Me and WHAT ARMY??

Well, hello! What on Earth are you doing here? This blog ended a year ago! What? You heard that I reneged on that decision and have returned to The Annie Scott Experience due to a pathological inability to shut up?

You heard right. Sort of.

In the above photo taken five minutes ago, I'm wearing the same dress as the last entry -- one year ago, almost to the date -- but many other things have changed. Kate and William got hitched and Osama Bin Laden was killed. My stuff doesn't seem all that impressive, really. I should draw a chart mapping the relation of how much in your life can change to how long you can wear the same outfit. But not right now. What, I can't do EVERYTHING! ME and WHAT ARMY?? More on that shortly.

So. I closed up shop here because I was traveling so much as a full time writer for AOL, and wanted to spend my personal efforts developing my travel writing and photography. PureHappyTravel.com was launched, and to great, great success! After its inception, things really picked up for me. I went to 16 countries in 2010 alone, and if you think that sounds like a fine time, well, you must be a travel writer, at least at heart. It was incredibly taxing and and unbelievably wonderful, all at once. It was, if you will, a dream within a dream. Within a dream.


After two-ish years of that pace and lots of thought, I decided to try out the corporate thing before the kids who are now majoring in social media (good heavens) graduate and take all the jobs. By this point, I had won a Shorty Award and garnered a pretty good Twitter following of my own (@AnnieScott), and had also taken up Facebook management for Gadling. I was starting to realize that social media was one of the most unprecedented glories of the universe (what? Some of us feel that way.). So now, since late last year, I work in social media management -- and I like it very much. I have always professed that a theater background is the perfect prerequisite for social media work, and have since found that not only do the lessons of entertaining apply to my now full-time work daily, but I've also discovered a whole wealth of passion for social media inside my burnt up little crusty heart. I'm really into it.

And, they're generous with vacation time. :) I'm still into travel. Hard.

I have since been sacked from AOL, thanks to the Huffington Post job massacre. I'm awfully glad I'd already begun moving on! It was a lovely five years of freelance, AOL ... most of the time.

<Annie sees worms sneaking out of the can and goes at it with a staplegun, then a drill and deadbolts. Stay closed, you stupid can of worms.>

I'm still taking freelance writing jobs here and there, but not actively seeking new outlets. When would I do that? Me and what army? I have a great full time job and a creative heart -- not a heart that desires to beg editors who don't realize that I'm a special snowflake to churn out soulless SEO pieces for lunch money. If I could write this entire blog by hand, I might - but that would be terrible for SEO.

Many people have told me I need to start a video blog; combining my on-camera/stage background with my blogging and social media experience to create ... I dunno, the millionth travel show? That would be great and all, but ... again ... me and what army? I can't exactly pound the pavement hawking a YouTube channel or selling a TV show while I'm at work. Maybe videos will happen on this blog from time to time. Maybe not. Maybe some producer will approach me to host a TV show about social media someday (actually, that would be awesome). But for now, in my spare time, I kind of want to sit in the exact position I am now, doing exactly what I am now ... writing. With no shoes on. You could pay me a million dollars a week and I'd do the same thing in the evening. This is just what I do. For better or for worse. (But I'd do it from a tropical island somewhere. I'm not crazy. Maybe I could get my husband to fan me with a palm frond...)

In conclusion, The Annie Scott Experience is back, and with a not-any-wiser-but-perhaps-more-well-traveled being at the helm. What will I blog about? Everything. Social media from the entertainment perspective. TV shows. Philosophy about our times. Stuff I bought. For example, today I bought toilet paper and wine. You're welcome, World.

P.S. I also started myself a Facebook Page, which I feel pretty sheepish about.