Velveteen Mind

Debunking, Defusing, and Demystifying the Big Name Blogger; Mommy or Otherwise. And Delurking You.

"I feel out of my depth."

"I know I'll feel overwhelmed."

"This is way out of my league."

"I am so intimidated by this group, but..."

These are just a handful of the emails I have received regarding RSVPing for The People's Party, a pre-BlogHer party I am co-hosting with a handful of bloggers the night before the BlogHer conference at the Westin St. Francis in San Francisco this year. 

Because we need to keep loose numbers on how many drinks and goodies our sponsors need to provide, we have asked you all to RSVP if you think you'll be able to come.  That's the customary purpose of an RSVP, but some of you seem to think that we have chosen to use it as a torture device and have been hesitant (popular word:  intimidated) to even leave a comment or email that says, "I'll be there."

Lord knows what you think the actual party is going to be like...  Spotlights at the ready to point out your every flaw...  Live rankings of everyone's blog stats projected on the wall over the bar...  Buckets of pig's blood dangling from the rafters a la Carrie...

Well, we will require you to log into FeedBurner to verify that you have at least 500 subscribers to your blog before you are allowed to enter, now that I think of it.  Sucks for you blogging losers.

Okay, that was a joke. 

The People's Party is just that:  a party for the people by the people, because that is all any of us are.  Seriously.  No one should feel left out or not cool enough or not popular enough or not enough enough.

Because, enough already.

You know The Bloggess?  She is hilarious, right?  Almost intimidatingly hilarious.  But you know what?  She's not buying the hype for a second.  She knows that at the end of the day, she's just a woman with a foul mouth, a decadent mind, and access to the Internet. 

She is a lot like you.  Only with less censoring.  And possibly less underwear.

She wants to meet you.  And, better yet, she is just as nervous about meeting you as you are about meeting her. 

Now swap "The Bloggess" with any other big-name blogger and you end up with the exact same scenario.  Possibly fewer references to "vaginas" and "ninjas" and "vagina ninjas" and "ninja vaginas," but you get the point.

If I have learned anything from planning this party it is that "Internet Celebrity" is all of the following :

1. Perception.
2. A fluke.
3. Fleeting.
4. Rampant.

None of the above are a reflection of my co-hosts, as this lesson is simply a result of the entire process as a whole.  Mostly a result of being exposed to more opinions and perceptions regarding "celebrity" than I have ever been exposed to before.

What makes a "Big Name Blogger" is not necessarily based on merit.  It is occasionally just the result of sticking it out and being at the right place at the right time.   It is sometimes based on hard work.  It is often not deserved.  Or if it once was, it is no longer.  It is the ultimate contradiction in terms.

Simply put:  It is meaningless and often holds little real value.

It is all perception.  And that is up to us.

However, being a successful and popular blogger is something in which I know we are all interested, which explains some of the "celebrity" fascination that extends to bloggers.  The most popular link on my Mommybloggers: The Resource page?  How to be a Popular Mommyblogger by A Mommy Story.

Wanting to grow your audience and expand your reach is healthy.  Boasting a large readership is a good thing because it opens you up to more opinions and feedback, which helps you grow your own voice.  However, when you begin to think of "popularity" in terms of the "cool kids table," you lose me.

We give the concept of cliques power that they do not deserve.  After BlogHer last year, the number one complaint I heard was that it felt like high school.  That the cool bloggers hung out with the cool bloggers and the newbies hung out with the newbies.  That "cuteness" came into play, whereas it doesn't usually factor online.  Friendships through blogs did not always translate in real life.

People you thought you would hang with shunned you from the "cool kids table."

Enough, already.

After we announced the party, I received a lot of comments along the lines of, "I had no idea you hung with the big girls" or "How did you get in with them?" 

First of all, I am a big girl.  Second of all, I let them in with me. 

And you are, too.  And you should, too.

It didn't occur to me that I might not be cool enough.  That my traffic statistics might not be high enough.  That I might not be popular enough.  So I just did it.

