PSA: Blogging and Personality

 

I am writing this post because it struck my fancy, that's it. No deep revelations about the human condition will be revealed. You won't learn how to attract 10,000 followers with "this one simple rule". You certainly won't make any money out of this. And finally, to be honest, you might not even be happy by the end of this post. So with all of that out of the way, let's get on with things!

Personality 101: How to have one.

First off, I realize I am not the most qualified to be speaking on this subject. I tend to the narcissistic and thus make everything about me. I have followed people like myself and had to stop because their ego was too big and I didn't like it. So I understand if people feel the same way about me.

But that is where personality as a blogger comes in. You may not like me, you may not follow me, but if you've interacted with me, you will not forget that experience. I have Blogging Personality.

The thing with blogging personality is that you have to have your own. You have to create it, grow it, be it. You can't copy it from someone else. If you do, you are a phoney and it will come crashing down at some point as the weight of being someone else will crush you to death. Being yourself is hard enough, so don't make it harder. Even if you are one of those bloggers who do nothing but follow the herd and read the same books as everyone, watch the same movies as everyone, do the same blogging prompts as everyone, you can still stand out and not be a little bowl of vanilla pudding that tastes like nothing and just sits there and jiggles.

Jifflypuff

You don't have to be a lion and dominate the scene. You can be a quiet, gentle lamb. But you have to be unique. That means having an opinion about something and sticking to it. Don't hem and haw and try to please everybody. You don't have to go out of your way to offend people, but remember, it is YOUR blog and everyone else can go slag off.

Now where do your opinions come from? Your mind of course. So think. Think for yourself. Don't parrot everybody around you. The world is filled with idiots and sadly, the world includes bloggers. If you remember that most bloggers are idiots, it will help you examine what they are saying and force you to think for yourself instead of just regurgitating their idiotic pap.

I hope this post has been helpful to you. If not, I will gladly refund your money. Or throw you in a big bowl of vanilla pudding. People pay to watch that kind of thing, so I bet I could clean house with a Pay-Per-View of you sloshing around in a swimming pool of vanilla pudding while an alligator tried to eat you!

Book Recommendations VII (The Final Edition)

 

Please read the Intro Post if you haven’t already. It explains pretty much everything (except how to use your microwave. Nobody can explain that!) Given how many responses I got from the Get-Go, my plans to collect responses over several months fell by the wayside. I was able to start right away. That brings us to this point, the end.

This has been a VERY fun series for me to do. Serious to silly, I've enjoyed the interactions with you all. The biggest problem is that it was TOO successful. My Calibre TBR now stands at over 270 and I've got over 100 on my ereader, which if you do the math, adds up to almost 400 books. That's almost 3 years worth of books. So I am going to stop these posts before I get up to 500. There's no need for that.

Without further ado, here are the final recommendations and my reactions to them!

Recommendations & Responses

Firewater suggested A Simple Plan by Scott Smith. After glancing at the last sentence of the wiki entry, which was depressing as all get out, I'm going with a "No" on this one.

Joelendil recommended Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett. One of those 1920's hardboiled detective novels. You can tell it is grim and gritty by the guy's mouth on the cover. Going to go with a big fat "No" on this one too.

Brian recommended Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell. Sadly, Brian faded from view before I got this post up, so I'm going to go with another "no" here.

Swords&Spectres recommended The Thursday Murder Club series by Richard Osman. He had reviewed one or two of them and they sounded very interesting. I'm going with "yes" on this.

Fraggle suggested High Vaultage by Chris and Jen Sugden. I read the synopsis and a review by another blogger and decided to go for "yes" on this as well. You can see why my tbr is growing with these posts!

My cousin Darren suggested The Deeds of Paksenarrion by Elizabeth Moon. I've read one other book by Moon and it was the typical woman writer blathering on about feelings and ignoring a good story that was passing the reader by. So I'm not going to tempt fate and subject myself to that again. No.

Nic suggested Wives and Daughters, an unfinished novel by Elizabeth Gaskell. I'd actually read it back in '13, based on the idea that Gaskell was similar to Austen. Not. Even. Close. I'll never try another Gaskell book again.

Chartreuse Flag Hall of Shame

Lashaan suggested Count Zero by William Gibson, a sequel to The Book That Shall Not Be Named. This gets him a Chartreuse Flag without even trying. That book was the worst book ever and left me in a reading funk for over a month, a MONTH! So I'd rather cut off my head then read a sequel to it.

