I don’t know if you will know this feeling, but it struck me tonight. The “getting home at the end of after another blah day at work and realise you are committed to writing a blog post but lack any inspiration or inclination” feeling.

I’ve got that.

So I am sitting at my keyboard, flicking through the bits’n'bobs folder of draft posts, happy with none of them, and I have two options as I see them.

1) Screw it. I posted some fiction last night. That can count as my mid-week post.
or
2) Throw something up that is rushed and not ready because I am obliged to post today as I said I would post each Wednesday and it’s barely been a month of this new resolution and I can’t give up so soon.

Neither appeals to me. I could have set yesterdays fiction to be posted today, but somehow my occasional fiction posts are outside of the normal blog framework for me. This blog is personal (or commentary depending on how you look at it) and, whilst my fiction is intensely personal, it is NOT blogging. The stories are an extra.

Gar. So what am I going to talk about this Wednesday?

The new 9rules? Nah. Exciting though this topic is, there’s nothing I can say that hasn’t already been said much, much better elsewhere. Though huge, massive congratulations to the lovely Esther for gaing her leaf whilst we’re on the topic. Clearly I have the best people commenting on Bright Meadow

Anything else?

Well, there’s always the post I wrote in the midst of a lovely bout of insomnia on Sunday night/Monday morning, but when writing something has you in tears it is probably a good sign that it is a bit too personal to be blogged straight away. The insuing mental upheaval did have me starting to sketch again, which is a change. I have always doodled but I tend to get exasperated that my ability with the pen isn’t enough to translate what I see so clearly in my mind - I guess that is what I write; people’s own imaginations can fill in the blanks I lack the skill to describe - and that exasperation leads me to stop drawing. I like to be good at everything I do, and if I can’t do something well, I just don’t do it even if I enjoy it. So I rarely sketch, but something about Sunday night/Monday morning had me doodling away whilst I thought through some stuff.

But none of it was blog-worthy stuff, so that still leaves me with a Wednesday post and nothing to talk about.

Um. I finally caved and brought a new mattress? No. That’s really not worth blogging about. Talk about scraping the barrel!

I think we shall have to face it. This Wednesday, there really is no point in visiting Bright Meadow. I look back and realise I have taken over 600 words to say I can’t think of anything to say, but that is not new. C’est la vie.

Go, play with better content than mine while I go try and find my inspiration and writing ability. I think they might be stuck down the back of the sofa along with my mojo. Either that or I broke them dancing on Saturday night

Filed under: Daily Waffle | 6 pearls of wisdom added so far »

She sat at the computer and stared at the screen in front of her. Who to make the hero this time, who the villain? What meagre aspect of her normal life could she twist out of all resemblance to reality. What curl of drudgery could she wow them with this time? She was fed up with it, sick and bone tired, of being always expected to come out with something new. Or with something old, just dressed over to look different. How much of her life could she stand to see put down in print on a page, how much of her past pain would these people swallow before they realised that it was all false?

There was only so many times she could see the look in her friend’s eyes as they read her words. She didn’t want to watch any more. The thrill of seeing tears brim had faded quickly to revolt that she was shaming them so. What right did she, to tell of the pain so publicly? The days of wishing she could stand and scream on the rooftops had gone, along with the days of waiting on a miracle to end it all.

She did it by stealth, let little bits of her truth filter out, hidden in a flood of fiction. Those that cared, knew; knew what she did. She shamed them by revealing in public all those little failures that had built up into the biggest of all. Her failure to be what they had wanted her to be.

She didn’t want it any more, that knowledge of what she was doing to them, those she loved. She couldn’t even love them enough to stop, because she kept going. After all, her public expected it, waited for it. The days when she could be silent for months at a time, her fingers moving over the keyboard for nothing but work were gone. This was her work now. Now she spent her days using her pen to dig away at the scabs of normalcy, till her full strangeness lay revealed for those who chose to see it.

