Pinterest

Do you Pin, have you Pinned? Have you even checked it all out?

I have often wondered about Pinterest? What is it, why would anyone want to join, how does it work?
I have got the general jist of it.....you pin pictures to virtual noticeboards showing people what you like. Be it a picture of an ornament, postcard, book, dress pattern, fabric, bathroom accessory or anything for the house really, a design of wallpaper etc etc

I am just amazed that to have notice boards on Pinterest you have to be 'invited' yes you can not just create an account and away you go, you have to send for an invite!
An invite to what?
I sent for an invite last night. I have received an email back saying that I have been put on the waiting list and they'll be sure to send me an invite real soon.

I feel like I am waiting to join a country club or something so equally special.
I feel like I am almost waiting for someone else to quit Pinterest so I can then have noticeboards!

Are you on there?

Online or Offline

I got introduced to blogging via a magazine would you believe?
There it was in a parenting magazine back in 2005. It was an article about keeping your family in touch when living many miles away and the nature the internet was now playing in keeping families in touch.
It listed and wrote about many different forms of communication and I quite liked blogging.
So 6 years later I have my blog, that has moments of input and other moments of being ignored, but everyone can relate to that!
I am a self taught blogger, everything that has been done to this blog has been done by trial and error, another thing we can all relate to. Sometimes I will see something done on someone else's blog and then I will try and work out how they did that, or even get my compter savvy husband to look at it and see if he can't help me out.
I have managed to change the template and layout myself using the Cutest Blog on The Block page and even managed to make a heading picture to match the theme.

I am sure there are a few other things I could do to make blogging easier and exciting things I could add to the blog but for now I am happy.
However the other day I did come across Windows Live Writer.
Now has anyone else used this, is anyone else using this as their way of writing their posts?

I have always just logged into blogger and written it there and then, sometimes saving it to draft to publish later when I have time to add pictures etc.
I am aware that you can email your posts in but haven't set this up or even contemplated it yet.

So does anyone have anything they can tell me about Windows Live Writer, I have worked out that it is about writing a post for your blog offline and then you can save it or upload it to blogger.
It states that it is easier to use and friendlier, although having just written a post in it I didn't like the line spacings. It is like writing in Word and on that part I found it easy to use, I added a picture and yes that was easy to do from the computer although Ican't say I played too much with the positioning of the picture.
I do like that you can preview how it will look once published without going online as well (because it has downloaded the blog template you use when setting up your system)

However I am still trying to understand the advantage of using it, apart from you are offline?
Really useful for me when at the caravan because we have to pay for internet over there and it is $8 per hour and of course writing on blogger online soon eats up your money, so usually I write in Word and then copy and paste to blogger and then quickly format prior to publishing, means I am not using too much time online.

Would just be interested to know if anyone else uses it and how they have found it and whether they have any user tips for newbies like me?

How Big is the World?

This is a question a class in Winsconsin are currently asking in their computer class. How far will an email go if you send it to 3 people you know and then they send it to 3 people they know?

With the wonders of the computer and internet people now know and communicate with people all over the world.

I remember when having a friend in a different country was a very special thing indeed because you had to really know someone to know them. People nowadays have friends all over the world, who are just as special as my friends from when I was younger, but it is a lot easier to keep in touch with them now. You can communicate with them everyday, whereas we had to wait for letters to get delivered and then for the letters to be replied too.

Man this makes me sound very old, like I am talking about pre war time, but I was only born in 1970. Man how life changes in such a short space of time.

The class have sent out a very short email:


SUBJECT: For our school

To whom it may concern: Starting on Monday, February 25, 2008, the Computer Literacy Classes at Cuba City High School, Cuba City, Wisconsin, are going to pass on this letter to see how far across the world we reach.

Please write to our teacher, Mrs. Cohen, with your city, state/province and country.
The email address is:MrsCohensClass@gmail.com
We ask that you forward this piece of mail on to at least 3 people.
It would be better for our experiment if you send this message to people who are not local to your area.

Thank you for participating in our experiment.
PLEASE DO NOT FORWARD THIS MESSAGE ANY LATER THAN MAY 1ST, 2008.

Yes I kindly replied telling them where I live.
This is what I got back:

Thanks for sending us your name and location.
This activity shows the students how easy it is to connect in our global world.

Mrs. Cohen
Cuba City HS
Cuba City, WI
USA

I hope their map of the world on the wall of their classroom has a button / pin in just about every place on there.

Blocked!

My blog has had certain parts blocked within the UAE!

OMG I can hear you cry, what has happened?
Well in fact it is not as serious as it sounds..
My parents are in Dubai at present and unfortunately the internet there blocks anything it doesn't deem culturally acceptable!
So no you-tube, facebook, skype or even fun quizs like this or this!

This is not just my site, this is all sites.

Isn't it amazing what control they feel they have to have over their people!?