Geek Dance Fun

Not all art has to be serious.

To appreciate art, you don't have to have overly long hair, act pretentious, or know how to open up a glass of red wine. As a performance artist for ten years as a dancer, and over twenty years in music, art is an experience of the moment, and emotional rush, and a connection you make with your audience.




In the past two years, I've been experimenting more and more with dance as comedy, knowing that a moment of laughter that we share becomes a moving image burned into your neural network. Some people might find my dancing a mockery of the art of bellydance, hip hop, and Bollywood, but I'll remind you that some of the most respected dancers in all three genres weave well-timed, whimsical aspects of dance into their routines.

Do you think you can dance? Do you like making people laugh? Try combining the two! You get to dance, and you don't have to pass gas loudly and light your farts on fire to make people laugh with you.

Don't forget to follow me on Twitter @HipsForHire and Facebook ImeiYogaDance.

n00b View On Gnomedex

n00b View On Gnomedex
Follow me on Twitter @HipsForHire
Follow me on FB ImeiYogaDance

As promised, here are my thoughts on Gnomedex from the perspective of the new kid on the block, and a new volunteer to Gnomedex. Volunteering for the conference meant my priorities were not around snapping photos and doing interviews. Instead, I had a unique, up close, and personal look at the Geek behind Gnomedex, the volunteers, the sponsors, and the speakers.

If you're looking for dirt, you usually find it. However, if you're looking for the dirt on Gnomedex, I'll leave that for Reddit.com to dish it out.

Five reasons why I LOVED volunteering for Gnomedex:

1. The speakers. My volunteer job was to assist Chris with curating two-day's worth of solid content and personable speakers. Over the years, Chris has learned that brilliant content can fall flat if the stage is not set, the speaker is not coached, and the community is not prepared. From day one, we dreamed of what speakers we would love to have join us, and received suggestions from volunteers, past speakers, and not-a-few unsolicited self-promoting queries.

The majority of the speaker line up you saw at Gnomedex came together quite quickly. Three of them were added to the lineup in the last 48 hours prior to the launch party. I bow and take off my hat to the handful of speakers who were given less than a week to prepare for their thirty-minute presentations. It was not only a thrill to watch you fly, but a reminder to me to just "let it ride" when you put your content out there. You've inspired me to take more risks, to try new things, and to seek to inspire others.

If you look on my iPhone for who I took the most pictures of, you'll notice that I took one of every speaker. Do I have a favorite speaker for Gnomedex? No. Do I know some better than others? Absolutely. Speakers who took the time to connect with me personally have left an indelible mark on my soul for their personal and professional contributions to my conference experience. Of course, I have a little more "happy puppy love" for those who were able to make it to my Belly Dance Tweetup at the end of Seattle Geek Week! You rawk. [So do your butts].

2. Chris Pirillo. The great thing about working alongside Chris is that he is so multi-talented. The challenge with working alongside Chris is that he is so multi-talented! Learning the process of conducting such a beloved conference from the Geek himself is a pleasure and an honor.

Sometime next week when I've turned over all the data of Gnomedex I was responsible for over to Kat and Chris, I'm going to poke my eyes out to give them a rest, because I swear I've poured over emails, documents, charts, phone numbers, venues, and threads so many times to catch the details, my eyes are swimming. But with Chris, you learn to be detail-oriented, professional, and thorough. If anyone reads this and wants to offer me a part-time, project-oriented job, I'm going to be asking Chris to tell you what he put me through to make me qualified to do almost anything short of coding.

3. Magic. For some reason, I like knowing that the magic we know as dance, music, performance, and public speaking has a math to it; meaning, even magic has a logical explanation. By volunteering, I felt I was part of the magic of the conference that so many others enjoy, whether in person, or via Youtube videos and livestreaming of the event.

Along with the magic comes the swag! I love watching people's faces light up when they won something. You'd think they were on "The Price Is Right", prancing down the aisle towards the stage to pick up their goodies. Sponsors provided great swag, such as Parallels, a night's stay at Hotel Max, a Wi-Fi iPad, and Throwboy pillow. Conferees changed out their own T-shirts for either the official Gnomdex T-shirt, or Swedish Hospital's, H1Nerd1 shirt.

4. It's finite. I enjoy projects that have a start and finish. Gnomedex had a birth, and it had a death. The next weeks and months are going to be interesting as all of us come to terms with ending something we believed in. My hope is that like all endings, it signals the beginning of something new.

5. Community. As a newbie, many of you reached out to me and made me feel welcome. While you could have treated me as unnoticeable hired help, you asked for my name, you connected it with my work, and you expressed kindness and interest. For all the dysfunction that I have seen in Social Media circles since the beginning of my year as "the n00b of Social Media", I saw many of you caring for others, including them in meals and conversations, and working against exclusion. Some of you even laughed at my jokes! I felt like less of a dweeb.


Five reasons why I HATED volunteering for Gnomedex

1. There is only one of me. I couldn't be doing one thing and taking care of another thing. I can't count on my hands and feet the number of times I had to end a great conversation to take care of an urgent need. I swear, this must be how new mothers feel: they never get to finish a conversation before the baby is spitting, shitting, or threating to put shit in their mouths and choke on it. The baby was Gnomedex, and it demands your attention.

2. No sleep for the wicked. It is very hard to be of any help to anyone when you don't get sleep. Volunteers sacrifice time, energy, and sleep, with many of us treating our volunteer activities like a job in the months before the conference. I had two nightmares before the start of the conference about something going wrong. One of the nightmares was true, involving an element in the schedule. The other nightmare had something to do with Chris stomping around the Gnomedex stage wearing nothing but pajama bottoms and swinging a light saber. I think that was brought on by sleep deprivation.

3. Volunteering means putting others first. If you are a selfish little arse, you won't make it very far. But I learned the hard way that if you put something out there for free, it will be gnawed to the bone. I knew I should have grabbed that scrap of food before it was gone...

But in all seriousness, serving others does bring up the question of taking care of your own needs. If you suck at putting others first, you do not know what it means to ask Chris or his volunteers - or even a paid event managing staff -- to conduct a future Gnomedex.

4. Disability. I think my right arm and my left wrist need to be in a cast for a few weeks to recover from responding to a million and one emails that flew by me from March 2010 until August. Can you say, "repetitive motion injury"? I am too tired to correct the auto-correction on my iPhone, so messages to Kat and Chris sound like teenage texts involving pee and poop.

5. Coma. My brain was firing on all cylinders, but fueled on PopChips and Zing bars. We had such amazing speakers, and it will be months before I will be able to sit back and enjoy their presentations without interruption. I did not get to sit back and absorb all the nuances that make Gnomedex magical. While audience members got to enjoy everything going "right" on the stage, volunteers have to keep their eyes open for everything that can potentially go "wrong", and step in to fix it.

