Midlife Musings

Having used this space frequently enough to express my opinions on PayperPost, I think it only fair that I tell you the exciting stuff here as well. That’s why I am using this blog to announce some pretty big news. I found out today that tomorrow, PPP is launching a new website, IZEA. According to CEO Ted Murphy, IZEA will be the new umbrella under which all the PPP holdings operate including rssbrief, blog in space, urlbrief, zookoda, and a plethora of other sites.

Murphy is bringing a harem of 80,000 bloggers and 11,000 advertisers to his new name. This makes PPP the largest consumer generated ad network in the world. Later in the month, PPP IZEA will be unveiling a new platform, Argus, which Murphy believes “can leverage this growth to expand even further, and allow us to address our broader mission: to empower everyone to value and exchange content, creativity and influence.” I happen to think he’s right, provided the company learns to protect it’s Achilles heel: communication.

My involvement with PPP has dropped off a bit in recent months, as I struggled to come to terms with new requirements and the communication failures that went with them. I’m looking forward to new platform. I think it is going to bring us very close to what Ted and those of us who have been here since the beginning have dreamed that PPP could be: a Camelot for both bloggers and advertisers. Excuse me. I meant to say IZEA.

I wrote quite some time ago about Papa and his cuckoo clock, the one that he always told me thought I was cuckoo. What I didn’t say at the time was that whenever I hear the term “grandfather clock”, I always think of that cuckoo clock. Even today, when I am forty, my mind instantly pulls up the image of that clock, and I can hear so plainly that bird, and Papa’s chuckle as he sets me up yet again. I literally have to remind myself that most people mean a tall clock that stands, regal and majestic, striking the hour with dignified tones and not a clock that hangs on a nail screaming cuckoo at you when they speak of grandfather clocks. My response to the phrase is completely tied up with my memories of Papa, completely separate from what the words really mean. I hope you can understand what I am trying to say, it’s coming out rather muddled on this end. let me try again. You know how you have heard people say they when they catch a whiff of Old Spice or whatever, they think of their dad or granddad. For me instead of a smell, it is the phrase “grandfather clock.”

Now, once I push past the memories, I do enjoy looking at grandfather clocks for what they actually are: finely crafted time pieces, each with a personality and character of it’s own. My aunt had one like that. It’s also tied with memories, LOL, but I will avoid going there today. Instead I will tell you what brought these clock-ish memories to the forefront of my mind. I saw a reference to 1-800-4clocks.com. Isn’t it funny the triggers we have? It’s a bit nerve wracking really, to think that the things I do could create such an impression on someone that someday they would have to make a mental adjustment when they hear a certain phrase, that it could be so tied up in who and what I am that the phrase would mean something totally different to them because of me.

But back to the clocks themselves: I saw on their blog some information about a test you can take to find out which grandfather clock is right for you. It’s called the Grandfather Clocks Personality Profile. I’ve left a comment to ask where the profile is, but I wanted to post about this NOW, and if you looked at my desk and saw the gargantuan stack of stuff I need to blog about you would understand why putting it off might mean you’d never get to read about it.

And also, I am impatient, so I had to just look at the site and see if anything struck my fancy. “Struck”, haha. So punny, that’s me. Just like Papa. I clicked on traditional, because, well, I’m a traditionalist at heart, I guess, and there I did indeed find something: the Reagan, by Howard Miller. Is anyone among us shocked that the clock I prefer is the one named after a Republican? I thought not.

You know how they say clean up on aisle so-and-so in the store? That’s the reference above. I am so sleepy. So sleepy.

Do you remember that series of posts I did on my very busy week? I did not mention yesterday in that series, partly because I was not entirely sure how it was going to play out, but let me tell you all about it now that it is over. I got up from the couch, where I slept to avoid little baby toes in the ribs, about 8:30. I did fight valiantly for my sliver of the bed until 2am, however, so don’t even think of that as sleeping in. We got ready for church and we went and set up the coffee fellowship stuff, rehearsed the children for our Christmas presentation (I’m directing), scurried around finalizing the last details for the party we had last night (that I planned and shopped for), and then I left before church started, asking someone else to tear down the coffee stuff and grab my crockpot.

I came home for less than 10 minutes and we went back out the door to cheerleading competition. We had to be there at 11:45, and it started at 1. We watched 29 teams cheer, and of course, my girls were last. So we screamed for a little over three hours. For those of you who thought watching a cheer competition was a spectator sport, it’s not. It is a participatory activity. I am hoarse today and my throat hurts. This is in addition to the sleepiness, LOL!

