About Miss Bossy
Who am I, anyway?
- Forty-something single parent with two kids: Eleven year old Drama Mama and now-an-official teen The Mogul.
- NE Portland resident for twelve years, with a short stint in California (don’t throw tomatoes, please) and a longer stint in NYC. Born and raised in Michigan.
- I’ve spent 20+ years as a media jack-of-all-trades for outlets ranging from small hometown weekly newspaper to multinational Big Media Corporations, with a few magazines, online ventures (yep, did the dot.com thing), and agency experiences tossed in for good measure. And now? I head up the professional services team at a technology company here in PDX.
- Email me: betsywhim at gmail dot com. I check my email constantly, and respond regularly.
- I also spend too much time using various social media tools – you can find me on Twitter as betsywhim; I’m on Facebook and Pownce and various flavors of IM as well. Stop by and say hi!
- And if that’s not enough information? See this profile over at VanPortlander.
What else can I do/have I done?
- This list ought to give you more information than you ever wanted to know about my supposed skills and abilities.
- I’m the chief cook and rabble rouser over at OurPDX Network a Portland group blog I started in June of 2008.
- I’ve contributed to and/or created “more blogs than the Iranian missile program” (according to a fellow blogger), including my daughter’s elementary school site.
- While I’m no longer writing regularly for DotMoms (find my archive here, I’m still an original Dot.Mom (according to the Wall Street Journal, anyway…)
- I’m on the board for Community and Parents for Public Schools here in PDX: yep, I put that website together as well (in my copious spare time, of course…)
What do others say?
- My kids will often tell me that I’m the “meanest mother in the whole wide world” right now. I take pride in that fact – it must mean I’m doing something right. Or, as my friend Karyn replies when hit with the same accusation: “I’m going for the gold, baby. If you’re gonna do it, be the best.”
She accompanies this with hands clasped over head, sometimes with an Oscar-like acceptance speech. Her daughter has been known to respond in one/two fashion, first with the whole TMMITWWW, then “”And DON’T tell me you’re going for the gold!” (Yes, we both have ‘drama mamas’…) - I’m in a book! Blogosphere: Best of Blogs had this to say about yours truly:
On the My Whim Is Law blog, Betsy shares parenting strategies from the perspective of a single mom of two children with a wicked wit and strong sense of conviction. Using the same aggrieved tongue-in-cheek tone first used by Erma Bombeck, the popular motherhood humorist from the 70’s, Betsy shares stories about her ongoing battles to get her daughter to do household chores properly, dating with children, and tips on enjoying a kid-free weekend alone in the house.
(My charming son sees the Erma Bombeck bit as yet another sign that I’m ‘old and decrepit’, urgh…)
- Scott over at Karmaville says that I’m a ‘person to see’, and cites my ‘wicked sense of humor.’ Best compliment I’ve had in ages…
- The kids and I were in a newspaper article about blogging; read it here. Of course, I got labeled as a ‘loud voice’ online, which is so not true, don’t you know…
- A “particularly vicious blogger”? Apparently so, according to this author. Get the backstory (and my response) here
- My 2nd grade teacher wrote once on my report card that “Betsy is a charming child, but she needs to learn to stay in her seat instead of coming up to share interesting facts with me all the time.” Uh, sorry – it seems as if I haven’t quite kicked that habit, just turned it into a blog of sorts.
- The father of my children used to say that when I was wrong, I was “wrong with such conviction” that he’d bow to my greater, uh, force. I’ve tried to learn to be less certain of things I’m not quite sure of as a result – to not set so many things in stone. It doesn’t always come easily…
Some of my more personal posts…
- In How’d I get so bossy, anyway? I explain just how I came up with this blog’s name.
- I rant about excuses, my own impatience, and simple common courtesy in Oregon: “The dog ate my homework” state
- I defend my divorced-with-kids state in Save your pity, sweetheart
- I see my beloved grandmother every day – in my daughter’s face.
- The letter I’ll never send to my father (this post was a finalist in the July, 2005 Blogging for Books competition.)
