As most of you have heard (or rather, read) me talk about over and over and over again until your ears (or rather, eyes) fell asleep from boredom, one of my main motivators in blogging is relationships. There is nothing that excites me more about blogging than to get emails and comments, or better yet, to get to meet a reader.
Call me weird, but I consider you all friends.
You enrich the whole experience for me, and your interaction urges me on to be a better blogger.
With that in mind, I have a couple of invitations for you – two events are coming up soon, and if you are local (or semi-local), I would love to meet you at one of them!
The first event is less than two weeks away, so hurry up and get your calendar out!
Another local blogger and writer, Javacia Harris Bowser, has organized a wonderful resource for bloggers and writers called See Jane Write. She hosts panels, discussions, and learning seminars, as well as sharing great information through her website and email list.
The next See Jane Write panel is specifically about blogging, called So You Think You Can Blog. It is planned for Thursday evening, July 28th from 6-8pm at the Homewood Public Library.
I am honored that Javacia asked me to be a part of this panel with two absolutely fabulous Birmingham bloggers, Laura Kate Whitney of Magic City Manifesto and Jen West of The Jen West Quest.
The three of us, moderated by Javacia, will be discussing many different facets of blogging, the challenges therein, and strategies for improvement.
Besides the panel discussion, there will be plenty of time for visiting and networking before and afterwards, and I would absolutely LOVE to meet you! The event is free, all you need to do is register. I hope you’ll join us!
Secondly, I am organizing a Blogger Tornado Relief Work Day through one of my other blogs, Alabama Bloggers, and I wanted to extend the invitation to all of you to come help as well.
The date is Saturday, August 13th from 10am to 1pm.
There is still so much to be done in our state, yet there are drastically fewer volunteers, so this is an opportunity for us to pitch in and help. Let me stress – you can sign up to come whether you are a blogger or not – we are just scheduling this in lieu of our monthly Alabama Blogger’s Lunch Meet-up, hence the name.
We will either be serving alongside the amazing volunteers at the Old Scott School in Pratt City, or with the organization that has largely headed up the disaster relief in our community, the Christian Service Mission. I am talking to both of them, and we’ve just not determined which we will be working with yet because it is dependent on how many people we have sign up and which one needs help that particular weekend.
But if you sign up to help (the sooner the better for planning purposes), I will be emailing with further instructions and details as the date gets closer.
Pratt City
We would love to have you join us and help volunteer on that day. If you have any questions or need more details before signing up, feel free to email me at rachel@graspingforobjectivity.com.
Last bit of news – I am going to get to go to San Diego for BlogHer!!
And better yet, Chris is coming with me!
No, no, no, I’m not going to make him attend BlogHer. I’m going to only go BlogHer on Friday (while he runs and explores San Diego – I told him he could do anything he wanted – EXCEPT hop the $2.50 trolley ride to Tijuana), and then he and I are going to have a San Diego date day that Saturday. So if any of you are in San Diego, used to live in San Diego, or have visited San Diego, feel free to knock me over with sightseeing and food recommendations – they would be much appreciated!
…Regular Programming will resume tomorrow.
Very excited about the Blogger Work Day! Particularly since I drive past an area that was hard hit every day on the way to work. And I happen to fancy bloggers.
So fun about Blogher. If your prediction of Atlanta 2012 is right, then I’m there!
I’m so glad you’re coming! I can’t imagine passing it every day – but in a way, I wish I did to keep the needs fresh on my mind.
And yes, if it’s in ATL next year, us Birmingham girls are gonna have a FUN road trip!!
i am signed up for the see jane write event. i hope i will be able to do the volunteer day but it depends on whether i have to work that day.
Great! I look forward to seeing you again! And I hope you’re able to make it to the volunteer day – just let me know when you know!
Well, now I wish I were nearer to Alabama! I am finally crawling back from under the rock I’ve been under the last few months- made worse by technical difficulties which I swear were not my fault- ahem. Anyways, I have missed reading your words and now you make me want to hop in the car and drive down there. Hope you get a great turn out!