The imaginary boundaries placed around cliques?  I figure, if my son can't see them, I shouldn't, either.

And now my blog name is on a gajillion badges on a spajillion blogs, right along with Oh, the Joys! and motherbumper and One Plus Two and IzzyMom and, yes, The Bloggess.  People at Parents Magazine's GoodyBlog know who I am.  People at Sprout® and PBS know who I am. 

People know who I am because I know who I am.

I'm a mom who writes her blog mostly in her underwear.  With a sink full of dirty dishes and piles of laundry staring at her from her peripheral vision.  I'm a blogger who puts on a good show, but whose numbers followed the fancy facade she put up for the world to ponder.  I'm a blogging mother that wanted and needed a way to reach out, get some things off my chest, and connect.

And I'm just like you.

Robin from Pensieve left a comment on my post about being interviewed by NBC Nightly News for msnbc.com (and my subsequent decision that I should be on the Today Show kissing with Matt Lauer) that said, "If 1/10 of Megan-the-blogger translates to Megan-live-and-in-person? The ratings would soar off the charts."

Megan-live-and-in-person is exactly like Megan-the-blogger.  Except with more pants and poorer spelling.

Want to meet me?  Come to The People's Party the night before BlogHer in San Francisco.  We are right below the newbie party that BlogHer is throwing, so you can float back and forth.  We'll have drinks and goodies and lots of compliments and questions and interest in meeting you.

And we'd love for you to RSVP so we can be sure to have enough of all that goodness, all for you.  Because you?  You are our people.

And me?  Well, I like to think that I'm your people.  Regardless of whether or not you are going to BlogHer.  Regardless of whether or not you are a mom.  Regardless.

Now, how about you stop lurking (reading a blog and never commenting) and take this second to connect with me. 

You.  Delurk.  Now.  Leave a comment.  Connect with a not-so-Big-Name-Blogger that may or may not be wearing pants right now.

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If Microsoft won't hire me, the Geek Squad will... not, either.

If you are looking for something clever or interesting, move along.  My computer crashed late Monday and I'm having to scramble to catch up.   Today, the first day I have been back online for more than 15 minutes at a time,  is one of those "This is my blog and I'll do with it whatever I please" days, so that means I'm using it as a bulletin board.

• If you are waiting for something from me, I am working on it.  Reminder emails are welcome.
• Blog Nosh Magazine channel editors:  I am wading through the acceptance emails re. who edits what channel and will be restructuring as necessary.  Don't fret:  there is nothing you are supposed to be doing, yet.
• Waiting for a signed contract from me?  I'm hooking up our printer today.  Probably.
• Waiting on a post from me for your site and checking here to see if I've been posting anything anywhere?  I haven't and I'll be a writing fool today, so bear with me.
• Updating my blogroll again this weekend.  If you asked, I promise I heard you.
• Are you my laundry and/ or dishes?  You'll have to just shine it on for a little while longer, because it ain't happening.

Finally, because I have now spent a week working on improving the performance of my computer (read: begging it to not crash again before I can back up all of our photos), I thought I would share with you a little of what I have learned...

1. Computers are not like cars.  You can not just drive them into the ground and hope that your dad or husband or father-in-law or random neighbor guy takes pity on you and checks under the hood for if it needs an oil change or whatever those fandangled automobiles need.  Apparently you have to maintain them.  Whatever that means.
2. Apparently "maintain" means doing things like scanning for viruses, adware, spyware, cleaning the disc, and defragmenting.
3. Bill Gates is apparently not God and does not design infallible machines and omnipotent hardware and software.    For instance, Windows may be the son of the devil.
4. If you hunt hard enough, there are computer geeks out there that hate Bill Gates enough and would like to steal his money enough that they have figured out ways to fix your computer for free.  Okay, they may need to work on the taking his money bit.
5. Gizmo's Tech Support Alert has everything you could ever want to fix your computer.  For free.
6. I would have the baby of Advanced WindowsCare Personal if I could.
7. IObit's SmartDefrag is my best friend.  Watching it degragment over 8,000 files (I am not kidding) was like watching the most complicated game of Tetris ever and thoroughly satisfying.
8. I have an immense amount of patience.
9. I am easily entertained.