Wrap Up

This series of 7 posts have been a lot of fun, I must admit. Thank you all who have participated. I'd like to also give a big shout-out to Nic for getting the ball rolling last year. I never would have thought of doing something like this on my own and I'm glad she pointed out the idea.

The only downside is now I have to be "creative" again and think of a new series of posts to write about once a month. Anyone have any ideas?

• Book Recommendations I
• Book Recommendations II
• Book Recommendations III
• Book Recommendations IV
• Book Recommendations V
• Book Recommendations VI

Mr Zip Turns 40

 

It is time to once again celebrate that Authorial Recluse, Mr Zip. Mr Zip is turning 40 this month and that is something worth celebrating. Heck, he's older than my little sister for goodness sake!

This is as far into "The Jungle" as Mr Zip ever wants to explore. Give him concrete and pavement any day! Plus, all the accoutrements of civilization.

Point in case. You will NEVER find a Mr Mac's in the deepest darkest jungles of Africa or the Amazon. Mr Zip has never looked, but he's pretty sure it is the case. He's also never looked on the Moon OR Mars, but he's pretty sure there aren't any Mr Macs there either. Mr Zip is one smart monkey!

Besides, all Mr Zip has to do is traipse the couple of feet over to the oven and voila, there is a Deluxe Hamburger mac-n-cheese. It's almost like magic. And it tastes better than magic too, guaranteed!

Once he's stuffed himself and is about to enter a food coma, Mr Zip likes to go to his favorite haunt and just chill. Bookshelves are the place to be for Mr Zip and it's about all he's actually up for these days anyway. Mr Zip is feeling his age and wants some warm food, a comfortable place to sit and an uninterrupted snooze, preferably 2-3 days at a time.

Mr Zip wasn't always such a sedate, comfortable bachelor. Back in his hey-day, he was tearing up the carpets like you wouldn't believe. He also got hitched. Yes, you read that right, Mr Zip was married.

She was a blonde haired temptress from the Cabbage Patch clan. While both she and Mr Zip were just reaching their majority (they were both a couple of months old by that time), it was obvious that this Romance was Meant To Be. A lavish wedding was thrown by the entire First Grade class at school and unending bliss was just ahead, or so they thought. But forces beyond their control tore them apart and they were destined to never see each other again. After that, Mr Zip swore that his heart was a stone and he would never love another. It is a vow he has kept to this day.

Thankfully, Mr Zip has made friends over the years. Of course, when he first met Jimbo the Desperado, nobody was sure if it was going to be friendship or a bloodbath. It could have easily gone either way.

Thankfully, they bonded over their shared love of the book Grumpy Monkey. Now they're best buds as they occupy their own favorite niches on the bookshelves.

Of course, once Mr Zip wakes up from his 3day long nap, he needs a little pick-me-up. Thankfully, he's as fond of energy drinks as I am. Down the hatch! He hasn't exploded yet from that much caffeine.

Then it is time for some light reading. This decade it is the Complete Works of Shakespeare. Mr Zip ain't no rube from the turnip farm after all!

Mr Zip has enjoyed his time with you all, but now he says "Shove off". You heard the monkey!

Book Recommendations VI (The Penultimate Edition)

 

Please read the Intro Post if you haven’t already. It explains pretty much everything (except how to use your microwave. Nobody can explain that!) Given how many responses I got from the Get-Go, my plans to collect responses over several months fell by the wayside. I’m able to start right away! That makes me pretty happy.

Recommendations & Responses

Firewater made a suggestion of Ghost Story by Peter Straub. It's obviously horror, so I'm noping that like nobody's business.

Joelendil recommended Emperor Mollusk versus the Sinister Brain by Adolfo Martinez. He compared it to Despicable Me and Megamind in his review, so I am totally adding this to my TBR!

Joelendil also recommended a non-fiction book. He even reviewed The Siege by Ben Macintyre. All in vain. Because that's a hard no-a-rewski!

Snapdragon recommended To Journey in the Year of the Tiger by Heather Dickson. I wasn't sure what to I was going to decide. Then she reviewed it (Here) and I realized it was dealing with anthropomorphized animals and I decided on a "no".

