So Misguided

There are all sorts of cool jobs, and cool people who get to do those jobs, and today I read about a fantasy job come true.

J. K. Rowling announced today on her website that she is going to read from Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince at the stroke of midnight on July 16 in Edinburgh Castle. Her audience will be 70 cub reporters, fans aged 8-16.

I have no desire to be 8-16 again, however, I would love to travel to Edinburgh, go to the castle, have a reading, get a signed book from Jo, and take part in the weekend of activities. How very magical.

BUT I can live vicariously through Emerson and Melissa. Emerson of MuggleNet.com and Melissa of TLC were personally invited by Jo to interview her at her house. Emerson and Melissa are some of THE hardest working Harry Potter fans out there. They have fantastic fan sites.

Can you imagine if your favourite celebrity called your cell phone and said, hey love your site, why don’t you pop over to Edinburgh and interview me? Oh but you can’t tell anyone for 10 days.

Well that’s what happened to these two. I read Melissa’s post about what the phone call was like and then the heartbreaking silence of the next 10 days. Here’s her post on TLC.

Melissa, Emerson and Jo are going to post their conversation in three corners of the Harry Potter world, i.e., on their three fantastic sites.

How freaking exciting.

But, ok, what if you’re not a Harry Potter fan? What would be your fantasy call come true?

Posted by Monique at 04:19 PM. Filed under: Blogging •

(0) Trackbacks • Permalink

So my learning curve on blogging has been a bit like the silhouette of a hockey stick, I’m still on the straight and narrow, no upward curve yet.

Well, slight upward curve. I discovered today that the comments feature is not working correctly. Why? Because there was an error in the template I downloaded. So part of that is fixed. Also I realize there was no preview comment ... that is sort of fixed. I have a template but it sucks and needs some help. But it does basically what you’d hope it would do. Preview the comment.

My apologies also to my new “members”. I’m glad that you’ve discovered this option. But I have no idea how it works. Welcome to my club. I’d love to tell you what membership entails, but it’s an elusive entity.

At this point, things can only improve. I hope you visit again.

Posted by Monique at 09:26 PM. Filed under: Blogging •

(0) Trackbacks • Permalink

The Litblog Co-op was all over the news this week. I love it. I’ve been following the progress on Bookdwarf and Elegant Variation.

What is it? The Litblog Co-op: “Uniting the leading literary weblogs for the purpose of drawing attention to the best of contemporary fiction, authors and presses that are struggling to be noticed in a flooded marketplace.”

Ya, so what is it? On May 15, the 20 participating litblogs will announce the 5 titles they think everyone should read. Apparently this will happen 4 times a year.

What I like is that the objective is to give little-known books more attention. Like my favourite book, Up In Ontario.

Posted by Monique at 12:44 PM. Filed under: Blogging • Books •

(0) Trackbacks • Permalink

To misquote Gauguin, where do I come from? Who am I? Where are we going? The answer might become clear later. For now, here’s my first post.

Exciting. A first entry. I know I have not been original in my title, but hey, I’m still using the unmodified “Butterfly” template, chosen at random during the install process. I like butterflies but I think that will be the first thing to go.

Starting a blog is a bit like moving into a new house. I like the neighbourhood, it’s the right size for what I’m looking for, and well ... I can change the paint colour.

I’ve been rather busy lately so the reno on the blog is going to be a slow process. For example, how do I change that About section?

Ok, who cares for now. I need to thank
Travis and Susie. They recommended ExpressionEngine, which I like so far. I need to learn how to use it, but that will come. More than that, Travis patiently walked me through the installation process. It wasn’t particularly difficult, but I am less than experienced when it comes to permissions and system preferences. So I asked for help.

Good judgement comes from experience, experience comes from poor judgement.

I made a good decision.

Posted by Monique at 09:17 PM. Filed under: Blogging •

(0) Trackbacks • Permalink