What do you mean I still have a blog?

Ok, ok, ok I know it's been pretty dead around here. I'm not going to make any grandiose predictions about how it'll be in the future but I will try to do a little better. In the spirit of that and because I need more page views Emma Watson's legs.

Hello

I think this is the longest I haven't posted anything ever....

New blog

My friend has started up a new political blog check it out.

Flu

Since a week last Tuesday I've been fighting with the flu not really sure if it's seasonal or the big one H1N1. Mostly back to normal now except for a occasional sneeze or cough. Blogging should resume soon have several book reviews to do including one of an early reviewer book from LibraryThing.

I'm back

Regular service should resume shortly with a list of books that I've just had to abandon....

Just not my day

Some unfortunate personal news topped off with discovering that apparently the Abe referral inks for all of my reviews have died. Tthe image has been moved. I have no idea what I'm going to do with them. I'm not looking forward to redoing 450 of these things again [I had to redo all of them when they switched program providers last year].

Yes I'm alive

Well I survived the upgrade. The less said about it the better. I posted my best of O8 list yesterday. It's probably the latest of anyone I follow. Hope you enjoyed it. I should be getting back to writing reviews in the next couple of days. The latest Louis Black is up for tomorrow.

Secret Santa! for Book Bloggers

I'm not sure if I'll be able to participate but this does look intriguing. If your a Book Blogger check it out. Deadline to sign up is November 18th. Nice to see that its international which I like as a Canadian.

ARC season

In the last week I received 3 queries to do reviews. Must be part of the rush for Christmas sales. It would save them some time if they would actually look around the site, 2 of the 3 books were from genres that I never review here.

Speaking of which I've added to the sidebar a widget for blogs that will review POD books. If you're interested in being added feel free to click on the join link. Thanks to Breenibooks for setting this up.

As always if you're an author or PR person feel free to leave a comment on one of my posts including some info about the book and an e-mail address to contact you. Everything goes through moderation so you don't have to worry about the address being posted.

Book Blogger Appreciation Week

This looks like fun! I've put a button over in the sidebar.

New look

I have been running the same template since I created my blog back in 06. I figured it was time for a change. I haven't necessarily settled on this one but I do like aspects of it. Particularly the larger font. Feel free to leave comments on the look.

600th post

Wow...

On blog traffic

When I put up a quick post on the passing of Rob Knox I didn't think it would be responsible for the highest traffic day in my blog's history. For a while yesterday for Google's blog search it was number 3 in relevance. Currently its 4th. Funny how things like that work.

Tag changes

Over the next little while I'm going to be changing how I tag my posts. I have over 530 to work my way through so it may take a couple of weeks. I'm going to add subject tags to my book reviews and clean out some of the ones that I haven't used that much. I've fallen behind with my bookshelf subject posts. I'm going to discontinue updating them but I will leave them up. I'll provide a link to the relevant tag. Hopefully this will make navigation around here easier.

For instance here's my new and up to date British history tag.

Blogger ratings bad idea

Blogger in their infinite wisdom decided to add rating features to everybody's blog posts today. They didn't actually mention it on their official blog. Rage, surprise and anger was the not surprising result. Great idea guys you're really thinking there making us switch the feature off instead of opt-in. If like me you don't want the ratings check out this description for removing them that helped me.

Update: as mentioned in comments to this post apparently it was supposed to be "opt-in". well at least they disabled the feature. Pretty embarrassing. Full points for admitting it though, I wouldn't want to be reading their feedback e-mails today.

250th review

I just posted my 250th book review. It was Armies of the Carthaginian Wars by Terence Wise. Not bad for 1 1/2 years.

Podcast any thoughts?

I've been considering setting up a podcast. I find that I have less time than I'd like to write out these reviews but often have more to say. A podcast containing "extra commentary" would seem to be a solution. I'd still do a posting probably about the same length as I'm doing now but also include a longer discussion in a podcast. Now here's the question if I bother doing this would anyone actually listened to it? Let me know.

I'm back

back from my vacation. With 11 new books. It was enjoyable. Regular posting should resume later tonight or tomorrow.

On vacation

I'll be on vacation October 4-14th. I'm taking a trip to the Maritimes. Won't have Internet access so no posting till at least the 15th. I'm taking 11 books with me so I should have some reviews when I return. I'll also be looking for local material out there. Try not to be to board without me.

I'm still alive

Reviews should begin again tomorrow. I've been bogged down with some stuff.