7 Quick Takes Friday #9

--- 1 ---

I am posting this mostly because my last post was so whiny and I hate having a whiny post up as my most recent work.

--- 2 ---

I started a post about some books I recently read but I didn't like them that much and that seemed whiny to me too. Still looking for book recommendations!

--- 3---

I thought it was getting cooler here and I was very excited but then it was all yucky and humid all last night so my plan to sleep with the windows open backfired on me.

--- 4 ---

We have been doing the numbers and it looks like I will have to return to work after this baby is born. I am bummed about this but I realize that this blog is not the place to discuss that, and probably no one cares anyway.

--- 5 ---

If you don't live in Dallas you might not be aware of the overwhelming majority of SAHM's here. I am anticipating feeling like a huge freak for another 1.5 years as a full-time working mom. Good times.

--- 6 ---

Oh yeah, if you don't read the family blog, I am pregnant again. I was all ready to go shopping for skinny clothes but nope, back to maternity stuff...

--- 7 ---

We will definitely be investigating more effective forms of non-hormonal birth control after March. The hormones from the Pill made me crazy, which is why I didn't go back to the Pill after Little Sir was born.

I wanted to do the Fertility Awareness Method again, which I loved, but you have to get consistently more than 3 hours sleep at a time for that to work and, well, that just wasn't happening, so I was never able to pick up FAM charting after Little Sir was born...before I went and got knocked up again.


