So, this is the 2 days where I am unemployed.  After an incredibly wonderful run with b5media, it is time to make a change. 

I began writing what is now eBeautyDaily in July of 2005, at AboutWeblogs.com.  An incredible group of women that welcomed me, a new blogger, with open arms.  In November of 2005, About Weblogs merged with b5media.  I adored the concept, and of course I adored Darren Rowse, so being behind b5media 110% was a no brainer.  At the time, I was not working, as I had not since I married and moved to TX.  I was at home helping my husband recover from his near fatal battle with MRSA.  His recovery took about 9 months, and he wasn’t working and finally told me I needed to go to work. 

So, I did not go down to Dillard’s and get a job at the makeup counter – I decided to do web sites.  Apparently I didn’t think I really “needed” to make money.  LOL  But I had started a community for MRSA sufferers, as there was NOTHING online at the time.  I then decided I was going to write a book about nails, having spent the nearly 20 years prior as a nail tech and a salon owner.  This led me eventually to AboutWeblogs, where I joined as a beauty blogger – one of the first.

A few months after I joined b5media, Jeremy needed some assistance.  I was so digging this blogging thing – I knew it was going to be HUGE from the minute I discovered it. So I jumped at the chance to be his $10/hr lackey. ;)  I loved it.  Ate it, drank it and slept it from day one.  Shortly thereafter, my gracious and dear friend Hsien gave up being the editor of the “Women’s Channel” – and we split that channel up and I became the editor of the superfantastic Beauty & Style Channel (and the Arts & Crafts, Home & Dining, and Lifestyles  Channels).  I guess I have been the CE over almost all of the channels at one point or another. ;) 

After our round of funding came in mid-2006, I got a “real job” – Project Manager.   That soon changed to Content Manager, as I really wasn’t a PM.  I was having a blast.  Lots of socializing, lots of “nose to the grindstone” – the thrill (and related mental exhaustion!) of a startup.  Love love love. 

In the spring of this year, I was approached to take over the Director of Content role.  We have gone through several directors – its a tough, tough job – attempted by some of the most brilliant people I have met.  I declined it, as I am much more about having a great time than trying to make as much money as I can make (hubby is obviously working again at this point…lol) but somehow I wiggled into the Associate Director role.  Tough stuff.  But, I love the people and I love the company, so I’ll do what needs to be done.  Im not sure what I could do beyond eat, drink and sleep b5media, but I did it.  I still loved it, although this has been an incredibly tough year.  I have lost several people who I considered dear friends.  I will always have some sadness over that, but it comes with the job, I guess.  Flashback to the end of The Devil Wears Prada.

So amongst all of this work work working – I still got to play beauty blogger.  Beauty is my first love.  I’ve had so many neat opportunities come my way because of beauty blogging.  I’ve been to Fashion Week, got to be a Glam Editor for the Day in NYC, had the opportunity (did not take it) to fly with the Victoria’s Secret models cross country on Virgin Airlines.  I have been quoted in the New York Times, Allure, Women’s Wear Daily and Texas Monthly magazines.  I have been to many amazing parties and had the opportunity to meet some truly amazing people, all while being privy to amazing new product launches, and a foot into the door of the industry I adore.  All these geeky bloggers I am around all the time - they think that tech blogging is all that’s out there and all that matters.  ;)  They have no idea how the beauty industry has adopted beauty blogging.  It is incredible, has grown into a massive genre of blogging, and is something that I am so proud to have been and early adopter of.  And then I went to L.A. in the spring, to the Total Beauty Blog Summit, where my dear friend Teri and I spoke on SEO.  Beauty and geekery all rolled into one.  LOVE!

So this summit took place in the offices of Intelligent Beauty.  While I don’t think that IB was wowed by my wonderful public speaking (it is my biggest phobia), they certainly did take an interest.  The amazing co-CEO’s Adam Goldenberg and Don Ressler, paid me quite a bit of attention and spoke to me a lot while I was there.  Knowing their history, silly me thought they were interested in b5media, but a few months down the line, I was contacted and asked to help them learn how to reach bloggers.  At first I thought I could do a little consulting on the side (although I didn’t know where I would find the time – not much time between eating drinking and sleeping b5media), but it soon became apparent that they were having none of that. ;)  So after realizing that this was THE PERFECT BLEND of beauty and geekery, and having a couple of good friends slap me in the face (thanks girls – you know who you are), I had no choice but to realize that my dream job was sitting in front of me, and I would be a fool to walk past it.  So, starting on Monday, I will begin a new adventure as Community Director of Blush, which is a subsidiary of Intelligent Beauty.  Go sign up for our newsletters - it is the bare bones beta start of something that is going to be great - this I guarantee you.  If you are a beauty junkie like me, anyway.

