Posts Tagged ‘Blogging’

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Little Ticked Off

June 5, 2009

Where’s my pretty kite avatar?  Hmm?     RRrrrrrrrr.    It really upsets me that my avatar is missing when I comment at your blogs!

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AND…

When I hit “My Comments” to see the replies to my comments on your blogs, I get…

nothing.

WP tells me that I should ‘make some friends by leaving some comments.’     Hey – I do have friends and I do leave comments.   SHOW THEM.

ratsafratsarats crap.

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Partial Post

April 21, 2009

Howdy.

I have started and deleted I dont know HOW MANY posts and thought I’d best just put anything ‘out here’.   But nothing has seemed interesting or blog-worthy.  I have been visiting you all and lurking (by ‘you’ I mean all of you who might be wondering what’s happened to me and why I haven’t posted here awhile.  You know who you are, right?!)

Allow me to give you a sample of various thoughts streaming across my consciousness:

It’s raining here today.   

I am addicted to the TV show Bones.   Anyone see it last night?!

I read 300 pages for last weekend’s 24 Hour Read-A-Thon.    It may not seem like much but it probably represents about 6 hours of reading time.     So, what was I doing the other 18 hours of the ‘Thon!?     I slept about an hour and half (it was a NAP!)  and I went to yoga class for 2 hours.   Of course, there are some activities that are difficult to do while reading and I did some of those.   and the rest of it, I was blogging!   Reading posts of other readers, participating in mini-challenges to keep us all excited about the Read-A-Thon, and commenting.   COMMMENTING COMMENTING COMMENTING and all the clicks and links and reading posts to comment on.    That’s what took most of my remaining 14 hours:   cheering on the approximately 150 other participants!      It was fun.   🙂

I’m reading The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett;  I’m about half way through the 972 pages.    After I finish, I will continue to read Oliver Sacks’ The Man Who Thought His Wife Was a Hat.     And then I hope to start In the Woods by Tara French.  

If you want to know what I’m up to blogging-wise and don’t know about my book blog, you may want to visit me there by clicking here.     

I’ve made a few pies lately:    Chocolate Pecan, Orange Meringue, Chocolate Cream, etc.    I’ll be baking a Bourbon Apple tomorrow.

Oscar is the most apathetic therapy dog in the universe.    But he’s loved and beloved so I keep dragging him along on my volunteer visits.   It’s not that he is unfriendly;  more like obstinately apathetic in a cooperative kind of way.

I haven’t traveled anywhere lately but I have a trip scheduled to Phoenix in May.

I’m having lunch this Friday with my friend Teeni – looking forward to that!    Maybe we’ll take a photo.    We’ll definitely be talking about Joan

When I logged into this blog today, I noticed that a few days ago, one of my posts had 133 hits.   WOW!    It was one of my Duffy posts…    I’ve been averaging about 20 hits a day here, in case you want to compare stats…

It’s really strange how I have set up such different worlds between my blogs.    Almost like having two different residences – my summer home versus my vacation home?    Totally different neighborhoods, weather, architectural styles…     It’s just odd, in a way.    

A huge happy hip THANK YOU to JavaQueen for granting me some linky-love and giving me an award!   The one called Let’s Be Friends!!   yes, let’s!

By the way, does one’s avatar ‘go away’ with disuse?     I’ve been leaving comments under this ID but my pretty little kite isn’t showing up…

Well, just bookmark this post for when you need to get some sleep.  ZZZZZzzzzzzzzzz.   But, it’s SOMETHING!

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Applause Vol I, Issue I

July 22, 2008

The woman has a blog and she isn’t afraid to use it.  

I’m refering to Annie, that Writer Chick Who Talks (writerchicktalks.com) and posts so frequently I admit it is difficult to me to keep up.   Is always heartfelt, often humorous, courageous and meaningful.    I consider her blog one my must-reads and call Annie ‘Friend.’    

Now, today and tomorrow+, she tackles the topic of Women and Blogging.    She has a panel of experts at the ready and she is asking tough questions.   This is and will be a fascinating read, in my opinion, and wanted to be a cheerleader for her and all the women and men who are participating.    

