Blog-A- Rama

YES! We are still at the laundromat. Any more questions? I refer you to Maytag, and the class action....... It's still hot out there. . . in kitty land. It's hot everywhere. So, this horridly hot weekend, I went to the 'blogosphere.' It was like stepping into a room with many doors, and each door leads to a room with more doors, and more, and more. Like some sort of Harry Potterish room of magic.

I only usually visit a few websites:

Pioneer Woman, where I go to find recipes with butter for PPP and her baking frenzy, and Fatty, where I revel in the fact that I am neither hurtling down steep and rocky hills on a bicycle nor trying to climb steep and rocky hills on a bicycle (it's really the wonderfully pure yet wry writing.) But no more! My blog world is wide now.

This is an important aside.... someone, maybe even me, must come up with a better word than BLOG. It's so close to blob, backlog, blah...no appealing words.

I did this blog-0- discovery tour by simply clicking on "next blog" at the top of many blogs. Multi-lingual is good for a "next blog" tour (I got THIS, shockingly, just now). Not so many blogs are in English. There are lots and lots of blogs in Brazilian Portuguese, and many in Spanish. A whole lot appear to be German, but could also be Norwegian or Danish. And then a boatload in alternate-letter languages. Wait until you read this whole thing. . . OK, you can skim. Then.....next blog, next blog....

Lovely comments on what I have written began to appear, from people I don't know. I thought I knew who exactly reads this thing. My sister. But evidently, people were finding out about our fascination with luminaria, or our sunglasses, randomly, or when I happen to comment somewhere. I tell you what, I sometimes wonder how I find my...let me rephrase that in a more appropriate way... It seems at times that I am as dumb as a brick.

While busy reading random blogs, I found this group, which is like hitting girl-blog gold. When BigD asked me if I was 'blogging' I would just say 'yes' and keep my head down. . . for several days. I do have some hints for bloggers. because some of you think this thing is private. It's not your little pink diary that you lock and stuff under your mattress. Anyone can read it. Your blog is not private.

• When you hit the words "Publish Post" anyone in the whole world can read it, IF they know our letter system. Probably not in France though, I didn't find many in French.



• The BLOGOSPHERE is not private. People forward them to others. Go ahead, try it. There is a little envelope somewhere that you can click on - and send the hilarity on to someone else. I know this because BigD loves to forward. So, all those details about the diaper explosion on the 4th...not so much, thanks though.
  


• You may think you are just "posting pix" of the grandkids for your parents in Idaho to see. Incorrect. The WHOLE WORLD can look and read. Your child will grow up, and will NOT be happy at the record you left out there for all the world to see at any time.



• When you say things like "Goo-mimi and Big Poop want to see you pull up your big boy pants" (complete with sequential pictures) probably Big Poop hopes that the guy who works in the cube next to him isn't privvy to that pet name.

So, what ELSE is out there? Lots and lots of scrapbookers and crafters and home decorators and writers. Lots. Apparently, the scrapbook folks also make blog templates, because many blogs look like scrapbook pages. It's awesome, in a voyeuristic way. I couldn't even BEGIN to find my favorite scrapbook blog, because I only have scrapbook kits and supplies that I have bought and then lost. Somewhere.

Somehow, once, I discovered young women who make hand-sewn crafts in England. It was so cool, but I lost them. I have spent a few hours looking for them again. How were they so easy to find once, but lost now?

There are a whole slew of medical blogs. I located them because of Midwife with a Knife, (it's the name) Her rant on the wicked hours residents work? I agree, wholeheartedly. Somebody fix that please.

Lots and lots and lots and lots of people chronicle every instant of baby's life from the pregnancy test forward. I love you all, each and every one of you, baby people. I taught Lamaze Childbirth Preparation classes for 15 years, I am a professional lactator and lactation support person. I've been a doula. I was all up in those babies (not this linked - one specifically, let's be clear ) Literally - like in there with ladies having babies, and getting that first latch-on. (Enough graphic birth talk, my Young Son will be uncomfortable) My babies aren't babies anymore, and don't tolerate much graphic talk.

Where is this going? you ask. And rightfully so. I opened this magical blog door and fell into a world of blogging parents of babies born with heart defects. I cannot, as of today, find my way out. I follow links from one family to another, to another, to another. I am absolutely fascinated by all of the medical-ish-ness of it. Not the creepy stalker like stuff (I don't know who or where these precious families are - other than Salt Lake City ). I know about the Glenn, about cardiac perfusion, sats, stats, minute to minute. And, I am cheerfully reporting, I have woken up intermittently in the night for the past few nights, worrying about these babies and their families. I wake up and find my self praying for little baby sweet-pea and whether they got the line in. Seriously, I need a life. And you'll have to find the little heart babies on your own.And, I am getting one - my own medical-ish life, I mean. The Sophisticate has had a big tummy ache for a few weeks or perhaps months now, (I know it doesn't LOOK that way, but trust me on this...since I am going to 'publish post') We are spending a very early morning investigating, while she wears a paper gown that she made into a little blue paper dress with a sash - tied in a bow. I'll bet I can find a blog about it.