachusetts where we commemorate the Battles of Lexington & Concord, the first battles of the Revolutionary War.

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It's also known as Marathon Monday, as the Boston Marathon is run.

So, what does that mean? That means no work today and a three-day weekend!

Let me catch you up on the doings around here.

This is in the oven right now:

You can find the recipe and the photo for Italian Sausage Lasagna here.

I'm trying to use up stuff in our freezer and we had some ground Italian sausage (which I usually use to make Paul's Pronto Penne) and I decided to find a new recipe to use it in. It was somewhat labor intensive, so I REALLY hope it tastes good!

Since we didn't have work today, I was able to stay up and watch BOTH of favorite Sunday night shows. 

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Call the Midwife & Mad Men! 

Call the Midwife peaked last season, in my opinion, but I really enjoyed last night's episode. 

It's Mad Men's last season and again, I think it peaked long ago, but I'm doing due diligence and seeing it through to the end. (Plus, I'm enamored with the fashion. Come to think of it, I'm enamored of the fashion in both of these shows.)

This month marks the fact that this blog has lived on for NINE YEARS!!!! Can you believe that? You can read my first (somewhat boring) post here. I'm pretty proud of myself for keeping this project alive for that long, since I tend to have the attention span of a gnat when it comes to projects.

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While this blog started mostly for me to chronicle John and I buying our first house together and all that entailed, it's turned into so much more. Writing is very cathartic for me and when I make the time for it, I enjoy it and benefit from it. (And if it's just my mother reading still, so be it! Love you mom!)

I'm actively on the look out for an Idaho blog to feature in my 50 States? 50 Blogs? feature, so if you have one to suggest, let me know! (I don't want to go six months between states again!) Perhaps a potato farmer's blog? (Sorry Idahoans, but that's what I associate you with.)

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(Yes, it took me a minute to figure that one out...)

We did some yard work on Saturday and I'm really ready for Spring. (I was ready weeks ago!) I must say that I am thankful that the rain is not snow. Can you imagine? Let's not.

I was inspired by a blog post I saw from Mommy's Kitchen to do some container gardening on our back porch. I bought this from Walmart (minus the flowers) and will set up on our porch with some colorful flowers of my own that love lots of sun (if it ever shows up).

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That's what's doing around here. How was your weekend?

50 States? 50 Blogs!: Hawaii

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(As you can imagine, there are no road signs that say "Welcome to Hawaii," so this is one from the Honolulu Airport.)

Hastings in Hawaii

First let me start by saying that it's been almost six months to the day since I wrote the last "50 States? 50 Blogs! post." (Never mind the fact that I haven't written a post in general in about two months. UGH!)

I've had a particularly hard time deciding on a blog to feature for Hawaii. There were a few that I liked OK...one stopped writing regularly (kind of like me!) and the other one just didn't wow me or feel worthy of me featuring (I take this VERY seriously!)

Since I joined Bloglovin', I've found that it's a good site to search for blogs/bloggers from specific states. I found Hastings In Hawaii via a search on Bloglovin' and knew that it was the one! I've had it in my back pocket for a while, but I had to hurry up and write about it, as it won't be "Hastings in Hawaii" much longer, but "Hastings in Nevada!" So, here we are.

The Hastings are Amelia (the blogger), Matt & furchildren, Bennett & Frankie. The Hawaii part is due to Matt being in the USMC and being stationed there. (Although, as I alluded to above, not for long! They'll be moving to Las Vegas in the near future.)

When I read Amelia's first post and saw "ate an entire bag of Fritos in one sitting," I knew it was Kismet. We'd get along just famously.

Amelia's blog is not your typical military family blog (in my opinion.) She certainly does talk about the challenges of military life, specifically deployments (Matt will be on deployment #3 in June), but she talks about "real life" stuff. (If you've been reading my "50 States? 50 Blogs? series, you'll know that these are the types of blogs I like to read and showcase.)