That's the nature of being a volunteer. What that does to you brain is make you appear like you have a brain the size of a walnut, a.k.a. "I am my cat". I'm not sure if I put one intelligent word after another when I congratulated speakers for their presentations, or said hello at an after party and remembered names and faces. It's one big blur of silly-happy exhaustion.

I can say that when it was time to jump off the platform and fly Saturday night at Emerald City Trapeze Arts, I was so glad I had said "yes" back in the spring.

To Chris and the volunteers of the last Gnomedex, thank you for having me on board. Let's go flying, but for real. May you take your best ideas and inspiration from Gnomedex, and see them soar.

Balls: Not Just On the Boys

I applaud everyday heroes. They are unsung people who decide that passive aggressive action builds nothing more than resentment between themselves and the person they dislike, and revenge obliterates the object of their  hatred so that they have nothing left to destroy but themselves.

So when Jenny uploaded 31 dry-erase messages to her co-workers and her boss, who her called her a HOPA after she transferred a professional call to him (Hot Piece of Ass), I wanted to stand up and cheer. Revenge would be to make his life miserable for his comment. Having the balls to quit without another job in place, yet to tell people why she quit with no regrets, is what I applaud her for. (Amendment: it turns out the Jenny story was a hoax from the jerks behind theChive.com. They seem to think it is funny to experiment on people and try to prove that people will believe anything, but all they proved to me is that some will stoop to any level to manipulate and take advantage of the good hearts of people. They wasted my time, all for their pleasure and probably for fame and fortune for themselves. The n00b has learned something new. There are some really creepy people out there.)

There are everyday heroes all around us. I once saw an American run alongside a bus in Beijing for nearly a half mile in the dead of winter, attempting to return the mitten of a young Chinese girl who had lost it as the bus door closed abruptly, snapping the mitten off her hand. I saw two men jump out of their cars when an elderly gentlemen slipped and fell on the sidewalk, hitting his head on a stone planter on the way down. One took off his jacket to stop the blood oozing from the man's head, while the other one called 911 on his cell phone (I came up just as the ambulance arrived).

Of course, I like stories where the underdog -- or at least the person with less perceived power -- stands up for what is right, and s/he puts a story "out there" for the world to see. Jenny may not be perfect, but Spencer (the boss who played Farmville on company time) will have something to think about for awhile, besides trying to figure out what other HOPA he can exploit and demean. And I hope someone will offer Jenny an honorable job, free from sexual harassment and "the little switch".

Ten Years of Bellydance: Orchestrating Emotion

This summer marks my tenth year since I started belly dance. The most common question I get (besides "How do you balance that sword on your head?") is, "Why did you decide to learn belly dance?" It's a valid question, but I also know this question comes with an a certain amount of curiosity about how a Chinese girl picked up a Middle Eastern folkloric dance as a passion.

The story: in 2000, I graduated from my second Master's degree program at nearly the same time a very important relationship with a troubled man was put on hold. My own personal suffering translated into physical illness. I ate and slept so poorly, my doctor recommended that I find something more gentle to do than running and aerobics for exercise (I had lost approximately 25 pounds in two months).

Picking up a Discover U catalog for Seattle-area classes, I flipped through it, looking for "something" that seemed interesting. I didn't know I was looking for belly dance, though I had been exposed to Lebanese belly dancing while on a tour of Israel a few years earlier. One of the Discover U class offerings was belly dance with Yasmine, who I would later find out was not only a dancer but a musician as well. With a few group classes, Yasmine encouraged me to consider belly dance as "your dance"; that is, she felt that I took naturally to it. I must admit, being a musician has its advantages: zill playing was a bit easier for me than the average beginner.


Imei, celebrating 10 years of belly dance, and different styles of dance

People ask me where I get my ideas for choreography. Certainly, all of us learn from someone, and we borrow their moves as it suits us. Later, we learn to listen to the music, playing with variations of how those shapes and emotions might look when in motion and facial expressions. Finally, we create, film, observe, perform, and elicit feedback, constantly working to refine the feelings and messages we wish to send to the audience with each piece.

Sabura once wrote an email with a piece of advice I have taken to heart over the years. She reminded me that it didn't matter so much what movement I did in a choreography, as long as it perfectly expressed the emotion of the music in which it occurred. If I can get an audience feeling what I feel -- longing, joy, tension, release, breath, misery, anger, confidence, comedy -- I have accomplished no small feat.

In essence, we dancers give our viewers the unique opportunity to feel what is is to embody the music itself, yet without having to move from one's chair, nor ooze a single drop of sweat. If you find yourself holding your breath, smiling, laughing, or emitting a flirty confidence from every pore in your body, you have just understood perfectly what it is to be a belly dancer: orchestrating emotions in a waterfall of pleasure

Belly Dance At MedFest: Why We Love This Festival

I am shocked when Seattle locals who have lived here for years are surprised to hear that one of the Northwest's largest belly dance shows occurs annually every third weekend in July in the vibrant West Seattle Community.

Over 600 dancers from California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and even Alaska register for non-stop dancing over two days on two stages for the Mediterranean Fantasy Festival, hosted by the Babylonian Ensemble. Audiences are exposed to various forms of the classic as well as emerging genres of belly dance, which include steam punk, tribal fusion, goth, martial arts, hip hop, and circus elements.

Additionally, MedFest has been open to Bollywood dance, and over the past few years, I've seen a few troupes present Indian-inspired works or full-on Bollywood pieces. This year, Mollie Singh introduced Bollywood Seattle, with excerpts of three solo choreographies as well as a group number, all choreographed by Mollie.

What I love about MedFest is how the organizers never fail to attract a high-quality workshop instructor and performer. Saturday July 17 Tito Seif of Cairo, Egypt performed on the outdoor stage (video recordings were not allowed), wowing the audience with his exciting stick dance, beledi, and dance performance while balanced on a tabla.

Tito Seif is one of the world's best male bellydancers, and an exciting choreographer. His joy is infectious, and his intensity and precision inspires dancers across the globe. In terms of the level of accomplishment this man has achieved, I was only surprised that I could not find a Wiki page about him. Bet his press team is working on that, because he is surely a "notable".

If you missed out on his workshop Saturday morning, Seif is offering another choreography workshop at 6 pm Sunday July18. For more information, go to the Babylonian Ensemble website, and click on the workshops.

Last but not least, one of my favorites is back: Shoshana of Arcata, CA. Shoshana's playful use of the four-yard veil always takes my breath away. She was the first to teach me how to use my veil like a rubber band, flicking it across the room if necessary [Added: Sunday July 18 at 1:45 pm. Shoshana had to leave early, so she performed at 12:30 pm instead of the listed time of 3 pm. Here's a few photos, taken on my Vado 3rd generation camera]:

Cocooned within a transparent, over-sized veil, Shoshana shows the audience how to spin out of a web.

