Blogging Gems I Need to Share

Every day I read a lot of interesting stuff on my Google Reader, Twitter feed, and Facebook wall. I come across something that is so gripping that I decide it's not enough to share it/retweet it/or bookmark it. I have a deep desire to talk about it on my blog. Notice I said, 'deep desire'. So, I bookmark it under 'Blogpost Idea' on my Google Bookmarks, and vow to return to it at the end of the day, and share it with my faithful readers. Then I sit at my computer and start posting insightful blog posts about these useful things and then all my readers are empowered and enlightened because of my wise comments!... Or not.

Instead, once these interesting blogs, pages, or posts have been bookmarked, they rot in bookmark purgatory until one day, I decide to purge myself by putting ALL those posts into one single humongous potpourri of miscellany.


Anyway, here are links to articles/posts/blogs that caught my interest. If you like it, good! If you don't please don't do a psychoanalysis of my personality based on my reading preference!! :P

Blogging - because I need serious help there.
604 Blog Post Ideas for When You are Stuck...like right now! And also if you need to see an adorable picture of a little boy and his pet dog!
13 Types of Posts That Always Gets Lots of Comments. Geez, I could use some of that!

Social Media - for the uninitiated (if they exist at all)
For Those Facebook Left Behind - if you are one of the million people who thought they are one of 4 people who knew nothing about social media.
Generator Blog - well, it generates everything except electricity. Go and experience hours of mind-bending and fruitless yet strangely addictive Internet activity that this blog has to offer!

Good Advice - because I know you won't listen!
Advice, like youth, probably just wasted on the young - Yeah! Way to go! Tell it like it is!
42 Practical Ways to Improve Yourself - I've already done one of them. Guess which one! If you know me, you know this is really lame...

Making a Difference - some people really do have better things to do.
The Ugly Indian - when will we learn to clean up our own mess...literally?
My good friend's blogpost on Contemplations and Ruminations - it's a post on Sherlock Holmes (she's crazy about books!), but at the end she talks about something good that the Kanyakumari district has been doing for a while...Find out!

Creative People - bringing the Wow! because they can.
3D Projections on Buildings - this is awesome!
Flash Mob at the Ohio Union 5/3/2010 - because I love to see people suddenly break out in dance and song!!



Food - because, with me, it all comes down to food!

14 Useful Tools for Your Kitchen - you know, when you can't use the pan for frying bacon, like normal people, and you need to use the microwave...or something like that!
Carl Kleiner - or when you're so NOT like me, and can resist yummy food long enough to go photographing them and making lovely ethereal pictures!
KFC Double Down Sandwich: Why Use a Bun When You Have Fried Chicken? - for when you really want a massive heart attack! No, really. This is atrocious...why don't you just pile it on, one day at a time, with chocolate? At least, it's more fun! But then, that's just me...

Of New Friends and 'First Times'...

I never thought I would ever say this, but here it goes, "I guest-blogged this week"...Oh no wait, that was the wrong font... People, I GUEST-BLOGGED this week!!!!!! ....Okay, that's better... whoa! how did that happen...? Flashback..scene fade...

It was two weeks ago, that I registered myself into 20SomethingBloggers... I know, that was like saying, "Yesterday I watched Titanic the movie"...(sometimes I come across as being pathetically ancient, and I am totally aware of it...). Anyway, I was immediately given a warm welcome by a couple of really sweet bloggers who introduced themselves, and even read my blogs...That's where I met the lovely Charreah Jackson who writes an interesting blog on love at Love Jones Lane. (Visit her sometime, she has some cool stuff to say about love and marriage, and why they drive us crazy!)

Here's where it gets exciting! She visited my blog, and actually asked me to write a guest post for her blog, on Love and Marriage in India!!! Okay, I think I need to go easy on those exclamation marks!!! So, I was like, 'Really? Is this happening to me?!!' Anyway, as she says, "Believing is half the battle".... so, I wrote a post, and hoped I didn't disappoint her terribly, and emailed the write-up to her...

Turns out she liked my post enough to actually put it up right there, along with her other posts. She also said some nice things about me, that are totally undeserved! So, go on over to her blog, and read my post entitled, "Marriage in India - I Chose Love".

Top 10 Moments of Vanity!

So, Vanity...we all have a bit of it, right? I mean, it is not so much a 'nose in the cloud, I'm too awesome for the world' kind as the 'I am precious in my own way, and I KNOW IT!' garden-variety!!!

This type of vanity is not obnoxious in any way, and mostly it's rather endearing! Still, it's a moment of self-love that can't be ignored. I am guilty of some of these myself, and I'm sooo not going to tell you which ones! heheh!

