Author: JWF

Nuts and Bolts: Blogging Basics 1

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A number of people who’ve viewed my Web page have asked me about how I set up my blog, what it cost, if it was difficult, and how I centered myself to write. I am not an expert, but thought I would share a bit about what I have learned over the past year.

Basic Steps

  1. First you need to get yourself a URL. If you don’t want your own domain name, you can go with WordPress for free, but the address will be more cumbersome and less distinctive. The recommendation to me was to go for a dot-com as that would give me greater visibility. And I wanted something that was easy to remember and also catchy. I chose jauntingjean.com and was able to register it with Bluehost. As I recall, I paid an initial registration fee of about $100 for a year; the renewal fee was a modest $15 to keep my URL.
  1. Next up is deciding what platform to use for your theme and where you’ll do your writing. This is the site that actually hosts your blog. While a few commenters have been less than complimentary about WordPress, I have now used it since the beginning and been quite satisfied. It is widely used and is free and has lots of features! I know I am not taking full advantage of all that WordPress offers, but for my basic approach, it’s working well. They offer a wide variety of templates/themes for the look and color of your site and I simple chose one of them. That’s why Jots & Jaunts (my blog title) looks the way it does and is red.
  1. Set up your site. After you have your theme, you should then create a short About Me paragraph—something about yourself and probably what the main focus of your blog will be. Now you’re ready to write your first post. The default is for public display so I always change this to “Private” until I’ve finished writing. Composing on the screen in WordPress is easy and straightforward. Just remember to hit the Update button frequently so that you don’t lose any content. You can also preview your post as you go along to see how it will look to your readers. When you’re satisfied, change the display to Public and press Publish. Voila, your post is now live for the world!
  1. Adding media. Whenever possible I like to add photos to my postings for greater interest. Most people won’t read as much text on the screen as they would on paper so inserting photos is a way to engage them. WordPress allows you to upload photos from your own files or the Web and you can insert them midst the text in a several different ways and even add captions if you’d like. At the top of your blog text is a tab labeled “Add Media” which takes you to another screen where you can choose media or upload new media–photos or videos.  It’s also very easy to select an uploaded photo to be at the top of your post as a header. 
  1. Helpful guides. I did most of my initial blog creation following a guide I found on the Web. That one may not exist any longer, but here are several other sites that offer details on how to go about creating your blog: Your 10 Step Guide to Blogging by Maisha Walker; The Newbie Guide to Blogging by Dustin Wax; and Blogging Basics 101 by Jessica Knapp.
  2. Publicizing your blog. My initial foray into spreading the word about my blog was the creation of a distribution list in my e-mail account. That list has 40+ names on it and I send the group an e-mail each week with the title of the latest post and a link to the site. More recently, I signed up with Social Maximizer  which is a social bookmarking service and paid a few dollars to have several of my posts shared with a bunch of Web sites and lists. In a matter of weeks, I received hundreds of comments on my blog—some of them spam, of course—but, many of them positive and helpful feedback

I also know that I am not fully using SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and this is something I plan to address–eventually!

 

Maine Musings: Restaurants & Reading

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LAZY DAYS

Being in Maine promotes being lazy—watching the lobster boats circling to check their traps, observing the patterns of sun and shadow on the garden lilies, letting the hours slink by without any pressure. It’s also getting together with friends, shopping at the weekly farmers’ market, and exploring new venues.

This week we returned to Portland for lunch at the Blue Spoon with new Florida friends. The café is small and serves good food that is more interesting than the usual sandwiches and burgers. It’s located on Munjoy Hill in a section of the city we hadn’t previously discovered. After lunch we walked down the hill to the waterfront and strolled along the Eastern Promenade. Stately old frame houses with widows’ walks and porches line the opposite side of the promenade, several with condo for sale signs. A tempting prospect.

We also had dinner at the Newagen Inn, the place we came to stay twenty-five years ago for the first of our annual visits. The inn has changed over the years and become more elegant—the latest addition an impressive portico and re-worked entrance drive. What hasn’t changed, however, is its lovely location on the point of land known as Cape Newagen. The casual restaurant has a cozy bar area and a porch-like section with big windows perfect for admiring the view to the sea. You can also sit outdoors on a wrap around porch with umbrella tables. We all enjoyed the excellent halibut on a bed of risotto studded with sundried tomatoes and greens. The chef, a tall young woman in a ball cap, came out to chat and enthusiastically shared her plans for future menus.

BEACH READS

With the relaxed pace of these weeks comes the desire to indulge in good stories, novels that are absorbing with convincing characters and a strong narrative arc. Here are two I read this week, one definitely better than the other.

Haven Lake by Holly Robinson. This novelist is also a ghost writer and she was new to me. Set in the Berkshires in Massachusetts, this is a novel of complicated family dynamics—an estranged mother and daughter (both adults and the mother a sheep farmer), an unhappy teenager, and a surgeon fiancé who seems obsessed with his work. Add to this a mystery about two deaths that occurred twenty years ago and you have an intriguing slew of emotions. I thought the portrait of 15 year old Dylan was especially well drawn.

