Tips to make your blog work

Lifehack.org has shared a list of 20 things to make your blog work.
Granted, many of you may not be concerned about this, but if you want to make any money from your blog and efforts they’re good pointers.
I’m still working on some of these. My biggest downfall might be that I have so many things I’m interested in that it’s hard to narrow my blog down to only one topic.
Here’s the top 10 pointers. Visit Lifehack for the rest.

  1. Pick a topic for your blog. Having a specific focus actually gives you more to write about. Like a novel, your blog takes on direction and purpose.
  2. Encourage comments. Allow comments, and respond to comments.
  3. Make it easy to subscribe. Make it easy to subscribe to your feed by placing an orange RSS button in a highly visible location.
  4. Route your feed through Feedburner so you can keep track of your subscribers.
  5. Include an About page.
  6. Present your ideas visually. Long blocks of text aren’t read.
  7. Keep posts short and to the point.
  8. Use subheadings for long posts.
  9. Link abundantly. Links increase readership and let others know you’re writing about them.
  10. Make headlines descriptive.
  11. Archive by topic. Rather than date.

What other pointers do you have to make my blog better or for others to improve their blog?

Come alongside me

I’ve subscribed to several newsletters from Smallgroups.com and their e-mail from yesterday caught my eye.

Has anyone ever told you to “mind your own business?” Ironically, the New Testament asks us to mind each other’s business. And in a small group we have the chance to do just that; to encourage one another, to bear one another’s burdens, to weep with those who weep and to mourn with those who mourn… yes, even to “admonish one another.” After all, if my friends in Christ won’t help me recognize where I am slipping or cheer me on to obedience, who will? And how can I grow to maturity if no one helps me?
Hebrews 10:24 says “let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.” That was written not just to pastors, but to all believers!

Taken from Small Group Dynamics ezine article: “Who Says So” by Steve Cordle, March, 2007.

Last night we finished up our study of Philippians’s and Paul mentions several things to the church of Philippi that I thought were very applicable to this same concept, idea.

  • I’m glad in God, far happier than you would ever guess—happy that you’re again showing such strong concern for me. Not that you ever quit praying and thinking about me. You just had no chance to show it.
  • It was a beautiful thing that you came alongside me in my troubles.
  • You Philippians well know, and you can be sure I’ll never forget it, that when I first left Macedonia province, venturing out with the Message, not one church helped out in the give-and-take of this work except you. You were the only one.

The church at Philippi shared in Paul’s burdens. They helped him when no one else would. They showed concerned and came alongside him in his troubles. They were in Paul’s business and ultimately God’s business.
If we as the church are going to be about God’s business we better be ready to get in the business of others.
We must be willing to help the needy on each and every street corner and in every pew and seat of our church.
“For they will know that we are Christians by our t-shirts love.”
We also better be slow to say, “Mind your own bees wax” and be quick to say, “I’m struggling. I need some help.”
We have to be ready and willing to admit our own failings and leave pride behind.
Why is this such a hard concept for the you and/or the church of today?

Getting “taken” by “the man”

So moving is no fun – and we’re not even done yet.
Doh! I think we’ve got Laurie fully moved but we’ll be moving my stuff in over the next 18 days or so.
There are definitely some companies who are now on my “avoid at all possible” list.

  • U-Haul/Self-storage place on Highway 287 in Waxahachie
  • Planet Beach Tan in Waxahachie
  • AT&T

