From there to here, from here to there, Funny things are everywhere
Oh wise and worldly bloggy peeps, riddle me this: do I need a Facebook fan page for the blog? Please argue the pros and cons.
(Caveat: I am not a huge FB user and would not I would not otherwise consider making a fan page, except I’ve been asked to investigate the concept at a professional level. Plus, I loved the kismet of starting to wonder about such a thing on the exact day that Scary Mommy posted this excellent and easy-to-follow FB fan page tutorial!)
I was playing with Google Maps, trying to show the boys the distance from Los Angeles to Hawaii. It found LA with no problem, and I asked it for directions to Honolulu, Hawaii.
I was perplexed to see it suggested driving up the western coast of the United States, but absolutely tickled when I realized it was suggesting I take to the water in Seattle and kayak up through Puget Sound all the way to Hawaii.
This begs more than a few questions, including why one couldn’t shave a good week or so off the trip and just start kayaking in, say, the Port of Los Angeles, let alone why Google Maps defaults to kayaking as the suggested mode to traversing the Pacific.
It made me smile, though, so that’s why I wanted to share it with you! Have you come across any other quirks in Google Maps?
Wow, can you believe it? Five years ago today, I dipped my toe in the Internet Ocean and have been dog-paddling madly across the sea ever since!
Five years! Wowza. And to celebrate, I dust off an old favourite meme that I’ve done at least two or three times before: the Time Traveler meme. Because that’s what anniversaries for, right? Taking a moment to look back down the path you’ve trod and shaking your head in wonder that you ever made it through at all.
15 years ago today I would have been:
10 years ago today I would have been:
5 years ago today I would have been:
1 year ago today I would have been:
This year I am:
Today I:
Next year I hope:
(You like the vagueness here? Goal-setting was never one of my strengths!)
In five years I hope:
It’s fun to have a record of these year after year, and see the amazing twists and turns in my own life over the last decade or so. Let me know if you play along!
You know I’m a bit of a blog award junkie. I admit it, in my personal life and even at work, I’m a huge believer in recognition and positive feedback. I’m sure this has everything to do with leftover insecurity issues from my teen years and my infernal and endless need for external validation. Back in the day, I was even involved with the Canadian Blog Awards because I truly believe in recognizing excellence — and there are so many excellent Canadian blogs out there. I must say, though, that I have lost a little faith in the CBAs over the last year or two. They were too mired in political conflict and I just didn’t have the patience or the stomach for it, and the folks who were trying their very best to run a good program were just overwhelmed, despite their best efforts, by the scope of it and the knee-jerk reactionism to what they were trying to do.
Which is why I am so delighted to see someone start from scratch and create exactly what I’d envisioned the Canadian Blog Awards could be. Schmutzie, creator of Five Star Fridays and tonnes of other Web goodness, has launched the Canadian Weblog Awards. From the “about” page:
The Canadian Weblog Awards are intended to promote good weblogs of all genres from across Canada year round through regular interviews, articles, and the nomination, judging, and award process that culminates with the announcement of the top three weblogs in each category on January 1st. […]
Even the best weblogs can get buried under the swathes of information that flood the internet, and the Canadian Weblog Awards are determined to bring good Canadian weblogs to light. This is why we use a panel of judges rather than the popular vote to unearth our best and brightest. The use of a judging panel that follows a specific set of criteria to evaluate the nominees helps to ensure that the winning weblogs are chosen more for their quality rather than by how many people they can mobilize to vote.
We’re a talented lot, we Canadians, and we should show it off. We deserve it.
So smart! The original Weblog awards use a juried panel to choose the finalists, and that always seemed like a better approach than the various rounds of popular vote. Also, rather than just running a short window for nominations, they’re accepting nominations all year. Best of all, though, they’re interspersing regular updates from various categories with interviews with nominees to keep it interesting for the whole year. I’m so very impressed by the whole thing, and that is entirely beside the fact that I’ve been nominated in two categories!
(I’m delighted to be nominated in the Family and Parenting category, but truly honoured that someone put me up in the Best Writing category, too. Thank you, anonymous nominator(s). You made my day!)
I only wish I’d had the brains to think of it myself, or — even moreso! — the time to follow through with it all. It’s a great effort that really should be recognized. Is there a weblog awards for best weblog awards? 😉
Seriously, though, go check it out and don’t be shy about nominating your faves. Who doesn’t love a little recognition every now and then? Isn’t that why we’re all out here on the Internet blathering away in the first place?
Edited to add: Oh, I can’t tell you how tickled I am to be nominated in the humour category, too! You might never shut me up now! You think I’m funny? *squee of delight*
*smooch*
The other day, I received an e-mail pitch about a recent kids’ movie that I had thought about taking the boys to over Christmas. Now it’s coming out on DVD, and a PR firm working for the studio contacted me with what was very obviously a mass mailing.
