Why you should talk to companies on Twitter

I think Twitter was born because we all just needed a place to vent about things.

I regularly complain about anything and everything on Twitter. Waiting in line, traffic, service at restaurants, my internet connection crapping out, my baby not sleeping -- you name it, I've probably complained about it at least once in 7,000 tweets.

Lately I've been making a point to search for a company's Twitter handle before I tweet about them. In my opinion, Tweeting directly at them gives me a better chance of being heard than not adding their handle at all, and if nothing else happens, I've drawn attention to it.

Case in point: You're all up-to-date on my cell phone drama. And yes, I've tweeted about that NUMEROUS times, going back months. At the beginning of the most recent meltdown, I tweeted the following:

Samsung responded right away by asking me some details about the phone and where I'd gotten my replacement phone. The manager of the account offered to take a look at the phone for me and send the service request link. Unfortunately, I couldn't go without a phone because we don't have a home phone, but the fact they offered was pretty darn cool.

Fast forward a few weeks to the Loaner Phone debacle. I tweeted this:

Of course, Sprint didn't respond because they sort of suck at customer service (both online and through the stores).

But that single Tweet was re-tweeted by someone with over 1000 followers and re-tweeted again by some of her followers. By the time that tweet trickled out of the Twitter stream, it had the potential to be read by thousands of current Sprint customers and future Sprint customers -- who might not become customers because of what they read.

Ok, that's a long-shot. I'm not Heather Armstrong and neither are any of you. None of us are getting any free washers out of a Twitter rant.  What I'm saying is that if a company is on Twitter, they have opened themselves up to these types of messages and it's in their best interest to respond.

Many times I'm not even asking for them to do anything. I just want them to listen. I want them to be  accountable for the products they sell.

Here is an example of a company who does it right.

I had three Restaurant.com certificates worth $10 each for a restaurant that closed. I was able to trade them in for credit on the Restaurant.com website but it would only allow me to trade in $10 at a time instead of using all $30. There weren't any restaurants I was interested in that offered $10 certificates, so I tweeted:

Within minutes, someone from Restaurant.com had Direct Messaged me in an attempt to solve this problem. They were able to  And you know what? They did. 

And because they listened to little old me, I'm much more likely to be a return customer.

Do you complain to companies on Twitter? Have they ever responded to you?

My Old Foe, the Pump

I've been nursing my baby for over five months now. This is a big deal for me considering we almost didn't make it five days.

It comes as a relief that pretty soon he's going to be eating solids regularly. We have started him on a few foods occasionally, and most recently a little oatmeal almost every day. I still nurse him before any foods so he can get the "good stuff" first. But in a few short weeks, these foods will give him additional vitamins and nutrients in addition to my milk. I feel like I'm off the hook a little.

You see, the amount of breast milk I've pumped has always been a "thing". It's a source of constant anxiety for me, made even worse because our daycare provider kept asking for more. I was afraid of getting to a point where I couldn't pump enough to keep up with him. And what's the worse that could happen -- formula makes up the amount I can't provide? That's not a big deal (to a normal, non-crazy person).

I talked before about where I pump at work. I had several people comment that it was so unfair I had to pump in a closet while sitting on the floor. I completely disagree. Knowing the state of breast feeding, I'm extremely lucky to have an out of the way place that's not a bathroom. It was my choice to sit on the floor because in all honesty, the room was kind of cramped and it was sort of awkward to have a chair and not have a table where I could set my pump.

The other day, our secretary cleaned out the closet and when I went in later, she'd rolled in a chair, a table and a radio for me. She made a new "Do Not Disturb" sign for the door and put all my magazines in a cute wicker basket. It really moved me that she took the time to do it, knowing how much breast feeding means to me.

My new digs.

Here's where I spill my deep, dark secret, a secret I'm sure I share with any mother who either works or is exclusively pumping: I hate my pump.

I mean, I sort of dig it. It's the Caddy of pumps. I was excited when I got it because I thought, "hooray! No more worries about milk!"

