Category Archives: Awards

January 2, 2012 · 0:00

The Envelope Please, Part II

There’s a reason I got crap presents for Christmas this year.  I’ve been a bad girl.  All throughout the month of December, I failed to pass on awards that I received.

Santa, I can explain!  For the rest of you, just sit back and set a spell.  It’s gonna be a long night.

Now Santa, what with all the stuff I had to do for Christmas, and actually trying to keep my job and neurotically trying to get to 5,000 hits on my blog by New Year’s (I made it!), well, I just didn’t have time to really think about these awards.

Now, some folks don’t like these awards, and that’s OK.  I’m giving it to you anyway.  Get over it.

Me, I think it is nice to be appreciated, and it gives me an excuse to really look at the blogs I read, to see who is doing what.  I also tried, I really tried to NOT give an award to someone who already has it.  But since, like me, hardly anybody knows how to get those little pictures over at the side of their blogs, it’s hard to tell.  That’s why I did a special page for my awards – not because I am such a snob (well, yes I am, but that’s not the reason I did it).  It was because I got nominated for one award six times and felt that was the only way I could let you know.

So here are the awards I got, and the people I’m giving them to.  Happy New Year!

Two special mentions here.

First, my friend Delajus at Higher and Higher is a woman I met in an online writing course.  We became fast friends.  She tells me the truth about my writing.  She argues with me.  She never hits “like” because she can’t find the “this is crap” button.  She is a beginning blogger, and only writes when she has something important to share.  She writes beautifully and is one incredibly thoughtful and thought-provoking woman.

Nancy at notquiteold led me directly or indirectly to the whole gang of folks I now consider my blogging buddies.  She wrote a comment on Crabby Old Fart that was funny, perceptive and right on target.  So I clicked on her blog and found a wonderful site.  Whenever I see that she has a new post, I wait until I have time to read it and synthesize it.  Her posts are often about ordinary things in which she finds humor, whimsy and love.  I started clicking on her commenters, and that’s how I found most of the rest of you.

As I said, I tried to look and see what blog awards folks have received, and give them ones they haven’t gotten yet.  If I left you out, I didn’t mean it.  Please let me know and I will rectify.  Because my birthday is coming up and I don’t want no more crappy gifts!

Candle Lighter Award (Thanks to Ardinam at Being Arindam)

My friend Arindam awarded me the Candle Lighter Award a couple of weeks ago.  There are no rules here, I get to award it to as many people as I choose.

Higher and Higher

An Observant Mind

Articles of Absurdity

Aurora Morealis

Georgette Sullins’s Blog

life is a bowl of kibble

notquiteold

Prairie Wisdom

RVingGirl

Sandy like a Beach

Sleep deprived and insane

Sunny Side Up

Undercover Surfer

Winsomebella

 Awesome Blog Content Award (Thanks to Susan at Susan Writes Precise)

This one is simple – to ‘accept’ the award you just add the abc award logo to your blog – the links are at the bottom of this page for you… and then you can share something about yourself with your readers and then pass the award on to other worthy bloggers – there’s no limit to how few – or how many – other bloggers you can send this to.

To share something about yourself – you will need to go through the alphabet and choose a word or phrase for each letter and use that to describe yourself – it might be something about you, something you like, or a place or thing you dream about. And that’s all – no long descriptions or detail – just create a new post, add your shiny new blog award badge and alphabet words and let your readers enjoy finding out a little more about you.  Like Susan, I will do that separately.

So here are my choices:

Higher and Higher

An Observant Mind

Georgette Sullins’s Blog

Childhood Relived

MJ Monaghan

Renovating Rita

Susan Writes Precise – because she’s good AND because of the post she did on the Penis Museum

Undercover Surfer

Winsomebella

Year-Struck

 Kreative Blogger Award (Thanks to Janice at Aurora Morealis)

 

Kreative Blogger Award started in 2008 when an Norwegian Lady named Hulda uses fabrics to create the first Kreative Blogger logo, and gave it to her sister and 3 other friends who she thought are creative. Her sister and friends passed the logo on to other bloggers whom they liked, and thus the trend began.

Today the Kreative Blogger Award logo has evolved, and along with the award that comes with some rules:

  • The Kreativ Blogger image must be displayed on the blog.
  • The nominator must be acknowledged.
  • The recipient must state ten things about himself that his readers probably don’t know.
  • The recipient must pass the award along by nominating at least six blogs to receive the award.