Here are some examples of "real life" for Hastings in Hawaii:

• Bennett (aforementioned furchild) had to have an emergency trip the vet due to urinary issues. (Turned out to be a UTI and Bennett was fixed up and returned to his normal self shortly thereafter.) In the post, Amelia shares Bennett's "rump shot" x-ray. TOO CUTE!

• Amelia shares her struggles with weight and going on and off Weight Watchers (which I can definitely relate to.) She not only shares her losses but also her gains. She's real about how tough it can be.

• Amelia also shares her struggle with social media, specifically Facebook and how it can "suck the life out of you" (my words...not hers, but I'm trying my hand at paraphrasing her feelings.) Not only do we have the fact that we could each eat a bag of Fritos in one sitting in common, but I believe our personalities are similar. In her post about quitting Facebook, she says this, "But the thing is, it can go from 0 to obsessive like THAT." Um yeah, that's me. I can sucked into the Facebook rabbit hole for hours and constantly checking, checking, checking. (I *might* also have an obsessive personality about stuff in general...)

• As I mentioned, Amelia does talk about military life and it's her posts about making friends and then losing them to new military assignments that are the most interesting to me. For those of us who are somewhat shy/introverted, the thought of making friends as an adult can be somewhat daunting, but then to know that you'll potentially have those friends taken away geographically? Tough.

• For me, one of the most "real"/moving posts is Amelia's letter to her dad near the anniversary of his death. It is the most eloquently written personal post I've ever read. I wonder how long it took Amelia to write it, because it's just so "right." I also love the fact that she ends the post/letter with this P.S.S.: 

"I'm glad you weren't around for The Talk. Seriously. Growing up in an all-female household definitely had a few perks."

:)

Things that caught my eye about this blog:

• It's gorgeous! I love love love the header and the fonts that Amelia uses. The pink background with the flower bouquets is awesome, too. Very pretty and not over the top.
• Great professional photo of her and Matt.
• The fact that it's not busy with headers, columns, etc..

Things on this blog that I'd like for my blog:

• see above 
• see above (except the photo would be of John & me. :)
• see above

I hope that Amelia keeps blogging once the move to Nevada happens. "Hastings in Nevada" doesn't have quite the same ring as "Hastings in Hawaii," but I have no doubt the content will be just as great!

Data Dump

Data dump.

It's one of those phrases that's in vogue at work.

Similar to other phrases in vogue at work, I really am not a fan of it.

To me, this is what I see when I hear "data dump:"

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A bunch of crap all thrown together.

No uniformity.

The papers in this picture are different colors, sizes, contain text/don't contain text, etc...

However, at work, it's meant to be a distinct set of data from a distinct set of fields...not just the kitchen sink. So, is "data dump" really the right terminology?

This is what I think about on my drive home (when trying to think of a blog post title.)

So, this is my data dump for today (everything INCLUDING the kitchen sink):

• Let's start on a positive note, shall we? Today is National Drink Wine Day. Bottoms up! (Another weird phrase).

(Plug: this wine is from the Traveling Vineyard. My friend Dana is a rep and you can visit her site here and order some vino.)

• Here's an up-to-the-minute weather report (completely neutral, of course):

Yes, snow. Again.

• I came home to only one window leaking due to ice dams on the roof, but newly plastered wall in basement is soaked. [insert sad face]. Here's what was happening last week at our front picture window:

• I kind of am in love with my 2015 Agenda. It's sunshine on a cloudy day:

• I'm completely underwhelmed with this season of Downton Abbey. The Dowager Countess makes me smile with her dry wit, but that's about it. I don't know if it's charm has just worn off for me...or what. 

SPOILER (turn back now if you're not caught up on Downton): 

I'm sad that Isis (the Crawley's dog) passed away. I loved that Cora & Robert wanted to sleep with Isis on his last night of life, but....would that really have happened in 1924? In England? Aristocratic England? Yeah..I didn't think so.

• On the other hand, the TV show, "Donnie Loves Jenny" is wacko. Completely wacko. I kind of liked Donnie Wahlberg better when I viewed him as a Boston guy that became famous by being in New Kids on the Block. I really don't like hearing about his bodily functions. Kind of ruins the picture.

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There's your dump. Data dump, that is.