What had turned her down this path? No therapy had spawned this version. No guidance counsellor suggested the pen as alternative to the razor. When had the sweet girl become bitter? Her cynicism – British humour, or neurochemical glitch? Whatever had happened, this wasn’t the truth or the reality, no matter how many journalists she told it was.

It was a fine line, the distinction between author-public, and suicide-private, but it was there if you took the care, and just enough people were left to know where to look. In the past she’d tried for a full-scale abandonment, but one or two had clung on, like so many barnacles. Unnoticeable till she tried to run, and then they caused enough drag to make the difference between clear get away, and guilt-ridden confrontation.

She kept saying to them, telling them to back away, that she didn’t want them around. But still, no matter what her desires, they knew best. It actually made them proud to read her latest work. Thrilled them a little bit when they could trace the arc of reality through the space-battles, or relate a minor character to some mundane feature of a life she no longer wanted.

Tell me what to do to make it right. Tell me what to do to make the voices stop, to make the pain go away, to make it all clear.

She was tired, shattered, beaten, worn down, and they didn’t even see. Those who professed to love her best didn’t see that she was being slowly buried alive under their expectations. She knew what they wanted for her, and it was so simple, which made it so much worse. She couldn’t even live up to their one simple request. Be happy. Two words, three syllables, a rush of endorphins…

The crucial switch in her head was stuck on “off”.

Long ago she had taken to writing it down because, on the page, or on the screen, something of the incomprehensibility faded, and she was able to see patterns. She had discovered her gift at the same time as the assorted transmitters in her brain had decided to take a few decades in vacation. Her gift, when she chose to look at it like that, was that she could also make other people see the patterns. There was something wonderfully gothic about the way that she could make other people understand what was going on in her head better than she herself could.

All they had ever wanted for her and she’d failed at it. But she was good at things, good at this. So she somehow managed to translate the randomness in her head into prose people enjoyed, but that wasn’t living. She made money, but so did street-sweepers. Not everyone could write the shit they saw behind their eyes, and not, it seemed, everyone, could be happy.

Tell me what to say and I will say it to you, I will do it for you, I will burn this house down. I will burn us to the ground.

Filed under: Creative, Writing | 3 pearls of wisdom added so far »

Doesn’t it feel good to be back where we all belong here on BrightMeadow.co.uk? I feel good about it and as I’m moderately hungover, it’s a miracle I can feel good about anything. Before I forget, everyone wish happy (ever so slightly belated) birthday to Neko and Bibby and say hello to fulnic who promised me last night that he would start reading again. He also mentioned being awe of me, but sadly it turns out that awe can’t survive rocking out to Bon Jovi. C’est la vie.

What else is new in the world of Cas? Well, I have short hair again. Properly short. I haven’t taken any pictures yet but when I do, rest assured that I shall share. Why cut it all off? I got bored. The last time I got it bobbed it didn’t work properly and I just got so fed up with it I booked an emergency appointment on Saturday. I probably won’t keep it this short, though it is so ridiculously easy to manage right now, but it is nice not to have to worry about it getting in my eyes and I can legitimately fiddle with it because it’s called “styling”. Felt weird dancing last night though. No hair to head-bang!

It turns out Penguin don’t want me *sniff* I lack the experience they require. It does make you wonder how the frack you are supposed to get the experience in the first place, but hey, I wasn’t expecting this to be easy. The next round of applications are being prepared even now.

Which brings us in our usual circuitous fashion to the roast for this week. Yummy linky goodness.

Got a piece of technology designed for a kid to use? Why not be novel and let the kids review it

Sadly rebooting Bright Meadow has lost me my stats history so I can’t share all the weird and wacky search terms that have brought people to this blog (though Christian Chiropractors does stick in the memory). What are your oddest search terms?

I gave up on my dream of being an astronaut a long time ago (health issues disqualify me if nothing else) but I still secretly cherish the belief that one day I will be in space. Have you got the right stuff, seeing as how there is a shortage of astronauts in the EU.

