This week’s Tuesday Blogversation is with Wendy Berry. I’ve been following Wendy’s tweets and blog posts for quite a while now. Between her regular links posts and updates about the latest rescue dog she’s fostering there is a lot of personality and humor.
Wendy Berry ( blog | twitter ) has been blogging on the same address for 10 years now. She works as a recruiter in the area, but the blog is about herself and her interests ( a lot of saving dogs and boobs). A native of Missouri she moved to the metro in 2002 for a job change. She’s a big sports fan, loves travelling, and Justin Bieber ( dead serious; she wrote that ).
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You’ve lived here since 2002, coming from Missouri. Why Minnesota?
I get this question a lot. I lived in the same small town for 22 years. I got fired from my job (totally my bad) and knew that I wasn’t going to be happy staying in the same small town the rest of my life. I ended up applying for jobs in Kansas City, St. Louis, Milwaukee and Minnesota, all places I knew someone. Minnesota made the first job offer (and retracted it on my move up here), so Minnesota wins!
Being both a Red Sox and Twins fan, who did you cheer for on opening day?
Twins. Duh. I love the Red Sox because of their history and their stadium and their city. I love the Twins because they’re hometown boys. I like that more.
So far I count two charitable activities that you participate in ( Dogs and Breast Cancer ) any others?
I’m all about saving dogs and boobs. Who wouldn’t be? We, meaning my friends and I, also participate in the The Aliveness Project’s Holiday Gift Basket Extraordinaire (or whatever it’s called) every year, where we buy holiday gifts for families. It’s a humbling, yet extremely fantastic event.
Was there a specific event that brought you to start doing the 3 Day Breast Cancer walk?
A friend of mine did it the first year it was in the Twin Cities and talked about it non-stop; that same year, a friend of mine in Boston did it, too. Between the two of them, I’d heard enough and joined. I’ve done the walk for three years (one year resulted in a fractured foot and being hooked up to an IV) and this will mark the third year for crewing. My BFF and I are Crew Captains, which is kind of exciting. **Here’s the donation link, but don’t feel obligated to post it!
Dez Says: Obviously I’m going to post it
Your house seems to be a revolving door for rescued pets, how do you manage not keeping ALL OF THEM (I would totally want to).
It is a revolving door! I was worried about wanting to keep them all, too. Our first foster dog was a one-eyed (not kidding) Pekingese. When she showed up, we were all “Who the hell is going to want to adopt this Cyclops-like dust mop?†and then the perfect family came along. It’s been like that with all of the foster dogs we’ve had, which as made it very easy. I wish there was an easier way to keep tabs on the ones we’ve fostered without being creepy and stalkerish about it.
What advice would you give other would be rescuers?
I’ve realized it’s more about people being hesitant they’ll want to keep the dogs or it’ll be hard. But it’s not at all. Even with our two very large dogs, having an extra dog around that you’re really truly helping is just… nice, for lack of a better word. You’re also really helping animals that don’t have a voice and while that might sound a little hippie-dippie, it’s totally true.
Being a part of the local LGBT community, how does the Twin Cities’ community differ from other communities around the country?
I don’t know. I’ve never, since relocating to the Twin Cities, felt like I was in danger or threatened. I would consider Minneapolis gay friendly, but I’m sure there are people that could dispute it. I avoid the suburbs a lot, so there might be a different story there. In my hometown of 20,000, I always get looks while visiting Wal-Mart, but they’re probably just jealous of my hair. My shrink told me it’s obvious I’m a homo, which actually made me feel good that my outside matched my inside. I think that gave me the confidence that I was looking for to not really care what people around me were thinking about my lifestyle. Holy shit, that was a BS answer.
How is the reception towards the community from employers?
I have a deep down feeling that I was fired from my last job for being gay. I got a new manager and he hated me from the get go. People like me, so it was odd for that to happen. I’d just shaved my head (for raising $5000 for The 3 Day!) and I have a feeling that rubbed him the wrong way. I wasn’t fully out at my last job either, though, so it may have had some bearing on things. Or the fact that I played Facebook Scrabble all day long. Either way.
At my current place of employment, the reception is no different than anyone else that works here. I love it. My department is 50% queer. It’s a small company, so I wasn’t expecting that when I started. I feel extremely fortunate and wish other people could have this same experience.
What made you start writing for the world to see?
I always have a lot to say about everything. I started blogging in the late 90s, before I switched over to my own domain in 2000. I’m pretty sure it started out as tales of the previous night’s trip to the bar and kind of evolved from there.
What have you learned?
That I can talk about myself a whole helluva lot. I got busted once at my last job after referring to someone I work with as Fake Tits (it his a family interview? Can I write tits?). To my defense, she did have fake tits and told everyone when she went to have them installed. Someone printed it out, showed her, and then she got angry. I freaked out for about 3 minutes, but it just reminded me of the old adage of don’t blog about anything you wouldn’t say directly to someone’s face.
Your posts are on the personal side, how do you pick what topics are publishable and not?
I won’t write about The Kid when he gets in trouble all the time (I guess I just did…) or about how many times I start the dishes and don’t finish them even though I’ve promised The General I would. I tend to stray away from extended family drama, too, because my parents read my blog, on average, 12 times a day.
What’s your viewpoint on sponsored posts (aka writing about a product/etc. for money)?
I’m down. Obviously. For me, it gives me a writing prompt of some nature and sometimes I need that. It keeps me on tracking to blog regularly, which sometimes I need motivation to do. I’ve been asked to write about plenty of things that I’ve turned down, like dry vagina cream. Even I can’t come up with 100 words about dry vagina cream. Or could I? I smell a challenge.
What blogs do you recommend reading?
Local people I’m a fan of:
Pretty sure most of the other blogs I would recommend have already been listed at some point!
And recent obsessions/discoveries:
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Tuesday Blogversation is a weekly series on iamdez.com featuring bloggers of all kinds from the Twin Cities (Minneapolis / Saint Paul) area. If you’d like to be considered for an interview please send mail to dez [at] iamdez [dot] com or get ahold of me on twitter.
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