Have You Abandoned Me?

Dear Langley,

I can’t help but notice that the last time you posted here was Halloween. It’s now past Thanksgiving. I try not to be needy or desperate but I’ve got to ask… are you spending time on other blogs? Prettier blogs? More exciting blogs?

What do you want from me? I can be pretty. I can be exciting. I’ll be anything you want me to be.

Don’t forget, you made me what I am. If you’ve lost interest, that’s on you. I won’t take responsibility. In fact, you need to get your act together and come back to me. I am a good and decent blog. You can look all you want but you won’t find a more upstanding, responsible and loving blog. You’re no picnic yourself. Everything’s always about you, you, you, with no consideration for my needs.

If you want to come back, you better be prepared to beg. I will not lower my standards to accommodate you, I have too much self-respect. Things have got to change between us. I coolly await your response. 

Signed, Lonely blog

Dear Blog,

I’ll come back, I promise. This isn’t about you, it’s about me. I’m spending my time writing for paying clients, trying to save money for the holidays. You’re still my number one blog. I have not forgotten all the good times we’ve had; all the fun topics we’ve covered and the nice followers we’ve met. Please accept my sincerest apologies.

Will you take me back if I promise to give you more attention? I can commit to posting at least twice per month through the holidays. If you’ll give me a chance, I’m sure I can be a better and more prolific writer for you. After we get through the busy season, I can even do better. I will try my hardest to post once per week after the New Year.

What do you say? Please don’t throw away all our good times. I’m begging. You’re worth it. Thanks for holding me accountable, it’s one of the many things I love about you. Let’s make this work.

Yours always, Over-committed writer

Testing the 'After the Jump' Function on Blogger

This is a test post. I've noticed that some of my blogger friends write their entire post on one 'page' while others write an intro and add a 'read more' link. Considering which way I should organize my blogs, I posed the question to the blogging community. 

WordPress vs. Blogger: the Conclusion

I started a WordPress blog and a Blogger blog at approximately the same time. (Here is the link to my first post about this experiment, if you care to follow the plot). Along with plenty of other errors and bad judgment calls, I named both blogs the same thing. *facepalm*

Then I joined a daily blogging challenge, which seriously tested my blogging skills but also forced me to go deeper on both platforms. Yes, not one to dip my toe in the water, I plunged right in. I over-enthusiastically signed up both (same named) blogs for the A to Z Blogging Challenge. As I hacked and miss-stepped and clumsily pushed forward, I learned a lot.

Before I give my final conclusion, I’d like to make a few things clear: I am technologically challenged, I gravitate towards the intuitive and easy, I want my blog to be easy (to read and to navigate), I don’t like to read instructions, I want my blog to look good, I want to know what people find interesting,

As I said before and still believe, there are pros and cons to each. If I was king of the world, I’d combine the best of both and have a goldmine perfect blogging platform. Still, after 30+ posts on both WordPress and Blogger, I favor Blogger overall.

What about you?

Blog Design Update

Hi friends. I have not posted lately because, well, the A-Z Blogging Challenge took it out of me. You may remember that I was new to blogging when the challenge began and I jumped in with both feet. All I had time to do - regarding writing - was push out some client articles and blog. No time whatsoever for blog design.

There's so much to learn about blog design, and so many fun things to do. I've changed templates here and added a signature (see below). Not sure if I'm completely happy with it, yet. Apparently this blog will be yet another WIP. That's okay, it's fun to learn new stuff.

Tell me what you think of the new blog template and the signature. What else should I do? Seriously. I'm a baby here and could use the feedback.

That's it for now, I'm off to learn how to change up the post dividers...

Yay! We're Almost Through

Yes. For Y-day I'm skimming by. Cutting corners. Taking the cheap route. Slowing down this train. My Y-word is yay as in Yay! We're almost through.  

The A-Z Blogging Challenge has been a learning experience. Dipping my toes in the blogosphere only days before the challenge kicked off, I had no idea what I was getting into. I started this blog and one on WordPress at the same time - as an experiment, to learn about both platforms. I fully expected to spend more time learning how to work within the templates than on the actual blogging. I planned to quietly blog under the radar until I found my footing. Then, and only then, did I plan to get serious about what I would write. I didn't think up cool names for my blogs, whether I should niche or go general, or any of the other smart stuff I would normally do. Nope, these blogs were only for me.

Then a friend learned about the A-Z Challenge and started (virtually) talking it up. With naive enthusiasm, I signed up BOTH BLOGS. Whatever was I thinking?! I didn't even know how to blog and I signed up to post on 2 blogs every day of the week (except Sunday) for a month? Oh, the folly of inexperience.

It's been good. Through this challenge I've learned:

• how to schedule a post on Blogger and WordPress
• how friendly and supporting this blogging community is
• how to remove a captcha code requirement 
• how creative and smart you people are
• how to add buttons, gadgets and other cool stuff to blogs
• that you can't monitize basic WordPress
• how to use google analytics
• that you can't use google analytics on WordPress
• that it's hard to write 2 posts per day and keep up with other writing requirements and a family and other regular stuff...
• that I've got a lot more to learn but I've gotten a good start
• that I've met super people and discovered excellent blogs to follow
• oh yeah, and that I love blogging

... and that I'm glad the A-Z Challenge is almost over. Today is Y-day and I say Yay! We're almost through. Tomorrow is Z-day and we will be through.

It's been a real pleasure blogging with you and I hope we stay in touch.

On a less sappy note, I'm happily accepting Z ideas in the comments section! :)

T is for Too Close to Quit

Warning: cop-out post alert.

That's right. I'm not good about writing on the weekends and today is Saturday. Amazingly, I have stayed 100% compliant with the A - Z Blogging Challenge (on this blog). I say amazingly because, since I escaped from the rigid corporate bonds of my previous existence I've become commitment phobic. So much so that I almost didn't participate in this fun challenge at all. The fact that the challenge had no strict 'rules' attracted me, so I jumped in. See, that's another thing I avoid, rules. No commitments and no rules please. Call it overcompensation or whatever, but I've had enough of those to last a lifetime.

My drive and competitive nature has not waned in retirement, however. Once I start something I will finish it. And I started this challenge so I will finish it.

Today is the day for a T-post. And, as I mentioned, it's Saturday. So my T-post is about the fact that I'm too close to quit. That's it. No more wisdom or insight. Just that I will continue to plug through until I reach Z.

That is next Saturday, right???

WordPress vs. Blogger

I started this blog to learn about Blogger. After a few years of writing for other websites I decided to jump in and do my own thing. Having no idea where to begin, I started a blog with WordPress and a blog with Blogger (Blogspot). After fumbling and bumbling around, I've organized the WP blog to my satisfaction, kind of. Nothing is ever completely finished, so I'll keep tweeking it relentlessly.

Anyway, a friend wants me to help me set up a blog for her. Laughable since I am such a newbie, I know. Still, I can't say no. Before I could recommend a blogging platform to her, I wanted to play around with Blogger more. I'd spent the bulk of my time learning WP so I turned my full attention to Blogger.

So far, I can see pros and cons to each - WordPress and Blogger. I'll keep pushing forward until I feel like I can make a solid recommendation. So, this is my first real post to Blogger.

If you want to follow this wildly exciting journey (ha) then either subscribe or check back. I'll continue to write about my findings as I learn more.

AND, if you have any advice or comments about blogging platforms, fire away. I've read everything I could find on the internet about the subject and there is no clear answer. I get that. It's all about personal preference. So this is me publicly determining which blogging platform I prefer.

See, told you this would be wildly interesting. Let the madness begin.