Last week I had a coffee date with a 25-year-old guy. (For business reasons, people. Business. You all know I stopped answering Craigslist personal ads right after that strangling nonsense started happening. It’s like you can’t trust random psychopaths on the internet anymore.)
Anyway, because I’m a mother and have a blog, the guy I met with kept referring to me as a “mommyblogger.” Which makes sense, but I guess I never really think of myself that way. Mostly because instead of cute baby pictures or organic diaper product reviews, I usually post things like this:
Of course, I’d much rather be called a “Manilow blogger” or a “Powerball Winner blogger” or a “Scarlett Johannson Look-A-Like But With Bigger Boobs blogger,” but let’s run with this mommy blogger thing for a minute, shall we? It might be fun.
How about we start with recipes? Everybody loves recipes! Here’s one of my family’s favorites that’s been handed down for generations:
OK, that’s an ugly swimsuit on a dork. Sorry about that. You see, I actually don’t have any recipes. In fact, I don’t even know if my oven’s gas or electric and I once made birthday cake frosting using corn starch and a pool cue chalker. But let’s try some mommy blog action again. I know I can do it.
How about a picture of my kids doing something adorable? Everybody likes those, right? Sweet, smiling, cute kids? Here’s one I just love:
OK, that’s a pigeon. I actually don’t have a picture of my kids. But just so you know, they’re a little taller than the pigeon and one of them has a new retainer on his teeth that makes him talk like the effeminate warden at an Eastern European prison camp. Also, neither of them has lice in their feathers.
So, how about a product review? Yes? Like a review I wrote about an exciting, new item that every parent in the world should immediately run out and buy just because I liked it? Here you go:
OK, that’s Leonid Brezhnev. That’s the kind of photo that gets stored on your computer when you’re friends with someone like Marinka, who emailed it to me because she thinks he looks like one of the angry birds in Angry Birds. I’ve actually never written a product review because, for some reason, nobody’s ever asked me. Not even the people who make ugly swimsuits worn by dorks.
Next up, my scrapbooking work! You may not know it, but I’m very creative and resourceful when it comes to using my hands and paper. Why, just look at the intricacy of this particular page I made to commemorate the first day of T-Ball:
OK, that’s me drunk on a cruise ship. I think this was taken right after my husband said that he wouldn’t allow me to enter the “Hairiest Chest” contest on the Lido deck, but I’m not sure. Maybe if I’d actually put the pictures from that trip into a photo album instead of losing the memory card in a dirty margarita glass in Puerta Vallarta, I’d know for certain. At any rate, I’m sure I would have won first prize because most of the guys in the contest looked like rabid chihuahuas wearing Ed Hardy hats. Ah, memories.
But I guess what all of this means—my lack of recipes, kid photos, product reviews and scrapbooking tips—is that I’m not a mommy blogger after all, if those are the things that supposedly define a mommyblogger. Then again, I’m a woman, I have children, I occasionally write about those children and right now someone’s throwing a Sponge Bob ball at my head and begging to be fed before they pass out from “freakin’ starvation.” So maybe I really am a mommy blogger.
But I’d still rather be called a “Scarlett Johannson Look-A-Like But With Bigger Boobs blogger.” Wouldn’t you?
________
HA! Oh my gosh! Leonid Brezhnev DOES look like the pig from Angry Birds!!
I am so calling you Scar-Jo from now on.
And is it wrong that the picture of you made me snort-laugh.
And here I keep reading your blog for all of those great recipes, kiddie pictures & product reviews. Oh, & I’m glad that lice stuff worked for the kids.
Forgot to ask – is that really you? I’m not sure what I envisioned, but you look cute & normal. What a letdown.
I’ve never called myself a Mommyblogger…but I am writing a post right now on scrapbooking. And I do talk about my kids. I don’t do product reviews. But…I’m trying to learn to cook…so I’ve been thinking about talking about the stuff I managed not to give my family botulism with. I guess I am a mommyblogger. Well, now I know.
You know, those little parasols can carry lice. Just saying. Gal’s gotta be careful on a cruise ship. Wouldn’t you have thought that by 2011, when we can make phone calls with our cameras and send bad 140 character haiku to the entire world in an eyelash blink, we’d be beyond thinking that motherhood would become the defining totality of female experience? I mean, I’m a mom, I write online, I’ve even written about food AND posted photos of my children. So sure, I’m a “mommy blogger,” but the purview of “mommy,” in my mind, includes: politics, education, economics, food, pop culture, books, movies, and Jillian fucking Michaels. Because all of those things go into being a “mom.” Now I will step down off my soapbox and go looking for one of those fun cruise ship drinks.