Usually, I just delete these, but I’d been interested in the movie initially so I e-mailed back and asked if I could have one or more copies to give away on the blog. I got a prompt response saying that there were no promo copies for giveaways, but did I want a review copy?
I waffled, and in the end said no. I feel kind of odd taking products for review now when I can’t share them with at least some of you through a giveaway. I’m curious, though — what would you have done? Why I am differentiating between this and the dozens of other freebies I’ve received and blogged about through the years is beyond me — it just seemed somehow greedy of me to accept. Weird, eh?
Maybe it’s because I had read this blog post not too long before. It’s a rather tawdry story of some really indiscrete bloggers who were accepting products, reviewing them glowingly and talking about how much they or their family loved using the products, and then selling the items on a Facebook page, proclaiming that the items were “brand new” and “never used” often with tags still attached. I’d have no problem with a blogger donating or giving away or even selling a review product they’d received and not used, but to be duplicitous enough to lie about using the product and then turn around and sell it? No wonder mom bloggers get a bad name!!
On the other side of the spectrum, I didn’t have to waffle at all when I recently deleted a glowing offer to become a “brand ambassador” for a popular daytime soap and another daytime talk show. According to the pitch:
Brand Ambassadors will:
* Get the inside scoop on show developments and segments
* Have direct access to the Daytime Team to share feedback on XXX
* Be asked to use their influential platforms to help spread a buzz
* Receive special perks and goodies. We just have to keep these specifics under wraps until the Brand Ambassador Team is selected!
Excuse me while I roll my eyeballs around in my head for a while. Maybe it’s because I’m not a soap opera kind of girl that I’m cynical about this. Heck, if Jeff Probst asked me to be a Survivor Brand Ambassador, I’d fall all over myself saying yes. Then again, if Jeff Probst asked me to play naked in traffic during the rush hour in January, I’d do that too. We seem to be off on a bit of a tangent here… where were we?
Ah yes, I was about to ask you your thoughts on all of this. I try hard to strike a balance between great freebies for you guys and not spamming you with consumer stuff. While I’d happily accept a free Nikon D90 for the pleasure of sharing the pix with you (hello Nikon, are you listening?) the idea of taking little things like DVDs or free breakfast cereal just seems kind of cheap to me — and yet, the line in the sand is entirely arbitrary.
If I had a few extra minutes today, I’d go back and parse this meandering ramble into a much more concise post, but this is as good as it’s going to get. What say ye on the subject of bloggy freebies? Would you or do you accept any and all offers? Do you ‘get’ my distinction or do you think I’m splitting hairs? I’m always interested in your opinions!
Well, wouldja lookit that? Turns out today is Delurker Day 2010.
You know what this means, right? You have to pay your annual toll by delurking and letting me know something about you. Lord knows y’all know more than enough about me; now it’s time to turn the tables and pay the piper and whatever other tired old clichés you can think of.
Delurk, and tell me something about yourself, or why you’re here, or just wave hello for goodness sake! (C’mon, you know you want to!)
I know, I know, everybody and his brother is doing the year in review thing. But I’ve done this in each of 2006, 2007 and 2008, and frankly, I got nothing else for today! Here it is again, a meme of review in the form of the first line of the first post of each month in 2009.
The problem with extended absences from the blog is all the posts I want to write that get tangled up in my head, so when I actually do get a couple of minutes to string together, I’m bloggily constipated.
My dearest darling Simon, You are five years old today.
I filched this meme from a couple of friends’ Facebook pages.
I’ve said before I’m a fan of Mabel’s Labels, and they just keep setting the bar higher with new and interesting products.
I’m glad I didn’t quit my photo-a-day project last week, and I’m kinda sorry I whined at you with all my artistic angst.
I’ve been working with the Mom Central network for more than a year now on various blog tours and promotions — from locks to board games to chocolate – and one of my only complaints would be the number of events and tours that were less convenient for or not available to Canadians.
Ten years ago today, in a tiny church in London’s Pioneer Village in front of 45 of our best friends and family on the hottest day of the summer, I said these words.
How bad can 40 be, when it starts out with a blissful day at the beach with some of my favourite people?
Every now and then, a pitch stands out from the noise that is my in-box.
Are y’all feeling a little freaked out by H1N1, the so-called “swine flu�
This is an exciting year for Santa parades in and around Ottawa.
I‘m always glad when November turns to December.
Hmmm, birthdays, photos, giveaways, and memes. I hope the whole year wasn’t as, um, flaky as these posts seem to indicate! Note to self, start each month with substance and flake out from there.
Happy New Year to all of you who have taken a moment to stop by and read, and especially to those of you who toss in the occasional comment or observation. Almost five years in and I’m still humbled by your presence here. I wish all of you a new year filled with joy, laughter, and wishes fulfilled!
