August 31, 2010

I Haven’t Had The Malibu For A Full Week And I’ve Already Gotten Lost

So far, the CT Chevy Girlfriend Getaway Program is going great, except I hadn’t even had my new Chevy Malibu for a full 24-hours before I found myself on the way to tape a radio spot at 96.5 TIC…and wound up totally lost!

I NEVER get lost.  I am one of those girls who was born with an innate sense of direction, and I even tend to brag about my navigation skills from time to time.  I guess at this point, I should just go ahead and stick my foot in my mouth, because last Thursday, I drove up and down Rt. 6 in Farmington like a lost puppy.

Before I left my house that day, I wrote down directions to the radio station on a piece of scratch paper and took them with me in the car.  It didn’t even occur to me that I am driving a brand new Chevy Malibu, which includes OnStar navigation service, and that for the next four weeks, my scratch paper days are a thing of the past!

Good thing I remembered that OnStar button on the way to my appointment, otherwise I may have missed my spot!  I pulled over at a gas station and hit the little button on my rear-view mirror.  A nice lady answered on the other end of the line, greeted me by name, and then explained that she was my “navigation specialist” and asked me what address I would like to go to.  I gave her the street name and number, and she automatically sent the directions straight to my vehicle.

“So THIS is what it feels like to be a celebrity!”, I thought!  It was like having a personal assistant sitting right there in the car with me!  Do you think that OnStar will ever add a feature that sends massage signals straight to the driver’s seat of the car? That would be pretty cool. And if it can somehow give me a pedicure while I’m driving from point A to point B…even better!

I managed to get to my radio interview in the nick of time…all thanks to OnStar and my new Chevy Malibu!

Now that I’ve experienced OnStar, I seriously don’t know how I’ve lived without it for all these years. I can’t wait to see where it takes me next.

*On a side-note…today is THE LAST day to vote for Nickelodeon’s ParentsConnect Best Parenting Blog. I would LOVE it if you could spare a minute to vote for me!  Just click the big button on my right-hand sidebar to take you to the voting site.  I owe you one!!

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Posted Under: CT Chevy Girlfriend Getaway
August 25, 2010

CT Chevy Girlfriend Getaway Program

Ok ladies and gentlemen, as promised, I have a big announcement for you this week!  I’ve been keeping quiet on the subject up until now, but I’m more than excited to tell you that The Mommyologist is officially part of the Connecticut Chevy Girlfriend Getaway Program!

This is basically the mother load of all product reviews, kids.  Because for the next four weeks, I will be test driving a brand new, fully loaded Chevy Malibu that I picked up at the program Launch Event today.  I’m not even going to try and be modest and act like this isn’t the coolest thing EVER, because it totally is.  It’s freakin’ RAD.

Each week, I will be going on different “Girlfriend Missions” in order to experience the different features of the Malibu, and I will be blogging about it on the CT Girlfriend Getaway website, as well as on this blog.  I’ve also been provided with a brand new Flip camera to video my experience, so expect at least one vlog per week from me as well.

The Launch Event was held at one of my favorite local restaurants this afternoon, and I had the best time meeting everyone involved in this program, including two other Connecticut bloggers, Cindy from Moomettes Magnificents and Cheryl from The Budge Bunch.

Here are a couple shots of me checking out my new car! (And yes, that’s the hubster in the 2nd photo. He’s finally made an appearance. Don’t tell anyone).

In case you were curious, yes, I’m aware that I somehow failed to get a good picture of the actual CAR in these shots, and I would go take one right now, but it’s almost 10 o’clock at night and it really stands out better in the daytime.  There will be plenty of pics to come in the upcoming weeks though!

I will be bringing you more details with each post, but for my fellow CT residents, here’s a sneak peek of how you can get in on the action:

*Beginning August 30th and going through October 3rd, 2010, consumers who visit any of the NEW CT Chevy Network Dealers and test drive a new Chevy Malibu will receive a $40 Spa Finder gift card!  Did you hear that ladies?  You can get a free manicure, pedicure, or other spa treatment of your choice just for checking out this great car!  And for all the guys out there who love cars…I bet your wife or girlfriend won’t mind you taking a test drive of the Malibu if you bring one of these gift cards home to her!

