I’ve done some minor updates around the blog as suggested by the Blog Improvement Project Week 4. Nothing too hefty, just some minor maintenance I’ve been meaning to do. After my rant about Social Media sites, I thought about being connected and getting the blog out there. I also thought about making it easier for people who do use those kinds of sites to share my blog with others. So I’ve decided to stick with the AddThis social bookmarking widget. It is fairly widely used and I appreciate that it’s design is not intrusive like the other widget I was using.

I have an issue with my sidebars: what should go “above the fold” … or to use a non-newspaper term, “above the scroll”. What fits in the sidebar before you have to scroll? Should my Knitting Widget be so high on the right side? I think my feed is important to have on the left. I have participated in so many things (Swaps & Challenges in particular) that I moved all older buttons onto the pages. But what’s different from Weeklies and Participating? And do you (as users) prefer Categories or Archives better? I don’t like WordPress.com Tags since it doesn’t show me everything on the blog I’m viewing that has been tagged, so I was also more into categories.

I’ve also been working on my blogroll. If you have added me to your blogroll and I have forgotten to add you (not intentionally), please let me know so I can add you! I tend to forget that adding people to my Feed Reader does not equate to my Blogroll.

1. I’m tired, I’m indecisive, I am having second thoughts.
2. Why do I have to wake up and not just sleep in.
3. How does this Twitter thing work, anyway? (Or more importantly, what’s the point of it!?)
4. Every morning, I put my phone in my pocket. 
5. I consider myself lucky because I have parents who will/can support me.
6. One day we’ll see THE WORLD. (Yes, I have a Bucket List!)
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to doing absolutely nothing, tomorrow my plans include class  in the morning(ugh!), but it’s Adobe InDesign(yay!) and Sunday, I want to enjoy a cuppa tea at the inaugural T.E.A. meetup!

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I missed last week due to crazyness, and I haven’t blogged much this week just because I haven’t felt the desire too. However, both last week’s and this week’s Booking Through Thursday questions were great, and I’d love to share my thoughts.

“How do you arrange your books on your shelves? Is it by author, by genre, or you just put it where it falls on?” (02/19/09)

I may be a total nerd (well, maybe not considered so in the literary community) but I arrange my books by Author Last Name. I like that I can easily find whoever I’m looking for. I have two long shelves that run the length of my bedroom’s northern and eastern walls near the top crown moulding. They’re nearly full, and I’ll be moving soon so I’m thinking of getting floor-to-ceiling shelves, but I suppose I’ll have to see how much space my new apartment(!) has.

ETA: Marina brought up TBR (To Be Read) books! Those don’t go into my regular shelves until I’ve decided that I want to keep it. Those are piled all inside my bedside table, which is just a 2-shelf table on wheels that was supposed to be a printer/office sidetable.

Collectibles: Hardcover? Or paperback? Illustrations? Or just text? First editions? Or you don’t care? Signed by the author? Or not?

I only have a few books I would consider collectibles, and it’s usually just a book I cherish. Is it sacreligious that I would read my ‘collectibles’? I would definitely recomment hardcover for collectibles just because they’ll last longer and are often more attractive with a dust jacket. If I was going to go to the trouble to get something signed by the author (we don’t get many big names doing readings here) I would make sure it was a first edition hard cover copy.

I wish I was a cat; they’ve got thee life. It’s been one of those weeks, and it’s only Wednesday! But instead of going on about all the minor hiccups in life (that make everything seem like too much to handle), I’ll just share a very late Whiskers on Wednesday post. Henry and I both slept in today, which was actually quite necessary as I haven’t been sleeping well.

Remember my rant? Well after talking about it with a number of people, and feeling quite justified by all your support, I am the Assistant Organizer of a new Tea Meetup on Meetup.com!

We are called T.E.A., which stands for Tea Enthusiasts & Aficionados, but we welcome even just the humblest tea drinker to a “master”. The point is to have a cup of tea, expand our horizons (local shops, sharing knowledge) and enjoyable conversation. If you are in the Greater Vancouver / Lower Mainland area… please join us! (P.S. I designed our banner!!)