Writing is to Bleeding as Happiness is to Manchego

"There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed." - Hemingway

that's all. move along. nothing to see here. oh wait, i lied. just finished The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Bank. Perhaps one of my favorites ever? Or maybe, just a relevant time to read about a wise woman's struggles at love and work. The narration is both quiet and seductive- almost uncomfortable at times but always well-written. One of my favorite lines: "You see yourself through his eyes, as THE GENERIC WOMAN, the skirted symbol on the ladies' room door." In any event, if you're a twenty or thirty-something lady with career aspirations and a penchant for finding the one you actually didn't believe you wanted to find, then this one's for you. I laughed out loud plenty of times.

At a Loss for Words

For somebody who thrives on finding the best way to articulate ideas, I sometimes can’t even come up with one good thing to say. It’s funny, because success in PR is built on words- written, spoken, implied, words not said. And yet, there are times when I just can’t think of one thing to say. I always know when it’s happening- I almost whimper. There’s a semi-stutter, an audible frustration, and a mini-growl (completely un-lady like). It ultimately ends with “ I don’t know how to articulate this.” It’s not debilitating, show stopping, heart throbbing. It’s muted, but it definitely happens. Writers, full-time speakers, creative brethren, etc. please do tell me how you deal with this. I suppose it’s called a “block.” And so I ask- how do you get those juices flowing again?

even suburbs have moments of greatness

If you know me at all, you know the flutter of comfort that washes over me everytime the train pulls into 30th St. Station in Philadelphia (or when the Chinatown bus pulls into 10th and Arch, or greyhound at Filbert- you get the idea). Today, my dad came to pick me up and asked if I minded if we swung by Wegmans to pick up a few groceries (weird but true: my parents' shopping list nowadays consist solely of yogurt, turkey slices, apple sauce, and pita chips). Wegmans really excites me. Not only for the veritable cornucopia of samples (brie with walnuts, crab dip, and organic marinara all in one supermarket fantasy land? yes please), but also because of the fresh produce, passionate employees, and excessive candy isle. It's a wonderland. It doesn't evoke the same feelings as my old Philadelphia apartment on Pine Street- rather- Wegmans produces feelings of a not-so-tragic suburbia. With Gala apples as perfectly pink-red as this, who needs xanex. For all of those soccer moms stuck in various forms of drug-induced happiness, I imagine that Wegmans provides a substance-free wonderland of perfection. Me? I'm just in it for the samples and the delectable cheese and olive bar.

A Tizzy of A Wednesday for the Hacks and the Flacks

Three things happened today in PR vs. Blogger world. I'm happy to report all three with a little commentary.

1) TechCrunch Calls a Death to the Embargo and says that "PR firms are out of control. Today we are taking a radical step towards fighting the chaos. From this point on we will break every embargo we agree to." Hrrm. Well, okay. I'm not sure why this comes as such a shock, as Arrington and his team are often NOT happy with PR folks and our smarmy practices. That being said, I am all for open and direct communication between PR folks and journalists. TechCrunch, today was very, very clear about how they will proceed and how they'd like to be pitched regarding embargoes (go ahead and send embargoed information, we will break it). The best comment, by far, was made by a PR person who politely asked Arrington how she should be pitching to TC to build a relationship with the writers- to which Arrington replied- Go Away. The link: http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/12/17/death-to-the-embargo/

2) John Byrne, editor in chief of BusinessWeek.com, posted all of the BusinessWeek Twitter addresses on his blog. In order to support his "Ideas from BusinessWeek readers" engagement tactic, he said that "a good many of us at BusinessWeek have been having great success and fun with Twitter, the hot micro-blogging site that allows users to blog in 140 characters or less." All I've got to say about this one is great, he gets it. Steve Baker gets it too. Heather Green, she gets it. Twitter is a public forum. If a journalist wishes not to engage, then a journalist doesn't have to engage. It's.that.simple.

3) In more hilarious news, a flack challenged a journo to a boxing match. According to Gizmodo, this particular event all started with a blogger asked politely to be removed from an email distribution list because they don't cover the products the firm was pitching. Fair enough. Well no, not fair enough according to the firm's president. Go check out the president's response: http://gizmodo.com/5112457/how-not-to-treat-people-when-pitching-them-stories#c9535804.

