The Weblog Review

All That I Can’t Leave Behind has a very stark and bleak feeling to it. The eyes of the main logo graphic are a perfect visual to give you the feeling of what this journal is all about. Those eyes watch you, and even the “Odin cam” proclaims that Big Brother is monitoring the situation.

Odin, author of All That I Can’t Leave Behind, can write. He writes in such a gripping way that it’s impossible not to read every word. This journal is a philosophical and often frustrated look at what’s going on, not only with the writer but also with the world. Most of us would say: “It snowed today.” Odin says, “The first snow has finally fallen. About a month late, I’d say. I don’t know why, but I’ve been waiting for it like it was an old friend coming back into town. And like an old friend, now that it’s here, it’s as if it never left.”.

There’s not much to say about the layout of the journal – it’s simple. The layout and colors fit this journal in a way that makes me not able to imagine this journal in any other way.

There’s a lot of good extra stuff here. Odin offers a glossary of the terms he uses most often, which is a great idea and something I haven’t seen anywhere else. There is a section that lists song lyrics, along with a link to download the song, and a section of Odin’s poetry. You can also purchase “Odinwear” – tshirts, mugs, coasters, mousepads, and frisbees with the All I Can’t Leave Behind logo. You can also directly instant message Odin’s cell phone using his tagboard. I might suggest a guestbook or commenting section in case someone has something to say that isn’t urgent enough to page Odin. All That I Can’t Leave Behind might also benefit from some sort of official About Me page.

All That I Can’t Leave Behind is smart and insightful. Odin is a wonderful writer, and I highly recommend a visit to the journal. I will definitely be back for subsequent visits!
All That I Can’t Leave Behind

On Writing This Review:
I couldn’t think of a better way to start it, then by taking a page out of this weblog, Life-Log Perpetual. Each entry starts out with On Such and Such a topic, which is actually some what useful. And though I read every post on this site, the posts that had titles that interested me more were read for better detail.

Chris posts about a variety of topics. He is still searching for his focus is my guess since the site just opened early October. He posts a question about weblogs of if weblogs need a certain amount of focus to hold a reader’s attention. To which the answer is: it depends on who the reader is. But Chris’s lack of a specific focus is not a bad thing. Everyday, hundreds of new weblogs are started, and most do not have a good beginning. However, Life-Log Perpetual is good in its infancy.

The posts themselves read almost like a good book. He tends to write in vague terms, but at the same time give a lot of detail. Its like when reading a 400 page novel, you know the book could have been written in 35 pages, but those other 365 pages are all the detail that makes it so much better.

The design of the site is a blogger template. And it is my least favorite. Why is it my least favorite? I don’t know. I just don’t like it. Too many people use it, and it seems to big and bulky for a site. However, to Chris’s credit, he did customize it a little with adding some images. This makes it a little easier to bear, but still, this reviewer still does not like the template.

Very few weblogs have actually gotten my attention since creating TWR. Even fewer have kept it. I hope that Life-Log Perpetual will be able to keep my attention, as it has definitely gotten my attention.
Irrelevant Press

Huai’s a student in Melbourne who started up his weblog in April of 2002. Since then, sixthseal.com has been very consistently updated with the happenings of Huai.

The site’s design is very basic. There’s a light blue table on the left with the naviagation portion of the menu, which is very simple to use. And to the right is the weblog. The main page features a photo of the day (POTD) at the top of the page. It’s not exactly a photo of the day, however, but more like a photo of the week. That’s not really a major concern of mine, but I could certainly see how readers could get disappointed with the photo not being updated daily like one would assume.

The majority of the entries are simple to read updates of what’s going on in Huai’s life – dorm life, his social life, how his classes are going, etc. It’s fun to read through the progress of the school year and the entertaining mishaps that get written about.

A nice touch to this weblog was the introduction of posting pictures from time to time. While the POTD might not be updated on a regular basis, Huai does a good job of peppering in pictures that he’s taken with his digital camera throughout a good portion of his entries. Doing that breaks up the constant text and gives the readers something more than just words.

Is this a site I’d visit again? Personally, no. Is it one I’d suggest to those in college perhaps experiencing the same thing that Huai is going through? Certainly. And I’d even go as far as saying you should at least check it out once – perhaps you’ll find the connection that makes you want to keep coming back.sixthseal.com

Life-Log Perpetual, the Personal Diary of Christopher M. Canavan, is a new addition to the ever-growing number of weblogs out on the world wide web these days since his “maiden voyage post” on October 8.

The beauty of this website comes in Chris’s writing. This is the kind of weblog I like to read. It’s one that lets you into the author’s life by him blogging about his typical day or what’s going on in his life. It’s not so personal that you can’t understand half the things he’s talking about because you don’t know the background on everything involved. But it is personal enough to give the reader some type of attachment and that desire to come back and read the Life-Log Perpetual.

Chris is funny, witty, intelligent, opinionated, and straight forward – that’s the impression that the writing in his weblog gives me, that is.

In his initial post, he advises readers to consider the rating of these posts to be of the XXX variety, which he does only to cover himself. I wouldn’t consider anything yet posted to classify as XXX, but like Chris says, at least you’ve been warned that things could go in that direction.

The appearance is by no means revolting, but I think Chris must have something up his sleeve to improve the appearance of it. The weblog is in a typical solid-color-blocked Blogger template. It’s not an ugly one, but it’s an overused one. And i’m not sure exactly how the pictures on the top and side really relate to the rest of the weblog, but perhaps that’s a mystery that all readers have yet to solve.

Even it it’s early stages, this site intrigued me enough to add it to my list of daily links. I’ll gladly come back and visit on a regular basis to see what other perils of wisdom Chris has to share with his newly developed weblog. I’d recommend anyone else to do the same.

Irrelevant Press

Drugs Make Me Cool is the blog of Sharon, comedy reviewer for The Comedy Lounge. I wasn’t sure if I should expect drug-induced lunacy or a news-type site – Drugs Make Me Cool is a very plain template Blogspot site.

Sharon, a self-proclaimed “television cynic,” is absolutely media-obsessed. She is currently working on a project to list and write about every TV show she watches “thereby exposing what a restricted social life I have.” There are some interesting things here, even if you’re not interested in television or comedy acts. There is a particularly funny chronology of breaking in new Doc Martins, which I can relate to, as well as a comical job hunt saga.

Drugs Make Me Cool would be better served by a new design. Sharon makes it perfectly clear that she doesn’t really know HTML and makes fun of herself for barely being able to install a guestbook. Still, Sharon’s stories are entertaining and a design more suited to her writing would give the site some punch. The only real problem with Drugs Make Me Cool is the occasional broken graphical links.

Drugs Make Me Cool is really a no frills blog. To make it a more user-friendly journal I would recommend a good About Me page or even a 100 Things list. Expanded navigational links might also be a good idea – an entire month of posts is listed on page and readers must continually go back to the Archives page to navigate to each month. This is just a personal preference type of thing, but I heartily recommend making a special entry page specifically for meme entries [Friday Fives, Monday Missions, etc.] – meme and quiz entries tend to break up the flow of reading for me.

Overall, Drugs Make Me Cool was an entertaining read. I would likely go back for another visit.

Dreadful Nonsense