Picket Fence Post

I’ve been blogging about parenting since 2005. My first parenting blog had the word “mommy” in the title. (I’ve been writing columns about parenting for a decade.)

My book — a collection of humor/parenting columns – has the word “mom” in the title, as in “suburban mom.”

I continue to blog under the name “Suburban Mom,” though that blog (Suburban Mom: Notes from the Asylum) now covers all manner of pop culture and politics, not parenting.

I write for a web site — Mommy Track’d – that has the name “mommy” in the title.

So when I heard that some folks were taking issue with the terms “mommy blogger” and the Today Show’s “digital moms,” saying that they’re used by the mainstream media as dismissive and pejorative labels — turning “mommy bloggers” into the ”modern day June Cleaver” – I decided to contact several women who are mothers who blog to see what they think about the monikers and whether they believe the mainstream media cop a patronizing attitude toward folks, particularly women folk, who write about parenting.

The result is my column entitled, “Mainstream Media Mommy Box,” where I had an excuse to again reference my favorite newspaper columnist, Dave Barry, who has frequently mentioned his family’s exploits in his writing.

The Obama family has officially been living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue for a little over a week now and already folks are posting images of Michelle Obama online where they scrawl all over her mid-section suggesting that the First Lady is carrying the First Fetus.

I’ve stated many times before how much I loathe this fetish that web sites and so-called “journalists” have made of dissecting photos of female celebs, suggesting that if women have any contour at all to their bellies that they MUST be pregnant. I find the whole practice invasive and tacky.

When people openly hypothesize online, in print and on TV about whether someone might be pregnant — and that person won’t comment about the subject — did those folks ever think that perhaps there’s a good reason for the silence and that perhaps it would be in good taste to back off? If the woman is pregnant, maybe she’s had difficulties in the past (such as miscarriages) and wants to wait until she’s further along in her pregnancy to announce the news. If the woman isn’t pregnant, maybe it’s a case where she was photographed wearing a baggy outfit, or maybe she missed a month’s worth of Pilates classes. Either way, what’s the harm in waiting to report on these things until you know for sure? It’s not like a pregnancy will be a secret for long.

That being said, I’m ALREADY sick of the speculation that Michelle Obama might be pregnant. I seriously don’t want to endure four years of bloggers and entertainment “journalists” writing all over Michelle photos.

Image credit: AP/Telegraph.

I donned my TV critic’s cap and dished with one of the two Manic Mommies about the new fall television season, the national political conventions, the Olympics, Mad Men, 90210, The Office and what I think about the title of the new CBS show, The Mentalist.

You can get directions on how to download/listen to the Manic Mommies podcast here. (It’s a radio show on the internet, for the uninitiated.) Or you can just go to iTunes and download it for free — gotta love the free! – to listen to our sparklingly witty conversation.

Image credit: Manic Mommies.