I Don't Write Anymore, But....

I have not blogged in forever.  Sorry, peeps.  Reality of single motherhood, an unexpected roommate (more on that another time), and a bad case of bronchitis has sort of put a crimp in our writing time.  But lucky for you we have not one, but two awesome friends who have each "arrived" in their own way.  Also, they're kick-ass peeps.  So there's that.

Emily writes about the challenges of raising boys and girls to be themselves while trying to buck gender norms at the same time.  We've always had a link to her blog here, love her writing, and today's piece was in the New York Times.  The Times, peeps!

Lani has her debut post out in a local NY magazine site.  It's about the humor of being a parent, so we're sure even our non-NY readers will relate.  Plus, newbies need encouragement.

Please check out their work and join the other mothers commenting discussion!
 

Carnivals and Cartoons

Big thank you to Libby for including us in this week's Food Allergies Blog Carnival. Go read The Allergic Kid and your lunchbox will never be the same.

In the meantime, if you share our rather twisted sense of humor, you may enjoy the cartoon above.  If so, check out her blog where Tiffany regularly posts cartoons on this subject.

5 Ways Times (and words) Are A-Changin'

Yo, yo, yo, peeps!

What's up with no one talking in full sents anymore? At least no one cool or under the age of 18, it seems. 

We're down with the shorthand on texts and tweets, but it seems to have spilled over a bit too much into our lang, ya know?  Has anyone realize the extent to which this is impacting our pop cultch?

1. Kids:  Friends, parents and educators are henceforth known as the posse that shall be called BFFs, 'rents and ur teech.  
2. Working professionals:  After permanently losing wasteful words in emails such as "dear" "please" "thank you" and "sincerely", businesspeople are now bucketing all emails into two areas: "CYA" or simply "biz deets". 
3. Therapists:  Lengthy introspection and intense psychotherapy have been replaced by simply telling their patients to "figs it all out".   
4. Doctors:  Medical histories are now called "MD deets" 
5. Spam:  Spam is shorter as lengthy emails are reduced to phrases such as "#nigerianking needs ur $$ stat". 

We'd say more but then we'd be over our unoffish char limit.  Hmmm.  Maybe this short speech thing ain't so bad. 

I Hate to Ask, But...

Apparently you readers see this as a food allergy mom blog.   This is not so surprising we suppose.  "Women with twisted senses of humor who work in advertising and have children who also happen to have food allergies that they often write about" was not a category.  Go figure. 

What was surprising was seeing this little blog get almost 300 votes in just a couple of days after being nominated for "Top 25 Food Allergy Mom Blogs".  So is the fact that "Top 25 Canadian Mom Blogs" is the next category.  Interesting...

Here's where the favor comes in:  we're just past 25 right now and would really like to keep the badge!  It's pink and all, you see.

So if you have enjoyed reading any of these warped thoughts, we'd really appreciate a literal vote of confidence.  You can click on the badge in the right-hand navigation bar, or follow this link:  You can vote once a day until Nov. 16th.  In fact, you can vote even if you haven't enjoyed reading this blog.  We won't hold it against you.

Thanks, lovely peeps!  And more importantly, thanks for reading!

Proof That We Are Wise Beyond Our....Oh, Wait...

If you're wondering who this is, keep a'readin

Hello peeps.

Today we have some exciting news to share: Theresa at A Mountain Momma has featured yours truly as a guest blogger on today's Wednesday's Words of Wisdom!  Link below...

Wake me up When September Ends

We won't give away any more other than to hint that if you're a mother, particularly a working mother, we'll hope you can relate and offer some thoughts and comments of your own as we all know no mother is perfect and it's not always easy. 

Please go visit and check it out, even if it's only to satisfy your curiosity to see how a sane woman could willingly connect Poker Chick and "wisdom" in the same thought.

While you're there check out her other posts, she's quite entertaining and worth reading.  No, really, that wasn't sarcasm.  For reals.

The Versatile Blogger Award

Behold:

The Versatile Blogger is the first formal writing award I have received in my adult life.  If I knew enough about technology to add sound to create a "ta-dam" sound, I would have.

I was in shock when A Mountain Momma, a total stranger and funny Canadian, bestowed this great honor upon yours truly.  This is a mother of two who just got accepted to graduate school.  She is both talented and brave, and her blog is hilarious.

Instead of the usual "I'd like to thank the academy..." speech, where I don a hot red dress while Joan Rivers mocks me*,  I am hereby obligated to share 7 facts about myself to you, lovely readers who are just discovering this blog.  So here are 7 facts about me and my writing.

