Geek in Heels - Page 126

Aug 17, 2010 • In Baby, Information

The Baby Name Map [Google Maps]

Check out the Baby Name Map to find out which names are most popular in your state (or country), all conveniently laid out on a Google Map. What’s interesting is that many of the most popular names seem to have no state or country boundaries, which wouldn’t have been the case just 50 years ago with limited media and mass communication channels.

I think that J, whose primary requirement in choosing baby names was not to know anyone in real life with that name, would be happy to find out that the name we chose for our girl does not seem to be very popular at the moment. Neither the first nor middle name made it to the top 100 in the state of New York, and the first name barely made the top 100 in New Jersey.

Via ohdeedoh.

33 Weeks

I managed to miss the 32 week update…oops! As stated yesterday, I haven’t been in a blogging mood these past couple of weeks (or in a mood to do anything, really) because I’ve been suffering from insomnia and its consequences. They say that losing sleep in the last weeks before delivery is nature’s way of preparing you for the real lack of sleep that will come when the baby is born, and I can certainly see how!

You can really see a difference in the 31 and 33 week pictures below…maybe I’ll only take belly shots every two weeks from now on?

Remember my scant stretch marks? Well they have definitely multiplied since June, when I posted that picture, and are now on both sides of my hips. The good news is that they remain short (about 2-3″ in length) and are localized, so it almost looks like they’re just indentation marks from my clothes. I still have yet to develop stretch marks anywhere else, and I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it’ll stay that way.

The funny thing is, my mother asked me last week if I had developed any stretch marks yet. When I showed them to her, she remarked that she got them in the same exact locations when she was pregnant with me! “And don’t worry about them,” she continued. “They all disappeared within a few months after giving birth — look!”

She then showed me the sides of her hips, and she was right. I couldn’t see anything. Not even white faded lines.

My mother is a freak of nature who lost all her baby weight plus a few more pounds, fairly quickly, without even trying, so I’m sincerely hoping that whatever genes played a role in our stretch marks will have the same effect on my weight.

Experts say that at 33 weeks, my baby now weighs about 4 lbs and is about 17 inches long. Lately I have been obsessed with looking up pictures of babies who are born prematurely at this point of gestation. It’s really comforting to know that most babies who are born at 33 weeks do not have much problems, and actually resemble the cute chubby babies (as opposed to skinny, sickly-looking babies) who are born at full term.

J refuses to look at pictures of premature babies because he says he has nightmares about them. He wants a big, FAT baby with arms and legs resembling those of the Michelin Man, and constantly encourages me to keep eating in hopes that my gaining extra weight will equal a fat baby. I have to remind him over and over again that a fat momma does not always equal a fat baby, and that he is more than welcome to hope and wish for a big baby when he is willing to squeeze a bowling ball out of his nostril.

There continues to be no major developments on the nursery front. The second bedroom has yet to be packed and cleaned; the crib that we purchased over a month ago still remains in a box in our foyer; and the carseat we purchased two weeks ago still sits in its original box, untouched, in the trunk of our car. We haven’t purchased anything else. Yes, we are officially the world’s laziest first-time-parents.

The baby continues to grow stronger and if her movements are indicative of her personality, she’ll be a feisty one. (“Just like her mom!” J says.) My new favorite nighttime ritual is to sit halfway reclined, lift up my shirt, and just watch her go crazy. Once in a while, she’ll extend herself to a point where you can see a bump protruding several inches out.

And although her kicks are becoming painful, this is the part of pregnancy I will miss the most. Maybe perhaps the only part of pregnancy I will miss. Because I love feeling my baby moving inside of me and wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world. It’s a special feeling that only mothers can experience with their little ones, and (as cheesy as it sounds) at no time do I feel more connected to my baby, to feel so blessed, than when I feel her movements inside of me.

What Credit Card Agreements Should Look Like

Branding expert Alan Siegel has designed a model credit card agreement that is only one page long, is easy to understand, and communicates everything that the average user would need to know about their credit card.

As such, “It therefore has no chance of coming to life” according to The Consumerist and I must sadly agree.

See TED to view Siegel’s talk, which calls for a simple, sensible redesign of tax forms, credit agreements, healthcare legislation, etc to make legal paperwork intelligible to the rest of us.

The High Cost of Insomnia

I have been utterly uninspired as to what to write on this blog in the past week or so, and last night at around 3:52am, I finally figured out why: insomnia.

They say that insomnia affects up to 75% of women in their third trimesters, and it looks like it seeped into my life right on time, at about two weeks ago and refusing to make its departure. What makes things even worse is that my lack of sleep exacerbates all my other third trimester symptoms: nausea, swelling/bloating, aching, nosebleeds, and the general feeling of ickiness.

It was only fitting that I stumbled upon this infographic this morning…

After browsing this infographic, I am hoping that my situation is a case of acute insomnia, not chronic.

