Category: Uncategorized

When I first saw the title of this site “You know how you do”, I was instantly reminded of that movie, That Thing You Do (you know the Tom Hanks one). Just like the movie, the title gives absolutely no clue as to what the site is about. No worries, I thought to myself, a challenge.

The site itself is a standard Blogger template, with basically no alteration. I know it’s simple and all, but I really think a Blogger template with a little TLC looks about a million times better. The site is neat and tidy and easy to read, one of the bonuses to using Blogger, but lacks character. There was also no “About Me” section, or anything of the sort. So when you start reading, you kind of jump in having no idea what the writer is about or where she is coming from.

The blog is personal in nature, leaving anyone outside of the group of people discussed lost and basically having no idea who is who or what is going on. The writer is obviously very passionate about her topics, however, when you don’t know the people you are reading about, and don’t know them any better by the time you’re done reading, it’s hard for you to care as much. That being said, it is quite apparent the writer has an audience in mind – those close to her in her personal life. This was proven by the word for word posting of emails and phone conversations.

The links in the site all work, although there are very few of them besides the archives, so other then the blog there isn’t much else to check out. The only issue I had was some of the older posts have some issues with punctuation – common when posting from Word into Blogger, which makes it a bit hard to read. The newer posts however are fine.

The site itself was well written, and overall well done, it was just hard to get into which I think is standard of any blog that deals mainly with a personal life. I think with perhaps an addition such as an About Me page to let people get to know the characters in the story, or at least the writer a bit better this blog would be something every reader could get into.
You know how you do

With a name of “Make the World a Better Place” I didn’t know what to expect. I thought that it would be about a tree hugger and how to “fix” things. I was wrong.

My first impression of the site is not a favorable one. The url that was submitted by the authors choice takes me to a blogspot page with the most recent post being in August saying that the site had moved to a new site. There were a plethora of url redirection warnings, which was way too many.

When the site finally loaded, I was greeted with a lot of information. First readings of the posts contained a lot of information about the topic. There are a lot of quotes from articles and or people that inspired the post and a lot of his thoughts on the topic.

After reading the front page I looked for the archives. I thought there would be an archive list by date, but unfortunately it was just by topic. While there are a great number of topics for people to pick from, this was a major pain for me. I like to see the “entire” picture and not just bits and pieces by topic. I could not really see how the author has grown which I was disappointed with.

The design of the site is nothing major, but it works. The yellow/green and white color scheme again does not do anything for me, but it isn’t harmful either. This is a standard two-column layout with the navigation on the right. I am glad there was an about section, as it really gave me insight into the author.

Overall I thought there was too much that was being presented to me. While I normally would enjoy this, with the vast range of topics, this was more of a hindrance. I also wish that the archives would be put in a standard format as it really does make reading a site that much easier.
Tikun Olam: Make the World a Better Place

My first impressions of Rambling Along are not quite positive. Just finding out that the weblog is run by BlogDrive took away my high hopes of a good design and/or layout. So loading the page was done. Indeed, it was the typical BlogDrive template, but I see that there was at least a small effort made with the top image.

Later on, I skimmed, not read, his sidebar and his entries. I saw some very uninviting pictures and text which made me worry about making a review and for the first time, giving someone a score below 2.

Fortunately for Kai, the author, I thoroughly read his weblog and the procedure I did was only for the first impressions part of my review. When I finally got reading, I found out that he is as gay as his humor, which is ironic since the last review I made was that of a lesbian’s.

Well, moving on. After the not so positive first impressions implied on me, I actually found myself absorbed reading Kai’s entries. They are generally sarcastic and cynical and can even be offending at times but there’s always a good point in Kai’s realizations. Plus, for a self-confessed homosexual, he doesn’t talk about men as often as other gay people I know. Instead, he’ll blast out humorous opinions about the government, his pet dogs, a number of celebrities and even his grandparents. Most of all, with the way he puts it he enjoys his gayhood more than anything, which is a good thing because it makes his entries more personal, interesting and less sugar-coated.

And so I’ve mentioned, he uses visual aids as well. He uploads pictures and I’m not so sure if I want to know where he got them from. At first glance, you’d say they were very tasteless, but once you see the text that supports the picture, you’ll probably realize that if a picture paints a thousand words, words make them a masterpiece. If I could give the crown for “Caption Queen of the Year”, I’d most definitely hand it down to Kai.

His entry styles vary from long narrative ones, lists of whatnots and cracking one/two-liners. The good thing is that no matter what the length of his entry may be, there’s always ann added spice to it, which makes you want to read on and on and on.

