Mental Health Hotline

Bill had a post about automated answering systems today, and how tired he was of pressing 1... it reminded me of this video. Enjoy!

Doing Research

I'm sad to hear this week that Multiply is going to focus on the marketplace portion of this wonderful site. They're headquartering themselves in Asia, where the bulk of the sellers (nee spammers) are located. They haven't mentioned anything about whether they will continue to support and maintain the blogging portion of their business. Having survived the slow death of Yahoo 360, I'm skeptical that Multiply will remain the place it always has been for those of us who were "refugees" looking for a home.

I've been looking around a bit, in case we have to abandon ship, and came across LiveJournal. Here's what one site has to say about it:

LiveJournal, formerly owned by Six Apart and written in PERL, differs from other major blog platforms because of its unique community feel and social networking features. The “friends list” provides a way for people who have LiveJournal accounts to connect with each other and a friends page displays a feed of LiveJournal posts (or “entries”) made by friends. One bad thing about LiveJournal is the fact that you must display advertisements (from LiveJournal) even if you upgrade to a Plus account. Plus users are able to change the display option for the advertisements as well as store and manage photos (not an available option in the free version) and create post polls and surveys. If you would like to go advertisement-free, you need to upgrade to a Paid account ($20 per year) which gives you many more features like creating new syndication accounts and creating a custom journal design with advanced options.

I opened an account just to check it out (http://mommadish.livejournal.com/) and it seems pretty easy to use. Does anyone else want to try? This may be premature, but I remember what happened with 360 and how we scrambled to make sure that we didn't lose anyone in the move... and then we did.

That 4 Thing Going Around...

I thought I'd resisted, but it still goes on... and it is kinda fun! So here goes...

1- Four states I've been to - New York, Louisiana, California, and Montana.
2- Four smells I love- Baking bread, garlic, Coppertone sunblock, and baby powder.
3- This one is supposed to be four people who will reply, but I'll turn this into 4 states I haven't been to- Massachusetts, Florida, Arizona, Oregon
4- Four TV shows I like- House Hunters, Supernatural, Cake Boss, House

I don't watch a lot of TV. I'd rather read a book. And I'm sure glad I didn't have to pick just 4 books I like!

Life isn't Fair

Those of you watching the news might know that my state (North Carolina) passed an amendment to our state constitution stating that NC will only recognize marriage between a man and a woman. This has caused a lot of discussion over the past few days, some of it constructive, some of it full of venom and hatred, no matter which side you were on.

As usual, I'm a moderate. I can really see both sides and was conflicted on how to vote. I listened to my friends, the people I respect, and they were on one side of the issue or the other. My Christian friends who believe in the Bible know that God sees homosexual relations as a sin, and voted "for." My more liberal friends want everyone to always have what they want when they want it, and voted "against." I was still conflicted.

After a great Facebook debate, it hit me - I had to figure out where I stood. What I stood for. What principles I live my life by. Then I would know. I won't tell you how I voted because it doesn't matter- the amendment passed with a good majority. But I did know where I stood, and that it was the right place for me to stand. At the end of the day I feel good about my vote and am happy I chose the way I did.

But it does bring to mind one thing I learned a long time ago- life isn't fair. And I don't think it was meant to be. We don't have the "right" to have anything the other person has just because we want it. When you get down to it, that is the basic idea behind communism- everyone gets what they need (until a dictator comes in and "needs" most of it!)

I did an exercise with my boys when they were little. I was so tired of hearing "it's not fair" that I declared a FAIR DAY. Things were going to be fair for one day. They were excited! They both got up at the same time, ate the same breakfast, drank at the same time, watched the same shows, had the same snack, played the same game (and had to have the same score)... which lasted about 3 hours before they screamed for mercy. They didn't want the same snack. They don't like the same shows, and they wanted someone to be victorious in the game.

It was a good lesson. Life isn't fair. You don't always get the same thing, or the same amount, that the other person has. And sometimes, the state you live in passes a law you like, and sometimes they don't. That's life. Good thing we're only here for a short time, then we're on to an eternity of better!