So that's it. Those are the big three from today. I've chosen an exciting career, i tell you. Although the endless blogger vs. pr dramz gets tiring, it certainly reinvigorates open discussion about the present and future of the industry i love so much. For now, i'll just keep doing my job the best I know how. And you know what? i'm willing to learn how to do it better.

confession: interesting people invigorate me

So, I was at a party on Saturday evening and while admittedly indulging on perhaps excessive amounts of charles shaw trader joe's finest, i had an epiphany. Interesting people invigorate me. I met this couple who completely impressed me- not just because they are seemingly perfect together (a meshing of the minds and equal passion for day-to-day life) but because they have a talent. THEY ARE UKULELE PLAYERS! And they are funny! So funny, in fact, that they were recently guests on Dave Attell's The Gong. I just want the world to know how great they are. Oddly enough, I suppose that's why I am in public relations. Discovering something/somebody so interesting and tenaciously urging the world to notice- that's the essence of it all. In any event, below, find a sampling of The War Ponies and also visit their site here: http://www.dianaalutto.com/Diana_Alutto/The_War_Ponies.html. All of that being said, i'm pretty sure you'll see them popping up in various media soon enough- if anybody can create mainstream demand for the uke, it's these two:

it's more than a cheesesteak

As I sit here, at The Last Drop, in Philadelphia, a sense of calm sort of reverberates off of me- for this city feels so comfortable to me (like that uber soft tshirt you've had for way too many years). Breakfast at my favorite spot, the pour house, where the the same waiter as last time brings my turkey bacon to the little round table. I walked past both of the philadelphia apartments I lived in- sort of dreamily gazing for a few moments outside of each. The streets all make sense, and I know just how long it will take me to walk across town. This city evokes a sense of calm in me, and I think it always will. Philadelphia is home.

a meat market, and not the good kind

Every morning, as I walk to the train, I pass a meat market. I should preface this with the fact that I'm not a vegetarian- I like steak and the rest of the commonly consumed game as much as the next gal... Before I have my coffee, though, the last thing I want to see is a reddish slab of uncooked meat. EW. And next to a pretty little coffee shop? That's just mean. Pumpkin muffins and bleeding prime rib? This does not evoke feelings of warmth. Epic fail.

you may never actually work again

I mean, i'm a cat person. But seriously, who could deny themselves from this small pleasure (A LIVE FEED PUPPYCAM): http://cdn1.ustream.tv/swf/4/viewer.45.swf?cid=317016


In case the link is dead when you get around to reading this, the above is streaming video of six baby Shiba Inus, a Japanese hunting breed. According to Time Magazine, this little stream has generated "nearly 2 million happily distracted views since it was launched just over a month ago".

Job Opportunities at Go!Animate

Dear readers (all 3 of you):

I'm lucky enough to work with www.goanimate.com- an entertainment website that enables the simple creation of unique computer animated stories, satires and sentiments that can be shared with the entire online community. The site offers simple to more advanced innovative features that provide users with a multitude of possibilities for customizing their animations. We will constantly be enhancing and adding features, popular licenses and animations from well known comedians, animators and writers. REALLY cool site and a dream to work on. They are hiring for lots of positions! The most exciting one for you, probably, is the community manager position in New York. Okay, maybe that's just the most exciting position to me. In any event, check out the open positions at the link below... and spread the word! Recession proof? Check. Fun staff? Check. Great office? Check. Exciting opportunity? Check.

Here's the link. Even if you're not interested in the position, go make some animations: http://goanimate.com/go/career

It May Be Years Until the Day

another dinner in the office. le sigh. my work is my boyfriend. my cat is my surly lover who complains when I come home late. streaming radio is my sanity and drug of choice. blogging is my dirty little secret. I know i'm not special. we all work hard, this much i know is true. you know what makes it all worth while? the segment that finally runs on cnbc or the feature story in businessweek (i'm projecting now, but you get it). I think that makes me dorky. I think i'm okay with that.

Feist says it best in her song Mushaboom:
But in the meantime I've got it hard
Second floor living without a yard
It may be years until the day
My dreams will match up with my pay

on the train, again.

I write from the train on a monday morning with the feeling of monotony sitting in my stomach, camped out right next to hunger. Is it age? Innate personality? Is it normal? Sometimes music breaks up the train ride monotony- today, specifically, tales from iron and wine, damien rice, nina simone and their friends ground me to a mentality of the 9-6 (7? 8?) workweek. Often, it is after work activities that add this needed color. Don't get me wrong- work itself is exciting- pleasantly pressure-filled and chock full of opportunity to learn about new things everyday. All of that said, though, it's just not enough. A trip to greece helped... And then skydiving helped...and now an impending trip to chicago (I've never been, please advise) is helping. I suppose I'm just built to wonder "what's next." Believe me, this has got dual implications. I just realized this post may seem like a whine, and I assure you, it's not. Simply an observation- one made every monday morning on the same train, to the same place.

i'm a bad blogger

but i think i might make it my new years resolution to be better. i usually don't make those, but i think this is important. so actually, i changed my mind. i resolve to be a better and more frequent blogger before january. how's that for living on the edge?

