There is a definite art to cutting an onion without crying. I’m hyper sensitive to onions and even garlic makes me slightly weep. I was given these cool shades to wear when cooking to help protect my baby blues. I’ve tried several things that I had hear to combat this: Soak the onion in water for 10 minutes before cutting and don’t cut the middle core, but nothing worked.

But there is a (less dorky) solution! The Total Food Geeks taught me that the trick is to not cut the EDGES of the onion. And it’s that simple. It does mean retraining yourself in the way you chop veg, but at least you can see what you’re doing & therefore eliminate the risk of chopping your fingers off.

This post was inspired by a picture of an onion on Pinterest. I do feel my blog is going into a big sea of randomness, but just thought I should share.

Keeping with my new tradition, here are my workout stats from January through April, 2012 and while I don’t find using notes on my iPhone the most ideal template, it’s been invaluable for my sessions – being able to keep track of my reps & weight has come in handy on more than one occasion. This also helps you to ensure you workouts are somewhat streamlined - and also a great way to notice if you’re improving.

Due to some injury issues I haven’t  been as much this month as I would have liked – I took two weeks off – but in other news – I’ve gotten back in the pool! It’s been almost a year since I participated in the Virgin London Triathlon on behalf o Belron and I’ve finally gotten back in the water (beacuse of certain injuries, I needed a break from machines & weights).

It’s actually quite interesting and funny in a way, that each time I’m injured, including the actual break , the one thing I turn to is the pool.

Below is my updated workout lists, post boozy Christmas, a holiday to New York and New Years parties. My goals:

• To rebuild my back muscles
• Tone my legs, bum & tum
• Reduce fat

Jan – April 2012 Gym sessions

*Notes for Gym workouts – machine definitions:
Upper:
#20 – lat pulldown (lays & biceps)
#23 – chest press (shoulders, pecks & triceps)
#14 – abs
#19: Seated Row (lats – upper & lower, biceps & shoulders)
#6: lower back: settings #2 on both
#33: Arm pulldown

Lower:
#18: squat (glutes & hamstrings)
#22: seated leg curl (hamstrings)
#21: seated leg extension (quads)
#4: Lying down squat machine (glutes, Hamstrings, Quads)
#3: Glues & hamstrings
#1: Abductor
#2: Adductor

The topic comes up regularly in our household: how are we connected? What are we syncing to? Could we eliminate any of the extra steps? What – this isn’t typical conversation in your house?

So we decided to make lists. Every place online we store data. @Johnstok sent me his list and I looked at it and thought – oh wow, okay, surely mines less than that… Nope. Not only did I have some to add, I uncovered more for him!

So here is my list of sites and apps that I push my data through or sync to almost daily (and sorry sites, but I can’t link to each of you – maybe if there weren’t so many!)

63 68. Count them.

There could possibly be some missing still – kinda scary! When do you reduce, when do you consolidate? It’s surprising how they add up. How many do you have? is there a chunk of them you could ditch?

As is the nature of the beast working in digital and also being a geek that loves to do it in your spare time, you sometimes lose out the opportunity to share your views and use any left over energy to write on your own blog – so in light of this – and so you don’t miss out – here are some of my posts from the LBi Bigmouthmedia blog over the past six months.

You can read the most recent post: Branded Facebook Timeline Covers: 10 of the best (so far)

If you haven’t checked it out, it’s definitely worth a follow (the whole blog – not my posts specifically!) Great news around all media & digital, updated regularly. Enjoy!

Most recent first:

• Is less more? One to watch: Path
• Pinterest: Already a Major Social Player
• Bigmouthmedia Social Media Week 2011 Glasgow #SMWbmm
• Will Google+ make waves?
• Social Media Results 2011 #SocMedResults

And a few keepers from the social team:

• Competitions and Social Media
• A play on words – WordAds or AdSense
• Social Media and the impending Zombie Apocalypse

Today I have been remembering how worried you were in ninth grade that you did not know what career you wanted.  Interesting that it had not been invented yet.  Nor would be until you finished your education.  Just some random thoughts.  Loving it.

- Mom (my mom, @TX_Cathie)

At the start of 2011 I hadn’t yet decided to participate in the Belron Triathlon, nor was I yet back to being a member of the gym. Now, 12 months later, here I am writing about my gym sessions like a dork and have a open water swim race under my belt.

