Five tips for newbie bloggers or for bloggers who just like Big Tips.
1) write about things that you feel passionately about. it can be gentle passion or quiet passion or silly passion or even bitter angry weaselly passion. but just write from your heart, not from that critic in your head that wants to fence you in like a white trash dog on a two foot chain. it's your blog. set yourself free. party on. do. your. thing.
2) if you do the above, your peoples will find you.
3) to help your peoples find you, go blog surfing. be a blog slut and find a blog heart hottie and then slide your way all over their link list. find another blog hottie and repeat. make sure to leave comments everywhere you go, even if it's just, "hi, i found you via so-and-so's blog and that is some masthead you're sporting." don't be (too) upset if they don't respond. many bloggers don't 'write back' (especially bloggers with big followings) or only leave their comments within the comments section so you have to go back and look at the comments again to see if they've responded. but the point is: you are commenting for many reasons, one of them being so that your own blog address gets out there and folks can follow your link back to you and leave comments on your blog and lose sleep over whether or not you'll say hi back :)
4) never ever blog negatively about your work. unless you don't mind getting fired. really. this is a murky, murky area right now in the commercial world and so Just Say No to posting about your boss and referring to him as Mr. Stinky.
5) pictures are nice. post some nice pictures for your peoples. pictures of your life or the things you love or the things you eat or anything you freakin feel like imaging and allowing others to view upon.
. . . enjoy :)
Yes, pictures... Waiting.... where are they friend? I want to see some of your pictures!
Posted by: krista | Saturday, November 04, 2006 at 11:32 PM
One thing I really like about your blog is how often you update your picture in your sidebar. Kate in autumn, Kate in summer, Kate on Halloween, it's like seeing a friend IRL every day. Really cool. I keep meaning to figure out how to do that on mine (someone else designed my site so I have to really dig into the files to see where stuff is and cross my fingers that I don't blow things up entirely).
Posted by: Diana | Sunday, November 05, 2006 at 12:26 PM
good bit of advice you have here... cheers!
Posted by: rashenbo | Sunday, November 05, 2006 at 12:37 PM
1. You missed off my brand of 'hysterical passion'
or is it just 'hysterical'?
3. I can blog about previous employers, yes?
Right now in the absence of heating and hot water and still sans-stoves, it's only the indignation that is keeping me warm in brrrrittany!
Well, that and several kgs of Tibetan fur!
4. Pictures of mushrooms, yes?
and Diana's right about the pics, you look good these days girl!
Posted by: Mouse | Sunday, November 05, 2006 at 12:52 PM
Love that line about the white trash dog on the two foot chain. Can I steal it?
Posted by: patry | Monday, November 06, 2006 at 12:25 AM
krista . . . pics, pics, i took many pics on those freakin mountains for you peoples :)
diana . . . thank you, sweet thang :) . . . it feels that way here too, where i'm trying to have a changing visual to match the changing posts . . . it shouldn't be too hard to do it on your site if your friend will just tell you where your photo is . . . but then again i'm a computer programming throwback and would shrivel if typepad went away :)
rashenbob . . . glad you found something useful . . . glad you stopped by to say hello :)
mouse . . . hysterical passion! we all have a little of that, yeah :) hope you are finding friends to hang out with and share tea in front of a fire with . . . :)
patry. . . sure! the best writers all 'borrow' from here and there . . . i'd be honored :)
Posted by: kate | Monday, November 06, 2006 at 10:01 AM
you are a real treasure! keep on truckin'!
Posted by: susan | Monday, November 06, 2006 at 06:25 PM
susan . . . that's very very very sweet of you . . . :)
Posted by: kate | Tuesday, November 07, 2006 at 06:04 PM