You Rock My Socks, Mr. Present!

December 26, 2007


Jon of El Gigante Verdoso presented me with the “You Rock My Socks Award”, and Ann of A Nice Place In The Sun invited me over to pick a Christmas Tree Gift from her page. From Ann’s selection, I have chosen “Mr. Present”, as he seems to be crammed with lots of nice little gift-wrapped items, and can be used all year through, not just for Christmas.

I am passing on these two awards (and I think they make a great combination), to all bloggers in the scroll box below.

The “rules” for passing on the Laurel and Hardy - You Rock My Socks Award are simple: all I am asking is a link back or a comment to this post..

The “rules” for passing on Mr. Present are that you write some accompanying lines about the blogs or bloggers you pass him on to. I am not going to do that for all those blogs down in the scroll box, but I am writing the following lines for each and every one of them:

In the past year I have come across, and have started to enjoy, your blogs. I have met most of you also in blogging communities, or at occasions were awards were passed on, or were some serious LinkLOve was shared. Thank you all for sharing what you did, on your blogs, in comments, in community messages. Make Blogs - Not War!
Thank you all! You Rock My Socks!

Ad Tracker of AdSense Tracker
Adria of InCinq
Adrian of First Time Dad
Andrea of A Circle of Women
Andrew Tan of Hotel Booking Pro
Ann Clemmons of A Nice Place In The Sun
Anndi of Anndi’s Luggage
Annelisa of Words That Flow
April of I Could Write a Book, April Decheine 2006 and April Decheine Wife and Mother
Arahman7 of My Journey to Recovery
Barb of Skittle’s Place
Barry of Inn of the Last Home
Beth Allen of Writing 5 to 9
Bill of Bill’s Everyday Life
Bill of Hey it’s Spanklin and ManningtonDeal
Blog Elf of The Blog Elf
Blue Ribbon Bloggers of Blue Ribbon Bloggers
Bob of Bobbarama Dot Com
Bobbie & Jerry of The Right Blue
Bobbie Revell of Revellian Dot Com
Bond of Big Leather Couch
Brillig of ’Twas Brillig
Brown Baron of Brown Thoughts
Bucky of The West Virginia Blogger
Bud Weiser of WTIT Tape Radio: The Blog
Bush of Bush Mackel
Carol of My View of “It”
Catherine of A Week in the Life of a Redhead
Chesca of Skindiving
Christina of Paris Romance
Christine of The Sapheyerblu Review
Christy Zutautas of Christy’s Coffee Break and Writer’s Reviews
Colin Richards of Life
Colin Sullivan of Chronic Pain Lifestyle
David of DavidBDale
Dawn of Twisted Sister
Debbie Dolphin of New England Lighthouse Treasures
Deborah of Climate of our Future
Deborah of Life in the Fast Lane
Derek Wong of Going The Wong Way
Diane of Much of a Muchness
Dixie of Dixie’s Heart and Soul
Drew of The BenSpark
Ed of The Pisstakers
Ejiro of Love Angle
Elaine of Girly Up The Web
Ellen Janssens of Positive Communication
Emila of Emila’s Illustrated Blog
EmmyRose of Dancing With Butterflies
Empress Bee of Muffin53
Eric of Speedcat Hollydale Page
Ev Nucci of My Life is Murphy’s Law
Frank Sirianni of Foxxfyrre’s Honk’n’Holl’r
Frogster of The Frog Blog
Gale Martin of Gem-osophy
Georganna Hancock of A Writer’s Edge
Gracie, Lyn, Deborah, Linda and Michelle of She Walks In Beauty
Graciel of Evenstar Art
Graham of Grahams Random Ramblings
Huub Koch of Zichtbare Zaken
Ilker Yoldas of The Thinking Blog
Insane Writer of The Insane Writer
Jace of Internet Safety Advisor
Jacky of The Painted Veil
JaniceNG of This is a Miracle
JaniceNW of Twist and Skewer
Jeane Michelle of Binding Ink
Jennifer of Goodness Graciousness
Jessica of Oh, the Joys
Joel of My Journal
Joey of Hearts a Fire
John C. of Homeless Family’s Blog
John of Where do we go from where we were
Jolene of Life with Heathens
Jon of El Gigante Verdoso
Jos of NoDirectOn (not: NoDirection), Marketing•Review, OgenDicht/EyesClosed and Additional BlogLOve
Judy of Sugar Queens Dream
Karen of A Deaf Mom Shares Her World
Kathleen Maher of Diary of a Heretic
Kathy of Photography by KML
Kelly B of Spiral Journal
Kim Barker of Laketrees
Kimberly of PurpleFrogCat (Myspace) and PurpleFrogCat (Blogspot)
Kitty of Kitty’s Bloggy Bits
Kuanyin of Blog-Blond
Lady Rose of The Diet Pulpit
Leo Vietor of Leo Vietor Observes
Lili of Feel Happy
Lillie Ammann of A Writer’s Words, An Editor’s Eye
Linda of Are We There Yet??
Lisa Mils of Work at Home Mom Revolution
Little Aussie Cynic of The Little Aussie Cynic
Lizz Strauss of Successful Blog
Lyman Reed of Creating a Better Life
Lynda of Lynda’s Loft
Lynn Chua of Recipes
Maartje of Behind The Page
Margot Potter of The Impatient Blogger
Mark of MeAndMyDrum
MaryT of Work Of The Poet
Marzie of Mariuca
Meghan of Pyreflies over Zanarkand
Michelle Dyer of Florida Weather Watch
Mike of Things By Mike
Mimi Lenox of Mimi Writes
Mo of It’s A Blog Eat Blog World
Ms. Q of QMusings
Nafasg Team of NAFASG
Nick Phillips of Anything Goes
Nihal of Nihal’s Anything n Everything
Nina of The Alien Next Door
OS9USER of OS9USER News Room
Paula of Six4Paula
Pearl of Interesting Observations
Pendullum of Dribblingwitt????
Ray of Mr. Besilly
Robin Lee Sardini of The Spirit Knows Best
Rose DesRochers of World Outside My Window
Sam Chan of Acquire Wisdom And Live With Passion
Sandee of Comedy Plus
Sandy G. of At Your Service
Sanni of Coffee 2 Go
Santa of Every Day should be Christmas, Santa’s Magical Golden Cat and Santa’s Community Blog
Sophie Chow of We We Wet Wet
Surjit of Gurushabad
Thomas of Photo’s from Northern Norway
Tiny Bellows of Doing it the Tiny Bellows Way
Tish of The Kat House
Tom Ledree of Tom Ledree
Winston Fong of Eat Your Maths!