Email Goggles: The College Kid's Guide to Drinking and Emailing

Is this a joke? Apparantly not. Straight from the "official gmail blog" comes a post entitled New in Labs: Stop sending mail you later regret.

From the post:
When you enable Mail Goggles, it will check that you're really sure you want to send that late night Friday email. And what better way to check than by making you solve a few simple math problems after you click send to verify you're in the right state of mind?

And a link to the full post:
http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/new-in-labs-stop-sending-mail-you-later.html

Google, kudos to stopping the world's problems. Economic downturn, who cares. Drunk emails we later regret? SOLVED. If only there was a stop to drunk tweets....

Greas-ing It Up, Greece Style

Hello! I'll be on a 2 week hiatus as I sail the greek seas. my trip begins and ends in Athens and i'll be at a few islands in between. I'll be sure you fill you in on all of the wild times upon my return. be good, internet world.

Hey Madonna, My Mom Says Not To Worry About Turning 50

No, seriously, that's what my mom said. In an Associated Press entertainment story about Madonna's 50th birthday that ran just about everywhere, (Forbes, MSNBC, Philly.com, Salon.com, Yahoo, etc) my mother- Dale Lieberman- was the lead quote for the story. She also happened to be the only non-media person to be quoted. Here's the story:


Madonna: An unlikely inspiration for 50-plus set from Associated Press>

i wish i had this problem

if i had this problem, i would have created this blog first. incredibly entertaining:

http://theleilatexts.blogspot.com/

at least you'll know if grandma got run over by a raindeer

Today, my colleague received an email: “Claire Eisenstein added you as a friend on Facebook”

Claire Eisenstein would be her grandmother.



Quickpost this image to Myspace, Digg, Facebook, and others!

almost thirty and going on sexless (no, no, not me - virginity-until-marriage is a notion i've bypassed)

there's a guy i know. let's call him Gavin. he's dating a girl i hardly know. let's call her Farrah. gavin says the relationship with like farrah is like dating back in high school... except a lot of us were actually having sex in high school. Gavin and Farrah are not. They are, however, smooching at the end of movies (i'd think that a real tear jerker marathon with Leonardo DiCaprio dying in Kate Winslet's frost-bitten arms might drive you to the yum, but what do i know).

not sure exactly why, but i can't shake the feeling that this is odd. it's not SO odd that they are not doing the sexytime... as they say, "to each their (sad, sexless) own". I think the part that's odd to me is that they've not really spoken much about this.

i believe that communication has a place in successful relationships. sounds basic, right? BUT GAVIN DOESN'T EVEN KNOW THE REASON BEHIND FARRAH'S CELIBACY! When asked, he's audibly, and visually, frustrated about the circumstances- uttering brooding questions. But he's not directing those questions toward her! Perhaps if he'd just ask her why, how long, what it means, etc. then he'd have an answer he could live with (or not). He's going to end up breaking up with her without ever talking to her about what's bothering him.

because this is meant to be a serious blogging experience (rather than anonymously detailing the lives of my friends), let me bring this back to public relations. to my tech bloggers: if we PR people are not giving you what you want and what you need, will you please just talk to us before you complete negate us from your existence? if you give us background and tell us how your way is different, then perhaps we'd be able to coexist- maybe even enjoy the ride. you'd think it would be so basic.

best of luck to gavin and farrah. i know you have it in you.

Did somebody say PR isn't dead? Well look at that. We've got a friend. Oh, wait, he's in PR too.

Brian Solis is smart smart smart. We're lucky to have him on our side. Here's what he's got to say (full article from PR 2.0 blog is here http://www.briansolis.com/2008/08/pr-is-not-dead.html):

"Let's not forget that some of the very bloggers who are suggesting that great products or people don't need PR are also among the first to tell you that they will not cover your news once the first person has already written about it, citing that it's "old news" - even if it's only a few minutes old. There are some incredibly adept PR professionals who can help companies do the right thing, the right way. There are also many more PR people simply working the grind and dispassionately pumping out garbage and tarnishing the PR industry in the process."

