Aqueduct

Posted by amy at March 6th, 2007

Some bloggers get one template and wash their hands of the process, their identity becomes entirely wrapped up in their template - would Bitch, Ph.D. be the well know blogging bitch that she is without that wonderful image of the two young girls caught in a truly bitchy moment?

For me, templates are like clothes, and if you are one of the three people who have visited my site in the past year, you may have noticed that I’m on my 3rd or 4th template. I began a knitting blog in 2001 called SSP (cleverly named both for Slip Stitch Pass, a knit stitch, and a Phish album.) My blog style then was minimal, always a white background. And even though I changed many templates since then, I always maintained a white background. Yesterday, I broke with tradition and voila, we’ve got a crazy brown template thanks to It Could Be This One. What do you think?

While I was tweaking under the hood, I attacked a project I’d been meaning to do for a while, which was to update my blogroll. At first I wanted to add a few of the local bloggers who I’ve met either online or know through work. They are listed geographically because that is how I’ve come to know them, even though most of them are not local blogs.

For tonight’s episode, we’ll breakdown the Little Rascal’s:

While I’m sure that this collection of men are not actually women’s haters, there are times when I am the only woman posting in the comment thread. Most likely it is my feminist training that makes me aware of being the only one in the room without a penis. The talk circles around local politics and culture, with a drop of good old fashion gossip. Wes, over at Walk In Brain was the first local blogger I met and you can often find him commenting on Ross’s Berkshire Sense blog. Ross often gets grief from the local old guard for being a sushi eating snob, but I know from his amazing wife that he doesn’t actually like sushi and I think preferring to eat your food off a plate rather than out of a take out bag may qualify you as a snob in the eyes of the old guard. Speaking of old guard, I haven’t met Southview of It’s Your Dime, but I already love him. He comes across as a crotchety old wise ass, who I can easily picture yelling at the neighborhood kids to get off his sidewalk, and yet, he is a 61 year old retired construction worker who blogs, be still my beating heart.

I’d been commenting for weeks over at Northwest Corner before I realized that our daughters go to school together. Although I did realize through the comments that we had a mutual friend in common - that being Tom from Mortar Bend, who not only was on my hiring committee, but was instrumental in one of my first professional podcasts. Funny enough, it was in the comment thread for a blog post about that very podcast that I first met MCLA Blazer Blog.

If you happen to stumble upon their blogs and look up old posts, I’ll be the one commenting in favor of casinos, strip clubs and against teenage pregnancy. I know, I’m deep like that.

Widening the ring out a bit, we have Jen at Breed Em and Weep who may be one of the most popular bloggers in America, among mothers of young children. Jen’s ability to tell a story is breathtaking - whether she is talking about a “clogger” or that one time she flipped her hair and the universe laughed back. Be warned, by clicking through to her site, you will find that hours have passed, your handy box of Kleenex are empty from laughing and crying, and you will have nothing to feed your family for dinner. Good thing Jen introduced a whole lot of us to Ali, at the Cleaner Plate Blog , who writes about finding healthy, yummy foods your family will actually eat, we haven’t tested her parsnips yet, but I did take her advice to stop using plastic Tupperware in the microwave. One post from her had a far greater impact than seven years of gentle nagging from my husband, who got his own category on my blogroll. DH is a man obsessed with ornamental horticulture, and WoodedPaths was were he showed that passion off. Now that it isn’t gardening season, he too has linked in with the He-Man Women Hater’s club and can be found commenting on their blogs, in addition to thousands of others dealing with national politics.

There, the circle is now conveniently connected.