A to Z Reflections from around the bay

This was my 3rd year participating in the A to Z challenge.  The first time I participated I worked my way through the Newfoundland alphabet, the second time I participated I worked my way through Newfoundland communities.  This year I stuck with Newfoundland again and worked my way through colloquialisms, slang, and lore.

This year, I used my skills of stealth and acted as a Ninja Minion - which was a great little treat :)

A few days into the challenge, I got "smart" and tried to schedule a couple of posts- which of course backfired - posts were popping up in strange places, I ended up having to delete stuff and reschedule stuff and, well my G post is still before my F post.  Scheduling frees up more time to go visiting, but I still can't seem to make it work for me.  I'm just a bit of a snarl.

Visiting is my favorite part of the challenge - meeting new people and finding great new blogs to follow.  My visiting attack plan was to try to average twenty blogs a day.  I did some major wandering - day one of the challenge I hit ten blogs before me and ten blogs after me on the list, then every two or three days I visited the numbers I was minioning, another day I visited blogs labelled MI like myself, and I would randomly visit blog with cool names.  I tried to keep an eye out for familiar names, and I apologize because I know I missed some!

I'm going to be perfectly honest here- if a blog post was long (took up more than my screen), I would sometimes get bored and move on before I commented.  If the post was about something that I had no interest in or didn't understand (I can be pretty dense sometimes) I often moved on without commenting.  If it was a post with adult content, I most likely moved on without commenting.  If word verification was turned on - I in all likelihood left without commenting (sorry).

It was slower on my own blog than in the past.  I am just going to take for what it is.  I'm not a writer, I'm not a photographer, nor am I an expert on any one particular subject.  I'm now everyone's cupppa tea.  I'm just here to have FUN!  I did!  I had a great time during the challenge, I would/will do it again in a heart beat!

(Wow this is longer than I thought it would be.  Hope I haven't bored anyone.)


--- thank you to all my new followers - I did a happy dance for each one of you!

------ sorry I'm still a little behind on my commenting/replies - but I will get there  :)

Reflection time...

Wow! What a month...Congratulations to everyone who finished in one piece and thank you to the organizers.

With nearly 2000 blogs participating, I knew I would never get around to everyone, I did hit about 470 though! (roughly 20 a day) Can you say VARIETY?! Holy Mayonnaise - I saw blogs about blogging, kids, pets, comics, food, swearing, Gods, you name it.

Now lets get down to it... the good and the not so good.

WORD VERIFICATION - I promise you, I am not a robot, please turn it off. With only so much time to get things done, staring at slightly askewed characters wondering if its a 0 or an O drives me nuts. I will admit that as the month wore on, I lost patience and exited some blogs without getting my comments posted. (sorry, but I'm being honest abut it)

NON-PARTICIPATION - believe it or not, I started a list. Each time I clicked a link to a blog that wasn't playing along, I wrote down their number, but I got bored and stopped doing it. I know stuff happens and a bunch of bloggers do have exciting lives off their computers (lucky), but if you have no intentions of participating, please don't sign up just to increase traffic to your blog. (a nice little blurb stating you know you signed up, but something came up is always a great idea)

POST LENGTH - everyone rambles, I'm guilty, I'm doing it now... for challenge posts, I love the short ones, after paragraph 5, ADD kicks in and I just want to skip to the bottom. Pictures and comics are a great.

COMMENTS - who doesn't love comments? Responding to them is a great idea. (I tried very hard to reply to all the comments I got during the challenge, I know there are still a few I missed, sorry, I'll try and get them done)

FOLLOWING - this can be a touchy subject. Not everyone is my cup of tea, just like I am not everyone else's cup of tea. I follow a blogs that do not follow me back, and there are people who follow me that I do not follow back. If I'm not following you, I'm not saying that I don't think your blog is good, it may just be beyond me (I only have a little brain). I appreciate every follower I get - believe me, I do a little jig each time someone new follows me, and I can't help feel a little hurt each time someone unfollows me too. I'm working on it.


So there you have it. My thoughts however muddy they may be. Again, CONGRATS to all the finishers, THANKS to the organizers, and WELCOME to my new followers (I have done a jig in honor of each of you) I hope you enjoyed your April 2012 tour of Newfoundland.