Happy Birthday, Blog!
Today is the third anniversary of this blog. You can read my first trial post on this day three years ago here. You can read more about the history of this website here. It's still pretty cool to be able to read my own words on the Internet, although I'm not sure that anyone else reads them (shameless plea for blog comments?). I'm still using the same tools to create this blog, namely Blogger.com with a custom template to match the rest of my site, and while Blogger doesn't do everything I could wish for, it accomplishes the job and is pretty reliable. I may eventually move over to one of the big-boy blogger sites, but it would take a lot of free time that I don't have right now.
I've been able to post to the blog somewhat regularly, but several of the pages are still out-of-date, especially the Work page, since I have been at the new job for more than a year. I have been able to keep up with the Books page, mainly because it's a blog of its own, and it's much easier to update than an HTML page. I created new blogs for my Thought of the Day page and my TiVo page. I still haven't had any problems with spam comments on this blog, maybe because I don't use blogspot to host my site, or maybe because I don't make the blog public in my profile on blogger. Or maybe everyone knows that posting to this blog is about as effective advertising as putting a message in a bottle and then burying the bottle. In concrete.
Some of the things I've learned since my last birthday post:
1) I can't write something every day, except for one remarkable streak from January 1st to March 3rd of this year, but I have enough good ideas to write somethingevery couple of days about once a week, if I make the time.
2) Blogs are more fun with links and pictures and now with video. YouTube is great!
3) People you really didn't think would read your blog will read it, so you have to be careful what you post. I try not to post anything about work that they would mind, because this is not a blog about my work life. Read about how this woman was fired for blogging about her job (she now blogs for a living, ironically, and writes an excellent blog that I read every day).
4) I try not to over-share with my personal life, too, and that made some people mad, too. I've never been able to keep a diary, other than my calendar, which is not a diary but a calendar, because writing down what I was feeling seemed too self-indulgent or even narcissistic at the time of writing, but my several attempts have proved to be very interesting to me in years removed. I think that posting about being tired or what I ate or not having enough time to post is boring, and I'm not doing that anymore. I may go through and archive some of those posts. I couldn't write a diary and post it to the internet, but I don't plan to delete those posts, just to save them somewhere else, less embarrassing.
5) I have a MySpace page, too, and I use it to keep in contact with folks who don't have their own websites. The software at MySpace is terrible, but most everyone has a MySpace page nowadays, at least all the single people do. I don't usually tell the MySpace people about this site, and I'm not posting the address to my MySpace page here either, although if you know enough about me you can find it with some digging. One reason is that I keep the content on this site at a "G" or "PG" level so that my nephews or my co-workers can read it without being offended. I don't many people at work about my website, but it's only a Google search away.
So, in moving on with the traditional anniversary "State of the Blog" post, I think you'll see more of what you've been seeing in the last few months, links with something cool I ran across, and an occasional article about something I'm interested in. I have been thinking about moving the site content behind the blog, making the blog the main content of the site and getting rid of the other pages or putting them in a less prominent position, but that would be a pretty large redesign, and it won't happen anytime soon. Unless I suddenly have more free time, like if I get fired for blogging. Hopefully not.
I've been able to post to the blog somewhat regularly, but several of the pages are still out-of-date, especially the Work page, since I have been at the new job for more than a year. I have been able to keep up with the Books page, mainly because it's a blog of its own, and it's much easier to update than an HTML page. I created new blogs for my Thought of the Day page and my TiVo page. I still haven't had any problems with spam comments on this blog, maybe because I don't use blogspot to host my site, or maybe because I don't make the blog public in my profile on blogger. Or maybe everyone knows that posting to this blog is about as effective advertising as putting a message in a bottle and then burying the bottle. In concrete.
Some of the things I've learned since my last birthday post:
1) I can't write something every day, except for one remarkable streak from January 1st to March 3rd of this year, but I have enough good ideas to write something
2) Blogs are more fun with links and pictures and now with video. YouTube is great!
3) People you really didn't think would read your blog will read it, so you have to be careful what you post. I try not to post anything about work that they would mind, because this is not a blog about my work life. Read about how this woman was fired for blogging about her job (she now blogs for a living, ironically, and writes an excellent blog that I read every day).
4) I try not to over-share with my personal life, too, and that made some people mad, too. I've never been able to keep a diary, other than my calendar, which is not a diary but a calendar, because writing down what I was feeling seemed too self-indulgent or even narcissistic at the time of writing, but my several attempts have proved to be very interesting to me in years removed. I think that posting about being tired or what I ate or not having enough time to post is boring, and I'm not doing that anymore. I may go through and archive some of those posts. I couldn't write a diary and post it to the internet, but I don't plan to delete those posts, just to save them somewhere else, less embarrassing.
5) I have a MySpace page, too, and I use it to keep in contact with folks who don't have their own websites. The software at MySpace is terrible, but most everyone has a MySpace page nowadays, at least all the single people do. I don't usually tell the MySpace people about this site, and I'm not posting the address to my MySpace page here either, although if you know enough about me you can find it with some digging. One reason is that I keep the content on this site at a "G" or "PG" level so that my nephews or my co-workers can read it without being offended. I don't many people at work about my website, but it's only a Google search away.
So, in moving on with the traditional anniversary "State of the Blog" post, I think you'll see more of what you've been seeing in the last few months, links with something cool I ran across, and an occasional article about something I'm interested in. I have been thinking about moving the site content behind the blog, making the blog the main content of the site and getting rid of the other pages or putting them in a less prominent position, but that would be a pretty large redesign, and it won't happen anytime soon. Unless I suddenly have more free time, like if I get fired for blogging. Hopefully not.
Labels: Blog
posted by drewc4 at
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