Mortification: Come One, Come All

A year or two ago I helped screen participants for the project described below - if you are interested in sharing a good laugh at your teenage dreams of being a highly regarded writer/poet/songwriter/lover, please read the following message from a nice gal named Heather Houston... -KiKi


###

Dear Friends,

As you may know, I produce the DC chapter of a national art project called *
Mortified* (*www.getmortified.com*). Hailed a "cultural phenomenon" by
Newsweek, and celebrated by the likes of This American Life, The Washington
Post, The Onion AV Club, and Entertainment Weekly, *Mortified* is a comic
excavation of the strange and extraordinary things we created as kids. Witness
adults sharing their own adolescent journals, letters, poems, lyrics, home
movies, stories and more!

Mortified DC is gearing up for future shows and looking for new content.
I've enclosed information about the project and details on how to submit.
Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or are interested
in participating. Also please help us get the word out by forwarding this
information to family and friends located in the DC area.

Thanks again for your support. We look forward to hearing from you!

Heather Huston
Producer, Mortified DC
heatherhuston@gmail.com
802-345-5262

__________________

*Dear Angsty People in Washington DC,*



- Did you write lame-ass love letters as a kid?

- Did you write angsty lyrics as a teenager?

- Did you spend high school writing melodramatic journals?



So did the people behind *Mortified*. And they want you to join them. Dust
off that diary! Whip out that Trapper Keeper! Yep, *Mortified DC *is
actively looking for new readers to join the fun. If you or someone you
know would like to read aloud utterly embarrassing childhood relics in front
of total strangers ... we'd LOVE to hear from you. Open to anyone from
politicians to accountants. Please note you must be 21+.



*WHAT: MORTIFIED - WASHINGTON DC AREA*

*SUBMIT*: *http://www.getmortified.com/casting*br/>


Hailed a "cultural phenomenon" by Newsweek, *Mortified* is a comic
excavation of the strange and extraordinary things we created as kids. Part
group therapy, part storytelling hilarity, and completely cringe-worthy, *
Mortified* inspires grown adults to share their own adolescent journals,
letters, poems, lyrics, home movies and stories and more!


*Real Stories. Real People. Share the Shame. Get Mortified!*

Using Social Media for Your Chapter Events - Looking for Panelists

On Wednesday, March 24th, the ASAE & The Center Component Relations Council will host another great CRP Virtual Lunch Call at 12 ET. But it will only be great with *your* help!

We are looking for *three* people to discuss using Social Media for Chapter Events for the next Virtual Lunch. Are you open to participating? We would love to add your voice to our conversation.

What are the benefits for you? You will be able to introduce yourself to a group of association professionals and add to your professional repertoire. Also, you will receive a CAE point for taking part in the call while giving back to the community.

Interested? Contact me at klitalien@delcor.com or on Twitter at @kikilitalien. 

These Are a Few of my Favorite (Online) Things - Image Post

1. I love using fivesecondtest for quick feedback about design. Sometimes it gives me just a smidge more courage on how I feel about a design before I show someone else.

2. I check out bit.ly daily to see how many clicks my shared links have received. Sometimes I am surprised by the number and it can guide me on what I choose to post about later.

  

3. Once upon a time I didn't use delicious as much as I do now. I don't think I grasped the amount of data I  would be consuming and wanting to use later. If you give presentations and need to keep track of helpful information, case studies, tools, or any type of specific topic; delicious can be your best friend. Bonus: I enjoy using the delicious tag search to see what other people are saving under certain words like "socialmedia" and "presentation" and "usability" - a quick way to find interesting information!

4. Who doesn't like Wired magazine? 

5. I read Acronym blog, ASAE & The Center's official blog for associations, every day. I am a chronic lurker who only occasionally comments, although I enjoy reading it quite a bit. 

6. Lifehacker was made for people like me. I love to find ways to add technology to make my life easier. Lifehacker features various ways to make your life easier or cooler using gadgets or simple items you can find at home. Do you like Make magazine? If so, you would like Lifehacker.

Finally, a quick shout out to one of my favorite non-business related blogs: Absolutely Beautiful Things is a place I go online to be inspired....http://absolutelybeautifulthings.blogspot.com/. These are just a few of my favorite online places.  What are some of your faves?

#snOMG: The Game

This is a short little game for all the DC Metro folks stuck in the 2010 blizzard that is easy to play. You can incorporate alcohol if you don't have to work today, but if you are still online and working (like I am) just take a swig of coffee instead. Ready?

Just take a drink or give yourself a point if you have thought of the following during the past week of snow:

1. Global warming
2. Those commercials with the snowman that walks into a house and melts to become a little kid again (is that for soup?)
3. Dr. Zhivago (movie & book)
4. Napolean in Russia
5. Hitler in Russia
6. Anything in Russia
7. Cavemen huddled in animal skins
8. Hot chocolate
9. Buying more canned goods
10. How awesome webcams and the internet are
11. The end of humanity
12. The Donner Party
13. The Ice Storm (movie)
14. The condition of our nation's homeless
15. The condition of the structure you are sitting in right now
16. The location of your first aid kit
17. Snow blindness
18. The situation in Haiti (now that the news is focused on something else, what's happening over there?)
19. Snowshoes
20. Moisturizer and/or chapstick

Bonus points (drinks) for the following:

• You are accutely aware of exactly how many rolls of toilet paper you have in the house.
• You are accutely aware of the charging status of all of your electronic devices.
• You are accutely aware of exactly how much coffee you have in the house (including the "emergency instant" in the back of the cabinet).

