Author: admin

One of the interesting things you’ll first notice when you visit this site is the quote in the title area. It draws your attention to the way the author uses the words, and in which way. It makes me a little curious to know what this blog is going to bring when I start to tackle the content. The blogspot attached to the domain is always a slight cause for concern, and archives generally tend to not work for these blogs. As always, curse blogspot, I can’t seem to “get to” the archives. There are plenty of entries on the page, going all the way back to April of this year. Seeing this makes me wonder if there are even anything to be put into archives. I’m not sure, but it’s full steam ahead.



I read through a handful of the older entries, not really sure what to expect. The entries are very well written, almost as though you were getting a sneak peak into the actual life of someone, objectively rather than personally. The entries are a little obscure. The subject matter isn’t very clear, even after you’re read the entry you’re still left scratching you’re head. Probably the oddest thing about this blog is that while you might not know what the author is actually referring to, you continue to read because they’re well written and for the most part very interesting. Danger, as the author has so deemed himself, is quite humorous in a very dry, matter-of-fact sort of way.



The design is much like you’d see passing through blogspot and going to any random blog. It works and is easily readable. The author has actually added a commenting system. The earlier entries are lacking in the comments, and I doubt it’s because of the writing, more so the lack of understanding the subject of the entries. There are a handful of external links, but nothing in the entries.



Danger is funny. Quite funny. It’s actually quite difficult to know anything more about the author than the fact that he writes. Sometimes he makes references to characters that you’d have to know a thing or two about to catch the meaning. “Then I’d be the gas and sell all the stuff to Mario, who would be the funny italian guy in a hat and jump suit who ran the local pawn broker which was really a cover for his go-kart shop (May 2).” The writing is definitely worth taking a look at, but don’t be surprised if you don’t understand the subject matter of what this author is writing about.Mysterious Island Place

As a reviewer, I haven’t yet mastered the art of the News/Links review. I

figured now would be as good a time as any to start getting better at writing

these kinds of reviews. The first thing I noticed was the lack of images.

This is quite depressing, as when you read Bill’s bio and find he seems like

an interesting person. I’ll admit, I have no idea what “Peoria” or “Pundit”

is. I had to look them up in a dictionary. For those of you who don’t know

either so I’ll give it to you here, just as help.

Peoria:

n.pl.
1. A Native American people forming part of the Illinois

confederacy
2. A member of this people.

Pundit: n.
1. A Brahman

scholar or learned man.
2. A source of opinion; a critic: a political

pundit.
3. A learned person.

Having gotten that done and over

with, onto the review.



First of all… go all the way back. Go back to the very beginning of this

blog. When you hit the oldest month, scroll all the way down to the oldest

entry. Now read the whole thing. It’s okay, I’ll wait for you. Just read.



Good. Now that you’re back we’ll get more into the review. Bill’s eldest

entries are scarce. There isn’t a lot of content in the 2002 archives, but

there are, in place of quantity, some quality reviews of sites, and books. The archived entries seem more along the lines of a personal blog. The entries are well written, as I’m sure they would be considering Bill is a Freelance writer and Newspaper Columnist. Bill’s entries are thought provoking and original. He isn’t saying the same things over and over again. I’m at a loss, simply because I’m not quite sure if I should write this review based on the massive amount of external links or the amazingly written content. He signed up as a “News/Link” site, but I’m finding this much more interesting than any news site I’ve run across.

Again, I say, I’m not sure how to review this site considering the large amount of personal entries throughout. There’s a bit of it that falls into the political. While another part of the site falls into personal interest. The author writes a good commentary for the entries leading to links, and makes the reader (at least this reader) want to click to find out the more.

Bill’s entries are interesting in the idea that he almost goes above and beyond what other bloggers seem to do. Most of the month of May is google searches on his name. He’s found some rather interesting articles in his search. The author’s thoughts have a tendency to swing one way, politically speaking, but they’re not extreme.



