Archives for September 2007

I am home

September 30, 2007 by Jen at Semantically driven

For the last five days and four nights I have been child free and immersed totally in things web. But now I’m at home sitting at my kitchen table typing this. The kitchen table is covered in bits and pieces and I don’t really know where to start.

I’ve got so much to say about the conference (Web Directions South). I also went to WebJam last night. I’m uploading some photos on Flickr, and looking through others of the conference to see what’s around. I’ve accepted a couple of new friends on Facebook and sent out a couple more requests to people I met while away.

Here’s a link to a photo of me holding my Mikons t-shirt that I finally remembered to get after the conference finished when we were at drinks.

There’s more to come – just not now.

A bit light on here for a few days

September 25, 2007 by Jen at Semantically driven

I was sick yesterday and spent the day in bed which didn’t help my efforts at work in doing the bits and pieces I need to do before I head off to Web Directions South tomorrow.

Tonight I want to head out for a bit to see my friend performing so I think I’ll leave work a bit early to make sure I have dinner cooked, the child near ready for bed, make sure my sister can connect up to my wireless internet at home, chuck some more things in the case for Sydney and just panic generally. Looks like the weather will be fine in Sydney for the next few days so what I’m planning to wear should be fine.

But maybe I’ll just stay home and rest – I haven’t quite decided yet.

At this stage I plan to take my laptop with me but even if I do I might not get much of a chance to use it so don’t expect too much from here until maybe Sunday.

Gay Pride London 1992

September 23, 2007 by Jen at Semantically driven

I was looking around a friend’s website recently and found this photo. He’s given me permission to post it here.

It was taken at London Gay Pride parade in 1992 and I’m the only straight one in this photo. You can probably tell because my outfit is nowhere near the same as the others here or any others at the festival. I still have this dress. Look at those lapels. The sunglasses were
given to me by a friend and I also still have those but they need some
repair work.

The guy with his arm around me looks very Pet Shop Boys. I actually thought it was my friend to start off with, all the while wondering why he looked a bit different to what I remembered until he told me he was the one taking the photo.

I don’t remember too much about the event because it was so long ago. I do remember marching down the street, seeing lots of rainbow colours and colourful sights and ending up in a part at the end where there was music and drinking.

Making any friends in London isn’t really easy – a bit the same in every big city I imagine – so I went out with my new gay friends to gay clubs. As a rule they didn’t come to straight pubs or clubs with me, but the good thing about gay clubs is that good dance music is played so I didn’t mind too much and gay clubs weren’t the only places I managed to get to. A regular haunt, however, was the Black Cap in Camden Town which according to a couple of websites is still around. We lived closeby so it was a very handy place to go out to with gay and straight friends alike plus it was open longer than the pubs which shut at 11pm.

Seeing this photo took me back to those times with these friends in London.

Crazy day

September 21, 2007 by Jen at Semantically driven

5am – wakeup and can’t go back to sleep so lie in bed and read.

6.15am – get up and check emails and Google Reader.

6.30am – take Monty for a walk.

7.15am – get home and have a shower, get dressed for work, eat breakfast and make lunches.

8.20am – Take JJ to school, drop him off, get to the tram and catch the tram to work, have meetings, have coffee with someone who’s leaving, have lunch, more work work work.

5pm – get ready to go home and am just about ready to walk out the door. Am asked to do something urgent for the boss boss boss’s PA who’s spitting chips and we don’t want them upset do we? Explain the need to be at school to pick up JJ by a certain time and get told I can book a car to take me there so I book a car.

5.10pm – finish the urgent work I have to do and I could have caught a tram but hang around anyway because I don’t want to cancel the car or bother with the tram now.

5.25pm – leave work and wait a bit for the car, and hop in the car.

5.50pm – get to the school, pick up JJ and go home. Heat up canned spaghetti for JJ and I eat some pate on biscuits.

6.10pm – hop in our car to go and pick up dad to go to the hospital to visit mum who had a little operation.

6.45pm – get to the hospital and mum’s feeling pretty awful and doesn’t feel like talking.

6.55pm – nurse comes into the room, kicks us out so she can get one of the tubes out of mum.

7.15pm – go back to see mum for a bit before we leave. JJ has behaved pretty well which I’m pleased with.

7.30pm – get to the carpark, pay $6 (bloody ripoff), drop dad off at his accommodation.

8.10pm – get home, get JJ changed, teeth cleaned, toiletted and bedded. I feed the dog, put on a load of washing, while organising JJ.

8.25pm – kiss JJ goodnight and go and pour myself a drink. Stay up for a bit and watch something I taped a couple of nights ago and when finished try to avoid the footy show while flicking around the stations to see what’s on.

