Noelle, AZ plantlady has a monthly meme – Celebratory-September-MGB My Garden Bouquet. What can you pick in your garden this month? Following her lead, I am keeping it simple this time. Once the roses get going most of my vases are just this. A rose. My Spiced Coffee bush turned up its toes this summer. It was too hot. No leaves left. But I waited, and wondered. Come the winter rain it has sprouted from the roots. This single flower was hanging, sodden with rain, so in it came in. Read the blogging tools, or look at the pictures for the non-blogging Ungardener and co!
6 Blotanical ‘Five years ago blogging was a club. There was this wonderful, delicious feeling of being able to talk … with people who shared your interests’ – David Sifry of Technorati. We, at Blotanical still have that – Blotanists don’t lurk, we comment, and discuss, and rant, and ask questions (expecting answers) and yes we answer. And if you are not the Lone Ranger in the Renosterveld, you may even find gardens which are like yours. Gardeners who are/do like you, and that like ranges all the way from casual acquaintance to I really heart your garden!
 |
| 'Woolly bear' caterpillar, and when I grow up, I will be a Tri-coloured Tiger, red and white, with yellow wings |
7 LinkWithin Most of us use this to bring back our golden oldies. I rather enjoy seeing thumbnails from posts, even I had forgotten. That is a downside of WordPress Related Posts, which are hoovered up from any old blog, and singularly NOT interesting.
 |
| Spiced Coffee 1 |
 |
| Spiced Coffee 2 |
8 StatCounter and ClustrMaps and BloggerInDraft new-Stats-gadgets. Between these three, I can see where my readers Came From (both website and country, or direct from Google Reader or…). What Keywords they used to get here. The Ungardener asks – But WHY do they download our pictures? 188 so far. Here is one answer olga-1821.livejournal A good answer, if you translate the Russian, she has linked back to my post, and brought me a bunch of new readers visiting from Russia! Olga ‘teaches Modern Greek at the Orthodox Seminary of St. Petersburg’ How exotic that sounds - and yet, how many sermons have I heard - in the original Greek that word means ... ?
 |
| Spiced coffee 3 |
 |
| Spiced Coffee 4 |
9 To check if your blog is one of those where the reader wanders off, instead of waiting … and waiting … then going instead to the next blog! Numion Stopwatch will give you a simple answer – your blog takes … seconds to load. Octagate SiteTimer will break it down, and tell you that … b a d g e is what slows you down, and that l i n k to …
 |
| Bee on white daisy |
10 Then we close with the dreaded viruses and malware. I use Antivir on this laptop (because Andre said so, and also for the ditsy blonde reassurance of the icon on the toolbar, when you switch on the little red umbrella is closed, as soon as it has ‘phoned home’ the umbrella opens and my computer is protected!). AVG is used on our desktop and at ThreeWisdoms about-computer-virus-protection. Windows Defender, because it is there. Piriform CC Cleaner and Glary-utilities for efficiency and removing assorted gunk.
Blogging-tools-I-use-1-5 I did on Wednesday. All of these software tools are free. I much appreciate your comments, and I would like to read about the blogging tools YOU use. After all, that is how I once found these, painstakingly, one by one, on your blogs!
11 comments:
Dear Diana of EE, Another mine of information. I shall keep your blogging tools 1-10 safe and when I have a spare day - no, make that a week - I shall try working through some of your suggestions.
Your rose looks a though it could be porcelain. Exquisite!
Once again, very informative! You are light-years ahead of me in blogging. I have only just managed to figure out Feedburner. I do use Google Analytics, though. Somewhere on my blog page there's a bit of code for it. The reports are no better than your #8 hints, but I'm familiar with them.
The Spiced Rose is outstanding!
Your bee on a daisy makes my head swoon! As does your blogging terminology.......so much to learn for this blogging newbie. I am definitely adding EE to my blog roll!
Diana, I love the combination of blogging tips and flowers. Some of the tools you've mentioned here are new to me, and I'll have to check them out. Spiced Coffee is a gorgeous rose, so I'm glad that it has been resurrected.
BTW, I just noted Alexander McCall Smith's Friend's, Lovers and Chocolate on your reading list. I read most of his series, but the Isabel Dalhousie books are my favorites. Her thought processes and the way all of life is an ethical dilemma for her make me laugh aloud (perhaps because they are so familiar??). -Jean
Brilliant post, Diana. I wish you lived round the corner, then I could come round for a tutorial!
Hello Diana,
This post is full of good info of programs that bloggers can use. I use some of them myself, but it took a while to find them on my own.
I love your single rose bouquet. Roses are by far my favorite flower. I have corrected the link in Mr. Linky for you.
I hope you have a great weekend.
Noelle
i adore hairy caterpillars!
ps thanks for info on octagate..will try it..
Well, Diana, these are some tools I haven't ever used. Now I must traipse backwards to your previous post and see what else you recommend. Sadly, I haven't been involved in Blotanical much this summer, but with the coming of autumn (well, okay it's here whether I admit it or not), there will be more time to enjoy all aspects of the gardening blogosphere.
Really good post with handy info. Some I will have to check out. Thanks.
Like your other commenter - you are light years ahead of me, too, as far as blogging technology goes. Which means I'm sorry I can't provide any hints you might not know about. I adore your rose, and admire how you get such good photographs of indoor flower arrangements.
Post a Comment