Happy Birthday Blinky St. James

Sometimes when we are in our most comfortable stations, life comes by and reminds that there is more than comfort to living. There is loving and caring and being. There is witnessing what else there is out there and acting accordingly. There is just loving people regardless of the fact that you might not even know them.

On twitter I have had the privilege of meeting Elizabeth and Katy Hughes of the south bay area of California. They are a mother and daughter team, Elizabeth is a widow and Katy is a delightful young lady who is insightful, witty and has the potential to be a great artist someday. The most amazing this about these two ladies is their perseverance as that they are homeless.

Elizabeth and Katy lost their husband/father when Katy was 6. Subsequently they have been living on survivor's benefits from social security and a job that Elizabeth held. A while back Elizabeth had lost her job and last year the survivor's benefits got cut in half because Katy turned 16. Now all they get is money for Katy herself monthly. Both ladies have health problems, they cannot afford rent and other expenses. They have had some short term apartments over the last few years, but except when they are blessed with someone donating money for a motel room, they sleep in their car.

I have read their blogs and you know, they are not happy with the situation at all, but somehow they are doing their best to keep their spirits up and I am awed by them.

My Dad used to have a saying, "I was sad because I had no shoes until I saw a man with no feet." I cannot think of better fitting words.

So the main reason I am writing today is that it is Katy's birthday. She is 17. Along with sending her my best thought, prayers and birthday wishes, I was hoping that we could all pitch in for her. They are currently staying in a motel through this morning and then they are back in the car. Maybe if we all pitch in we can come up with enough to keep them in the motel for a few more nights that would be a great gift to Katy. Not exactly a new purse or some new clothes, the typical 17 year old gifts, but at least they would not be sleeping in their car.

Okay here are the details. Elizabeth's website is God's Power and Love and Katy's website is Destination Anywhere But Here.

Elizabeth's email address is hugheselizabeth@rocketmail.com Paypal donations can be sent to that address.

On twitter Elizabeth is known as @imexhausted and Katy is @blinkystjames. Follow them they are great gals!

Whatever we all can do for them would be great. They just need a hand!

So Happy Birthday Katy! and many many more. And for you a little Michelle Branch.



I hope that we can help them. And Please pass this blog around to other friends, the internet is a great big place and we all can help if we try!

Social Media..I Want to Be Ashton Kutcher?!?!

Hello My Dear Friends,

I write this today, as a tremendous event has taken place. Ashton Kutcher @aplusk has broken the 1000000 mark of followers of Twitter. During this week he was in a neck and neck battle with CNN to see who would do this. Ashton broadcast via ustream and CNN went live on their station including on air pleas from Anderson Cooper. Okay, so what does this mean?

To me, I am not totally sure what the whole scope of this is. I do not have my finger on the pulse of the tech world, most of the time, I just follow along because all the cool kids are. And who doesn't want to be one of the cool kids? In retrospect, I am finding that in my quest to become more than I already am, Twitter has become very important.

I originally signed on to promote my business, make contact, meet potential customers. It was really cool at first, searching for the famous people to get small snippets of their lives. I bought into the genre of "What am I doing" and I admit my first tweets were "Picking up DD from dance" or "waiting for dinner to finish...meatloaf yea". Okay sort of lame, but I was taking it literally and that's okay. But sort of boring and ordinary. Boring and ordinary don't get you many followers.

As I continued and got the hang of things, I found my self searching for better things to post. Or share again, retweets, they are called. I have read a whole slew of blogs and snippets and viewed pictures that I would have never seen anywhere else. I have read some quite amusing things that made me laugh out loud and I have come across some opinions that made me yell at the screen. I wanted to add content with some value and sprinkle in the ordinary. I am working to achieve the perfect mix. I have also added on to my followers.

