Every week something new comes out in social media. One of the “latest and greatest” is Triberr.

Triberr is a service that allows you to partner with other bloggers and share each other’s blog content across your twitter stream. The idea is that you partner with people that are like you, are your friends, or just simply people you think have great content to share – and then you are able to help promote their blogs via twitter.

I like the idea behind it. I really do. I think helping and promoting friends content is a great idea – and we should totally do that.

The problem comes in when all of a sudden it looks like your twitter stream has been taken over by someone – or something else. I saw a case of great confusion with this a couple of weeks ago. One blogger didn’t know exactly what had happened when all of a sudden she had seemingly been tweeting another blogger’s content. After doing research, she realized that she had signed up for Triberr without knowing what it did.

A local friend of mine – Jen from The Big Binder – brought her concerns to me about it this morning when she saw a Triberr tweet in my stream this morning. After hearing her out – especially about it being spam-like, I totally agree with her. (No one can say that I’m not willing to learn and listen!)

I stopped my subscription and cancelled my account with Triberr shortly after that.

But that doesn’t mean I’ll stop promoting good blog posts. Most (including myself) have a button on their blog posts to share. Another idea is to start up a recap like what Jen has on her blog today – sharing the best from the area – or like what Jill from Diaper Diaries does on a weekly basis to recap what she’s reading. (Not sure what I’ll do yet, but those are ideas.)

All I know is that since I don’t like to be spammed in my twitter stream… I’m going to be less spammy as well.

What about you? Do you use Triberr? Do you find value in it?

This week’s prompts for Mama Kat’s Writers Workshop were all so good… so I turned to twitter for help. Asked my friends to choose a number 1-5… and one person a piece chose 1, 2, 4 & 5. So #3 was left out – and it was decided that it meant that would be the “winner”.

3.) What makes you mad, and what are you going to do about it?

One of the questions that is brought up frequently in the eHarmony “closed questions” phase is about how passionate you get about issues. {I don’t know why guys ask this question a lot, but it is a “popular” one.} My answer always is… with a little discussion, I can get passionate on just about any issue.

Especially politics. I hate to say it… but it’s true. {As a side note, I was almost a political science major in college.}

There’s something in me that doesn’t quite fall into either of the 2 party system that we have today. The Republicans seem to be too strict on their social issues and the Democrats seemingly want to keep spending & having the government provide all kinds of services that somehow we all have to pay for… even though I (and many others) will not get to benefit from them.

I don’t usually write about the ‘hot button issues’ of the day because I get so worked up when I am writing about them that it all just seems to come out wrong. It all just makes me so mad that I write and write and write… and in the end it just doesn’t make sense.

Like how there are 535 members of Congress… yet the major two parties there can’t seem to see eye to eye or TRY to understand each other long enough to actually DO something to help people in this country.

With the highest unemployment rate that we’ve seen in years and the economy still not quite jumping to the forefront of providing jobs… it seems that many members of Congress are more focused on making themselves look good (because apparently they all think they are celebrities) rather than helping to make the lives of the people they work for better.

Yes, the Democratic party joined together and provided a health care plan… that won’t fully go into effect until the President is out of office {even if he would win a 2nd term.} The one thing that’s missing with this plan is that the government employees (essentially Congress) won’t have to follow the measures within this plan… they still get to continue in their own plan and system.

About 8 years ago, then President Bush and the Republican party pushed through tax cuts for the American people that are set to expire this year. And neither the Democrats OR Republicans could come up with a plan to continue these… essentially giving EVERY AMERICAN (no matter your tax rate) a tax increase for the upcoming tax season.

Now with small businesses {the leading employer and economic driver in this country} not being sure of how they’re going to pay for these tax increases and new healthcare mandates – they probably won’t be jumping on the bandwagon to hire more workers for a little bit yet.

Which means that the slow economy continues…

If this were a perfect world {which I know it will never be} the congressional members would actually sit down and listen to one another. Peacefully. With respect. And then I think they could actually get something done.