Silver Bay by Jojo Moyes. I like Moyes’ work and thought Me Before You was an exceptional novel due to its subject matter. I also enjoyed The Last Letter from Your Lover. This novel is one of her earliest and it shows. It isn’t as tightly constructed and, to my lights, could have used more focus and more editing. That said, it’s set in Australia at a hotel that attracts tourists who come to see the whales and the dolphins on Silver Bay. When a developer has plans to build a new hotel and retail complex, there is immediate conflict between the outside firm and the local whalesavers and environmentalists.

Maine Musings: Food, Film & Finch

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After the intensely bright hot Florida sun, mid-coast Maine’s gray skies, cool temperatures, and spotty rain showers yesterday were a relief. Portland on Friday before the cloud cover was weakly warm with enough sun to say summertime. Thanks to my cousins, we visited the iconic Portland Head Light for the first time after lunching at the Good Table in Cape Elizabeth.

Later we meandered the cobblestone streets of Portland’s Old Port browsing in familiar and new shops from the Paper Patch to Abacus to Sherman’s Books, all the while hearing in the background the screechy honk of the ever present seagulls.  I know there are seagulls on other shores, but they always seem particularly present here.

PORTLAND DINING

Dining in Portland was also a taste treat! The restaurant scene has expanded, and the city has been featured in every food magazine I know. We enjoyed dinner and the ambience at Vignola one night and had a superb meal the next in the back room known as David’s Opus Ten.  Plain David’s, the front of house, was crowded and noisy so we were glad we had opted for the small back space with its short menu of small plates. Especially noteworthy were the butter poached lobster on a crispy risotto cake, the tuna tartare, and the Serrano ham and manchego cheese plate with mellow warm black olives.

AT THE MOVIES

Earlier in the week, we went to see “Testament of Youth.” This new film, based on Vera Brittain’s 1933 memoir of the same name, is a grim and unvarnished depiction of the horrors of war, in this case WWI.  Some of you may recall that Masterpiece Theater did an adaptation of this work some years ago.

The film draws a stark contrast between the exuberance of youth and young love in the green English countryside and at university before the war, followed by the dirty gray and brown of death and destruction on the battlefield in France. Brittain left university to sign on as a volunteer nurse. This was a romantic, idealistic time and I don’t believe as many youths today see war as quite the adventure these men did.

WHAT I’M READING

Of course, I had to read Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman. I read To Kill a Mockingbird in high school (haven’t re-read it, I regret to report) and saw the film so for me Gregory Peck will forever be Atticus Finch. That said, Watchman is a worthwhile read. The writing is enjoyable, there are some touches of humor,and one gets a different picture of Maycomb, Alabama.  I found it to be a coming of age story for Jean Louise (aka Scout). At 26, one might say she is a bit old, after having lived in New York for seven years, to become disillusioned with her father, but so be it.  Other than that, she is quite believable and carries the book. Henry, her putative fiancé, is a bit flat.  Calpurnia, their servant, is a warm and sympathetic character while her uncle Jack, an eccentric doctor, provides counterpoint to her father. Atticus is here, but is no longer the perfect man and perhaps as a segregationist more realistic for the times.

Note that there are no photos this time due to a less reliable Wifi signal which I hope gets better!

 

Booknote: Summer Reading

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For some of us, summertime is an excuse to read something light or more frivolous than we usually would.  For others, it’s an opportunity to devote time to delving into a serious tome, perhaps one that’s been languishing on the shelf.  I view it as a chance to do both—indulge in lighter fare and stretch my brain with something more challenging, usually a nonfiction title.  When I was working fulltime, Maine was my time for extended reading.  Now I have more available time, but I still see Maine as a gift for long spans of reading, whole mornings or whole afternoons.

Before leaving home, I load up my Kindle with new books, pack a few paper books in my luggage, and, don’t tell my spouse, even mail myself a box of assorted novels and nonfiction to await my arrival.  On the day we arrive at our rental house, a priority is to assemble all the books I’ve brought or mailed and put them in stacks on the living room end table with another stack in the bedroom.  There’s something very appealing about having all those choices laid out from which I can choose what to read next!

Here are some titles I’m considering.  More to come in a future post.

Flying Shoes by Lisa Howoth.  A first novel about an unsolved murder in Mississippi in 1996.

Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris, 1932 by Francine Prose.  A novel about a lesbian and cross dresser that seems appropriate reading given today’s ongoing conversation about gender and gender roles.  On the “2014 100 Notable Books” list from the New York Times Book Review.

Mrs. Lincoln’s Rival by Jennifer Chiaverini.  Chiaverini has written several historical novels set in the time of the Civil War as well as a series of books about quilters.  Lighter fare and this will be my first of hers..

Muse by Jonathan Galassi.  A new short novel about the world of publishing.

Ashley’s War by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon.  Nonfiction account of women on the battlefield in Afghanistan in 2010.

The Secretary by Kim Ghattas.  Published a couple of years ago, this is a reporter’s account of traveling with Hillary Clinton when she was Secretary of State.   Timely given her candidacy.

WHAT I’VE READ RECENTLY

What is it like to work in the White House?  The Residence by Kate Andersen Brower is a quick read  based on interviews with butlers, seamstresses, housemaids, valets, and other White House staff from FDR and Truman to the present.  For the most part, the closer you get to the present day, the more restrained the staff are in their comments about the President and First Family, but you still get an intriguing glimpse of that enclosed world.  Each family has its own distinct personality and its own preferences and some families were definitely friendlier to the staff.