To my beloved (and I really, really mean that) Channel Editors – many of you have become friends who I will always hold very, very dear to my heart.  I have told you all that this change is going to be good – and I feel deep down in my heart it was the right thing to do, both for me, and for b5media.  Hang in there. Thank you all for everything, again.   I love you all so much, wish you the very, very best, and will always be behind you 110%. 

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox,

CJ

***Update***
As of Sept. 12, I have pulled out of b5media completely. If you’re looking for my beauty rants and raves (hopefully mostly raves), please keep in touch with me at Christina Loves…

Yup, thats me. 2008 has proved to be a wild and woolly year for me so far. We got through Christmas, then took off for Fall 08 Fashion Week in January/February. Then had South by Southwest (in my backyard in Austin, but regardless, gone for a week) in March. Then went to the Beauty Editor for a Day with Glam in early April, back to NYC. Then May has been a whirlwind - A week in Toronto at the b5media HQ, then 4 days in Los Angeles to attend and speak at the Total Beauty Blog Summit, and then last, but not least, my BFF Suzzann was here for 5 days and just left this morning (*sob*). Dare I say it - I have no more trips on the schedule. The last two times I said that I got slapped with (great!) trips. But I am super grateful for all the great opportunities I have had this year, but it has left it nearly impossible to blog. Im doing my best to keep up with my beloved eBeautyDaily, but even that has been challenging this year. It is shocking to me that it is almost June, almost halfway through 2008 - but its been a blast for sure. Opportunities that I would have never dreamed of.

My darling Zoe graduated from 8th grade last week and is moving into Rudder High School next fall. Yowza - I wish I could slow time down a little. We have made it through the spring and have 8 bloodhound/australian shepard puppies and 7 of the cutest kittens you have ever seen. Mom is in Colorado finalizing things with Grandpa’s estate. Must. water. plants.

Ok so Im going to make a renewed effort to get back to some personal blogging - this post being a pitiful kick in the ass to get started. Someone poke me if I dont update regularly, ok?

Just in case you haven’t had enough of The Rock:

So, yeah, its been awhile. No rest for the weary. I have had tons going on, between lots of work, tennis and soccer season, I am on the move these days! And well there was that lost week in Vegas. I came home from Blog World Expo super-renewed though (thank God not super hung over and exhausted…LOL), and until a massive workload brings me back down to reality again, I am working hard on some special projects. The first one is video production.

I have been dabbling with this, but only to the extent of overcoming my fear of putting myself out there - and I guess I am officially past that now, so its time to move on to the next step. I spent some time in Chicago this summer at BlogHer talking to my dear friend Robyn about videoblogging - she is a pro, but unfortunately, she is a Mac fangirl (as opposed to a MAC addict, like me). So, while she was an absolute wealth of information on important things like lighting, she wasn’t able to help me much on software, which is the first thing I need to tackle. So I chatted her up again in Vegas last week, and tried to pry PC video software ideas from a Mac girl. Again. Not a great idea. LOL So, I have been doing some serious homework, and have tried out Sony Vegas (oy-confusing!), Cyberlink Power Director (worst. program. evah. to try to get off your computer, but easier to understand than Vegas, BUT it didn’t seem to like my Vista computer much), and Pinnacle Studio (I think I am going to like this one best).

My next issue is getting my DV video camera to talk to my computer. I can hook it up with good ol USB cables, but boy does that give me some crappy results. Ok for webcamming, not so good for actual video capture/transfer. It is time to upgrade. So, I headed out to the dreaded Best Buy for a FireWire/iLink/1384 cable tonight after work. Oy. $50 bites the dust, and after I cussed and fussed about not being able to fit the dern plugs into the holes, I finally got them in. Apparently this is a common problem for the first time you plug them in. So all is well there - I think.

