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Friday, November 14, 2008

Friday Blog Roundup

So...you may have noticed this week that I've gone a bit Kirtsy Krazy (like that? The double "K"s? Does that make me clever?). First and foremost, it's a great time suck. It's like tapping into a very cool Google Reader that you can skim. I read the tiny explanations on the post and only click on the ones that interest me. Secondly, it's pretty much all women so there is a modicum of "this is our space" to it that doesn't exist for me with Digg.

Which brings to thirdly--I want to see our stuff on the front page and I want other women to find our stuff. We are 12.5% of the child-bearing age population. In America, we are 7.4 million citizens. We are a large portion of the population and our posts are underrepresented there. And we deserve front page space as much as posts about Elizabeth Hurley's boobs or cute panda bear photos.

So I'm starting to Kirtsy one post per day and writing what I'm Kirtsying on the LFCA under the first category as Kirtsy'd Pick O' the Day. So far, we have managed to get four out of four posts to the front page of Kirtsy this week. How do you "vote" for something with Kirtsy? Simply by clicking on the title of a story. So it's two clicks: you click from my link to the post on Kirtsy and then you click on the post's title. You don't even need an account with Kirtsy to participate.

I am hoping that (1) you will "vote" so it gets on the front page and can be found by other infertile women who may not yet be part of the ALI (adoption/loss/infertility) blogosphere as well as the general public and (2) help me find good posts to Kirtsy.

What makes a good Kirtsy post? Something with staying power. Something that doesn't require you to know a person's backstory in order to jump into the post. Something that presents a "how-to" or stands as a quintessential post to the experience. Angry Infertile's Noob List is fantastic--you can read it well into the future and it still makes sense. A post about a fight with your husband--not so much. I mean, it may make for a great read, but it isn't going to move up the ranks in Kirtsy.

Good:
  • Anything that gives insight into the experience (a blow-by-blow of your HSG)
  • Anything that presents a "how to" or gives a guide (such as AI's Noob List)
  • Anything that kicks off an ongoing project (such as Perfect Moment Mondays)
  • Anything that stands as an example of part of the ALI experience (the day you matched, your first retrieval, getting the diagnosis, etc).
Not Good:
  • Anything so personal that it's not accessible without knowing the backstory.
  • Anything that is so all-over-the-place that it can't be summed up in a sentence or two.
  • Anything that is just your average post (do you know what I mean? The one you'll never remember two days from now).
If you're considering using it for the Creme de la Creme, if it is something that you wish could get a larger audience, if you think you have something that could give insight to an outsider, please send it my way. Either your own stuff or something you read along the way. I will not be able to Kirtsy everything and I may not write back about each post (I feel like a tremendous bitch writing that and I'm apologizing in advance), but I will read everything and try to get a balance out there of experiences and types of posts. Email me the permalink for the post with the word "Kirtsy" in the subject line.

Please help out also by voting for Kirtsy'd posts. That is how they actually reach the front page. I'm trying to keep Kirtsying to a minimum so the site is not flooded and the voting watered down. Hence why I may not be able to Kirtsy everything that comes in or everything I find on my own. But I'll put the posts I've Kirtsy'd in the news section of the LFCA.

*******
Speaking of great posts, I'm kicking off the Creme de la Creme list this Monday. The list will go up in the order in which posts have been added therefore, if you want to be towards the top, perhaps take this weekend to start perusing your archives and making some decisions. There will be a simple form to fill out to submit your post and I will do the rest. Please be sure to read the whole post because I've streamlined the process this year. Last year, we had almost 200 posts on the list and I expect there will be the same amount if not more. So I need the time to read and write the blurbs for all of the posts. This is seriously my favourite thing I do all year. I'm really excited to get this party started.

Oh--and EVERYONE is welcome to participate (and I hope you do) regardless of whether you have 300 posts under your belt or only 3.

*******
And now, the blogs...

Fighting Infertility has a post called "No Other Colour But Blue" about the cycle of hope. The post begins with this gorgeous thought: "My blues come post-mortem – it happens when every hope goes and I’m weeping on its grave being deeply sorry for myself." It is a post that is wholly familiar while being completely unique.

An Older Version has a post about her life being an extended holiday from reality as well as how she stopped trying-to-conceive and move away from family building. She writes about the reinvention of herself: "I pull myself up by the roots, and not only do I try to replant myself somewhere else, I also think I can somehow become a new species if I just try hard enough." It's an incredible post about examining the new woman she has become and wondering not only how she got there but if she wants to be there at all.

An Infertility Odyssey has a post about feeling like she's just getting by. She writes: "I almost felt like I could see myself in this deep dark hole where I could just barely make out a pinhole of light above me. the more I tried to get out the deeper I got. I know that sounds too much like depression, but not so. It is loss, and grief, sadness, pain (both physical and emotional). It was all of those things." It is the perfect post: one that needs to be read as much for the reader as for the writer.

I Kirtsy'd it, but in case you missed it, this post about standing at the eve of foster parenting by I Think I Hear Your Mother Calling needs to be read. Not just because it is raw and deep and beautiful, but because it is a small window into another world; a chance to try on someone else's shoes. She writes: "Then the hurt came crashing down. We aren't doing this while I'm miserably pregnant - the emptiness of my womb is like a third person in the room. I will never know what it's like to be pregnant, this is something that has been made clear. We aren't doing this with a referral in our back pocket. We aren't doing this while our matched birthmother prepares for labor." I promise you that the rest of the post is equally as gorgeous.

A roundup to the Roundup: Kirtsy while you're thinking what to say, it saves time (name that book!). Creme de la Creme is coming. Lots of excellent blog posts to read. Will catch you back here Saturday night for Show and Tell.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Just a wild suggestion, but what about some of the posts from Operation Heads Up for Kirsty? So many of them are well written and focused....

Just a thought.

HereWeGoAJen said...

You are not a tremedous bitch.

I am so glad that you told us how to do the Kirtsy thing. I tried, but couldn't figure it out.

emma said...

Mel...you have introduced some major time-suckage into my life but I love you for it. I've already found some shoes I want to buy, a Christmas present idea. Kirtsy is exactly what I've always wanted but never knew about.

Jendeis said...

A Me Too on the thank you for the Kirtsy instructions. I had no idea what to do (let alone know what Kirtsy was).

If you need any help with the Creme de la Creme, please let me know. I'd love to help.

Kristin said...

You are not a bitch for not being able to acknowledge every submission. No matter how hard you try, there are still only 24 hours in a day. I am amazed you do as much as you do.

Anonymous said...

I second the "not a tremendous bitch" vote. You're a busy woman. I, like others, have no idea how you manage to do so much and still raise the kids, feed the husband, and, oh yeah, WRITE A BOOK.

Shelli said...

Speaking of Google Reader (or any reader for that matter), I noticed that you are not publishing Full Feed posts anymore.

Any chance you might switch it back? I get cranky when I can'r eyeball an entire post in Reader. lol.

oooh, and I love Kirtsy~

Anonymous said...

I'm not familiar with kirtsy but I'll head over there - though it sounds like a dangerous place!