Until his bottles started increasing. Until I realized it's pretty difficult to pump at work every 3 hours. Until I saw that piddly 3 oz bottle after 15 minutes of pumping and that little voice in my head said, "You can't keep up."

I'm getting resentful of that pump. I hate that I have to be connected to it so much. I hate all the cords to plug in, the parts I have to wash. I hate that after my baby goes to bed, I have to drag out that beast and pump instead of doing things I enjoy doing. I hate having to carry it in every day, or remembering to stick the cord in the bag, or making sure the bottle cooler has frozen.

On the other hand, when I make the bottles at night with milk I've pumped, I feel very proud of myself for keeping it up.

I'm not planning on giving it up. My goal is one year and then I'll probably have to since I think I'm only legally entitled to all those breaks for one year. I'm OK with that, too. The pump is a necessary evil in my life, and I'll keep doing battle with my old foe until he's weaned.

It's a labor of love, but I won't be sad to see that pump go back into the closet.

What's your labor of love? What do you resent, but love at the same time?

Oh, hey, by the way, I did a review of a nursing cover called Baby Bond over at my friend Laurie's blog (Steals & Deals for Kids). She's giving away a cover! check it out!

VlogTalk #1: All about It's Blogworthy

I haven't replayed this. I'm scurred.



Linking up with Jessica from My Time as Mom, Elena from Mommy is in Timeout and Kate from Mommy Monologues.

Mother's Day: I want a redo

Welcome to the 50,000th Mother's Day re-cap post on the World Wide Web!

I knew my hubby, and by extension, my little guy, would do something fantastic. Hubby is the best present giver in the history of the world. He always knocks gifts out of the park with his uncanny ability to figure out just what I want without ever asking.

I had this feeling on Saturday that something would go awry, but thought it was just based on last Saturday, when a combination of going to bed way to late and my child sleeping almost 0 hours all night left me completely exhausted on Sunday. And even knowing that might be the case, I stayed up late again on Saturday night because in my mind I'm still 25? Who knows.

Anyway.

Baby was up pretty much all night with a cold. Hubby took the first shift, I took the second, and then around 6:45 I decided just to park in the recliner in Baby Blogworthy's room. A couple hours later I woke up feeling pretty alright.

Hubby woke up and we decided I should open my presents right away since the baby was in a good mood.

First was a new charm for my charm bracelet.

It's the last charm on the right -- a pacifier -- and Hubby called it the "mute button". Before Baby Blogworthy was able to nurse really well, we used to just stick our finger in his mouth to quiet him down. Then the heavens opened and angels started singing when he discovered the mute button. Pretty cute and sweet.

The second gift was a really nice women's devotional Bible, which I've been asking for for awhile. Then he saved the best for last:

Click the picture for bigness.

And of course it made me do this:

That's the ugly cry face and Baby Blogworthy with his mute button saying, "eh."

After that the day went downhill. Baby B has a cold, so he was fussy and miserable all day. Hubby started feeling nauseous and ended up with a fever. Me? I became more and more exhausted. With only four hours of sleep, good will runs out pretty quickly. Every time I'd lay down for a nap while he was napping, he'd wake up 45 minutes later almost as soon as I'd really fall asleep.

By the end of the day I was spent, especially since he refused to fall asleep even though he was CLEARLY tired. Why babies refuse naps, I'll never know.

So that was my crappy Mother's Day. The gifts were awesome, the rest of the day not so much.

Honestly though? Even bad days seem a little bit better when you have this going on:

How was your Mother's Day? If you have furbabies, did they get you anything? If you're dad, did you spoil your wife?

Celebrity Weekly Round-up: Roc & Roe, let's go!

People, we did it! We made it to Friday! Time to kick off the weekend (and yes,I do consider Fridays at work part of the weekend because, let's be honest here, you're not working today) with some celebrity stories.