But, in my search for better things to post, I find myself growing mentally and spiritually, taking more in everyday. And as I take in more, my output is becoming richer. I voice opinions and have mini conversations and wish people everything from "have a nice day", to "Happy Birthday", to sending condolences for an animal that is passed. One of my tweets even ended up on the ABC news website about a particular story. I am a part of news and the "new media"! We all are.

We can observe, ask questions, voice our opinions and even promote ourselves, all in real time. I have access to an infinite amount of people at any given time. We all do. I think that might be the thing that is so gratifying about this whole new media concept is that it is ALWAYS OPEN. It is current, it is fresh and there is always some one to talk with. This is something so different that you don't find with Google or the various "chat" type interfaces. And it is something really different than TV.

While all this is going on we might consider the outcome of always being on. What is it going to do to us knowing that there is really always someone there? I think that with technology, as separated as we may seem, we are actually closer. Take the example of actress Demi Moore @mrskutcher who received a tweet about a person with the intent of committing suicide. She passed it on in fear that it was real, other people saw it and were able to track it down to let the police know and avert tragedy. The lady really needed help and her cry was answered. Or how about the Amber Alerts that are tweeted and retweeted. Or even the free rental code for Redbox that I share when it is sent to me. Always on.

As I write in my other blog, It's a Fairy World, I have four general rules that I go by. 1. Be good to myself. 2. Be good to others. 3. Learn my lessons from all situations and take notes for future reference. 4. Love God. I would say, overall, being part of this "new media" applies all four rules.

So while I will probably not be Ashton Kutcher and you will probably never see 1000000 followers on my twitter page @julieanneg, I know that I am making a difference in others and in myself!

Onto our birthday shout out! Today we are wishing the singer/songwriter Liz Phair and very happy 42nd birthday. Ms. Phair is an Chicago area girl, raised in Winnetka Illinois and a graduate of New Trier High School. She has earned her chops as an artist, working from the very bottom up on the Indie scene to become the mainstream artist that she is. My fav song of hers is "Extraordinary". It is the kind of song that you blast in the car while driving and sing a long. The chorus is the best part :

I am extraordinary, if you'd ever get to know me
I am extraordinary, I am just your ordinary
Average every day sane psycho
Supergoddess
Average every day sane psycho

Great lyrics, right? Perfect actually. Here is the video of the song.



Thank you Liz for great thoughts and Happy Birthday to you!

Well, that is all for now. Just a few thoughts...lol. And hey if you aren't on twitter, check it out. You will be glad that you did!

Every Thought is a Seed...

Hello to All my Blog Friends!

I have heard from many of you that you have enjoyed the video clip from St. Baldrick's Day. Thank you for all your warm responses and thoughts. As you have read in the past, we are really committed to this particular charity and we always have a blast doing it!

No excuses for my absence, I lost a little bit of focus. Anyway...

I have become attached to Twitter. I read more than I tweet, but it is fun nonetheless, even when I had the flu. So scanning the tweets this morning, I came across this quote. It was retweeted by @DeniseHammock and the original tweeter was @VizionG. Here goes...

"Every thought is a seed. If you plant crab apples don't expect to harvest Golden Delicious." OMG I just love that! Talk about the slogan for positive thinking!!!!

So I have to look and see daily now, what exactly am I planting. And this is so far reaching from our individual thoughts to our interaction with others. And actually it will be way more healthy, mentally and physically for me. So cool!

I am finally in a place to start new creations once again and boy am I excited! Also be sure to look for a change in y blog. I am beginning to sell on Artfire. I am making the change, primarily for the ease of use for my customers. I will update you when this change occurs.

I have not done a birthday shout out lately and here it is!

Happy Birthday Loretta Lynn. Today she is 74. She has had a long life both in and out of the spotlight. I was amazed that her music catalogue is so long and full. Ironically she is touring right now, small venues and will be appearing in my area on April 16 at the Old Town School of Music in Chicago.

So her most famous song to me is Coal Miner's Daughter and I'd like to share that with you today.





