Oh, poor blog, I have neglected you.  For the same recurring reasons--being busy, fatigue, lack of photos despite ongoing knitting and other projects--but also because I've been getting sucked way too much into Facebook lately.  And I don't really like Facebook.  I mean, I like the immediacy, and the ease of sending messages and posting links, but I don't like that it's such a time-suck, or having to hide all the stupid game messages, or posts by people who I'm friends with for various reasons but who are generally INSANE--plus there's the privacy issue, and the fact that Mark Zuckerberg seems like a total jerk.  And I don't like censoring myself.  I don't have to censor myself here, since nobody in my family knows about it, and even my husband doesn't read it.  (Bless him, or else I wouldn't have been able to bitch about my inlaws when it was most cathartic.) 

 

Anyway, I had pretty much decided over the weekend that I was going to try to up my blog usage and minimize the Facebook stuff, when two things happened yesterday that kind of sealed the deal:

 

1.  My mother tried to friend me.  Ack.  She doesn't actually use Facebook except to look at pictures of my niece, so I suppose she did it in anticipation of the nugget's arrival.  When the time comes, I have no qualms about setting up a separate photosharing account just for baby pictures--particularly because you can make everything password-protected, so there's no weirdness about sharing bathtub pictures or anything.  I am not friending my mother on Facebook.  She doesn't need to see every single political link I post to my page, or every off-color comment I make on someone's status update.  I know there are ways to block things by creating groups, but like I said before, I don't really like Facebook.

 

2.  Yesterday I posted a status update:  "The word of the day is:  Santana."  I was making a specific reference to Tuesday night's Glee episode, in which we learn a whole lot about the awesomely bitchy Santana Lopez.  (Great episode in general, despite my feelings about Gwyneth Paltrow's singing, blech.)  I had three people "like" my update--all female relatives in their late 40s.  Clearly they thought I meant the BAND Santana, which is cool and all, but wow, they didn't get it.  And I had no intention of elucidating, since the subject matter of this particular episode (and wow, like, every episode) would have grievously offended my extremely holier-than-thou, homophobic cousin (by marriage).  This woman and I are not tight, and I really don't give a crap what she thinks, but I prefer my internet presence to be a peaceful one, since God knows I create enough drama in real life. 

 

So I believe these two events have clinched it for me.  I can use Facebook to receive messages, to update my artist page, and to look at cute babies, but other than that I'm just over it.  I'm actually writing this as an email (we'll see if it goes through), and will stick with this and Flickr for posting if it seems to make things easier.  Tomorrow I may actually have pictures (we'll see...the camera lives in Mark's car, apparently!), but I will definitely post more.  I wasn't kidding when I said I was busy!  And hopefully, if I can stick with this, I will send a FB message to select people to inform/remind them of the blog, and I can get some more readers!

 

Oh, but here are two links:

 

I recently discovered "Advice Smackdown" on alphamom, and I think I love this woman.  This post and the comments that follow are really touching, and I think I will refer back to it as I get closer to my due date. 

 

Ten ways to save money on gas.  I guess I need to drive the speed limit on 540...