on Monday May 5, 2008

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So, for all of those registered members out there, I have come up with another bit of innovation in the form of "The Community Blog."  The Community Blog is one part forum, one part blog, and one part totally awesome. 

Why use The Community Blog? 

• You as a registered user can now post content on Joeprah.com 

• You can use the blog to give yourself link love from Joeprah.com (a site that has a Google Page Rank of 4) whenever you like. 

• You can use the blog to talk about hot social topics in a friendly mature forum moderated by a super talented and handsome webmaster (ahem)

• You can use the blog to talk about something you just posted at your own site

• You can use the blog to write down a grocery list item before you forget

• You can use the blog for world peace

• You can use the blog to ask questions in the Joeprah community

• You can not use the blog and be totally fine, probably?,  but remember it's out there and should be fun to interact with

Enjoy this new innovation courtesy of team Joeprah.  Word!

Joeprah Says... User Comments (6) Favorite This Post (18)

on Monday May 5, 2008

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Views 332

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     First, I would like to say that the month of May has some exciting things in store for those loyal readers of, what I consider, the best site ever--Joeprah.com.  I will be releasing the first ever series of articles that are only going to be available to "Registered Users."  In this series entitled "Confessions of a Stay at Home Dad" I will go back to the beginning and allow readers to find out the story behind Joeprah becoming a stay at home dad.  This series has already been touted by critics (I am my own worst critic trust me) as groundbreaking, and better than reading the obituaries.  So if you haven't registered you will soon find yourself on the outside looking in, I have forced your hand in a stroke of brilliance to register.
 
    Second, in May I will be continuing to upgrade my site (if that's possible), I am going to start by allowing registered Joeprah members to share there Twitter Home Pages, Cre8Buzz Profile Pages and BlogCatalog user pages within their profiles.  This information will also be viewable in the “interactive blogroll.”

    The third major improvement for Joeprah.com members is the addition of a gallery tab in your profile page. This gallery tab will allow members to further customize their profiles by utilizing state of the art technology.  This technology will give members the ability to upload multiple images into their profile page making it just that more awesome.

    I have had some folks wondering why they should register at Joeprah.com and after spending some time reflecting on the question I have realized that there are literally at least a couple of reasons to register.  Here are my favorites:

Greater Exposure:

How many blogs do you know of that announce when you have logged on and allow you to have a customizable profile?  Just mine?  I thought so.  At Joeprah.com, when you log in, your profile ID is displayed on the left sidebar and each time someone looks at your profile you will notice your “hit counter” go up. These hits mean more people notice your website/blog and this means more possible visitors to your site.  Win/win.  Also, being a member gives you an opportunity to upload a profile image that is seen whenever you comment on an article.  Your username is directly linked to your profile and if someone clicks your name from within an article's comments, once again your hit counter reflects this. 

Fun:

At Joeprah.com we strive to give our users a fun experience.  Yep, that’s all I got on that one.

Money:

Money?  What?  Yep, now at Joeprah.com, you will have an opportunity to turn your zealous love for Joeprah into cold hard cash.  The Independence Day Contest at Joeprah.com allows registered members to compete for cash.  Lots of it.  Well, depending on what you consider lots. Let’s just say compete for a sum of money.  The rules of the contest are as follows:

The Independence Day Contest at Joeprah.com:

Rules: 

•  Any registered member with a website can participate.

• The contest runs from May 5^th to July 4^th

• The member with the greatest number of referrals to Joeprah.com will win the prize money

• You can refer people to my website using your website only

• You can use links in a post or in your sidebar

• Clicking your own links is both reprehensible and in poor taste of the contest

• I will track referrals via a state of the art traffic program

• The prize for the website with the most referral traffic to Joeprah.com is $25.00 (USD), eh
  

• If you plan on participating you should announce your intentions by responding to this newsletter stating your intention and listing your website address

• It costs nothing to play

Cash will be paid on the week of July 4^th either through PayPal or cashiers check to the winner.

 
I have created some badges that you can proudly display at your site to help get yourself some referral traffic or to just spread the love of Joeprah throughout the internet.  Here are the badges with their accompanying code (you do not need to copy the images, just the code):

<center><a href="http://www.joeprah.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://joeprah.com/images/stories/contest1.png" alt=" " width="175" height="120" /></a></center>

 <center><a href="http://www.joeprah.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://joeprah.com/images/stories/contest2.png" alt=" " width="175" height="120" /></a></center>

 <center><a href="http://www.joeprah.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://joeprah.com/images/stories/contest3.png" alt=" " width="175" height="120" /></a></center>

 <center><a href="http://www.joeprah.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://joeprah.com/images/stories/contest4.png" alt=" " width="175" height="120" /></a></center>

<center><a href="http://www.joeprah.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://joeprah.com/images/stories/contest5.png" alt=" " width="175" height="120" /></a></center>

<center><a href="http://www.joeprah.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://joeprah.com/images/stories/contest6.png" alt=" " width="175" height="120" /></a></center>

<center><a href="http://www.joeprah.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://joeprah.com/images/stories/contest7.png" alt=" " width="175" height="120" /></a></center>

I will post bi-monthly updates for the participants which will give those involved in the contest an idea of where they stand. These updates will be done through a post which only registered users can have access to.