If you want to improve your computer's performance, here is what I did, in a nutshell that actually took about five days to figure out, but you can now get done in a couple of hours:

• uninstall all of your virus programs, because odds are you have one too many
• back up as much as you can on DVD, CD, whatever
• run disc clean-up on your hard drive
• set a Restore point
• install and run Advanced WindowsCare Personal, which does about a million things, all of which are incredibly helpful (virus/spyware/adware cleanup, registry cleanup, disc cleanup, Start Menu cleanup, etc.)
• install and run SmartDefrag (this bit is time-consuming, so do it overnight)
• reinstall virus program

I still need to update Windows, but I'll get to that once reading computer jargon doesn't make me nauseous anymore.

Now, back to work.  More regular posting schedule coming up, I promise.  Ish.

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If Matt Lauer Won't Have Me, Brian Williams Will... Not, Either.

NBC Nightly News emailed me the other day.  Yeah, the one on TV.  The one with Brian Williams.  And, no, you smart-alecs, it was not a newsletter or some such spam.  A real live NBC Nightly News staffer emailed me personally.  For my opinion.  Or, as I like to think of it when one of The Big Three calls me:  my Oh-pin-eee-yawn.  Okay, clearly I've been watching far too much The King of Queens, one of the few DVD sets we own while we have no cable.

Speaking of no cable, someone get that hooked up ASAP because I am going to be on TV!

I immediately pictured this: Brian Williams:  Tonight on NBC Nightly News, I fall in love with Megan Jordan and steal her away from Matt Lauer.

Let the Velveteen Mind love fest begin!

And may I say that it is about time that NBC noticed me?  I've been writing about Matt Lauer ever since my guest post on Plain Jane Mom, My Label Maker is Broken This Week.  In fact, it was that post that finally caught the attention of NBC News.  You know, this NBC:

Brian Williams:  So Barack, I'm thinking Megan's boobies would be about this big in person. 
What is your opinion on that matter?
Barack Obama:  You nasty, Brian.

The NBC News researcher found my "Label Maker" post while researching the topic of pollsters using labels such as "Soccer Mom" and "Security Mom" during this election.  Not the first time I have been hit up for an interview based on that guest post, mind you.  Naturally, I am the go-to blogger on the topic of politics.

Ahem.

Nevertheless, Erika Angulo had questions.  On behalf of NBC.  Which clearly means, on behalf of Matt Lauer.

Note to Erika, it's only going to get uglier from here.  I'm about to massacre our interview, so you might want to go back to work for Brian Williams right about now.  Tell him I said, "Holla!"

The brilliantly patient Erika, who had no idea of the long-winded answers she was about to receive, wanted to know if I felt labels such as "Wal-Mart Mom" are necessary to describe certain groups of voters.  Additionally, what are the main issues for mothers during this election and do I feel that John McCain, Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton are doing a satisfactory job of addressing those issues?

The Queen of Spain is now spitting out her coffee and yelling, "Why on earth would you ask Megan, of all people?!" 
Shut up, Erin.  I am wicked smaht.

In response to Erika's questions, clearly on behalf of Brian Williams himself, I expounded as such:

"I think that our current Presidential candidates are, in fact, too concerned about what specific groups want to hear.  Hence, the mad grasping at labels so they can get a jump on what they expect to hear.   So, do I think that they are doing a good job of addressing issues of mothers today?  Yes, and I wish they'd stop.

Catering to our "interests" may be just what has helped to create the entitlement society in which we are currently living, in my humble opinion.  (You are laughing, right?)"

I wasn't sure if I had answered her question, so I went on to further not answer her question by offering my opinions about how complex mothers are today (which I will illustrate with a photo of me standing in front of ABC Studios in New York, demonstrating my opinion of Good Morning America vs. The TODAY Show on NBC):

"Many of us are struggling with rather disparate opinions when it comes to our current political environment.  Not to mention the financial environment.  What we want and need for our families may be contradictory at some point, so that leaves us grasping at three tremulous candidates.  All of which are walking on politically correct eggshells and offering very little real hope.