Ok, after cheer competition we came home again, where I got a glass of tea, changed out of my heels and into clogs, and we loaded up and headed out to the fall festival at church. I was in charge of this, but I had a couple of ladies come out and help me. We started the decorating and set up at 5:30 and were ready for people at the designated 6pm start time. All I can say is ‘thank God for good help”. Without my daughters and the ladies who came early and my dear husband who individually counted 1,046 m&ms, I totally would not have been ready. So, we ate, we played games, we cleaned up, I mopped up a small river from the backed up drains, and we left adjourned to the parking lot where we chatted for awhile longer.

I finally got home around 8:30, sat down and looked at my PRs, decided Google is smokin’ yet more crack and I don’t care, chatted with a friend and then I went to bed at 10 and read for a bit. So now you know that I have had less than a good night’s sleep on Saturday, run like a mad woman on Sunday, and to complete the trifecta of sleep seduction, it turned off blissfully cool last night, finally. Cool enough to want all the covers on, cool enough to snuggle down and drift back to dreamland, cool enough to make this sleep deprived woman really disappointed about having to get up this morning.

And the three cups of coffee I have had while I wrote this post haven’t done a thing to wake me up. Sigh.

So, I mentioned briefly in passing that I am the new Cub Master for my sons’ Scout pack. The pack is in an absolute mess, we are a couple of months behind before we have even started, we’ve missed the major fundraiser, the old Cub Master isn’t returning my emails, and it’s just … sad. In fact, I mostly volunteered to do it pretty much because I could not bear the idea of looking at my boys and telling there would be no scouts this year. Sigh, Let’s go back to last fall.

The old Cub Master told us all year long that someone needed to step up and take this position. it was our first year in scouts, and I really wanted my boys to rely on other adult input for this, and so I said no. Repeatedly. I finally, at the last minute agreed to be the awards person for the pack, and Some Dude agreed to be the Cub Master, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief, because, yes indeed, the pack would continue. Except that over the summer Some Dude has disappeared. With any records that the pack had. There may also be some funds involved, but we don’t know, beeeeeeecaaaaaaaauuuuse the old Cub Master has pretty much washed her hands of the whole matter and isn’t much returning emails either. Yeah.

So, I was kinda at a loss. I know nothing. Out District Executive has been less than forthcoming with info, and in fact, we thought from his lack of responsiveness that he was a volunteer until this past Tuesday. I and three of my Den Leaders attended training in the next town over. It was a two part training, and after the first one, I was still as scairt as I had been when I walked in. After the second one, though, I think I am actually ready to do this thing. No, I know I am.

The structure of the Boy Scouts is a lot more formal than I realized. The church where we meet, which I had been left with the impression was a necessary evil, is actually supposed to be an integral part of the pack. They are there to help me make this program what it should be for the boys. And part of the reason I wasn’t sure what all the job entailed is because …well…it wasn’t modeled for me, and I’ll leave that there on the table and move on.

I talked to our liason at the church today, and I told him some of the things I had discovered at this training, and I’ve asked him to recruit a couple or three church members who could serve on the pack committee. He was amenable to that, and seemed really positive about the two parts (the chartering organization –read that church– and the boys) of this pack moving forward together. And I am excited. I am ready to get some camping gear and go sleep in a cabin. HA, you did not even think I was going to say tent, did you? Hello? I’m still me, ya’ll.

But I am excited now and whereas before I was doing this because it needed to be done, now I am excited about the possibilities. Four days ago, I wanted to know the bare minimum to get me through, and now I am trying to find the money in our pack funds to cover the next training that I need. See, I can do the job now, but I know I could do it so much better if I had that training. Even if it does interfere with “getting my hair did”.

Anyway, I’ve got a lot of work to do. But it’s good work, worthy work, work that will change the lives of boys forever. Work that will change me. And that’s probably a good thing, too.

Well, apparently the wait is over. Google had delivered it’s slaps and is now patting other folks on the back. Long term paid bloggers got bit in the butt, along with a bunch of A-listers who don’t take paid posts but are heavily networked. My thoughts are that the algorithm was changed to discount blogrolls and that all those who were dependent on those for the majority of their backlinks got zapped. Otherwise, why would Problogger or Copyblogger take a penalty? I thought that was what was happening a couple of months ago, when I noticed my backlinks disappearing over on the backlink checker. The sites I knew were heavily blogrolled dropped more proportionately than the ones that had been linked to in posts. So if you love me, forget the blogroll idea. Just give me a nod in a post and move on.

So what’s changed, really? If you look in your toolbar, at the time of this writing, it reflects the old, higher PR. And when I searched for some of my keywords, I still come up in the same spot in the SERPs. So nothing has changed really except what Google tells me my writing is worth. What Google tells me my writing is worth. Frankly, I don’t rely on Google to give me value. I know when I am doing a crappy job on this blog, and I know when I am doing a good one. This piece of internet real estate is mine, not theirs, and if you look over there at the manifesto I’ve had in place since not long after this blog began over on blogspot, you’ll see that.