I'm starting it off today with the biggest celebrity news of the week: Mariah Carey finally popped out dem babies. They were 100 lbs, 60 inches long, and were born at 3560 days gestation. Mother is resting comfortably, the daughter is off getting her hair did and the father is shooting hoops in the family's indoor basketball court.

They were born Saturday and kept the names a mysterious mystery for several days. Picture this: I was out running errands at lunch one day and when I walked in, my friend says to me, "AMANDA. Moroccan and Monroe." And I'm all, "excuse me? I didn't have a liquid lunch, did you?" And she's all, "That's what Mariah Carey named her kids."

I've been around celebrity crazies for a long time and I've heard plethora of bizarro names: Apple, Kal-El, Pilot Inspektor. And I have to say, Mariah Carey's baby names aren't as bad some, until you find out her reasoning for them:

- Moroccan Scott's middle name comes from Nick Cannon's own middle name, which is also his grandmother's middle name (sweet and normal)
- Moroccan Scott's first name comes from the top tier of Mariah Carey and Nick Cannon's apartment, which has a Moroccan inspired decor and was the site of Nick Cannon's proposal (also, can we talk about the fact that they have a top tier of their NYC apartment?)  I'm not for certain, but this may also be where they took their nasty nudie pics while she was preggers. Yeeks.

As for the little girl:

- Monroe is named after  Marilyn Monroe, Mariah's idol and inspiration.
- Monroe 's middle name is nothing. She has no middle name because her mother has no middle name. Basically she's named after her mother.

Nick Cannon already has nicknames for them: Roc and Roe. Stellar.

I wonder if cray cray is hereditary.

Speaking of things you are born with and things you are not, what happened to Bristol Palin's face?

(That transition was painful. My apologies.)

Yeah, looks like "teen activist" and "dancer" and woman-about-town had her face done.

via

Oh sweetie. Oh. Sweetie. That's clearly a chin implant. Wait. Sorry. That's clearly "a good night's sleep" and makeup. If a pseudo-celebrity has plastic surgery in the forest and nobody is around to take pictures of her on a red carpet she has no business walking down, does she make a sound? Yes. It's the sound of her 15 minutes tick, tick, ticking away.

A couple hooligans whose 15 minutes are just starting are up next. I vaguely  remember something happening last week that had It's Blogworthy all abuzz, but couldn't quite remember the details. Thank the Lord, then, for US Weekly, who reminded me gently that THE ROYAL WEDDING JUST HAPPENED AND THINGS RELATED KEEP HAPPENING.

Reporters keep relating the royal wedding to a fairytale, and what fairytale is complete without some buffoons who hang around the princess to give us all a good laugh.

Enter Kate Middleton Princess Catherine's younger brother and sister, James Middleton and Pippa Middleton.

James likes football, travel and taking semi-naked pictures with his hands in his pants.

Pippa likes shopping, champagne and dancing in her bra at parties.

I'm sure Queen Elizabeth is so proud those genes are entering into the pool. Honestly, though, aren't those two links more entertaining than anything the royals have done in the past 30 years?

Cray cray is hereditary; class is not.

Enjoy the weekend!

What were your favorite stories of the week? Do you want to see less of Bristol Palin and more of the Middletons?

Don't forget about the furbabies

This post brought to you by Nutrish. All opinions are 100% mine.

Before Baby Blogworthy was born, our animals were our babies.

Hubby and I are animal collectors. We're borderline animal hoarders over here. We moved to Florida with two cats and one dog and have adopted two more cats while we've lived here.

Like most couples with no children, we doted on our pets and called them our furbabies. We'd talk about them when we went out to dinner. I can't tell y'all how many times we had the "What do you think the cats are doing?" conversation.

Our dog was especially babied. She's a sweet little Jack Russell/ Beagle mix named Truffles. This dog has seriously she's been through a lot. She had a skin condition when she was a puppy and had gone through three leg surgeries before her first birthday. She's always been terribly loving, quiet, well-behaved and cuddly.