So Mrs. Lynn, Happy Birthday to you and many more!

Have a great day everyone and plant some Golden Delicious!

Taking the Facebook Plunge

Hello To All!

This is the second time I woke up this morning. The first I was up at 3:15 am to get my husband off to work, I blogged on my other blog, Twittered a bit and then hit the hay for two more hours. Now I am up for sure to do the rest of my day!

My etsy store. I have some new and improved photography on some of the listings. The rest will be improved soon with new listings as well!

I took the Facebook plunge last night. Actually I had signed up for Facebook in 2007 and never went on it or anything. It had been so long that I had to reset my password. I searched around on there, saw some people I know, it was cool. My main purpose is to meet more people to do business with. You never know!

On Twitter a fellow tweeter @janeblogs gave this link for funny shoes. You have to check out the site. My personal fav is the bird sandals about two-thirds of the way down the page.

I have been trying to ignore the whole Rush Limbaugh vs.White House banter but now it gets absurd! Check out this story. RL wants to debate the President to see who "owns" America.

For starters, I am an American and I am not owned by anyone!

Secondly, I read the article and there are points in there that I could agree with, then it goes beyond agreeable to RL just being the arse that he is. I might remind RL that the President might not do anything/everything right. It is really a crapshoot. But, considering the pit that the other party left us in, the one that we are trying to claw ourselves out of, RL should just put a sock in it! Own America my butt!

Today's birthday shout out is for the late Andy Gibb. He would have been 51. (I did a double take when I figured this out then realized that I am 44 so 51 works for him!) He had a great career and unfortunately he got caught up in the fame, got addicted to drugs, got clean and died of a heart infection shortly after. What a shame.

I have the most pleasant memories of the time he was popular, hanging out with my friend Ann from across the street or Melody from two doors down. I had an AM transistor radio, one that was shaped like the smiley face and we would listen all the time WLS-AM and hear Andy Gibb, the BeeGees, Elton John, Donny Osmond and all the others. We were so cool! And we were so sure Andy was singing right to us....big sigh.

So now I leave you with my fav Andy Gibb song. Mr. Gibb, thank you!





Have a great day! Look for me on Twitter and Facebook!

Of Mice and Men....

Good Morning to all!

I hope you slept well and I hope for your sake that you did not wake to the chilly, icy weather that we have here in the Chicago area! Brrrr. But they are talking 40's next week and no precipitation of any sorts. YEA!!

Look on my side blog and you will see that I have become a Twitterer!?!? Or is it Tweeter? Not sure, but I have joined and to be honest it is sort of cool! So far, everyone can follow the ins and outs of my mundane life, lol and I am following public names I recognized like the President and others. It is just interesting. Do you Twitter? Do you want to follow me on Twitter? Would you like to join Twitter? Just click on the link "Follow Me on Twitter" and it will take you there!

For today's birthday shout out I send my regards to the late John Steinbeck. Today marks the 107th anniversay of his birth. He was a great writer who wrote of the human struggle and all the things that surround it. Amoung all of his works, the book "East of Eden" was made into the movie of the same name that was a starring vehicle for James Dean.

I have spoken before that I consider myself relatively intelligent. I try at least. While John Steinbeck was surely recognizable, I am almost sad to report that I have never read any books by Steinbeck, I think I have only seen a portion of either "Of Mice and Men" or "The Grapes of Wrath", but I know a lot of "things" and dear Mr. Steinbeck was one of them.

I read his wiki page this morning to find a little fact that he enjoyed the works another author who is a fav of mine, O. Henry. That is a cool thing to have in common. (Okay, so sometimes, I am just so shallow! lol)

I love to collect quotes and from my personal collection, I give you thoughts from Mr. Steinbeck:

"A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find that after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us."

Thank you Mr. Steinbeck for all you have contributed to the furthering of the human spirit!

Thanks for reading a long and I hope you enjoy your day!