CLICK HERE to go directly to Writer Chick Talks.

I thought I might attempt to answer some of her queries myself and yet…   no.    I am either 1)  too much of a chickenshit to expose my thoughts to hard questions, or 2)  apathetic and/or aware of my lack of ambition of any ‘impact’.    But that doesn’t diminish my personal fascination with what Annie is presenting. 

Do I think women and men have different approaches to blogging.  YES, SURE, MAYBE.   But I don’t know what exactly or how to qualify, quantify.    

Her panel has a variety or participants, some of whom I know and admire.   The answers promise to be quite interesting.    Way to go Annie!    You’re awesome.    I’m cheering you on. 

I’m going to call these “Shout Out” posts my Applause Series.   I believe a couple of my best qualities are enthusiasm and the ability to encourage.   I will featuring bloggers who deserve attention, admiration, and applause.

   

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Conundrum

June 24, 2008

I am very content to play and piddle with my wordpress.com blog and don’t go too much for all that fancy plug-in stuff.    I’m seeing quite a few blog-buddies ‘upgrade’;  I’m assuming to wordpress.org?  am I right?  and I’m curious as to why?   I thought the only reason was to include advertising?   I’m wrong, aren’t I?

I love the personalities of these bloggers (you know who you are) and I don’t mind having to sign in every time I leave a comment.  You are worth it to me.   

I suppose that might beg the question why I don’t have auto-form-fillers or some such and the answer to that is ‘I don’t know.’    I recently changed the security system on my PC and I can’t get the form filler to work even though everything tells me it is setup for it.    I have yet to punch numbers on the phone (do we still say ‘dial’?) to call support and see what’s up but I did notice that this security suite of products is only to be used with Microsoft IE.  

So, that puts off my decision to investigate FireFox.  

Am I in the dark ages?    Do I need to take a class in…   what, exactly?

Then, yesterday, I met a very nice man who requested some PC help through our library’s tutoring program.   He wanted an overview of WordPress which is why they asked if I could help him.  They know I am a bit enthusiastic about all this blogging nonsense so the match was made.

However, he has it all setup with wordpress.org and I haven’t a clue how to help him.     He really doesn’t want help – he wants to HIRE someone to do it.      Should I have him buy the WordPress for Dummies book for himself or make him buy it for me?    Would you recommend this book?     I’m afraid he might have to buy me a whole new upgraded all-the-bells-and-whistles latest COMPUTER, too.     Now, that  might make it appealing…   

 

 

 

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Follow Up and Then Some

June 12, 2008

First.    Hmmmm, I don’t know what to address first…   I want to respond to a few of the comments to a few of my latest posts.   

Ah, let’s address the question of Wilhelmina.    A few of you will remember Wilhelmina, yes?    I had posted about her, oh back in February?   And then zipped off to Costa Rica, got obsessed with my tan, flew to AZ, Palm Springs, involved with a wedding, and of course, my favorite time filler:  blogging, and.   well…   Wilhelmina has ended up like this:

 

So, sndra of no link, I can’t show you ‘how it turned out’.   I have only the heart I glued on and maybe, not sure the pencil marks will show up in the photo, but I drew on her to get an idea of how to map out my idea.    I have collected a few more items that are concave and convex to attempt a ‘fit’ with her curves, and that’s about it.   Guess this calls me a procrastinator.   Have I ever told you about the Christmas stockings I was cross-stitching for me and Hub?   I got one done a couple of years ago.   The other is still only a half way stitched design and I started these is 1990.     I have dresses cut with their patterns still pinned waiting for me to just sew up that were begun in 1993.    Which means that the cross-stitched stuff has been stored in SEVEN houses, and the sewing project has been following through my last FOUR houses.   Did you all know that I move a lot?    Yep, I am living in my 7th house.   in under 20 years.    It was a much worse average before the last 3 houses but the 6th house was lived in only 4 months so maybe not?   whatever.

