I'm pretty sure they don't even know how to read

In the last few months, I've gotten no more than four requests from CSN to host a giveaway or review on my blog.  I'm pretty certain that if they read this great little section under the tab labeled Media Policythey would know, I don't do reviews unless you're a book publisher. Or you want to give me a car (partial to Mercedes and BMW but I'm not altogether picky).  Or a free trip.  But it would have to be a real trip not like the time I was offered a trip to South Carolina to write about the great state and I gave them my home address to recive the information and I never heard from them again...Actually that was probably a ploy to sign me up for spam.  Then again that was a few addresses ago, so suckers!  I move way to much for anyone too track me down.

This CSN thing is really bugging me.  As I've told them several times, I am not going to now nor ever work with their company.  There's a very specific reason why.

Last year I hosted a review/giveaway for them.  I got my product (an automatic wine opener) and I picked a winner for the giveaway.  I supplied the winners address and that was that.  Or so I thought.  When I emailed the winner to make sure they'd gotten the product, imagine my surprise to learn they never got it.  Oversights do happen (apparently in my giveaways, they've happened twice, hence why I no longer do them!) 

CSN never bothered to respond to my emails asking what had happened to the prize (and I immediately yanked the post when I didn't get any response).  I was so mortified that this would be the impression the winner would have of me, I bought a wineopener myself (not from them!) and threw in a gift card in a vain hope that she wouldn't blackball me to everyone around.  (She was sweet and understanding and thankfully didn't.)

If they would bother to read my blog, and the two emails I sent regarding the first two requests, they would know I have ZERO interest in ever hosting a single giveaway or review with them.  My thinking pretty much goes like this, if you are going to offer a tit-for-tat then keep your end of the bargain.  Don't ignore emails from bloggers with whom you've made a written agreement.

In the blog world it's pretty simple I think.  Do what you promise.  Cause us bloggers, we've got  a really long memory and the power of the internet...

Have you ever been wholly disillusioned hosting a giveaway?  What happened?

*If you've ever been a winner of one of my giveaways and didn't get your prize - tell me!  I can't make it right if I don't know it happened!

Oh Chicago!

This past weekend the family and I went to Chicago.  Unfortunately, we had to drive.  It was hell a rather interesting journey.  None of us had ever been to Chicago other than the airport (well, other than the time I was flying with Thor, alone, to my parents house when he was 2, and we got stuck overnight, but that's a whole other story).  So this was kind of exciting. 

In case you didn't know, I love big cities.  Like love love big cities.  If I had my way, we'd live in New York city and my kids would be those city urchin kids who navigate the streets like its second nature.

We stayed at The James Chicago, a fantastic boutique type hotel on Rush Street.  Modern, contemporary, cute.  The staff was very friendly, the room a pretty decent size for a city and the beds were nice and plush.  This would have been a great bonus if I hadn't been sleeping in the same bed with Chick who kicks and grinds her teeth at night *shudder.  Anyway, I fell a smidge in love with Chicago last weekend.  In all actuality, I fell head over heels in love with Chicago.  Here are a few reasons why:

I know, it's just a bunch of buildings (sorry if the pictures aren't excellent, I took them from a trolley tour bus.  It was effing cold in Chicago last weekend!  But I still loved it.)  I love architecture.  I love buildings.  Chicago is full of rich blends of architecture, old and new right next to each other.  Mies van der Rohe, one of my very favorite architects, designed several residential bulidings on Lake Shore Drive.  The buildings were very forward thinking for the time, made of glass and steel.  To be right there next to them...well, for me that was pretty gosh dang fantastic.

The other thing I loved, besides enormous, fantastic breakfasts at both Yolk  in Streeterville and Eggsperience; I highly recommend both places, we even went to Yolk twice.  Their coffee was so good, I didn't even add sugar and the food...sigh, yum.  I literally distracted myself from what I was saying by thinking about the food.  What did I love besides the food and the buildings?

The people.  I don't know if it's a midwest thing, or a Chicago thing, or even what exactly to say that explains it but, the city is just friendly.  It's a very different feel than New York.  New York is hectic, frenetic, crazy insane wonderful.  There are people clogging every street and it beats a constant thrum all its own that can't be dupilicated.

Chicago is different.  Maybe because we were there when it was 20 degrees (I really get why it's called the windy city now, really get it.)  Maybe that kept people off the streets a bit.  But everywhere we went, from the restaurants to the musuems to the bus to the train, people were just friendlier.  People were more relaxed.  Maybe it was me who was more relaxed, but I felt a big difference from being New York.  The difference isn't good or bad...just different.