It has been a little over four months since I sat on my first Razr, necessitating a replacement. At the time, I had only had it a week and I loved it - it was so slim, it fit in my wallet, it had a satisfying cthliunk when you closed it, the keypad was all sci-fi-y. Now I’ve lived with it and I loathe the bloody thing. Yes, it still fits in my wallet and has a satisfying cthliunk, but that sci-fi-y keypad gets up my nose. It has no memory so it is stupidly sluggish to run, when it wants to run at all. It randomly decides to change things (like a whole week where it didn’t let me know when I had a missed call or voicemail - I was wondering why no one seemed to love me that week, till I checked my messages!) and the menu system is just the most unintuitive thing this side of the Fasthosts control panel! But I can’t get rid of the damn thing because there is no phone out there that does all that I want it to (and that I can afford). Not that the Razr does what I want it to either, but it (more or less) lets me make calls and texts. So I totally agree with this article. Completely and wholeheartedly.

I get a bit of schtick at work because I rely on my paper to-do lists at the same time as banning post-it notes and insisting that people email phone messages and jobs to do. I just know that I plan my day better on paper, whilst if people keep giving me things to do on scraps of paper, they get lost. The blend of electronic and paper works for me. Could it work for you too?

I remember the day the CCM brought two of these beauties home. Yes, two! And you could join them with a cable to duel at Tetris! Talking of Tetris, does anyone know if you can get it on the newer Nintendo models? My mum is a Tetris fiend, but she can’t use our old Gameboy (yes, it still works) any more because it is too heavy and big for her RSI.

JK Rowling is wrong - a decent analysis the lawsuit Rowling brought against the print version of the online Potter Lexicon.

Their stupidity at not hiring me withstanding, Penguin are doing some pretty sexy things at the moment playing with the idea of literature on the internet. The last “We Tell Stories” story, ‘The (Former) General’ by Mohsin Hamid is probably my favourite. Not strictly for the story itself, but for the approach. I have this really exciting idea to take the week 1 idea with Google maps, and mash it up with the multi-linearity of week 6, bringing in other multimedia (pictures, video, external websites, etc). Sadly I lack the technical skill or time to do this, but is there anyone out there who might take the challenge up? Please?

If you could get OSX on non-proprietary hardware, would you ditch Windows? Yes. In a heartbeat. I love the look of my PocketCalculator, but it is getting to the end of its life, and I just can’t afford to get a new Mac. I refuse to go back to Windows so I’m in a bit of a fix!

Mac Slocum has hit the nail on the head when he calls for ergonomic design of ebook readers. Note Scoble’s rant at the “flappy paddle thingies” for how irritating bad design can be.

Confused with all the different sorts of ebook formats and readers? I know I frelling am! Here’s a handy guide

The other week I twittered my sheer exasperation that I couldn’t find any good new blogs. I was trying to step outside the 9rules family because I don’t want to the run the risk of getting a blinkered view of what’s out there, but found I was drowning in the sheer amount of crap that is out there.
Steve Lawson jumped right in with some great suggestions including -
David Byrne’s Journal
Where Did It All Go Right? by Andrew Collins
Thanks Steve!

I could bang on for hours for the reasons behind the work I do, but I won’t because this isn’t the time or the place. This article should give you some context though

Just two trailers this time, so Abi, try and ration them
Henry Poole is Here
War Inc

Which brings me to the end of the rag bag of links I have found this week. I am off to drown my hangover in endless cups of tea - you sit back, have a lovely weekend, and why not share fun stuff you’ve found in the comments as well?

Filed under: Sunday Roast | 9 pearls of wisdom added so far »

BrightMeadow.co.uk has risen, like a mythic-creature, from the rubble of what turned out to be a hack.

Yes, someone thought that Bright Meadow was worthy of hacking! (For the intrigued, it turns out that this was the problem).