My messy craft room, Wilhie up close:

      I glued the ♥ a little too high…

Second, on my artichoke post, JavaQueen mentions that she saw artichokes in the store and wondered how to cook.    Honestly, my first thought is RUN TO GOOGLE and look it up?!     What I really did was actually open up the WordPress search and entered How to Cook Artichoke and found some good resources.    Whenever anyone asks me “How Did you Know…”, I can usually always answer, “I GOOGLED IT!”    Ok, somebody tell me what you call a word that has been watered down to mean the universal non-specific noun/verb and not the brand?  ie, Xerox, kleenex, etc?   ‘Google’ is becoming such a word, don’t ya agree?   (crap, they are going to come look for me now and demand a nickel.)

and Lastly and or Thirdly, my rant about commenting in the first half of the artichoke Wednesday post, was in no way to admonish any of YOU to leave me a comment (or I won’t visit you.?!  ha)   That is SO not the case!    I was only expressing a slight dissatisfaction with a particular activity on my other blog that is supposed to inspire community (duh, comment-leaving) where I felt I did MY  duty to the others and got no love in return.   It would be similar to my Photo Fridays if I always posted, commented on the other participants’ photos and NONE – ie, NO ONE, in the 6-7 weeks of ‘sharing’ – EVER came by to say hi.     And I can only assume it’s due to the variety and thus ‘chore’ of commenting on so many types of blog platforms.     (oh, PFers!  I love our sense of community but I know it’s not always possible to visit everyone each and every week, especially when we start getting hundreds involved, right?   good.   AND, btw, the theme tomorrow, FRIDAY the 13th, is UNLUCKY.)

Please, comment when you want to, don’t when you don’t.   Really, it’s OK.   I’m a big girl and I will get over it, and move on.    LOVE YA!    

OH, you didn’t think I was done, did you?!    I just HAVE TO SHARE THIS!   I planted zucchini!    Last FRIDAY!  and now yesterday they are not just babies, they are toddlers!!

 

  Yes, I know, I KNOW I planted too many.  I’ll thin the grouping down to one eventually, which is sad, maybe I’ll transport some instead.

 

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Spring Is Sprung

April 3, 2008
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I’m all worded out from a fun trip to California.  My internal clock feels like it’s wound funny and I’m just starting to wake up.   My poor hub worked after we got home last night and was up at 5 am to get into the office.   Me?   I’m off to Dunkin Donuts cuz I don’t feel like making coffee, but I am up for driving(?!)   My fingers are typing words that I’m not sure my brain initiated;  I thought I would post a few pics and not be pressured to think up any more words.    I meant to show you what I came home to:   FLOWERS!

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The crocuses are blooming and I have one vibrant daffodil.    And, of course, I missed the pup who I suspect is resenting that I picked him up from his doggie resort – he was having so much fun there with his friends.   Now he has to sulk and pout while I play on the computer…

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So, What Do You Do?

March 27, 2008

I do love it when I log onto my blog and see comments from such wonderful bloggers on lots of different posts!     You make my day.  Thank you.      [ToDo #1:   Consider this IDEA:   “Do I respond to all individually or in one big post?” and then JUMP to it!]

Then I saw that one of my comments had a request so I JUMPED on that already.    If you ever have commentors whose ID won’t link back to their blog, just tell them to read this:  My POST on IN SERVICE:  the WordPress Comment Linking Issue.

After that, I saw that I had 21 trapped spam in my Akismet folder.    Most were for drugs and naughty things like “Do you want to cheat on your wife?”   But I don’t have a wife so I deleted that.     But one of them was a website that STOLE MY WORDS!!!!!!      RRrrrrrrr.

WHAT DO I DO ABOUT THIS?

I have my copyright copyrt.gif banner in the upper right of this page…   But what does that DO, really?    Here’s an IDEA, “C”…   Go to copyscape and jump on some RESEARCH…   [ToDo #2:   Visit copyscape and see what they have to say.]

OK, now that I’ve got some IDEA of what today’s To Dos to Do, I best JUMP on ’em.