So, we'll just be trying something different after this one...


~~~

Well that's all for this week, be sure to visit Conversion Diary for links to more 7 Quick Takes Fridays.

Soap.com: can't take credit cards?

There have been, and I imagine always will be, many posts regarding the sponsors and companies giving away the amazing amount of swag at BlogHer conferences. As I mentioned in my BlogHer recap post, it really amazes me that very large companies purport to respect bloggers enough to give them free items, coupons, and gift certificates, but yet not enough to send representatives to the conference who are knowledgeable about the company or products.

Or, apparently, treat a blogger with respect when redeeming said coupons or gift certificates.

I am going to name names here because I believe if a company commits to inviting me to experience their online store by giving me a gift certificate at a blogging conference, they have invited me to comment on that experience on my blog. And I don't just deal out the warm fuzzies up in here.

Soap.com is a new offshoot of the popular Diapers.com online store. I had ordered from Diapers.com in the past and never had any issues. However, it has been about a year since I made any Diapers.com orders because they mostly carry things I don't use (like disposable diapers).
At BlogHer 2010, I was given a Soap.com gift certificate for $20.00 plus free shipping.

I went online, selected my items, and applied the gift certificate with no problem.

When I went to check out, the Soap.com web site kept saying my card was declined because the address didn't match. I had the exact same address for billing and shipping, which is also the address on my credit card. I work from home, so there is no other address for me. Yes, we moved, but that was over a month ago, more than 30 days that the address had been changed on my credit card. This was a different credit card than the one I had used on Diapers.com over a year ago.

I called Soap.com and they blamed the credit card company, but admitted that they had attempted to charge the card 4 times and now my card had 4 potential charges on it. Nice.
Total call time: 7 minutes

I called the credit card company and they said they showed 4 approvals on their end. This was apparently a problem with the Soap.com end.
Total call time: 11 minutes

I called Soap.com back and they continued to blame the credit card company. They finally agreed to conference call with the credit card company. While everyone was on the phone, the credit card company approved the transaction both digitally and verbally for the 5th time while Soap.com continued to come up with "address does not match".

At this point I had been on the phone for almost an hour. I had been missing work.
The nanny had to stay overtime because I was unable to leave the phone.
My child was beating on the door and crying.

Soap.com came back on the phone after another series of being on hold and said they were sorry but they can't process this transaction. I am not making this up, they actually had no good excuse to give me except that they couldn't do it. Their only suggestion is that I start an entirely new transaction and pay via PayPal.

My child was with his father at this point and wailing his head off in the other room.
No dinner was being cooked and everyone was starving.
I am pregnant and starving and talking to someone on the phone about an online transaction that should have taken 10 minutes.

The supervisor on the phone at Soap.com finally had to manually re-credit me the cost of the gift certificate and I had to pay via PayPal.
Total call time: 26 minutes

Total time it took to order 2 items on Soap.com, including when I was searching for the items online and going through the initial checkout process which didn't work: over 1 hour

Even the next day, upon reflection, I still think this is ridiculous. I realize that credit card transactions must be somehow amazingly complex and that this person on the phone at Soap.com couldn't figure it out. However, I have been buying things online for at least 10 years now and never had a company tell me that they just can't figure out how to charge my card. I buy things online with this same card somewhere between 1 and 3 times a week. In fact, this was probably my third transaction online in the last 7 days online.

I would almost expect this from a brick-and-mortar store that had just gone online. But Soap.com is an online only store, and since they are an offshoot of Diapers.com, I would expect them to have some experience with charging credit cards.

I think the other thing that still bugs me is that the guy on the phone from Soap.com (who was a supervisor) acted the entire time like I was being completely unreasonable in expecting my card to work at all. Like it was my fault for moving 30 days ago and that really just screwed everything up.

Am I just completely insane to have the expectation that I should be able to use my card in an online store?
Does it seems strange to anyone else that Soap.com was on the phone with my credit card company and still couldn't figure it out?

I thought those things were weird and I have a really bad taste in my mouth about the whole thing. I will most likely not be purchasing anything else from this web site. Which is fine, because honestly I could find hardly any items in their inventory that are deemed safe by the Cosmetics Database. They have plenty of items with phthalates, PHO's, and things that are disposable and do not biodegrade, if anyone is looking for any!
Just don't try paying with your credit card.

It's true, I don't wear antiperspirant

I haven't talked about this much because I was afraid people would call me one of those crazy hippies. I mean, I do cloth diaper and baby-wear and I threw out all my non-green cleaning products way before we had kids. I make my own body wax out of sugar. But I've never talked about my deodorant.

But, it's true: somewhere around 2009, I quit using traditional antiperspirant/underarm deodorant products.

It was a big switch for me because I was actually using Secret Clinical Strength at the time. That stuff is potent. I don't think I sweated for, like, a year with that stuff!

That was actually what concerned me. There are sweat glands in our armpits for a reason. Is it really a good idea for me to be putting chemicals into my pores that will prevent anything from escaping? That's kind of weird if you think about it.