Even with a breeze, Shoshana's control makes throwing, tossing, and flicking the veil look like liquid magic.

Letting the veil follow her slightest coaxing.

Did I mention the shopping? I'm not much of a shopper, so when I do shop, it's usually in binges. This year, I purchased four dresses for $65! I wasn't in need of a new costume, but there are plenty of costume vendors ready to suit you up in gorgeous glamour, whimsical skirts, and gothic tribal wear. If you don't want to depart with any hard-earned cash, do not (I repeat, do not) go anywhere near the indoor stage area where Shiny Sparkly Things is happily liberating people of their dough. I bought a pair of earrings from SST a couple of years ago, and I'm getting great mileage out of their high-quality, costume jewelry.

Hungry? Falafel sandwiches, kabobs, and non-alcoholic beverages are vended from a conveniently placed truck and grills.

All-in-all, you and your family can spend the afternoon at MedFest in this highly entertaining, vital community of dancers, musicians, fans, and people who love world music. Come and join us if you can (just don't park on Walnut Street, or you are likely to get a parking ticket), and bring a light jacket, as it is a bit chilly for mid-July.

The Sh!t: To Do Or To Be

People who I consider deep thinkers have many characteristics in common, but one that fascinates me to no end is their shared experience of an unexplainable, undefinable moment. I know this already, sounds not only vague and woo-woo like, but I assure you, it isn't magic juju. The most successful, brilliant, out-of-the-box thinkers have all had "experiences" -- moments that helped them see beyond their senses -- that shaped their direction, choices, attitude, or outlook. With that shift in energy and perspective, they went on to do great things. In times of discouragement, they drew upon those experiences to give them strength to pursue their path.

For right now, I'm going to call that experience, "The Sh!t" (here, I'm using an exclamation point to symbolize the "i", turning a slang word for fecal matter into a metaphysical signifier for that uncommon, and often unrepeatable, experience). In contrast to "the shits", which refers to having repeated loose stools in rapid succession,"The Sh!t" is a welcomed phenomenon, though perhaps poorly understood.

Take a look at this video from Youtube. This is a perfect example of "The Sh!t", even if the viewer suspects the man behind the camera has ingested some magic mushrooms:



What should you do when you are facing "The Sh!t"? One of my former graduate school professors used to remind people to stop getting so worked up about "doing", and focus more on "being". I don't think he was on any mushrooms while he said this, but he would constantly point to the merits of "going with the flow", "being in the stream", "riding the wave", and other terms we commonly share for letting what's happening "do its thing" without our resistances kicking in and shutting "The Sh!t" down.

"Being" isn't an excuse for laziness. The truth of "being" includes being alive and awake to what is happening, just like the man shouting in the video, "What does it mean?" Being is an active process, not a passive one. Laziness is not active; laziness is a state of half-sleep while events happen, yet without interest or reaction from the person. The lazy person defaults to either apathy or lack of appreciation, even though the "being" person may also appear to be doing nothing on the surface. The difference is observation. Though the man behind the camera does not get an audible answer to his question, he simply stays with the moment, laughing, appreciating the beauty, sobbing, and then coming back into equanimity with "what is".

My friend Bill calls these "shifts" [though I had thought of them as epiphanies]. Shifts include energy, motivation, and attitudinal movements that occur inside of our thought processes, and maybe physically in our bodies [though perhaps we have no way to measure it except in things like heart rates and body extremity temperatures). When a shift occurs, we are freed from the stifling heat of our own wearying thoughts, fears, and paranoia.

We may find the video "Double Rainbow" funny (and that is the category it is listed under for Youtube), but I'm also caught with my own experience of "The Sh!t", and I can assure you, there were no mood-altering substances involved! When I watched "Double Rainbow", I found myself laughing at his goofy remarks, and then suddenly uncomfortable. I knew I was watching something of a very private, vulnerable moment, and one that I have experienced so many times before. One can laugh it off as a joke, or one can also grapple with the complexity of an existential moment bearing down on the shoulders of a man, and wondering how his mind didn't just snap under the pressure.

I am fairly confident for the number of "The Sh!t" moments I've had in my lifetime G-d/Life/The Universe is sure to throw me a few more of those. Will I -- and will you-- know how to "be" with "The Sh!t", or like many things we do in our tech savvy world, simply ignore it in the waterfall of unending content we see every day? Will you chuckle and chalk these kinds of experiences up to things that we make up for silly Youtube videos? Or will you open your eyes to "The Sh!t" and let it take you into Being, while taking you on a rip-roaring ride towards greater creativity and more passion for connection?

Your choice.



For those of you who couldn't get enough of the "Double Rainbow" effect, take a look at this KFC parody "The Doublelicious", also from Youtube:

Seattle Nightlife Initiative

Mayor McGinn will sign the Seattle Nightlife Initiative on July 13, 2010 at the Century Ballroom to help stimulate a better and safer nightlife economy for Seattle, including flexible hours for serving liquor, more public transportation at night (yay!), and ways to deal with nighttime noise and nuisances.

School of Rock is scheduled to play two short sets to help us celebrate. A no-host bar reception will be held at Tin Table afterwards. Mayor McGinn had the press release added to his Twitter feed today.

Hips For Hire believes some of these changes will definitely be a boost to the nighttime economy and allow artists in the registry to pick up more gigs as the demand for quality performances increase. I hope to shake the hand of Mayor McGinn, and tell him how I hope this initiative will help performance artists make a better living -- and perform in safer venues! -- with the initiative going into effect.

If you plan to be there, it's at the Century Ballroom on Pike Street in Seattle, starting at 7 pm. We might be getting a bite to eat elsewhere (Boom Noodles, Mediterranean Express) to stay on the cheap yet yummy side of the food spectrum. Join us by looking for the girl in the black "geek" shirt.

iPad Geek Out: Merging tech and art

While the iPhone has already spawned several concerts composed of people using iPhones (such as the Michigan Mobile Phone Ensemble), I've been waiting to play around with apps for the iPad that would allow myself as a dancer and musician to explore sound and music while getting geeky with it.

After passing my iPad over to Chris Pirillo with the plea, "Pimp my apps," he loaded Beatwave, and later texted me with the message, "Grab Granimator now, it's free!" [unfortunately, it's not free any more]. You can see Chris demo the Granimator on his Youtube video.

Beatwave app for iPad got me thinking. Why not set up a repeating pattern based on a the principles of western music (we like resolution or resolved dissonance), and then express those patterns through movement and dance?

Here's a quick video demo of how that works (wait for the Picture-in-picture video at 1:17).


Filmed at home using a Vado. Bose speaker.

