Snapshot Chronicles

Susan Getgood's personal blog

Kids TV: Characters Parents Love

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Last month, I conducted two very unscientific Twitter polls about the children’s tv characters that parents dislike and like the most. I wrote about the hated characters on August 27th. This is the follow-up about the characters we like. Not surprisingly, there are some that appear on both lists, further proof that one person’s poison is another’s preference.

The top vote getters, with two each, were Wizards of Waverly Place, Phineas and Ferb and Spongebob. Everything else was mentioned once. Apparently, we often agree about the most annoying characters, but when it comes to what we like, our tastes are all over the place.

Here’s the list of single-votes:
Kipper
Little Bear
Curious George (with a shout out for the William H. Macy voice-over)
Ang (Avatar)
Dora
Handy Manny
Zack and Cody
Elmo
Sportacus (LazyTown)
Steve (Blues Clues)
Statler & Waldorf (Muppet Show)
The Count (Sesame Street)
Pepe le Pew and all the classic Warner Brothers cartoons
The Wiggles

I cast my votes for my favorites among the current crop my son watches — Wizards of Waverly Place and Phineas & Ferb — but looking at the list, I remember Kipper with great fondness. I also would give a thumbs up to the Avatar but my favorite character was the Uncle.

Here’s a clip from Wizards that amuses me nearly every time I watch it.

Women are more than mommies: More Women

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crossposted to Marketing Roadmaps

I’m sure it will be a surprise to the mainstream media, but women are more than mommies.

Many women aren’t mommies at all, for a variety of reasons that are their business, not ours. Those of us that are parents don’t define ourselves solely by that role, even if we write a mom blog. And definitely when we do not write a blog about our parenting experiences. When our blogs are about other things important to us — our jobs, our hobbies, our causes, our politics, our opinions, our rants and our raves.

Our lives. Ourselves.

We find our identity beyond our motherhood. It may encompass it, but women are not simply wombs who walk.

But in the minds of the media and many marketers, women bloggers are mom bloggers. The consumer products companies reach out to moms. The media companies create opportunities for moms. Moms moms moms.

It’s a perennial frustration for women’s blogging community BlogHer, which works overtime to focus attention on the full spectrum of women’s blogging, but regularly sees the media hone in on the one segment. Mom.

Some — myself included — see this repeated reduction of women to our reproductive status as a form of sexism. Moms are about kids. Men are about the world. Moms aren’t serious.

It’s part of a cultural mentality in which a company can argue that lactation is not a condition of pregnancy, and dismiss an employee for taking unauthorized breaks to pump while allowing smoke and pee breaks. Isotoner/Totes, if you are wondering. That Danielle has a nice summary with links to other posts.

Bullshit.

But, you know, we are more than our reproductive organs. Media, marketers should pay attention. We’ve got disposable income. Even if we are moms, we do not spend every cent on floor wax, juice boxes and school supplies. If we aren’t supporting the Disney and LEGO franchises, we’ve got even more money to spend on stuff.

So, why aren’t companies reaching out to us in greater numbers? Why isn’t the media telling the stories about women entrepreneurs, women bloggers, women philanthropists? Grandmas and grad students. Women doing all sorts of things to make a difference in the world beyond just the genetic material we created or might create.

It’s been a refrain for years at the BlogHer conference. This year, the indomitable Grace Davis decided to do something about it. Something to call attention to More Women (than just moms.)

She’s created an online community called More Women.

Why is this important?

If you are a woman blogger, with or without offspring, check it out. We need to make our voices heard as women, not just as mothers.

If you are a marketer, pay attention. We will be heard, and you might want to be among the first to catch our ear.

Laugh if you will. I know the song is a bit hokey and outdated. But for many of us in Generation Jones, it was large part of our development as women and feminists. More than 30 years later, I Am Woman still says we won’t give up.

I am woman, hear me roar. In numbers too big to ignore…

Eureka! It’s a good show.

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Just this year, we discovered the SyFy channel show, Eureka. It’s been on the air since 2006 but for whatever reason, we just hadn’t watched it, perhaps because it was on a weeknight, and our habit is Sci fi on Fridays.

But, desperate for something to watch last spring after all our favorite shows ended (for the season or for good, depending), we rented the first season from NetFlix. And quickly became hooked.

It’s not the best sci fi show I’ve ever watched. Farscape and Battlestar Galactica are more or less tied for that slot in my world view, for different reasons, with the original Star Trek getting honorable mention for nostalgic reasons. But it’s a good family science fiction show, and I like finding television that we all can enjoy.

Here are a few reasons why I like it:

The plots are always fantastic-strange, with some sort of mystery or conumdrum that needs to be solved, but they are also easy to follow. This makes the show accessible to kids my son’s age. Nothing loses the attention of a nine-year old like a convoluted plot. But it’s not dumbed down; they just keep things simple

While it is an adult show, it’s clear that the producers understand that they have a family audience; there’s no strong language and the youth characters are as well drawn as the adults.

The entire cast is excellent — even the smart house Sarah — but Colin Ferguson who plays the central character Sheriff Jack Carter, is absolutely terrific. Often cast in the role of straight man to the outlandish antics of the other characters, he can speak volumes with a wry look. I’m also particularly enjoying his romance with new character Tess Fontana, played by Jaime Ray Newman.

If you like a good sci fi mystery, I suggest you check it out, Fridays at 9pm on SyFy, with the previous week’s episode repeated at 8pm. There is an ongoing storyline, so it does help to watch in sequence, however, the episodes can be enjoyed stand-alone as well. If you’ve never watched, on September 4th, there will be a daylong marathon of viewers’ choice favorite episodes, with the final two new episodes airing on September 11th and 18th. The show has been renewed for a full fourth season.

BTW, I still think changing the network name from SciFi Channel to SyFy was a bonehead move.