1.  My "writing" career began in elementary school with some poems my 3rd grade teacher made a big fuss about.  In 5th grade I wrote a "book" that spontaneously became our class play.  People still laugh at my pinata scene.  And by people I mean me.

2.  In junior high I started a writing club and the school liked it so much they made up some fancy award for me.  No, seriously.  They did.

3.  In 11th grade I took my writing to the next level by adding beautiful stick figure illustrations.  Together with a writing partner, we turned it into a regular comic series that was featured in every mock school newspaper issue.

4. In college I wrote a mockumentary expose on our cafeteria workers in the Punch Bowl.  I also wrote a killer paper for my management class on the gaming industry.  Wynn resorts proudly provided marketing material to this 19-year old future gambler of America.  Thanks, Poker peeps!

5. I don't write in the third person for anonymity, I just do it because use of the royal "we" cracks me up. 

6.  I am one of less than 1% of mothers who don't post pictures of their kids on Facebook or on their blog.  I know this because I work in advertising where I learn and quote statistics like this on a regular basis.  I do this because of future pedophiles.  And yes, I know that makes me one of the top .5% most neurotic mothers in the country.  I'm nothing if not a competitive overachiever.

7.  I know this will be hard to believe, but my name is not actually Poker Chick.  People IRL call me Michelle.

Despite all of the above, it's taken 5 years of blogging, one amazing writing group, a mentor, a screenplay, and one fancy blogging award to start thinking of myself as a real writer.

As an award-winning writer, I am proud to introduce these 15 amazing writers who you may not know. 

Emily
Emily is one of my oldest and dearest friends.  She works her ass off and is smarter than 99% of people you'll ever meet.  In the "yay for you" category, she tells a good story. 

Gray Matter Matters
A former ad chick and (together with Tina Fey), my female-comedy soul-mate, Betsy will entertain you and keep you on top of modern technology to boot.

Bern This
Jessica is just effin' hilarious.  'Nuff said.  

Nut Free Mom
A writer, speaker and expert on raising kids with food allergies.  Jenny's blog is really informative.

Allergic Kid
Not only is Libby's site an awesome place for school lunch ideas, she's also helped call national media attention to a family in Florida that was picketed for trying to protect their peanut-allergic 1st grader in school.  You go girl.

Working mothers break
Katrina's not exactly unknown in the blogosphere, but if she's new to you then you should check her out.  She's trying to make the US workforce more family-friendly, and her honesty is refreshing.

Laid off dad
Have been following his thought-provoking posts for a while.   Plus, you gotta have a token dad in the mix.

Allergic Girl
Have been a fan of Sloane's blog for years.  She's becoming famous so go visit while you still have a chance at your comments being noticed.

Mouthy housewives
These women have been neglecting their families to give you advice since 2009.

Food Allergy Mama
Aside from kick-ass recipes, Kelly takes pictures that will make your mouth water.  Plus, anyone that can write a book while raising FOUR kids warrants serious respect.  

Working moms against guilt
Great resource for working moms. 

Nancy Davishko
Nancy is a new find; and she's just hilarious.  Also, she uses the word "Malarkey". 

Walking with scissors
Another self-professed overprotective mom.  So I have to like her.  Also, she's funny. So there's that.

Chicky chicky baby
Tania is funny enough that I forgive her for being one of those people that do family Christmas cards.

Michele Lewis
A mother who's also a professional poker player? My hero.

Thank you again, Theresa!  You've rendered me totally verklempt.  And that word wasn't in spell check, either.

*Funny, but can't take the credit for that joke.

Spam Gets Smarter

Professional spammers have clearly taken some lessons in behavioral marketing, optimizing their "messages" by target audience.  For example, they know that Moms are the single largest and most influential group in the blogosphere, so if the King of Nigeria is out there with his life changing news he might need to tailor his message to fit in a little better.
 


He must be learning because the spam is better vs. what it used to be.

For example, the comment below, which Poker Chick received today:

 Hey Fellas!  Those of you that know us know that for a nice and dealing with my own child's negative behavior.  They were only pretty much driving me ridiculous at all times, i didn't know what to do or even what to tell them.  A few weeks ago my spouse and I finally decided to get to the base of it and discover a solution that might work.  I searched each and every website as well as blog i really could possibly discover on the subject and lastly i found the best solution.  If any of you happen to be having similar issues with your children you can Private Message me.  On second imagined i will merely give you the websites i discovered on the topic to help you possibly read it and repair your child too.  Thanks for experiencing my rant. [insert obviously fake website which Poker Chick has not included as she does not want to support these peeps]

Note the technique used to build this spam, scientifically called "computer finds most common words on posts and puts them together in a sentence".  Now imagine this comment landing in the box of a poor unsuspecting mom whose baby hasn't slept in 3 months and just learned how to headbutt and is really "driving me ridiculous".  She might, just might, accidentally let it pass as legitimate.  And then the world will see their comment and the link to their wares!!! Mwah, ha ha...