Anyway, thanks to the sheer glory of that marvelous personage known as karmatosed, who spent this morning fingertip deep in sql databases, order has been restored to my blogging universe. I cannot begin to tell you how great that feels! Plus, I am now running WP2.5 on that domain (about bloody time too) so have access to all sorts of shiny new stuff and features. The one I am currently loving is the ability to tinker with my template from within the admin panel. No need to mess around with ftp!

Yay!

There are lots of other lovely benefits, but before I totally geek out, just take this as notification that life is back where it belongs at Bright Meadow. I will be posting there/here from now on, letting brightmeadow.wordpress.com retire into the background (though I expect I might have to return to it if/when my server gets wiggy again!). I have done sneaky things with the feeds once more, so if you read through RSS, you shouldn’t notice any change.

If, however, you aren’t sure, the correct feed is: http://feeds.feedburner.com/BrightMeadowFull and this is the correct comments feed.

At some point I am going to see if I can merge the databases so posts from wordpress.com will be folded into the archives here. If I can’t do it automatically, I’ll do it the old fashioned way and copy/past across!

That’s it! Thank you SO much everyone for sticking with me through this debacle (yes, it rates being called a debacle)

Filed under: Daily Waffle, Housekeeping | 2 pearls of wisdom added so far »

So it turns out I might have been hacked. Let’s see if things are back to how they should be…

Filed under: Housekeeping | 3 pearls of wisdom added so far »

This post is cross-posted with the alternate Bright Meadow whilst I resolve some server issues

There were a few moments this morning when I didn’t think I would get this Roast written. Settle back whilst I tell you the tale…

I woke up this morning at the ungodly hour of 8.30am - not actually that ungodly I will admit, till you take into consideration that as a rule I am never conscious before 10am at the weekends and, if I am, I make a concerted effort to go back to sleep. But for whatever reason, this morning I just couldn’t get back to sleep so I thought “Sod it! I’ll get up and write the Roast before lunchtime for a change!” Best intentions and all that, because I couldn’t log into Bright Meadow to post the bloody thing. Which kind of threw my morning for a loop! The mystery deepened when it became clear that you could still view the blog, but anything requiring a php script to be triggered (commenting, logging in…) was borked. I could still access the site via FTP but then folders kept randomly disappearing as I tried to edit them and…

You can probably imagine the swearing.

So I have reinstated BrightMeadow2 here at wordpress.com and I expect I will keep on this domain for a little bit till I can be satisfied that all is as it should be. If you read via RSS then I have been sneaky and automatically redirected you, so you don’t have to do ANYTHING to keep on reading the Meadowy-goodness. If you are a non-RSS reader (and I know there are lots of you), then adjust your bookmark to brightmeadow.wordpress.com. That is it. Keep reading and commenting as usual

(I will be cross-posting things on both blogs when/if I can gain access to brightmeadow.co.uk to try and keep the archives in as much of synch as possible - keep commenting at wordpress.com though if you can. I’m going to take this as a sign that I really need to upgrade my WordPress install and get that new design sorted. We could be on wordpress.com for a little while!)

Read more »

Filed under: Sunday Roast | 1 brave soul has joined the conversation »

I have been using the Net and screen-reading for many years now and I don’t think I am alone or unusual in this. I have been reading books and physical print media for an awful lot longer. I cannot remember being taught to read, it is just one of those skills I have always seemed to be able to do, and I cannot remember a time when I wasn’t avidly devouring every piece of printed media I could lay my (often grubby) little mitts on. Mum went through a phase when we were kids that there was to be no reading at the breakfast/dinner table. The phase lasted all of a month or so till she got fed-up of us reading the back of cereal packets - clearly conversation wasn’t on the cards, so why not let us read something proper if we were so insistent?

So it surprised me when I was in the library the other day looking for something new to read that how I read (at least pick the books I am going to read) has been so influenced by the Internet.

