finally...some content management!!

dear Plothickins team members...nancy will now be Outsourcing to India!
this way she won't skip a day or two when she's busy with the kids or on deadline with so-called Real jobs. you'll get to hear from Aman Choudhary, Managing Partner--a Solutions Specialist, maybe he'd like to meet Michelle the Area Specialist? (see January). Regardless, he will be able to take care of all your Plothickins needs while nancy's driving to SAMOHI, drawing spot illustrations, bbq-ing a Memorial Day flank steak or just cleaning up Otto's poop under her desk (his fav spot).
never again will anyone have to go to The Plothickins and find a stale entry....Aman Choudhary wants to work this Organization and keep lines open 24/7.

see below:

Dear Sir/Madam,

I am following up on the email I had sent you last week.

Aman Choudhary, Managing Partner and Founder, IOTAP would like me to arrange a conference call with you.

If you have few minutes to spare Aman would like to discuss the following items:
a) Discuss possible partnership possibilities
b) Present a proposal on how IOTAP can work together with your organization
c) References and case studies of IOTAP's working relationship with other companies and how they have benefited

I have attached a copy IOTAP's pricing sheet for your reference.

Let me know if you or someone appropriate would be able to speak with Aman.

You can view a brief flash presentation of our CRM Practice on: http://www.iotap.com/cms

If you have any questions, please let me know. I look forward on hearing back from you.

Regards - Ashwini
_______________________________________
Ashwini Kulkarni
Solutions Specialist, IOTAP
(O) USA +1.480.282.8751
(O) India +91.22.2837.5300
(E) akulkarni@iotap.com
(W) www.iotap.com

From: Ashwini Kulkarni [mailto:akulkarni@iotap.com]
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2007 3:18 PM
To: 'nancy@nancy.com'
Subject: Content Management Solution from IOTAP

Dear Nancy,
I found details about your Nancy in a web design directory.

I am Solutions Specialist at IOTAP which provides Content Management Solutions.

At a high level, the following is what we would like to offer you:
- A Content Management System to your customers, so they can easily update web content in a Microsoft word like editor
- The website can be easily integrated with Google

How can we work together:
- Your company would design the wire frame (template) and supply us that
- IOTAP’s engineers would convert that design and deploy that on a Content Management Solution

Here is a flash presentation on our CMS solution offering: www.iotap.com/cms

we use Dot Net Nuke (DNN) product in our CMS Solution.

Regards –Ashwini

_______________________________________
Ashwini Kulkarni
Solutions Specialist, IOTAP
(O) USA +1.480.282.8751
(O) India +91.22.2837.5300
(E) akulkarni@iotap.com
(W) www.iotap.com

my roommates at the Ritz Carlton

Back from Bourbon Street

Where's your Binder Reminder?

jonah keeps his right here.

"Binder Reminder" is the cute little name for the datebook given out to all highschool students to keep track of their studies and sports. it's got the school logo on its cover and nancy loves the way 'don't forget your Binder Reminder!' sounds so much better than 'get your fucking homework done." nancy thinks the Binder Reminder *dresses up* what could be an unpleasant or challenging concept. the happy rhyming words make the odious task of remembering to study for that math quiz or show up for the 7am 5K seem FUN! and the space for writing is really really small...so you can't fill it up with lots of junk. you have to pare it down BEFORE you write, so even the act of fitting all your important stuff into a 1.5x1.5 inch square box gets you organized right away!

