Sweetney

The Mommyblogging Panel.

This photo by Eden is far and away my favorite of the entire conference, because it sort of crystallizes an external expression of what I felt internally over the four days: gape-mouthed, dazed, overwhelmed.

Before the time of the panel arrived I'd talked a good game about not worrying about it or being at all nervous. And I honestly wasn't, until I sat down next to Alice and asked her how she was doing. “I'm really nervous. I don't know why, but I am” she replied. And that's when my flimsy house of cards sort of crumbled: ALICE is nervous? OH MY GOD, WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE! RED ALERT! RED MOTHERFUCKING ALERT, MAN!

The rest of the panel is sort of a blur for me. I think I made some grunting sounds at one point, and may have tried to lay my head in Alice's lap. Good times.

PS: Unrelatedly, it is supposed to be 102 degrees today here in Baltimore, with a heat index of 115. Which means that by late afternoon I'll likely look something like this:

Face meltastic!

BlogHer II: The Revenge.

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

I've been wracking my brain trying to come up with a way to summarize my BlogHer experience, but I've never been terribly adept at the art of retrospective encapsulation, so whenever I think about it (and, more importantly, think about writing about it) I experience some sort of paralyzing brain-freeze. It was really too big of an experience to whittle down and make manageable, concise, readable. But what I will say is that I was absolutely overwhelmed -- nay, fucking shocked -- at people's warm and enthusiastic reception of me. You know, you write all of this stuff on the interweb, and see (via the wonders and terrors of stat counting) that people are reading it, but it all seems sort of abstract and unreal in some way. But at BlogHer, every time I turned around I'd run into another real live flesh-and-blood person who actually seemed to like me, to like sweetney, and after a day or two of this I was walking around in a fog, dazed and confused by all the love.

Not that I'm complaining or anything, of course. More love? BRING IT, SUCKAS.

No One Gets Out Of Here Alive.

I'm writing from Chicago's O'Hare Airport, having been left here to die by my long-time arch nemesis, American Airlines.

When will I learn to not be lured into their steely grasp by the enticement of (relatively) low airfares, when honest and for true I know full well that I'll end up paying in emotional anguish and precious time wasted in airport purgatory?

Am I such a bad girl? Do I really need to be punished so?

Anyway, until I return to sweetneydom -- after I have my life reconstructed at home and get to spend a good long while gently nuzzling my girl (I briefly spotted a 3-year-old girl on the plane from San Jose to Chicago, and I think I may have spontaneously blown an ovary) -- please do help yourself to a heaping troughful of tasty photos ala BlogHer.

And to everyone I met, saw, and spent even a few fleeting moments with in Cali: Thank you for making the past four days so lovely for me. I only wish I could've spent more time with each of you. For reals. sniff.

/end sap

Geeks In Love.

Me and Marrit, yesterday morning.

Today's the panel I'm speaking on. Wish me luck.

gulp.

EDIT: For those interested, you can get a rough-cut, unedited audiocast of my panel here...

The BlogHer Has Landed.

I'm back in Cali, Cali, Cali, and its been a whirlwind 24 hours accompanied by the anthemic chorus of my nasal passages unsuccessfully attempting to expell their mighty payload of snot throughout. Yes, I'm still just a wee bit stuffy, and as a bonus, the constant squealing and motormouthing BlogHer engenders is causing my voice to deepen to a husky, Kathleen-Turner-meets-Harvey-Firestein tone that is SO becoming. By the time of my panel on Saturday, I may just have Alice speak for me, she of course being the Miracle Worker to my Helen Keller.

I know I'm not making any sense. Just roll with it, dogg.

Some things of note that must be recorded, even in my mildly psychotic state, for posterity:

california, here i come.

today has been an all work and no play day, as i've had to bear down on preparations for my big trip to blogher, where i plan to meet many of my fellow she-geeks with a little help from the social lubricant that is alcohol. let's just hope barfing isn't involved -- being sprayed with partially digested food tends to adversely impact feelings of kinship and camaraderie amongst peoples. so let's just say i'll be pacing myself.

so i leave tomorrow. expect a weekend chock full o' updates from me -- to not blog at a blogger's conference would be near heresy. i promise to try to keep blogging-under-the-influence to a minimum, though that may in fact be more entertaining than a laundry list of things i did and people i saw. honestly, i have no idea what to expect from this weekend, though i am bound and determined to have fun, despite the sucking black hole of beth's absence. yes, sucking. HARD.

gotta go pack and charge up the ipod... i'll be talkin' atcha next from the land of sunshine and silicone.

later, skater.

blogherxiety.

in just a couple days i'll be goin' back to cali, cali, cali for this blogher dealy i mentioned a little while back... and as the time draws nearer i've sensed my social anxiety threatening to squelch my otherwise anticipated good time. which would be a major downer.
so here's a few things i've been repeating, mantra-like, to myself in an attempt to hold the forces of darkness at bay (feel free to borrow/modify to suit your own anti-anxiety needs):

*i expect no one to have even heard of me, let alone to have read my blog. i realize i am a nobody within blogdom, and embrace that.

*this is the first and only time i have been away solo-style from my husband and/or daughter in 5 years. so get the fuck out of my way if you plan on harshing my buzz in any manner whatsoever. dude.

*imbibing of various psychoactive substances [cough] will be a priority, as will laughing until i almost wet myself (these two facets of my weekend plan may or may not be related), even if i have to do these things alone. gawdammit.

*there are people going to this that i'd like to meet, but if they aren't accessible i'll be ok with that. i'm not one to throw myself at peoples, so in all likelihood i'll end up hanging back and not approaching certain someones. BUT THAT'S OK. I'M OK WITH THAT. REALLY.

*i will be on an inspired and vigorous quest to have fun. so you can get on the sweetney party train or not, but the train is leaving the station regardless.

*say it with me: FUN FUN FUN!

did that sound convincing?

but really, i'm a nice person. do say hello, won't you?

revenge of the blogher.

so the deal is that beth and i were supposed to be going to this together (err, meeting there rather, since she's in utah (i was going to say FUCKING UTAH, the emphasis intended to convey its ends-of-the-earth-type otherworldliness and mystery)), but now it seems the deal might be somewhat in question for her, after some misunderstanding with a parental unit regarding childcare. [sigh.] i guess she still could make it somehow, but that appears to be not terribly likely. [even more dramatic sigh.]

so uhh any of you going?

but i swear to christ being alone will not be a bad thing. i mean you mama-types hear me, right? ALONE. can you even fucking imagine?

maybe i'll get drunk in my room and order pay-per-view porn or something. and then blog about it.