Posts Tagged ‘blog’
Gift Giving Guy, Rewrapped
Yes, I have been known to rewrap a present or two. Just tear off the wrapping paper and start with a new roll of gift wrap. Now I have rewrapped this blog, moving from Google’s free Blogger service to a self-hosted WordPress blog.
Besides the new look, I added an index of previous posts, Gift Ideas A to Z.
Are you seeking a present for a birthday, anniversary, or another holiday? Check out Gifts by Occasion in the right column.
Need a gift for a student going to college? Click the red pennant in the right column to reach College Gift Finder.
Enjoy Gift Giving Guy, rewrapped.
Tags: blog
I’m overdue on my annual bookkeeping for this blog. In 2009, I made five resolutions for Gift Giving Guy. Let’s check the ledger and see whether I was on time, within grace or past due.
Resolution #1: Publish 100 posts in 2009.
Past Due. I posted 75 times in 2009, three quarters toward the goal.
Resolution #2: Introduce six new gadgets, design revisions or other blog improvements.
On Time. I started using Twitter on March 22, adding a follow link and the latest tweet to the right column. I embedded a ShareThis link on each post. Two new hub pages, Guy Gift Ideas and Gifts by Occasion, made their debut. And I included two new Blogger gadgets: recent comments and a poll.
Resolutions #3 and #4: Create an online quiz. Offer a guide on gift giving by personality traits.
Within Grace. I’m counting my post, “Selecting Gifts by Personality Quiz,” toward both of these resolutions.
Resolution #5: Blog about gift giving and e-commerce insights discovered in my MBA classes.
On Time. I matched my graduate school experience with gift giving six times in 2009:
- A Gift Deferred: The Wii for Christmas
- Brand-name Gifts
- A Perfect Gift from Buckle
- Irreverent References: Gifts for MBA, Law and Medical Students
- When Gift Retailers Fail
- Keeping Workplace Gifts Respectful
Tags: blog
Due to a hiatus, I was not able post on my second blogoversary, May 19, 2009. But the week is not just over yet. For last year’s blogoversary, I tried out the SomethingStore and was dissatisfied. (See my June 21, 2008 post, Something I Won’t Try Again.) I guess the SomethingStore shows random gifts rarely trump thoughtful gifts.
This year, I’m celebrating my blogoversary by giving myself a niche gift for Mac web geeks: an upgrade to latest version of BBEdit software. BBEdit deftly modifies and manipulates raw text and code on Macs. This HTML/text-editing Swiss army knife comes from Bare Bones Software (that’s the BB part). But it’s not a word processor; there are no text formattings or page layout features. I used BBEdit extensively when building the College Gift Finder on this site last year. Plus, how could I go wrong with software that markets itself under the slogan, “It doesn’t suck”?
Tags: blog, gadgets
I’m still seeing scores of weight loss commercials on TV, so it can’t be too late to make new year’s resolutions. In 2009, I resolve the following for Gift Giving Guy.
- Publish 100 posts in 2009.
- Introduce six new gadgets, design revisions or other blog improvements.
- Create an online quiz.
- Blog about gift giving and e-commerce insights discovered in my MBA classes.
- Offer a guide on gift giving by personality traits.
Tags: blog
Pencils down. It’s time to turn in the blog for end-of-year grading. On January 1, 2008, I chose five New Year’s resolutions for Gift Giving Guy. With 2008 coming to a close, I’m grading each blog resolution on a pass/fail basis.
Resolution 1: More posts on “gifts for guys”
Pass. I wrote a dozen guy gift posts in 2008, but I’m deducting points for late entries. I started a series in January called Seven Guidelines for Guy Gifts. After Guideline #3, I let 10 months pass before returning to finish the series. (Darn MBA classes.) So the following posts are really new, but backdated to February to fit in with the flow of the Guy Gifts series.
- Guy Gift Guideline #4: Give an Adventure
- Guy Gift Guideline #5: Consider Retro
- Guy Gift Guideline #6: Go with Manly Gifts
- Guy Gift Guideline #7: Inspire Show and Tell
Resolution 2: More posts on anniversaries
Fail. I covered anniversary gifts just once this year, describing my own eighth wedding anniversary. Perhaps I took the “once a year” meaning of anniversary too literally.
Resolution 3: Seek a few more reciprocal links
Pass. GiftStumped.com, ScottFeldstein.net and Katrina Lynn, Inspired kindly link to this blog.
Resolution 4: Use more of Blogger’s new features
Pass. I added the new blog list gadget. I switched to Feedburner for RSS subscriptions and added a contact form. I also tweaked the design to use a label cloud and Lightbox 2 for image zooms. While several of these improvements are not from Blogger, the changes meet the spirit of the resolution.
Resolution 5: Try different online stores for gifts
Pass. It’s hard to shake the monogamous love I have for Amazon Prime
I wish I could say the same for the Something Store. Instead, I found delays and disappointment. But thumbs up for these online gift sites I used in 2008: PajamaGram, Perpetual Kid, Z Gallerie Home Furnishings, Wine Country Gift Baskets, Heifer International and ProFlowers.com.
Bonus Points:
Pass. I spent my summer vacation compiling 1,517 links to online stores of 1,300 U.S. four-year colleges and called it College Gift Finder.
Tags: blog, gift sites
