February

This is supposed to be a list of goals for 2010, but let’s be realistic; who knows what this year will bring. I’m just going to focus on February for now. Maybe if I’m really good about it, I’ll revisit this in March to see how I did.

Health:

• Drink plenty of water.
• Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a beggar.
• Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat less food that is manufactured in plants.
• Live with the 3 E’s — Energy, Enthusiasm and Empathy
• Play more games.
• Read more books.
• Sit in silence for at least 10 minutes each day.

Personality:

• Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
• Don’t dwell on negative thoughts. Instead invest your energy in the positive present moment.
• Don’t overdo. Keep your limits.
• Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
• Don’t waste your precious energy on gossip.
• Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.
• Life is too short to waste time hating anyone. Don’t hate others.
• Make peace with your past so it won’t spoil the present.
• No one is in charge of your happiness except you.
• Realize that life is a school and you are here to learn. Problems are simply part of the curriculum that appear and fade away, but the lessons you learn will last a lifetime.
• Smile and laugh more.
• You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

Society:

• Call your family often.
• Each day give something good to others.
• Spend time w/ people over the age of 70 & under the age of 6.
• Try to make at least three people smile each day.
• What other people think of you is none of your business.
• Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch.

Life:

• Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.
• However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
• No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
• Remember that the best is yet to come.

[List edited from an email from Mia.]

Magazine

It’s kinda fun to see your name in print. Especially when it says this:

Abby Ross, …, who also happens to be well-known and well-liked in local social-media circles, …

Well-known AND well-liked?! Happy Monday to me, indeed.

Jonathan Wander wrote about location-based applications in this month’s Pittsburgh Magazine, and thanks to Woy who recommend me as a source, you can read what I think about them here. He came up with those compliments all on his own; I didn’t bribe him, I swear.

Things that are cool about this:

• Magazines are writing about current technologies/social media trends, and connecting them to “real life.”
• Pittsburghers continue to make connections to leverage professional and personal “spheres of influence” through these channels.
• I get to chat with all kinds of people about things I think are interesting. WIN.
• I’ve been twittering for 13 months now, and it’s turned into something tangible. I’ve met friends, you know that. But now it’s seeping into my professional life. The times, they are a-changing.

Party

If I didn’t love the Mattress Factory before, I certainly do now.

In case you haven’t heard — where have you been?? — they throw one of the coolest (hottest?) parties of the summer. Last year’s Urban Garden Party was a spicy mix of food, drinks, models, dancers and general Rock & Roll. This year, I expect the Summer in the City event to rock our socks off equally as hard.

So yeah, that’s cool. But the cooler part is how Jeffrey is using Social Media to create a “MF Twitter Posse.” (Watch his PCPGH4 presentation to learn more about how he is building Friendship 2.0 in the museum world.)

Did you click on the “this year” link up there? Did you notice how it had “pgha” in the URL? Not a mistake. Check out what Jeffrey has to say in today’s email he sent to the posse:

This time around, each and every Twitter posse member can get a FREE ticket when they help us sell two Garden Party tickets. We’re giving you your own personal URL:

http://urbangardenparty-pgha.eventbrite.com

You can give this URL out to friends or family, email your contacts, tweet or post it to your Facebook news feed. The instant two tickets are purchased through your URL, I’ll send over a code you can use to reserve your FREE ticket.

Shut up. I love this. I love this selfishly, cause I want to go again. I love this as a Pittsburgher, because supporting the arts is always important. I love this as a “Friend of Social Media” because hot damn: community building! selling tickets! creating mini marketers!

WIN.

WIN.

WIN.

Please note, all you “monetizers” out there. This is not using social media as a money-making tool. This is creating a community through social media networks, building relationships and leveraging those to enhance and promote your brand. Only then can you turn around and say: “Hey, y’all. Can you help us sell some tickets to this rad event?” Guarantee you this will be a sold out event. The posse gets to feel special with free admission for an awesome night and the MF gets tons of Internet-savvy friends Twittering, blogging and Facebook about them. You cannot buy that.

Jeffrey, you’re doing it right. Thank you.

Truth

One of my ladies’ night compatriots just posted a little shout out to our rag tag group. I don’t want to get super mushy about it, but it is pretty rare for me to find women who I can hang with for an extended period of time, let alone a WHOLE GROUP of them. I think perhaps that’s what brings us together, in our own ways.