You DO look so cute and normal. I envisioned my 8th grade PE teacher.
I like it! Can I be “Angelina-Jolie-But-Cuter-And-Funnier blogger”??
I think I’d rather be called a look-alike to an Angry Birds character than an 8th grade PE teacher. No offense to any 8th grade PE teachers who may read this.
I take offense to someone in a suit calling me a “mommy” when my own kids don’t even call me that. Though “jerkblogger” doesn’t really make me any happier.
(and yes, Wendi is super cute. . .though normal may be pushing it)
Apparently there’s an age limit to being a mommy blogger. Thank goodness I dodged that bullet. Not that there’s anything wrong with mommyblogging. And I don’t see any categories for smut-writing nanabloggers, so apparently I’m my own category. At least I have big boobs. Not sayin’ nothin’ about the lice.
Apparently, if you’re female and you have kids you’re a mom blogger. I just started blogging this year at age 51. I mention my kids but not in a nice way and yet…i’m pretty much grouped in there.
I thought about trying to change it but what the hell, why bother? i mean there are millions of moms out there and if only they read my blog, that’d still be a lot! so i quit bothering.
ALso, for some reason i thought you were a brunette. It’s kinda weirding me out now.
Don’t do it girl! You are not a mommyblogger. If you accept that you are, then I definitely have to cop to the fact that I am. I’d rather suck a hospital mop than to make that admission.
I swear I have a picture just like that of me somewhere. Only I might be sticking my tongue out. And also, instead of a drink umbrella behind my ear, maybe it was some dude’s sock.
Hairiest chest contest? i knew i loved you!
The swim dress made me pee a little. I mean because I was laughing. Not because I have bladder issues. As far as YOU know.
Also, I really want to meet your kids now. I LOVED Hogan’s Heroes!
Maybe we need to reclaim the term “Mommyblogger” kind of like “Queers” took back queer, or make the term so broad that it becomes meaningless.
On second thought, maybe not: “mommyblogger” sounds too much like “mommy booger” for my tastes.
I love that you referenced the Lido deck. Does every cruise ship have that? I would like to see you lounging around the pool in San Diego in that floral getup. I bet that has SPF built into the fibers.
I do dork modeling on the side when not executing super-fun PR campaigns with mommybloggers and that bathing costume photo is actually of me. Thanks. Thanks a lot.
You have kids? Damn.
What is wrong with scrapbooking, recipes, product reviews, and posting pictures of your kids doing cute things?
Oh, yeah, I don’t know how to do any of that stuff.
Still, if I could, I’d be an awesome mommyblogger.
Just like you would be, if you, you know, could do any of that stuff, too.
If you change your mind and want to be a Mommy Blogger — I’ll ghost write recipes for you. Plus, just post pictures of cute kids that come in the frames. No one will know. Screw the product reviews and scrapbooking tips. You can’t be everything to everyone — pick your battles!
So you never got caught for all the stranglings?
(I laughed out loud at this post. It’s so funny it makes me want to be a mummy blogger).
OMG he does look like an Angry Bird. Shit I will never look at the birds in the same way again.
I now have the answer as to WHY I never saw recipes or photos of your kids. You always do take out and there are no kids.
LOL
Totally. I don’t look like Scar-Jo (seriously, who the fuck comes up with these absurd nicknames??) but I do have bigger boobs than her.
Also, hello, you 25 year old jackass who just had the honor of sitting down for coffee and a chat with Wendi – just because we have proof that our reproductive system works and we have blogs doesn’t make us mommy bloggers. Though if you are an a**hole who works in PR I totally retain the right to call you PR a**hole.
LOLOL! Rock on Wendi!!
And this is why I love you. You Mommy Blogger you!
What’s a “recipe?”
:-/
A.
Right now you are my favorite mommy blogger of all time.
I can’t even call myself a blogger, much less any “type” of blogger. I’m an underachiever like that. Now gimme back my umbrella.
In that picture, you are channeling a pouty Reese Witherspoon. It is funny that the readers who don’t know you IRL thought you wouldn’t be cute. Guess they still think smart girls aren’t pretty!