I remember when going to the gym was just something I did, daily. Maybe more than once, like eating. As a competitive swimmer, waking up, burning 1000 calories and then starting my day was normal. I didn’t think about it, I just did it.

When you have the momentum, it’s easy to keep it going. It’s when you lose that momentum, when the cycle stops, that’s where it gets difficult.

My momentum stopped in 1997, maybe it was 1996. My first injury. Only someone like me could start a sentence with ‘my first’! I tore two ligaments in my ankle right before my sophomore year in high school. This meant I wasn’t able to try out for the Swim Team and I spent a semester riding a stationary bike and freezing my ankle off in an Ice bath.

From there I decided to join cross country to stay in shape – I was over swimming after 13 years of it. If you know me, I’m not a runner. That lasted a semester, 6 miles a day – 2 miles at 6:00 every morning and then 4-5 after school. I actually hated it so much that I didn’t want to go to sleep at night because I had to wake up & run. I did it though. Every day.

Off to university I go – gym included in tuition. Win. Pool – meh. So to the gym as I felt like it – decided to try the pool second semester. Joined the Swimming Club – great group of friends, great work out, fell in love with the coach – ahhh… fell out with the coach; stopped swimming – back to the gym.

Around 2000 I went to the Voodoo Festival in New Orleans, LA. So much fun. Ended the evening by crowd surfing to 311 – did such a decent job on my first try – that I got near the stage and dropped about 6ft onto dirt ground that had been stomped on all day – felt like cement. Injury number 2: Separated shoulder, cracked my shoulder bone & fractured my shoulder blade… Ahhhhh…

Needless to say, once I got out of the sling months later and did physical therapy I had lost all the muscle in my shoulder & arm I had built up over the years.

What is my point and why am I going on about all this?! Well, I’m making excuses – or am I? Ankle, shoulder in 3 places, 2 spinal surgeries… Getting fit again is hard! Injuries never fully heal and new injuries shake up old injuries. It is a pain in the ass.

So with my injuries, scar tissue, asthma, crooked knee caps and whatever the hell the pain is shooting down my hip and I look back and think (in fact have to remind myself a few times a day) – considering everything – I’m doing a pretty damn good job.

… so what I didn’t go to the gym all of December – nor have I swam since the triathlon

Sept – Dec 2011 Gym sessions 

*Notes for Gym workouts – machine definitions:

Upper:
#20 – lat pulldown (lays & biceps)
#23 – chest press (shoulders, pecks & triceps)
#14 – abs
#19: Seated Row (lats – upper & lower, biceps & shoulders)
#6: lower back: settings #2 on both

Lower:
#18: squat (glutes & hamstrings)
#22: seated leg curl (hamstrings)
#21: seated leg extension (quads)
#4: Lying down squat machine (glutes, Hamstrings, Quads)

*photo via Courtesy- http://www.mdeals.in

There is an oxymoron of absurdity and beauty about the idea that because a date changes, you get a clean slate to start over. The beauty lies in the psychology behind how a simple date change can convince our minds that we can actually have this fresh start. It’s a new year or even tomorrow’s another day.

To not scupper tradition, I am too joining in the millions around the world who are looking for 2012 to indeed be a New Year, on many levels.

My resolutions are simple, and therefore I hope achievable. If you set yourself unobtainable or unrealistic goals, you are really just setting yourself up for a fall or failure – and then you’ll end up having to take three steps back.

Resolution 1:
I did well in getting back into working out last year, training for the triathlon relay, and while I’ve had injury issues along the way, I was doing a pretty good job at getting back into shape. Therefore, now that I’ve taken a month (maybe more…) off, I plan on continuing to go to the gym, therefore I won’t make that a resolution. However, I do need to take better care of myself in other ways, such as drinking less, caring more about what I put into my body, stress etc. Also, seeing the right people to ensure my shoulder/neck/back issues aren’t long-term.

Also, I do want to make a concerted effort to ride my new bike more.

Resolution 2:
Focus more on my personal life and self and less on  being married to job. I do live to work and maybe I’m not balancing it as well as I should. This will include many things, but some are: more ‘me’ time to do what I love doing and seem to never have time for; spending time with my other half and family, learning new things.

Resolution 3:
Learning new things! I want to take my new camera and get back into photography, including creating all the creative photo plans I’ve had in the past, as well as using the 1080p camera and Final Cut Express to actually get more involved in video editing. Just need a muse now! Might be Chase Kitteh at first…

I’ve also signed up for the Code Academy – so maybe I’ll learn to code a bit as well.