What's actually WRONG with sweating, anyway? It cools the body.

Of course, the odor is what we don't like. I certainly don't want to subject people around me to yucky smells, and I have a really sensitive nose, myself. I hate feeling icky. However, there are plenty of natural and organic deodorants that remove the offensive smell of sweat while still allowing your body to sweat.
Deodorants without phthalates, I might add.

I ended up with one of the crystal body deodorants. The kind you wet under the faucet and rub under your arms. When I know I am going into stressful situations, I will back it up with a solid herbal deodorant as well.

I think the hardest thing to get used to is being careful about what kinds of tops I wear. If I wear anything fitted around the shoulders, I have to be pretty sure I won't be in a warm or stressful environment, cause I will have moisture marks.

It's kind of a mental thing. Sometimes it does get warm and I sweat. I can tell it doesn't smell but there is something psychological that makes me feel like I should be ashamed of my sweat. I have to stop and tell myself, "This is normal, there is nothing wrong with sweating. If it bothers someone else, that is just a construct of society". It sounds dumb, but I believe it is true.

Obligatory BlogHer 2010 recap

I skipped a few days of blogging, which probably should have been recaps of the day after BlogHer ended. Instead, I spent these days sightseeing with my husband in NYC, traveling back to DFW, and going back to work yesterday (ugh).

My thoughts about BlogHer:

It was great to see and hear from other "green" bloggers. Especially the clothdiapering mamas!

The amount of swag was NOT exaggerated. This brings up the interesting point that apparently very large companies believe in the influence of female bloggers enough to give away a LOT of free full-size product in hopes of creating future customers. However, they did not believe in us enough to send representatives who actually knew anything about the companies and the products. A good percentage of the reps in the expo hall were unable to answer most of our challenges and questions. It's like they expect us to just buy their product and shut up about it. Not likely.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, while I do love that women bloggers tend to really examine their product and company choices conscientiously, I also got a little sick of everyone getting offended by SOMETHING. Offended by Scholastic offering a tour during panels, offended by formula samples in the swag bags, just mad, mad, mad about anything. I am all for holding companies accountable (I spoke to Pillsbury, for what little good that did, and I do understand the Nestle boycott), but I am sick of people taking free stuff from companies and then complaining about it for whatever reason.

See, I just wrote an opinion. Which I am sure people could get mad about. But that is what I think. And if I learned anything from BlogHer, it is that I should be more vocal and use my power.

Can I use it to say, "Stop your whining, you got a free full-size Mr. Potato Head in your swag bag!"?

BlogHer 2010: Day 2

Day 2 of BlogHer was a lot of fun!

Before breakfast, I went to see the rest of the Expo Hall and ran into my nemesis, Pillsbury, who continue to refuse to remove the partially hydrogenated oils from their products despite the fact that they are often the only refrigerated dough brand in many smaller stores. When the rep asked if I wanted a sample, I told her "I will not purchase or eat any of your products because you guys are still not taking the hydrogenated oils out of them. Do you have any plans to remove the hydrogenated oils at all? I have been writing letters to you for years". This rep said, well, they are trying to work on it but they can't really do it without impacting the quality of the product. WHAT? I would consider the overwhelming presence of PHO's in a product a sign of poor quality, myself. Later, when talking about this with other green bloggers, someone pointed out that Pillsbury's "Simple" line of products actually does not contain PHO's. I remembered that this is right because I have actually bought Simple chocolate chip cookies before in the specific effort to support their endeavors to remove PHO's. This was just one example during the conference of a sponsor company sending representatives to the Expo Hall who were less informed than the bloggers who were asking the questions. I will most likely be doing a post about this later.

I attended a lot of panels during the day, the first was "Radical Blogging Moms", Annie from PhDinParenting was a panelist (I blog-stalk her, but I was still too intimidated to speak to her in person because, what if she finds out I wasn't able to breastfeed past 6.5 months??! Fear!!). I was really encouraged at that panel to consider at least talking about some of my opinions on this blog.
Maybe.
Sometime.

It's not that I'm afraid that I might lose readers (what readers??) that I don't get opinionated on this blog, but more that I don't want to argue with you people. I know we don't agree on things and frankly, I just don't care. But that is another blog post, I guess.
Or not, if I chicken out.

After that panel was lunch, and this was the first lunch I had attended at BlogHer, since I skipped the Day 1 lunch. I was very impressed by the caterer's vegetarian and gluten-free options! Usually they just provide salad and grilled veggie sandwiches. Here they had beans to add to the greens, and cold seafood salad, and hummus and all kinds of extras. Very good!!

The next panel I attended was the "Mindful Monetization" panel. I think my thoughts on that panel can be summarized by a tweet from @thesmartmama:

Oh well.

I had to leave that session early because I had a FREE pedicure from Ecco shoes! Go check them out, they rock!

I think my favorite session of the conference was "Loving your Small Blog". This is exactly what it sounded like, and was very encouraging. There were a few thoughts about how to make yourself bigger if you'd like to, but there was also a lot of encouragement for us all that if we love what we are doing, there is no need to change just because other people (readers, friends, family) might want us to "take it to the next level". Sometimes blogging is just for yourself, and that is OK.