20 Comments | Awards, BlogRolls, LinkLove, Mr Present, You Rock My Socks Award | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Technorati LinkLOve Back To You

December 25, 2007


In the scroll box below are the blogs that were kind enough to link to this blog in the last 10 days. That is… the ones that Technorati counted…

I have copy/pasted the Tecnorati pages with “blog reactions”, changed the rel=”bookmark” to rel=”dofollow”, deleted the images, and.. hey presto!

Hope this works to give you some LinkLOve back (If it works, it will give a lot of LinkLOve to Technorati, too ;).

Thank you for linking to ‘NoDirectOn (not: NoDirection)’!

10 Comments | BlogReactions, LinkLove, Technorati | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Technorati Freshness vs. Authority

December 24, 2007


I am so not getting this! Sorted on Authority there are 1,025 links to this blog, as registered by Technorati. Sorted on Freshness that’s 1,024. That difference is a small step for mankind, but a huge leap for me to try and figure it out. Anyone??

7 Comments | Technorati, technorati authority | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Blogger re-introduces auto-linked URL in commenter identification

December 23, 2007

blogger commenting
I just noticed that Blogger/Blogspot have returned on some of their steps and are now re-introducing the option to leave a link to your name: if you select the “Nickname:” option, an extra field appears for leaving your URL. Almost just like it used to be. See You Blog We Listen for more info.

By now, many bloggers have embraced the new OpenID support for Blogger/Blogspot blogs, but also were disappointed to find that Blogger struck out see the option for unregistered commenters to provide an auto-linked URL with their comment. With this new URL field below the “nickname” box, this has now been restored.

You can now comment in a variety of ways:

1. by using your Blogger/Google account;
2. by using your OpenID that comes with your LifeJournal, TypeKey or WordPress account, or with your AOL/AIM account;
3. by using the option “Any OpenID”, that you can use for any OpenID.
4. by entering your name in the “Nickname” box and your URL as a direct link to your nickname in the “URL” box;
5. Anonymously.

For this blog, I would prefer you to use options 1, 2, 3 or 4

Personally I am not at all sure that this step back is a positive change… Surely, it’s positive in a way that Blogger have listened to the gazillions of complaints they got over this. But on the other hand, I would rather have everybody use some ‘checkable’ ID — I hate spammers, and I hate having to check if a comment link is actually spam, even more.

So I am assuming that The Blogger Team may just be a bit frustrated over this. Apart from the unforgivably horrible way they communicated about this, they probably now feel like they were trying to do some good - and then “these dumb users” wouldn’t understand their beautiful goal. In the end, I fear this may lead towards an even more customer-unfriendly (”why bother about our users, they’re all dummies anyway”) attitude at Bloggers’ Development Team.

