Updated at the bottom yet again:

I was going to start this post with "someone should write a book..." but then it occurred to me that if my googling finger wasn't feeling lazy at the moment, there probably is a book already out there on blogiquette--some set standard of blogging etiquette that tells a person how soon they should reply to a comment or if they should ask before linking.

The problem, of course, is that no one really knows the content of said book if it is published because these questions pop up all the time on blogs. I've asked them. When JJ at Domesticated popped my IM cherry, I asked how often I could bother other innocent people who were diligently working. I received only two answers. It could be because it was a stupid question or because no one truly knows. In the meantime, I'm so scared to IM that I've been revirginized and can again wear white on my blog truthfully. Or somewhat truthfully. Who even knows at which point a person truly becomes IM revirginized? See, we need a book.

Um...the point. The point. Oh, the point is that I feel like an enormous bitch simply writing back "got it" on an email and not pausing to write a long response in regards to the Creme de la Creme. It's a two-parter: one half of it is time. If I wrote back the long response, something would have to drop. Working, eating, raising the ChickieNob and Wolvog, washing my husband's underwear, reading blogs, writing my own, and listening to non-stop Christmas music while making boatloads of candy that I am consuming by the boatload. Stress eating--proper stress eating that is worth doing--takes time. So I've been writing back a brief "got it!" and feeling like a huge bitch--as if eating an entire tray of toffee is more important than you. And it's not. But it's hard to walk away from an entire tray of toffee and to have that entire tray, I need to have time to make it.

The second part is honestly saving the blurb or my gushing until post day. The two or three line blurb is my own summary of the post and I love writing them. Listen, there's a reason why the Creme de la Creme is good enough to eat--it is literally fun to make and fun to read. In fact, there is a storybook rhyme that I thought of last year as I compiled it that has come back into my head again.

The book is Seven Silly Eaters by Mary Ann Hoberman. It's a book about a family of fussy eaters who try to make their mother breakfast on her birthday, botch the whole meal, toss it in the oven to cover their mess, and accidentally end up with a "pink and plump and perfect cake" (apologies if I get some words wrong; I'm writing this from memory). If you want to get really deep and stretch a bit, you can also see it as a tale of the happy accidents that come when unhappy ingredients crash together.

We all are or have been miserable--infertility, whether it is functionally- or medically-based, hurts. Even when you are not actively trying to add to your family, it has left a scar. Infertility and loss are the unhappy ingredients. But we throw them into this pot--the Creme de la Creme list--and we get this fantastic creation. It will make you laugh and cry and nod in agreement and curse the writers.

At the end of the first day, there are 23 currently on the list. 23 blogs, 23 posts, 23 sets of words that are going to move you beyond belief. There is a song that will literally make you pee in your pants every time you remember it as you walk over to the shwanking rooms at the clinic. And there is a post about the day a woman learned she was about to become a mother a few weeks later. There is a rallying cry for fertility coverage and an explanation for infertility to those outside its realm of understanding. I hope I get 23 every day between now and December 23rd. Wouldn't that be an incredible list?

We sort of are like the kids in that Hoberman book, we all throw in our ingredients BUT just as they were each responsible for whipping up this cake during future meals, we each can spread the word about the list and try to get everyone in the infertility/pregnancy loss/adoption blogosphere to have a contribution on the list. Please nudge your favourite bloggers to send along a link.

So I apologize for the short emails or if it takes me a few days to write you back. Or all forms of rudeness that come from a lack of cohesive understanding when it comes to blogiquette. Or perhaps that's just my excuse for being a complete dick. Beyond being mega into wizarding (of which I still am).

Um...and send your link! And don't be turned away by my gruff "don't you dare leave your link in the fucking comments section or I will rip your head straight off your neck and..." that I left in the Creme de la Creme post. It was only the blog post that you couldn't leave in the link in order to keep it a surprise. You can still leave me a comment. Make me feel special. Make me feel like a trillion dollars.

Added:

Just wanted to add that when I admitted my distress at a host of blogging issues--from the length of time it can take me to respond to an email to replying to comments to writing brief replies to having a row occur in the comments section--Josh replied that the rule should be that "if it's rude in real life, it's rude online too." Which is a good rule until you start applying it and then you remember that terse replies in real life are rude therefore "got it" is equally rude. And then Josh says, "but you can't write back everything you want to write each time." To which I reply, "but then you're telling me to be rude because terse replies are rude in real life." To which he says, "Mel, email is different." And I shoot back, "but then your rule is worthless." Which leaves me back at square one.

Sorry, last thought:

And this all goes back to politeness and rudeness. For whatever reason, a bunch of the Creme de la Creme emails have gotten stuck in my spam filter. Which isn't a big deal--I just fish them out. But sometimes things get deleted from the spam filter before I can save them. If you send your submission and you don't get back my little, rude "got it" email within 24 hours please send it again. You will get back some response from me when I open the email so...if you haven't gotten a response, I haven't gotten the email. See, this is where politeness can actually save the day! Three cheers for a response, even if it is a lame response.

For those who have been having problems with the badge, does this work? Again, change all the { to < when you put it on your blog (there are 6 of them) and bring it all into a fluid paragraph (I had to divide things like "getting-ready-to-read" onto two lines to get it to fit):

{a href="http://stirrup-queens.blogspot.com/2007/12/getting-ready-to-
read-little-creme.html" target="_top"}
{img alt="Creme" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_2SDEpISlohw/R1L4JRVi5II/
AAAAAAAABRg/ZVNmR_9POno/s200/Creme+de+la+Creme+List+Are+
You+2.JPG"/}{/a}