So why do you care about this? You probably don’t, but I am really trying to encourage and help my fellow Beauty & Style bloggers to branch out into video blogging, so I thought that chronicling my adventures might be helpful. And if a PC video producer happens by, maybe they can point me in their version of the right direction.

So, tomorrow morning, I am going to try to shoot an actual little video and see what I can do with it. I look too rough today to shoot myself, but Marshall has long wanted me to get The Rock on the web, so tomorrow, he is going to be the star. The next step after that is to figure out where I want to post these videos - I feel the need to branch out from YouTube, I think. Stay tuned, and if you have any video advice for me, please feel free to give it.

I have been meaning to write about One Note for a VERY long time, but who has the time? Not I, said the fox. But, I want to at least make a mention of it while it’s on my mind this morning.

I got One Note on my computer when my step son needed it for something he was doing at school and downloaded it on my computer. Well, back to school he went (LSU), and here sat One Note. Man, is this a great program. It is a note taking software - you can add just about anything to it - plain text, web clippings, mp3 files, images, documents, spreadsheets - anything you can imagine. You organize these things in notebooks and folders, just like you would if you were in school and living in a non-geeky world. I upgraded to One Note 2007 as soon as it became available, and it was a massive improvement mostly in the organizational options. Whereas in the older version you could only easily have one notebook (with folders within), you can now have multiple notebooks (aligned vertically along the left hand side below), which really suits me since I wear so many hats these days.

This has been truly a lifesaver for me. One Note can be set up on two computers and with just a little bit of configuration will sync itself - so it is on my desktop, that I use most often, and on my laptop, where all the information can stay current, and I can hit the road without fear of not having everything I need. I use OneNote mostly for my b5media work, where I have it organized into a notebook with all of my various non-content related projects, one notebook for the content team, another for channel editors, another for the Beauty & Style channel, one for Blogging, and one for all my personal stuff. Pages and sections are easy to move and copy from notebook to notebook - this is the perfect organizational program to me. And One Note 2007 is a much improved version, so definitely spring for that one. If you have Office 2007 and have just ignored the One Note packaged in with it, open it up - you might find it to be a great tool like I have, whether you have 92,000 projects to keep up with or just one.

With the build 600 version of BlogDesk, it is now fully functioning on my Vista laptop! w00t!!! The prior problem was that when clicking the add picture button, nothing happened - no “browse for the picture” window.

Thanks Johannes - you still have the most kick ass editor out there! If you love BD like I do, think about slipping Johannes a little skin - I sure don’t want him to quit updating!

I will say that Windows Live Writer has worked in the off season though, so it is good to know it works and I can fall back on it.

Passive Aggressive Notes is a fun website that just slipped into the “just for fun” section of my feed reader next to Desperately Seeking…Something (NSFW!!), Post Secret and True Wife Confessions. Check it out, its most humorous.

Suzzann, this means you.  And anyone else who loves music - b5media is looking for music bloggers to fill up our soon-to-come Music Channel.  Do I need to tell you that b5 is a fun place to be if you are passionate?  I hope not. :)  It really is.  If you live and breathe music, whether it be a specific band, genre or even an especially music friendly locale (*cough* Suzzann *cough*), b5media wants to hear from you.  Please head on over to our application and tell us about yourself.  If you are a writer and think you can write about anything, this is probably not the job for you.  We want passionate music lovers so we can create the best music channel working the tubes.  I know you are out there - if you think I am talking about you, I probably am, so come on and join us.  

Immediately after posting “The Perfect Guy,” this ad shows up:

ROFL

I already have mine, but if you need yours, find a man who reads Men’s Health - OR SheKnowsBest. Dexie shares these fine points of how to be the perfect man - with my comments added instead of hers:

1. Don’t worry about looking like Brad Pitt - thats always good though.

2. Do something when she’s in a bad mood - let her take a nap - feed yourself - feed the kids - feed something so she doesn’t have to (or do some dishes, if all else fails)

3. Know when — and how — to be a gentleman

4. Ditch any and all jealousy triggers - jealousy will run off your woman something quick - or at least it should. Same goes for you, girls.

5. Hone your kissing skills

6. Take your sweet time in the sack.

7. Give her the best orgasm of her life. 5, 6 and 7 - OH YEAH.

Now, what I really want to know is what MY hubby thinks about this “perfect man” list. This should be good.

Check out Dexie’s original post for her commentary on the perfect man list.