1. Making sure that you hold your new purse 'best side out'! You know, no matter what tearing hurry you are in, you make sure that the snazzy side of your purse is turned outwards - the side with the obvious designer logo, or the gorgeous buckle, or the pretty flap!

2. Strutting! You walk into a room, and everyone is seated, and well, you know that everyone is watching, and you know that you are no beauty queen, still, you know you are dressed at your best, and your hair is shiny, and people are oggling you, even if it is briefly...and you strut...just a little...but it's a strut nevertheless.

3. Exhibition of Good Parenting Skills! Your daughter is about to make a fuss, and other people are present. You keep your cool, talk to your child, calm her down, solve the problem - basically do just what a good parent ought to. And you ARE a good parent... Everyone is watching, and you know you rock! And then you flash your neighbor a smile like 'Hi, I am a good parent, and I do this sort of thing all the time...it's nothing!'. No, you are not haughty or anything, just proud that you did good!

4. Telling a Joke, and Loving It! Your sense of humor is popular with all your friends, you are sweet yet ROFL funny! And you say a joke, and everyone is doubling over, rolling on the aisles, and loving you! You are thinking, "Boy, I'm pretty funny, huh?!"

5. My Family is Awesome too! This is probably the sweetest kind of vanity, and I'm sure most women are guilty of it...personally, there exists enough evidence to prove that I am so guilty of this little vanity!  Your husband is addressing a crowd and the audience is spell bound! Your child just sang a song in the most wonderful voice, or said the most clever thing a child has ever said, and everyone is Oooh-ing and Aaah-ing at him or her! And you're thinking, "yeah, I know, they are wonderful...and they're mine...Booyah!!"

6. Doing a Personality Test/Quiz and Posting it on Facebook! Okay, you know you are a nice person, and a Facebook quiz just told you you're right! You answered honestly, and still got told that you are a wonderful team worker, mom, friend, lover etc etc. Facebook asks you, "Publish this Quiz" or "Skip this Step"! You picture your friends seeing this, and all the comments  you'll get, and then everyone, and I mean at least everyone, clicks over to take the quiz. So, you hit "Publish"! Then Facebook sends you a message that you are an awesome user! Win and win, all around!

7. You go up to Your Spouse and ask them, "I was wonderful out there, right", just after you have done something awesome!!!! And you know they will say 'Yes'! (I don't do this all that often, but a significant other person does it all the time...and I kind of find that endearing in him...!!!!) No, you don't brag about yourself to anyone else, but you do fish for compliments from your spouse, because seriously, who loves you more? Of course, you are open to constructive criticism, and you do get a lot of it (!), but sometimes, you know your significant other thinks you're wonderful, and YOU JUST WANT TO HEAR IT! Sweet!

8.  You start a blog. (you link shamelessly...here's my twitter feed for good measure! @janehamilton !!!! shame on me...) And then, another one. Even though you know quite well that the both could have easily been combined into one blog, and it wouldn't be such a big deal! Because really, the stuff here is not that earth-shattering! (Okay, this vanity moment? I think I'm the only one here guilty of it! Still, in the name of being honest, and all...)

9. You write a post about Your Moments of Vanity!

10. You link it to OhAmanda's Top 10 Tuesday, so that you can see your name along with some wonderfully awesome, enviable bloggers out there, and tell yourself, "Hey, my name appears on a blog other than mine! Yaaay!".

I'm hopeless, I rest my case! So, what I really want to say is - even though we all have these little moments of vanity, it is what makes us human, and endearing, and loveable.... and also, reminds us that Humility is important too!

Food Blogs, and Why I Hate Them!... a.k.a Okay, I Actually Love Them Too Much!

Okay, I have an obsession (this blog just got dangerously personal...)...staring at food...there I said it! People make food, eat food, sell food, buy food, design food, sculpt food...I just stare at it. At the lovely colors, the lovely food photography, the chocolate cake that I can almost taste off the book or computer screen, the roasted chicken I can almost smell in that scrumptiously lighted photograph...

And the best place to appease the hunger pangs coming out of my eyes? Food blogs!! I don't know why I had to say that with double exclamation points, since food blogs are a dime a dozen these days...! exclamation point! (I seem to use a lot of these nowadays, probably because I can't believe myself half the time?? Question marks?

Okay, help me out people...don't tell me no one else in the entire blogosphere has this obsession??...come on!!! Okay, I hear you back there...thanks for the support.

Anyway, I have, like, tons of them subscribed on my reader, and bookmarked left and right, that it takes me hours, every night, to finish oggling at the food. Some recipes, like a few, ...okay, maybe 1 or 2 in the entire time I've been reading these food blogs... I have tried to make. Others, I simply look at, and wish someone would make them for me...not make by myself, mind you...but that someone would bake me that cake, roast me that chicken, saute that asparagus, get me that doughnut, give me that cookie, brew me that coffee...you get the idea .....  siiiiiiiiiighghghghgh! I am really sad now...