Thanks as always for all your support!  So, go forth register, update your profile with your Twitter/Cre8Buzz/BlogCatalog info, take a chance at winning the $25 Independence Day Contest and subscribe to Joeprah to stay up to date with all my most recent posts.

Your Truly,

Team Joeprah

Joeprah Says... User Comments (11) Favorite This Post (14)

“I never thought that after seven years in college to finish a four year degree that my workplace chores would include changing diapers and using a nasal aspirator.  This chapter looks at how I became a stay at home dad and the tough choices our family made that went against the grain.”

I am a stay-at-home-dad and this is my story.  All the college courses and “on the job training” I have endured have done little to prepare me for my adventures in parenting as a stay-at-home-dad.  I remember growing up as a young boy and being asked the typical questions, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”  I can’t remember ever saying, “I want to use a number of moist towelettes to remove poo from a baby’s bottom.”  You never think as a boy growing up, “You know what, I am going to be a dad when I grow up,” it just happens.  I met my wife, Jodi, when we were 16.  Yeah, I know, my name is Joe and my wife’s name is Jodi—fate right?  I trained her how to scoop ice cream at a Friendly’s Restaurant.  She, almost immediately, fell head over heels in love with me.  Although everyone in our circle of co-workers and friends knew this to be the case I was blinded to the fact that someone could find me to be appealing.  After some aggressive maneuvering on her part, namely her kissing me, I got the point and we became an item.  We became best friends almost instantly and, although that alienated us from our existing group of hormonally challenged acquaintances, we never looked back.  We married at the young age of 21 (me) and 20 (her) respectively.  Even today, looking back at our wedding photos is a bit of shock.  We were young, we looked young, but we didn’t act young. 

Jodi and I worked our way through college and from apartments to finally a townhouse in Towson, Maryland.  From waiting tables in college to my job as a construction supervisor and hers as a technical assistant for an engineering firm we had started to find our way in the job market.  We were 23 and both of us had nearly attained our four year degrees, but the strain of full-time work and college had begun to take a toll on us.  My wife realized that she did not want to be a teacher after her student teaching exercise.  She had nearly completed her degree and was quite sure that she had chosen the wrong career path and needed a break from college.  I too had chosen the teaching path and had switched from English Education to English Writing in an attempt to “stop the bleeding” as I had come to a similar realization that teaching was all wrong for me.  There we were no degrees, lack luster careers with one goal in mind—we wanted to start a family. 

After moving up in our careers subtly over the next several months we noticed that our attempts at conceiving were not working out.  Even before we were married we had always talked about not only having a family but having a large family.  How many kids did we want?  Eight.  Yeah, we wanted a lot of kids and we were probably crazy to some degree as well.  I think we had romanticized visions of having kids as well as ideas based in some kind of reality.  We loved kids and romantically thought about holidays together with lots of little ones and how a house felt so empty without kids running around in it, but on the flip side we knew kids meant diapers and poop and lots of it.  So, after several months of failure we started to become worried.  We desperately wanted to find out the cause of our problems.  Apparently, it is usually assumed that problems conceiving usually center around a woman’s vagina more than a man’s penis so we began to look for a experienced GYN to help us out. 

Jodi’s current GYN at the time was a sadistic, crazy lady who on a recent visit during an examination had ripped a cyst off my wife’s uterus without warning.  Apparently, during that unannounced procedure Jodi screamed at the psycho lady and as she returned home throbbing and bleeding she swore never to see her again.  This was an obvious harbinger that we were not in good hands and needed to find someone more qualified to A) identify our problem and B) guide us through a pregnancy.   After shopping around a couple GYNs we were recommended to a new Doctor.  The new Doc had a reputation of helping many women out who were frustrated trying to conceive and as it turned out he was a godsend as he expertly found the cause of our frustration as endometriosis.  Secretly I hoped that I wasn’t the one with the retardation that was holding us back, so I was almost relieved to find out that my wife had issues.  A total stupid “guy thing,” but that is just what I thought.    

Jodi, up to this point in her life, had always been a needle fearing, hospital and doctor hating maniac.  However, once Jodi knew what the problem was and that she needed a surgical procedure to correct it in order to have children; she turned into a callous model of strength in the presence of doctors, needles and beeping instruments.  Jodi has always been very humble, a very attractive trait that I can only aspire to, and this is one part of her personality that she seemingly forgot about—her fear of all things doctor related—as she marched through blood tests and examinations leading up to and including her surgery.  Our Doctor announced the surgery to be a success and we were given the “green light” to try after a few weeks.  We were pregnant the following month. 

