Category: Uncategorized

A personal blog, lately devoted nearly entirely to poetry, rosebaby is an acquired taste. Most of the posts largely consist of poems, excerpts of poems or quotes by famous authors, occasionally dressed up with an introductory sentence or drawing. However, earlier entries were much more personal in nature, and like e.e. cummings, rosebaby is no fan of capitalization, the effect being that posts can be unwieldy and inconsistent. On the other hand, what small bits of personal information included in the posts there are, you nonetheless get the sense that rosebaby is in transition, busy getting on with the business of mourning her late dog, raising the new one and handling a full time job while occasionally delving into the heartache of an ex- who has moved on. I can’t help but feel that in a few weeks, the posts will once again be less poetical, more personal and more whimsical.

It should come as no surprise to any visitor to the blog that rosebaby is an experienced web designer: the site is cool, clean and sophisticated. Navigation throughout the site is a treat, and the site’s shortcomings are simply limited to the inconsistent postings which often lack original content and inspiration.

rosebaby is at her best when she uses poetry, excerpts or images to illustrate her mood, letting us in why those excerpts or images matter to her at that time. Without such information, the postings consisting of bare pasted-in excerpts are cold and impersonal, a remediable situation, especially when rosebaby has such potential to be a must-read site for the hyper-literate.
rosebaby

Every once in a while, while traveling the blog world, I come across a title I wish I could steal and plaster onto my own site. ‘Neurotic Oasis’ is one of those ingenious titles. The site sums up a refreshing and revealing idea – that we’re all crazy. However, the more significant meaning of the title is that the author might be crazy, but in a crazy world, she’s just like any other. As she says, “Since when did neurotic become a bad thing?” Ironically, her clever naming of her blog sets her apart from the other 999 million blogs out there.

When you load up Neurotic Oasis in your browser, you’re presented with a nice, clean design. There aren’t any clashing colors or outrageously large pictures. I found the site easy on the eyes and simple to navigate. There’s the usual ‘archives’ on the navigation section, but I also found two pleasant surprises : a picture of the author (which is often forgotten, despite the fact that it allows the reader to become more personal with the blogger by putting a face to the words) and something called a ’24-hour autobiography’. The ’24-hour autobiography’ is precisely what it says – an hour by hour description of what happened to the author on a specific day. I found it a unique touch to the author’s blog.

As far as the author’s entries, they fall under the same category that the rest of the site gets -unique. I appreciated the author’s candor and fresh writing. She often tells us what’s going on in her life through stories, which are descriptive and revealing. Her writing also spans a large range of emotions – serious to on-the-floor laughing. For example, I couldn’t stop chuckling when I read her March 2, 2003 entry. But I won’t breathe a word. Go make a visit and I’m sure you’ll enjoy browsing through the author’s “neurotic oasis”.

Neurotic Oasis

I decided that I would review this site because of the name. Ramblings of a Technology Addict sounds a lot like something I wish I would have thought of when starting my own blog. I figured this site has to be about technology based on the title.

That is not what I got. Instead I got a mix of technology, war, personal, and general blog ramblings through out the blog. It is a well written blog with frequent updates for the better part of most days. The best posts, however, were those that were about technology. I didn’t like seeing all the normal mumbo jumbo within this blog as it didn’t flow. Scratch that. Put the technology stuff in one blog, and the rest of it in another and you have two good blogs that flow, separately.

The design is a complete shrine to Apple OS X and the author does not try to hide his love of the Macintosh. At the top of the screen we have the “menu bar” that one would see on a laptop, but somewhat customized. I was a little confused with all of the mini icons that had a link to Apple’s page, specifically the Jaguar OS page. Why? Past that point the blog is in a two column layout using only CSS. If the content is not long enough, some of the “navigation columns” content gets put under the blog. The links to other sites are listed in an iTunes listing which was just another addition to the Macintosh shrine.

I did have one major problem with the site and that is with the archives. Each day is archived instead of each week or month so it made it very hard to see where he had been versus where he is now. It became very time consuming to go through each day’s worth of entries instead of being able to read a month’s worth at a time.

Over all we have a fairly good weblog. As I stated I think it should be about technology and not a personal blog. If the author has the ability to categorize the posts it would make it a little better and would have much better flow to it. So if you are a technology buff or just looking for a good site to read, then check it out and see what Ramblings of a Technology Addict has to offer.
Ramblings of a Technology Addict

While I know that the biggest percentage of internet users probably includes the majority of people using a 1028×768 screen resolution. I, however, am not at this moment in time, and because of that, I had to scroll from side to side to read entries on the main page. It looks like this is just caused my the placement of images in certain monthly archives.

I was absurdly amused by the FAQ section of the site. Perhaps it was, for the most part, made up, but I still found a lot of interesting information about the author and the “Studied Authenticity” weblog – personal information about the author, like his pets or his current living situation, and information on how the weblog got its name and the initial purpose behind it all.

In addition to the “witty banter and links”, there’s also a link to some of the author’s personal poetry. The standard external links to other weblogs the author reads, links to the books he’s reading through Amazon.com, and the archived months are listed along the right side of this standard Blogger template.

Most of the posts I read through related back to some form of pop culture. Combining a review of the Ben Affleck/Samuel Jackson movie “Changing Lanes” along with a comparison of how the movie relates to his daily life is one of the many entries that stood out when reading back through the archives. The author is genuinely funny, with the type of slightly dry, offbeat sense of humor that not everyone’s going to get.

He throws in a great diversion of humorous images throughout some of his entries to break up the stream of constant text. Another fun addition is the way the author uses phrases like “The Lord sayeth unto me, ‘Yo nigga, I done gots some revelations fo yo dumb ass!'” as a title for a weblog entry, turned essay-length rant the author claims “really went nowhere”.
Topically speaking, readers are going to find a broad range of subjects to read about. The author, through his writing, seems very passionate about any subject matter at hand. Whatever he feels like talking about is always backed with strong opinion and plenty of explanation.

Reading a weblog from someone that appears as confident as this author is always refreshing, and even helps build confidence in your own opinion on matters. So, in all, this weblog is ideal for those that have opinions or enjoy reading the opinions of others and are looking for a little more than just the standard day-to-day updates of someone’s every day life.

Studied Authenticity

When you first come to the site, the design strikes your fancy — something new! You immediately think to yourself… there has got to be something good going on here. And the surprise is that there is something good going on here.



The blog itself brings the reader closer to the author by his sharing of everyday little things that are often overlooked. It reminds me of those moments in life where you’ll find yourself thinking something silly (May 22), believing that you’re the only one that believes that way, only to find that you’re not… there are others. The author’s entries are filled with humor and wit, stacked on top of intelligence, which is rampant throughout the blog. There are many interesting things to read here, and it’s a well-rounded read. Anyone that can comment on Shakespeare’s gayness (March 5) and talk about video games (April 17) has to be a somewhat balanced writer.



The design is fresh and new. Quite unique by way of blog designs. Comments are offered, though there is no about me page, which is a bit of a let-down.



He has a few other blogs linked and some movie reviews of things the author has recently seen. He shared with you what he’s currently reading, and currently listening to. Another added feature that I found kind of fun was the links to “songs of the moment,” added onto specific entries. This helps to bring the reader into the mind-set of the author and shares with the rest of the world the kind of mood he might be in.



Overall this blog was fun to read. I found myself reading entirely more than could possibly be needed to write a decent review. I browsed through the majority of the archives and found them just as interesting as the recent stuff. Sometimes there are just subjects that are timeless.ODAAT- one day at a time