Karen’s Opinion

It’s National Punctuation Day!

I have difficulty with punctuation. I must have been daydreaming while sitting in elementary school. I don’t understand when to use colons. What is the difference between colons and semi colons? When are hyphens appropriate? I guess at where to put the comma. I have no trouble using exclamation points! I might use too many. LOL

How are you doing with punctuation? Does it come naturally for you or are you like me, having to look up every rule? Am I the only punctuation illiterate out there?

In 2004, Jeff Rubin secured a listing for the day in the “Chase’s Calendar of Events” reference book, and National Punctuation Day was born. This year marks its seventh official celebration.

I hope he doesn’t read my blog.

Wow! I am honored that my sister, Lynne, who blogs at The Sewing Mom, bestowed this award on my blog.

With this honor comes the requirement of listing 10 things that make me happy!

1. The freedom I have to live a life full of joy.

2. peach roses

3. white twinkle lights on Christmas trees

4. a wonderful daughter in-law who totally gets my son

5. reading a good book

6. a new sewing machine

7. great girlfriends

8. 2 sweet dogs

9. a husband who spoils me

10. cheesecake

The things I listed are in no particular order when it comes to importance.

I have been blogging for many years and some of those years were on free blogging sites. I loved changing the colors of my blog and fine tuning it to suit my tastes. I met many bloggers in those early days and many are still my friends to this day. Once I decided to become a serious blogger, meaning I started to post my opinions in addition to playing with memes, it was time to get my own domain and find good website hosting.

Thankfully, I had wonderful blogging friends who guided me to inexpensive web hosting sites and helped me figure out how to buy a domain name. I was in the dark and needed so much prodding. I am so glad that my friends didn’t give up on me. I think it made them feel good to help a lowly blogger like me. LOL

As the years passed, I found out what the difference was between a mediocre host and a good host. I had a less than mediocre host. I was getting tired of outages and weird messages when visitors came to my blog. I worked hard to get visitors and it frustrated me to think they were unable to read my posts. It was time to get quality web hosting. I hated to bug my blogging friends and was glad to know about Web Hosting Rating’s website.

I knew that my blogging buddies would help me but I was enjoying my new found freedom and decided to utilize the Web Hosting Rating website and let their expertise guide me. They have unbiased reviews of web hosting providers. I laughed when I saw my previous web hosting site listed as cheap. Cheap was a good word for them. I look for the words reliable when choosing a web host provider. I also read the reviews from actual users and see what they have to say about a hosting company’s technical support service. Let me tell you, technical support means the world to a blogger like me.

Whether you are a beginning blogger and need help choosing a free host so you can get your feet wet, or an ecommerce site that needs extra bandwidth, visitor trackers, and your own I.P. address, Web Hosting Rating has the information you need.

I am amazed at how much energy some of my blogging friends have. Of course, they are young and know more about technology than I do so why should I be surprised?

Take my friend Drew. He is always thinking of ways to help people and how to make the world a better place. He is the one who takes the pictures for that little widget, The BenSpark Photo-A-Day, down there on my sidebar.

Drew and his wife, Alison created an event ‘Blogs, Brews and Belly Laughs’ at their local comedy club, the Speed of Thought Playhouse to unite bloggers while enjoying a few brews and crazy, fun comedy. What a terrific idea! A bunch of other people thought it was a terrific idea and had loads of fun. Here is a picture of Drew enjoying the evening full of live blogging and twittering. He was even broadcasting the whole thing!

On April 17, 2009 BenSpark.com in collaboration with Speed of Thought Playhouse present Blogs, Brews and Belly Laughs II: Laughing it up while raising money for Walking for 2nd Base!

Please stop by Drew’s blog to read more, join his Facebook group, make a donation to help Walking for 2nd Base (which is part of the Avon Walk For Breast Cancer Campaign) or to simply leave a comment.

Drew has tons of really cool prizes to give away, so you can be sure I’ll be attending to support this wonderful cause and to take responsibility! You can join in on the fun at 8:30 pm on Stickam April 17 2009.

When you blog, do you get excited when you receive a comment? I definitely enjoy receiving comments. I banter back and forth with those who are interested in what I had to say. I am surprised when something that is written from my heart receives no comments. I am joining a project called ForumFinder to keep that from happening. ForumFinder has a comment exchange section that will bring traffic to my blog. I am excited to see how this works. From what I have been reading in the comments of other bloggers, it is a fun way to find interesting blogs and meet bloggers. I am always open to new things. I’ll let you know how I like it. Better yet, join me over at ForumFinder.