How I use Google Reader

To feed my mental consumption, I use Google Reader pretty heavily. I have about 75 subscriptions of various weight, from 100s of posts per day to one or two posts per year. As such, I have to take care in organizing them to prevent the low-volume high-significance posts like personal friends' blogs from getting lost among the high-volume low-significance posts like Slickdeals or Engadget.



Most obviously, I group my submissions by similar topic and similar volume. My 'Nerd' group and my 'slickdeals' group can put out close to the same volume of posts. The difference is I keep up with the Nerd group pretty consistently, whereas the slickdeals I let build and build and only if I'm really bored do I start going through it. The slickdeals group is still useful to me, because I can use google reader's search to find a cheap price on, say, a 16GB thumb drive real fast.



'Consume' is something of a catch all that blends my interests in cooking, drinking, Ikea, design, and sandwiches. Generally I browse these subscription by subscription depending on what my interest is that day.



Likewise, 'People' is a huge catch all, but it's more centered around personalities like cartoonists, bands, bards, youtube, and other random bullshit.



'Blogs I'm following' is interesting because it actually comes from any blogs you have followed on Blogspot/Blogger. This was real useful to me when my friend Lisa had a password protected site while she was in the Peace Corps, and Google Reader was able to forward my identity into Blogger. It's not strictly necessary to use this, but it can be handy in a pinch.



Finally, the tags I have at the bottom I use for long term storage of posts. Basically, if I find a smart recipe buried in the middle of a cooking blog, I can tag it with my own personal tag, and use that as a quick reference whenever I need it. As such, my tags contain a running collection of things I found particularly interesting on the Internet.



Speaking of such, be sure to make use of the Note in Reader bookmarklet. Have that in your browser, and you can share whatever the new and clever meme of the moment with everybody else just by clicking it.

Spring Review - A Threeway is Never Enough

Erin, PJ, and Erin added another ring to their tree trunk.


The classiest four people to share a garage.


I had someone taking a photo of me taking a photo of Glen taking a photo, but their camera exploded from the paradox.


Ain't no party like a Beagle party.


A classy lady; an elegant host.




Err, did I say classy?


Big Country could give lessons to Cool Hand Luke.


It's really hard to just stop with three beautiful ladies.


Especially when they have these kinds of talents.

Spring Review - Acoustic music? In MY coffee shop??

My best friend Ben played a gig in Williamsburg at Aromas.


The redder the face, the harder the rock.


Here's the Lisa that I had shipped in from Namibia especially for this night.


Matt and Duncan: Gentlemen Extraordinaire


Last song. It was a Bombs over Baghdad sing-along. Actually, I don't remember what it was.

Spring Review - Two Month Anniversary of Camille's Birthday

In fact, Camille's birthday should happen every month.


A beard of talent; a beard of vigor.


Just 2 guys and we're having a good time


This cupcake got obliterated two seconds later. I may have helped that, but I plead the Fifth.


Excitement? Or brainlust? You make the call!

Spring Review - One Saturday

You know, a blog post is like fine wine. It gets better with age.

I went on a walk one Saturday from my place to the farmers market, to Riverview nursery, to a kitschy antique shop, to Decorum, Total Wine, and finally home.


A neat little architectural styling from one of the old industrial places off of Church St.



A duck couple chilling in one of the ponds at Riverview Garden Center


An awesome print at the Antique shop. This really caught my eye and turned into a gift for Camille.





There was lots more awesome knick knacks there but I started to feel like a dork after taking so many photos.


And to wrap my day up, I discover even mundane things can end up beautiful with the right lighting.

P.S.

I can't decide if I'm a glutton, a thrifter, or a packrat

 
I own far more shoes than I own feet. Oh well, at least I have a pair of water shoes in case I need to travel back in time to when I was 11.

Late to Report - Snow Day

 

I was slow to get this up here, but heres a snapshot of my big white Volvo on our snowy day this past Monday. It looks pretty now, but it was to piss me off 45 minutes later when I found out the locks were frozen shut