9.45pm – go to bed. Am surprised I managed to stay up this long. Read for about two minutes then turn out the light and go to sleep.

4.30am – wake up. Damnit!

Blogging rhythms – like growth spurts in children

September 19, 2007 by Jen at Semantically driven

Do you have a blogging rhythm? By this I mean does your blogging creativity ebb and flow like the tide? I have a rhythm with this blog that I’ve only just started realising.

Recently I was flush with ideas about what to write here. They were ideas coming at me from all directions. I was in my purple patch of blogging. I’d start a new post with each new idea so I’ve now got a few drafts sitting around that may or may not see the light of day. Actually this is one that will see the light of day because I started it when I had all those ideas, but never got around to finishing it. Now I’m in a bit of a dip in my blogging, it’s being resurrected because I’m too busy to think of anything much else.

I equate this blogging rhythm to to growth spurts in children. When JJ is about to have a growth spurt, he sleeps longer and eats a lot more – a bit of a cross between a bear in hibernation, and a competitive cyclist gearing up for the Tour De France. Similarly when I’m gearing up for my blog’s growth spurt my blog posting might not be as frequent, but I’m gathering and collecting information from all around to write about later.

Going through this stage though, I know that I’ll come out the other end and see it manifesting itself in more activity around here – a bit like my real life too. I am a Libran, and we’re supposed to be quite lazy sometimes, and then really active at other times.

The blogs about blogging I read all say to gear up for the quiet times by writing posts that can be published later but for me, no matter how hard I try, it just doesn’t work. Let’s face it, while I love blogging, it’s not my number one priority so at least 50% of those drafts that I wrote won’t make it because the momentum has been lost.

My blogging rhythm is also in the pits right now for me because I’m really busy at work so my mind can’t wander off and think about what I might write here. I’m also thinking about what’s left to organise before I head off to Sydney in one week. So, for me, real life gets in the way of blogging rhythms.

How about you?

How not to run a competition

September 18, 2007 by Jen at Semantically driven

Just over a month ago after I’d implemented a new weblog banner for this blog I thought I’d offer someone the chance to have a new one too. The deal was to leave a comment pleading your case as to why you thought you needed a new blog look.

I got lots of comments, but only two comments pleading their cases. One ended up dropping out because she needed more help than just a new banner. She found a WordPress guru to help her out so the other person won by default – it was close though.

We’ve had some contact and she told me what she liked and wanted. Then I realised I hadn’t asked her what words and/or logo she wanted in her banner and after two emails I haven’t heard back from her. If she reads this blog then the offer’s still open to her, but quite frankly I’ve lost a bit of interest after having heard nothing.

If I ever run another competition I will do it differently. For a start I will get people to enter via their own blog with a link back here which will help spread the word. I’d put the word out on BlogHer and on Bumpzee but there still weren’t enough people interested.

Perhaps the offer was something people just wouldn’t be interested in. Let’s face it, I’m not a renowned graphic designer.

What I should have done was consult ProBlogger more closely for tips on how to run a competition.

My first Flickr meet, including a Flickr employee

September 17, 2007 by Jen at Semantically driven

On Saturday I went to my first ever Flickr meet. I’ve been putting my photos on Flickr for at least two years now and had never really bothered with the social networking aspect of it until a few months ago when someone invited me to be his contact.

It turned out he was part of the SA Central group so I joined that as well. The SA stands for South Australia so it’s a good group to add photos to for me.

Whenever I think of it I add photos to this group and have a look to see what’s happening with the discussions (thank goodness for RSS feeds for Flickr discussions otherwise I’d never keep track).

A meet was organised for last Saturday because a real live Flickr employee – George (underneath the fire hose here) – who happens to come from Adelaide was going to be in Adelaide, and at this meet so I thought I’d go along too. I had been planning to get to earlier meets but couldn’t for various reasons. I was quite nervous. It was a bit like going on a blind date, but with a group of people instead of one person.

I recharged camera batteries and off JJ and I went to the Exeter Hotel in the city. I gave JJ my first digital camera so he could take some photos and he took absolutely heaps and did a really good job of them.

The group were very friendly and made me feel welcome so it was quite easy. I spoke very briefly to George and asked her how she started working at Flickr. I probably wasn’t the only one and she’s probably sick of answering that question and that’s the only time I actually spoke to her.

We went to a closeby rooftop where a bunch of artists work and took some more photos.

If you’re interested pop over here to see the whole collection.

So on Sunday as everyone was loading up their photos, some of them made me their contact and vice-versa, we commented on each others photos and I organised my photos into collections.

Overall it was good fun and I can’t wait to do more. JJ had a great time and he’s very keen to take more photos.

Oh, and one of the guys in the group likes taking portraits and he took a great one of JJ.