And the envelope, please:

An Observant Mind

AFrankAngle

Childhood Relived

Good Humored

MJ Monaghan

Sandy like a Beach

Year-Struck

 One Lovely Blog Award (Thanks to Janice at Aurora Morealis)

One Lovely Blog Award Rules:

  1. Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award and his or her blog link.
  2. Pass the award to 15 other blogs that you’ve newly discovered.
  3. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

The envelope, please:

An Observant MInd

Being Arindam

life is a bowl of kibble

Prairie Wisdom

Renovating Rita

RVingGirl

Sleep deprived and insane

Sunny Side Up

Winsomebella

The Versatile Blogger Award (Thanks to Janice at Aurora Morealis and Prairie Wisdom)

The Rules for The Versatile Blogger Award:

  1. Thank and link back to the person that gave you the award.
  2. Share seven things about yourself.
  3. Pass the award to fifteen bloggers that you think deserve it. (Elyse here – there is lots of room.  But many of my blogging buddies have already received this one)
  4. Lastly, contact all of the bloggers that you’ve picked for the award.

The envelope, please:

Being Arindam

Magsx2′s Blog

MJ Monaghan

She’s a Maineiac

psychodynamom

The Red Educational Shoe Award (Thanks to Lorre at Articles of Absurdity)

For this one, I first need crutches if I am expected to walk in that shoe.  I also need to pass it on to 5 supportive commenters.  OK, so I can’t count.

The envelope, please:

Childhood Relived

Emjayandthem

Higher and Higher

notquiteold

Sleep deprived and insane

psychodynamom

She’s a Maineiac

Year-Struck

So, Santa, you see, I’ve been busy.  But I am having a great time reading and commenting and sharing laughs with all of you guys.  Thanks for reading my stuff, too!

OK, everybody.  Wake up and look for your website.

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January 1, 2012 · 0:00

The Envelope, Please, Part I

Remember how I told you that my acting career died in a broom closet?  I lied.  I mean, I took literary license.  That’s allowed, you know.  I pretend to be a writer both at work and here in the ‘sphere; I am allowed to lie.  So there.

But even after leaving my dream in tatters with the mops and brooms, I continued to pipe-dream.  That’s different than the real thing, and you don’t have to remember lines, or stage directions or what to do with props.  It’s actually much easier.  You get to keep your privacy, too, which is nice.

Most of my friends are aware of this fantasy of mine, and of my need to, from time to time, stand on a table (instead of a stage) and tell a story.  It often involves alcoholic beverages.  The table standing, not necessarily the story.

So, as I try to figure out recipients for the awards I’ve received for blogging in the last couple of weeks, I know when I have an opening.  So tonight, I’m going to tell you about the night I received my Oscars.

Really.  It was an incredibly special night for me.  An honor really.  Well, actually, two honors.  Two Oscars.  Two Awards.  But I only got to make one speech.

It was 1983, and some really fun people worked in my office that summer, one of whom, Jon, was from the area.  Carol, Mike, Jon and I all went to Jon’s house one night.  You see, 1983 was still in the Bronze Age, and Jon’s parents were on the cutting age of technology, because they had a VCR.  And Risky Business had just come out on video.

In the middle of the movie, we took a beer/bathroom break.  And guess what I spotted, casually stuck on the bookshelf in the TV room of Rob’s house.

Oscar 

And Oscar

It turned out that Jon’s father was a filmmaker.  Documentary films.  And while Rob didn’t know of my dreams, Carol sure did.  So my pals presented me with two Oscars for Documentary Filmmaking.  Sadly, not one of us had a camera.  Probably just as well, because not many stars accept wearing blue jeans.

Receiving Oscar, and his twin, Oscar, was a special honor to me, since I had neither made, nor been in any documentary films, nor even fetched donuts and coffee for the real filmmakers.  Regardless,  I got to hold Oscar and Oscar, and I got to make a speech accepting my Academy Awards.  So I am in an unusual club of people who have never actually acted or contributed in any way, shape or form to a movie, who has been presented an Academy Award.

Yes, I’m that good.

But I am of a generous nature.  And while I cannot give each and every one of my blogging buddies an Oscar, I am able to share some awards I have recently received.

But first, I have to figure out who has won what, so as not to be redundant.  Redundancy is OK when you’re getting Oscars, but not so much with blog awards.  But that’ll come.  Soon.  Because we bloggers are taking over the world!  Oscar and Oscar would be proud.

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December 13, 2011 · 0:00

SevenBySeven

Last week, Georgette Sullins nominated me for the

I am honored — Thanks Georgette.  I appreciate your thinking of me!  I think that just about everyone who reads my blog (both of you) reads Georgette’s.  It is one of my personal favorites and was one of the first sites I found when I was looking for folks to read.