This is going to be SO much fun and I cannot wait to tell all of you about my experience with this awesome car!

Disclosure:  The CT Chevy Girlfriend Getaway Program is being sponsored by the NEW CT Chevy Network Dealers who gave the chosen bloggers a 2010 Chevy Malibu to test drive for one month and blog about our experiences using the vehicle. Girlfriend Getaway has given us some fun projects to do and will be providing us with gift cards to allow us to do this. They also provided us each with a Flip camera to vlog our experiences.

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Posted Under: CT Chevy Girlfriend Getaway
August 18, 2010

10 Reasons Why Facebook Totally Sucks

It’s something that most of us log onto every single day.  In fact, for some people, I think that it is pretty much the center of their social universe, which is kind of sad.  I’ll admit that I used to be one of those people, that is until I started blogging.  And now instead of being a Facebook whore, I’m a blog whore. Ok, so I’m kind of a Twitter whore too…who are we kidding?

When I first started using Facebook, I absolutely loved it.  I couldn’t get enough of seeing who was on there from my high school, and seeing which of my ex-boyfriends were married, single, bald, etc.  (The bald ones still crack me up.  That’s what those yahoos get for letting me go).

Now that I’ve been a loyal Facebook user for a couple of years, the glamour has definitely worn off.  In fact, there are days where I think that Facebook pretty much sucks ass.

And here are 10 reasons why:

1. My hairdresser always tells me not to flatiron my hair, because it dries it out and makes it look fried because it’s so over-processed from all of the color changes I put myself through from season to season.  Usually I would just nod my head and say, “Ok, I won’t flatiron it, I promise”, while sitting in her chair…but now that she and I are friends on Facebook, the pictures that I upload from my Iphone from a night out with my husband where I’ve taken a flatiron to my hair to attempt to actually look halfway decent are plastered right there for her to see.  And now she knows that I’m a liar.

2. When I was in college, my friends always warned me against the possible after effects of “drunk dialing.”  I now know that drunk dialing is for amateurs.  Drunk status updating on Facebook is way more embarrassing. The end.

3. Sometimes I feel that I have to exercise way too much restraint when scrolling through the status updates from my friends in my news feed. Because every so often, someone is on there talking about how perfect their child is (I’m guilty of this too, so I really have no grounds for getting pissed off), and it usually catches my eye on a day when my son’s behavior is less than stellar. And all I want to do is type, “Oh Shut the Fu*! Up Already!” into the comment field, but I know that I’ll probably regret it later, so I hold myself back. And then I get all stressed out for the rest of the day.

4. Perfect marriage status updates are just as excruciating as perfect child status updates, and again, those usually catch my eye on a day when my husband and I are getting on each others nerves.  And once again, I have to exercise an unbelievable amount of restraint so that I don’t type the words “Gag me with a spoon” into the comment field.  All this holding back of emotion just isn’t healthy for me.

5. Of course, I have to go and leave a comment when someone gets engaged, has a baby, posts a picture of the new baby, etc. Because if I don’t leave a comment, then I’m just a really shitty friend.  But then about 200 other people go and send their well wishes right after mine, and then when I log onto Facebook it says that I have a million notifications.  And all of them say something along the lines of, “Suzy Homemaker also commented on Sally Snowflake’s status.”  And I really just don’t give a damn.  If I want to know who else commented, then I’ll go back and look at the freakin’ comment again.

6. Every so often, one of my old friends posts a VERY old photo of me on Facebook, and then they go and tag me in it.  And then I’m forced to look at a picture of myself wearing a flannel shirt and baseball cap with frizzy hair poking out the sides and remember that at the time, I thought I was hot shit.  And then I go and untag myself so that the photo doesn’t show up under “pictures of me”, but it never works.  So when people from my past friend me and click on my pics, they think that I haven’t changed a bit in 15 years.  And I don’t know if that is necessarily a good thing.

7. Facebook lets other people know when I’m online.  And then they want to “chat” with me.  Not that I don’t love to chat, cuz I do…but not when I only have eight minutes before I have to pick my son up from summer camp and I only hopped on Facebook to find a way to kill those eight minutes so that I don’t have to sit in the parking lot at the school and wait out the extra time when I arrive.