RELATED POSTS:
• Blogger launches OpenID commenting
• OpenID explained: Convenience + Security
• How to enable OpenID support for your Blogger/Blogspot blog
• Commenting with your OpenID (and delegating your blog url to it)
• Changes to Blogger Commenting (continued)
• Unfair Changes to Blogger Commenter Options

P.S.: You may not have noticed before, but it has been possible for some time now to receive updates to comments by e-mail. All you have to do is check the E-mail follow-up option and enter your email address.

No Comments » | Blogger/Blogspot, OpenID, Opinion, blogger, blogging tips, co.mments | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Please (re)join Santa’s Community

December 22, 2007


You may have seen that Santa is currently experiencing some serious hacker/virus related problems. To support Santa, please check the status of your membership of the MyBlogLog Community for Santa’s Community Blog. And, should your membership have been removed by these hackers, please rejoin! If you haven’t joined Santa’s community before, please take a moment and join us. You can get there by clicking the above image.

8 Comments | MyBlogLog, Santa's Community Blog | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Christmas e-Card from Twisted Sister

December 20, 2007

I received this e-Card (from my friend Dawn of Twisted Sister) that I thought fit to share with all of you. Thank you, Dawn!

Click on the image to start a little Christmas jingle.

And make sure you jingle “all the way”..

No Comments » | Christmas, Christmas Card, Humor/Fun, Twisted Sister, e-Card | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Bloggers that are Cool and Crazy

December 19, 2007

It’s an Award - and it’s a Sign!

I have created this award badge as a clear signal to the visitors of those blogs that carry it. It is intended to be a sign that says: “this blog is cool & crazy, and the blog owner is not afraid to admit it”.

It is for those bloggers that I think are really Cool — and I suspect they are a little Crazy too.

They are running their blogs to be a true reflection of their own personality and they stick to it. They are providing an atmosphere that makes their visitors feel welcome as members of their blogs’ community. They manage to use the right tone of voice, write about an inspiring choice of subjects and treat their visitors and their fellow bloggers as friends. And they all do that without taking themselves or their blogs too serious, in spite of all the time and the crazy hard work they put into it.

I am handing out this first batch of gold label Cool & Crazy awards to those bloggers that I know are — rightfully so — very proud of their blogs, each in their own cool and crazy ways:

They are:

Brown Baron of Brown Thoughts
Bucky of The West Virginia Blogger
Colin of Life
Dawn of Twisted Sister
Eric of Speedcat Hollydale Page
Jacky of The Painted Veil
Jeane Michelle of Binding Ink
Kim of Laketrees
Kimberly of Purplefrogcat
Kitty of Kitty’s Bloggy Bits
Mark of MeAndMyDrum
Mike of Things By Mike
Sandee of Comedy Plus
Santa of Santa’s Community Blog
Winston of Eat Your Maths!

The next batch of certifiably Cool and Crazy bloggers, fitting the description in their own peculiar way, are:

ALL Authors of Blue Ribbon Bloggers
Adrian of First Time Dad
Ann of A Nice Place In The Sun
Debbie of New England Lighthouse Treasures
Paula of Six 4 Paula
MaryT, aka ‘The Teach’, of Work Of The Poet

34 Comments | Awards, NoDirectOn's Cool and Crazy Award | Permalink
Posted by Jos

The Spirit Of Christmas

December 19, 2007


Wishing you and the other visitors of
‘NoDirectOn (not: NoDirection)’ a warm Christmas
and a happy, healthy and prosperous new year!

8 Comments | Christmas, Christmas Card, The Spirit Of Cristmas | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Wordless Wednesday 10 - Advertising Photography

December 19, 2007

(click image to see the full page of this ad)
(credits: Advertising Agency: D’arcy Athens, Greece)

• see more of my Wordless Wednesdays

14 Comments | AIDS, Advertising, Non-profit, Wordless Wednesday, photography | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Pre-defined scroll box in post body text

December 18, 2007
EXAMPLE OF PRE-DEFINED SCROLLBOX

Colin, Nov. 16, 2007
Sandee, Nov. 18, 2007
Christy, Nov. 22, 2007


Sandee, Nov. 17, 2007


Sandee, Nov. 17, 2007


Sandee, Nov. 17, 2007
Christy, Nov. 22, 2007


Sandee, Nov. 29, 2007


Sandee, Nov. 29, 2007


Eric “Speedcat”, Dec. 3, 2007


PurpleFrogCat (who created this Award), Dec. 6, 2007
Ann, Dec. 15, 2007

FirstTimeDad Christmas Star Award
Adrian, Dec. 9, 2007

Best Friends Award
Colin, Dec. 12, 2007
Colin again, Dec. 17, 2007
Colin again (via BlueRibbonBloggers), Dec. 17, 2007

B-List Blogger
www.kineda.com, Dec. 17, 2007

I Like Your Blog award
Adrian, Dec. 18, 2007

(example of pre-defined scrollbox)

There have been some questions about the scroll box I am using inside my post body text, like I did in the previous post (”Some Extra Christmas (Link)Love“), where I put a long list of links in it.