Stay Tuned for the Next Installment 

Joeprah Says... User Comments (4) Favorite This Post (1)

on Friday May 2, 2008

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Average user rating 10/10   (2 votes)

Views 160

Favoured 19

In this episode, Professor Toddler takes to the great outdoors.  Enjoy this video compliments of team Joeprah.  Happy Friday and here comes the weekend, enjoy it!

 Also, let me take this opportunity to thank everyone who came by and supported my article yesterday !  I am both humbled and very thankful to have such great bloggy friends.  Aw shucks, you guys rule.  Thanks again!

Joeprah Says... User Comments (19) Favorite This Post (19)

on Thursday May 1, 2008

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Average user rating 10/10   (5 votes)

Views 455

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Setting the Stage 

 Remember that scene in Pulp Fiction where Brad talks in circles and Jules gets uber upset and shoots him?  You know the Kahuna Burger scene?  If you haven't seen Pulp Fiction I will set this up in terms so that you can understand.  One party says something so ridiculous that it makes another second party hostile and super angry.  Gun play ensues and the first party is quite dead while the second party is left unscathed from the fray.  In this scenario I am Jules (Samuel L. Jackson) and Brad is Penelope Trunk .  Admittedly, I am not a Penelope Trunk connoisseur, but I do get the gist of her blog.  She gives tips/hacks to help deal with the corporate world.  Ms. Trunks lends her insight and experience to suggest solutions to deal with workplace problems like office romance, how to get a job you may not be qualified for, or teaching your kids important values so that they may be better equipped to succeed in today's fast paced and ever changing corporate world.  I have no issue with this at all and I find that she is well equipped and quite battle tested with her own personal experiences to handle such topics. However, yesterday she took on the topic of "stay at home dads " and immediately turned herself into Brad eating a Kahuna burger.  I will give you some time to acquaint yourself with the article.

Excellent, you're back!  So, what did you think?  Need help?  Let me start by saying this article is offensive to 99% of the SAHDs out there trying their hardest to do what's best for their families.  If you did not read the article here is the synopsis:

The Synopsis 

• Penelope Trunk begins by saying she is extremely sought after
  

• We call this tooting our own horn, but she does it in an obnoxious way 

• She is obnoxious

• She says SAHDs always want to be interviewed by her because she is really important and all

• She thinks they are all lame except this one dude

• She posts a collection of edited emails from this guy saying:

 I like this guy because he is more honest with me about his life than any other stay-at-home dad I know. 

• The guy she highlights in the post talks about having an affair with a 50 year old woman

• The guy’s emails never mention his kids except that they exist

• He talks about life as an admitted absolute chauvinist

• The title of the article is "What life's really like for a stay at home dad"

• She gets it all wrong

• She is annoying

• She asks follow up questions at the end of her exposé that prove she is completely out of touch with the topic she speaks of 

• She should stick to business questions

• Many folks unsubscribed from her blog because of this ridiculous post 

My Turn 

Bottom line, her assertion is that everyone in the US cheats and that SAHDs are "keeping it real" if they admit to it because it fits into the box she lives in.  She applauds this mans honesty only because it must somehow validate her own philosophies that, perhaps to no fault of her own, have been created by past failed relationships or witnessing others struggle with infidelity.  

My reality, after reading many SAHD blogs, articles, and forums; after being a SAHD (part or full-time) for almost 8 years; after meeting and talking to other SAHDs in my journey as a dad/husband/human being is that the average Joe SAHD isn't some rock star, ego maniacal figure that looks for spa treatments and manicures, but rather a hard working guy that deals with spit up, crying babies and stinky diapers with the best of them.  If Ms. Trunks is so intune with corporate America then she should understand that the workplace is changing and many more dads are working from home or out of their home more than ever before.  The trend isn't chauvinistic jerks, like the one she highlights in this article, but rather dads becoming more active in their children's lives.  Seriously, labels always suck and what Penelope just did was pigeon hole a segment of society unfairly and without provocation simply because this one dude emailed her more consistently.  If that’s what it takes to get a guest spot on her blog I suggest that all crazy people everywhere start emailing her consistently and make her blog really fun.  

I try everyday, whether it be here on my blog or in public when I am out with my girlfriends (what I call my daughters), to show people that SAHDs are just normal people who hug their kids and kiss their spouses just like everyone else.  Thanks for the slap in the face Ms. Trunks , we could do without it.  Drive-thru. 

If you feel as strongly as I do about this, please leave a comment below so that Ms. Trunks can see the solidarity.

Joeprah Says... User Comments (75) Favorite This Post (22)