Julie Pippert: Using My Words

On All Things Considered, Frannie Kelley told a story about a band she learned about from a press release. Except, it turned out, the story was very little to do with the band and very much about the press release. The Band Delicate Steve is a sort of indie instrumental style, based on the clips I've heard. It's mostly upbeat, I think, and reminds me a lot of movie soundtracks. If you like Badly Drawn Boy, I think you'd like this. The band is lead by Steve Marion. Steve is a 23-year old Jersey boy who plays multiple instruments. Steve is currently on tour. But that's not what the press release said. The press release was conceived of by Yale Evelev, who runs the label Luaka Bop, and executed by Chuck Klosterman, former Spin writer, and author of two books ( Fargo Rock City and Killing Yourself to Live: 85% of a True Story ). The Press Release Yale Evelev thinks band bios are boring. Frannie Kelley quotes him as saying : "I've watched how writers write about...

While researching girls in tech topics, I consistently run across these awesome women doing so many things in tech...around the world. For example, while searching Twitter for Girls in Tech (on any given day) I found an international array of people supporting girls in tech in Indonesia, Africa, Asia, Israel and more. I set up Google alerts for the same search and was bombarded. I ran across a great article that explained in Africa, across the continent, young women lead the tech scene . The Silicon Sisters just released a new iOS game, made by women for girls . You've got Girls in Tech with chapters spreading around the US. But then we see a few other sides to the story, too. There are good questions and discussions about inequity, and how to balance the scale, such as Allyson Kapin's Where are the women in tech and social media? There are appalling and bigoted assertions about women being their own worst enemy, with no actual solutions, such as Michael Arrington's Too F...

Driving home from school with my girls is what I think of Quality Catchup Time but they probably think of (or will soon) as Suffer the Mom Inquisition. The latter title comes from an inside family joke about Suffer the Mom Love, which is when I give hugs to children and pets because they want and need them even as they pretend they don't. Trust me, I can tell the difference and respect a sincere no but give a smiling "Oh Moooooooommmmm" a good squeeze. While in the van, I ask each girl very specific questions so as to avoid potential monosyllabic responses. My younger daughter has been trying out her storytelling skills and we've been working on the "that's a great story, what a neat imagination" distinction from "that really happened, how interesting." Sometimes it's hard to tell. Such as in the telling of the story/report from the other day: Daughter: Today I have a romantic tale! *giggles* Me: A...romantic tale? Daughter: Yes! *giggles* ...

Yesterday, after an admirably long run of successfully avoiding April Fool's Day pranks, I got punk'd but good by Hollywood. I went to go see the new movie for kids: Hop . Ha ha Hollywood, you really tricked me with your great cast lineup, all of whom had me totally fooled that they'd never do anything except creative and clever cinema. I was lulled into a false sense of security between that and the Toy Story series. That's the best con, you know: get to know your mark, build a sense of trust and then WHAMMO! I fell for it! You got me with your con of "worthwhile artistic cinema." Friday afternoon, I made one of those infamous "it seemed like a great idea at the time" decisions. I joined a group of friends and we took a gaggle (honestly, it was a gaggle -- I lost count at the sheer number; I know I brought four and it seems as if everyone else brought about that many too) of kids to see Hop . If you have kids, you probably won't be able to avo...

THE CRITICS UNILATERALLY CONCUR: DELICATE STEVE IS A BAND WHO CREATES MUSIC Newton, N.J. – Every 30 or 40 or 500 years, the DNA of culture itself emerges from the translucent blackness of the not-so-shallow underground. You hear a new band, and you think, "This is really something. This is like My Bloody Valentine, minus the guitars." But then you think, "No, that's not true. That's not what this is like at all. Plus, there are lots of guitars here. I'm a goddamn idiot." You want to walk away, but now it's too late; now, you start to wonder what makes this music so deeply arresting. You wonder why you are dancing against your will, and you wonder why every other sound you've ever heard suddenly sounds like the insignificant prologue to a moment you're experiencing in the present tense. You find yourself unable to perform the simplest of activities — a cigarette becomes impossible to light, a mewing kitten cannot be stroked, a liverish lover c...

Lately, my kids have been competing for the award for Bickeriest Bickerton Ever. I find myself saying, constantly, things such as: If you start a sentence with No no no no no no, you are probably starting a battle. If you start a sentence with this sarcastic tooooonnnnnneeee, you are probably starting a battle. If you accuse someone of something awful -- you lied! you stole! you broke! you're so weird! -- you are probably starting a battle. I am trying to convince my kids that starting a battle is a bad plan. It takes time, wastes energy, creates an unpleasant environment, leaves everyone feeling bad, and doesn't accomplish a thing. I don't want them growing up feeding off negativity like drama vampires, you see. In point of fact, I don't want them to grow up to be thoughtless or bullies or only able to relate via "telling it like it is" and through harshness and cruelty. Lately, though, it's getting harder, and I think I realized my tolerance is at an all...