Lashaan suggested the comic book series Tintin by Herge. I read these in my tweens and teens and have often wondered about re-reading them and recording my thoughts in a review. However, after my attempt at doing just that for the Asterix series, and having it whimper out, I have decided to simply let Tintin stay in my memory, for good or bad.

Chartreuse Flag Hall of Shame

Orangutan Librarian "recommended" (knowing full well what she was doing) the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare. If you don't know, ol' Cassie used to write Harry Potter fan fiction, BAD harry potter fan fiction. Then she decided to publish it with changed names, etc to be a "new" series. There was a lot of outrage, especially at Devilreads and she was one of the bitches who clamored for censoring of reviews, shelves, tags, whatever it took, of the reviewers because they were just stupid peons and not a giant intellectual like herself. She specifically got the P2P shelf automatically deleted from users accounts, with no justification by the staff at GR. P2P "can" mean "pulled to publish" and refers to people who write terrible fanfiction trying to go legit and pretend they are real writers and not just total scumbag losers. HOWEVER, P2P has a lot of other meanings but that didn't matter to Cassie. P2P was deleted from GR and if you complained, your account was put under review and your reviews were 'hidden'. I dislike a LOT of writers and authors as people, but Cassandra Clare can burn in hell for the role she played in '13 in the censoring of reviewers on Devilreads. And I'm going stop there before I start writing things I will regret later. But suffice to say, she is one of the lowest of the low in my opinion and is an enemy to free speech.

The Most Important Part

Well, as you might have noticed in the title of this post, I am going to be winding this "series" of posts down with the next one. Honestly, when I started this I figured I'd get two or three posts out of it, but here we are, approaching seven. I am as pleased as punch about that and want to make sure I thank you all for your needed participation. I literally couldn't have done this without you. I'll be thanking you all again in the next and final post.

Because the next one will be the final post for this, if you have any recommendations, please limit it to just one in the comments here. I'd rather not have to add 33 more reactions all in one post :-D 

Book Recommendations IV

Please read the Intro Post if you haven’t already. It explains pretty much everything (except how to use your microwave. Nobody can explain that!) Given how many responses I got from the Get-Go, my plans to collect responses over several months fell by the wayside. I’m able to start right away! That makes me pretty happy.

Recommendations & Responses

This will be a longer than usual list. People have really gotten into the spirit of things and so I need to up my blogging game as well.

A Kiss Before Dying by Ira Levin was recommended to me by Film-Authority. While he had the temerity to suggest a Barbara Cartland romance novel in an earlier Book Rec post (thus earning himself the first diseased Chartreuse Flag), this was a serious recommendation. I hate Modern Lit and A Kiss is square in the midst of that time period. So I’m going to dive into it and see what I think. Added

The House on the Borderlands by William Hope Hodgson was recommended by Snapdragon. I have heard of Hodgson but never read anything by him. I’m totally up for trying out an old newtome author! And look at that cover? Is that just plain creepy or what? Added

The Mr Men series was recommended by Dave. Going to have to pass as I never experienced these as a kid and thus have no nostalgia factor to draw me to them. Pass.

Bartimaeus trilogy by Jonathan Stroud was recommended by Mallika. I’ve read this Trilogy and the Prequel back in 2009-2011.

The Stand by Stephen King was recommended by Firewater. Sadly for him, I’ve read that, back in 2008.

Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman was Mogsy’s recommendation. Now, you have to understand, Mogsy and I have a “history”, a book history that is. We read upon parallel SFF tracks and over the years have found that our tastes are VERY similar, but our bookish interests never quite converge. In fact, it’s become a running joke that if Mogsy absolutely loves something that I think sounds interesting, I’ll end up hating it. Because that’s how it has shaken out every single time. So this gets a hard Pass!

Chartreuse Flag Hall of Shame

Now we come to the part where I begin to wonder about all of you. Seriously.

Version 1.0.0

Jilly Cooper’s Polo was recommended by Nic. Based on that cover alone gets Nic a Chartreuse Flag of Shame. Good job Nic, you earned that flag! 😉

The Most Important Part

Recommend me some more books!!!! Leave a comment with your recommendation of books you think I should respond to. I have the list of all the recommendations so far, so don’t you worry, I’ll be getting to them all eventually. And I had a lot of fun doing this 🙂

• Book Recommendations I
• Book Recommendations II
• Book Recommendations III