483rd Friday Blog Roundup

So you may have noticed (though probably not if you’re a regular reader of this blog) that I turned on comment moderation.  It only affects the first comment you leave.  Once I’ve approved your first comment, you should be able to comment without moderation (save for a select few that Akismet always dumps in moderation for whatever reason).  But this will hopefully help with the enormous quantities of spam that get past Akismet without changing anything for you.  I will still need to deal with the spam, but I’ll get to it in my own, sweet time instead of feeling pressure to be cleaning it up the moment it hits my site.  I spend an extraordinary amount of time daily cleaning up spam.

Every real comment will still go up as long as it conforms to my commenting policy which is fairly loose: no hate speech, cruelty, or traffic grabbing.  I define traffic grabbing as someone who leaves a comment solely to drive traffic elsewhere.  Just want to make that clear: I never delete a comment that links to a personal blog — I want to be able to follow a comment back to someone else’s space and see what they’re writing about.  I am not talking about linking to your story.  But I do delete comments that write something like, “nice job!” and then link to a site where someone is selling something.  They clearly weren’t here to join a conversation.

I know that there is no one out there who likes spam, but I absolutely abhor spam.  I hate not having things neat and organized, and spam is like someone dropping crumbs in my inbox or on my blog.  It’s just another little mess I need to clean up.  Nothing huge, but annoying at the same time.

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Early bird pricing for BlogHer ends today.  If you were considering going, now is the time to buy your ticket because you can get $150 off.

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The Americans started back up again.  That show freaks me out so much.  And it’s on late.  So I watch it and freak myself out right before bed.  But it was so good to see everyone in that first episode.  I’ve missed them.

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And now the blogs…

But first, second helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week.  In order to read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• “Why Miscarriage Matters When You’re Pro-life” (The Lewis Note)
• “Loss of Innocence with Hope” (Oh Baby, Baby)

Okay, now my choices this week.

No Kidding in NZ has a post about the flip side of gratitude and how she hears people processing appreciation for their life.  It’s an interesting take on trying to please others which comes to the conclusion that you can’t.  Especially not with a blog where your words are directed at a wide range of people vs. a single individual.  Go over and read the posts and comments.

A Woman My Age has a post about being a practicing Buddhist for 15 years.  She explains, “At the end of the marital struggles, elder care, depressions, job loss, and infertility, I KNEW I had the ability to survive any MOTHERFUCKING thing.  Including myself.”  It’s a wonderful post about the journey which keeps going and going and going.

A+ Effort has a post on the two year anniversary of becoming a mother.  It is so simple and so profound.  Congratulations!

Lastly, Serenity in Chaos has a post about the birth of her friend’s child.  She writes, “I was HAPPY for her, but also couldn’t help feeling a bit jealous. After all, this is the first biracial baby in my inner circle and it was DIFFICULT not to have any thought of “this could have been ours”. I couldn’t help staring at the cute baby photos on the first day. More than three times a day. On purpose.”  I loved this post for the deep honesty which covers the gamut from twinges to unbridled happiness.  It’s just a beautiful capturing of a moment in time.

The roundup to the Roundup: Trying to combat blog spam.  BlogHer early bird pricing ends today.  The Americans is back!  And lots of great posts to read.  So what did you find this week?  Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between February 21st and February 28th) and not the blog’s main url. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week?  Read the original open thread post here.