So this is where my rubber meets the road. I can sigh and moan and gnash my teeth, or I can blog like nobody’s watching. I can blog for me, and by extension, for you, and Google can go “put that in their pipe and smoke it” as we say down here in the land of the rednecks. My value lies elsewhere.

However, I am going to take the opportunity to create a “Blog Action Plan” as my friend Ann calls it. I’ve known Ann for a number of years, and she is a remarkably level headed woman with more common sense than Encyclopedia Brittanica has knowledge. I also want to give a shout out to Brett for an early writing of what I had been thinking. These folks are just able to get their thoughts together in written form faster because they don’t live with 8 interruptions marvelous and delightful gifts. I love them dearly, but my people always need something, and that siren call always comes right before my thoughts reach that jello-state where you can try to pin them down. Then I have to start over. That’s my circle of life, hehehe.

Okay, my BAP, agenda, manifesto modification, plan.

1)I’m going to write. I’m going to write until my whole thought is written. If it’s good you’ll stick around to the end, and maybe leave a comment. If it isn’t any good, shorter isn’t likely to make it any better, and it’ll keep nagging at me and I’ll have to keep writing but not writing about it, and let’s just go ahead and do it and be done, however much that takes.

1a)In as much as possible, while still meeting contractual obligations, I”m only going to write when I have something to say. That means there may be days without a post. Now, I need the traffic of having you come by here every day, but if you need to subscribe to the feed instead, go ahead, and I’ll understand. If my nefarious scheme brilliant idea fair and reasonable plan works as I think it will, then the search engine traffic will pick up, and I can have the best of both worlds–long term friends and new readers, too. If not, then I suck as a blogger and I get what I deserve.

1b)I’m not going to post here more than three times a day. More than that floods those who are on feeds, and also, I’m not sure I can have more than three good ideas in one day, yk?

2)I’m gonna get back into the conversation of the blogosphere. I’ve been so busy trying to pump the posts and net the works that I have become a blog hermit. I’m not having fun over here by myself, and I want to come out and play, so that’s what I am going to do. Everybody seems to think 5 is a good number of blogs to visit, and maybe it is. And I do plan to start visiting old friends again and chatting them up a bit. But I also plan to visit and comment on one new blog per day.

In short, I am going to do what I said up there and blog like nobody’s watching. And I think that’s what we all ought to do, whether yesterday and today left us as Google’s pet or their ho.

I forgot to tell ya’ll the rest of my Friday. It sorta got eclipsed by the eye thing in my mind. I had told dh to go ahead and get the pedestal sink we needed for the small bathroom, and so I knew he would already be going to the store. I had decided to do some cleaning—- —- getUP off the floor, and quit that shrieking! What’s wrong with you!?!? Why are you acting this way?????—– —– whatever, I was cleaning by vacuuming — STOP IT —- and sparks started coming out of the vacuum, accompanied by the odor of roasting ….something. I called him to to pick up a new one, but he forgot, and then we had the eye thing, and I still don’t have a vacuum because I spent all the disposable income on my eyes. I’m worth it. I guess.

Now, some people might think that this is just a vast conspiracy to avoid the vacuuming, but I can assure you that the one thing I detest is a crusty floor, and no collaboration software was involved in this series of events, even software with a 30 day free trial. I’m innocent. Innocent, I say. Nonetheless, there will be no vacuuming around here until at least Friday, and possibly longer. Because this little trip to the eye doctor took more than the vacuum money, and honey, I gotta go to Vegas in 2 weeks!

In which we consider whether a bottle of Dawn dishwashing liquid is payment for a blog post, or if it is rather a sample on which to base an opinion which one might express in such a blog post, complete with the biting humor you have come to know and love.

My friend, Elizabeth received a bottle of Dawn dish detergent in order to review it. Now, PPP has decided that she was in fact PAID for the review with this soap, and they are therefore not going to pay her for the review she did though them for another product. Bear in mind that Elizabeth’s blog is built solely on consumer reviews, that’s what it’s always been, even before it was accepted for PPP. Here’s how PayPerPost justifies their decision:

A sponsored post is any post for which you received something (cash, goods or services) in exchange for writing the post. In this post you say, ” I received a free bottle of Dawn Simple Pleasures in exchange for this review.” This leads me to believe that you would not actually be writing the review if you were not receiving something for it, i.e. you did not write this post because you tried a new product and decided to share your thoughts. Because of this, I do have to uphold the rejection as this is in violation of our Terms of Service regarding Interim posts. I do apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and thank you again for blogging with PayPerPost.

Needless to say, I totally disagree with their assessment of the situation, and here are various things I have said in the past two days to support my position that what Elizabeth received was not a payment.

How can they send you a bottle in exchange, if you do the review after? What if you did not write about it? Will the P&G police come take it back?

and

You were paid in………….dish soap. Clearly, this is a product in high demand, and everyone wants dish soap, and you are liable to get mugged on the streets of New York for your dish soap. Be careful not to let anyone see how much dish soap you have they will be jealous!

