Sheila's Guests and Reviews

It took a while. I sort of got an idea of how to feed and furnish a blog. I made one for "stuff," one for writing. and one for Bible studies. Then I sat back, feeling suitably proud of myself till I realized I had to write things too. And finally I stuck them all together, made a website and felt really good... ...and then I found all these writer friends that used Facebook and Twitter and nings, so I followed them there... ...and then they had "lenses" that had nothing to do with my eyes growing old and tired, and squids that didn't need to swim in the sea... So now I've tied my blogs and my website together, added another potential website, and included links here and there to a Squidoo Lens that I linked to some quizzes. If you're bored (and not just bored with my boring old blog) or otherwise have time (ah but what is time? Existentialists rule) I'd love to know what you think of the new-look links, and even the squid: http://www.squidoo.com/in...

Bemoaning the fact that my novella's not going to turn into a novel by the end of the month (why do I set myself such tasks?), I find I'm reading lots of blogs that ask if I keep a diary or write notes . Perhaps the novella would have a better chance if I didn't wander the blogosphere, but that's a different tale. So, no. I don't keep a journal though I tried, many years ago. Somewhere hid away in a box upstairs there are lots of scarcely used diaries; I don't think there's much of a second hand market for them. January usually has a few entries. February less. There might be a shopping list or two in March, and some notes - yes, yes! I sometimes write notes - tucked in pages in June or July. The notes will be scraps of poetry, or a five-line story, a character study or two, written on a bus, or from a chair in a doctor's waiting room. As notes go, they weren't very effective, lost in a diary, lost in a long-lost cardboard box. But my theory is, and...

So, I did it! I searched the web for advice, found lots, then got myself another blog - http://sheiladeethhome.blogspot.com - and tried to set it up as my home page. (The most helpful advice I found was from Camy Tang, a pdf on how to blog your website - highly recommended.) 1. I want my "posts" to appear like separate pages, not all down the screen, so I set the new blog up with 1 post per page, and enabled post pages under archiving. I think that was so I could find and edit (and link to) each page separately, but I'm not sure. I'm just a beginner. It's what the pages I looked at said I should do. 2. I want the "welcome" post that I put on my home page to keep appearing there. But blogs always show the newest post first. So I use the "post options" button at the bottom of each new post and set the date to sometime in the past. It's really neat. 3. I don't want dates appearing my web pages, so I edited my layout and used the "ed...

I think I used up most of Thursday's excuses yesterday. Headache - yes. Housework - tons of it. Laundry - well I emptied the dryer, but I didn't get round to the washing; maybe tomorrow. Yardwork - I cut the grass, which is growing too fast; ran out of time before I could weed the flower beds. Shopping - forgot the bread. Internet - I posted day 48 of my Revelation drabbles; posted 49 today. Family - that's what distracted me from yardwork. Dog - she's a wonderful exercise machine, so of course I took her for a walk. I didn't get to the editing. But I made lots of lists while working out how much I might complete by the end of the day. And reading - that's what I did at the end of the day. (An excellent book, that I found through Moonlight, Lace and Mayhem while wandering the blogosphere a little while ago.) Today we saw Star Trek. It was great. So maybe I'll find more time to write tomorrow.

I phoned my Mum on Sunday, but it wasn't Mothers' Day in England, so we didn't exchange any special wishes; just switched our computers on and skyped and enjoyed temporarily shrinking the miles between us. Other than that - my husband was ill, so I gave him breakfast in bed; met some friends at church and drank coffee; woke my son up and gave everyone lunch; went shopping, on my own; made dinner; read a book while the guys watched soccer on TV... ...which doesn't sound much, but I really enjoyed Mothers' Day. Having the chance to read when the house isn't empty around me is always a bonus. And the strange coincidence of my cell phone ringing just as I parked the car, contrary to all Murphy's laws, was a wonderful Mothers' Day gift. It was also a phone call from our oldest son that I got to enjoy all on my own, uninterrupted, so I'm glad I was shopping alone. And since I didn't get any presents, I got to order my next proofs from Lulu. What more c...

Once upon a time I got a diary for Christmas. It was a beautiful shade of blue - that perfect tint that the sky never quite imitates. The cover was padded, with vines of pink flowers and green leaves. And golden letters declared "My Secret Five Year Diary." The pages were gilt-edged, crisp cream paper, firm and smooth, with narrow lines because I was a big girl now and could write small. And I faithfully reproduced the boring details of my life, in slow and careful scrawl, for all of five days. There was a lock on this diary too, all filigreed gold. And there was a key, which I kept attached to the strap in case it got lost. I think I already knew nobody would want to steal my secrets. After all, they weren't even interesting enough for me to keep writing them. So now I have a blog. Ironic really. I wonder what I'll do with it.

Most of the nings I’ve joined are for readers and/or writers, and on one of them I found myself volunteering to write some book reviews. I’d done a few reviews on gather before ( www.smd.gather.com ) but this time I was asked to post my reviews to Barnes and Noble and Amazon… Yeah, I know. It’s no big deal. But I’d never done it before. Should I use my real name or stay anonymous? How much or how little should I say? And how on earth do I rate something when I’m seriously ratings-averse? …and on Goodreads? I’d never even heard of Goodreads. So I went there, signed up, and in a spurt of unaccustomed energy ending up posting all my reviews at once, new and old. You can find them at http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/2039269 , though it’s not a representative selection of books that I’ve read – just of ones I’ve reviewed. Maybe I should write a few more, just for completeness. It’s on my to-do list.

Once upon a time, I promised my sons I would never visit Myspace or Facebook. It’s a privacy thing—-I wouldn’t go messing with their stuff; I wouldn’t barge into their rooms without knocking; I wouldn’t search their files on the computer. And it’s trust—-I have three sons, and they care about each other: they let me know if anything’s wrong. But it’s also a generational thing—-Myspace and Facebook just looked so strange, I wouldn’t know what to do with them anyway. Then came Gather. To be more accurate, then came the first ever Gather First Chapters Competition, just as I finished writing my novel, so I joined ( www.smd.gather.com ) and entered. I wasn’t sure what all these groups and connections were about—“It’s just like Myspace,” said my sons—-but it was a fun place for me to write and make friends. There was something on the Gather front page about blogs back then. Yes, I’d heard of blogs. I wasn’t quite sure what one was, beyond a public private diary, but I’d heard of them. Still...