Views of Blogher

On My Desk...October 15th

Lord...I almost wrote August. It IS almost summer weather, the Indian summer kind of day in the mid to high 70s. Three desk areas to work with today.

Here the primary project is to get the dregs of some aerosol glue off the cutting board. Then perhaps some ATC work and finalize some postcards. One package to mail later in the week.

Here I have all the contacts from BlogHer to sort thru and my terrible notes to read. I am sooo out of notetaking practice, sigh, and wished I had taken a notebook of my own, other than the little one from my bag. I started to and then decided not to. Mistake. Also big reminder to make/get BlogCards...the mini Moos look great and feel great. I often forget how important the tactile is to me.


Finally...IRA rollover paperwork to finish and absentee ballot to fill in. The IRA stuff has been in progress for a while so it isn't directly related to the current economic crisis but I sure wish it had been finalized in June! I'm sorry we won't be IN the voting booth this year, but la dolce vita calls. ;-)

Now the rest of Wednesday's desks are over inside that On My Desk link on the right. Amazing how Kirsty can keep them all neat and tidy inside that button, isn't it...

Notes from the BlogHer Mavens

One of the interesting break-outs I went to was on Managing Information Overload: How to Find Your Blogging Community. I actually got into this one by mistake but figured that there are no accidents, so I stayed and learned.

First on the discussion was figuring your agenda, asking yourself why YOU blog - what do you want to get out of blogging. For some there is a cause centered goal (politics, autism, green children etc) for others it is about getting your art/business out before the buying public, and for others it can be a safe place to say your piece, voice things that you just don't want to say anywhere else.

Whatever your goal/agenda, and it most likely will be a mixture of things, you want your own community. You don't sell bathing suits to Eskimos...well unless global warming accelerates! While most of us are ok with civil discourse on ideas we present, we are usually looking for our own tribe. We look for and need people who resonate with us - somehow. You know the feeling...you scan a new-to-you blog and immediately think...Yeah.. bookmark! Whatever the agenda is for my blog, what I'm doing IS marketing me and I want to find both my own niche audience AND people I want to read.
Geeze, most days still have only 24 hrs, right?

Below are some of the tools that came out of this session. Take what fits and leave the rest. It did get me to get back on Twitter. btw, I'll have to see if I ever got those Boulder pictures up on flickr....


Figure out your agenda
Use Google Reader
Twitter
Stumble Upon
Blogher
Use a kitchen timer to schedule yourself
Think of these tools as marketing tools
Rescuetime.com
Firefox app to aggregate your social media -Shareaholic
Leverage knowledge: spread out the expertise in an organization
COMMONCRAFT a good instructional site to explain tech things

The whole session thread has so much more information. If you read it and still have a Huh? I'll try to answer any questions about points/places they mention.

Women Women Women

Original by scripsi_scriptum

Oh the fun of it all. BlogHer DC, I mean.

Sunday was dinner with dh in Bethesda at Jaleo on a mild fall night, a gorgeous full moon, and then a night by myself in a hotel (luxury is sleeping in the middle of the bed - sometimes). Monday, I crossed the street to the Hyatt and a day full of mostly local bloggers, around 250 of us, talking, laughing and Having Fun. Oh it was heaven. Noisy but heaven.

And did the sponsors feed us! But I'll get to that later and be back with lots more fun bits and ideas gleaned. I learned so much ...about blogging and about us as female bloggers from the presenters and my fellow bloggers. In addition, I think I finally have found some local community.

wowOwow!

If it's Monday the 13th

I'm at ...

BLOGHER in Washington DC!!!!!

If YOU are at blog-her....look for me and say hello.

Love Friday

Good so far...an 8am Photoshop class at the Apple store, a bit of a cleanup at home, a nice catch up visit with a friend who does counseling at the local, now HUGE, hospital...and cool breezes coming in the window while I practice some of that Photoshop from the a.m.

This afternoon...

I finally get to see Episode one of MI-5, Spooks to the rest of the world. I had this one on request for about 6 months at the library and had given up hope of seeing the start of this series. I have been hoarding Season 5, loaned to me by ds, and now I can stretch it out a bit more. Oh when will Season 6 be released?!?

Personally, I am just glad to be home during yet another Mercury Retrograde in which dh and I EACH left our wallets somewhere. Both were returned immediately with no loss etc but this is so very out of our natures that it's amazing.

Have a happy weekend, and Monday, I'll be at BlogHer in DC! Woohoo!!!! (PS to Taccolina etal....I sooo wanted the t-shirt that said..I"m blogging this!...to wear but I forgot where I saw it.)

36 Million Women

Now that's a number to be reckoned with isn't it? Do you know what that # refers to???

36 million women who blog and read blogs worldwide

If you're reading this, you are one of those women according to the BBC story about Blogher. The bulk of the story discusses paid ads on your site but that stat just astounded me. Astounded me and inspired me...with hope for us who inhabit Mother Earth.

Made me think of Jean Shinoda Bolen's book The Millionth Circle. Come on tipping point, come on soon.

Think of your own blogroll as your own circle, and look at how many of our circles intersect, and lap over each others'. "When a critical number of people change how they think and behave, the culture will also, and a new era begins." Blog on!!