Liz Money, The Internet Honey

Simple Things in Life

Life needs not be complicated. I honestly do the most I can to keep my life free of complications. I’ve never been one to enjoy drama. My personal life really is drama free, and I like it that way. It takes so much effort to create drama.
Whether that is working with me or against me is still to be determined. It seems like being a sane, drama free person is working against me, but we shall see. I think in the long run, it will be to my benefit.
Today was a good example: dinner and hanging out with good friends and just kicking back. Nothing crazy went down and stayed out of the stream for the most part. I dig it. Starting to gravitate towards center. That’s a good thing.

New Leaf Livin

So I’m attempting to turn over a new leaf. [again] It’s definitely going to be a good thing, I can’t put out the perception that I unabashedly live this hedonistic life so publicly. There have been a handful of people who have told me that the first thing they do in the morning is pull up my twitter stream from the night before to see what me and my peeps have done. Which, on the one hand is really cool, I’m totes flattered that me and my crew are more entertaining than morning tv. But, on the other hand, when I need to get down to it, will I still be taken seriously?
And, I think that there are peeps that are afraid that what they tell me is going to end up in my stream “out there” and public. I don’t want to make people uncomfortable, and surprisingly enough, while I put a LOT out there, there’s even more that doesn’t get put into the stream, and I respect my friends’ privacy tendencies.

So there’s some self imposed guidelines that I’ve implemented, and I’m going on the philosophy to: check myself before I wreck myself.

I’m not sure how far this will go, it might go so far as to let more people in to experience the real me. [terrifying for both parties, I’m sure] This was demonstrated tonight at a tech networking meeting that I go to every month and was outed by my friend. He wrote my real, actual, given, name on my name tag instead of the usual LizMoney. This is pretty major.  Very few people in this crowd know my real name. Peeps roll with the Money and it’s all good. I got lots of quizzical looks and jokes about “oh I didn’t recognize you! b/c your nametag doesn’t say LizMoney”

I felt surprisingly vulnerable. LizMoney is what I’m comfortable being. It gives me license to be an augmented version of me. Having my real name on my tag for everyone to see stripped away the persona and I wasn’t sure if I wanted everyone to know that part. Because to know my real name is a slippery slope to getting to know the real me. And I am very very choosy about to whom I give that VIP pass to. And by choosy, I mean wary. And scared.

Not that LizMoney isn’t me, because it is. My personality is pretty bold. I am out there, I say what’s on my mind, I’m inappropriate, and am socially awkward and clumsy.
I’m just not bulletproof. Not by a long shot.

Doin it: NaBloPoMo

Visit NaBloPoMo

oh yeah, I’m doin the National Blog Post Month. I’ve fallen out of blogging and in my efforts to have self discipline, I’m participating this year in the blog post per day month.

2 days late, natch. I got distracted. Hopefully, this exercise will help that problem.

See This Leaf? I'm Turning it Over

It’s no secret I’ve had a crazy couple of months…ok years. I’ve hurt a lot, learned a lot, and now, what do I do with it all?

Well, it’s time to get back to center, figure it as much of it out as I can, and go forward. Not that I know which direction is forward. I seem to think I move forward only to find out that I’ve taken quite the wrong turn and end up farther back from where I started.

Last week, I had the opportunity to go to TribeCon. There were amazing speakers who have been doing amazing things that I’ve been tracking for the past year since I slid into the Social Media realm and are, in my eyes, total rockstars. I’ve been mulling over and absorbing the things I’ve heard and processing all the information from all the presentations and panel discussions that I heard and yes. I’ve been inspired. More importantly, I’ve feel a little better about my situation and myself. I was especially taken by Micah Baldwin’s talk about Failing. (obviously a topic I know lots about) but what to take away from it, is that it’s ok. Everyone does it. And there’s success behind it.

I really feel that I failed at my last endeavor. And I didn’t even get to DO MY JOB  at my last gig. I could have rocked the fuck out of it, but never got the chance to do it.  But what I feel that I failed at, is making that decision to go over there in the first place. That I failed even before I got to actually fail at something. Like when I was forced to run track when I was a kid and stepped on my shoelace at the starting gate and ate it even before I got to run the race. I may have done well in that race, or I may not have, but I didn’t make the initial right decision in the to double knot my laces and fucked myself from jump. So I feel that since I made the wrong decision in the first place, it’s just been a domino effect of burned bridges and now I’m associated with that bad decision and am tainted for it.

In the meantime, I’ve lost sight of the goals I had at the beginning of this year, and went in a direction that I never thought I’d go in. I did it pretty publicly, and  am now left to rethink that whole thing…So, it’s time to rein it in, and try to mend my rep. I’ve finally learned to duck, and I just hope that success is somewhere coming up the pike.

Celebrate Hello Kitty's 35th Anniversary - Three Apples at Royal T

eoncreative:

Friday, 10.23.09, 10a - 9p
Drop by Royal T and celebrate all things Hello Kitty.

Saturday 10.24.09, (all day) 10a -10p
Super Fan Day at Three Apples!

Today is all about the super fans! Bring your favorite friends to a fabulous Hello Kitty brunch where you can enjoy  scrumptious Hello Kitty-themed waffles & pancakes and a live DJ set.

A very special appearance by ‘Kitty Mama’ Yuko Yamaguchi (Hello Kitty head designer straight from Tokyo) & tokidoki creator, Simone Legno — and the launch of the exclusive tokidoki for Hello Kitty 35th Anniversary collection — follows.

Later in the day, immerse yourself in a variety of activities – a hands-on jewelry workshop with ‘Three Apples’ artist Natalia Fabia, a yummy Hello Kitty sushi & bento box workshop with acclaimed chef Sushi Girl, Hello Kitty happy hour for fans 21 and over complete with Hello Kitty-themed cocktails and a Hello Kitty-Oke karaoke dance party with Karaoke Queen Raina Lee (author of Hit Me with Your Best Shot: A Guide To Karaoke Domination) plus photo ops with Hello Kitty herself!

You’ll want to stay the whole day.  Super Fan Day produced in association with Flux, LA’s innovative event curators. (Descriptions taken from Three Apples.)

My First Vid. And it's a Blooper.

I referenced this video just a few days ago, and come to find out, I made it exactly a year ago. It’s the first video I ever made for the web. I try to review my favorite Japanese drink, and it goes a bit wrong. This is essentially the roots of LizMoney and The Money Shot.

An aside - I look -really- young and tiny. I wish I could go back to looking like that.

demo gone wrong - Geeks!