Egg Head: Why Yes, That is My Profile Pic

So, as some of you may have noticed, there have been a few changes on the Three Bean. I have created a fb page specific to my blog. Go ahead, click right on the "like it" button over on the left, or click on the fb button to bring you to my page. Come on, I know you want to. . .

I have also joined Twitter. Now, I am still not 100% sure what I am supposed to be tweeting, but I am hoping it will increase readership and draw some traffic to the site. However, I do have a two issues with it.

1. Beyond linking to a new post and unintentionally retweeting something from the Yankees about my boyfriend, Andy Pettite, I haven't really posted anything.

2. I have no profile photo. Apparently on Twitter, it is like the kiss of death if you just have the default "egg" photo as your profile picture.

Basically, it is lazy. And it is kind of anti-social networking. It is hard to promote yourself if people can't get a visual. 

I want to put a profile pic up, I just haven't done it yet. Initially, I was hoping to put up a logo for the blog, but since I haven't gotten around to getting it created yet that isn't going to happen (but it is on the to-do list). So, partially it does come down to laziness, the other issue, and perhaps the one most responsible for my still-egg-persona is that I have no photos of myself that are even remotely usable.

I think it is a cop-out to post a pic of my kids. Are they cute? I think so. Do I have thousands, upon thousands of photos of them at my disposal? Yes. But I am the driving force behind this blog and the "face" of this brand, so I do think the photo should be a shot of my mug.

The problem is twofold.

1. I don't have a ton of photos of myself because I am usually the one taking them. Any photo I actually like is more than two years old and even though people misrepresent themselves on the Web all the time, I think a more recent photo would be a better representation of me at this point in my life. 

2. Any recent photos of me have been taken by my kids on my phone. 

Please see below for those lovely gems.

This one was taken by the Lady. Note the breast pump in the background and the sheer look of exhaustion on my face. This was when QT was about three months old and there was no sleep to be had. I don't even think Instagram could save this one.

Here is another photo. This one was taken by the Little Lady. There I am in the background, behind QT and his incredibly red cheeks. Not sure this one will make the cut.

 

Finally, there is this one. I can't remember if this was also taken by the Little Lady or if I just took it myself. Obviously, I would have to crop out the Lady. I did consider this photo for about 10 seconds and then I became distracted by my front tooth, which looks really snaggled. In real life there is a bit of a tilt to it, but nothing that extreme. I dare you, try to look away now. Also, I feel like my nose looks weird. The one saving grace is that it is blurry enough to hide small wrinkles and I don't have a double chin.

I am not kidding that these are the only photos I have. I can get my husband to take some pictures when he gets back from his trip, but the whole process of that is too much for me to think about. He will tell me that he can't take a good picture, then I will say that anything is fine, when in reality it isn't. . . you get the (for lack of a better word) picture.

I guess I will have to spend some quality time with the self-photo feature on my phone and hope for the best. I mean I can't spend the rest of my life as an egg.

If you are at all interested in following me on Twitter, I can be found @the3bean.

Happy Birthday To Me

Today is the big 3-3. Let me just start by saying that facebook is nice on your b-day because everyone is reminded and sends a little note and you don't actually have to talk to anyone on the phone. Texting is also good for this!

Thank you all for your b-day wishes. Most of my loyal readers have already sent on their greetings and I am grateful.

For my b-day, I asked my husband for tickets to a Yankee game. I hadn't been to one since before the Lady was born. With the new stadium up and the Sox in town, it looked like it would be a good night. Now, I didn't specify that we needed to see the Boston series and I didn't specify that we needed to go around my birthday. In my years of Yankee game attendance I have learned a few things. Number one being that it rains a lot in the early season and it is often cold, it is not that brisk October air that is tolerable during playoffs, but a damp, (dare I say moist?) cold that is just miserable. Add a few innings of heavy rain and a loss and the allure of the new stadium wears off quickly.

I was envisioning a nice warm evening sometime in late June, what I got were a few dry early innings where the cold wasn't too bad, which turned a wee bit sour once the rain started and the Yanks again failed to drive in any of their base runners. I did get to spend a few hours alone (well minus the 46,000 other people) with my husband and that hasn't happened in a while. We commiserated under his giant golf umbrella and stuck it out to the ninth, nimbly bypassing a guy who was yelling at everyone for leaving the game early. I would have stayed until the end, if the train schedule was a little more accommodating and if perhaps the Yanks had a chance.

