The State of the Blog (Part Two): About Reading This Blog

(To read more about what's going on with my side of the blog, go here)
(If you're looking for Wednesday's actual post and not this crap, click here)

Here's the thing. I'm a bit of a freak for communication. I love feedback and comments and I love knowing that I'm talking to engaged people, which is why I'm a Justice of the Peace.

Anyway, there's a couple things I've done to make it easier for you to give me feedback or ideas. We'll get to them after the jump:



1. Enabled anonymous commenting.
Some of you clearly know this already, but if not, there you are. My one request is that you only comment anonymously if you're finding it a hassle to log in to or otherwise use a Google or Wordpress account to comment (I know OpenID isn't working right now, I have asked the Blogger people and so far all I've heard are some very noisy crickets).


2. Added "Reactions" to all the blog posts.
If for some reason you find commenting takes too long or you just don't have anything to say other than "pretty neat," the reactions button lets you give me general feedback on each post. I might remove these if no one uses them or whatever. I don't really know how they work.
Update: I currently am not seeing these at all, but I've kept this up for if/when I get them working.
Update 2: I think it might just take a little bit of time for them to show up.

3. Went back and tidied up a few posts (aka The Special Edition).
I plan on doing this to almost every post eventually, but I went back to a few posts and moved a joke around or two, added some more jokes, changed a joke, whatever. I think there's at least 4 posts I've tinkered around with like that. So if you want to, say, go back and read one, what I'd love is for you to post your reaction (did you notice anything different, if you did is it better this way, &c.) so that I know how good a judge of my own work I am. I'm pretty sure I improved all the posts for the better, even if it is only slightly, but who am I to know? A lot of writers (and directors, AHEM) are awful judges of their work, and I might be no different.

Here's where you really come into your own, here, because this next thing is something I can't really do very well at the moment (what with being busy, I barely even have time to write a good post):

4. Suggestions needed.
Seriously, I know thinking of things for me to write about is hard (I've been there, you see) but sometimes when I'm really hard up or something it helps me out a bunch. I know it might seem lame, me asking for help, but to be fair I'm going from 0 blog posts a week to seven, which is like reverse-quitting-something-cold-turkey. Even if it's a joke suggestion, go ahead and write it in the comment box and submit it. I may actually be able to write about it. Just try to recognize which things I will and won't do (will: a post about hats; won't: a post about rubber bands). I know this may sound crazy but there are some things I don't have an opinion on. I think one of my favorite posts (although it's not like I'm choosing from a huge selection here yet) is the one about hats, and I never would have done it if the comments hadn't suggested it.

The only request I make for you about suggestions is that you not suggest something someone else has suggested. This gives me as wide a spectrum of ideas to choose from as possible.

So, go ahead, suggest away, please. Seriously. Even if I don't use your suggestion immediately, I may very well come back to it if I'm running low on material. Just one suggestion can spark a whole storm of writing.