Fortunately, if you're writing a blog, you probably also know how to spell.  And you also have a brain, and no desire to "repair your child".  And if even that fails, there's our secret weapon which is always a step ahead.  It's called a SPAM FILTER.

Where are we again?

Stumbled upon ourselves here: 

Anyone know this site?

Where To Turn To In Your Darker Hours

There are times a woman needs some non-judgmental understanding. An outlet for confession, one that does more than instruct you to do Hail Mary's. One that can relate and perhaps offer a few beverage suggestions as well.

So Poker Chick would like to introduce her newest link...





Helping mothers everywhere b*tch with satisfaction since 2009.

And now, it's time for a laugh

Poker Chick continues to scour the blogosphere. This post admonishing frivolous lawsuits made her laugh out loud so maybe it will do the same for you. We're beginning to fantasize now...Poker Chick v. mean old bus lady....

More on Alltop

This other chick has a nice post explaining more about what this Alltop thing is. They're no longer in beta, so check them out. Apparently this site was started by Guy Kawasaki, and they still claim to have found the "best and brightest" bloggers in each category. Now before you go saying that the mom category must have all the mom blogs they could find (how else could Poker Chick find her way here) you might want to take another look. There are lots of blogs here, but not that many, peeps. In fact, many of these other awesome female bloggers are just as shocked (yet flattered). Like Glennia here, for example.

It's rare for Poker Chick to get such objective compliments so we are so honored by Alltop's inclusion, however the heck they made that decision. Please don't kick us off too soon.

You Tell Me

Admittedly Poker Chick has not posted anything of substance for a while. You may think this is because she's been too busy at work. True. Perhaps there's been nothing interesting worth writing. Perhaps also true. But mostly, she's caught with too many thoughts in her head these days and no clue what to write about.

The thing is, she has no idea what you peeps want to read and what is dismissed as dull.

So here's a taste of different topics on her mind. Time for you to to tell this girl what the heck you want to read about. Seriously, please. She's clueless.

• Resolutions. It's Feb. 1 so how is she doing?
• Grandparents.
  
• Euthenasia.
  
• The never-ending saga of the teeth in progress.
• Birthday parties.
• The Super Bowl. Not football, stupid. Re-read the title of this blog as well as the url. What other interests might the Super Bowl hold?
• What an awesome weekend looks like.
• The election.
• Femininity.

Who is Poker Chick?

The question on everyone's minds: who is Poker Chick, international woman of mystery? She is the new superhero. She is your friend, relative, colleague. Her random knowledge is endless. Ask her to interpret focus group data. Ask her what the Hungry Caterpillar ate on Wednesday. In two languages. Or maybe even three. Ask her about the latest celebrity gossip. Ask her what to wear, even for random ocassions like pseudo-weddings. Ask her how to tell what kind of jeans people are wearing just by looking at their butts. Ask her what Brian Boitano would do. You can even ask her what the hell Siegfried and Roy have to do with poker.

Yes, Poker Chick knows it all. And, dare say, has it all. Career and family. Beauty and brains. Imagination and wit. A breathtakingly beautiful genius-child. A wonderfully delusional inner world. She's a trail-blazing trendsetter hidden beneath a cynical surface of endearing clumsiness and innate nerdiness. Your typical neurotic Jewish girl with secret powers. Or was that secret tequila? Ahem. Poker Chick is getting ahead of herself. Well, at the very least, she's got some interesting warped thoughts.

So let's go back to reality for a second. The original impetus behind this blog was grounded in efficiency. I was going abroad for a while and wanted to find an easy way to update my loved ones about my travels. Later I found that it was a good way to keep in touch with far-away family. Then, surprisingly, others asked for more posts. Finally random people started sending comments on a regular basis and thus came Blogger Chicks, Alltop, and Jon Stewart. Fine, so the last one's just a fantasy. But the rest is true. Despite the new friends, my friends and family have been the biggest fans and it is with them in mind that I post most often.

Now that you've found Poker Chick, does this mean that you are hereby obligated to bookmark this site and check it regularly? That is for you alone to decide.

Now, some people will assert that blogs are egotistical. A highly-evolved technological form of conceit, if you will. Please. As if. These critics make these statements sound like accusations. I say: how is this a bad thing? Hooray for humanity! Embrace your inner Narcissus! Now since I've never been one to shy away from modern trends, why not a blog? Besides, recent trend intel advises that modesty is currently over-valued. You heard it here first.

Vanity, thy name is Poker Chick.