Organizationally Gifted Daughter takes to this like a Jewish princess to Marc Jacobs. she has hers with her at all times,
in fact, at this moment it's IN her Marc Jacobs bag. today, May 22nd, like every other day is crammed with homework assignments, errands to run, phonecalls to make....reminders galore that give Maddy a real leg up on her day.
and what she can't fit in here, she puts on her White Board at home. and what doesn't fit on her White Board she makes her mother remember or her father pay for.

in contrast to his sister--like complementary colors, as yellow is to purple, like yin is to yang -- Organizationally Challenged Son keeps his Binder Reminder on the floor of the front seat of mom's car.
nothing has been entered since early April except for a "reminder" to himself that it's his birthday.
since we like to think of ourselves as a supportive family who embraces diversity (and we're so good at wearing even bad things well and we don't like to be too matchy/matchy with our outfits or our personalities) we consider it progress that anything has been entered at all. moreover, we fully accept and almost appreciate the zen quality of jonah's empty binder reminder. that's why, it remains yet again on the floor of mom's car getting trampled by feet in late May next to his Spanish book which hasn't been opened since February. Unphased by this, the human Binder Reminder daughter/sister faithfully and sweetly asks organizationally challenged brother: Don't you need your Binder Reminder? and proud mom watches her teens tumble out of the car as he says for the 47th day in a row: No.

and jonah walks off without his Binder Reminder. but we tried. and we'll try again tomorrow.
Is this love or enabling? optimism or codependence? hope springs eternal and the glass half full?
or a form of OCD in one kid, ADD/sociopathy in the other and a mom with a little too much magical thinking.
makes you wonder, is it possible to secrete TOO MUCH serotonin? should i not find this all so Positive...and cute?
as long as we're pathologizing, maybe it's that oft-invoked definition of insanity that bitter bummer ex-father-in-law Grandpa12Step likes to spew - the one about doing the same thing repeatedly expecting different results.

all nancy notices is that they leave the car happy, together...and thoroughly entertaining.
still fighting the good sibling fight. resilient and hopeful.
saying Bye mom, i love you. see you at 3.
and all joking aside, nancy thinks this looks and IS pretty great.
the fact that they watch out for each other makes nancy wear a very big smile.
corny as it sounds, she drives out of the morning school traffic with a full happy heart filled with the humor and great goofy love of her kids from whom she always learns so much. whether it's how to stay away from weird hats--you don't wanna become a Weird Hat Mom and they'll let you know if you are. or how to stay a kind, hopeful, loving person despite the occasional Shut up you Fucktard. all this makes nancy feel like maybe she's doing a good job with them. or maybe she's just lucky--like being born with a fast metabolism. but right now nancy feesl pretty darn good about the People her kids are becoming from the inside out, binder reminders or not, as she drives home in the wrinkled clothes she slept in last night.

which brings us to....
today nancy is wearing a white linen shirt and a cotton blend strawberry shake colored sweater. just like the shake she got jonah from In n Out burger last night at 10:30pm. she wears a fleur de lis around her neck from new orleans that reminds her of those st. christophers she always wanted as a teen but couldn't get cuz she was jewish in mar vista. she's wearing levi jeans that are a weird light weight of denim but have a nice, flattering taper to the leg. as far as sleeping in clothes, this was an excellent choice, not that she thought about it much, being somewhat drowsy after enjoying an ice cold pale yellow Kumquat Sake after work with a Benedryl chaser to get the buzzing out of her ears from the flight home from New Orleans two days ago. but the outfit, such as it is, wears the wrinkles well. as we all know, linen is of course GREAT for that, the more wrinkled the better. the more disheveled the sexier! and FYI, nancy found the light weight denim far more comfortable to sleep in than the indigo dyed firmer denim of her cropped japanese brand jeans which have a more snug fit but leave painful and unattractive indentations on your skin in the morning. here are those jeans in the lobby of the Ritz Carlton, New Orleans. in the spirit of Jonah's binder reminder which only shows his birthday, nancy has cropped the shot of the cropped jeans because nancy didn't like her face in this picture. and she was wearing a weird Mom Hat. she's learned something from jonah's minimalist binder reminder -- just crop out the bad stuff and keep the good!!

i like your skirt

where will i pack my digital?

going on a little vacation this weekend and there's no more room in my suitcase. thank god cameras are so compact these days.

