The Bs Are Back

The carpenter bees arrived for their annual feast of my front porch a few weeks ago. I don’t

mind them. Sure, the bees have some baggage. They make a big mess digging their holes. The little sawdust piles mix with the pollen, making my porch pretty nasty. But, they’re not the world’s worst house guests. For starters, they remind me that spring has arrived.

Double Top Secret Way to Publish WordPress.com Posts on Facebook

Call me a control freak, but I’m guessing there are other people out there in WordPress world who want to add some but not every WordPress.com post to their Facebook Profile Newsfeed.

RSS Feed

The easiest way to add your WordPress.com Posts to Facebook is by creating an RSS feed on your Facebook profile.  To do this see below. But, if you are like me, you may not want every single WordPress post to automatically go to Facebook.

Hats off to Judi and Callahan for solving one of the great mysteries of the world with such a simple New Trick.

Add A Link To Your Post

Here’s what to do:

• Compose your WordPress post as normal.
• Somewhere in your WordPress post, add a link back to your post.  I stick a little tag, ‘Link to this post‘ at the very end of the post. If you want to be fancy, you could use a white font for the link text so that it doesn’t show on your post.
  
• Insert a link to the Post’s URL (either by grabbing the Permalink or publishing the post and copying/pasting the URL) in the tag.
  
• Publish the Post.
• View the published Post.
• Hover over the link.
• You’ll get the ‘WordPress Snap Shots’ dialog box like below:

• Select the ‘+SHARE’ button
• From the ‘Bookmark & Share’ dialog box, select Facebook
• Follow the prompts

A few notes:

WordPress.com is the online hosted version of WordPress.

There is a WordPress app for Facebook but it doesn’t appear to be working at the moment.

How to add your WordPress.com posts to your Facebook NewsFeed.

• Go to your Facebook Profile page
• Select the ‘Settings’ button (just under the Status bar)
• Select ‘Blog / RSS’
• Enter the URL for your WordPress.com blog
• Give it a few seconds, then your blog posts should appear

From now on, your WordPress.com Posts will automatically appear on your Newsfeed as soon as (or shortly after) they are published.

Adding Flickr 2 Your Facebook Profile

Share your Flickr photos on your Facebook Profile

One of the few apps that still seems to be working with the new Facebook layout is Flickr Badge.

Sure, you can easily upload photos directly to Facebook Albums but, for one reason or another, you may want to keep the photos external.  In my case, I wanted to share existing Flickr photos with Facebook and Face-less friends without having to re-upload the photos to multiple places.

There are several different Facebook/Flickr apps available. The first few I tried created a separate Flickr tab on my Facebook profile page but I wanted the photos to appear on my Facebook profile sidebar so they could easily be seen.  Enter Flickr Badge to the rescue.

Here’s how:

• Logon to Facebook and Flickr (the Flickr logon is necessary so you can grab the URL of the items to be shared).
• From the Facebook search bar (located at the top right hand corner of your screen), enter ‘FLICKR’ or just click on this link: FLICKR BADGE.
• Select the ‘Applications’ tab from the results list.
• There are several different apps, but ‘Flickr Badge’ by Erik is the one I used to add the badge to my Facebook profile.
• Select ‘Go To This Application’.
• You may get an ‘Authorization Required’ prompt. If so, allow the application to access your profile.
• You’ll get the ‘Flickr Badge’ set up screen like this:

• From the ‘Type’ drop down list, select the Type of Photos you want to share. My photos were in a Set.
• In the ‘Data’ field, enter the URL value for the type of photos you are looking to share.

My url was something like: http://www.flickr.com/photos/leapdontlook/sets/72157607656291001

Since I wanted to share a Set, I simply entered: 72157607656291001 (no, silly, I didn’t type the whole string by hand, I just cut and pasted it from the URL name)

• Enter the number of photos you want to include on the badge. For me, the magic number was 10.
• Select ‘Add Photos’.
• You’ll get a ‘Yay – photos added successfully’ box.
• Select ‘Add to Profile’.
• Wallah – the badge will be added to your profile page.

Don’t be surprised if you get an error the first time you try it. I had to enter the Set name a  couple of times before it worked for me.

If you know of another cool Flickr/Facebook app, do tell.

Link to this post

A Life Without Times

Even though I love the new ‘job’ and the opportunity to learn new things, there are certain things about it that make me cringe.  Mostly, the things that remind me of my old job. Things that  take me to a mental place I never wanted to return.

Now that our first project is nearing completion, it’s time to think about documentation. I could live happily ever after having never written another line of documentation. I’ve been doing a great job of avoiding it up until now.

Tonight, I finally gave up the battle.  Before I’d even finished the first page, I realized a wonderful thing about my new life. Something I left behind 8 months ago but never even thought about till now.   What’s happily missing from my life ? The font -  Times (in all it’s flavours Times, Times Roman and Times New Roman).  You can call it whatever you want but nothing about that font says hip or fresh.