We have fun; we laugh, drink, eat and play games. We look out for each other and talk about random stuff. Not exactly breaking any records over here, but it works for us. And yeah, totally all thanks to Twitter.

Thanks, Internets.

Parking

Any time I whip my car into a parking spot, I think two things.

1. Man, that was easy.

2. I can’t believe that was so easy.

I don’t have too many vivid memories from days gone by, but the day pops tried to teach me to park in between two cars is burned forever into my memory. It went something like this*:

“I can’t do it!”

“Yes you can. Just calm down.”

“It’s NEVER going to happen. There’s not enough room, I swear.”

“Yes there is. Why is your face turning red?”

“This is stupid. I don’t even want to get my license anyway.”

“#%$%^”

“!@#%&%”

“OK, we’re leaving.”

*(Some creative license taken.)

Let’s just say it wasn’t the best hour of my life. It took a while for me to stop trying to calculate the turning angle, and just do it already. (I have a tendency to overthink things. It’s kind of a thing.) Pretty sure I passed the driver’s test shortly thereafter; parking lot parking wasn’t part of the test anyway. Once I got the external confirmation that I was legal to drive, I stopped having issues pulling into spaces. Go figure, huh?

Today, I pride myself on my stellar parking skills. (It must be a genetic thing – pops thinks he’s the king of parallel parking, so we’ll go with that.) When I was 16, not so much. No way, no how, would I ever be able to do that. The older and wiser me laughs at it now.

As I was parking at the grocery store the other day, I had a third thought: What will I be laughing at myself for in 10 years?

Eds. Note: You guys know this post isn’t about parking, right?

Candle

I’m trying not to covet things, but I really want this print.

If nobody buys it for me, I’ll just have to come back here and keep reminding myself of its lovely message.

Maybe this should be the new tagline for the blog.

Pain

• Remember when when I rang in the new year with a sinus infection and hacking cough?
• Or the time I went too fast down a hill on a sled, landed on my head and got whiplash?
• How about when I ate gluten-filled pizza and was rewarded with a 4-day migraine?
• Let’s not forget the time I went to the fancy famous surgeon and he told me my knees are borked and unfixable. That was my favorite.

That all happened in the last 22 days. Swell. 2010 is off to an interesting start, let’s just say.

Despite the ways my body might fail me, to look at me, you really wouldn’t know anything was wrong. Which is what I want to talk about today, not invite you all to my pity party. (Which is Tuesday. And you’re totally invited.)

But first, cue the music:

In some way, for some reason, everybody hurts. It could be a physical pain that will go away tomorrow or an emotional wound that might take years to heal. Some of those hurts can be ignored and will disappear on their own but I’m betting a lot of them need to be shared.

As mentioned last week, we’re pretty good about helping other people. It’s in our nature. But what happens when we don’t know if someone needs help? Not every problem comes with earth shattering evidence and a film crew.

Lots of people don’t like to complain, or appear vulnerable, or ask other people for help. Some people don’t have anybody to turn to when they feel like crap. Most people are like me – they have pains that are invisible.

Over the years I’ve learned to express my hurts. Sometimes I whine, or cry, or make a joke, but I try really hard to not bottle myself up. It probably gets annoying at times, but trust me, you don’t want my crankiness to fester. That is way worse. (See: ages 13-17) But this isn’t about me. This is about the people you interact with every day, or pass on the street, or share a bus ride with.

I’m not saying we need to heal the world; that’s not a thing. I’m saying that we need to keep this in the back of our minds – everybody hurts. So be nice. Or at least nicer.

Yeah, you might encounter some royal jerk on the street who cuts you off or a coworker who spreads rumors about you. People suck sometimes. I get it. But don’t add to it. My mother always said there were no bad people, just people with bad behavior. Maybe that bad behavior comes because Joe has a wicked headache or Jane just got some devastating news. No, it doesn’t excuse them, but it might help you deal with them without flying off the handle, or having bad behavior yourself.

Spread some positive energy out into the world. You’ll feel better, and who knows, maybe it will help start to heal all of those unspoken pains out there.

Grace

This post could be about tragedies around the world. It could be about the power of social media. It could be about the awesomeness of Pittsburgh and its people.

But it’s not. It’s about human nature.

I won’t go into the details of the situation in Haiti and the BRESMA orphanage here. Go read them – all of them – over at Ginny’s blog.