With Beatwave, you can adjust the reverb, speed, tone, and you have four "pages" to work with, creating solos or muting a page of notations. Better yet, non-musicians have a perfect picture of a matrix-style representation of your musical creation. Though there are other apps that allow you to create musical patterns using keyboards or hitting objects with your fingers, I like Beatwave's sense of almost random generation by trial and error, and then the ability to share what you created with friends. You don't have to be a musician to create some cool stuff.

I did not create the music before turning on the camera, nor should you have to tell a person how to move when s/he hears a note. None of this was choreographed. Imagine what I could do with six to 10 people, line up across a stage, while I, the maestro, keys in notes on Beatwave, and I assign a note to each dancer. I could layer two or more people to take on the chords layered by my choices. One could create an entirely spontaneous stage piece, with dancers following simple principles related to sounds assigned to them. It's like an Etch-a-Sketch, only for space and time, and geeky people like you and I.

If you liked what you just read, come join me on Twitter @HipsForHire, or friend me on Facebook ImeiYogaDance. Better yet, go on my Youtube channel YourLilChinaGirl, and leave me a comment.

Uncommon Uses for the iPad

Last night, I found myself walking to a bus stop unusually late from an event. I discovered that an offer for a ride home unexpectedly changed, but Seattle has a pretty decent public transit system, with service to my neighborhood, so I didn't panic. I punched in the info to a Metro trip planner, and headed off to the bus stop according to the map. [common use #1 - bus finder and Google maps]

The bus stop was located on the opposite side of a busy freeway. After three attempts to figure out how to get to the other side (as there was no overpass), a homeless person pointed to a dimly-let sign: pedestrian underpass. I walked on the sidewalk of the busy street, getting honked at a few times by cars who must like frightening the bah-jesus out of women. Forget doing some Yoga breathing to stay calm: the sidewalk and stairwells of the underpass smelled of beer and urine, and reminded me that men really do think the entire world is their toilet. At these times, I wonder if my sacrifice of reducing my carbon footprint is really worth the sacrifice.

Twenty minutes later, teeth chattering and hugging my iPad for warmth [uncommon use #2 - heat source], my bus came. Thank goodness I exchanged my WiFi-only iPad for a 3G+WiFi model within two weeks, because 3G was the only connectivity available on the side of the 99 Highway, though I clearly saw the names of locked networks all around. As great as the iPhone4 is, it wouldn't have kept me warm.

As I sat down, a man spoke to me with a French accent: "Nice shoes. And the hat and the scarf work for you." As he was saying this, he was smiling and looking at my iPad. [uncommon use #3 - man magnet]. He worked for a tech company, but certainly wasn't talking tech. When he got off at his stop, he asked for my first name, took my hand, placed a soft kiss upon it, and said, "It was lovely to meet you."

On came a man who had taken an earlier bus: "I didn't want to wait at the stop I saw you at. This one is further downtown, a lot of gang bangers, but at least it wasn't so isolated." Good point: I should have downloaded MyNextBus.com, gotten a transfer, and waited with a bunch of smokers. Not.

We chatted about the iPhone all the way to West Seattle, where I bid him, "Au revoir." About a half a block into my walk home, I realized all the street lights were down, and the people of that street didn't do a lot of gardening and maintenance to the overgrowth. I tripped and nearly fell, cursing myself for not replacing the mini flashlight I used to carry in my purse. Without really thinking, I took out my iPad, slid the unlock button and punched in the password, and held the screen facing away from me [uncommon use #4 - iPad as a mobile street lamp]. Needless to say, I had a nicely illuminated path all the way home.

Well, some people say that the iPad isn't all that magical. I didn't need it to be. Instead, it got me thinking about uncommon uses of everything we have around us, if only we'd use our own heads and creativity to see.

Do you see?

Creativity: Blank page or Template?

With just 18 days left until Seattle's largest bellydance festival, Mediterranean Fantasy Festival I made a decision two weeks ago to challenge my usual patterns of creating choreography. Usually, I start with a piece of music I love but have never choreographed, study it, and start interpreting the music into movement. I then get a couple of sets of eyes to look at it with me, and give me feedback and suggestions to help milk the movement for ultimate emotional impact.

This year, I'm doing something different.

Blame it on Artist's Circle, which has been challenging my thinking about what makes belly dance "work" for me. Sprinkle on some pressure from BollywoodSeattle.com, where my time is being squeezed out of me like toothpaste as we prepare for our first group performance and solos at Medfest 2010 July 15-17, a restaurant, and a parade. Oh, and I could slide in an equally legitimate excuse as I work behind the scenes on getting speakers lined up for Gnomedex August 19 - 21, 2010, Seattle's "confluence of influence" for technology enthusiasts (and n00b's like me). The bottom line: what will allow me to show share with my fans my personal growth as an artist?

Over the years, I've learned to keep my choreography and song selection a secret. The powers that be have strange ways of teaching you about the malevolence and unkindness of others. This year, I considered that I might change things up a bit, so much that what I'm doing is transparent.

For nearly five years, I've been in love with a piece of music. Take a look at Tina Sargent, winner of the Miss Belly Dancer USA contest, performing Maleeha's choreography to "A Shot of Glory" from The Cafe (Mareal Caracalla):


Choreography by Maleeha (Iowa).

Having studied veil technique with master dancer and choreographer Sabura while also having taken the same choreography workshop with Maleeha featured in the above video, I have formulated a new approach to this year's offering: give a nod to my mentors, teachers, and heroes of dance, and then build upon it by adding my own flair. I'll be performing "Shot of Glory", using the first moments of Maleeha's choreography, and then departing from the choreography as you see it in the video, and welcoming you into my interpretation of those same musical notes.

If you're in Seattle, be sure to mark July 15 - 17, 2010 in your calendar. I'm dancing Sunday July 17 twice: at 11:12 am on the indoor stage with Bollywood Seattle, and later the same hour in my solo of "Shot of Glory" on the same stage at 11:50 am. Believe me, I'll be having people back stage tearing off my Bollywood costume, jewelry, and redoing my hair in a quick turn around for this belly dance solo.

If you do not live in Seattle, I'll have my interpretation of "Shot of Glory" filmed for Youtube and my websites, and if it turns out well, you'll be able to find it there on my channel Yourlilchinagirl. You'll be able to see the clear departure from Maleeha's choreography, yet still get a sense of who I've studied with, admire, and highly respect in the world of belly dance and folkloric performance art.

For me, dance has never been about the diva behavior I've been exposed to in the past few years. The proof is in the ability to give it away for free because the world needs your art to add to its beauty. It is all about the inspiration and joy we find in the dance when we share it with the world. As cheesy and tree-huggerish as that sounds, it still remains true.