And short of running and getting myself elected to a seat in congress {which to be honest, I don’t have a lot of desire to deal with their pompous attitudes}, there isn’t a whole lot I can do.

I’m going to continue to do what I’ve done in the past… write to my congressional representative and senators. I don’t think they (or their staff) actually read this mail (electronic or snail), but it’s still worth sending. Maybe – someday – one of these elected officials will take me up on something I said. Maybe they will listen and hear what I’m saying.

Now… see what I mean about things not always making sense when I start writing about things that get me all worked up?!?!

What is the one thing that you get mad about… and can you do anything about it??

Sometimes I feel like the most invisible person…

I know that I’ve done some pretty amazing things. Losing 150 pounds being one of them. Being on the Rachael Ray Show is another. But there are times that I just think that somehow I just don’t stand out. I don’t feel like I’m seen.

I just don’t stand out in a crowd after all, I’m no super model. I don’t take the spotlight when in a group as I don’t have great public speaking skills. Nor do I necessarily want these things.

But I do want to be valued.

Especially with my job – a place where I often feel like my talents are overlooked and undervalued… not because I am not paid well, but because I receive very little feedback on how I am doing. In fact, I am very rarely even spoken to about things that are not directly work related.

I can’t even tell you how long it’s been since I’ve received a “good job” from anyone here.

Not only that but it’s been a few weeks since anyone has come to my office to “chat”. I’m a pretty social person. I love talking. But that doesn’t work well when you don’t have any friends in the office. Or if you do have friends here (as I did in the past) the higher powers didn’t want you to talk about anything personal (even if they do it themselves with other coworkers now.)

Although it’s not always about work either.

I did a {very unscientific, but seemingly typical} survey of my call history from my cell phone for the last 2 weeks:

Calls in from family: 0
Calls in from voicemails left: 2
Calls out to family: 18

I’m not sure if I should have a complex about this or not. I’m really not sure how I feel about this. I’m finding more and more that I have less and less in common with them. At family functions, I feel like the “odd man” out. I don’t have much to contribute to conversations about school, family or various other things. But I want to be there.

So now I’m sure that with my writing that part will stimulate some sort of family-type discussion… as my mom will likely read this. I don’t want people to feel obligated to call me. I just want my {whole} family to WANT to call me. To WANT to check in and see how I’m doing. To WANT to let me know what’s up in their lives. Maybe not daily… but a phone call here or there would be nice.

Or maybe they don’t call me because I call them too much.

And this is one of the biggest reasons I want to move away from the area. Because I want my family to want to talk to me – to let me know what’s going on. And with me being here… they must think I’m always “in the know.” {I don’t think I’ve ever acknowledged that before.}

The one place that I feel valued the most is with my internet community… my friends on both coasts and in between. The people that read my blog and tweet with me day in and out. They are friends that are with me when I’m feeling good about something… and when I’m feeling bad. When I met many of them at the Bloggy Boot Camps in San Francisco and Philadelphia – I had more fun than I had bargained for. Because they *knew* me. No wait… they *KNOW* me.

And now I’m missing that.

I think the overall theme today is that I want to be wanted. No matter where I am.

But I think we all want that.

Either that or I’m just having a pity party for myself today. Probably just because I’m tired.

Do you ever feel like you are forgotten?

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Did you know that I’m also posting over at Hope for Women today… go check out my refections on being silent.

I rarely get political on here. I rarely say anything about world events. I won’t say never… but it is rare.

But then yesterday afternoon’s tragedy struck in Haiti. An earthquake with a 7.0 magnitude. Devastating. My heart breaks for the people, especially since I was just to that island in October (for my Dominican Republic Mission Trip.) I helped and was blessed by people that were of Haitian decent, living and working in the DR trying to make the best of their lives. Some of the people have never been to their native country…

…and now the country is broken, torn apart by a horrible earthquake that possibly has left thousands upon thousands of people dead. People that could have been – albeit distantly – related to some of the people I met a few short months ago.