One of the things that I must do in accepting this award is tell something that nobody knows about me.  My secret is that I have a friend, Delajus.  The fact that I have a friend, isn’t completely shocking.  But my friend has helped me and my writing enormously, particularly at the beginning.  Because she is one of the few people I know who will honestly say: “Ummm, Elyse?  That’s not funny.”  Other people do say that, but I ignore them.  For some reason, I often listen to Delajus.  Annoyingly, she’s usually right.

Now, the 7×7 award demands work.  I’ve been away, and it has taken me a few days to figure out what to say, because I need to look at my stuff, and the stuff others have written and make some choices.  I HATE choices.  But here they are:

Most beautiful piece.  This was the easiest to figure out, because I don’t write “beautiful.”  Well, not normally, anyway.  But I think that Happy Adoption Day would qualify.  There was not a bit of snark in that piece, so in addition to it being my most beautiful, it would qualify as most surprising.  But hey, I will only count it once.

Most helpful.  An easy question:  A Better Way– which outlines, ummm, a better way to choose the GOP nominee for president.  Even though we have gone through 2 (or is it 3?  4?) GOP frontrunners in the weeks since I posted it, well, it is still a better way.

Most popular. Thanksgiving Weekend, I was busy, had company, and had been doing a lot of cooking.  But when I took the night off and read the directions for the frozen dinner I was preparing, well, I had to post:  Too much information.  That got the most hits of any piece I wrote.  I did not tweak it, I just plopped it in the slot and hit publish.  Go figure.

Most controversial.  An early piece, I recommended what we should do with stupid people.  My destination for them, though, was controversial:  Manitoba Bound.

Most surprisingly successful.  Great Balls of Fire.  Folks seemed to like reading about my new neighbor, and his Civil War fantasy.  My husband still expects him to read this piece and, umm, retaliate.

Most underrated.  Hmmmmm.  I could link to the “My Favs” block up there on the right.  Those are the ones I did way back, oh, six months ago when I started this blog.  That was when I chose every word with extreme care, and edited and re-edited to an anal degree.  Of those, I would say Downsizing is possibly my favorite.

Most pride worthy.  …comes around or Gunsmoke.   Sorry, I can’t decide.  “…comes around”  is very personal.  “Gunsmoke” is more of a national issue.  You choose.  Well, if you read them, that is!

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So, who to nominate? These are bloggers I follow who (1) are really good and (2) have not (as far as I can tell) already won this award:
  1. An Observant Mind:  She is one of my favorite bloggers – and had the audacity to take a month off.  She’s back, and as funny and thoughtful as ever.
  2. Childhood Relived .  Or is it Childhood Reviled?  One of the two.  While Angie is really hilarious, it is worth checking out her blog just to see the look on her face in the picture she has up on the right, where she sits next to her big brother.  I’m sure her parents were thrilled when the picture was developed.
  3. Prairie Wisdom.  PW is a varied blog — she writes practical things, she writes funny things, she writes about life.  Check out her blog.  It is always new and different and fun.
  4. Ramblings and Rumblings.  R&R is an irreverent and humorous person.  She mirrors my warped sense of politics and puts it into pictures.
  5. RVing Girl lives in Bermuda and her humor is often priceless.  Besides, I can’t hate her for living in Bermuda if I plan to move in with her one day …
  6. Sandy Like a Beach is another funny woman.  I guess you have to be if folks can’t figure out how to spell/say your name when it is “Sandy” and you need to explain it to them.  She has to be funny or become an ax murderer.  Wise choice, Sandy!
  7. Sunny Side Up.  Lori at Sunny Side Up’s blog is unfailingly cheerful, funny, and makes me feel good.  And her banner — with  a lovely image of Black-eyed Susans — makes me feel sunny, too. Besides, my Dad used to make me Sunny Side Up eggs which I always think of when I see that I have a new post from Lori.

Thanks again to Georgette who made my day by nominating me, even if it was a day a week ago.  But I had to put on my thinking cap to do this piece.  Not like usual.

***********

Well, apparently my thinking cap wasn’t good enough, because I forgot to mention what the 7 folks I mentioned just up there need to do to carry on the tradition.  It’s pretty simple:

  1. Tell something about yourself that no one knows;
  2. List 7 of your posts, including:  Most Beautiful; Most Helpful, Most Popular, Most Controversial, Most Surprisingly Successful, Most Underrated, and Most Prideworthy
  3. Nominate the next 7 bloggers to receive this award.

I’d like to add another:  Make sure you pass along these instructions to the folks who have to do it.  Letting the recipients know that you’ve nominated them helps, too!

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