8. Have you ever noticed that your number of friends on Facebook seems to fluctuate on any given day?  Or do I just get de-friended a lot?  All I know is that when I log on and see that my number has gone from 263 to 262, I frantically start scrolling through my friend list to see if I can figure out who hates me.  And then when I can’t figure it out, I decide that maybe they were right in kicking me off their friend list because they aren’t even important enough for me to notice.  And then I feel like an asshole.

9. Ok…how shall I put this?  Has anyone ever heard of “TMI”, a.k.a. “Too Much Information?”  Don’t get me wrong, I feel bad that you’ve been up all night puking or that you haven’t taken a poop in five days, but I don’t really want to hear about it when I’m eating my egg whites with cheese and chunky salsa each morning.  Why can’t people just stick to, “I feel like shit run over twice” and leave it at that?

10. Honestly, Facebook totally sucks because it’s just one more thing that I’ve gotta check each and every single day.  Between my main blog, Twitter, my new gig blogging for Babble, and my multiple email accounts, it tends to take a backseat.  And then I feel totally out of the loop because all of my friends have about five different discussions going on there that I’m excluded from.  And I don’t like to be excluded.

On that note, I’d better go check Facebook before I go to bed tonight.

57 Comments
Posted Under: Time Management
August 15, 2010

Raise Your Hand If You Know What A Blowout Is

I had the pleasure of spending most of the past week in Washington, D.C. with my hubby for his annual International Conference. I actually haven’t been to one of these shin-digs in about two years, and I’m so glad that I decided to come to this one! It was at the Gaylord National Harbor Resort and Convention Center, and it rocked.

The hubster works for a great company, with an awesome group of people. They are so awesome, in fact, that sometimes it feels more like hanging out with friends you’ve known for years than your typical office crowd.  And though I did get a bit tipsy at the piano bar that we went to on the first night I got to D.C., I’m fairly confident that I didn’t do anything to embarrass myself, or my hubby for that matter.

Or at least I haven’t heard any rumors about my behavior being anything less than appropriate.  And no incriminating pictures have surfaced on Facebook.  Yet.

Of course, being that some of us in the group are parents, you know that there was one particular subject of conversation that just HAD to make an entrance at some point.  I mean, it’s seriously just a “must discuss” kind of topic.

And that point came last night, ladies and gentlemen, while we were all dressed up in our finest attire and sitting around our table at the Awards Banquet for the last night of the conference.

And yes, I’m talking about poop, in case you hadn’t caught on yet.

My husband’s boss was looking at his Blackberry and laughing at the funny posts that were coming in from one of their other co-workers wives, who couldn’t make it to D.C. this year.  Of particular interest, she said something along the lines of, “Now I officially know what the definition of a blowout is.”

Yes, she was talking about a diaper.  And yes, she was talking about a diaper FILLED with poop.

Her niece was visiting from out of town, and what started out as an innocent fart turned into the end-all-be-all of diaper explosions. Every parent knows EXACTLY what I’m talking about.

I won’t go into any more detail than to say that in addition to the blowout, she made a reference to beef stew, and a reference to peas.

And then we all had a good laugh about diaper blowouts and dug into our plates of pesto-stuffed chicken and risotto. (Although I refused to eat the chicken because I’m going through a bit of a “fear of consuming chicken in public” phase).

And nobody gagged.

Isn’t hanging out with other parents the best?  I can’t wait for next year’s conference!

*On a side note, I know I’ve been M.I.A. for the past couple of weeks and it feels great to be back!  I had a great vacation with my boys at the Cape, started my new job as a Celebrity Parenting Blogger for Babble.com, learned that there really are some crazy lunatics in this world who have nothing better to do than read celebrity blogs and tell me how much they hate me, decided to turn on comment moderation on this blog for a little damage control, and now I’m on my way home from D.C. and I’m ready to rock and roll.  Stay tuned for an exciting announcement about The Mommyologist coming next week!”

24 Comments
Posted Under: poop
August 9, 2010

Embrace Your Body Week 2010

It’s Monday, August 9th, and it’s officially time to kick off Embrace Your Body Week 2010! I’ve been so excited about this event since I announced it last week, and I am so thrilled that it’s finally here!

