Revamping My Blog
Friday is the day I’ve been posting on the topic of fiction – talking about vampire books, classic books, celebrity writers, author franchises, and more. Not today. I have an announcement: I’m revamping my blog!
One fabulous feature of a blog is flexibility. Unlike a book, where your plot better stay on track from the prologue to page 343, you can meander a bit. It’s like taking a nature hike and seeing a trail off to the side. Are you the kind of person who thinks, “I wonder where that leads to”? Well, I am. I wondered about doing something different and decided to give it a try.
Next week, there will be a new background, a tag line, and a change to my posting schedule. I’ll be blogging twice a week – on Wednesdays and Fridays.
First, however, why do I blog at all? For me, blogging has a few purposes:
Flexes the writing muscles. I write novels. That’s my job. If the novel is a marathon, blogging is a refreshing jog around the block. Like crafting a book, blog posts require an idea, research, organization, and delivery of words on a page (okay, screen). It’s a shorter run, but it keeps me on top of writing. After all, runners run and writers write. It’s what we like to do.
A conduit for information.Through others’ blogs, I’ve discovered what’s worth a watch on TV (Tiffany A.White), fascinating true crime and paranormal stories (Catie Rhodes), social media tips (Kristen Lamb), and much, much more! When you visit my blog, I hope you learn something, get a different perspective, or refresh a memory. I like sharing information.
Helps you get to know me. I’m not that interesting of a person, and since I spend a lot of my time slamming keys on a laptop, perhaps you’d do better to hang out with Lady Gaga or Tiger Woods for a good time. However, like most readers I enjoy getting to know authors and friends better, and reading their blogs helps me to do that. So here I am, hoping that I can say something worth reading a couple of times a week.
Helps me get to know you. By tracking which posts get a lot of hits and perusing comments left on the blog, I get to know y’all. In fact, one of the best things about blogging is that it opens up an avenue for conversation. I like reading through blog comments and finding a chat between readers. It feels like a virtual coffee shop where I brought up a topic and friends weighed in one at a time. I’ll have virtual mocha latte now (I hate real coffee).
Allows me to sound off. Let’s face it: We like to say what we think. Through blogging, I can highlight topics I find interesting or lessons I’ve learned or books I’ve read. People are interesting, and what they think can be interesting. I’m talking people in general here, so maybe I’m not as entertaining as Glee or your cousin’s Cheetos-up-the-nose trick. Yet trading ideas can be a stimulating experience.
So what do I find interesting? What makes me interesting? I’ll be blogging twice a week with these themes:
Amazing Words Wednesday – Same as my usual Wednesday Words with a new title. All about words, grammar, and the fun of language! These are not posts from a cranky red-pen-gripping grammar purist (although I do enjoy proofreading). Instead, my posts have covered word wonders like Tom Swifties, The Perfect Comeback, and Tongue Twisters! A couple of weeks ago, I traced the origins of Rock Band Names. Language is cool, huh?
Deep-Fried Friday – On Fridays, I’ll be writing about whatever strikes my fancy. And by “fancy,” I mean fiction, movies, television, flashbacks to the past (like my 1980’s Quiz and my 1990’s Quiz), and other culture and people-watching topics. Why call it “Deep-Fried Friday”? Growing up in Texas, I recognize that everything is better deep-fried. Chicken fried steak, fried okra, hush puppies, fried shrimp, French fries, fried turkey for Thanksgiving, and so on. Hopefully, these Friday posts will be deep-fried thoughts – my juicy ideas with a crunchy exterior you can sink your teeth into!
What do you think? Have you chosen themes for your blog? What topics do you cover and why? What inspires you to blog?