Happy Mother's Day

Hallmark had every card i needed!!

Which applications are we running today?

are we running Photoshop? are we applying for a loan? or are we just using iPhoto to apply our lipgloss?

I can sell your house

meet terry and david. they can sell my house. and they've been telling me this for a very long time.
they've been dropping off those little pads of paper for almost 3 years now. especially since they ran into my ex at a 12 step meeting and *networked* that we were splitting up. sleuthing who's getting divorced in WLA is like finding a dead tenant in a NYC apt buidling. reminds me of when i lived on 77th and West End in a really weird studio apt in the 80s where you had to walk through the kitchen to get to the toilet. i was wishing to upgrade so I let my super know to contact me if anything bigger opened up. one day, there's a knock at my door and it's the Super. i open the door and he says: The lady in 11D is dead.

anyway, back to Terry and David....
they drop their little handy pads of paper on my doorstep with their little teeny tiny black and white photo wearing their Black Real Eastate Suits. they're so smart--just in case i forgot or in the event i ran out of cash in a bigger way than usual--i can do my grocery list on that pad as i'm subliminally reminded that They Can Sell My House. makes me wonder if they ran into my ex again at the celebrity AA meeting or they've got a deal going with FICO and they know how bad my credit is.

but i've got scoop on them too.

i happen to know from when i used to bump into Terry in the neighborhood and get invited to their Theme Parties that Terry has a sweater collection of about 200+ cashmeres, cottons and blends that drives David crazy. other than that they seem to have a good marriage. they both streak their hair and work out a lot at the gym. they're pretty in sync and they're always on the job--you never know who might be at the gym, newly divorced, trying to conquer depression and lose a few pounds to start dating again. and with the monthly cost of the gym and the dwindling child support...you never know who might be crashing their budget causing them to NEED to sell their house.

anyway, they might need to buy a new house themselves if she doesn't stop buying so many sweaters!

wow some women are married to such tolerant guys - my ex used Too Many Sweaters as grounds for divorce. i had so many he finally left!! then again, a la 12 step - i guess i have to own my actions. maybe i bought so many sweaters to drive him out of the house. or at least out of the closet. maybe i didn't properly acknowledge how anxious it made him that i HAD so many sweaters. and enjoyed them even as i couldn't keep track of them (just like what i do with the kids). that drove him extra crazy. enjoying stuff was a big bummer around here. well, i guess we'll never know if i drove him out of the closet....but one's things for sure: i now have plenty of room for my sweaters though not as much money to buy them since i'm on a divorce budget.

but at least i don't have to move.
sorry terry and david! i'll keep you posted if things change.

Today nancy is recommending

Better Together on Amazon.com--and you'll qualify for free shipping too!