And then while looking at different websites today that covered the story, I saw this story — or actually video — of Pat Robertson saying that Haiti is not a prosperous nation and a nation suffering because they “sold themselves to the devil” years ago.

I’m not sure where he gets this information… but as a Christian I am horrified that at a time of crisis — less than 24 hours since this event occurred –that he makes these statements. Not that I would ever agree with anyone making these statements EVER. This country is largely a Christian country… mainly Roman Catholic… so his statement makes me even more angry because it simply cannot be true. Our God is a loving God, and while horrible events happen like this at times, the heart of God breaks each and every time one of his children is suffering.

I’m not sure if Mr. Robertson is saying that the devil has control of this country — because that is simply not true. God is in control. And God loves His people — all of His people.

We as Christians are supposed to love our neighbors — and if I could drop everything right now (and I wish I could), I would go be a part of a team that could help restore Port-au-Prince to a bigger and better city than what it was before yesterday’s earthquake. In the meantime, the best that we as Christians can do at this time is pray for the country, for the survivors and for everyone in Haiti, and around the world, that lost people they loved in the past day. The other thing everyone can do is to go to Worldvision or Compassion and donate what you are able to help the relief efforts — as well as help the country rebuild in the coming months and years.

And as far as I’m concerned Pat Robertson can say “I must apologize for acting, stinking, treating you this way.”

*today’s lyric title is from Gwen Stafani’s “Sweet Escape.”

Is it just me… or does it seem like a lot more people have their holiday decorations up already this year. My neighbor put her tree up this weekend. I was thinking about bringing my (fake) tree in from the garage so that I can set it up sometime next weekend.

With the changes in my living room this year, I’m not sure where I’m going to set the tree up. Maybe in front of the slider — because when it snows, there’s no way I’ll be using it anyway — or maybe I’ll move the coffee table and put the tree in the corner by the television. Hmmm….

But I digress…

Maybe this early holiday set up is a phenomenon that’s just in this area… but I don’t think so. I’ve been hearing about others in various states being glad that they can hear Christmas music… or that they too have seen decorations popping up in their neighbor’s yards or houses.

I’m guessing that because the stores have all their displays up and various radio stations are playing Christmas music 24/7… that this may have gotten some people in the mood for the holiday already.

But why rush things so much? So many people complain about how life moves too quickly — how we rush things along… but by making Christmas appear so soon, aren’t we missing out on the everyday life that is November? Or is it better to start the Christmas traditions this early so that we are finally ready when the holiday comes upon us… because we all know it will be here in the blink of an eye.

Now I don’t have the spouse/family thing going on (as you know)… but I would hope that when the time comes for this, that my family could enjoy the fall events that are around us before the snow comes and don’t rush into the Christmas holiday anticipation so that it loses all of it’s wonder when the actual holiday arrives.

I’m really afraid that the more we lose the anticipation of the Christmas holiday — the more it becomes just like another day. When I was growing up, one of my favorite things about the holidays — really any holiday — was that the stores and restaurants were all closed. I loved the big streets with little traffic, loved the peacefulness of the parking lots, loved the silence of it all.

Maybe that’s really what this all comes down to. We (myself included) are all in such a rush of life that we don’t get to stop and reflect on the things we cherised as a child.

And maybe that’s why the holiday music and decorations go up earlier and earlier each year… because we are trying to capture this “wonder” for just a moment again.

So I’m dedicating this blog post to my dad… my brothers… my coworkers… and all you other golfers out there — just look at what you are doing!?!?

Did you know how bad golf balls are for the environment? This article from CNN lays out information from the Danish Golf Association about the impact of golf balls disrupting the environment when you leave your golfballs and then when you pick them up later after they’ve started to decompose. Not only that, but even during the decomposing process so many non-natural elements are put into the ground and water around it.

Now I am not a golfer… I do understand that a lot of people enjoy the game, the challenge of it and especially the feeling of achievement when things are going well. I guess rather than rant too much about the subject… I will simply encourage each golfer out there to use biodegradable golf balls. Good for the environment, good for future generations.