This not to say that artist's aren't worth their weight in gold. I formed Hipsforhire.com to help artists like myself get hired for reasonable pay while raising money for various charitable causes. Though it's been slow going, HFH is finally being recognized, with emails and calls for paid events throughout the Northwest. I am so humbled that people are recognizing this vision, and I am thrilled that people are paying me well for my performances. Yet there are times when it is appropriate to dance for free.

I'm giving my dance away, because now it has become something that is worth being copied, yet cannot be stolen.

Troll Patrol: Five Reasons To Have Them Visit You

I have friends who think that what I'm trying to do is amazing. As I continue to use Social Media not only to promote performance art or connect people to use my project, "Video Nurse", they remind me that they don't know anyone else who is doing this in quite the same way. More likely than not, they explain to me in plain words, "I couldn't do that. I'm too scared."

My question: too scared of WHAT? Or, WHO are they scared of?

I can only imagine the fear they express has something to do with stories of breaches of privacy and security that have been the source of lawsuits, complaints against almost all Social Media platforms, and news that has now become as commonplace to our lives as credit card fraud. Most people don't want to open themselves up to this kind of nuisance. But now, we have something else to deal with that is a problematic as security breaches.

When I first initiated an Internet presence through a website in 2000, I couldn't have conceived of the types of web terrorism that we now have on our hands today. Sure, I was aware enough back then to keep my private information off the web, such as home phone numbers and addresses, or the names of my family members and children.

But now we have on our hands the web equivalent of a gang-style, drive-by shooting, something which I'm naming a Troll Patrol. The troll patrol is a group of loosely-organized douchebags mostly composed of young males. They gather at appointed times, comb the Internet for unmoderated shows, livestreams, and web communities, and once designating a target, swarm an unsuspecting site. Comments are saturated with boring uses of expletives, racist and bigoted remarks, repeated lines of garbage, and progressively more violent, misogynistic, or rude comments to try to provoke the moderator or web manager to react. Those who were enjoying the site feel terrorized in the volatile environment, and they may leave and plan not to return. Whereas a single troll can easily be blocked or removed, a horde as large as 200 or 300 trolls is a bit more like trying to spray insect repellent on a horde of angry hornets. This hornet's nest, however, is composed of bored teenagers looking for fun at your expense.

At first glance, interacting with a group of bored teenagers might not sound very daunting, nor scary. But you might recall an incident a few years ago involving a pair of teens who threw the switch of a train, sending it off the tracks and killing several on board. When interviewed as to why they did this, the answer: they were bored. Use this example as a reminder of what a group of bored teens and young adults can do collectively using smartphones, laptops, and the power of Google to search the web for information about you.

If a troll patrol comes and visits YOUR sites, could there possibly be any reason to celebrate?

Five Reasons to Celebrate a Troll Patrol Visitation

1. Use a Troll Patrol visit as an education. As disgusting as some of their comments may become, you are receiving a fast education about what this generation of users has absorbed from the Internet. For better or for worse, study your market.

2. Their presence on your site, for however long it lasts, may signal that you have a good presence on the Internet. They aren't targeting first time users. Break out the bubbly, and congratulate yourself: you have arrived.

3. Practice handling hostility. Someday, this will help you if you have a PR nightmare on your hands if you ever get a public complaint about your business, or you make a mistake that needs your quick answer, free of defense or excuses. How you handle a Troll Patrol is a pretty good indicator of quick thinking and fast action.

4. Stand on your own feet. A moderator, spam bot, or your blocking application won't be helpful. Visitations are brief, and you won't be able to remove them as fast as they can return; at the same time, you have to protect your real fans, client, and viable community. Here'a great chance to allow people to sling mud and for you to not take any of it personally. Your true community will see you for who you truly are: strong and confident. The trolls are doing you a favor: while demonstrating their own pathos, group trolls are unwittingly making you look good to your community.

None of this is about you; it is clearly about them. Watch how they turn on each other if you laugh and smile at their comments while they search for ways to "get to you." One of the comments on my recent troll patrol visitation speculated that I must have a child who was retarded. The commenter asked if I was angry. Another commenter added that he would like to me in the . I observed their frenzy with fascination and amusement.

5. Use the experience as a "shake-down" for security measures you may want to add to your sites, such as age restrictions, user registrations, and blocking abilities. If you don't have a moderator, you might want to find one by searching through your most loyal clients or fans. In exchange for moderating your site, you could give free product, discounts, services, or a title on your site that connotes honor and loyalty.

Have you been visited by a Troll Patrol? How did you handle it? If you have a funny or interesting related story, please share it offline at info@hipsforhire.com.

Relationship Talk on Ustream.tv

Love stinks. Yeah yeah [love stinks]. Love stinks! Yeah yeah [love stinks].

Well actually, I'm no executioner of love. In fact, I am probably more in line with the belief, "All We Need Is Love" (and maybe a really good prenuptial agreement, in some cases, lol). Today I decided to let loose with an hour of talk about relationships for my one-hour segment of "Video Nurse", which aired June 21, 2010 at 4 PM PST. It was one hour earlier than usual, due to a scheduling snafu that Chris Pirillo takes full responsibility for, as he had not alerted me that I was attending a Tweetup at 5:30 pm in which he needed my n00b presence to help balance out the number of Social Media savvy and n00bs in the room.

I recorded just a couple of segments from the hour, with one shorter one up on Youtube, and this one here on my post from "Shaw" (I had his spoken permission to use his question for discussion).


http://www.ustream.tv/myvideos/1/7814582


I think you'll find some valuable questions and exercises to do (pen and paper, or iPad!) that could help you or someone you know how to move on from a relationship that you feel "stuck" on thinking about longer than what seems to be helpful.

It certainly isn't all that I would tell a person who is grieving from the end of a relationship. But it is a start. The transition from being in a relationship to being without that person can take many forms, and there is no designated timeline on how long that takes. However, this person sounded like he is struggling with the other person bringing up the relationship again after a long period of time.

My private practice at Seattle Direct Counseling encounters these kind of relationship questions (and more) on a regular basis. Video Nurse is simply an avenue where community can build and gather to talk about what interests us most about health, mental health, and relationship issues. Join us next time at our regularly scheduled time Mondays at 5 pm PST. Join in the dialogue.

I'd like to thank Chris Pirillo for use of his office, lighting, and Comcast High Speed Internet connection for this segment of Video Nurse.

n00b Kid On The Block

I like being the n00b kid on the block.

In an earlier blogpost on my Ning site, I explained how being a beginner at something has its adventures, advantages, and downfalls. So far in my 261 days as "the n00b of Social Media", there haven't been many pitfalls. I've had a rather thrilling ride through Social Media 101 Blogworld 2009, LeWeb 2009, 140TC 2010, SXSWi 2010, ReThink Hawaii 2010, and I'm currently volunteering with Gnomedex 2010 for August 19-21. I just finished my first eBook, started a third Twitter account @VideoNurse, and launched a regular Ustream.tv show "Video Nurse" airing Mondays at 5 pm PST talking about health care and its intersection with technology. I've assisted with content on another eBook, and I'm about to launch a fully-interactive website for my psychology and wellness website, SeattleDirectCounseling.com (coming on WordPress soon!).