I wish you could come here, too!! I’d love to meet you! Thanks for stopping by and saying hi – good to hear from you again!
http://geekthreads.blogspot.com/2011/07/san-francisco-travel-guide-part-1.html
A different kind of blog to you but some San Fran suggestions to consider.
Have a lovely time, whatever you do. :)
I wish I could come see you and I really wish I’d been able to physically help with tornado relief but distance and situations have not allowed for that. However, since you’ll be on my end of the country for BlogHer, let me know if you have a layover in Portland and I’ll come see you at the airport! (It’d be a messed up flight pattern to get you there but I’ve seen worse!) Otherwise we’d have to work something out for Thanksgiving since that’s our next planned trip South. (FYI, you cannot book an airline ticket for an infant who has yet to be born since you don’t know their birthday! Good thing infants can ride on laps and not need seats!)
Nope, going through Houston :( We’ll have to wait till Thanksgiving! :)
The other airlines must be different – on Southwest, they didn’t even care that I HAD an infant until I got to the ticketing counter, at which point they issued me a lap baby ticket.
Continental (and United since they’re merging somewhat) let us book our two tickets but when we said we had an infant too, they asked for his name and birthday which at 29 weeks I don’t know! =) So we just booked ours and will either add him to our reservation once he’s born or when we check in at the airport. It was just a completely new experience that sorta tripped us up because we thought adding an infant was just an option to check like saying we wanted an aisle seat, not that they would want info on him! But luckily he’s free and Continental is pretty generous with their luggage allowances for those flying w/ infants. And even moreso is the peace of mind that we already have them booked and I don’t have to make these decisions when I’m a sleep-deprived new mom! =)
And on a different note, I saw Comic-Con is in San Diego and got worried for you that it would overlap with BlogHer the same way the Bama game and Dragon-Con overlapped when you and Chris went to ATL but it appears the dates are different! =)
Yes, Blogher is actually in the same location as ComicCon, so it’s a good thing they’re not at the same time! That’d be pretty insane. And I’m flying Continental out to SD – my first time flying with them.
We visited San Diego when my brother and I were kids, and the thing I remember most is the zoo! It was beautiful, and the most fascinating thing to my young mind was the outdoor escalator! :) We also toured an old ship….I think it was the “Star of India”? or something like that…I bet you could find it with a Google search.
The ship sounds interesting! If we were taking the kids, we’d definitely do the zoo. But since it’s just the two of us, I think the zoo will have to wait.
Thanks!!
Seeing you can’t happen since I live in Europe, but I do admit that I often find myself saying, “I have this friend in Birmingham..” And in case you aren’t awake yet, that is you I am talking about. Sounds silly since we could pass on the street and not even know each other, but it is true. If I had some sort of email address, I would even add you to my family bog, it isn’t nearly as cool as yours, but it is on lockdown since I know some wackos. Then I wouldn’t be as much of a stranger to you.
Ha – I’m glad you consider me a friend, too! Feel free to send me an invite for your blog – I’m pretty bad at keeping up with private blogs, though, because they won’t work in my reader. But I’d love to get to know you better!
I totally refer to you as my mom friend in Alabama! =) And you know, when ever you’re in Arizona…we would so meet up and hang out! Congratulations on all of the exciting Blog events!! As everyone who lives in Arizona either spends the summer in San Diego or wishes they spent the summer in San Diego… you’ll have a grand time! If you can get to Coronado Island, definitely do so! (but either you or hubby needs to be a steady driver. It’s one heck of a bridge. Take a look online and see.) But the place is a cute and charming little town with a beautiful hotel that is very open to tourists… you can eat in town, enjoy tea (or such) at the historic hotel and sit by the beach (I think they had a porch if you don’t want to sizzle at the water) If I were in San Diego WITHOUT kids (ahhh, the dream…) that’s the only place I’d go… Good luck!
Thanks for the info!! Someone else suggested Coronado too – l hope we get a chance to get out there and see it!!
And I’ll definitely let you know if I’m ever in Arizona…I’ve often thought it would be fun to do a bloggy road trip, visiting blog readers along the way. If only the kids loved the car!
Thanks so much for mentioning the See Jane Write event and thanks for being part of the panel. It’s going to be a great event!