(2) My deep-dish and uncomfortable thoughts on free stuff. When it comes to free stuff, I don't go looking for it but don't get me wrong, booyah! I luuuurve free stuff. Hell, if swag lands in my lap and it's of use to me, into the bag it goes. In fact, I pack light going to BlogHer because so many generous sponsors and party hosts give tokens of appreciation for attending their party. Attending being a very key word in that sentence. It is never expected but damn it's nice and I know it's going to happen. But if it didn't happen, it wouldn't change my weekend.
Anyhow, the swag thing at BlogHer was weird this year. There was a very small number of the generally awesome population acting like freaks. Freaks as in committing blackmail over shoes or like in my personal experience while working the door at The People's Party where I witnessed something small but strange. This incident kind of set the tone for me on the subject of free stuff over the weekend.
Let me explain it the best way I can: As a hostess of The People's Party, I was handing out drink tickets and big welcoming smiles and/or hellos to everyone I could reach as they surged (literally SURGED) through the doors. When the surging had died down to a well-heeled stampede, I witnessed a woman come in, make a beeline to the swag bags, grab four (!) (as in two on each arm), and then promptly turn around and march out. The only reason I remember her so specifically is she totally didn't make eye-contact with me when I tried to hand her a drink ticket -- she put her hand up in a blocking / dismissive way and marched on by. So I watched what she did because I was taken aback (what can I say, I'm sensitive). When she breezed on past me after her bag scoop, I stepped outside the door to watch her leave and she proceeded to walk away from the party crowd towards what I'm not sure... the elevators? Her friends? They weren't anywhere near the party, that's for sure.
I told myself, she's probably just grabbing it for other people and bringing it back to the room. I seriously tried to convince myself that she did because I didn't want to get pissy at my own party like my name was JLo or something. But then I thought about all the people who were here, not getting or caring about bags, and staying because they were there to meet people. Because you know, that's the purpose of The People's Party.
But my observations are full of total conjecture and it was just odd to watch. I could be totally wrong. Maybe she had already had her free drink and her friends had sent her in to grab the swag they didn't get the first time around and ten minutes was enough time at the party for all of them.
Yet I couldn't help myself and felt compelled to record this encounter because regardless of her reason / plan of use with the bag, it was somehow appeared more important to her to grab the free stuff than to just come to the party and meet with other bloggers. Instead she appeared to be doing a free stuff recon pre-party attendance. Because the free stuff is just a nice perk, not the purpose. It left me with an icky feeling.
(3) BlogHer is a mindfuck.
(4) Can't wait to do it all again in New York.
(5) Damn everyone looked good at BlogHer this year. Especially you.
(6) All Hail the Unicorn Cake from the planet MamaPop!
(7) This week during my BlogHer detox, I had grandiose plans to clean and reorganize this entire home while SB and G were out of town but after making a mental list of everything I needed to do I took a nap.
Then I woke up, decided to add doing an internal cleanse while eating nothing but fruit and veg because I don't have to prep any meals for others all week, and felt proud that the nap gave me such clarity. Viva la Siesta! Then I promptly sat on the couch, ordered a pizza (online! no human interaction! if I could have shoved an envelope under the door with the money, I would have!), and after eating more than half of the damn thing, I fell asleep.
So to recap: this week I've accomplished nothing but a post about Joe Jonas having his heart smashed in seventeen places by Camilla Belle (which I first read as Camille Paglia and let me tell you, I was very confused) and also I managed to go pee. Oh and I also managed to make myself into a Mad Men avatar (what do you think - did I get it right?)
(8) BOO-YAH!