Working the grind sounds a little dirty. I don't think i'd like to become a star grind worker. But i do want to be passionate. If you know me, you know i'm passionate about lots of things and really really don't care at ALL about others. (i guess that's not so unique) In any event, the public relations industry is one of the things that I AM passionate about (others include vices like wine, tall European men, books, travel, quality time with family, a great foundation of friends that I admire, etc). So thanks, Brian Solis. We're not so extinct. We're trying to thrive.

i know this happens annually, but it's not my favorite

Ah, slow news time. Doesn't feel like slow news time, but it must be, as tech bloggers are smarmingly negating public relations as a profession. To say it 's a changing prefession is completely valid. This much I buy. A stagnant profession just won't do. But Mike Arrington, at Tech Crunch, actually headlines with "The PR Roadblock to Blissful Blogging." Are we really a hindrance to creativity? You give us a lot of credit!

Seriously? If startups had press flooding their inboxes, perhaps my profession would be negated. But for clients who have no idea where to begin- sorry mike, but there are appropriately evangelistic CEOs who do not know they ought to immerse themselves in techcrunch- sometimes PR is a good starting point. there are PR people who are true evangelists for their clients, wanting to spread the word because their clients have a viable model. I know this, because I am one of them. I want to pitch appropriately, I want to garner great stories for my clients. I want to introduce my client to the appropriate channels to get involved in, the appropriate communities to actively participate in, and hopefully introduce them to the right media. I'll even let the journalist/blogger decide how to write the story. (is that really so rare?).

Isn’t it possible that we can work in happy web harmony under mutual terms? Why does it matter where the discovery to write about something comes from- pr person vs stumbling upon something through a community? Isn’t the end result - the piece of news you create- the important part?

The article is here: http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/13/the-pr-roadblock-on-the-road-to-blissful-blogging/#comments

you didn't event this theory, but it's a good one.

The following mashable post, via a Steve Rubel post, goes into "the changing role of public relations." Perhaps i'm no authority (one point for self-deprecating humor) but i truly do not think that this is such a new idea.

Here's the post: http://mashable.com/2008/08/12/role-of-public-relations/#comment-1086125

Now, i'm a fairly passionate PR person. I truly believe in a value and need for public relations professionals. That being said, i don't agree that the above is a wholly new mentality...A good PR person is never a gatekeeper... although i believe my MCOM 101 class defined PR as such. It all just seems a little bit basic. No blogger or journalist likes spam. No blogger or journalist likes being pitched off-beat. No blogger or journalist likes a gatekeeper or waiting for interviews. It's true- there are PR people who don't get it - hence, Kevin Dugan's incredibly entertaining Bad Pitch Blog.

Some of us really do get a thrill out of developing great relationships with journalists/bloggers, providing information and resources in a timely and effective manner, and just straight connecting. I don't need to shape the story, that's your job. I can give you the facts and connect you with my client (hopefully the things I am working on are newsworthy and I believe in them enough to pitch them). And hopefully, the end result is great for everybody- client, PR practitioner, and blogger/journalist. but again, is this really a new thing? shouldn't it have always been this way?

We've all got a job to do, here. I think we can come up with some terms that make all of us comfortable and successful. Come on, Scoble, give us another chance. At least the ones who care.

my second blog post ever

not long after the first, i'm back. i've now missed my train due to my first blog post. hopefully i don't miss that wall street journal opportunity on account of blogging. just kidding, that will never happen- i am an animal about my work. but apparently, i'm an animal about other things, as well.

When I asked PikPR (http://www.blogger.com/profile/08628445144975919362) via every social channel possible (twitter, DM, IM) why the first blog post scared her, the answer really made me laugh out loud..(Mostly because we've never actually met and sort of because it's kind of true). Her response was "the thought of you running loose in blog form is scary. who knows what will be covered."

Whatever, maybe she's right. Time will tell. Okay, now it's really time for me to be off to potentially invigorating/potentially awkward conversation with old friends.

my first blog post ever

this whole "first blog" thing feels somewhat like losing my virginity, albeit, much less stressful (sorry, jason X, wherever you are and WHOEVER you are, ha). honestly, i just felt like it was time to break into blog world. i read a lot of blogs- in fact, i devour them like little brett easton ellis novels, scouring the internet for good fits for my clients, good places to live and laugh around nyc, and even hot blogging dudes to force into my aquaintance(exibit a: http://twitpic.com/7gwf). Twitter only fueled this fire- i know "short and sweet" is the whole point of microblogging but who said 140 characters is enough? So here i am.

in any event, welcome to my blog. I can't promise to keep up with it. I'd say I'll try my best, but I say that about so many things (i stopped biting my nails for a whole month this year). I can promise, though, poignant and witty observation of all things in franiland. call me self-centered, i don't care.


tonight, i'm off to meet up with friends i've not seen since mid-highschool. if you've been in this situation, you know that this can end up really good or terribly tedious and draining. I'm hoping for the former and will let you know how it goes.

hrrm, i think i need an editor.