Seen on E. 11th street in East Austin.
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Last year, I attended the Austin-based Texas Conference for Women with my LIVESTRONG team, and we had a blast.
We heard talks from GoldieBlox creator, Debbie Sterling, the CEO of the Malala Fund, Shiza Shahid, journalist, mom and overall bad-ass, Soledad O’Brien, and my personal favorite, swimmer Diana Nyad, whose tales are as grand as one thousand This American Life stories combined.
(If you have a minute, do yourself a favor and watching Diana Nyad’s inspiring and hysterical talk.)
Between speakers, our team bounced around to various breakout sessions, workshops and roundtables, and we left the conference feeling inspired and empowered.
If you’re a woman or a man who loves women, I highly recommend checking out this year’s event, and lucky enough, I might just have a ticket for you!
The 2015 Texas Conference for Women, located at the Austin Convention Center, features actress Patricia Arquette, journalist Robin Roberts and artist Candy Chang, (more…)
I’ve lived in Austin for seven years, and within those seven years my feelings toward the city have oscillated. I’ve fallen head over heels in love, I’ve been heartbroken over change and I’ve been inspired by a new kind of affection. I fall into one or all of these categories at any single time.
In 2012, I wrote the pro-growth article “Austin is Ch-Ch-Changing: Give up the Hate and Embrace the Non-Natives Who Make Our City Great,” but one year later I questioned Austin’s rapid growth with the article “Austin Changing: Why My Love for Austin is Being Challenged.” Sometimes I felt like a teenager girl, yo-yoing between her emotions. Do I love Austin? Do I hate Austin? How do I feel about this complex and complicated city?
I look back on these articles with both empathy and embarrassment. Look how silly that girl was, thinking she understood Austin! And I know I’ll one day look back on this article with equal sentiment.
It wasn’t until recently, when I was faced with the prospect (more…)
Guys, Hipstercrite was voted “Best Local Blog” in the Austin Chronicle’s Best of 2015.
I still can’t believe it.
I freaking love Austin and I love the Chronicle, and to be in such good company means so much to me.
When I first moved to Austin seven years ago, I remember thinking, “Shit. That would be so cool to win something like that,” but I never thought that was going to happen. It still surprises me that people even read this silly thing.
If you voted for my blog, thank you.
Check out all the other kick-butt winners.
This has been such an amazing journey and I love and appreciate all of you- except for the trolls. Trolls, you can kiss my butt.
I joined Medium back in January.
Initially, I thought of it as an additional avenue to push original content and to repurpose Hipstercrite blog posts.
For the first six months, my articles got only a handful of eyes on them, which was ok since I enjoyed finding and reading diverse content on the platform. Despite having a fair amount of people following me thanks to Medium’s system of connecting individuals who are friends on other social media platforms, very few read my work. My first post had almost 100 recommendations, but ensuing posts only received a smattering of views.
In June, I republished my “Dear People Who Live in Fancy Tiny Houses” Hipstercrite blog post on Medium and it got less than ten recommendations in 30 days. The post died before ever being seen. Then one day, out of the blue, the Medium entry of “Dear People Who Live in Fancy Tiny Houses” took the f off like the Concorde. It got over 2,000,000 views in a couple of days and my social media and email inbox (more…)
The other day I came across a meme from Kid President imploring that “we need to live in a world with fewer selfies and more #otherpeoplies.”
This meme got me thinking about the word “peoplies”; it’s so damn fun to say. But then it got me thinking about my own photo-sharing experiences wherein the majority of my photos showcasing my mug perform better, meaning more ‘likes’ and comments, than the photos I take of other people, things I find interesting or places I travel to. I asked my boyfriend which of his photos perform well, and he echoed my experience. Think about your own pictures: Which photos do people respond to the best? Are they pictures featuring your sweet self or of something or someone you find interesting? Or take a look at your friends’ Facebook or Instagram feeds; do the people who fill their feeds with selfies have a higher following than others?
It makes sense that your friends and family would respond best to photos including you. Seeing your happy face is familiar, (more…)
A recent editorial trend is the admonishment of women who apologize. This movement has spawned similar essays that disparage women for vocal fry (common example: any word that comes out of Zooey Deschanel’s mouth), upspeak, the use of words such as “like” and the act of verbally undermining oneself.
(I’m about to defend women who do any or all of these things, but let me first say: VOCAL FRY SOUNDS LIKE FLAPPY MOUTH FARTS. I’m not going to tell any woman how she should speak, but damn, if you do vocal fry, particularly with upspeak, please reconsider for the sake of healthy ears everywhere.)
To me, the articles mentioned above scream, “Women, stop being who you are! Start talking more like a man! Talk in a way that makes men respect you more!” It also suggests that women want to constantly climb their career ladder, with the implication they work in a corporate setting, and for many of us, this is not applicable.
I get where these articles, found in publications such as the (more…)
Back in February, I pulled a Maureen Dowd and completely lost my f’ing mind on (legal) edibles in Denver, Colorado. (I emphasize ‘legal’ for my current employers and any future employers. Hi, guys.)
Let me start by saying: I’m weed ignorant.
I believe this is how many stories begin when someone loses their shit on edibles.
“I didn’t feel anything so I started eating more…”
I guess when my boyfriend and I nervously bought the THC-filled cookies from a dispensary in the hip Highlands part of Denver, our knees shaking as we giggled like senior citizens who had just watched a porno for the first time, we must have missed the part about waiting an hour to feel the effects. We were too busy feeling like scared ass clowns.
Instead, about 30 minutes into eating the cookies, my boyfriend proclaimed that the skunky-tasting treats were defective, so we decided to go for a second one. And then a half of a third.
And for another 30 minutes, nothing.
And then we met up with (more…)
If you’re a blogger, you know how hard it can be to make your site stand out in the sea of personal blogs.
Well, after years of research spent on the subject of blogging, I’ve finally discovered the secret to making your blog both popular and successful.
Have a baby.
From my calculations, having a baby is proven to increase your blog traffic by 200%-1000%.
If you’re hoping to break free from the pain of obscurity, follow these easy steps and watch your site, and stomach, grow:
1.) Have sex with someone: Your spouse, partner, friend or a turkey baster with the $20 sperm of the young, cute guy who works at Urban Outfitters. Sure he’s 19 years old, but you know you two will most likely create a child that looks like Shiloh Jolie-Pitt. AND THAT’S ALL THAT MATTERS.
2.) Once pregnancy is confirmed, announce it on your blog. There are only two ways to do this:
2a.) Take a photo of your shoes, your partner’s shoes (if he/she is part of the story you are creating) and (more…)
Last week I posted on my blog a survey asking childless friends, acquaintances and complete strangers why they didn’t have children. The response was terrific, and I slightly surpassed- 63-60- the amount of responders for my first poll, “Should I have children? A survey for moms and dads.” If you haven’t read the initial survey, I recommend reading it.
Unlike the first survey, this poll enabled participants to choose “other” and to explain their answers. I did not do that for the first survey because I’m a Luddite.
Below are the results from the second survey. You can also see the entire survey results and comments here.
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1.) Why Did You Not Have Children?
As you will see from the first question, the majority of participants selected “I never felt the desire to have kids.” However, this question had the most comments, with many people explaining that they had multiple reasons for not wanting children, including lack of funds, miscarriages, not wanting to lose freedom (more…)