I had to leave this session a little early to pick up some additional swag from The Green Soiree a few days earlier, which hadn't arrived in time for the party.

Last was the closing keynote and it was nice to hear the ladies there. It was very inspirational and all of that, but honestly I started to get sleepy. After it went overtime by 5 minutes I decided to go ahead and beat the rush up the elevators to my room so that I could clean up a bit for "A Green Affair", the last party of the day for me.

At "A Green Affair", I met up with Calley, the EcoChic, who I'd been running into over the course of the weekend and who is just the funnest person ever! She introduced me to Gina, The Feminist Breeder, who I had heard about but never met. They are both super #clothdiapering mamas, so I really enjoyed talking with them about cloth.

Gina was sponsored at the conference by Fuzzi Bunz, a brand of one-size all-in-one cloth diapers that I had also heard a lot about but never tried. Turns out, she was giving away free diapers, so I am taking one home to try out! They have great colors and the insides of the diaper are sooooo soft! Can't wait to try them!

I ended the day having dinner with Christian and Garrett, who had been bumming around the town all day (rode the Staten Island ferry and gone down to Soho to shop ... at Uniqlo and H&M ... I KNOW, right?). We ate at some supposedly "famous" NYC diner, but you know, they all say that on the sign. There's no way all of those places could be famous. Still, it was good and, in the NYC tradition, ridiculously expensive.

BlogHer 2010: Day 1

Day 1 of BlogHer can be summarized by the word: full!

It started with the newbie breakfast. It was hard to get up after staying up late going to a diner the night before! It was also confusing because none of the conference guides online included the location of anything - only the event. So I had to sort of wander around 3 floors looking and asking people.

After the newbie breakfast there honestly weren't any sessions I was super interested in, so I used that time plus the lunch break to walk with Christian and Garrett over to Times Square. We ate another round of falafel and sat on Broadway watching people.

I haven't been to NYC since they closed off Broadway like that, and I really like the environment it has created! We looked for the Naked Cowboy but never saw him. We did see the Granny Peace Brigade, who was raising awareness of the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima.

I tried to go to some sessions in the afternoon, and I enjoyed Liz Henry's Geek Lab "Fight Spam and Hackers! Plugging Security Holes in Your Social Media Life". I think I have become a Liz Henry fan! I also enjoyed the blog post she read at the evening keynote (and I love her hair).

I left that session a little early because I'd been getting Twitters from BumGenius founder that she was in the Expo Hall and I really wanted to meet her! Unfortunately, after spending 30 minutes in the Expo Hall I never found her. * sad face *

I did find Mrs. Potato Head.

So, I was a little late to the next session and it turned out it was so full that I was unable to hear anything from as far away as I was. This was disappointing because it was a panel about taking better pictures, and you know I suck at this.

Instead, I took a nap for a little while, then went to the end-of-day keynote. I really enjoyed hearing bloggers read their own posts. They were sad and funny and surprising!

After the keynote, I joined Christian and Garrett again and we got on the subway and traveled to a ramen shop Christian had seen on Japan TV. It was good ramen!


When we were super full, we headed over to the Empire State Building. I had heard that at night, the lines are shorter. I am not sure if this is correct - is waiting an hour and a half considered a short line? I was pretty tired by the time we got to the top. After all that waiting, this is the view I had:

It was so crowded, I couldn't really see over the side at all unless I wanted to elbow my way in. After a while I went ahead and did that, and got a few slightly better shots.


Then we went home and went to sleep!!

BlogHer 2010: Arriving

We arrived in NYC for BlogHer 2010 yesterday around 2:30PM! When we got here, we were starving so we had a yummy falafel sandwich from a street vendor!

Then we took a looong nap and headed over to the Green Soiree hosted by 3 Green Angels. There I got to meet some of the marketing pro's from Plum Organics. Little Sir looooves Plum Organics "squeezy food"! We left a whole stash with the grandparents...

At the end of the day Thursday, we had already accumulated some great swag!

Yes, that is a full size Mr Potato Head and duffel bag of Play-Doh for Little Sir!!

How I roll at BlogHer

So, who else is going to BlogHer?

I am super excited to attend, but in the most nerdy way. I think I should post this explanation in case I meet people at BlogHer and they visit my site for the first time.

Here are the things I am excited about, in this exact order:

1. I am excited about the panels.
2. I am glad to be there with my husband, without the baby.
3. I am looking forward to being in NYC after 7 years since my last visit.
4. ... and finally, I am glad to meet other bloggers, and especially the ones whose blogs I follow.

However.
I am not a big partier. There are only two parties I am interested in:  A Green Affair, and Green Blogger Soiree. So I will see you there, if you are going!

I'm not avoiding other parties because I'm antisocial, or even that I am awkward in crowds of strangers. When I was single I would often go to all kinds of events, even weddings, alone and I had no problem with it - still don't. This is how I meet people, so I don't mind it.

Only, I haven't been to NYC in around 7 years and my husband has never been. I want us to see as much as possible together. And really, I am not very big in the blogsphere. I am not a "celebrity blogger watcher". I don't read Dooce or The Bloggess, even though those ladies are wonderful bloggers.

I will look forward to hearing them and perhaps seeing them, but honestly I am slightly more excited about seeing the Old Spice man who will be in the exhibit hall.

That's how I roll at BlogHer 2010 this year - if you see me at the conference or at lunch or breakfast, be sure to say hi!