Too often as women, and in particular, as moms, we look in the mirror and put ourselves down on a daily basis.  We make comments about our bodies such as, “My thighs are so fat.”  ”I wish that I could lose my belly pooch.”  ”I hate my cottage cheese ass”, and so on and so forth.

Let me ask you a question:  How do you feel about yourself after you make those derogatory comments?  Like shit, right?  Well, Embrace Your Body Week is about getting rid of all of those negative remarks and accepting and being happy with WHO YOU ARE.  Right now. At this point in your life…no matter what your shape and size may be.

Because we ALL have things about our appearance that we wish we could change.  But we all have things that we love and appreciate too…even if they aren’t perfect.

Wanna know what I love about MY body?  I’ve prepared a little vlog for ya!

Ok ladies, go grab your cameras and start snapping away and tell everyone what you embrace about the way you look!  Write a blog post, or make a vlog, and then come back here and link up anytime this week. The McLinky will be up until Friday, August 13th.

Here is the grab button for your post:

After you link up, be sure to visit the other bloggers who have posted and leave them a bunch of compliments and remind them of their worth and how Mom Sexy and beautiful they are. This is a great way to meet some new blog peeps…and you can also help boost the self confidence of other women…and you just can’t put a price tag on that!

There is no prize this week…no winner, no Mom Sexy Blogger of the Month. This is all about spreading positivity and uplifting each others’ spirits.

I can’t wait to read each and every post!

*To my wonderful readers, I wound up having to turn on comment moderation because of a few looney tunes who were a little too fascinated by me! Thank you for understanding!

57 Comments
Posted Under: Mom Sexy, vlog
August 2, 2010

Embrace Your Body Week: 8/9 – 8/13

Ok ladies, I’ve got a question for you?  How many of you got up today, got dressed, looked in the mirror, and said something negative about the way you look?  I’m sure it went something like this:

“I hate my bra-line bulge.”

“My thighs are just so freakin’ huge.”

“UGH!  My stomach is totally hanging out!”

We are all guilty of criticizing our bodies in one way or another.  It almost seems like it’s in our nature, as women, to be self-loathing when it comes to our appearance.

And I’M OVER IT.

Let’s face it ladies…putting yourself down just isn’t Mom Sexy. In fact, it doesn’t even come close.  And I think we need to celebrate the way we look…wrinkles, dimples, and all.

I’m hoping that you will all join me and link up for a fun event that I’m hosting August 9th – August 13th.

This week is going to be all about self-acceptance, and accentuating the positive attributes of the way we look.  And this is gonna be an easy one to play along with.

HOW TO PARTICIPATE:

1. First, you need to find at least one thing that you love about your body. And don’t even try and tell me that you can’t find anything to love, because that’s just nonsense, and it’s not Mom Sexy, and I don’t have any room for anything OTHER than Mom Sexy over here.

We spend so much time using phrases such as, “I hate…”, or “I can’t stand…”, or “I’m so (insert self-depreciating term here).”

I want you to tell me what you LOVE about the way you look.  It can be your entire body, your legs, your face, or even something as small as your toenails!

2. Grab my button above, then take a photo of yourself and write a blog post (or make a vlog) telling everyone what aspects of your body you EMBRACE, and then stop by The Mommyologist anytime next week to link up your post.

This is a great way to meet some new bloggy friends, and to spread love and positivity to other women.  My goal is for this to turn into a “carnival of compliments”, or something to that effect.  I will be encouraging everyone to visit each and every blogger who links up, and to read their posts and remind them of just how beautiful and Mom Sexy they are.  Because I believe that by joining together, we can inspire more confidence in each other.

We’re bringing Mom Sexy back, dammit!

I will be kicking off Embrace Your Body Week on the 9th with a special vlog telling you about the parts of me that I love.  And I absolutely can’t wait to hear what all of YOU love about YOUR bodies.

I would love your help in spreading the word about this super-positive and fun week!  If you could spare a tweet, I sure would appreciate it!

Join @themommyologist for Embrace Your Body Week, 8/9 – 8/13 http://bit.ly/bPnlCa Please RT

46 Comments
Posted Under: Events, Mom Sexy