Testing Boundaries

or what to wear (and not wear) when serving after school lemonade to your post puberty kids.
here's how to gross out your teenagers. or just test a boundary or two on your average gorgeous day in So Cal when there are no pressing deadlines and you don't feel like adding up your debt or even getting dressed. you just feel like celebrating the end of that awful Seasonal Affect Disorder that came over you this winter (in LA this means it was cloudy two days a month, the weather dropped below 72 and all you felt like wearing was pajamas - see blog images Jan - March).
so you hit the bathing suit drawer to see how last year's bikini will fit the mood, the body, the escalating temperatures inside and out and what would've been your 22nd wedding anniversary in june. you're reminded of Gilda Radner's riff on how bad everyone looks on Memorial Day. but you brave it anyway. gotta start somewhere.
and when Dad (aka your ex) drops off your two adorable teens after school -- your 15yo skate rat/Megadeth-infused son and that 17yo stressed out pre-college, voluptuous daughter -- you answer the door in a bikini. in May.
when you notice that your son is having trouble looking at you, distract him by telling him there's a dead baby opposum in the backyard.
go get a shovel for him to clean it up. walk in front him putting it out of your mind how grossed out you'd be to see your own ass from this view. when he asks where the poor little dead baby animal is, tell him it's behind the trampoline--that you discovered it when you were jumping there earlier that day. in fact, when you noticed the opossum you had to jump the other way. eww. gross. it was so sad--you didn't think you even cared for opossums till you saw this little baby one. dead.
you realize at this moment that anything's cute when it's a baby. and anything's sad when it's dead. but you need to the exercise, so you simply turn the other butt cheek and keep jumping. facing the newly lush bouganvilla.
turns out your 15yo son will be extra grossed out at this--not the opossum, he'll think that's cool--but the fact that you jumped on the trampoline in a bikini by yourself. in the middle of the day. bonus points!
your son will say: what will the neighbors think when they see a 50yo woman with white May skin in a string bikini bouncing around the backyard? you and your son will laugh. he has a sense of humor about it. you've found this boundary and it's not a bad one. you even hope this is the beginning of Respecting Women.
but your 17yo daughter doesn't find anything funny about any of it. not the bikini, the jumping, or the poor little dead animal. she inspects the little gray and black dead baby opossum with her brother then retreats to her hot pink bedroom to chill. you try to deflect her by whipping up some fresh lemonade in a beautiful glass pitcher. (just as you know to deflect away from your physical flaws when you dress, you know to do this emotionally too) very June Cleaver except for the blue string bikini and the shock of white May skin. you serve a beautiful icy pink glass of lemonade to her as she checks her email on her pink double bed with the yellow satin bedspread and treats you like her secretary. she accepts it without looking up. then she looks you straight in the eye of the negative space of the bikini (your tummy) and with undisguised disgust she flat out requests that you Get Dressed. you think you are dressed. for something. you ask her why she wants you to put something else on. she says because you look gross.
then she accuses you of being Julie Cooper the slutty mom from her favorite show The OC. all four seasons of the OC, as you cuddled on the couch with your teens and bonded with them, dumbing down your own TV sensibilities to enjoy closeness and teen travails with your kids, you stupidly thought you were getting away with reminding the kids of Kirsten the good mom with the pretty long neck and the moral compass who serves lemonade and is understanding about everything. jonah would even say so occasionally. but no. now you're Julie the bad mom who dresses inappropriately, sleeps with her daughter's friends and marries for money. all because you answered the door in a bikini. in may. after school. and without a trip to beach and a proper cover up. (so, now you have learned somthing new about Boundaries: outfits need Context and Goals and permission slips from your 17yo daughter).

well...gotta go. jonah's calling. the opposum is in the trash, the shovel's put away. and he wants extra allowance this week.
but interestingly, right now he wants a snack - something deep fried and dipped in chocolate he says. something that'll rip his heart out. he's STARVING. thank god someone didn't lose their appetite due to a misappropriated bikini or a dead opossum. go figure--his sister literally studies the dead little baby opossum over by the trampoline and that doesn't bug her at all. but seeing mom in bikini without warning or a little sand on the beach - that's another story. shocking. ewww.
GROSS.
but also interesting to note: just now, your 17yo fashionista CEO is busy dying a strand of her hair hot pink. for that Inde look. she pops in to show gross bikini-clad mom the progress. in fact, she wants approval and...advice from her scantily clothed lemonade toting mother despite mom's fashion faux pas of the day--or maybe she's just become desensitized to the profound grossness of it all. in may.

kids are so great that way. so much more fluid than adults, like the waves at the beach you're supposed to be next to in this bikini. they are unconditional in a conditional kind of way. you embarrass and disgust them one minute--they need you,love you, want your opinion the next.

ok, better go fry up some chocolate and serve some more lemonade before the kids lose their appetite for good.
happy bikini wearing all you mid-century moms. don't take offense, just take this entry as Data..or my latest fashion tip.
just know that a dead decomposing baby opposum will NOT gross out your kids, but appearing in a bikini will.

Borderline Personality

which aisle are we shopping in today?