When I read on the computer I have become used to scanning and making snap judgments on websites. A blog, for example, has very few lines to capture my attention and make me want to read more, let alone subscribe and visit again. When I read longer content such as articles, again my attention is more likely to wander and I need regular prompts or section breaks to keep me hooked. I found myself doing this at the library as well. I would browse, my attention would be grabbed by a title or pretty cover (yes, I am seduced by pretty things), I would scan the blurb, and (if still intrigued) glance at the first page.

This is in and of itself is nothing new. I have always tended to graze for new authors that way if I am not going on recommendations. What is new is that I am much more impatient and have to be grabbed much quicker by either the blurb or the introductory lines. It used to be I would read through at least the first page to get a sense of whether I would like the writing — and, hence, the book. Now most books don’t even make it as far as the first paragraph.

I am not sure why, nor could I really quantify what grabs me about some books and not about others, but whatever it is I base my judgments on, it has become a lot more impatient. I am harder to please and I think it is a direct response to all the web browsing I am doing now.

There is simply so much out on the web that is constantly yammering for our attention. We have had to learn to filter all the noise out and our inherent “spam filters” are getting pickier by the minute. When I started blogging I would subscribe to anything and everything that came my way, sucking it all into my giant bookmarks collection. I was at an all-you-can-eat buffet and getting fatter by the second. I quickly found myself in overload and, much trial and error later, discovered that for my own sanity I could only deal with about 200 feeds. More than that, I just wasn’t giving things my full attention. Less than that I got bored — which is bad for everyone. But with so much great content out there, how do you decide what to keep and what to send to oblivion? It is hard, deciding what does and doesn’t get your attention and you have to be ruthless. A blogger hasn’t said anything interesting lately? Her/his style of writing annoy you? Out in the trash they go.

Conversely it has meant that when I find my favourites I am so much more of an avid fan. I relish every word they write, greedily guzzling everything and everything they say. If they recommend something, I am so much more likely to trust what they have to say. Once they have my attention, we can start to build a relationship, and we all know how hungry for love I am.

How does this tie into my book reading?

I have already mentioned how I find myself browsing for new books in the same way I browse for new websites. If I am feeling like putting some energy into the search, I will chase down links (recommendations from other authors I enjoy, reviews and so on), but mostly I am lazy. I will wander around the store or library till my eye is caught by a pretty cover or title. I will scan the blurb and, if I am further intrigued, flick to the front page. It seems that very few books get further than that but, as my groaning bookshelves will testify, clearly I end up buying lots. My bookshelf space however, like my imposed limit on the number of RSS feeds, is finite. Once I have a book I very rarely let go of it so only books I want to read over and over tend to make it as far as my shelves.

Bookshops must be aware of how I shop, because they put those tantalising piles of books on tables near the door. I rarely make it as far as the shelves themselves, or if I do it is because I am looking for a particular author. Because If I find an author I enjoy and they have written other books then it is pretty much a given that I will chase down those other books and buy them without recourse to the whole ’scanning’ process. They get a free pass through my spam filter because the author already has my attention.

I am not actually that happy with this state of affairs because, lately, I have found myself at a loss for new books to read. I know great books are being written, I just never seem to get my hands on them. All I seem to get presented with when I walk into bookshops are the same fifty “best sellers”, including the celebrity biography de jour. The gems and marvels pass me by because I am caught in a loop of impatient grazing I cannot seem to break. I beg for recommendations and occasionally I will stumble across a gem, but that is so rare as to leave me caught up my current backwater of fluffy chick-lit.

Help me? Rescue me from my current diet of Jill Mansell and Freya North. I used to read books by brilliant authors who stretched my mind. I used to have a fairly decent literary taste. So I enjoy fluffy chick-lit but time was it would take me a few days to read a book because I was savouring the words and digesting multi-faceted plots. Now I am on a book a day, gorging myself on happily ever afters, and it isn’t exactly what I should be admitting to.