Lately she's been super duper depressed. Actually, since that screaming, crying little bald thing came into our lives, or approximately December 1, 2010. We call her Prozac Dog 2011. She said Prozac wasn't strong enough.

When Nutrish contacted me with a sample of Rachael Ray Nutrish just 6 dry dog food for my puppy to try, I thought it was the perfect opportunity to baby our furbaby. She'd get a treat and the chance to star in her own blog.

Just 6 dry dog food is a premium dog food with six natural ingredients, plus vitamins and minerals. According to the website, the dry dog food also contains no by-product meal or fillers and:

• No corn. No wheat. No soy.
•  No artificial flavors or artificial preservatives.
• 100% complete & balanced nutrition for dogs. 

Much better than the Walmart special she usually gets.
The sample came in the CUTEST packaging:
  

She needed a new bowl! And as a bonus, Hubby tied the ribbon around his head like an awesome bandana.
We are always anxious when we give her new food. How will her little tummy handle it? Will she like it? Cause ain't nothing worse than spending $30 on a big bag of dog food and then having your dog turn up her nose.

So you can imagine how excited I was when she gobbled this stuff down like it was a turkey dinner:

We typically don't feed her a ton of food when she eats because of her bionic legs and our concern that she's gonna get porky (stress eater over here), so we only gave her part of the bag. She kept sniffing around and tapping our arm until we have her some more.

If Truffles could talk, I think she'd say, "This Nutrish just 6 brought me out of me depression for 4.5 seconds. Yummo!"

Want to let your dog have a taste of the good stuff? Grab your free sample and let them see how the other half lives!

Loaner Phone Part 2: Text message bonanza

I'm used to having lots of apps to play with on my smart phone, including Twitter, Facebook and TMZ. Now that we have a baby in tow, there are times when Hub will run in to a store and leave us in the car, especially if the baby is sleeping. I missed my Samsung Moment the most when we were running errands.

I was sitting in the car at Lowes getting bored while Hub shopped and the baby slept. What to do, what to do? I decided to take a virtual tour around my Loaner Phone and see what I could get into. They weren't able to download my contact list to this phone, so the only numbers I had were those of the people who had already texted me. I scrolled further and realized that not only were the contacts still in the phone, all the text messages were, too.

Hot diggity dog!

This guy's whole world was opened in front of me. Not a word was spelled right, unless it had something to do with drugs. More wuz, ur, bros, brahs, kno, wat, wassups, dams than you can shake a stick at. There were pleads for more weed, lots of text flirting and this little number:

White Girl T: Gas is $4 a gallon I'll take u but u gotta put $15 in my gas
PG (Phone Guy): I am good man dam like

Then there is this one, which I'm still trying to figure out:

Back Door: Im at rondia house now bruh come threw ima buy what i can frm ya when i get in.

(Buy what, pray tell? Probably selling some Tupperware or something.. Yeah, that must be it.)

And this one:

PG: Dis me way u at?!

But nothing is quite as spectacular as the text fights between PG and what appears to be his number one lady love, in the contacts as "My Bay". From the look of these text messages, I think they have the same kind of relationship me and my Samsung Moment have.

My Bay: So i guess i'm suppose to be dumb all of a sudden your phone has no service you couldn't talk to me while in the house your phone hung up you don't call back one thing about it mama didnt raise no fool it hasn't been the same its cool though i pick up on stuff very quickly just kno i kno

The next day....

My Bay: Luv u hope you have a good day today
PG: Thank you bay and u too
My Bay: Missin you bae

The next day.....

My Bay: You can keep your attitude you get mad for stupid reasons i swear damn but you say i like to argue besides my baby still runnin a fever ask questions first

And it goes on and on and on. It was fascinating. In fact, when Hub got back into the car that night he was all, what are you looking at? And I'm like, THE MOST AMAZING SERIES OF TEXT MESSAGES EVER. I mean, I couldn't make this stuff up.

I can't say I was too incredibly sad to see Loaner Phone go yesterday, but I can say that I erased all my OWN texts before I sent it in.