How did you do? Maxed out on points? Drunk?

Feel free to add rules and/or items to add to the list. We aren't going anywhere for a while! ;-)

 

Posted via web from kikilitalien's posterous

The First Commercial for the Social Media Sweet Spot Webcast? (Created by Me)

Variety is the Spice of Life (or, "Why You Should Check Out #blogchat")

Because I spend my days as a technology consultant helping association teams with their social media efforts - and my weekends and evenings as a freelance makeup artist - my online world primarily revolves around a few things: associations, social media, and makeup. So how I came to participate in an engaging, creative, and inspiring online chat on a Monday night at 9 pm ET about musical artists using social media is not a huge stretch, but still not my usual routine.

Blog Chat (#blogchat) is a regular chat happening on Sunday nights from 9-10 pm ET (although, I caught it on a rare, rescheduled Monday night because of the Super Bowl over the weekend). Mack Collier (@MackCollier on Twitter) founded the chat "to discuss blogs and best practices" and had a well-educated and spirited group of participants on the chat last night, including Chris Brogan (author of Trust Agents) and Curt Smith (founder of Tears for Fears).

To be honest, I wasn't expecting much from the chat and usually find other things to keep me occupied at 9 pm at night. However, I thought I would check it out for a bit and vary up my online activity. That decision helped me to stumble across a dynamic conversation that will have me coming back for more next Sunday at nine o'clock.

Why was this such a discovery? Because it has inspired me! Because we are creatures of habit.

I am hard pressed for time and keep myself pretty busy at all moments of the day. Did I mention I have a two-year-old? Did I mention I am studying for an important exam? Right. We're ALL busy, so it is super easy to skip what we don't know or what we are not already involved in. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't still explore occasionally. Check out a chat we don't usually participate in...listen to a podcast that is new and different...crack open a book (or Kindle) for something a little different. We should look for opportunities to get inspired!

Other things I've done that are not the norm this week:

• Played with my daughter in an enormous amount of snow
• Participated in #blogchat
• Filed my old docs that have been waiting for organization since I introduced my new filing system to my office
• I tried bacon bits in my omelette (NOT a good choice for inspiration)
• I listened to 2 BlogTalkRadio broadcasts that I've never listened to before

What do you do to "fill the well" and get inspired?

Snow kidding - I'm still indoors!

Feeling a bit like a shut-in, I am posting this on my 7th straight day of not leaving the house. I have been reading a writing quite a bit, so all of my blogs are about to look a lot fresher. Yippee!

Posted via web from kikilitalien's posterous

The Chat with the Funny Name

"Come for the ass and stay for the chat," or something like that.

Maggie McGary, author of the mizz information blog and regular contributor to the weekly Association Chat on Twitter, shared her favorite funny comment someone had made about the chat's hashtag #assnchat (regularly (mis)pronounced "ass n' chat").

With a name so regularly commented on by those out- and inside of the association world, one might assume the group would want to rename it - to avoid such salty comments. However, knowing the regular personalities in the chats, I believe "ass-n-chat" is even more beloved by its participants because of its easy-to-pick-on name.

Is that indicative of the creative and carefully rebellious association people I see in the online community? I'm not sure, but I'd love it if that were the case.

I've been listening to Seth Godin's Linchpin book (usually while I'm trying to review other things...) and his argument about the importance of the indispensable talent versus the old-fashioned workhorse cog fits in well with what I've been seeing. Happily, I see amazing, talented people all around me online and in the association community - people who are bucking ordinary job constraints and paving the way to do work that is not only inspired, but necessary for their organizations to evolve.

That's it. that's all I have to share today. Just that I know a bunch of really smart and talented people who aren't afraid of silly names - as long as the content is good.

(Not) Testing ChipIn to see if I Can Do the CAE Immersion Study

Okay, I had wanted to test ChipIn to see how it worked and I thought of trying to raise money for the CAE Immersion Course. The Course is $745 and too pricey for me to swing right now...especially with it taking place February 24-26...in a few weeks.

But, it didn't feel right. I'm guessing I will test ChipIn when it comes time to try and raise money for my alma mater's International Fund, but for now I just feel a little ridiculous putting my virtual hand out for money. Sure, women pay for breast jobs and all kinds of stuff by putting their request for funding out there, but where does it end? I would never pay for someone else's boob job and although I probably would donate to help someone take the CAE Immersion Course, I just feel a little...uncomfortable with this idea.

What do you think? At any rate, I think ChipIn looks like a great way to coordinate funds...whether for a group gift or for a charity.