By far, this doesn't make me:

1. Successful
2. Rich (!)
3. An expert

I'd like to convert my forays in Social Media to become:

1. Richer
2. A Savvy and smart business woman
3. A better networker
4. Helpful to others with a much larger reach than one person at a time.

Nothing felt more "n00bier" than receiving several emails from different fields, requesting easy tips on turning their current websites into monetized blogs. I felt n00bish because my first reaction is "Who am I to give advice on this? What do I really know? What have I really done?" I'm still in the "hard work, all for fun, where's the money" stage. Though each email was a sincere ask for help, I felt n00bish because I'm frankly still a n00b, and I enjoy being a n00b.


Sound Effects for Your Thoughts

With just 104 days of my n00b year left, I'm asking all those hard questions. What can I really show for that year? What were the losses? What were the gains? If I could do anything differently, what would it be? And what am I deeply satisfied with?

One thing that has become apparent: just about everything I've done has shown up on an unfinished list from Chris Pirillo on the topic of making money from blogging. That isn't the only thing I'm trying to do, but at its essence, a blog doesn't survive for long if it doesn't yield a measureable return on your investment (ROI). One of the tips eluded to is a tried-and-true motto:

Easy money usually means hard work.

Five seconds ago, I tried to think of one word that would describe my immersion into Social Media. The only word that flashed was this one:

mentor

To clarify, the word is MENTOR, not "mental", although there have been times that I have felt the latter quite deeply.

A few related words also suit the effect: coach, teacher, model. You see, I have a pile of books in my house, and all of them are full of information, insight, suggestions, exercises, and reviews. However, I'm not very motivated to learn from these books and swim through the minutiae to find out what HTML code I need to insert in my website in order to make a button bigger or smaller. I'm just not that kind of Neek (hybrid nerd and geek). I'm not inclined to read 50 reviews to find out if the camera I'm using is the best one for my purposes. But I am sold on the process of sitting with someone who shows me in front of my face what I'm doing right and what I can improve, even if that is done in a group setting. I'm all into the learning process, but I'm suggesting that your learning process cannot be limited to a CD and book study program (just $49.95 plus shipping and handling). It can't be encapsulated in a friend's well-meaning but greatly attenuated "hot list" of things you need to do.

As my motivational coaching practice takes flight (I already have clients!), I believe I'm going to see more of this trend happen in Social Media. The emails with requests for short cuts and tips will keep coming in. However my answer will remain the same: "There are no short cuts, and there is no free lunch. Get a mentor or a coach." I am passionate about this answer, because this is what has been done for me.

I am indebted to two men, Joe Kennedy and Chris Pirillo, for the n00b journey I've been on. Joe Kennedy is responsible for inviting me to Social Media 101 September 25, 2009 and being the incredible networker that he is. Chris Pirillo is responsible for asking me out to coffee after I shyly told him I had just launched my first Twitter handle. He showed me what happened when he retweeted my Tweet: "What would Scooby Doo do with a Macbook and an iPhone?" As people responded to that Tweet, my eyes were opened. Everything else is history.

Please follow me on Twitter @hipsforhire @VideoNurse and Facebook ImeiYogaDance, and check out video on YouTube YourLilChinaGirl

Veil For Belly Dance

After five years of dance study with a variety of different master teachers, I have heard a lot of smack talk about using veil for Middle Eastern belly dance. Usually there is a split down the middle between the old school, who believes that authentic belly dance should only use the veil for a short entrance piece but ditch it before the meat of the choreography (the visceral opening of the guts of a musical arrangement), and those who have found an ethereal (and maybe even spiritual) place akin to the whirling dervish dances where the dancer is both tranced and sweeps the viewer into the magic of concealing and revealing veil work.

I think you can figure out where I stand. As one of my teachers once pounded into my brain, "It really doesn't matter what movement you do, as long as it expresses the music and emotion." My amendment to that is that the majority of those movements do need to come from Middle Eastern Raks Sharki to be considered belly dance, but that doesn't exclude movement found in most folkloric dances, such as spins and turns.

I'm not here to argue with old-schoolers how much veil work to include in your choreographies in order to make them "authentic". If you're an old-schooler, you've already convinced yourself of that answer. What I enjoy doing is passing on what I've learned of various veil movements used to express the vocabulary of emotion found in Middle Eastern music, and to let the dancer choose the presence, absence, and volume of veil movement in his or her own choreographies.



In my years of study with "veil master" Sabura (her website appears to be down at this time) has passed on some beautiful veil technique, which she teaches throughout the U.S. and Canada. It would be completely unfair to her to reveal her more advanced technique to others. If you are interested in learning Sabura's advanced veil technique, please request her in a city near you. Her double veil and her "triple wrap" work are just stunning to see and to learn, but you won't likely see this on a teaching DVD. It has also inspired me to find my own variations and to encapsulate them in a different genre, such as what I call "Imei's Latin Veil", using Latin dance inspiration in the midst of exciting veil work and combinations.

Learning veil for a choreography? I challenge you dancers to start putting some good stuff out there on Youtube. Have a question about a veil move? Please post it to my Youtube channel, YourLilChinaGirl.

Check out Sandra's classic veil entrance DVD (she included it in the last Bella costume I purchased from her recently) for a nice veil choreography to "Faddah", which happens to be one of Sabura's favorite pieces of music.

Hands on the Wheel Instead of the Cell Phone

Not so long ago, in a galaxy called West Seattle, I used to get up in the morning, fix myself breakfast, grab my tote bag, and make the drive between Seattle and Everett. The approximate 30 mile commute went from 40 minutes to well over an hour on bad traffic mornings (Tuesdays being the worst), and yet I needed to commute for a few months before handing my office space over to a colleague and moving my private psychotherapy practice to West Seattle. Sometimes I commuted on my motorcycle, which made things a little less stressful, except when I was polite enough to line up on the backed-up stretches of the entrance ramp to I-5.

By the time six months slid by, I wanted to someone to take me out back and shoot me. I hated commuting, and it was making feel sick.

Once I got past the mobile phone "drop zone" on the West Seattle bridge, I used to try making phone calls to catch up on errands. But the stress of using my commute for more "work" made this idea less and less appealing. The commute time was also inappropriate for client calls because of distraction.

Like most people, I began considering alternatives: listen to music, listen to news programs, practice learning French using language CD's. Each of these alternatives had a point: keep your hands on the wheel, and your eyes on the road. Reduce your distraction, and remember that when you climb behind the wheel of an automobile, you are taking your life (and possibly someone else's) into your own hands.