P.S - a little note to publishers - I like the ‘lists of books already written by this author’ you sometimes find on the fly pages of a book. It is a great help, but can you please make it clear which order series books are to be read in? This especially holds true with fantasy/sci-fi. For genres rife with trilogies and multi-book-sequences, sequels and prequels, character reuse and mulitverse-crossing storylines, you’d be surprised how often a simple “read in this order…” list is omitted. Grr.

Filed under: Daily Waffle | 3 pearls of wisdom added so far »

… for my lateness, but there are sometimes reasons… not least a trip to Portsmouth and then Brighton for leap-year parties and then a stag do for a very very good friend of mine. I did not return to Southampton until well past Sunday Roast time, then events took over me on Monday and Tuesday.

That and despite 2. 3 degrees I am a technological cretin and have not retained the knowledge of how to log in to Bright Meadow and upload this lovely effort. Which also means I have had to write it in a text editor, and revisit my third year computing course (which I have just realised was six years ago!!!!! Six years!!! WOW) to remember basic html tags, then wait till Cas got back to S’oton after a visit to the homestead so she can upload it for me, so sorry if it isn’t all pretty and several days overdue!

What I did remember/ find time to do was collect linkage to share with you all… and your beloved host, (who will return soon and save you from me I promise!) sent me some too…

I know that a lot of geeks read this blog, and I include myself in that. I’m guessing therefore that most of you already know about the passing of Gary Gygax… (for those not in the know, he co-wrote Dungeons and Dragons (the game, NOT the awful movie!!)). I’m not a huge D &D fan myself, but as the first roleplaying game it spawned the genre of hobby that is responsible for almost all of my non university/ school based friendships. I’m proud to be part of a community of worldwide geeks who produce witty and sweet tributes to their heroeslike these.

Fulnic found this: Cuddly Toy Web Hacker Taunts Met Police and posted it on his facebook, so I’m shamelessly stealing it for the roast waffles, including his comment- ‘love the part that says “badly-spelled message” - they obviously can’t read haxxor-speak. Noobs.’ Indeed.

No wonder I feel like a lump when I consider the women lots of my male friends drool over- not the unrealistic women in magazines, but the even less realistic women in comics! Why all female superheroes look the same

Yet more with the geekery I’m afraid, though this time found by a friend who does not (yet) frequent the meadow… Re: your brains is a very silly song, that a lot of very silly geeks have been making videos to… the WoW video is funny in it’s own right but you really have to listen to the words

Random House are doing the right thing , about DRM as far as me, Cas and Cory Doctorow are concerned.. I’m going to watch this space and see if any of the other big players go the same way.

I’m with Randall- f@~k grapefruit. They are evil, and this particular web comic made me GLAN (giggle like a nutcase) in the PhD office at uni for ages, so much so that everyone looked at me like I was being even crazier than normal!

Cas has found Freakangels a webcomic by the truly gifted Mr Warren Ellis, who also has a great blog. I’m now addicted, I challenge you all not to be…

I think Taylor Kitsch is a bit too pretty to play Gambit - I mean, he should be a drawling rugged charmer from the bayou, right? Josh Holloway would have hit the spot just about right (Sawyer from Lost)…

The NYT has an article that warms my heart and confirms something I’ve felt to be true for a while- the internet is not just for boys. Lets hear it for the geeky girls!

Why 9rules is a nice place to be : memes like this.

And finally, just for Abi so she has some trailers to watch:

The Visitor - Perhaps a little ‘feel good’ and with a bit of a message for America, but looks like a good one to go and watch with the girls…

Filed under: Guest Bloggers, Sunday Roast | 15 pearls of wisdom added so far »

I am a firm believer that it is personality that is important in this modern age of Web 2.0, distributed communications and mediated, online societies. I have always felt that blogging is about making connections between people. Easier said than done, but possible. The blogs I enjoy reading are the blogs where the authors are clearly identifiable. They have personalities and opinions and voices that I do (and don’t) enjoy reading.

