A part of my job that I love the most is helping others – and since another part of my job is blogging, I love being able to combine the two.
Tomorrow at Third Tuesday I will be holding a food drive for the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society on top of providing the live blog of Mhari Petrovic’s talk. To encourage attendees to bring a non-perishable food item to donate, I also have a great collection of prizes to give away. Here’s how it will work:
– Come to Republic tomorrow at 7:00pm for Third Tuesday – “Canada’s Social Media Meetup” – Anyone can attend and the event is free.
– When you arrive you’ll have the chance to donate a food item for the Food Bank
– Should you donate an item you will get a ticket for a prize draw (one ticket per item so bring more to donate and have more chances to win).
Prizes include:
– CARE by Stella McCartney gift pack
– WordPress t-shirts
– (4) tickets for a Vancouver Giants game of your choice this season
– Seth Godin‘s new book Tribes (donated by Kate)
– A signed copy of Gary Vaynerchuk‘s book (donated by Reachd)
– We will also have a silent auction for the Food Bank – the prize is two tickets for this Saturday’s Canucks game (lower bowl!). Leave your bid on the auction sheet and at the end of the night, the highest bidder/donor walk away with the tickets. Big HUGE thanks go to Kulpreet Singh for donating the tickets.
Is it just me or are the only laptop bags available for women absolutely huge, or covered in silly retina-burning patterns? (I’ve found the same thing with iPhone cases as well). Last year when I was on the hunt for a new bag to suit my MacBook it took me ages to find something that was a) small b) light c) not “briefcasey”.
I ended up in the purse department of Hbc downtown with a cute little over-the-shoulder purse that perfectly fit my 13 inch MacBook. I’ve found that since then, purses have made the best options – especially since I use a neoprene sleeve for water protection/padding. The only drawback is that they’re not the most durable, especially for carrying such a consistent weight all the time.
I was recently sent a link on Delicious to a Macworld article about ladies laptop cases, “There’s no shortage of durable laptop bags—backpacks, messenger bags, briefcases, you name it—on the market. Unfortunately they’re not always, well, pretty.” They link to the Pocket Full of Puter (which is really cute however still to “briefcasey” for me) as does Kate, who highlighted a bunch of cases back in 2005:
Melissa Beth Designs is a Toronto designer who has her bags in Canadian and American boutiques. She designs laptop bags as well as iPod cases. One of my favourites is her “Pocket Full of Puter” bag (shown here). The article also showcases Acme Made who is the original designer of the Veer bag, Casuri Cases, and Case Closed – a New York bag designer. I must admit, my affections have moved from the Acme Made bag to Case Closed. [My Name is Kate]
Kate also links to her post on Squidoo, which features a plethora of ladies laptop cases, as well as this one about sleeves. She is definitely a trusted source on the matter.
Yesterday I picked up a Nine West shopper tote bag ($18.00 at Bellis Fair, yay America!) and although I underestimated the tapering at the top, it still fit my MacBook. I’m just not sure how long it will last.
I’m really hoping that stores around here start carrying more of these styles that can double as purses so that when I’m walking around with one of my most-prized/most-needed possessions (and main tool for work) I’m not actually advertising, “Hey, I have a computer in here!”
I completely forgot about a special event this morning that my niece and nephews probably would have loved to attend, luckily – it was just a preview of what the Vancouver Aquarium has in store for this Halloween season so there will be many more chances to check it out.
World of the Weird at the Vancouver Aquarium – This month, if you want to experience the creepy, slimy, ghoulish and VERY weird… there’s only one place to be: the Vancouver Aquarium.
Haunted Hallway
Dare to explore the famous Haunted Hallway, where you’ll come face to face with nature’s nightmares, spook-tacular sights, and our own mad marine scientist! Check out the frightfully fascinating Bat Exhibit, and then embark on our Howl-o-ween Scavenger Hunt, with a chance to win a Sea Otter Trainer Tour for two!
October 16–19, 23–26, 30–31
Haunted Hallway tours run from 11am – 4pm
Ideas on Tap, an evening of networking that celebrates business n’ beer, saw five people from five seperate companies have one minute to pitch ideas and speak to the crowd. Presenters last night were:
After all of the speakers were done, the audience (in excess of 200 people) voted on the best speech. Andre came in first place (with an awesome talk about phonegap) and I took second – which I didn’t mind at all because my prize was a pair of Canucks tickets.
It was a lot of fun to mingle with a different crowd than I’m used to at many of the social media meetups around town. These were professionals from all types of business (shout out to Boating in Beautiful British Columbia, Omar from Cossette and Tony from David Aplin) and I was able to meet so many new people – some I’ve only known so far through Twitter.
Video in which John Chow calls me “the face of social media in Vancouver”.
The next Ideas on Tap will probably take place in January, and while I hope they can find a venue that may be a little less crowded (and hot), I think it’s a great event and kudos to Chris and his team for pulling this off – and for taking on the liveblog.
Tomorrow at Third Tuesday I will be holding a food drive for the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society on top of providing the live blog of Mhari Petrovic’s talk. To encourage attendees to bring a non-perishable food item to donate, I also have a great collection of prizes to give away. Here’s how it will work:
Melissa Beth Designs
