Things have been pretty busy here the past couple weeks at chez Monnibo. This post is going to be a mish-mash of many things.

We went to Spanish Banks on Saturday and met some Camp friends for dinner. When the tide was out, we went for a wander in the ocean. Gorgeous photos resulted (and I made a new Flickr set called Vancouver Beaches).

Spanish Banks at low tide

We went to Bard on the Beach on the weekend and saw Anthony & Cleopatra. I really enjoyed it and I have to say that Bard on the Beach is one of my favourite festivals. And of course there is a Bard Flickr set too, with various years’ photos.

Intermission at Bard on the Beach

Speaking of festivals, I sent The Word On The Street Vancouver program guide to the printer today (!!!). We’ve been working on this all summer. I’ve also got some other initiatives for the festival going: if you’re on Twitter, follow WOTSvancouver — if you’re on Facebook, “like” The Word On The Street Vancouver — if you’re on Flickr, share your photos on the WOTS Vancouver Group Pool — or add the WOTS Vancouver blog to your feed reader!

At BookCrossing Meetup the other night, we were talking about books (of course!) and then blogs and publishers and authors, etc. I mentioned I signed up for newsletters and followed publisher/publishing blogs. Dale and Marina instantly wanted me to write a blog post full of links… and this is just to say that yes, I intend to do that, but I don’t have time right now.

Philippa Gregory’s new book comes out this Thursday, August 19. The Red Queen is book two in her next series about the Houses of Lancaster and York. I enjoyed The White Queen (review) but wasn’t crazy about it. So, I don’t know how I feel about The Red Queen, but I’d like to give it a shot.

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins — book three of the Hunger Games Triology — comes out in one week (Tuesday, August 24)!! I’ve read (and reviewed) both The Hunger Games and Catching Fire and I’m really looking forward to the final installment.

Julie Forrest tweeted a link earlier today to an upcoming knitting book from Random House — Vampire Knits: Projects to Keep You Knitting from Twilight to Dawn by Genevieve Miller. There are many Twilight-inspired patterns on Ravelry already (including a leaked pattern from Vampire Knits), but it will be neat to see what other vampire-inspired knits are devised.

Okay, now one weird question… why are my house plants plagued by fruit flies?

Last Friday my mom and I went for a bike ride on Deas Island Regional Park. Highway 99 decends in Delta on Deas Island and travels under the Fraser River to emerge in Richmond. Whenever I return to Vancouver, just before we go into the George Massey Tunnel, we pass over Deas Slough. Deas Slough always looks so picturesque, quiet, and beautiful despite the highway running right through it.

View of Deas Slough from Deas Island Regional Park

Deas Island Regional Park dock and boat launch

View of the Fraser River from Deas Island

Bicycling Deas Island Regional Park

Take a look at all my photos from the bike ride on Flickr.

The only downside to this beautiful day was that my car died inexplicably during the drive home (thankfully before we got to Highway 99 and the George Massey Tunnel).

Being towed home

There are pros and cons to all shopping experiences, but even more so for shopping online. You’re taking a huge risk and purchasing a product, service, or deal based solely on photos and descriptions. Sometimes things go great — I have had tons of positive experiences when things go great as well as awry.

I’ve been really impressed by the daily group-buy offers and have even purchased one (and nearly purchased a few others). I love receiving those daily deal emails from StealTheDeal, Groupon, TeamBuy, GoodNews, LivingSocial, and EthicalDeal. Another great experience: Once we ordered an all-region DVD player but it arrived only being able to play Region 2. We emailed the eBay seller who was able to send us instructions to reset the region to 0. Fantastic customer service!

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But since Saturday, one recent experience has been pissing me off. I really need to rant about poor customer service. Frankly, I don’t care if you’re at Comic-Con or on the other side of the world (hello World Wide Web…). I ordered this item a month ago and I just want a damn response regarding a replacement!

Craig’s birthday is this Friday and he’s a fan of the online comic, VG Cats. He’s been laughing over this humourous Zelda-themed shirt sold by SharkRobot for a while. (View the VG cats comic it’s based on OR read a Game FAQ to find out why it’s funny). He hadn’t ordered the shirt due to the cost of shipping to the UK. Good for me though, since shipping to Canada was pretty reasonable. I ordered the shirt a month ago and it arrived last Friday (allow 4-6 weeks for shipping, fine).

But when I opened the package I was highly disappointed. As you can see above, the image is supposed to be large and wrap-around. It is tiny and only on the front.I replied to the “Order Shipped” email with my dissatisfaction and demanded they reprint the tshirt as advertised and reship it to me. I don’t want a refund, I want the product I paid for. I hadn’t heard anything by today (Tuesday) so I sent another message via their website and quoted my Order Confirmation number. As of this post, I still haven’t heard back. Grrrr…

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Online Shopping silver lining: today I came home and Kim Werker had retweeted something from PoppyTalk about an online sewing class. I’ve been really tempted to take some of the clothing workshops and tutorials offered at local shops, but really don’t feel my skills are up to snuff. I realize that the point of a class is to learn, but if my basic skills aren’t honed, I might miss out on what I really want to learn about. What appeals to me about a local class is that with clothing, they can help measure me and teach me how to modify patterns to fit.

However, with this online Home Ec class offered by Leigh-Ann, Courtenay and Rachel, I’ll be able to practise some basic skills for a reasonable price! I ordered as soon as I finished reading the list of project and course description.