Whatever happened to old-fashioned, undistracted driving? Unless you have your own driver (that isn't you), when did you think it would ever be OK to take your hands off the wheel and move your eyes and your attention somewhere else than on the road and the cars, bicycles, and pedestrians around you? Almost every time a car has veered through a crosswalk when I had the right of way as a pedestrian, nine out of ten times that driver had a cell phone in his and her hands. Likely, the driver never even noticed me.

Check out what King 5 News had to say about the new hands-free cell phone law that starts Thursday June 10: http://www.king5.com/news/consumer/LOOPHOLE-IN-NEW-CELL-PHONE-LAW--95824039.html. Now you can be pulled over and cited for holding your cell phone while driving without any other reason for being pulled over (such as a traffic violation). You can still talk on your phone, but you can't hold it in your hand to your ear or cradle it between your ear and shoulder (though it can be in your hand, just not held to your ear). And it's still not OK to violate traffic laws, cell phone or no cell phone. [added 06/10: a woman holding a Bluetooth device to her ear was pulled over, but did not receive the $124 fine].

And though cell phone users and drivers have plenty of hands-free devices to help them be compliant, I implore you to go a few steps further:

1. Don't engage in emotional conversations with others while driving. Emotions can cloud your judgment and elongate your reaction times.
2. Keep your conversations brief and business-like, such as, "I"m just calling you to let you know I'm running 5 minutes late, see you soon."
3. Consider talking briefly only on freeways and highways, and not in congested areas involving bicycles and pedestrians. Use voice dialing.
4. For crying out loud, don't text or jabber away on your cell phone while taking your babies and children on errands with you. Pull over to the side of the road, and take care of what you need to on your phone. We already know that parent drivers have to split their attention between the road and their children. You don't need to give any more attention away to a cell phone.

Some cars are outfitted with Bluetooth and a decent set of speakers. Still, I (as Video Nurse), advocate cautious and informed use of calls made from your car, especially because of the distraction factor. What conversation in the car could possibly be worth the value of your life, or someone else's life?

The first time I saw a police officer use a computer while engaged in a high speed chase (I was doing a ride-along program to learn more about our police force), I was momentarily terrified. Then again, officers are trained to do this. The minute the officer punched data in, both hands were on the wheel, pedal went to the metal, and I have never felt safer. The rest of us don't have hours of experience learning how to control a car AND communicate vital information back to police headquarters WHILE occasionally punching in data onto a netbook-sized keyboard. So if you don't have this kind of experience, don't pretend that you do. Put the phone down, and limit your use of voice dialing and cell phone calls.

So, how did I pass all those hours of commuting without losing my mind? I practiced singing show tunes, learning about 300 tunes at one point in time. Guess some day it'll pay off when I do some serious karaoke, or if you ever ask me to sing in your wedding.

Video Nurse: Five Things People Do That Could Kill Them

Just another friendly reminder: Video Nurse will be talking about, "Five Things That People Do That Could Kill Them". Yeah, yeah, we know that we're all going to die someday, and that death is an inevitability. But Video Nurse is going to talk about some uncommon thoughts about people's every day choices that can lead to dramatic (and sometimes devastating) results in regards to their health.

Video Nurse has already released several short segments on Youtube covering the following subjects: dirty money (should you wash your hands after handling money?), hawt dogs (shoes and foot care), Eating Disorders, and how to stave off a cold. Now we're coming to you live to unleash the power of technology and community to help foster discussion on what you can do to improve your overall physical and mental health.

Video Nurse makes its official debut Mondays at 5pm Pacific Standard Time on Ustream.tv (look for Video Nurse) starting June 7, 2010. It's a one-hour show by topic, with time for people in the chat room to ask questions and jump in the dialogue about health-related topics. I'll occasionally record segments of the show and archive them by topic.

While Video Nurse does not exist to diagnose or treat any specific person's disease or disorder, I can speak generally about the disease/disorder, and point callers towards resources to help them make the most informed choices possible.

In a Nutshell: The Truth About Allergies

Ask a roomful of people, "Who has an allergy?" and the majority of hands will go up. For some, it's outdoor allergens like grass, flowers, weeds, and dust. For others, it's indoor allergies such as mold, pet dander, or perfumes.

Since I was very young, I have been allergic to more things than can be listed in a short blogpost. In fact, my present allergy list takes up three full pages (and that is in a summarized report). Somehow, I managed to survive all the pets I grew up with, the weeds I rolled in, and the foods I subsequently ate without knowing what it would do to me. The "wake up" call came in 2001, when I ate food specifically ordered without peanuts (a known allergen to me), only to discover later that the peanuts had simply been "removed" from the food and re-served to me by the cook. Alone in my office, wheezing, and on my knees, knowing I only had minutes to respond, I dragged myself to my office's kitchen, made strong black coffee, and drank three cups of it after calling for help. [And no, I didn't have an epinephrine pen on me]. The caffeine works as a vasoconstrictor, buying me precious time when I feared I might be running out of it.

Today, I live with the same allergies and sensitivities, but it appears I'm not alone. Not only have many schools banned peanuts from their premises, but now the DOT is looking into banning peanuts from flights. Right now, only United Airlines bans peanuts and peanut products from all flights, creating "no peanut" zones [and we're cautioned to check that fact with United, as things can change].

The kinds of questions I receive about severe peanut allergies range from the curious ("Why does there seem to be a rise in the number of people with peanut allergies?") to the ignorant ("Why can't people with peanut allergies just not eat peanuts? Why do the rest of us have to be deprived?"). Here are a few facts:

1. Food allergic reactions can also occur by contact or air, meaning, an allergic person can be affected by contact with or by breathing the air containing the allergy. At the writing of this post, a friend sent me a link to an article where a person was handed a peanut-dusted pillow by an airline attendant. Not good.

2. Peanut allergies may be linked to the use of soy milk and baby lotions containing peanut oil. A study in 2003 was conducted in England demonstrating that link (www.bristol.ac.uk/alspac/documents/peanut-allergy-press-release.pdf). There are possible ways to treat peanut reactions coming in the future, but for the most part, there is no known way to remove a peanut allergy, only to treat the rashes, swelling, digestive, or anaphylaxis associated with this allergy.

3. Peanut allergies doubled in the U.S. between 1997 and 2002, but the incidence seems to be unclear. I have seen one report in Wikipedia stating incidence is between 0.4%-0.6% of the population, and another more recent report stating that percentage has climbed to 1.1% or higher. Approximately 100 deaths occur from peanut allergies, making it the most deadly of all known allergies. Possibly the difference in percentages reported is that the collection of data may have only included those reporting severe sensitivities, or incidences that were reported by schools and hospitals for treatment. It may not include the mom who had a child who responded with mild tongue swelling or a rash, but was resolved with an OTC antihistamine.