As Mia has pointed out, blogs from a “personal” standpoint as opposed to an official view are rare in corporate environments. This is not to say that they can’t be done and done well, but these are the exception rather than the rule. I think that people need a ‘face’ to relate to. The Net is a hyper-crowded market place and you need to make full use of any hook you can develop to bring the customers in. One of the reasons I keep coming back to Innocent smoothies, despite their high price, is that they are just so fun and approachable as a brand.

How does this relate to blogging and in particular the “personal” blogging that I practice?

I used to joke that Bright Meadow was a small community of people, more than just me, made up of everyone who reads and comments. I have also said time over time that I couldn’t do it without y’all. I would still be writing and blogging without the regular input of readers, but for damn straight it wouldn’t be the same. It was brought home to me recently that this jest has actually become the reality. In my latest moment of blogging angst (yes, even the best of us have our moments of insecurity) several people stepped up to the plate and flat out told me that I had created a great community around the site.

And that chuffed me to bits.

I am also chuffed to bits by the fact that I have had just three - yes, three - trollish comments in the five years I have been blogging. And the people responsible for two of those came back to me, apologised, and now contribute to the wider BM community.

What has perhaps chuffed me to bits the most is the welcome my guest writers have received. I know it was/is a big thing for both of them so my heart is always in my mouth when they post (not because I don’t like to let anyone loose on my baby, but because what if the readers are rude?!) but I should know better. Somehow there has developed a unique group of people who hang around Bright Meadow and I can trust them (you) to treat the space and everyone in it with respect.

How have I done this? I am not exactly sure, but I think it is something to do with my personal policy on comments. I do have a comment policy, but as you can see it is fairly basic: no spam; no meanness; and I reserve the right to remove/edit obscene or inflammatory comments. My unofficial comment policy is that I leave no comment un-answered, even if it is just a “hello”. All first time commenters get a “welcome to Bright Meadow and thank you for commenting” and as much of a personal response as possible. Even if the comment left is rude I much prefer to respond in a reasoned fashion and try to engage the person in dialogue than just summarily delete it.

I think it makes a difference. I know it has worked on the trolls because one of them flat out emailed me, said mea culpa, and now joins in the fun.

I know when I comment on other sites and don’t get a response, something that happens all too often, I feel unwanted by the blogger. Quite frankly, I find it rude. If you don’t want to join in the conversation, don’t have a comments field. I am a reluctant commenter at the best of times because I am shy and hate to be rebuffed. I can’t be the only one who puzzles for an age over the simplest comment and who more often than note clicks on from the page leaving her contribution unsaid. It is a big thing for someone to leave a comment. Acknowledge it!

This policy, I think, has directly led to readers getting involved with Bright Meadow; makes them want to come back and contribute again and again. It has got to the point where whole conversations and debates happen in the comments between readers. We even had our first duel a few months back! I can’t express what this means to me. It means I have succeeded. And it makes me think other bloggers should do the same. Without our readers we are just one more self-obsessed geek pouring our hears out to the disinterested Net. People read our words, especially on personal blogs, because they want to make a connection. It is unpardonably rude to ignore them.

Where did this thinking stem from? I am not totally sure. It certainly has something to do with my background in customer service, where more often than not a smile, an anecdote and a personal connection with a customer got me that machine sale, and more importantly for my manger, repeat sales. I wouldn’t be surprised if my first introduction to the web being on gaming communities where all the posts contributed to an ongoing story doesn’t have something to do with it. But it is also the inescapable conclusions my research over the past few years have led me to draw. I am not the only one. Neko is finding it hard at the moment to get this personal approach into her research and I can understand her frustration ^*. There are currently certain arenas where it is not deemed appropriate to bring the personal voice (scientific research being one of them) but blogging is categorically not one of those arenas!

So how has my comment policy affected by blog? It has made my blog! It is not an after thought, but something integral to the site. Just as I will not tolerate spam or meanness, I will not tolerate ignored comments. If I ever ignore a comment you make, feel free to take me task.