Well, hello there. You’re still here? Yay! Sorry about the extended absence. I’ve been distracted by something shiny and new that I got for Christmas. I’m so spoiled — Beloved bought me an iPod Touch! I hadn’t even asked for it, and have to admit when I opened it my first thought was, “Wow, this is great — but what am I going to do with it?” I already have my battered iPod Nano, the one that survived in the glove-box of the flaming van, and it does me fine as a music player and for the occasional game of solitaire. (Truth be told, I have been coveting an iPhone, but just couldn’t justify the monthly cost of the data plan.)
But you know what? I love it! LOVE it. I called it the MotherPod, and I’ve loaded 50 of my favourite pictures and my entire music library and filled less than 1/4 of it. In about two clicks I’d connected my e-mail account and found my way online. I wasn’t going to put any games on it, because I knew that the moment it looked like a gaming device would be the moment that I surrendered myself to sharing it with the boys, and frankly I don’t want to share. It’s MINE!
I surfed around looking for recommendations for Apps (should I capitalize “Apps”, do you think?) and found this most excellent post on Greeblemonkey, with an annotated list of all the Apps she has on her iPhone. I downloaded a couple of freebie Apps, like Google Earth and CBC Radio. (Jian Ghomeshi on demand? Be still my heart!) Did you know that there’s an App to find the nearest Tim Hortons? Now that’s useful technology. And a word game called Moxie, which is kind of meh, but I wasn’t going to start paying for games and it was free.
And then, with a few serendipitous clicks, I began reliving my digital youth. I found — are you ready for it? — Sim City, and suddenly it was 1990 all over again. Sim City? Oh, the hours I dedicated to that game, on my very first computer with the 40 MB hard drive. (Ha, some of the photos I upload to Flickr are more than 40 MB!) My only regret is that the version for the Touch doesn’t say “reticulating splines” as it loads. I never did figure out what splines were or why they needed to be reticulated.
Not too long after that, I found Tetris and I haven’t stepped away from the device since. Tetris? Oh, how I do love Tetris. It’s even MORE addictive than Tim Horton’s coffee. I haven’t yet downloaded Rockband, but I am *this* close!
So if blogging is sparse over the next little while, you’ll know that at least I’m not doing anything productive like, say, cleaning the house. I’ll be reliving my digital youth, playing Tetris and Sim City, and roaming the ‘hood looking for wi-fi hot spots.
Got a favourite App? I’ve still got 3/4 of an iPod to fill. What else have I been missing?
’Tis the season for advent calendars, and even though we’re already half way through December, I wanted to tell you about this amazing blog post courtesy of my friend Sue, who is the curator of the children’s lit collection at UNB (doesn’t that sound like an awesome job?)
Sue has put together a wonderful list of 25 animated shorts based on children’s books. Truly, it’s a thing of beauty, this list. It’s defiinitely worth bookmarking, whether you share them with your kids throughout the holiday season or save them for a rainy day. Brilliant stuff! And if you love it as much as I did, toss Sue’s blog a vote in the Canadian Blog Awards, would you? It’s Mouse-traps and the Moon, and she’s up for Best Canadian Culture or Literature Blog.
And, ahem, if you’re still in a voting mood… you could always toss me a bit of clickety-love, too!
Speaking of advent calendars, I’ve continued to be impressed by the items we’re unwrapping from the Hill and Knowlton / President’s Choice advent calendar. We’re up to day 17, and despite continuing exhortations from Beloved to jump ahead, we’re still opening one new item each day. In case you missed it, here’s what we’ve had so far. In the last week and a bit, we’ve opened:
With just over a week to go, even though I can’t imagine there is anything more delicious than the truffles and the biscotti left under the tree, I fear I may yet lose the battle to prolong our enjoyment of these treats throughout the full 25 days of Christmas.
Edited to add: when I was noodling this post in my head, I knew I had three advent calendar ideas but for the life of me couldn’t remember the last one when I actually sat down at the computer. Got it now! Courtesy of Suze of Here In My Head, check out this awesome collection of 25 of the year’s best images from the Hubble Space Telescope. Truly awe-inspiring!!
Hey, thanks for your votes! I made the first cut on the Canadian Blog Awards to make the top 10 Best Family Blogs. Yay!!
So you know what comes next, right? Much pestering on my part for your continued voting support, especially now that I know you have to are permitted to vote every day. Hint, hint.
Let’s post those voting instructions one more time, shall we?
Press “confirm”. Don’t forget this part!
And, hey, guess what? If you found that to be an enjoying and enriching experience, great news — you can do it every day through December 19! 😉
Thanks, as always, for your affection and support. (And indulgence!)