AliThinks

Adieu

2011-01-05T20:13:28-05:00

After much thought, I've decided to quit writing here at AliThinks. Don't fret, Constant Reader, I shall inhabit another space on the internet. If you'd like to know how to get there, please leave me a comment or send an email to ali dot thinks at gmail dot com.

Thank you for reading my words these past six and a half years. Thank you for leaving your own here. And for some of you, thank you for becoming my friend.

Twenty Eleven

2011-01-01T01:02:34-05:00

Happy New Year, all.

May you have a healthy, happy year.

An Interesting Discovery

2010-12-30T02:27:34-05:00

I found a guy named Adam whose blog is called Adam Thinks. Whaddaya know? Anyway, I chanced upon Adam and his Thinking via Political Irony, who posted this image that Adam made. Adam is clearly still enthustiastic about blogging, and more power to him.

AliThinks, AllanThinks, Adam Thinks. I wonder how many other Thinks blogs there are out there. This is the first time in 6+ years of blogging I've come across another NameThinks. No, really.

Just One Of Those Things

2010-12-20T00:46:59-05:00

As I was reading a friend's blog entry (and it was the included image that made me think of this, but the post is worth reading), I was reminded of a time when my paternal grandmother corrected me. I was young, maybe six, maybe a little older, and I was talking to her about Nancy Drew. I mentioned Nancy's tit-ee-an hair, and my grandma said, "Tee-shan."

My grandmother was of country stock, she lived on a dirt road, and yet she knew how to pronounce Titian. She'd been to college. She also knew how to make whoopie pies, which she we called devil dogs. She knew a whole lot of stuff, and I wish I could hang out with her for a while. I left the country at the end of 1992, and my grandma died in 1999. I saw her in between, but she had Alzheimer's, so it was hard. I don't know if she knew that the baby she held in 1996 was my daughter Charlotte.

This is just one of those things. Tonight I made Christmas-y treats with two of my friends, and our significant others were there too. We had a great time. But S. reminisced about her grandmother's bun recipe, which no one had managed to write down, and I thought about my grandma's cooking. We have her recipe for Texas sheet cake, Ranger cookies*, and some other things. I feel sure, however, that there were things that Grandma made without a recipe, and we've probably lost those forever.

*I preferred chocolate chip cookies, but Grandma seemed to always make Ranger cookies.

And so we go on. If I have grandchildren, they may not care that I correct their pronunciation of Titian; they may never encounter that word. And that's okay. (It took a lot for me to write that.) I do hope that I can give them some memories, and more importantly, some recipes.

Which means, oh hell, I need to start writing my cooking down.

2010-12-14T00:52:03-05:00

Here I am testing the "Quick Compose" feature on Typepad. I'm not really sure what the point is. My first guess is that it's supposed to be like Tumblr.

Edit from within Typepad: There's no title! MEH. Also the permalink is a gajillion miles long. Whatever. I'll click an extra time or two to bring up the Compose window in Typepad. (Also, I know the Quick Compose thing has been around for a while; I was just never that interested in using it. I was right.)

First Of All,

2010-12-04T01:30:08-05:00

thank you. I really appreciated your comments, some of which surprised me. I have lurkers!

And while I haven't looked at my stats, I'm sure that if there's a high point, it's because of all you commenters. Which brings me to:

You like me! You really like me! (Apologies to Sally F.)

It seems a little like vouja dé. I feel like I've done this sort of "zOMG, do you laaaiiiiiiike me?" thing before, and that troubles me.

Because really, à la base, and excuse my French, isn't blogging supposed to be about the blogger rather than the audience? (Here's where you chime in "Why yes, Alison, yes!")

And so I guess I will start thinking of myself and what I want to say. If you want to read my words and thoughts, then that's great. If you don't, that's fine. I think I'll keep writing for ME in this space. If I move from here, I'll let you know.

I Should Blog That

2010-11-22T01:40:34-05:00

The title of this entry is in opposition with this photo of me that Allan took back in 2005.

I seem to have lost that t-shirt in transition, and I mean that in every sense of the word.