Can you care about gas prices but also capitalism?  Can you pay to drive your kids to soccer practice, frowning at the havoc it is wreaking on your budget, while you or your husband is earning the money for that gas by working at "The Better Mousetrap Company"?"

I think at this point, Erika was saying to herself, "Did she just answer my question?  Did she read my question?  Does she think this is a blog post?  She had better not try to turn this into a blog post."

She responded to my email with something along the lines of how my opinion was "refreshing," which I think means "completely irrelevant and uninformed" in reporter-speak.  She then went on to ask my opinion of whether or not the government should pay for child care and if employers should implement mandatory work schedules to enforce a work-life balance for mothers.

Asking a stay-at-home mother about working mothers' rights is sort of like asking a frog if birds should be allowed to fly at night. 

But I answered her anyway.  I had to answer her, because I was picturing this:

Brian Williams to Brian Williams:  I never knew such a brilliant mind existed out there.  And to think I can read Velveteen Mind any time I want.  Now, do I pronounce this political goddess's name "Meeegan" or "Meg-an"?

I would hate to deprive Brian Williams, and by extension Matt Lauer, of my profound opinions on things I have no business talking about...  or pretty much thinking about ever.

So I responded to Erika's questions about working mothers' rights with something along the lines of, "Where does it end in regards to who picks up what part of the bill?" and "Exactly when did our responsibility to make well-informed choices as parents end?  When were we granted the freedom to stop making the hard decisions, because I seem to have missed that memo?" 

Oh yeah,  and something very much like, "I don't want a SugarDaddy-in-Chief."

Then Erika emailed me back with something like, "Huh?"

And then she dropped the bomb on me:

"The story should be on msnbc.com this weekend."

What?  I thought I was going to be on TV?!  MSNBC dawt calm?!!!  That's for losers that don't have cable!

Um, apparently while I was distractedly dazzled by the photo of Brian Williams at the top of the website she sent me to in her first email, I failed to notice she had sent me to the "web exclusive" section. 

Note to NBC:  your staffers should not be allowed to send interviewees to sites with photos of people that even know Matt Lauer if they are not, in fact, going to be seduced interviewed by said person and broadcast out for all the world to see on television...  with flashing signs illuminating their cool blog's URL and such, too.  FYI.

So, I remain this close to meeting Matt Lauer:

So close, yet so far away.

And the interview consigned to msnbc.com?  It showed up on the front page that weekend, as promised, and lots and lots of people got to read all of my erudite opinions on political pollsters and the distinct lack of a need for a SugarDaddy-in-Chief.

Wait.  Damn.  No, they didn't.  My bit was cut down to a couple of lame soundbites that Goose, my one year old, could have given.  I have no idea why they cut out my comedy routine.

I'm here all week, folks.

PS-  NBC the television network: 

I am available to fly (at your cost) to New York and appear on the TODAY Show or NBC Nightly News or any of your other shows that are housed in the vicinity of Matt Lauer's dressing room any time.  I even know where to find you, though a limo to Rockefeller Plaza would not be turned down.

PPS-  I know I told you there was going to be some "tongue" involved in this post, but the photo of me, well, sort of licking Matt Lauer has been compromised.  Don't be too disappointed, though, because his face may or may not have been made of cardboard.

PPPS-  NBC also interviewed Erika Jurney from Plain Jane Mom for the same piece and she came off sounding smart.  Whatever.  When she starts seeing bumper stickers that say "SugarDaddy-in-Chief" she'll be jealous.

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Related Posts:

What's Important This Election, Mom? by Erika Angulo on msnbc.com

Phrase Anatomy:  Who will be the "Soccer Moms" of 2008 Campaign? by Jennifer A. Dlouhy, Hearst Newspapers

I Am Your Very Own Dichotomy.

Who's Afraid of the Queen of Spain?

My Label Maker is Broken This Week.  guest post on Plain Jane Mom

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