I have a new post up at Lifescoop: Music to Your Ears: 5 Ways to Discover the Latest Music

Remember when emerging music just fell in your lap? Your best friend was a part-time DJ, your show-going roommate made you mixes, you’d occasionally spend an entire Saturday slackjawed in front of the internet? But the time we make for new music sometimes gets nudged out by the trappings of adulthood.

Fortunately, if you have a few minutes a day, it’s easy to bring new music into your life. Here are five simple ways to find music that’s actually new, not just new to you. Read more…

Two weeks ago, I was at ease onstage in front of 600 people. This morning I woke up with a sore jaw from teeth-grinding stress dreams — about my talk for preschool career day. This is most of what you need to know about my subconscious.

On the ride to school, Hank looked similarly worried.

“You okay, little guy?”
“Yes.”
“You seem anxious.”
“Yes.”
“Why are you worried?”
“What if they don’t like you?”

Preach it, kid.

I explained to Hank that people are mostly just worried about whether you like them. So if you smile, and seem comfortable, everything will be OK.

Also, I brought balloons.

Thanks to the Kahuku Land Farms Fruit Stand in Hawaii, I’ve officially hit 100 fruits. Milestone! Bam.

I told Mike, our trip lead, how close I was to being centufruitarian, and he went out of his way to find new fruits to try. Thanks to Mike, and the rest of the Hawaii Five Oh team for being so patient and enthusiastic with my quest.

These are the fruits that pushed us past the 100 mark:

No. 99 Cherry Guava

There’s something about bite-sized fruit that just makes me happier. Snacks!

Cherry guavas are such a pretty color, like a sunset. They’re tangy, and the round seeds have a pleasant pop to them when you crunch down.

No. 100! Chico

When I asked the woman at the market what Chicos tasted like, she said, “brown sugar.” She had a bit of an accent, so I thought I’d misunderstood her.

She was exactly right. They’re soft inside, the dominant flavor is brown sugar, and they even seem to have little crunch granules in the flesh.

It was like eating a baked apple plucked directly from the tree.

No. 101 Apple Bananas
No. 102 Ice Cream Bananas

More tiny snack fruits, hooray! These bananas are about as big as my palm, maybe a third of the size of a banana you’d find at the grocery store, and much, much tastier.

The ice cream banana is light and creamy, apt! The apple banana has a pleasant tartness that offsets the sweetness.

Both were fun to eat because you can shove the whole thing in your mouth, and then walk around beating your chest like King Kong. Which I recommend.

No. 103 Mountain Apples

These are a lot like Jamaican Apples, only smaller and tangier.

And this is an Edvard Munch Mountain Apple. Scream all you want, apple.

They’re less dense than a conventional apple, the crunch is more like a really crisp, seedless cucumber. Mmm. Quenchy.

This Friday, we’ll celebrate the century mark with a roundup of my top ten favorite fruits so far. You cannot wait. Fruit nerds, unite!

This photo makes me happy.

These are my friends Sarah Bryden-Brown and Laura Mayes, talking on Sarah’s couch in New York City. I’ve been spending a lot of time in New York recently because the three of us are making something, which is our very favorite thing to do.

As some of you know, Laura and I have been working together for years on Mighty Summit and Camp Mighty, and she’s also a co-founder of the Mom 2.0 conference series. A few years ago Laura said I needed to meet Sarah. At the time, Sarah was heading up Babble in preparation for its eventual acquisition by Disney. Most recently she created a strategic direction for Kirtsy, and founded Blogstar — a community of professional women bloggers — which has been folded into The Mission List. (Boo-yah.)

Now the three of us finally have space to do a project together. It’s a big undertaking, the kind that makes you feel a little nervous and sweaty-palmed, but excited knowing we’re in it together. So for now I just wanted to introduce you to our little team and tell you we have big plans. When everything’s ready to go, I hope you’ll be in it with us too.

Superfly Flat!
You guys. I just bought the shit out of these.