Spinning is one of those blogs that you really need to sit down to with a nice hot cuppa and a plate of shortbread – and it really was too bad that I was forced to review the site through the day at work where a nice relaxed hot cuppa and a plate of shortbread just isn’t available.
My first impression of the site was that it was a bit too greyish. It’s a very basic design that doesn’t confuse you but it’s basic almost to a fault. I personally would like to see something that reflects the writer a little more but it’s okay as it stands.
As usual, my immediate action was to check out the “about me” and the first couple of entries in the blog to get an idea of the person behind it, leaving the rest of the blog alone until I’d achieved that particular goal. Well… there’s not really that much in the “about me” section. We have a one-line bio and one that is fairly typical of bloggers world-wide; “A lover of writing and reading.” She goes on to explain that the pencil drawing that appears in the top right-hand corner of the blog is not her but a picture of an oldtime movie star that her mother drew. We’re also given a brief glimpse of her interests which range from reading and writing to computer hardware.
You really can’t garner much from the first few entries (going back to October 2003) anything more about the writer either, but you don’t really need to. The quality of the writing is outstanding and draws the reader in (or at least, it did with me) regardless of the fact that there is very little information about the person behind the blog. This is a sure sign of a great, engaging writer.
While it’s personal, it’s not the mundane retelling of daily life. We don’t have to read what Spinning’s author had for breakfast, or that the car wouldn’t start. The audience gets to read past the obvious and into the interesting. For instance, when I think of the inside of a computer, I think of loads of wiring that I have no idea what to do with whereas Spinning’s writer will say “..fiddling around deep inside the bowels of a computer…” as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
And don’t get me started on her creative writing either, for it’s utterly fantastic. There’s little snippets of writing which left me wanting more and this entry is just one where I really got into the simplistic creativity.
This is a real example of not judging a blog by it’s design – for whilst the look of the site won’t catch your eye, the content will keep you rivetted.