4. Not all children outgrow allergies as adults. And yes, you can develop allergies later in life. [In my case, I did not find out I was allergic to peanuts until I was 28, and still remember what it was like to eat my first peanut butter and jelly sandwich as a child, without incident].

5. This is so not funny, but a peanut-allergic person can die from kissing someone who ate peanuts earlier. I am truly sorry for the boyfriend of this young gal.

So, what are our choices when it comes to flying, sharing the air (no pun intended),and staying alive? Here's what the DOT is considering (as taken from http://regulationroom.org/airline-passenger-rights/peanut-allergies/)

The Proposed Solutions:
DOT thinks perhaps the time has come to address again the problems of travelers with severe peanut allergies. It is considering the following options:

An outright ban on airlines serving peanuts and peanut products
Banning service of peanuts and peanut products only on a flight where a passenger with a peanut allergy requests a peanut-free flight in advance
Requiring the airline to provide a peanut-free buffer zone around a passenger with a medically-documented severe peanut allergy if the passenger makes a request in advance.
But DOT is open to other solutions, as well as to not adopting any regulation on this issue. See next section.

Already, peanut-sensitive people have resources to help them make the safest decision in regards to airline flight. They know who they are, and they usually take great steps to ensure their own safety, including medical alert bracelets, epi pens, and peanut product avoidance. The bigger question is if airlines need to do more to reduce their liability and incidence of peanut allergies on flights, AND if the public takes this as a cue to researching how infiltrated their food supply has become with oils, fats, and faux ingredients that are harmful and unhealthy.

What do you think? Should the FAA and DOT move towards a ban of peanut products on all flights? Do you believe peanut-allergic people take enough strides to protect their health, and need the public's help in taking the next step? I welcome your comments.

And by the way, did you know I'm airing "Video Nurse" live on Ustream.tv/video-nurse Mondays at 5pm Pacific Standard Time? Join in the fun as we discuss, "Five Things People Do That Could Kill Them". Follow me on Twitter @HipsForHire and @VideoNurse.

Lose Weight With One Change A Day

Recently I've been chatting with web entrepreneur Chris Pirillo about weight loss. Chris has been keeping up a steady pace of weight loss by counting calories and exercising fairly regularly. Yet even Chris experiences a day that ends with a "F*ck it!" and an extra helping of something or other. We all do.

What if you want to lose weight, but you're in no real big hurry to do it? You want it, but slow and steady, at nothing more than one pound a week. Is there anything you can do that doesn't take a dramatic shift in diet or routine, and doesn't involve an expensive magic pill?

I'm been reading Michael Pollan's, "In Defense of Food", the sequel to "The Omnivore's Dilemma", and Chapter Four lists most of the tips I tell my clients at Seattle Direct Counseling if they just want to make a change at a time towards healthier eating and subsequent weight loss.

Here's the skinny on those tips, with my additions [in brackets]:

1. Pay more, eat less. [By paying for higher quality food, you're likely to need and eat less].
2. Eat Meals. [Eat real meals, and snack less. At the very least, don't eat meal-sized snacks].
3. Do all your eating at a table. [And the computer desk does not count as a table. See #7]
4. Don't get your fuel from the same place your car does. [Corn is biodiesel. Get rid of it.]
5. Try not to eat alone. [You're less likely to binge, and you eat slowly and enjoy eating]
6. Consult your gut. [Learn internal cues to satiety and satisfaction].
7. Eat slowly. [Your brain needs more time to figure out you're full]
8. Cook, and if you can, grow a garden. [You're more likely to know what's in your food, and you can learn to portion it correctly].

You can try instituting one of these tips a day, and see what effect it makes. For example, take your lunch to work, but eat in a public space with other co-workers, and chat it up. Or with Tip #2, skip your office's doughnuts offered as mid-meal snacks, and have a small apple and sparkling water available if everyone else is standing around eating and you feel legitimately hungry.

None of these tips are designed to give you fast weight loss, but all of them are safe, and all of them are associated with the habits of the most health-conscious and lower weight cultures on the planet.

I'll be putting together my best weight loss tips for you in an eBook soon. In the meantime, let me know how any of these tips from Pollan's books are working for you to either help you lose weight slowly over time, or maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Interview with DJ Chuang

A friend of mine has been using social media tools and the Internet ("new media" was what it was called before) for years. Dj Chuang (djchuang.com) is a web guy, engineer, ePastor, and geek in his own right. He decided to interview me about my immersion into Social Media as a non-geek, non-industry person -- otherwise known as a "n00b".

Check out the video interview (and sorry for the verbosity, I got really excited about sharing my story!) about how I got into using Social Media for my businesses and my newest direction for Video Nurse.



What do you think? Does Video Nurse have a place in all the voices and talking heads out there?

Video Nurse: Five Things People Do That Could Kill Them

It happens all the time. In fact, it happened yesterday evening.

A friend emails me, asking about a side effect of a medication he is taking. He wants to know if he should stop taking it, or if he should continue taking it. Can he stop taking a pain killer he was prescribed, and take some OTC Tylenol instead?

As an RN and licensed mental health counselor, I have the licenses and background to field general questions -- something like a triage nurse -- and help you, the consumer, find practical answers. With cheeky humor, entertainment, knowledge, and maybe a tiny bit of pointed sarcasm for the belligerent help-resistant person, I can point you in the right direction. I'll help you wade through medical journal articles, understand studies and statistics, and tell you when something sounds downright fishy (or as my friend says, "It's a bunch of crap!").

Video Nurse makes its official debut Mondays at 5pm Pacific Standard Time on Ustream.tv (look for Video Nurse) starting June 7, 2010. It's a one-hour show by topic, with time for people in the chat room to ask questions and jump in the dialogue about health-related topics. I'll occasionally record segments of the show and archive them by topic.

While Video Nurse does not exist to diagnose or treat any specific person's disease or disorder, I can speak generally about the disease/disorder, and point callers towards resources to help them make the most informed choices possible.

Here's just one example of Video Nurse:



On Monday June 7, 2010, Video Nurse will cover the topic, "Five Things People Do That Could Kill Them". I already gave you a hint to one of the five in the above example. When you don't read your prescription carefully and mix medications, you are playing "mad scientist" with your body as the lab experiment. In the example above, Tylenol had an adverse reaction to the pain killer this friend wanted to replace. The same could be said about stopping a medication mid-prescription without informing your doctor (for follow up): that's almost always a dumb thing to do, because doctor's usually do not prescribe medication without a reason.

Every single person is responsible for his or her own health, even if you see a physician. No matter your culture, age, gender, or sexual orientation, it is your right to be informed about what keeps you healthy. Ultimately, the choices available are yours to take. Watch Video Nurse, and start living your most satisfying life today.