Well of all things. I was visiting one of my favorite sites this morning and I found another great flowchart.
Yep. Pretty much sums it up.
By the way, this chart came from a site called Typcut. It’s got some other great stuff. I encourage you to go poke around for a bit.
My friend is freaking out about something right now. I hate it for her. She’s in a really cruddy situation. I want her to feel better, so I made her this handy-dandy flowchart.
It’s a good thing she loves me. And that I’m not within striking distance right now.
The big migration is complete, and seems to be working. Hopefully I’ve set up all the feed stuff correctly so that if you’ve subscribed to my blog, you’re still receiving it.
I have to give the credit for this painless migration to two people. Mama Blogga wrote this awesome guide to migrating. It was so comprehensive, in fact, that I only had one issue. And the issue had nothing to do with her instructions at all. I’m pretty sure it was a buggy thing with the latest version of WordPress. You see, one of the beauties of WordPress is that is has a handy auto-import tool that seamlessly imports all your posts and comments from Blogger. But that didn’t work. It imported nothing. So that’s where my second helper came in. My crazy/funny/smart friend Brent stepped in and helped me import the Blogger site into the old version of WordPress (v2.9.2), then export it into a WordPress xml file that I downloaded, then import that file into the new version of WordPress (v3.0).
And voila. I’m here.
I still have lots of tweaking to do. But thankfully I love the redesign part. And I’m sure I’ll go a little plug-in happy for a bit. But I’m done now! Thanks for moving with me!
P.S. I did almost all of this while drinking wine on my back porch last night. And the issues bit I did this morning via conversations on Twitter and email WHILE I was entertaining company and a film crew at my house. So really, it’s VERY easy to do. Don’t be scared.
UPDATE: Looks like I did something wrong with the feeds. I’ll look into it.
I’m going to try and migrate from Blogger to WordPress this weekend. Pray for me.
I’m pretty much always on a quest to improve myself. Sure, there are times when I wallow in my mediocrity or take unnecessary pleasure in being bad. But for the most part, I swear, I’m working on it.
And I feel like I’m doing a pretty decent job of it. In fact, that’s why I celebrate getting older. Each year, it gets a bit easier to be the new and improved me. “If I’m this great at 35, just wait till I’m 50!” I think to myself.
Just kidding.
Sort of.
Anyhoo, I’ve read a couple of things lately that got me thinking about the person I want to be. I read this post by Seth Godin. I recognized myself in it. Yes, I said recognized, as in past tense. I used to amplify like a maniac. Not so much anymore. But it’s hard work, not being like that. It’s a conscious choice that must be made, many times each day.
I also read this post by Rachel Held Evans. In it, she talks about the character traits she wants to develop. But she used a phrase that, for some reason, really resonated with me. She used the phrase “default setting.” And it inspired me to make a list of what I want my default settings to be.
I’m going to imagine that everything I do is controlled by little switches, and that with each thought and action, I can choose to flip, or not flip, a switch that will affect the outcome. Just to be safe, I’m going to put my switches on the desired default setting in the beginning. Here’s what my defaults will be:
I took this photo of the Ferris Wheel at Riverfest. I think it only reinforces my belief that carnival rides are creepy.
I never really talk about work in this space. I can’t pinpoint the exact reason why. It’s a combination of things. Mainly because I’m always nervous about mixing up some bad work/personal life cocktail that makes me wake up the next morning filled with regret. (Says the hypocrite who married the guy who was once her boss for a short period of time. Whatever.) I also never say much about work because what I do isn’t the most exciting thing in the world. To others, it’s always seemed fairly glamorous, but to me, it can be a bit tedious. Except when I’m meeting famous people. That bit rocks. But I really haven’t talked about work much recently because I didn’t have lots nice to say, and well, you know what your mama told you about that and all. It’s not that I didn’t like my job. It’s that I didn’t like how I was having to do it. And I just don’t want this space to be the place where I whine about work all the time. I bore you enough already, I’m sure.
But recently, things have changed. Remember that leap of faith I told you about yesterday? Well, I took a new job. It wasn’t an easy decision. I left a perfectly adequate, well-paying position to take a job in an unknown field, with unknown people, with a less certain paycheck. It was scary. But God help me, I had to do it. For my career. For my family. For me. I’m in my third week at me new job now, and I LOVE IT. I’m getting to do exactly what I enjoy doing, and I’m learning so much. Plus, I’m commuting less and getting home at a decent time each evening, which has done loads for my mental health.
What am I doing, you ask? I won’t go into lots of details, but I will say I’m getting to work with this awesome gal. Before she ever even had an open position, I admired her talent, her drive and just plain liked her as a person. I used to dream about getting to collaborate with her one day. And now, look at me.
I probably still won’t talk about work much here. I do prefer keeping my professional and personal lives as far apart as possible. Plus, I’m working on launching a business-type site where I will have a forum to talk about what I do. I’ll be sure to give you details on that when it gets up and running, just in case you’re interested. So yeah, I’ll still be here, making fun of my kids, talking about my travels and sharing recipes from time to time. But just know that there’s a happier me behind this blog now.
I’m glad I leapt.
There’s a really cool church here in Little Rock with a really cool website. At times, they open up their site to voices from outside the congregation (a noble act, which more churches should endeavor to do). Not too long ago, I was honored to be asked by the church’s founder to write a piece on faith. I encourage you to read it here.
From the piece:
There I was, the girl who’s always smugly thinking about how strong her faith is, how solid her relationship with Christ is, forgetting to have any faith at all. I was forgetting to shut up already about the negatives. I was only thinking about the bad that could happen, and forgetting the wonderful ways in which my life could change.
Big changes have happened recently. Go read about my leap of faith, and then come back soon. I’ll tell you how the story ends.
Flapjack and I heard this song today. We decided we can really relate to it.
Flapjack lives by two maxims: Let no quiet moment go uninterrupted, and let no mother who’s just trying to decompress from a long day at work go unannoyed.
Which is why, when I pick him up each evening, he talks incessantly. He rarely fills me in on his day or tells me how much he missed me. Nope, he just talks for the sake of talking. Half of it’s nonsense. That child talks and talks and talks and talks.
Today he decided to count out loud. When he got above 100, he was saying “one hundred and one, one hundred and two, one hundred and three” and so on. I interrupted:
Me: You shouldn’t say the “and” when you’re counting above 100.
Flapjack: Why not? It’s what we all say in class.
Me: You don’t use the “and” when writing out the number, like, for example, on a check. So it’s a bad habit to get into. And it’s not very efficient, is it? Saying all those extra syllables. Think of all the time you’re wasting. You’ll never get that part of your life back. (Yes, I said that. And yes, I have an obsession with efficiency.)
Flapjack: I’m just a kid. I don’t write checks.
Me: Well, you could certainly work on improving your efficiency.
Flapjack: You make me crazy.
I’m glad that, at such a young age, he’s already realized what Mommy’s special purpose in life is.