Font was a four letter word in my old life and no font caused me more grief than Times Roman. I hate it – it’s so old school, so last Reagan. It’s a newspaper font and we all know the way of the newspaper.  Just now I googled it to discover I’m not alone. There are even ‘I hate Times Roman groups’ on facebook and mySpace. One blogger summed it up best when he said it’s:

ugly, amateurish design, lacking soul

Times is an old trick. We would never, ever use it at our new venture, New Tricks.

So, tonight I celebrate ridding my life of Times Roman.

I think I’ll go with ‘Gloriola’ for my documentation. It won the 2008 TCD2 awards. Typographica says:

It succeeds in being a typeface of the now, without resorting to trendy gimmicks or ornamentation.

All of a sudden, I really dig documentation

The Next Leap

Normally, I’m not big on the self-help stuff, but since two different people people gave me Elizabeth Gilbert’s ‘Eat, Pray, Love’  when I left the ‘corporate’ job last summer, I figured I should give it a shot. After a bit, I got into the book.  I finished it while sitting on a beautiful beach in Mozambique.  The book follows the three chapters of the author’s self-discovery – eating in Italy, praying in India, and learning to love again in Indonesia.

Originally, I’d planned to give myself 6 months to sort out what I wanted to do with life. While my journey hasn’t been nearly as glam as Elizabeth George’s, I do feel like it’s had distinct phases.

Purge

Phase 1 was spent detoxing myself of the old job by traveling to South Africa/Mozambique. It was the only bit of my journey that was planned – if you count a FF Award ticket as a plan.

Pinch Myself

The second phase was spent volunteering for something that I’m really passionate about. It was a wonderful experience full of amazing stories. I still have to pinch myself that I got to be an itty, bitty part of history. I’m convinced that it happened the way it did because, just about the time I returned from South Africa and start volunteering, most of the Obama staff members were being shipped out to other states.  If I hadn’t  been able to find a parking space that day (a major miracle given the parking situation at 1080 spring st), I probably would have driven home and given up on volunteering.

Pinch Myself Some More

Once I finished celebrating our accomplishments and catching up on my sleep, the 6 months were over.  I still hadn’t figured out what I wanted to do but I knew alot of  things I didn’t want to do.  Every time I got ready to send out a resume, I choked. The only jobs that interested me had to do with website design and social media but I don’t have a whole lotta experience in those areas so, in today’s competitive market, my resume wasn’t exactly going to the top of the ever growing pile.

As it happened, my friend, Judi, who I met through the Obama campaign (Judi and her husband Duane graciously donated Urban Oasis, their fab Inman Park home/b&B/Studio, to the campaign as our get out the vote Staging Location) had been working on an informal basis with small businesses/artists to help them convert their old outdated or non-existent web sites to WordPress. WordPress, the blogging platform I use, can also be used as a CMS system. While it looks as good as high-ticket websites, it’s much easier to update/maintain.

Judi got the double-good genes – she is blessed with both an incredible sense of design and savy business skills. So, when Judi asked if I wanted to join in her new venture, I got out of the pjs, put on some shoes and headed right over.

The new venture is called ‘New Tricks’ and the tag line is that ‘It’s Never Too Late!’ – meaning you can always learn new tricks.

Before I joined the fun, Judi had completed a couple of projects on her own. We are just finishing up our first team project – a website launch for Milk Money Consulting. Milk Money provides talent and studio space for the recording industy. It’s been a fun project to work on and I can’t believe how much I’ve learned.

We hope to have a few more tricks in the bag before our official launch in mid-April.

So, I think I’m starting phase 3.  It doesn’t seem like a leap – more like a happy skip.

Stay tuned for more….

Note To Judi – No, I didn’t insist we go with orange  just so the logo would look good on my blog.

Happy Birthday Barbie – where’s my invite ?

Today is Barbie’s 50th birthday.

I wasn’t invited to her party (maybe the evite went to my old work email address?) but I’m guessing she celebrated last night with vintage champagne and carrot sticks.

Since I grew up with Malibu Barbie, I’m envisioning the event was held in LA.  Even with the economic downturn, I suspect it was a lavish doo.

I’m sure she wore a glam new outfit to the party – after all she had her own show in Feb at New York Fashion Week.  I’m not sure which dress I would have chosen – maybe the Vivienne Tam – but I certainly would have gone for those hot Christian Louboutin shoes.

I bet Ken was there with his partner. They probably arrived early to do her hair and make up. I’m sure Barbie and Ken remain close friends.  Afterall, she had to have known he was gay from Day 1. If you don’t believe me, then you didn’t watch the ‘Mod Hair Ken’ video above. Ken’s either a car salesman or dermatologist. I’m hoping the later so he can do her botox for free.