Lastly, get back into using WordPress.org more, maybe use some of the coding to improve this blog through the back-end.

Okay – so not much to get on with then! Better get started…

Happy 2012 to you all and may it be a great one!

Lists. I love lists. I love lists and I love Twitter. What this means is that, you guessed it – I love Twitter Lists.

There are a few types of lists. The kind where you write down what you want to achieve and then have the amazingly simple satisfaction of ‘marking one off’ once you’ve accomplished it.

There are several online versions for ‘to do’ lists, which I find less satisfying than pen & paper, however, that’s for a separate blog post. Maybe a guest post from iamjohnstok.com…

Twitter lists. Twitter lists are what I want to call a best kept secret, but they aren’t secret. They are there, begging to be used, however from recent experiences explaining them to others, it’s not as straightforward as one might believe.

This has inspired me to (finally!) write an overview of Twitter lists – the basics, top tips and how to use them effectively through a series of Q&A.

Do I have to be following the person to add them to a list?
Nope! This is one of the great aspects of Twitter Lists. You can add people to a list that you don’t want filling your normal feed. For example: Clients, contacts, competitors or even someone you might just fancy. Now if you have an entire list dedicated to, as one friend used to say ‘prospects’ (sexual or romantic), then I might worry.

Can I DM people I follow on a list?
No. You give up this privilege when you simply add someone to a list. But remember – if they follow YOU, you can still DM them.

I follow too many people!
There is always one reason or another thought that you can’t ‘unfollow’ some people. My advice here, and what I actively do, is create a ‘Private’ list, called something like ‘Core’. Then move your key tweeps to this list. I following about 1500 people. I have a core list that is maybe 250 people. Does that mean I ignore everyone else no, but if I’m in a rush, I can skim the list and hopefully pick up key tweets. However, any other time, I do read my full list – especially when I’m using my phone or sitting in front of the tv.

I need help organising my followers, like Google Circles.
The best way to organise your followers is to create multiple lists and add them to accordingly. Then use an app such as Tweetdeck (my preferred app at the moment) to  follow them.

Go to your Twitter profile, click on Lists – then choose ‘create a list’. From here you can add anyone you wish, weather you follow them or not. Simply title your list – something like ‘Colleagues’ or your company name if you want others to be able to follow the list. Then write a brief description about what the list is for and save. You can now easily click on each list and follow what the people on that particular list are up to.

I want to be added to someone’s list.
Just tweet them & ask to be added!

How do I create a list?
As previously stated, just sign into Twitter,  go to your profile, click ‘lists’ at the top of the Twitter stream and then choose ‘create a list’.

If I follow a list will other people be able to see it?
If you follow someone else’s list, yes other people will be able to see it. At the moment, you aren’t able to share private lists with other people (this, in my opinion, would be very useful especially for the workplace).

Can my list be private, so people don’t know they’re on it?
Yes. If you want to follow people and for any reason, you don’t want others to know the list exists – you can keep the list as private. When you create the new list, simply tick the private box.

This might be because you are following loads of celebrities and you’re embarrassed; you could be stalking competitors or even have a list of clients or potential clients and you don’t want others to see – however you want to keep an eye on their feed or make sure you’re up to date with them.

What do you do Darcie?
I’ve pretty much explained it so far, but basically I love lists. I have created lists for various reasons, such as the Edinburgh Coffee Morning: #EdCM. This way all (up to 150) attendee’s can  follow a list and easily have conversations with one another. This helps meet new people, find those who you have met, but maybe didn’t catch their name/Twitter handle – or keep up with the Twitterati of Edinburgh.

I also have lists created to make sure I can see what my colleagues are up to – what interesting industry news they tweet or their own blog posts etc. I have a strong view on people in the work place communicating on Twitter and how it probably helps strengthen relationships amongst employees and colleagues – but that’s for another post!

I keep a ‘Core’ list, for when I’m on the go. this is the main list in my Tweetdeck set up. I have the the ‘Core List, followed by a column of all the people I follow, then @replies, then those I follow through @DarcieT, then @replies to that account, followed by DM’s, then the LBi/Bigmouthmedia list and my EdCM list.

I hope that covered most of the questions surrounding Twitter lists – if you have anything specific you are curious about, just ask in the comments below!