• General Information,  Opinion

    Put the “social” in social media

    Anyone who is using social media without investigating the local component is missing a huge piece of what this technology has to offer. Location-based tools like Foursquare have clearly shown that social media provides value in the way we get to know our communities and companies like Groupon and Living Social are getting us deals on our local adventures. Twitter is no different - there are many local groups who have routine “tweet-ups” to facilitate connections in the community. Whether you’re new to town or just want to learn a little more about the area, staying connected with these groups is a great way to make new friends and expand…

  • General Information,  Opinion

    Chain Letter Wannabe

    My mother is a wonderful, near-perfect human being but there is one aspect of her personality that makes me wake up in a cold sweat: she has the tendency to send chain letters. Well, chain emails but it’s the same thing. Actually, chain emails are worse – I like getting mail that isn’t a bill but a chain email is one step above SPAM. One teeny, tiny, oft-abused step. So when my cousin, Jellybean Mama (a.k.a. Cate) tagged me in what is essentially a blog chain letter I sighed dramatically and resigned myself to my fate. But I was secretly a little happy 1. for the excuse to blog and…

  • General Information,  News & Events,  Profile

    All-Star City

    I am very proud of my city. Raleigh, NC hosted the NHL All-Star game (and associated a activities) this weekend and it was fantastic. I don’t know how the experience was for an outsider visiting or watching at home but from my perspective Raleigh was a wonderful host, threw some great parties, offered up some beautiful weather and just generally impressed. A few high points:  

  • General Information

    Woot! More Blogs for me to Ignore!

    So I’ve actually been spending a lot of time with my blog lately, though you wouldn’t necessarily know it… To begin with you can see that this isn’t the same theme that was up here on my last post (sorry Evan Eckard… it really was a nice theme!). I’m easily bored and distracted by the “look n’ feel” of my blog so I’ve been playing around. Hopefully this theme will be here for awhile. I’m also taking a class this semester on Social Media as it relates to business. I didn’t realize it but this is actually something I’m pretty interested in, and as one of the assignments and my…

  • General Information

    Long Days

    I’m going to skip the guilt for not posting this time. For the record I did post, and a pretty good one at that, about a month ago. But seeing as it dealt with work, and in a pretty negative way, I decided it was neither the time nor place (yeah, censorship!) and took it down after about 15 minutes. Which actually ties nicely into my gloomy post for this evening. I’ve noted several times of the past few months that this year sucks. At first I thought it was just me feeling sorry for myself for turning 30, but there’s a lot more to it than that. Aside from…

  • General Information,  News & Events

    Something to Look Forward To

    So to preface this post, I’ve had a little to drink tonight. And I think there’s some rule about don’t drink and post but I’m FAR too wise to listen to such silliness. Went out with some friends this evening. It’s so nice what a little alcohol and some good company can do with an evening. Anyway, among our ridiculous suggestive comments, stupid ideas, happy/dirty/forgotten memories and frustrated work stories was a discussion on travel. Now these are some of the same people I went to NYC with this past New Years and we had a great time. What’s more, we traveled well together (I thought. Wait, you don’t agree?…

  • General Information

    Hey you!

    Welcome! I’ve moved. In July of 2005 I started a blog on Google’s Blogger site. I generally ignored it an occasionally jumped on to share a few random (and mostly silly) thoughts. Somehow I managed to stick with it, however marginally, for more than three years. I’ve recently decided to get own domain (it was LONG overdue) and I naturally turned to WordPress to make my blog super-fantastically awesome. And here you are. Who know, maybe I’ll actually post more now…

  • General Information

    101 Posts

    I missed it at the time but “Poli-ticked Off” was post number 100. I can’t believe I’ve been doing this for so long- or that I’ve managed to stay on this one blog the whole time. It’s very amusing, and somewhat depressing, to read my old posts. I’m not really sure how far I’ve come, but it is kind of nice to have a record of the path. So happy 101. Thanks for reading! In other news I dropped my fall class today. Work continues to be very busy; our CIO has big plans which sadly seem to require large amounts of work from my unit. Doing school work, and…

  • General Information

    10 Things I Learned on Vacation

    Wisconsin is huge. Contrary to popular belief, one can go two whole weeks without a phone, email, web browsing, TV, etc. It’s true. Cheezees (aka: Cheesy Poofs, Cheetos, etc.) are the perfect vacation food (unless you’re 4 and get queasy while riding up a twisty mountain road…) I do not sleep well in the car. The water in Canada is cold, but it really does feel good when you get in. Honest! Chicago has traffic jams. At 2:30. AM. On Sunday morning. Apparently I can spend 17 days with my family and not want to kill them. Mosquito’s suck. A LOT. Strawberry muffins are fabulous (at least those from the…

  • General Information

    The mean reds

    It’s 11:45pm. Not that late really but since I’ve been trying to fall asleep for almost an hour the time has gone by agonizingly slowly. I’ve read, had the TV on, TV off, played mind-numbing games on my cell phone, and lain in the dark thinking of soft sandy beaches. I’ve tried thinking of nothing. It’s all been spectacularly unsuccessful. I’m thinking about work, and all the stuff I haven’t done. Thinking about school, and all the stuff I haven’t done. Thinking about my pregnant cousin and all her crazy stress, thinking about my office NCAA tournament pool that I’ve done nothing to prepare for, thinking about my weight and…