I’m sure Madonna was there – since the Material Girl turned 50 last year, I suspect she is helping Barbie adjust to the new age bracket. And, I think Vincent Chase from Entourage was in the house. Maybe he’s Barbie’s new boy toy?

There is some speculation on the internets that Barbie has been or is about to be made redundant. I just don’t see that happening. After all, she constantly reinvents herself.  According to the Guardian, over the years Barbie’s careers have included:

An astronaut and fashion editor in the 60s, a surgeon and gymnast in the 70s, and has since been a rapper, a Unicef diplomat, a palaeontologist, an African-American presidential candidate (non-partisan) and, perhaps most brilliantly, an art teacher.

“Career”, of course, is another name for “outfit”…

My guess is that, at this point, she is either self-employed or taking a career break. After all those jobs, she probably needs some time off.

I’m also guessing she woke up this morning (or perhaps afternoon) with a wicked hangover and aching feet. Serves her right for not inviting me to the party.

early 70s malibu barbie

Soup n Slosh

At the first sight of a snowflake this past Sunday, I did what every respectable ATL-ian did and made a mad dash for the grocery store.  The storm wasn’t much of anything – mostly slosh. It’s all gone now. The only thing left of ‘Winter Storm 2009′ is the emergency soup I made.

I’ve been on a bit of a Kale bing so I went for a Portuguese Kale Soup from the Food Network.  While the soup is like a Portuguese Caldo, in researching this post (remember research = high journalistic standards and job search avoidance), I learned that both the Scots and German’s are kale people.  Apparently, a kale culture has developed in north-western Germany. There, social clubs host a “Grünkohlfahrt” (“kale tour”) in late January, where they consume large quantities of kale, sausage and schnapps. Most communities in the area have a yearly kale festival which includes crowning a “kale king”.  I’d love to see that crown.

Dresden’s official Kale King is Dr. Michael Hupe. In addition to holding the Kale King title, Dr Hupe serves as MD of the Dresden Airport and Chair of the Dresden Convention  Bureau.

‘(The Revd) Kale King’ is on LinkedIn and just plain Kale King is on Facebook and mySpace. There was an ‘I ♥ Kale King’ sweatshirt on Amazon but it’s been discontinued – oh, drats.

Here’s the recipe. Some cornbread would have been really tasty with it but a diva can only spend so long in the kitchen.

It was tastier today than when I made it yesterday. I’d award it a ‘yum, yum, yu’ (or 2 ½ yums out of a possible yum, yum, yum)

Portuguese Kale Soup

Adapted from the Food Network website/Gertrude’s Gallery

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 tablespoon finely chopped garlic
• 1/2 cup diced onions - I don’t believe in them
• 1/2 diced turnips - the recipe didn’t specify a ½ of what so I assumed ½ cup but I pretty much went with 1 cup of all the veg plus the whole bunch of kale
• 1/2 cup diced carrots
• 1 bunch kale, stemmed and roughly chopped
• 6 ounces chopped chourico (spicy Portuguese sausage), or chorizo – I went with veggie sausage. I’m ok buying meat sausage at Whole Foods but couldn’t pull the trigger on it at the Kroger
• 3 bay leaves
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves – I passed on the parsley
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh thyme leaves
• 6 cups beef stock
• 1 cup kidney beans – I drained
• 6 ounces diced tomatoes
• 10 ounces diced potatoes – I went with Sweet Potato – bumped it up to a cup or so

Method

In a large stock pot, heat the oil over medium-high heat. Add the garlic, onions, turnips and carrots and cook for 5 minutes. Add the kale, chourico, bay leaves, parsley and thyme and mix well. Add the beef stock, beans and tomatoes. Bring the soup to a boil, and then reduce the heat to low and simmer for 30 to 40 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan, bring salted water to a boil and add the diced potatoes. Cook until tender, about 10 minutes. Drain the potatoes and add them to the soup.

Remove the bay leaves and serve hot.

Say it isn’t so – I’m a tree killer

squeeze = trees

Everyone knows that UK toilet paper sucks. Not only does it feel like sandpaper but it comes in colors never-found-in-nature.  Think easter egg shades of light pink, green and blue. I always feared that the dye was cancer causing.

I’m a charmin girl. And never the ‘good value’ charmin – only the ultra soft, quilted, extra ply will do. When I lived in the UK, I’d smuggle back suitcases full of charmin.

So, I was crushed to see a recent article in the Guardian that American style toilet paper is tres bad for the environment. Somehow my beloved extra soft Charmin:

causes more damage than gas-guzzlers, fast food or McMansions

The problem is two fold – it’s made from extra virgin wood and the chemicals used in pulp manufacturing are harmful. Americans are big toilet paper consumers, using

three times more per person than the average European, and 100 times more than the average person in China.

The article links to the Greenpeace cut-out-and-keep ecological ranking of toilet paper products.

Unless I change my ways – I’ll be a big tree-hugging hypocrite – a modern day version of Mr Whipple.