He’s a wonderful writer and there are many things worth a read in this blog. I don’t generally enjoy blogs like this, but the older entries did a good job in changing my mind. THe newer entries seem to follow suit in how most blogs of this type are. They’re short, sometimes sweet, and “go read it yourself” attitude is a little stand-offish. I’d much rather come back for a read if the entries were as personal as the earlier posts. One of the better parts of this blog?? It’s all interesting news, and not the information you get inundated with daily.Peoria Pundit

A quick look at the list of Jim Howard‘s interests is innocuous enough at first, until you reach item number eight: nudity. As the site’s tagline so neatly states, Jim is from Missouri, words aren’t enough, you’ve got to show me.

However, aside from a semi-nude cam photo in the top left corner of the site (nude from the waist down, mind you), there isn’t an awful lot of skin outside of the photo galleries. The blog is a mildly diverting read; currently a lot of time is spent discussing the site’s eventual move to a new url, and the problems Jim is having securing a domain name. The content is often relatively personal – no grievance sharing, plenty of familial discussion – though it reads well and the author pays attention to his spelling and grammar, which certainly helps.

Unfortunately, one thing Jim has apparently not devoted much time to is the site’s design. In IE it is passably average, in Netscape a little less so. The masthead is a poorly optimised jpeg with red text on blue that blurs more and more the harder you try to read it.

The site is a three column affair, though a little more organisation would help with the placement of links – one column devoted to external links, one to navigation, would make far more sense. So too would having a proper archive: there is a calendar view of September, though it is impossible to select a different month to view so trawling through older posts is a cumbersome and involved process of selecting the last entry and clicking the link to the previous one each time.

There is a reason to come back to the site; many reasons, perhaps. The author and his family are moving house, and are saving to do so. The struggle to save money is well communicated, so too the search for a new home, and how different family members treat the process. With any luck, Jim will find time to redesign after the move(s); a change could do this site some good, but until then, at least it’s easy enough to read everything that happens in September.

Jim Howard’s ShowMe

The first thing that caught my eye on this blog was the neat background and the interesting header image. After that, it looks like your standard personal blog/journal. The title, “Stephanie’s Online Diary,” verified this assumption.



Random Scribbles is the diary of a gal named Stephanie. Her entries are pretty interesting and honest, but they are few and far between for my standards. After going through the archives, it looks like Stephanie doesn’t blog as much as she used to. I’m sure there are reasons, but infrequent updates don’t make for a good daily read. There’s a good variety in her writing, but there’s nothing that really sticks out for me.

The blog is well organized and is well designed. It’s a Movable Type blog, so it has organized archives and integrated comments, which are always a plus. Stephanie also took the time to customize her template with a nice looking background and a captivating header. Very nice.

Overall, this is a very well designed personal blog, but there isn’t really anything special to warrant it a daily read. I’d definitely come back though and see what Stephanie is up to. Random Scribbles

The title itself suggested this was probably done by a little girl, maybe in junior high, for a bit of fun for herself and her friends. The hot pink background you see for some time as the site loads reinforces this idea.

This site has a lot of technical problems. It’s two colums, but the boxes and sliders everywhere are frustrating. Sometimes the archives work; sometimes they give you a Blogspot error message. If I’d just been a casual visitor I probably wouldn’t have hung around long enough to read through it. It’s graphics heavy and there’s also music, and an upper navigation bar I found eventually, as it took a full ten minutes by the clock to fully load. (Often, those on high-speed connnections forget that 50% of the online population is still on dialup modems, as DSL and cable is not available everywhere.) Some of the links in the left go to inactive webrings.

While I was waiting, I skimmed through the archives and found there were a few spotty entries since July of last year. I discovered Deb is a 20-something college journalism student, so this is probably a “fun” project. Such entries as there are have quotations found on bathroom walls, some lines (with more graphics) about Barbie and the author’s Women’s Studies teacher. If this is a parody on ultimate ditziness, I’d like to see more! This is why I hung around long enough to try and read more of the entries. Even the “non-blog writings” (also difficult to get in and out of) are downright hilarious!

It’s clear she’s put a lot of work into creating this world — next time I’m out at the college where they have a T1 connection, I’ll make a point of visiting this site again for a better look. But if I was teaching writers at her school this young woman would definitely get some extra credit for this blog.

I’d recommend it to anyone with a high-speed connection, who could use a laugh for the day. Judged on content alone, this blog would rate a 5, but unfortunately the technical problems will put off some visitors, so I’ll give it a 3.

Deb on the Web