It’s FREAKING DISH SOAP. It’s not a payment, it’s a sample.

and

They pay in cash, which I can then use to purchase things like shoes and food. Unlike you, who are now apparently content to work for dish soap. How’s that working out for you? Doesn’t it get a little messy to measure it out when you buy things?

and

Re:dish soap, I am still trying to figure out how you are going to spend that.

I was laying awake last night as I often do, being a relative insomniac, and I though to myself: Self, if hamburger went on sale for 2.49 a pound, and Elizabeth wanted to stock up, and she might, having a family of five, and all, why she’d only need to haul TWENTY bottles of dish soap down there to the store to get 20 pounds of hamburger meat. And just right there, I realized how MONEY came to be such a popular way to PAY people.

and

Food I might could understand, since it does constitute a rather large segment of most people’s budgets. Dish soap is really pretty negligible on the budget list, generally less than 1% of the budget.

But, totally I would blog for gift cards to grocery stores so that I could choose dish soap OR food depending on which I needed at the time.

and

And, oh by the way, I’m totally blogging this. No charge, You can keep your soap

Now, PPP has done some totally asinine junk in the past few months, in their quest to build a good, dependable, literate stable of bloggers, and I have mostly kept my complaints on the boards and off my blogs, because it should mostly be internal business. You may have noticed fewer posts through their market place on this blog, as I have come to certain decisions about them, but I have avoided calling the whole wide world to witness their stupidity. But this latest thing that they have done, to declare themselves the arbitrators of blogging payments, is just beyond the pale. Would you work for SOAP? Would anyone you know actually work for household cleanser?? No, I didn’t think so.

PPP is failing miserably at obtaining and retaining quality bloggers because they are failing to be proactive. They accept far too many marginal blogs, and then when those blogs get worse instead of better, they try to fix it by making a new rule, by reacting. And the bloggers who get pinched by that are the good bloggers. The bad ones don’t care — they will just continue to write a semi-coherent post for PPP, then some claptrap about the color of the sky (usually blue, occasionally grey, duh) or Phoenix real estate exactly 4 sentences long and then another post for PPP. And because they are technically within the rules, their posts get approved, and they write for PPP another day. Good bloggers, like yours truly (ha), who write 902 (currently) words and then throw in a link like I just did are then left with a choice: write another huge article that takes an hour or more so they can write a $10 (at best) post for PPP, write a short piece so they can write a post for PPP, or stop at the $5 they will get hassle-free for the real estate link and move on.

Which do you think I will choose, after 994 words?

Hi ya’ll. I kinda missed ya’ll, and then again, I was so busy………. No, seriously, I have missed blogging, but equally seriously, I have been remarkably busy. Lemmee pop you some popcorn, pour up some soda and we will catch up. Just make yourselves comfortable here on the discount home theater seating, or, you know, the couch, and I’ll be right back and we’ll get started.

Okay, I last posted here on Thursday, and I had told you that I had a slam packed week, and was actually anticipating a relatively relaxed Friday at home. Accordingly, I was sitting here working along, FD&H, when the lower left quadrant of my vision went grayish, and I began to see squiggly lines. It took me less than 5 minutes to decide a visit to the eye doctor was in order, and less than 45 minutes to arrange everything and get there. The good news is that I am not going blind. The more interesting news is that I have what are called silent migraines. With silent migraines, you have all the symptoms of a migraine except the pain. It’s kinda freaky in a way, but also it’s nice to know that all the times I feel like I am about to crawl out of my own skin have an explanation. Also I am getting cute little pink glasses to replace my five year old broken pair. They will be for night driving and computer work, since my vision is fine except for that darn astigmatism.

And I just love that doctor. He saw four of my kids week before last, and will see three more this week. Midway through this emergency exam he said, “you know you need glasses, you need to come back for that.” I explained that I could not afford to come again, and that I had been planning to come for a regular exam, but then this thing had happened. He asked about insurance, and when I told him I didn’t have any, he did the prescription exam right then so I would not have to pay for another visit. He’ll be seeing my kids, who do have insurance for, like, ever for that little trick.

And, that was Friday. Saturday was lunch, bowling, ice cream and Bible Study with the youth, and then a football game. I was still a little flaky from the un-headache, but it was an enjoyable day. Sunday, I went to church and then spent the afternoon shopping for the stuff we need for the party next Sunday night because I looked over my schedule and realized that if I didn’t go get the stuff yesterday, there would be no stuff gotten. Wanna see what a party for 60 looks like?

Yes, it’s on my dresser and that is indeed my ceiling. Where else in this house could I stash a candy-themed party for 60 and expect it to still be there in a week? And!! If you want to read all about the goodies, go over to Cass Plays.