 Children's Musuem Wet World Raincoats

Picture for memory purpose only, no, I am not going to be a Cubs fan!

We had a great time.  The kids loved it (I even caught camera shy Thor digging the trolley tour which was 2.5 hours long).  We went on the Chicago Trolley and Bus Tour experience (our driver/guide was so dang funny.  I think his name was Yorn? York?).  We went to the Musuem of Science and Industry, The Children's Musuem, Wrigley Field, Navy Pier and walked down the Magnificent Mile of Michigan Avenue.

I loved Chicago.  Chicago loved me.  I can't wait to go back.

What's your favorite place?  Where have you been recently that left you feeling speechless?

Delurking day, the truth about adoption

It is delurking day.  The day where we come out of the internet’s shadows and comment on a blog we read but maybe never acknowledge.  I don’t know if this post personifies that theme well, but I sat down at a blank screen and this is just what I wrote.

Chick at 5 months (before our referral)

If the world could look past the preconceived idea that love is instant when it comes to a child, if they could see all the pain and the suffering and confusion, in each persons eyes, the child and the parent, then maybe they wouldn’t be so quick to judge.  If we could take an honest look at what adoption feels like, I think most people would be shocked.  It is not an instantaneous love, a perfect joining of child and in my case mother.  I didn’t look at her as she screamed and cried in my arms, straining for her nannies, her familiar bed, the only one she had ever known, and say I love you.  I couldn’t comfort her in the weeks and months to come.  The betrayal in her eyes as I held her down for the nurses while they repeatedly poked needles in her arms and x-rayed her liver.  All so we could know that in the future she might have to go through it all again.

The nurse asked me to sing her favorite song.  How would I know what that was?  I wanted to say, I’ve known this child for two weeks, I know nothing about her, about what comforts her.  I don’t know how to hold her hand or rub her head the way she wants me to.  At fifteen months, she is a stranger to me and I to her.

Our first hours together in Taipei

I had nine months to prepare for my son.  We started our journey together from day one.  From the first moment of life, we were in this thing together.  We had time to learn about each other, how hot he liked his milk, what soothed him to sleep, how he seemed to love music straight from the start. 

Pregnancy months and adoption months are very different.  Adoption months are much longer than nine, my adoption pregnancy lasted sixteen months. I know I’d do it all over again to get the same little girl who’s laugh makes you smile and who’s hugs melt your heart.  The process is painful and long and it seems never ending.  After eight months of staring at her picture, watching her grow ever bigger before my eyes, first steps, first teeth, first laugh, first birthday…I almost did give up.  Some people do.   And I commend them for even having tried.  Adoption can take even the strongest and turn them into a sleepless mess.  You even start to hate the people whose names get called before yours.  They got your referral or your travel call.  They flew through the process while you remained stuck, stuffing down week after week of heartache every time someone cared enough to ask if there was any news.  No, there’s no news.

Summer 2010

At a very precocious, bossy, charming four and half, I love my daughter.  Even when she screams at me, and stomps her feet up the stairs, and yes, even when she slams the door to her room making me count to twenty, and then count to twenty again.  I love her because we’ve had all this time together now, over three years to learn about each other.  I know she loves spicy foods, can steal your entire bowl of rice before you can even blink, she loves dogs and wants to pet everyone she sees, and she dances and claims Supermassive Black Hole is her favorite song.  And while she might not always be easy to understand, as her mother, I know every word she speaks because that’s just how it is with a mother and a daughter.

I wish so many other adoptive parents would share what it’s really like those first months, because for most of us, it is the same.  It’s hard.  It is not what you thought it was supposed to be.  It is not the story so many tell of everything just being perfect from day one.  If we could step back and say, here is the honest, hard, painful truth about what adopting a child is like, we’d be better prepared for it.  It would not have changed my decision to adopt for a second.  But maybe it would have helped me feel less like a failure, less like I was doing something wrong and more like what was happening was okay.  In fact, it was normal.  

If you know someone who’s adopting, thinking of adopting or has adopted, remember that not everything is always wonderful, even if they tell you it is.  It is a long process to feeling that love…and the thing is, in the end, that really is okay.

If you thought this post was worthy of delurking I hope you'll leave a comment and let me know.