Tonight I posted a link on Facebook, and I included a lot of commentary, and then in a comment to my own commentary, I wrote "Also, bla bla bla. I should really turn half of my statuses on Facebook into blog entries."

And I really should.

It's no secret that Facebook and Twitter took away from my blogging. My move from France back the US took away from my blogging, and it took away some of my readers, as well.

I need to decide what I'm willing to put here. And if that turns out to be "nothing," I need to shut this blog down.

Typepad has been great, but if I'm not using the service, why continue paying?

And now I'm going to do something I never thought I'd do. If you are reading this, if you read my blog, even if you never comment, please comment now. I'd like to know what the stats can't tell me. You don't even have to say anything if you don't want to. Just leave a * or some other symbol. I just want to know how many people are really reading me.

Thanks in advance.

In Praise Of Locally-Owned Joints

2010-11-16T00:05:04-05:00

A few days ago a locally-based independent bookstore announced that it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, about a week after announcing it would close two of its stores in Charlotte and Pittsburgh. Now, Joseph-Beth will also close stores in Cleveland and Nashville.

I work in a locally-owned (not -based, nuance) independent bookstore, and I do not relish this news. Joseph-Beth's Lexington store (their flagship) will remain open. So that's good. This town has several book stores, and I believe it's a big enough town that we can all co-exist.

The announcement last week got me thinking about the nature of bookstores. Say what you will about digital media and "the death of print," but there is still a place in society for bookstores. One of the common complaints I've heard about Joseph-Beth is that it sold so much besides books. "It's like a gift shop that has books," is the refrain. That kind of store has its place for sure. But Joseph-Beth and Barnes & Noble are such big places that when you go it becomes a "shopping experience."

The bookstore I work in is small. Many people think that it is a used bookstore, because they are not used to seeing such a small bookstore with new inventory. And at least once a week, we have a customer who says "I had no idea this place was here!" or "I'm so glad I found you!" and that feels really good.

About a year ago, my friend Nick wrote a piece for a local weekly alternative paper, and he spent some time at the Morris book shop talking to my manager, Hap. The resulting essay was long, but what Nick wrote stayed with me: the idea of a bookstore as a cultural commons. Here's a PDF link to the paper the article was in. (The article starts on page 5; incidentally, there is an awesome review of the Twilight series by another friend on page 1.) Here are some choice phrases that Nick wrote about the place I work:

Local bookshops are able to
provide the interpersonal intimacy
absent from the digital realm. More
specifically, a transaction at a shop
like Morris establishes a relationship
beyond mere commodity, or informa-
tion, exchange. The shop is a nexus
for community interests, interests that
one shouldn’t have to—even virtually—
leave his or her community to explore.
Its connective tissue is simply people
(who are your neighbors) and books.

...

There’s no telling what will happen
to the printed word in the future, but
places like Morris needn’t worry any-
time soon. By providing a venue for
the community to educate itself and
learn about one another, it connects
to its customers by establishing bonds
that transcend typical commodity
transactions. While its fate is beholden
to the industry it operates within, it
sees itself—and deserves to be seen—as
something greater than a middleman.

Nick wrote some good anecdotes about that afternoon he spent at the Morris book shop, so if you have a few minutes, the entire article is worth a read. What I've quoted here is the crux of it, however. A bookstore is a gathering place for ideas. Sure, coffee helps. But we don't have coffee at the Morris book shop (yet), and I have to tell you, I have been privy to — and participated in — some incredible conversations over the past 18 months that I've worked there.

I'm not so starry-eyed as to think that these kinds of "cultural commons" discussions don't happen outside of small, independent bookstores. Of course they do. Connections are made all the time, in all kinds of places. But places like the Morris book shop, or Third Street Stuff and Coffee, or Coffee Times, or the Co-op have an intimacy that larger stores do not. These are community-oriented, locally-owned places. Their patrons are community-oriented as well. These are the places where ideas are discussed, fleshed out, perhaps even come to fruition.

I've no doubt that Joseph-Beth was once this kind of place. And I think as we move forward, we need to look back to a time when homogenization was only something you associated with milk. There will always be chain stores and restaurants. Some folks crave the stability of having the same offerings no matter what city they are in, and I kind of get that. But in our own towns, let's embrace the local joints: not only are they motors of the economy, but that's where stuff really happens.