Now think about the position that Ginny is in, and what she’s done with it. Her blog has launched her into the local spotlight, and briefly put her on the national stage during her stint on the CNN homepage a few months back. She could keep writing about killing pigeons and making fun of Skippy Steve or whatever his name is and continue to entertain people. (Or annoy them, depending on your persuasion.) And she does, when the time is right. But when she sees an opportunity to use her blog – and its multitude of followers – for good, she wastes no time. We saw it when she raised more than $10K for Children’s Hospital, and we’re seeing it in action now.

When it comes down to it, Ginny is a professional. That’s evident in her writing, her sense of timing and her ability to see the problem at hand a mobilize a boatload of strangers to find the solution. (BTW, If you STILL don’t understand Twitter, go back and read her tweets from the past few days. You should get a sense of its capacity to reach millions of people globally pretty darn quickly.)

We can’t talk about Ginny’s generosity without talking about who she is helping. Jamie and Ali have been selflessly giving their lives to care for and help these kids in Haiti. Read Jonathan’s fantastic story on them in Pittsburgh Magazine, and bring a tissue or two.

Love her or hate her, Ginny is doing great things. Whether you’ve been following Jamie and Ali’s story for years, or just heard their names yesterday, they are doing great things.

That’s what I call human nature. The desire to help other people, the ability to give yourself and the drive to follow though. We can all do great things, on any scale.

Jami sent me this article a few days ago on the “Survival of the Kindest.”

Human beings have survived as a species because we have evolved the capacities to care for those in need and to cooperate.

That’s what I’m talking about. I’m talking about our lives. Take care of yourself, take care of your friends, your family, starving children across the world, your ailing neighbor and these orphans in Haiti. Fill in the blanks. Find something that you can do to help someone else.

We’ll hopefully be asking you to do just that pretty shortly here when Ginny et al get these kids to Pittsburgh. I’ll no doubt be asking you to do it again, as we continue to support local food banks and other need-based organizations.

Stay tuned.

Lists

Lots of folks in the twittersphere are talking about making to-do lists for this year, and lots of other people are recapping what they did last year. I wasn’t sure I wanted to participate on this here blog, but I have a lot of work to do without much desire, so here I am.

In an effort to focus on the good and sustain some positivity, here is a random mix-up of cool things that happened in 2009, and cool[er] things that will happen in 2010.

• I spent NYE in Boston with my girls. It was cold, snowy and full of champagne.
• I started a blog. It kinda sucked back then.
• I went to a Twestival. It changed my life.
• I went to blogfest, and it really changed my life.
• I took my cat on a picnic. He’s kind of a big deal.
• I ate wings, cupcakes and pizza. You were probably there, too.
• I went to the funkiest Urban Garden Party you could imagine.
• I got an iPhone. Bus rides suddenly got a lot more interesting.
• I went to Ireland with my rambunctious family. Still can’t believe we pulled it off.

Geez, I’m only halfway through the year and I’m tired already.

• I helped to organize this little social media event. Maybe you’ve heard of it? It kinda took a while.
• I met some cool girls, and started hanging out with some more.
• I took over the @PGHTweetup account, and have organized/supported lots more events.
• I reconnected with an old friend. We had a lot of ideas.
• I found out I’m going to be an aunt. I expect life will get exponentially cooler because of him.
• I helped collect some food for worthy recipients.
• I decided to stop eating gluten. It’s interesting.
• I thought a lot about Christmas, and what it really means. Still thinking about it, actually.

I’m probably forgetting a bunch, but man, we had a lot going on. 2009 was no joke.

I tried a lot of new things last year and I’d say they were all pretty successful. I met a boatload of new people and spent a good bit of time bumping with them. [Seriously.]

My dear friend Abby has brought back one of our favorite phrases for 2010: If you’re not excited, you’re not invited. So, in that spirit, let’s rock this year.

You want plans? I got plans.

I’m not going to write them down, though. Not in detail, anyway. 2010 is the year to keep it simple, focus on the good, and make someone else laugh. Ready?

Go.

Years

I contemplated writing a “year in review” post, but it kinda freaked me out. Sit down and think about all that’s happened to me this year? All that I’ve done? All that I let slip by? No thanks.

There certainly was a ton of good in 2009, with some not-so-good thrown in for balance. I don’t need to go over the details to know it’s been one of my best.

In the spirit of “moving forward,” let’s just remember the laughter we shared this past year and seek to double it in 2010.

New year. New start.