My Goodness

In the last few months life on the home front has been more than a little fraught and I have been only making flying visits to the blogosphere.  In that time I have been tagged to follow a meme, and given no less than four awards (one of them twice).  I have been extremely remiss and have ignored them all.


I am about to become a tiny bit better behaved.  I am going to acknowledge (as I should have done at the time) the very generous donors of said awards.  However, despite it feeling a little like deliberately breaking a chain I still do not have the time or the energy to comply with the conditions.  So ... I will acknowledge the generosity of the donors, and will also outline the conditions attached to accepting either the meme or any of the awards.  If I read your blog or you mine you are assuredly more than qualified.  If either the meme or any of the awards takes your fancy please feel free to pick it up and run away with it.  I should also add that if you don't already know the people who were so generous, that their blogs are more than worthy of being investigated.


I was tagged to play on the meme by Kath Lockett from Blurb from the Burbs.  Essentially the idea was to answer eleven questions set by Kath, devise a further eleven questions and tag (you guessed it) eleven bloggers to continue the fun.


Kath's questions were:

1. When and why did you start blogging?

2. What is your middle name and why did your parents select it?

3. Toilet paper folder or scruncher? Provide your reasons

4. What do you do at home when everyone else is out?

5. You've been given five hundred bucks (two hundred and fifty quid, say) to spend on nothing useful and just your self. What do you do with the cash?

6. It's finally come true. One of your 'five celebrities you're allowed to sleep with' has walked into your kitchen and is up for it. Who is it?

7. Name one famous person (so that all our readers know who it is) that you think 'has their shit together'. Explain why.

8. What makes you get out of bed in the morning?

9. Who would you like to smack in the face, publicly disprove all of their stupid opinions and freeze their bank accounts?

10. Low slung jeans on boys - how do we eradicate this disease?

11. Tell us about an invention for the home that we desperately need.

The first of the awards I was so generously given was the Liebster award.  This was bestowed upon me by John of Tok Tok Place.

The guidelines for this award are simple.

Firstly to do a post acknowledging the generosity of the person who gave you the award and then select five blogs with less than 200 followers to share in the love.  (Liebster means dearest in German, which is a really nice sentiment).  Thank you so much John.


The Double Whammy of Awards came from Gary and Penny (the modest internet star) at klahanie.  From this lovely pair I received the Fabulous Blog Ribbon

and One Lovely Blog Award

  

Naturally there are conditions:

1.  Link back to the person giving you the award.  Well, that's just good manners don't you think?  I have been really remiss but I promise I was brought up to have some manners. 


2 (Fabulous Blog Ribbon Award) List five fabulous moments in your life

2 (One Lovely Blog Award) Tell us what you consider to be your most beautiful posting and

3.  Nominate seven bloggers for each award.


Finally the lovely Delores from thefeatherednest heaped coals of fire on my undeserving head by also nominating me for One Lovely Blog Award.


Kath, John, Gary, Delores I hope you will be able to forgive my slackness.  I am truly appreciative of your generosity.

Flabberghasted.

Or, you could have knocked over my substantial self with a feather.

You may have noticed two new buttons on my side bar.  Last week, at a point where I was tired and crabby and the smaller portion was behaving like a toad, I received an email which moved me to tears.

The email came from the talented and lovely Kim of, among many other things, Sunday Selections fame.  She told me that she had nominated this blog for the Best Australian Blogs of 2012 Competition.  Oh.  Do you mean that?  And other incredulous phrases.

She did mean it.  So I have joined up, and with the other 1023 entrants my blog will be considered for the title.  Winners and finalists (and I have no expectations here) will receive writing courses (on line or face to face) at the Sydney Writers' Centre in Milsons Point.

Pretty amazing isn't it?

Oh, and I am told that, for those who are infinitely more comfortable with social media than I am, #bestblogs2012 is the competition twitter hash tag.  Voting for the People's Choice category finishes on Thursday 9 May at 5.00pm.

Friendly Blogger Award

The lovely River passed this accolade onto me this morning. River herself epitomises friendly and nice, as was illustrated by her distress earlier this week when she had thrown a very mild hissy fit at someone who had been ungracious, rude and just plain mean to her.  Anyone who was less nice than River would have ripped him a new intimate aperture and rejoiced in his discomfort.

To accept this, all I have to do is link back to River, then award this to other bloggers that I think deserve it.

I have been brooding about this on and off all day. I have been very fortunate since I started playing in the Blogosphere earlier this year.  I have been welcomed and met with friendliness, kindness and support on all sides.  People commenting on my blog have also been, (with one exception) very friendly.   The exception firmly believed that she was commenting on someone's elses blog and, since I pointed that out, has not been back.  A blogger who disagreed with me (not at all the same thing as being nasty) has become a friend.

I love the glimpses of other people's lives I have been given.  Many blogs are filled with beauty.  Others educate me.  Some entertain me.  Others do all three.  I am in awe at the creativity of people around me.  I have met one wonderful blogger, and corresponded with others.  How can I possibly complain?

Essentially what I am saying is that I cannot nominate any particular bloggers for this award.  If I visit you, or you visit me, consider yourself a recipient of  the Friendly Blogger Award.

And thank you.