Happy Thursday! kite32.jpg

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I Just Realized…

March 21, 2008

I just realized that I blog cuz I don’t have enough people to talk to.    It truly can feel like one of the job fairs or better, the vendor room at a conference, where you stand awkwardly in front of some goofy placard selling your wares (I had the term ‘touting’… is that better?) and HOPING that some nice person will stop by and talk to you and yet not be too dorky.      [Or in Bound&Gags case, you have a big sign to warn the dorks NOT to engage in silly conversation…   Display in RED for “WARNING!”]

And then when they do stop by, you yap and flap your gums and hope you are making a good impression but knowing deep down, you’re a dork, too.    

I sometimes need the safety of my blog (or to keep my analogy imagery going…  the placard/table) so I don’t have to wander around and talk to anybody else!    

[Giving credit where due – if you are in need of a conference placard thingy, just click on the photo of the two very nice people from MegaPrint showing off their event banner….]

Yes Joan, I did walk 5 miles yesterday and I think I will attempt 4 today.   These are all on my treadmill.  I have a strange head condition that makes being outside in cold temps extremely painful after about 20 minutes of exposure.   I think it might be related to air pressure but I’ve never been scientific with it.    And I tried bringing it up to a doctor but it never hurts when I’m at the doctors, so – hard to figure it out.   I just don’t spend time outside unless it is warm like 60 degrees or higher…   Otherwise, I start acting like I’m one of those characters on the old Star Trek when being exposed to some highpitched noise that I assume feels like someone is stabbing my brain with an icepick.     [Couldn’t find a pic…  had to go with this one instead.]

Another thing, isn’t it AMAZING when blog-block breaks and the difficult part isn’t what to talk about but what topic to choose today?!    I’m flooded with ideas right now!!!!!!!!!   Which is sad when I come up with this crap instead.   Oh well, I’ve said it before.  It’s my blog, and I can cry if I want to.

To respond to Annie at WriterChick (and someone on my other blog!), I didn’t realize you could cut and paste from other places…     I always saved an image to my PC and then used the upload feature in wordpress editor.    I think I must have attempted the cut&paste exasperation on one of those wordpress-trouble days when you can’t get the carriage return to work or the edit buttons to do anything, etc.    So my 3GB is getting full and thought I needed to delete out all the jpegs!   But wordpress only allows you (last time I tried) to delete them one at a time with WAY TOO MANY page clicks to make it happen.      And I also wonder if past posts with images then don’t allow the image to display if I delete it out of my collection.   Which would be sad on my FOG post, huh.

I know others use different editors – I’ve even researched a few but I HATE to download new stuff to my PC!   

And when did WordPress start allowing the editing of the timestamp?   Is that new?

Have a terrific Thursday, y’all.          kite3.jpg

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One of My Top Ten Posts…

March 14, 2008

One of my top ten posts has never been commented on.

Something about that is really COOL to me.    It’s the one that most seem to find by searching on ‘fog’:    Called WONDER, you may click here to go read it… 

Now, don’t spoil it by commenting there!   Come back here instead!    (just a thought; I’m really not the kind to tell people what to do.)

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♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

February 14, 2008

  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Yesterday was my biggest hit day according to my stats page.     And yet, viewings of my main post counts 11.    Hmmm.   The Orange Plaid post shows 34 viewings.   Whatever.

FYI – American Idol has the top 24 ready.    Here’s why I like it:   I’m thrilled that such talent that may not have an outlet to be shared with the world may come to light.    It’s the “rooting for the little guy and he prevails” feel-good feeling.   Yea, so, the exposure and style of the show and its process can be seedy, but I still love the happy parts.    I’m in love with the Archuleta fella.   He’s just adorable and his voice is so dreamy!

 

  

I have yet to watch Project Runway from last night.  I DVR’d it and it’s waiting patiently for my date with it later this morning while I run/walk on the treadmill;  I promise to review this afternoon.

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

I snuck a cut out heart with “I love you!  XOXOXOX,  CuriousC” into my hubby’s lunch box this morning!   This is amusing me then, now and will until he calls to tell me he found it.   And if he doesn’t call me, then my afternoon will turn into me being even more amused wondering what he has in store for me, knowing that it is driving me crazy that he hasn’t called me yet!     Ah, love…

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Happy Valentines Day!

kite3.jpg Curious “C”