*****Tomorrow is Tall Paul’s birthday – stop by Blogenstein and wish him a happy day!
*****Who says nobody walks in LA? The third annual Great Los Angeles Walk will take place on Saturday, November 22 – over 18 miles, from downtown (Union Station), down the full length of Santa Monica Blvd. Sign-up instructions are here.
*****Starting in November, there will be TWO Bookworms Carnivals every month! Here’s the info on the upcoming carnivals:
Edition 17 hosted by: Dewey (The Hidden Side of a Leaf)
Deadline for submission: November 14, 2008
Theme: graphic novels
To submit a post, email: dewpie at gmail dot com
Edition 18 hosted by: Bookopolis
Deadline for submission: November 28, 2008
Theme: Memoirs
To submit a post, email: preferred.stock at gmail dot com
Remember, you DON’T have to have a “books blog” to participate in the Carnival, you just have to write a post on your own blog – book review, essay, etc. – related to the topic, and then send the post/link to the Carnival host.
*****Think about this: bloggers banding together to help promote great, under-the-radar blog content.
New in Google Reader
Nuestra vida con Adrian (Dariela’s a new member of the Los Angeles Moms Blog; this is her bilingual personal blog)
Tuesday in Silhouette, via Blue Archipelago
Book Roast
Bookopolis
Word Strumpet (via Twitter)
Random blog-reading moments
(Since I got so backlogged in Google Reader last week, a few of these links are a little older.)
>> I’m one of several bloggers quoted in this article about “blogger karma” by Caroline Jorgensen (a/k/a Morningside Mom) in the October edition of the online magazine Moms CLIQ.<<
Rumors of the death of blogs may be exaggerated…but reasons for blogging may indeed be changing.
Perspective sometimes just shows up when we really need it, and it can help us keep things in order
I read this post about career courage just after I’d returned from our annual employee recognition lunch – and trust me, walking into that room took courage for me! (Yes, I’m socially dysfunctional.) Here are some more thoughts about courage and fear from Maria Shriver’s address to the California Women’s Conference, via the LA Moms Blog.
I’ve been enjoying Mâvarin Karen’s chronicles of her growing political involvement – this chapter talks about some Democratic pockets in McCain territory. On a related note – the Scholastic Presidential Election results are in! And isn’t questioning authority and challenging the status quo a fine American tradition? (It seems to me we wouldn’t have an America today if some folks hadn’t started doing just that back in the 1770’s…) Thoughts on “choice” and circumstances; also, motherhood politics, and, inspired by her daughter, a mother emerges from a political midlife crisis.
And because sometimes politics is just silly: Sarah goes to the Oval Office (be sure to click around!), via e-mail from my husband; and the presidential campaign, Dungeons & Dragons-style, via The Park Bench (disclosure: I’ve never played myself, but I’ve known players and sat in on a few campaigns):
…HILLARY: WTF you guys. Why am I playing the cleric?
MCCAIN: Hillary, we’ve been over this.
HILLARY: No, dude. I am so sick of being the girlfriend healer. Seriously, I can’t even use a sword. Fuck this noise.
KUCINICH: IM A BARD
OBAMA: That’s nice.
KUCINICH: MY FAMILIAR IS A PURPLE SNOW LEOPARD
MCCAIN: Oh, Jesus. Here we go.
KUCINICH: DID I MENTION MY WIFE IS A TOTALLY BANGIN DRYAD WITH 20 CHARISMA
HILLARY: C’mon you guys, I’ve been playing this shit since Gygax was in eighth grade. Why can’t I be the party leader with the magic sword for once?
MCCAIN: Because no one wants to see you in a bronze bra.
OBAMA: Oh dude, BURRRRRNNNN.
HILLARY: SCREW YOU, Grandpa. I will so kick your ass…
Here’s a handy list of new vocabulary words. A few of my favorites:
Myspacery – Discovering that all the friends you thought you had are imaginary.
404 – Someone who is clueless, as in “404 not found.”
Irritainment – A celebrity spectacle that, like an accident, you just can’t turn away from.
Generica – Features of the American lanscape that are the same no matter where you are (i.e., fast food joints, strip malls, etc.).
Incompitense – The stress felt as one waits for the government’s next boneheaded move.
Politiclone – A political commentator who is unable to think for himself.
Sarchasm – The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn’t get it.
Have you met the Boss’ sister?
How to embarrass your teen even when you’re specifically trying NOT to
October 30 is NOT Halloween (just ask my sister – it IS her birthday)
>> Confirmation that it really ISN’T my feed, it’s Bloglines. Or it WAS – supposedly it’s been fixed now. Meanwhile, if your blog is on Blogger and you’ve using the new “follow” feature, it looks like Feedburner IS counting your followers in your Google Feedfetcher subscriber numbers.
Book notes and wishlist
# If you enter this giveaway you will reduce MY chances of winning it – but maybe not by much, since I get three extra entries by posting about it! Find out why Trish (Hey Lady!) says The Likeness, by Tana French, is the best book she’s read this year, and you may want the chance to win a copy of it from her too.
# Schooled by Anisha Lakhani was already on my wish list, so I’ve entered a raffle to win the ARC that was reviewed on J. Kaye’s Book Blog this week. The winner will be chosen on November 12, so you have time to enter too!
Have a great weekend, y’all!
I hope blogging isn’t dead, what would I do during the day? 🙂
Thanks linking, people are probably going to think I’m a nut. But that’ okay. 🙂
Mike – That’s OK. You’re a mostly harmless nut :-).
I think many of us will fight the death of blogging with kicking and screaming!
Great tidbits. I too was looking at the blogging karma and the death of blogs article and those new terms are funny!
Haha! Love those new vocabulary words!
So is your sister’s birthday the 30th or the 31st? Mine’s the 31st. 🙂
Shiona – Glad you enjoyed those! I really think most of us just won’t LET blogging die.
Tanabata – Her birthday is the 30th, at 6:45 PM, so it was really close to being on Halloween – but not as close as yours!
Happy birthday, Tall Paul! I hope he has a wonderful day. 🙂
I will have to keep in mind the date for the memoir Book Carnival. I will be reading a reviewing a memoir about that time.Watch me forget. That seems to be my general habit.
Congratulations on being quoted in the article about blogger karma. I do the same thing that you do–I like to check out new blogs, especially when someone new takes time to comment on my own. I all too often add the blog to my reader. Probably why I struggle to keep up these days. 🙂
Thank you for the new list of vocabulary!
Have a great week, Florinda!
Wendy (Literary Feline) – Tall Paul seems to be enjoying his birthday so far. We’ll be having his birthday cake – his favorite, German chocolate – and gifts tonight, before the kids go back to their mom’s house.
I have a couple of older posts that I will TRY to remember to submit for the memoir carnival myself.
My office is watching bandwidth usage pretty closely, so my online time at work is going to be limited, and I’ll be offline during the move next weekend, so keeping up with my blogs is definitely going to be a challenge for the next little while!
Have a good week, Wendy – glad your little blogging break is over now :-D!