If I’m out of town for more than 24 hours, my mom likes to have my cat, Henry, over for a visit. Last weekend (Canada Day long weekend) I went out of town so my mom had Henry over. My sister is also out of town so she’s currently taking care of my sister’s cat, Sasafrass, too.

A few weekends ago the cats were napping and had swapped blankets; Henry was on Sasafrass’ and Sasafrass was on Henry’s blanket pad. I cooed and melted and couldn’t believe mom hadn’t snapped a picture. So last weekend, mom made sure to take photos of the furkids (her grandcats) sleeping.

Happy Whiskers on Wednesday!

A couple weeks ago, I picked up a bike rack for the trunk of my car and this week I had my handlebars raised on my bike. I also purchased a water bottle holder to attach to my bike and my dad fixed my kick stand. All of these tasks were in preparation for going on regular cycling trips.

I will admit that I am out of shape. I have asthma, I am overweight for my height/age, and I really want to be stronger. I am going to try to go for bike rides on Fridays. With the use of the bike rack, I’ll be able to check out new areas in the Lower Mainland as well as selecting trails that suit my fitness level.

I’ve been following SmuttySteff on Twitter and she’s been tweeting about her cycling achievements. It’s been very inspirational and the other day I emailed her for some cycling advice. Steff said I can share some of her advice here:

• I ALWAYS have a hard time breathing in the first 5-10 minutes of cycling. Even now. Not as hard as I used to, but there’s a marked difference in my ease of breathing after 30 minutes than when I first start. Why? The lungs just need to warm up. Give it time. Huff, puff and wheeze through it. You’re allowed to take a break here or there, but I recommend just shifting down as low as you can and peddling lighter till you catch your breath.
• [For cycling as transportation] It’s really hard for the first four weeks. It’s supposed to suck. It’s supposed to hurt. All you have to do is make some allowances for that, but you have to push harder & further than you THINK you can, because it’s totally a mind game. Do that, that’s where the accomplishment comes from.
• Get yourself a tripometer at MEC for $15-20 so you know how far you’re cycling and at what speed. Tracking progress feels great and is more black/white than numbers on a scale or measurements — when the others aren’t coming for you, knowing there’s progress in performance compensates fabulously.

Steff had tons more recommendations and I’d like to publicly thank her for emailing me back! Now, without further ado, my bike ride!

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A few weekends ago I attended the first ever FreelanceCamp Vancouver at The Network Hub downtown.

This was very well-spent $10 admission, but with an unconference style only some of the talks appealed to me.

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Craig arrived on Friday evening and I picked him up at the airport. We had a quiet night at home and I had made hot spinach and artichoke dip. We headed out to camp on Saturday to say hello to his family and catch up. We went horseback riding with some friends just before dinner on Saturday.

Myself, Rachel, and Krista showing off our dirty bums after riding horses bareback.

Then we got an invite to go to the movies with some other camp friends, but not just any movie theatre. One of my favourite summer activities is going to the Twilight Drive-In in Aldergrove. On Friday and Saturday nights they play three movies starting at dusk. For $12 per person and the comfort of your own car, it’s a fantastic deal. We often get four people and pile into the back of a pick-up truck with foamies, blankets and pillows. Showing on Saturday night was Killers, Robin Hood, and the new Repo Men.

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I’m going to be pretty busy for the next little while, so updates may be few and far between. Just a heads up! Email me if you need me.

All this talk at Northern Voice and during the “Writing and Editing for the Web” course I just finished has me itching to work on the backend of the blog. I’m trying out some new things and updating some things that I’ve been neglecting. I also have some questions that perhaps other bloggers can help answer.

Uploaded Images and Photos on Flickr

I have gone back in all my uploaded photos (here on the blog) till October of last year and altered the titles and alt text. I’ve been naughty and haven’t been keeping that up to date. But as suggested by Alexandre in the SEO session at Northern Voice: start using good practices immediately and they will start to come naturally.

I’ve been adding photos to my Flickr and have removed almost all photos from my Facebook. I bought Flickr Pro in February and I am loving it. I’ll still be posting photos on the blog but now, I’ll try to link to the appropriate Flickr album for more photos when it isn’t necessary in a blog post.

Speaking of Facebook, I also deleted all my videos and will make sure to keep my YouTube channel up-to-date. However, most of the videos I upload to YouTube get embedded here. Which leads us to our next topic…. plugins.

WordPress Plugins

I am using Viper’s Video Quicktags plugin right now, but I just downloaded the Apture plugin to make these cute little icons in front of my links. But Apture also has an embed function, so do I need to keep Viper? Also, if I uninstall Viper, will it break my current embeds (mostly YouTube).

I already love how AddThis Social Bookmarking plugin works. I also recently activated the All in One SEO plugin and I’m exploring that more too. I’ve also been making sure to add tags to all my posts. This how-to video from WordPressTV that was suggested by kmore on Twitter has been a big help for doing all this tag updating.

Do you have any plugin suggestions that are vital to your blog well-being?

Improving my Workflow

I am interested in exploring Evernote to keep track of things. I already really like my “To Do” list on my iTouch and I use my iCal religiously. I’m interested in how Evernote can be integrated into my workflow. (And maybe it will make me less dorky at conferences when I whip out my pad of paper and favourite pen).

It was really hard to wake up this morning, but I dragged myself up and out to UBC in time for the 9:30am Keynote speech by Chriss Messina. Unfortunately someone mentioned that there would be a WordPress Genius Bar set up, and I was so distracted the whole time thinking about all my WP questions. After the keynote, I hurried over to the WP booth to ask a couple quick questions.

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