Of course, this is a handy feature for long lists, but you can put anything inside a scroll box, such as long texts, or images. In the above sample, I have put some of my blogging awards in it.

I don’t remember where I picked it up, but it is actually quite simple. There are other ways to put a scroll box in your posts, but I like this one, because it is pre-defined by some code I have put in the blog template. That way it is always immediately available, with the same style features and effects that you have assigned to it, and it is very simply to “call” it in your posts. See the instructions below. I am using a modified Blogger “Rounders-3″ template, but I am guessing this will work in most templates.

All you have to do is enter the code below into your template, somewhere between the <head> and </head> tag:

/* pre-defined scroll box in post body text; to be called by “<div class=”scrollbox”>” and to be closed by “</div>” */

.scrollbox {
height: 250px;
width: 410px;
padding: 5px 5px 5px 0px;
overflow: auto;
}

It is “called” to open by entering <div class=”scrollbox”> into your post editor (in HTML-mode), immediately before whatever you want to appear in the box. At the end of what you want to appear in that box, “close” the box by entering </div>

This pre-defined scroll box can easily be modified; in the above example it is 410 pixels wide, with a height of 250 pixels, and a padding of 5 pixels on the top, right and bottom sides of the box and 0 pixels at the left side. You can also add any other ‘decoration’ to the box, such as background color, font size, etc. My own scroll box (see he one at the top) also has a background color added to it, for example. — Remember that it is fixed and pre-defined, though, so if you modify it later, the modifications will also affect any previous posts where you have used the scroll box.

More scroll boxes
To give you a choice, you can pre-define any number of different scroll boxes. All you have to do is enter the code into the template more than once, and give each scroll box a different name (in the “. scrollbox {“-line). In your post text you can call it to open, by using that different name, as the example for a “scrollbox125” below shows:

/* pre-defined scroll box in post body text; to be called by “<div class=”scrollbox125“>” and to be closed by “</div>” */

.scrollbox125 {
height: 125px;
width: 410px;
padding: 5px 5px 5px 0px;
overflow: auto;
}
(don’t copy&paste this example, as it contains extra HTML to display the red color!)

This “scrollbox125″ would be called to open by entering <div class=”scrollbox125″> and closed by entering </div>

No Comments » | Blogger/Blogspot, Pre-defined scroll box, blogger, blogging, blogging tips, template | Permalink
Posted by Jos

Some Extra Christmas (Link)Love

December 18, 2007


I received a jolly Christmas Card from Colin. He sent it to the list of blogging friends below, accompanied with some linklove and with the rel=”dofollow” tag set with each link. Thanks, Colin!

This is Colins Christmas message, that I am gladly repeating here. I am joining Colin in these words: “The world of blogging is exceeding itself with bloggers from many continents making the blogosphere a wonderful example of unity, peace and love. In the spirit of this Season of Goodwill I would like to pass this Christmas Card on to the following friends, old and new alike. Thank you all for your support, comments and participation within the blogosphere. YOU are the people who make it what it is…a growing Global Community. Hugs and Love to ALL of you, you are awesome.”

0-Cotojo 1-Lisa , 2-Kim, 3-Deborah, 4-Pearl, 5-Sandy, 6-Jesse, 7-Chris, 8-Zubli Zainordin, 9-Santa, 10-Blog Elf, 11-Jackie, 12-Marzie, 13-Adrian, 14-Jos, 15-NAFA SG, 16-Paula, 17-Sue, 18-Kathy 19-Maartje, 20-Morgan, 21-Greg, 22-MaryAnn, 23-Eric, 24-Hawk, 25-Carol, 26-Diane, 27-Ev Nucci, 28-Surjit, 29-Kuanyin, 30-Christy Z, 31-Sandee, 32-Robin, 33-Hanna, 34-Maunie, 35-Kim, 36-Bobby, 37-Billy, 38-David, 39-Jennifer, 40-Aryst, 41-Winston, 42-Christy, 43-LilyRuth, 44-Jess, 45-Rudy, 46-Lynda, 47-Lili, 48-Sandy G, 49-Ange, 50-BlackWyrm, 51-Vincent, 52-Colin & Anne, 53-Blandly Urbane, 54-