Another "book thing"

I heard about goodreads.com on one of my author lists and thought people might be interested in it. This is more for readers, though there is a group of Goodreads Librarians with 62 members. Not all of the site is accessible unless you have an account and log in, but I thought it was worth investigating.

This site uses Amazon to locate books readers want to enter, but information can also be entered manually. You create your own bookshelves and you can add your books to your blog, like I did with Library Thing, and you can import/export your books to a spreadsheet, which sounds like a great idea to me!

Linda

liszen

I couldn't think of anything I'd want to set up a search engine for, but I took a look at all the CSE's listed in the lesson and I submitted my blog to LISZEN, so we'll see if they add it or not.

Linda

Tea stamp

I used FD's flickr toys http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/ to create a "frame", in this case a stamp using the Tea Display photo I uploaded to Flickr. I think it looks pretty cute. :D

I like the way this works better than the image generator at the generator blog because with this one, I can download the framed graphic instead of relying on HTML to create the frame. I was able to upload it to my Flickr account:

http://flickr.com/photos/lindamclaughlin/652426624/

I'm going to see what else I can generage with this tool.

Linda

My Library Thing

Wow, what a great idea! Wish I'd known about this sooner. I love the idea of a personal online library.

I followed Ed's instructions to create an account and upload five books. I couldn't resist including two of my own, figuring this will be the first time they'll show up at the site. I added three others by author friends.

I see several groups I could join, but I will resist for the time being. I can barely keep up with the bloglines thing!
Ed, what are you doing to us? ;-)

I've been at this too long now so I'm signing off. Here's the link to my library:

>http://www.librarything.com/catalog/flightsafancy

Talk at you later,

Linda

SFP Week 4 - Image Generators, part 1

Since Ed emailed and posted this week's topics, I took the advantage of "car race Sunday" at my house to get a head start on the assignments. The DH is a long-time racing fan, and summer Sundays often find him glued to the TV set. :D

I'm using the slow modem again, so to start I just went to http://generatorblog.blogspot.com/

and clicked on "Murphy" (the Slogan generator: Terrible things mixed with popular commercial slogans.) to see what I got. Most of them were unprintable, but there were a few I liked that I could share.

Sweet, sweet love.
All natural, no caffeine.
(This appeals to the romantic in me, and may end being used in some of my promotions. :D)

Chuck Norris
An army of one
(I think he'd like that one.)

Beer
The magic begins.
(Works for me!)

Dumb people.
Kid tested. Mother approved.
(After all, maternal love should be unconditional.)

Later this week I'll try some of the image generators. Hope everyone is having a good day. (Hope someone reads this some day.)

Linda

Check out my FunPix!

I discovered slide.com this weekend and created this picture by adding the "skin", i.e. the monitor border. You can do a lot of other stuff at slide.com, including make slide shows of your graphics, set up a guestbook, and add other effects to photos, like glitter and borders, etc. Kind of fun to play with.

When I found this clip art writer years ago, I thought she looked a little like me.

Linda

Some changes to my blog

I spent some time this afternoon revising my profile, playing with a new template and uploading a logo I created in Paint Shop Pro for my newsletter. I'll get the hang of this yet!

Linda

A Flickr Favorite

I spent some time browsing Flickr and found this photo taken in Tasmania.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dunottar/578513368/

Many years ago, I visited a friend in Australia and we took a camping tour of Tasmania. This picture reminded me of the fabulous scenery near Port Arthur. It was hard to reconcile the natural beauty of the area with the brutality of the penal colony that existed two hundred years ago.

Linda

Fullerton Public at Flickr

I'm running late on this week's assignment, but I've finally got two photos uploaded to my Flickr account. Btw, my Flickr address is http://www.flickr.com/photos/lindamclaughlin/



This picture was taken in the board room before the Romance Tea author Janet Quinn and I spoke at in February, and they're the only pictures I have of the library. Kyle Samudio organized the event, with a lot of help from Laurel Twoomey and some of the other ladies, (to my discredit, I've forgotten their names - shame on me) who made the tea and sandwiches and served the attendees.

For more about the institution of afternoon tea, check out the article in my March 2007 Flights of Fancy newsletter at http://www.lindamclaughlin.com/newsletter.html

That's all for now.

Linda

Off to a late start.

Well, after a non-starter last week, I've finally been able to participate in the library Summer Fun Program. The whole outlook thing was a problem for me since I'm a substitute librarian mostly working from home. Today has been fun, though.

I'd done some blogging before, but never started one of my own. The RSS info was completely new to me, however. The news junkie in me is jazzed beyond belief by my bloglines account, but the overworked author is groaning. I'm behind on my deadline for June already.

I took the name of this blog from the author newsletter I use for the books I write as Linda McLaughlin, my real name. (So much for privacy.) In the last newsletter, I wrote about Tea since another author and I spoke at a tea at Fullerton Public Library. Here's a link to the newsletter, if anyone is interested:

http://www.lindamclaughlin.com/newsletter.html

Dinner time now. More later.

Linda