But WHY? Why do you obsess over food blogs? Why do you do it? My answer, (channeling Isla Fisher here), "Because when I obsess over food blogs, the world is a better place". Camera zooming in on dreamy eyes (mine), shocked expression on face (yours), violin playing a slow tune, rising to a crescendo (orchestra...Hey, who invited them?!?!)... surreality follows...

So, maybe I am no expert when it comes to blogging (I totally wrote 'globbing' just now...probably delirium from staring at all that sugar!), but these are some of the best food blogs out there...take a peek, and hope you can never look away...and Hey! if you cook some of the food you see here, be nice and send me a sampler, or a big package...I'm not picky that way!

Bakerella You have got to be from some other galaxy, if you are a foodie and haven't heard about this lovely lady. She stands for all that is sweet and cute...lotsa sweet, but the cuteness...ooohhhh, I feel faint already!!

The Pioneer Woman I wish I was one of her kids, no seriously...Ree, will you adopt me...like, not for always, or anything...but only for meal times...please...Pretty PLLLLeeaaaassssse?!?!?  Could I have your Cinnamon Rolls just once, please? Then I can die peacefully... Reader, go to her website, click on the 'Cooking' link, and stay there!

SmittenKitchen The only food blog whose name is a warning of your fate once you start reading the posts! I am smitten, absolutely smitten! There is always a jaw-dropping picture smack in the middle of the page, and...well, that's usually as far as I get! Her recipes list is so long, you could put on weight just by reading it! And I am smitten...but I already said that... Go get smitten, people! You know you want to...after this picture....

Joy the Baker Can't argue with that! What an appropriate name! What joy at looking at all those good eats, and that fabulous personality! I love the little bees buzzing around on her blog...I mean, who can resist food like that, right?

Two Boos Who Eat A lovely couple who love good food, how simple yet yummy can it get?! And they like to stay healthy...important if you have all this yummy-ness going on!

Love and Olive Oil And while we are on the 'couples' thing, these guys are pretty cool, too! Love and Olive Oil, two very healthy, very 'good for you' things...I can't complain about this visual either!

Multiply Delicious Really huge, mouthwatering pictures of food, and this Heath Bar Chocolate Trifle pretty much did it for me! I'm a a fan for life! Mommy Heather and her family of 4, cute family picture, adorable babies, yummy color-scheme,  - win, win, win!!

Fancy That...Fancy This Ameena Din's awesome humor, her cute little baby girl, her humor, her interesting food choices, equally interesting rants about the furniture, and humor! She has some good recipes too! But best of all, she has visited my blog..Yaaay! I have 1 reader that other people recognize!!!!

And, finally, Dad~Baker & Chef Super Dad who makes the best Chocolate Mousse in the whole world, on short-order? Bakes awesome birthday cakes? Cooks delicious Indian cuisine? Takes on a Daring Baker Challenge? Check, check, check, and check...Guilty on ALL counts of Awesomeness! Sheesh, I envy the kids!

Okay, now that I am sufficiently miserable knowing what I'm missing, I will proceed to share the miserableness with my family through dinner...Actually, I am not that bad a cook, just not 'Food Blog' material...so, I wrote this post to get some of that awesomeness onto my blog!!

Enjoy... But first, tell me, do you know of any good food blogs out there? Or do you have one of your own?...Tell me in your comments; I would love to visit!

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I have entered this post in "Things I Love Thursday" over at TheDiaperDiaries. Go on over, and join the party!

Thou Shalt Blog

It is truly despicable that a blogger should ignore her blog for a period of two months and finally come back with a cheeky post about how 'thou shalt blog'! But it's happening and I am the blogger in question.

And suddenly there was work. I think it's a good thing that I am suddenly in demand for a whole batch of technical writing tasks. My work is sought after, and I get paid for it. (am i making it sound like a great adventure, here?! It really isn't. It's just work that I am supposed to get done.)

But that left me with absolutely no quality time with my blog. I just stuck to plain technical writing. I do have a sense of achievement that I have finished one training manual, written an advertisement and a promotional letter to school principals, have written a post for the company blog and an article to be featured in a popular search engine news section. Still, I feel guilty that I forgot my AdLibitum, green layout and all. (The layout has been changed since then - my update on January, 2009). Sitemeter traffic is truly humbling. I plead guilty but acquit me in the name of all things creative and verbose.

Will try to do more justice from now on!

This was a really lame effort, but I'm saying this was atleast an effort, so ...

Next post, and all that...tomorrow.