Well, I have been positive for the past few paragraphs. Now let’s deal with the down sides of Rambling Along. I believe that Kai is very street-smart and wise, but I think he lacks knowledge about himself. He is very observant, and he outputs his thoughts with very playful words, but rarely do I hear him speak with more intimacy about what’s really inside. Maybe I’ve missed it but it seems to me that Kai knows more about the world around him than the world inside himself. Sure, he knows he’s gay and he knows what he likes and what he hates and what he thinks is stupid, but somehow he doesn’t push himself beyond the line of personal access or however you may call that.

Also, words, no matter how great their meaning, will not mask out the dullness of the design. Even if he moves to a better weblog provider, with his self-confessed lack of HTML skills, I don’t think he’ll be creating some journal eye-candy any soon.

Another downside is his English skills. I’ve seen lots of mispelled words (even if he says he’s good at spelling) and he has a problem with grammar too, specifically with punctuation (commas are very important, you know). Fortunately, those problems are still at a minor level and it wouldn’t distract you much as it would do with those who sPeLL diZz WaY.

To sum it all up, I’d give the thumbs up for Rambling Along. The author has a great way of sizzling up this dog-eat-dog world with the humor that all gay men, I believe, are blessed with. His lack of depth and the boring template are lapses in his weblog, but if that’s not what your there for, I’d recommend Rambling Along strongly.

(By the way, Kai, I have one of those butt washers at home.)Rambling Along

Out of a long standing habit, looking for an “about the author” section is the first thing I always do anytime I visit a weblog for the first time. I was so happy to find one here, and to find one that explained exactly who was writing this weblog and why they were writing it. Beyond Contestation is a weblog that belongs to Mizmo (the pseudonym she’s adopted for use on the internet), and through this weblog, she’s able to jot down her thoughts about her current diagnosis of breast cancer.

Mizmo starts journaling her experience with her recent diagnosis as soon as it happens. January 9th, 2004 is the first date in the archives, and it’s also the day that Mizmo initially found the lump in her breast that would eventually lead to a chemotherapy treatment. The site is updated very regularly, providing readers mainly with the status and details of what Mizmo is going through on a daily basis for the past three months.

The layout is very clean and crisp. It works well in three different browsers, and is never distracting from the actual content of the weblog. While pink is not my personal favorite color at all, the method in which it’s used at Beyond Contestation is a very calm, soothing manner. Of course, the use of pink is also very symbolic of breast cancer awareness, which is also represented by the pink ribbon in the top of the layout. Using pink as the color of the hyperlinks on the site was something that I found a tad hard on the eyes from time to time, but it was definitely something I overlooked once I became involved in Mizmo’s writing.

Dealing with the effects of finding the lump in her breasts and the trials and tribulations that come along with this type of a serious matter, Mizmo does her best to give just the basic facts of how she’s dealing with things. Of course, like with any person, this type of situation isn’t one that can be portrayed as happy or silly the majority of the time. However, when reading this weblog, I mainly felt the positive vibes that the author emanates, along with the positive comments from her regular visitors. While dealing with such a serious topic, the author does an excellent job not bringing down morale of people that might just happen to stop by for a quick read around her weblog.

Mizmo does a great job with Beyond Contestation. She updates when she can, and when she has more news or further developed feelings on the issues she’s dealing with right now. Readers will either find themselves drawn to Mizmo due to her dynamic writing style, or they just won’t find any interest in a weblog of this nature. Unfortunately, there’s probably no middle ground to that. Beyond Contestation is definitely worth a visit to see if Mizmo is someone you’ll enjoy reading about from day to day.

Beyond Contestation

They say honesty is the best policy, but sometimes I just dread being honest , but here goes.

When i first entered the blog “Deletetheweb”, my first impression was “Yet another dull one”. The posts were in the center and the links on the left hand side with very little design to the page.

Along with the links on the left hand side was a link to “100 things about me”. This is where I learned that the author was a 30 year old male from London. I learned a lot about him from reading that section.

I then proceeded to read his entries. Starting with his main page , then into his archives. He wrote about a surgery he has had, he wrote about his blog, his work and just other everyday happenings in his life. After I got halfway through his main page, I started to feel depressed. His entries were actually depressing me.

I thought maybe they would get better if I kept reading. It just didn’t happen. This guy doesn’t even seem to have any confidence in himself. Apparently he doesn’t even seem to think that very many people are reading his blog. Here is an example of a couple of lines he wrote.

I attacked Blog with the digital equivalent of a feather duster today, mercilessly clearing away several months worth of accumulated cobwebs. In an attempt to be friendlier to new readers (not that I have any, but a blog can dream, can’t it?),

I just couldn’t get deep into the posts. To be honest, I enjoyed reading the secton of “100 things about me “, more than I did the entries. There is even one entry where he is talking to his blog. Maybe it was supposed to be funny/amusing, but it just didn’t make me laugh.

In conclusion, the writing is good. Very neat and very easy to read. Maybe if the author could brighten up the design a bit, and spruce up the posts a little so they won’t be so depressing, his blog could have the potential to recieve a rating of 5.iMark