PR... What's that?

This may be really PR nerdy of me but something GREAT happened at my job today and I wanted to share. I get a lot of questions about what exactly I do. I work in public relations and probably 50% of my job is media relations which means that I call/email/stalk reporters and see if they are interested in writing about my client/product/news.

Recently I sent a pitch to SheKnow.com – one of the biggest women’s websites in the world with 18 million readers – to see if they wanted to write about my product, GoToMyPC.

Below is my pitch and the article. Please notice how the author basically used my pitch word for word. That may seem like plagiarism but in the PR world that makes you feel like this:

My Pitch:

Hi Mary,

Blah blah blah, would you like to cover GoToMyPC?

· GoToMyPC- You're in a VC funding meeting and you realize you've forgotten your presentation. It's on your home PC, not your laptop. Holy crap. What do you do now? If you're a smart entrepreneur, you use GoToMyPC and instantly access any application or file on your Mac or PC from your iPad, iPhone, Kindle Fire and Android device.

The Article (link):

Thrilled.

Belize

A month ago Andrew and I went to Caye Ambergris, Belize and I thought it was about time to document our trip. Ever since our camera was stolen I have been a horrible photographer and I curse that thief on the reg. So, not as many photos as I would like, but enough to remember that we were there.

A few fun facts about Belize/Caye Ambergris.

• It's in the Caribbean so it is gorgeous. Blue waters, hot hot heat, humidity, very tropical. You know, paradise kind of stuff.
• Everyone is Belize speaks English (it is the national language) and then Spanish and Creole is also spoken by some.
• Belize is super cheap and everyone takes US dollars! 2 Belizian dollars = 1 US dollar. Score.
• Belize, to me, had the feel of a third-world New Orleans. Just like in the south the people are friendly, the food is AMAZING (we were there for lobster season and I had a two pound lobster, two nights in a row for $30 USD! A trip highlight for me.), and everything is pretty chill.

We were there 5 days. The first two days were gorgeous and we walked around the town, swam a bit, and went to a Mayan Ruins (pics below). Then the rain came. I'm talking a monsoon. 40 MPH winds, 8 inches of rain in 48 hours, docks blown over kind of storm. It was pretty cool to watch but kind of a bummer on our beach vacation. Our last day there it cleared up enough for us to scuba dive (the reason we went in the first place). 

Scuba diving was amazing. I jumped in and below me was about 15 huge nurse sharks! I freaked out even though we were forewarned that they were there and very friendly. The dive master kept telling me to decend but I refused until Andrew got in the water too so we could go down together. I wasn't going into shark infested waters by myself. The nurse sharks followed us around like dogs as we swam through the reefs. It was kind of eerie but really cool. Another trip highlight.

Day 1: taking the water taxi to the island. 

The view from our hotel room at Corona Del Mar.

Day 2: Back to the mainland for a boat ride into the jungle to visit some Mayan ruins.

Lamani.

On top of another ruin, whose name I forget.

 Day 3: A storm is a brewing.

Day 5: The island clearing up a bit after the storm.

Enjoying a nice chocolate milkshake.

The one and only shot of me and my boo. Glad the picture turned out so nice. It would be sad if the only photo we got together was fuzzy and grainy and whatnot.

One a scale of 1 to 10 - if you're poor(ish) and looking for a tropical paradise vacation getaway, Belize is awesome and totally recommended. Just maybe avoid the rainy season (June - November).

It's a Girl! Baby Shower

My sister-in-law, Saki, is having a baby girl in a month so on Sunday we threw her a shower. Little baby girl Tera is coming so of course we had to give her a proper welcoming party. Have you ever seen the blog Oh Happy Day? Well it is my downfall because it made me want to throw a pinterest-worthy DIY shower which took TONS of work but it was a lot of fun.

With a little help from Martha and her great Japanese lantern collection and some streamers, the place looked like the pink Carebear threw up on it. Exactly as I had hoped.

My mom and Saki are very crafty. They made these lids for the mason jars. We served raspberry Italian sodas in them with pink paper straws... can you tell the theme was pink?

This was for the game. We played baby relay where you get in teams of four and do a sippy cup chug, baby food eating contest, binkie spitting contest, and a adult diaper fashion show. It was hysterical - especially when my mom starting chanting "chug, chug, chug!" causing her teammate laugh and snort all her water.

 And then there was so much food. My uncle is a chef and teaches at a culinary school. I got to go cook with him at the school for hours to make all the amazing food. I loved that part.

    

One month and counting then I'll be an aunt of 5!