Does anyone have any suggestions for battling pregnancy-induced insomnia?

Via Power of Data Visualization.

Twitter Bug Lets You Tweet Over 140 Characters

A bug in Twitter’s new t.co URL shortener allows users to tweet well over the 140-character limit. And some Twitter users are taking full advantage of the flaw, like @sskhybrid who shared a 2,135 character tweet, or @esehara who decided to tweet Genesis Chapter 1 in its entirety (3,157 characters).

If you want to join in on the new trend, just head on over to http://twitter.com/share?text=&url=yourtext, add whatever you want in place of “yourtext,” copy and paste your new t.co URL to Twitter (or use the convenient TweetButton), and tweet away.

The only caveat seems to be that the long tweets will not be able to viewed on many mobile Twitter clients, only on the Twitter website itself.

Via TechCrunch.

The Office Strikes Back

Combine one of my favorite televisions shows with Star Wars and what do you get? A very happy geek.

Art by Jason Sly, via Laughing Squid.

MetroCard Commercials from 1997 [Remember When?]

Remember when we had to buy tokens to ride the NYC subway? And being a frequent user of the MTA meant you needed to purchase rolls of tokens? (Is that a rolls of tokens in your pocket or are you happy to see me?)

Now, in 2010, it’s hard to recall a time before MetroCards. Take a trip down memory lane with these series of commercials for the then-new MetroCard (called “MetroCard Gold”) from 1997:

Via Gothamist.

P.S. — Taking a similar trip back in time, remember the days before E-ZPass?

P.P.S. — It looks to be another busy weekend. Sorry for the lack of posts!

Some Additional Thoughts on Squarespace, and Updates to the Site

I have been using Squarespace since 2008 when I was asked to test their new V5 platform, and even wrote an extensive review on it after deciding to switch over from WordPress. I still believe it to be the best blogging platform available, and wholeheartedly recommend it to all my friends and colleagues.

But as much as I love Squarespace, I would be lying if I were to say that I do not have any issues with it.

I think it’s safe to say that Squarespace can be comparable to Apple (more specifically, the iPhone platform) in that they are very secretive about what’s coming next, its users are reliant on them and not third-party resources for major improvements and updates, and those updates are few and far between.

However, like Apple, those improvements and updates are almost always meticulous and well-tested, and more often than not well worth the wait.

For example, its release of Social Widgets a few months ago was met with warm applause all around. I had a Twitter timeline on the sidebar of my blog before using the code provided by Twitter, but Squarespace’s Twitter Widget allows me to add a highly customizable, pretty Twitter badge that pre-loads data and does not slow down the loading of this site, even when Twitter is slow or down…all at the click of a few buttons!

That being said, my biggest gripe with Squarespace thus far is its archaic commenting system. There is no way to incorporate Gravatars. There is no way to reply to individual comments, or receive email notifications when someone replies to your comment. And along that route, there is no way to visually thread the comments. All are features that have been widely available on other blogging platforms for quite some time now, and experts claim that engaging with your audience (in this case, your commenters) is one of the best ways to build a community around your blog.

Squarespace’s response to this (very common) complaint is that you can choose to install a third-party commenting system like Disqus or IntenseDebate to your site. While these two are both very respectable and widely-used systems, I do not like the fact that all my comments will be stored on their servers. What happens if the company goes bust? Or if their website is down? Additionally, there is currently no way to import my old comments to their systems, and I do not want the thousands of comments that I have received over the years to suddenly disappear (technically, be hidden) from my blog.

Well, Squarespace added some new features yesterday, one of which is an option to easily subscribe to comments on a particular post: simply check the box stating so at the bottom of each comment box.

While this isn’t the commenting system I would like to see, it’ll do for now. I’m just keeping my fingers crossed that a robust commenting system is on the way with Squarespace V6!

In addition to the option of subscribing to comments, Squarespace also announced the incorporation of (optional) HTML snippets to each post so that bloggers will have the option of easily adding Facebook “Like” buttons, Tweetmeme buttons, Google Buzz buttons, or even the new Twitter buttons (which was perfectly timed as Twitter announced its official button yesterday).

Since I recently re-activated my Facebook account, I figured why not? and proceeded to add both the Twitter and Facebook buttons. You can find them at the bottom of each post:

So please feel free to Tweet or “Like” away! I’m always delighted to find that a post has been shared via any social media outlet as I myself have found many of my favorite blogs this way.

I continue to look forward to more updates from Squarespace in the future (and I am quite certain that their frequency and quality will increase as they recently received a major investment), and I will try my best to keep this site attractive, user-friendly, and up-to-date. In the meantime, if you have any suggestions for this site I would love to hear it!

Adobe Photoshop Cook

My friend Kelly (of Blunsh!nk fame) shared this on Facebook today and I couldn’t help but be utterly delighted. I hope all my foodie and designer readers love it as much as I do…enjoy!