Free AliThinks!

2010-11-09T23:01:38-05:00

Nahhhh, not really.

My Typepad account was suspended a couple of weeks ago (while I was in France, phew, I didn't want to let any of you ingrates know I was out of the country anyway). I'd failed to update my debit card info. So while you could read my blog, I couldn't post to it. I didn't mind; as I said, I was away from home, and I don't like to broadcast that kind of information.

But then I had another dilemma: should I renew at all? Typepad's parent company Six Apart was recently sold to Video Egg. Y'all have Google fingers. I'm not linking today. I'm not sure what it means for Typepad. And I'm not sure I want to continue blogging.

I have to think about things over the next few weeks. You know, the future of this blog. The future of the archives of this blog. That kind of thing.

Love-Hate

2010-10-20T00:49:57-04:00

Every damn day I hate Facebook for one reason or another.

But then I look at the good stuff about it, and I relax. I still hate it. I will always hate Facebook to some degree, but that kid knew what he was doing. So I commend him for that, and I continue to use his service, which changed my life here in Lexington. (See? I can't hate it that much. It really helped me in a social way.)

I heard about Facebook when you still needed a .edu email to join, so I got an alum email address from my alma mater. I was an early adult adopter, and some of my earliest friends on Facebook were my blogging friends. And I don't mean that in a hipster way, like Facebook is so uncool now that they let everyone in.

(Although I'm sure that folks who were in college five years ago feel that way. To that I say I GET YOU.)

The changes Facebook has made annoy me. To be sure, rare is the FB application that I will allow. And I clamp down on my privacy settings as soon as I hear about a change. For this bullshit, I hate Facebook. But for all the rest, I love it.

And I hate that I love it.

I Wish I Had A Snappy Title For This Post

2010-10-17T23:54:38-04:00

Today a Facebook friend from high school posted an AP photo of President Obama. She said "This picture was actually attached to an AP article entitled Many Obama 2008 supporters defecting to GOP....is it just me, or do I detect a little craziness in his eye? maybe its just the full moon...."

I thought of commenting that the media often uses unflattering photos of personalities. Then I thought better of it, so I said nothing.

Then I saw that another guy who was in our high school class said this about the photo: "He's a liberal...of course he's nuts."

I took the bait.

I replied, "Gee, based on that logic, I must be nuts too."

To which the guy said "That would be correct."

I replied back, "Wow. Have a great Sunday. See ya!"

I just didn't want to get into a political argument with someone I wasn't even friends with back in high school.

My friend who'd posted the link called him out on the name calling (he'd also spewed some other stuff about liberals, then said "You can't fix stupid. LOL"), and I have to commend her for that. It was also her space that was being used, so I don't blame her.

I addressed her, and agreed with what she had said regarding politics. She is more conservative than I am, I am pretty sure, but she seems to be open to other points of view, and doesn't label people.

The point here is two threefold: No matter our political beliefs, those who are on the other side of the spectrum are not crazy or stupid. And yes, it took a lot for me to write that. But being labeled "nuts" and "stupid" by someone whose beliefs are more conservative than my own made me realize that we tend to operate in generalities.

The other second point is that we can always learn something from the other side.

The third is that it's important to vote.

And there's another thing I thought about all afternoon: I'm proud of who I am, of my principles and beliefs. That might be another blog entry, although as my t-shirt rightly states, I never finish anyth

Well, That Was Fun

2010-10-11T22:17:04-04:00

The 2010 Alltech/FEI World Equestrian Games are over, and so is my paid role of raising awareness for Alltech's Sustainable Haiti Project.

It was a great experience, a definite learning experience. And there's one more video to come: me reading a poem to Heather. I can't wait to embarrass my kids with it. (Because me? I'm 40. I just don't care anymore.)

Many thanks to David Wescott, who brought me on to the Haiti Project, and to Heather Chapman, my partner in crime.

So it's back to normal here at AliThinks. And boy, have I been thinking. I just have to deem what's blogworthy. Wish me luck with that.