We’ve been “fighting” with AT&T since last Tuesday afternoon to get my phone service and DSL moved two miles down the road. I was tried doing the transfer online but they kept forcing me to accept an address with the wrong zip code. So finally after doing some Google searches (the numbers are not online) I was able to track down the proper number to call them with.
I got a hold of someone who assured me everything was inline for the move. My phone line (and DSL) would be cut off on Tuesday and the phone service would be re-established on Wednesday. The DSL was scheduled for installation on Monday (yesterday).
Wednesday afternoon I received a voice mail saying they couldn’t find my home in Cedar Hill.
I wonder why – we live in Waxahachie?!
I had to wait on the phone for 15-20 minutes so I could finally talk to someone and tell them I don’t live in Cedar Hill but in Waxahachie.
I finally thought everything was in line and they told me service should be connected later that day. Of course that didn’t happen.
I came to Laurie’s and the phone was still not working that evening.
I called again on Thursday and waited on hold again – and was assured someone would come to the apartment on Friday between 8 a.m. and 12 noon.
I waited. And waited. Big props to DirecTV though. They also said they’d be there between 8 and 12 and surprise – they were. The satellite service was up and running by 1 p.m.
By 1 p.m. AT&T still hadn’t shown up and I decided it was time to call them again.
I think I ended up talking with someone in India somehow before they gave me a number to “The former SBC, now the New AT&T.”
I waited on hold again and was then sent to their repair service. The repair service told me a ticket had never been filed.
Wonderful.
They promised they’d send someone out the following morning. Finally Saturday morning – four days after it was promised we had phone service at our new place.
Monday afternoon I showed back up at our new place to check the DSL (which we’ve been without since Tuesday evening) and surprise – nothing!
I was on the phone again for another 30-45 minutes trying to explain the situation and get something done.
Finally a manager guaranteed me the service would start on Wednesday (tomorrow) and we would receive a $25 credit on our phone bill for our troubles.
We’ll see tomorrow what happens.
—
As for Planet Beach Tan – This doesn’t really have anything to do with moving but it’s happened in the last week or so, so I feel like venting on it as well. I seriously felt like a woman in a mechanic shop. I got the great idea to get a tan before my wedding day and honeymoon. I don’t want to scare people at the resort when I walk around without a shirt on by the hot tubs.
I only wanted a few sessions but somehow ended up with a month membership and $35 lotion.
$35 for lotion?! They looked at me like I was the most backward, hick, cheap guy in the world because I only used $5 sun tan lotion from Walgreens in the past.
Somehow, if I didn’t buy their lotion I didn’t care about my body, my future wedding, marriage, future kids or grandkids. They would all be labeled by my poor decision.
I have to admit. I should have done some sort of research on tanning before I went or took Laurie with me, but I thought, “Heck, how hard can it be. You buy a few sessions and get tan.” But apparently they took me and somehow I ended up paying for way more than I ever expected or will probably ever use.
—
As for U-Haul – yeah I don’t even want to go there. But let me just say this, “They don’t know what they’re doing when it comes to renting trailers and such.”
We planned to rent a trailer and because we were told it would connect easily to my pickup truck and/or someone would be available to take care of it if it didn’t.
Well the light kit didn’t work and no one was there who knew anything about it.
I was told to go to Wal-Mart to get it hooked up.
Finally, frustrated after several other issues, I gave up and just spent three times what we had planned with a 22′ U-Haul trailer.
Granted that worked out OK but it was the most frustrating experience ever – well other than trying to move my AT&T service.
So there you have it. My venting over moving.
I think I’m going to do everything I can to just stay in the building we’re in for the next 10 years.

This just in…

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This just in from Laurie…

I knew that you would want to be informed as soon as it aired but Anna nicole smith’s baby’s daddy is Larry Burkhead!

Now who is he?
Wait. Another update from Laurie…

haha, he’s the good guy..well as good as he can be. They were together before the guy she was with when she died.

So there you have it. You can all rest better tonight having that knowledge in hand.
Lonnie said he can sleep a lot better now, knowing that it wasn’t him.
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A Rabbi looks at Christianity from the inside

logo_npr_125.gifNPR talks to Rabbi Joshua Martin Siegel who has been recently hired by the Baltimore-Washington Conference of the United Methodist Church to study Christianity and work on their staff.
Siegel brings out some interesting points…

  • Sometimes out of your pain and suffering you can find God.
  • I’ve learned about how hard it is been to be Christian. They struggle with this image of Jesus. All that He is all that He was and all that He accomplished. They’re beset by the secular culture and they’re beset by a lot of things and they’re beset by this curse of having been all powerful. They’re so used to being everywhere that they don’t know how to be not everywhere so they suffer with this new minority status. That’s a whole new ball game for them.
  • Who’s at the center? You or something larger than yourself which you must give allegiance?

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