Recently in blogging Category

So today we are seven. Seven years of blogging. I think it is accurate to say that we, my blog and I, are currently undergoing a bit of a seven year itch. It's a hot summer in the city and I've sent my blog to the coast with the kids. Everything seems so dull and routine now, the shine has worn off. And, yes, while it's been enjoying cooler climes, I have flirted with attractive neighbors. Twitter. Facebook. I admit it!

But I didn't sleep with them. Facebook, well pretty much all my IRL friends and family are on it. I only use it to keep in touch with them. Facebook and I are just friends. It's complicated.

Twitter, well sure I had a pretty big crush on it for a while. Now I find it to be a bit ... noisy and vacuous. That's the only way I can describe it. I stopped tweeting several months ago when I realized what a colossal time suck it was, not to mention my compulsive need to read each and every tweet was overwhelming. I've met and socialized with people from Twitter. It is great for that. And I don't mean to insult my friends on twitter. Twitter is great for Social Media. I'm just not sure I care about Social Media. It feels over marketed. Once they started calling it that, it lost it's appeal. I jump on now and then. I use it when I change my facebook status and I know it's going to be less than 140 characters. When I spend a lot of time on twitter and facebook, I know I am bored.

There has been a lot of talk about Twitter killing the blog lately. But I disagree. They are two different animals. There are times when I have something short and pithy to say, for which Twitter or Facebook works great. There are people who use the medium PERFECTLY. I have to think they put great time and effort into constructing something so entertaining or meaningful in 140 characters. It can be a fun challenge. But that's the exception more than the rule. Twitter is an amuse bouche. Tasty, but it's not going to fill you up. It's probably high in fat and empty calories as well. Blogging is the main course. It contains a full daily requirement of vitamins and minerals. Blogging is A NICE BIG STEAK.

But, back to the seven year itch analogy. There have been times I have thought about just stopping. But that's a cop out. Better to ride the wave and work on our relationship. Take it to new depths. Discover new things about each we didn't know. Get the PASSION back. Don't you think?

As always, I am deeply grateful for all of you who read my blog, past and present. I am especially thankful for those who have become my friends. And occasionally husbands.

I'm coming up on my 7th blog anniversary at the end of this month. Although, I have not been a very good blogger these last couple of years. I feel like my blog had a heyday and it was a few years ago, that's for sure. The last few posts were either about the weather, the sims or WoW, and that made me kind of sad.

Maybe I'm tired of blogging. Maybe I'm tired of blogging the same old way I used to. I don't know. My blog has always been about my life and what I am doing. The fact is, I'm not doing anything. Somehow the the hours pass, the days go by and most days are exactly like the ones before it.

That might be the crux of it. Maybe I don't want documented my failing to make something more significant out of my forced early temporary retirement. I suppose I'm a bit embarrassed that I have not written a book, become fluent in French and learned all the nooks and crannies and secrets Vancouver has to offer. Nobody really wants to broadcast the fact that they are not living up to their potential.

I don't know. I'm just thinking out loud. Maybe the way I blog has to change. I've thought about stopping entirely. But that is not what I want. I want to love it again. I want it to be fresh. My blog and I are just not as intimate as we used to be. I want to fall in love all over again. And other clichés.

I believe I am going to blame all this on Evildeb, for not moving to Canada with me.

In case you are reading this in an RSS feed... I put up a new blog design. It still needs lots of tweaking. But I'm pleased not to have a generic, non-jodiferous, template up. I basically stole the banner from my old booklist page and changed it up a bit. Added Momo. It's not the only banner I designed over the last few months, but oddly, it was the first. I was completely sold on another idea, but then I took a good look at both of them together, and I just decided this on was more me.

Couple of things, I created tabs along the top. And pages for the blogroll and Monthly Archives and Category Archives. After nearly 7 years of blogging, a list of monthly archives can get quite cumbersome. Trying to clean up the sidebar a bit. I've also added my Goodreads book list info, but I've been pretty negligent about adding my books to it. I resolve to do better.

So... yeah. There you go.

Hey, I'm messing around with the blog design and layout today. Don't be surprised if you see weirdness come and go.

Well... at least I am not playing the sims nonstop.

The hiatus was unintentional. I have reasons. Maybe we'll discuss them later. And I feel extremely rusty now. I think I will baby step back.

