Re-reading VC Andrews

October 29, 2009 by · 4 Comments

To satisfy my love for reading, I always save a part of my salary for buying inexpensive books and magazines. This allows me to purchase anything that goes on sale at National Bookstore, Booksale and Buy-the-Book. I’m not exactly a big fan of VC Andrews, it doesn’t matter to me who wrote the book, I’d buy literally anything that catches my interest. But I find her writing style entertaining and the words used are often simple, which means to say I don’t have to constantly check my dictionary for definitions :) I’ve also read Sheldon’s and Rice’s novels but theirs are not cheaply priced and I’m honestly limiting my monthly budget to 500 pesos.

We will have a 3-day vacation for the Holloween and all I want to do for the holidays is to read, read, read! I missed reading! Since I started blogging last October 2008, that hobby has been put aside. I used to read at least one novel per week, now it’s amazing if I’d finish a book in a month. But I’m really going back to reading. Not that I’m giving up blogging. I just don’t want to forget my first love.

My budget for this month went to “The Frank Family that Survived.” It’s a great story, I cried over the fact that it was based on a true story. It also made me want to read “The Diary of a Young Girl” by Anne Frank but that’ll have to wait. For now, I want to re-read all family series of VC Andrews.

Filed Under: book reviews, Consider This · Tagged With: ,

Bad english! Go to your room!

October 28, 2009 by · 2 Comments

Everytime I have the chance to read my recent posts, I couldn’t help but laugh at my english. Thing is, I know the basic grammar rules but I still find it hard to converse or write in english. Like now, I was just reading my previous post and caught myself frowning at how I construct my sentences. It’s embarassing :)

I remember when I was in elementary, my teacher once gave us a take home exam. It was a 2-page essay about our most unforgettable experience (why do teachers always ask students to write about their most unforgettable experience?). Since, I couldn’t even fill the first page with words, I wrote my essay in Filipino and then asked my Dad to traslate it for me. But my father had a degree in Political Science and B.S. English and he was also a speech writer of a congressman (I’m so proud of my Dad!!), so I only got disappointed when he handed me the translation. Not because his grammar was a disaster, but it was too good for a 9 nine year old girl! Nobody would believe that I wrote that essay. I ended up locking myself in our room (me and my sister used to share room) for more than 4 hours just so I could accomplish that 2-page essay. My teacher had a lot of corrections in my work but at least, I was the one who wrote it. I was fine with that.

Now, I still do that. I mean, I still lock myself in my tiny room (my sister already got married) to write for my blogs. And believe me, I’ve wasted a lot of yellow papers for constantly erasing words and re-writing sentences! I can’t seem to get contented with my articles. I think I need to buy a mechanical pencil, a big eraser and nice notebook.

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Improving Alexa Rank

October 27, 2009 by · 6 Comments

Not that I’m bragging about this, but, from top 17 million, my blog ranks 510, 000 in Alexa now. Yippee! I know it’s not enough to get advertisers but I’m very thankful for this improvement and also to Miss Vienna and to those who accidentally visited my blog! According to Alexa, most of this site’s visitors are coming from Austria and I’m quite sure there is only person from that country who knows of my blogs’ existence, so, I’m guessing it’s just Ms. Vienna, but I’m also hoping that there are other people from Austria who frequent my blog :) The top 2 country is USA, that’s Miss Ruthi and then top 3 is the Philippines, that’s me haha! Maybe I should use entrecard more often to gain more visitors? I’m also thinking of trying adgitize but I’m too lazy to install the codes plus I don’t know how it works and the rules. I honestly don’t want to bother my self with traffic as of this moment but it’s nice to know my blog’s rank is consistent for this month even if I didn’t work on it much. For now, I just want to concentrate on writing more posts and dropping at least 15 ECs a day to get some visitors (that 20 posts target within the month of October is driving me nuts, I swear! I just want my blog to qualify for PPP, that’s all). Again, thanks to my visitors!

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This is final, promise!

October 26, 2009 by · 1 Comment

The problem with me is that everytime I’d stumble upon a great-looking theme, I’d immediately download the files without even thinking twice. Even if it’s not compatible with WordPress 2.6 or if its installation requirements are too complicated, it doesn’t matter. You see, I’m not scared of modifying (or ruining) any blog template mainly because I attended a short training on basic xml, html and LaTex tagging (LIAR! LIAR!). It was one of the prerequisites to become a Certified QA (JOKE! HEHE). But whatever I learned from that orientation was totally irrelevant to my blogging ambitions. It only gave me a little understanding on how to read simple equations and mathematical taggings. That is why, when I first opened a PHP file in my FTP, it didn’t look like a bunch of undecipherable characters. At least, that training familiarized me with start tag and end tag.

So, going back to changing themes, yes, I’m guilty. I simply couldn’t resist the urge. I change themes as if I’m just changing clothes. Imagine this, there are only 6 posts in Manila Street but I’ve changed its layout more than 10 times already! Instead of updating my blog during my spare time, I’ve been too busy trying different themes. Such a waste of time! I should have temporarily used the WP default theme until my blog reaches 20 posts or until the next Google Page Rank update :(

Anyway, I’m not really regretful about that. Regrets are nothing but a waste of time, so I say. I’ll just try to keep my current themes for a longer period of time. HOPEFULLY! Six months, perhaps? Besides, I’ve also grown tired of modifying errors like undefined call to function, missing stylesheet, etc. By the way, in case you are searching for new wordpress themes, try templatepanic dot com.

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20 posts and a mountain of laundry …

October 18, 2009 by · 2 Comments

My target for the month of October is to write at least 8 posts (for a total of 20). This blog is turning 6 months in a few weeks and I haven’t earned even a single cent from it yet. So, I’m getting paranoid! May 15 is coming up soon (that’s the day when I will have to renew my hosting plan). But with my unpredictable working schedule and a mountain of laundry waiting at home, I’m not so sure if I would be able to meet my goal. About that laundry, this is going to be the first time in 15 years that I’m washing my own clothes. We have a helper who does it for us but she’s temporarily gone for a vacation and won’t be back until November 5, that’s after holloween. For the meantime, I’m in charged of doing my and my mother’s dirty clothes. Sometimes, I feel like I’m spreading myself too thin. I have an 8-hour desk job to attend to, four blogs to maintain, high school/ college bestfriends to meet at least twice a month, a sweet-cute-adorable-funny-lovely-baby nephew to bond with every morning (this is the most important!), a long list of novels to read, a bag of borrowed DVDs to watch, and now a mountain of laundry to finish. Please don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. I’m just thinking that maybe I should reconsider my priorities or re-organize myself. The books and DVDs can wait and I can always ask my bestfriends to set our dates another time. Maybe I can work in the morning, do the laundry in the afternoon (divide it in 3 batches), and update my websites later in the evening. I really really want to register my blog to PPP now!

Filed Under: personal thoughts · Tagged With:
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