I will say the new stadium is really nice. I mean where else do you get to see baseball history all around you and pay $11 for a beer? Go Yanks!

Tonight we are going out to dinner as a family, the hubby, the Lady and myself. Once we get home I plan on retreating upstairs to watch last night's BL episode. I promise I will update.

Facebook: My Own Personal US Magazine

Us Magazine has always been an escape for me. It has offered me a glimpse into the lives of the wildly rich and the overly exposed. I have seen countless mugshots and Wedding photos. I have tracked bump after baby bump and groaned in disappointment at yet another totally unforgivable baby name. I have always likened the addiction to following the cool crowd in High School. Remember the hallway gossip, the ten minute relationships, and the keg parties? All of it fodder enough to fill an entire glossy gossip rag each week. This is why I love Facebook.

Facebook has truly become my own personal US Magazine. It is a daily update of the lives of not only the cool crowd but every other person in your High School who decided that if you graduated within a two to three year period of each other that they should friend you. This is the real life good stuff. Forget celebrities with their nanny's, drivers, and hangers-on--give me the guy I haven't spoken to or seen in fourteen years and then show me a picture of his new tattoo, photos from his latest vacation and an up to the minute report on what he is doing right now.

I have admitted to using Facebook to silently stalk. I love to see how people have chosen to live their lives. I love the photos, the updates, the quizzes. I will friend somebody I haven't seen in months or years and then never even contact them on their wall. All the while I have checked out their page. I know where they live, work and play. I have seen photos of their kids' birthday parties, and memorable shots of late nights out. US Magazine doesn't even come close to this type of exposure. I can poke you, send you a bumper sticker, invite you to join my favorite cause, quiz you or send you a challah, but I never have to actually speak to you at all. It is the ultimate High School reunion. Everyone is on display.

I recently had a real life encounter with a guy from High School. He is perfectly nice and I have seen him a few times here and there over the years. Here we were in a social setting, a night out and this is what the conversation consisted of:

Him: Hey you have a baby now?

Me: Yeah, she is however many months she was at the time.

Him: That's great.

Me: How was your vacation to Aruba?

Him: We had a great time.

Me: The pictures were really nice. We have been there a few times.

Him: Yeah.

Me and Him: See you on Facebook.

I mean that might not be totally verbatim, but you get the gist. We had an opportunity to actually catch up, to engage in conversation. Facebook allows you to skip the awkward public exposure and just pry and spy in the privacy of your own home. Voyeurism at its best.

US Magazine runs a page called "Stars-They're Just Like US!" On it they show pictures of celebrities buying coffee, going grocery shopping, walking their dogs and playing with their kids. I know it always makes me feel better that Jake Gyllenhaal cleans up after his dog. With Facebook it is more like "Random People from Your Past--They're Just Like Me." I think it is actually humbling to see the successes and choices that people have made in their lives. I mean who really cares if some star carries a reusable shopping bag--isn't it infinitely more interesting to see how the class clown became a dad of four and works in finance?

There are so many opportunities out there for people to reinvent themselves, to project themselves as different from their past. There is also that need to connect. At one point in my life, I walked down the same halls as these people, sat in the same classrooms and listened to the same lectures. I saw them at football games, homecoming, in the woods behind the school, at parties and awards ceremonies and just passing by in my car. It amazes me how easy it is to just fall back into a casual friendship, like the last fourteen years almost didn't exist.

Those High School hallways have made their way online. I walk in and interact on a daily basis. We have all grown up, some of us have changed, and some of us haven't. But we choose to connect with each other. Even if it is just to silently stalk, to gloat in the weight gain of Miss Popularity or to be amazed by the utter transformation of one of your peers, Facebook gives us what US Magazine never could. Connection to the bits of our past in many cases we thought we left behind, connection to people and experiences that helped shape the way we live our lives today. Is it a real connection? I don’t know. If given the opportunity to meet face to face with someone, like I did, things can sometimes feel forced and awkward. Facebook gives you that locker door to stand behind or a seat at the cafeteria table two over from the conversation. But it does give you the opportunity to take advantage of including someone with a shared past back into your present life.

I doubt I will give up my US Magazine. I think I will continue to subscribe until I don't recognize any of the faces anymore or can't lose myself in the fantasy. As for Facebook, who knows where it will take me. Will I still be writing on the walls when I am 40? 50? I don’t know, but I know that I am always going to want to see what everyone else is doing. I am always going to want to keep viewing those photos, catching up on the everyday issues of people's lives. I am always going to want to connect.