1. The old lady in front of me at the store today smelled of beans and franks. Also, I'm pretty sure there was a guy in bulk foods who had recently pooped his pants. I have the nose of a dog.

2. Does anyone have a really good lasagna recipe? I want to learn to make lasagna. Feel free to share. Must have meat.

3. I didn't mention this earlier, but Wil was laid off at the end of January. We knew it was coming. He's looking for a job. Please give him one if you have one free. Must be fun and pay lots of money.

I do love english muffins. One, because they call themselves "muffins" even though they are not part of what I would, traditionally, consider the muffin family. Cheeky. And, they make the sublime Egg McMuffin possible. (You want to blow your own mind? Make your own egg mcmuffin at home. With cheddar cheese. Good god, that is good eating.)

What I like best of all is the way the english muffin encourages my excesses. No sooner do you touch your knife to the muffin, then the butter disappears into deep crevices. And you have to get MORE BUTTER. More butter = more better, that's just a fundamental truth. Everyone knows that.

Thank you, english muffin! Welcome to my tummy.

Chris says it's Delurking Day and I believe him.

So drop a comment if you lurk, and say "hi!" And if you lurk, but have your own blog, add the link so I can come over to your house and say "hi!" back. And then we'll be friends! Won't that be lovely.

If you don't lurk, you should still say "Hi!" because I live a pretty sheltered life.

The Greater Vancouver Region has a very strong Blogging/ Social Media community, which is great. I didn't know of such a community in Seattle. In fact, I never knew any other bloggers in Seattle, sadly. I'm listed on a uberlist of bloggers in Seattle*, that's as close as I came to knowing other bloggers. So even though I considered myself a Seattle blogger, of course, I have never really considered myself a Community Blogger. I blog about myself. So I'm very impressed with the community here in the GVR.

The other day, I was mentioning to Wil that our friends, Airdre and Kerry Anne, won Favorite Audio/ Video Podcast for their excellent beauty podcast, Lipgloss and Laptops, in the Best of 604. Very well deserved. He asked me why I didn't win an award. Which is sweet, don't you think? In addition to not really being heavily involved of this community, it's quite simple. This is not my blog's heyday.

Oh, it's true. I know it. You may or may not know it. Blogs, like everything, have and ebb and flow. I think that once I quit my job, my blog started to ebb. Or maybe it's flowing. I'm not sure. Either one. Man, you should have caught me sometime in 2004 or 2005. I was rocking the blogging.

I'm ok with this. It's understandable really. If my life were one of those Family Circus cartoons, where they show what Billy or Jeffy did all day, everywhere they went, it would show little Jodi footprints running from my apartment, to the Safeway half a block away. And back. Occasionally, you'd see little feet running further down the block to the bank or London Drugs. But your chances of blog fodder decrease greatly if you never leave a 3 block radius.

Nonetheless, I did recently win two nice awards. One from Captain Dumbass of Us and Them, who lives here in the Greater Vancouver Region.

Hee! He said "booty." One day, Captian Dumbass and I will run into each other when we are both wearing our Bad Monkey shirts. I certainly hope we aren't compelled to fling poo.

And another from a former coworker, although I didn't know him at the time, Good Father.

It's too bad he wasn't blogging back in the days when I was at my POE. (And we didn't know each other) We could have had Blogging Lunches. Booked a conference room on the 2nd floor, right next to Central Services, with it's free soda and candy jar. Remember that kid, the mail guy, who one time dyed those kick ass flames into his hair? His name escapes me, because I'm horrible with names. It starts with a "D." He's worked there about 20 years by now, I figure. I hope he's still there. And the last big formal Christmas party we had, right before the dot com bust? We had different international themed rooms for the dinners. Oh man, I got DErunk that year. I did it for Evildeb. She was pregnant with AlmostCertainlyGoingToEndUpEvilMaggie, and was sad she could not "party."

Anyhoo, I like these awards. They are übercomments from two readers saying "I like you. Or at least your blog." And that's all the reward I really need. ** I know that one day my blog will cease to ebb and start to flow again.

* I suppose I should remove myself, but I'm not gonna. I still consider myself a Seattle blogger. I'm just... North of Seattle, is all. Very very north.
** ok, I suppose all awards are really saying that.