Well crap – now i have delete all the pictures I have of me wearing that swimsuit. I was going to post them as a sort of May Day gift to my 6 readers. You’re so cruel.
Loved it!
Speaking of mom failures last night I ran a concession stand for my son’s baseball team. Yes in North Dakota the wind was blowing 80 miles an hour and it was cold! We ran out of food twice!!First we ran out of buns for the hot dogs and served the hot dogs on a hamburger bun-yes people who were hungry were ok with that then we ran out of buns totally and they actually just took a hot dog on a napkin!! So maybe we didn’t run out of food we were just resourceful!!??
You’re just a mommy blogger. Mommy blogger! Mommy blogger! Mommy blogger! You’re a mommy blogger.
Yeah, that might not make sense if you don’t remember the doorman scene from Knocked Up. Or haven’t seen it at all.
I have that swimsuit. I’m kidding. Maybe.
And as for recipes, I have LOADS. Most of them include: Gin, vodka, rum, brandy, whiskey, full-fat cola, ice, lemon and limes, a shaker, and SOMETIMES, a glass. I can post these on my Mommy Blog for you, if you would like?
At first from the picture I thought you were doing tequila shots and had conveniently stored a slice of lemon behind your right ear. But now I see it’s just a drink umbrella. My bad.
Every time someone says Mommyblogger to me I want to cry. And yet my latest post was about packing school lunches. Irony, thy name is Normalarkey.
I don’t know if you’d want bigger boobs than Scarlett. She already looks like she might topple over depending on the angle of the photo shot. You’ve got to love the labels. I guess I’d be childless/occasionally humorous/not quite ready for prime time blogger. I see the marketing potential, don’t you?
The term doesn’t bother me personally, it is what I do after all. But I’d say you’re definitely a humor blogger. Did you let the young guy get away with the mis-label? Sorry I can’t even TRY to be funny right now – so damn tired.
Holy Manilow, Nut Crusher! You let that twerp get away with that tripe? Have you lost your mojo?
Huh. Labels? I want one. But I’m not sure what I’d be. Fucking Swearing All the Fucking Time Blogger? I think that’s good enough.
PS I totally would have voted for you for the contest, hairy chest or no, because I believe that you should live your dreams.
I think regardless of what you say, if you are a Mom, everyone thinks you are a Mommy blogger.
I actually had someone criticize me for not talking about my kids for a few posts…they aren’t THAT exciting. I do some pretty damn fantastic things all on my own. Or at least I write about me too.
I have been adding recipes lately, but I call them recipe-ish because really they are emails to friends about things I periodically prepare and don’t know what I’m doing. Nothing new there.
I’m so glad you’re not a mommyblogger. Well, not one of *those* mommybloggers. I only eat Luna bars and Lean Cuisine, so I don’t know what I’d do with the recipes anyway.
“But I’d still rather be called a “Scarlett Johannson Look-A-Like But With Bigger Boobs blogger.” Wouldn’t you?”
Aaaaah… no!
I’d rather be one of the big boobs on a Scarlett Johannson Look-A-Like, if you follow me.
The mommyblogger name is so strange and pervasive. For example? At least once a week I get an email or get put on a Twitter list or encounter something that calls me a mommyblogger.
And I don’t even have kids.
Would your 25-year-old-male coffee date be called a boy-toy blogger or slackerblogger or cougarbloggerhound?
Just wondering.
I’d rather be called a Helen Mirren lookalike because she is classy and even older than me — and I want to wear combat boots with that lovely white dress she had on in RED. Oh, yeah, and let fly with the Ma Deuce, but hey. You can’t have everything.
You are the LEAST likely candidate for a mommyblogger. I mean that as the highest of compliments. And if you ever post a recipe. I will shove your head in your oven and we’ll find out if it’s gas or electric. Hugs and kisses, Chalupa
We should get mommy blogger t-shirts…for our cult
I was an event with mostly food bloggers and somewhow I was the lone “mom blogger” there and I referred to myself as having a lifestyle site called nycsinglemom.com because I felt mostly old because the food bloggers were all in there 20s.
I’d definitely go w/ the bigger boob nickname. Give you some sort of distinction. I’ve been told by people from high school and college that I remind them of ‘the girl from The Cutting Edge, but less of a bitch.’ Which I think is a shame because I’d like to think I’m a bigger bitch than that.
Could you use MommyBlogger and SoccerMom while driving the Mommy Shuttle Van?