And now we perhaps come to the best bit and what keeps me sitting at the computer, typing away despite the RSI in my wrists. Here, as always, is where you all get to say your stuff. How did the welcome make you feel? What are your thoughts on commenting? Am I totally talking out of my hat?

And can you help me update the Usual Suspects page? I really want to get it up-to-date and to include as many of you as want to be included, but I don’t want to miss anyone! If you want in on the page, pipe up in the comments or shoot me an email. Requirements are a name and a short bio (no bigger than 50 words if poss). If you want to include a link to your own site, then even better

^* Yes, I did read it sweetheart, I just needed to think things through.

Filed under: Daily Waffle, Research Ramble | 17 pearls of wisdom added so far »

This week we have a Moose flavoured roast for your delight. The reason? Cas felt like taking a break so last week she asked me to take over for a couple of weeks. She then tried to take it back, but I refused. The roast is mine, all mine! Mwah, ha, ha, ha! Anyhoo, I’ve been a busy little beaver all week collecting titbits for your amusement. You’ll notice a distinct difference - I don’t do tech stuff. Twitter is something little birdies do as far as I am concerned. You’ll also notice that most of my stories come from the BBC. I know I should try and get a more varied view on life, but meh.

In a couple of months time it will be one of my favourite events of the year - the Eurovision Song Contest. A time when we get to mock our European cousins for their taste in music and fashion, as they mock us for ours. Apparently, the Irish have chosen a puppet called Dustin the Turkey for their entry this year.

The Vatican is going to make it harder to become a saint. I’m curious, if the criteria changes what happens to all the current saints? Do they become saintlets?

British and American scientists have uncovered the fossil of a giant frog in Madagascar. They have named it the frog from hell, which I personally feel is a bit mean. How do they know it was a nasty frog? Just because it shares some similarities with the modern day horned toad, doesn’t mean it acted like one. It might have been a gentle giant. I think they may be jumping to conclusions based on it’s size, which is discrimination. I’d report this to the Commission for Froggy Rights (CFR), if we had one.

But while we don’t have a CFR, we do have a British Toilet Association. Is any other country in the world as obsessed with public toilets as we are? The government is currently proposing a scheme where businesses allow non-customers to use their toilets, to help with the shortfall of public facilities. There’s no real point to linking to this story, I just like that we have a British Toilet Association, and that the scheme in Westminster is called ‘SatLav’.

A little game to test your geography. This has had me enthralled for the past week. I can find most of the European ones, don’t do too badly on the Americas (except for the Caribbean), need a bit of work on Asia, but am completely useless when it comes to Africa.

Tate & Lyle, a major British company, is switching all it’s sugar production to Fairtrade over the next few years.

David Cameron, leader of the Conservative Party in the UK, has made a bit of a booboo. He referred to the UK government sponsoring students to go to Auschwitz on educational trips as a gimmick. Silly boy. Such a rookie mistake. Everyone knows that you can’t criticise something to do with the learning about the Holocaust without major (justified) backlash.

Argentinian teenager gives brith to triplets, again. She’s 16 years old and now has 7 children in total. Wow.

Especially for Abi, as many trailers as I could find.
Indy IV - I can’t believe Cas didn’t link to this last week!
CJ7 - like Flubber with hair.
The Happening - the lastest from M. Night whatisface. Looks good, as his trailers usually do. Warning for Firefox users, this kept crashing my browser. Could just be me, but I can only view it in IE.
Smart People - oh those crazy messed up academics, eh.
Redbelt - not something I would normally go for, but it does have Chiwetel Ejiofor who is a very good actor, and not bad eye candy either.
Street Kings - one word, Keanu.

And finally, a plea to the Great British public - please, please stop voting for Greg and Linda on Dancing on Ice! They are not up to the standard and shouldn’t be in the competition any more. Thank you.

Filed under: Guest Bloggers, Sunday Roast | 8 pearls of wisdom added so far »