"Let's be friends forever -- LYLAS!" has morphed into "Let's be BFFs!" since I was a girl, but the meaning is still the same: young, open hearts feel a swell of emotional connection and want to extend that warm and lovely sense. Forever, though, is a really different concept from person to person. My girls take it pretty literally, and do sincerely mean it. I understand this; it's my way too. I don't understand it as a fleeting metaphor. When my girls encounter this, their hearts break and they sob in my arms, "Why does she not want to be my friend any more?" For now, it is their buddies. In a few years, though, I know it will be something more. How can you explain to the broken-hearted that one doesn't love more or less but that some others have more of a plural approach to love and friendship, in counter to their more singular approach? You hug them, bless their lovely loyal hearts, and help piece back together a heart hopefully left ...

"Mom, I must have been really bad this year," my nine year old said. "Why is that?" I asked. "Because Santa brought my friend a bike and all I got was little stuff. Santa must not like me much," she said. The terrible, horrible, no good Santa Situation aka the Big Dilemma aka the rough moment and what is a mom to do? Let me back up a bit. My husband and I decided a while ago to be very conscientious about how we handled the Santa situation and Christmas gift giving. We planned with an eye to the long-term. Here are key factors we considered: Both kids have birthdays in December, making it a massive gifting and receiving month, with the rest of the year pretty bone dry. Santa is a very special part of the holiday, but we didn't want the holiday to revolve around Santa or what Santa brings. Santa is a great morality tale/myth potential that's gotten way too diluted. The original concept of Saint Nicholas giving to needy and building out a concrete em...

Note: Read all the way to the bottom for the MUST WATCH kids' Christmas show, which will air on Christmas Day. Okay so here are the things I got this year for gifting that I actually thought were awesome. They meet my "I'd really give this to someone and feel great about it" criteria. Some were things I might never have thought of, but got offered as review. I admit I used a good deal of selectivity in agreeing to receive certain products to review, so there was always a good chance I'd like them, but let's just say some were hits and some were misses. There are also a few things I risked buying online and have since received, whereupon I discovered they were as awesome as I'd hoped. I'll distinguish what I found from what was sent for review. Here are the hits: My find -- Lillian Vernon I used to buy from Lillian Vernon frequently on gift-giving occasions. I'm not sure why I veered away. They have good stuff, you can personalize most of it, it inc...

It finally got cool here. I know, highs of 62 barely qualify as cool but there you have it: our average winter low here. It feels like early fall to me, and so that means I am whipping out the crock pot (and anyone who knows me knows how I love my crock pot: it's mass amount cooking, everything and the spice cabinet, tasty, aromatic, slacker cooking -- in other words, all my favorite ways to cook rolled in to one!). When I pull out the crock pot, I tend to also pull out a vintage cookbook. My stepmother gave this cookbook to me in 1989 when I moved into my first apartment -- solo living, like a real grownup, with rent, utilities, and everything. It's like feeling that taste of independence, doing it my way, anew. All while getting old-fashioned comfort cooking. You know what I mean? So, of course, my first foray for crock pot hot meal cool weather cooking is...chili. Hey. It's Texas. And of course I use a recipe straight out of this cookbook called Chili Con Carne. Except I...

Not too long ago, I was reading a New York Times article about why people unfriend other people on Facebook and it got me thinking about a lot of things, truly. What does Friend mean, anyway? (And when did it get to be a Proper Verb? When did Verbs get Proper, anyway?) Don't you Friend people you like, and thereby, de facto, accept as they are? Who are you to deem someone else uninteresting? Okay let's start at the end. From the article : "The rules of Internet friendship seem to differ in other ways from their earthbound equivalents. There is a bluntness to unfriending that would hardly fly in real life: “As soon as you have a baby, you become uninteresting,” noted one survey respondent." Really? You think maybe, possibly, it could be that it's a case of the other person hasn't become uninteresting but, in fact, developed a new life focus that is just worlds away from your own, and that doesn't make either of you bad...it just means you don't fit the...

After a stroke today, incomparable JFK speechwriter Ted Sorensen died . He was 82. Sorensen might be the most quoted speechwriter. He is certainly the man behind JFK's best lines. Sorensen, though, always attributed the famous lines -- such as "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country" -- to Kennedy. In an interview with the BBC about a decade ago, Ted Sorensen tried to explain why he and John F Kennedy got along. I think, in fact, it was his way of trying to explain why he always said JFK came up with the best lines, rather than taking the credit. It's something writers can understand, I think; in essence, to paraphrase, he said he channeled JFK when writing -- he knew him so well, knew what he'd want to say and simply formed the lines that he knew his friend would want. As someone who has ghostwritten and extensively "developmental edited" books, I know what he means. As someone who has written lines for politician...