Monday, December 31, 2007

Your Substitute Monday Photo Shoot: What's New?

Cross-posted from Outpost Mâvarin: Your Substitute Monday Photo Shoot: What's New?

As you should all know by now, today (Monday, December 31st, 2007) was John Scalzi's last day blogging for AOL on By the Way. A number of people have said they were going to miss John's Monday Photo Shoots, and a few have asked me whether anyone will be picking up the slack, and assigning them in John's stead. MPS addict that I am, I'm willing to give it a shot. How about you?

Here's how this will work: I will post an entry every Monday with that week's subject. (After this week, it will be early Monday AM, not Monday night.) If you want to join in, take your picture, post it to your blog or journal, and leave a link in the comments to the original entry here. On Thursday night, I'll do a follow-up entry just as John did, linking back to everyone who participated. Simple, no? Then let's get started!

Your Substitute Monday Photo Shoot #1: What's New? In honor of the new year, show us something new. It can be a gift you got over the holidays, something you gave yourself, or even something that symbolizes the New Year to you. If it's new, it'll do!

Here's mine:


This is the coolest Christmas present I got this year: the 25th Anniversary Illustrated Collector's Edition of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. It's one of my favorite books of all time. It's also one of my favorite tv shows and spoken word records, several of my favorite audio tapes, my very favorite radio show and my second favorite towel. It's not remotely my favorite film, but one can't have everything.


I have the text of the first Hitchhiker's book in several editions as it is, but this one is pretty special. It's full of visual reproductions of annotated scripts, behind the scenes photos from the various productions, merchandise, flyers and fan memorabilia. Love it! (And yes, I realize the above photo isn't terribly good from a technical standpoint. The glare off glossy paper gets me every time!)

Your turn! Take a picture of something new, post it to your blog, and come back here and leave your link. You have until midnight Thursday night, when I will compile the roundup of links from both Musings and the Outpost. Remember, your participation or lack thereof will determine whether there's still a Monday Photo Shoot in the weeks ahead. And if someone else wants to take it over, please let me know so we can coordinate. Thanks!

Karen

Friday, December 14, 2007

Celebrate Him Home

Cross-posted from Outpost Mâvarin:


As we know, AOL will soon be parting company with John Scalzi, creator of the AOL Journal By the Way, the Weekend Assignments, Monday Photo Shoots, and a handful of nifty Ficlets. This is one of those "by mutual agreement" situations; AOL is contemplating a change in direction, and Scalzi is contemplating how much easier it will be to meet his deadlines for writing books if he's not busy amusing us with news of phosphorescent cats and fun games and pictures out hotel windows.

I already did my main Scalzi tribute entry, so I'm not going to go on and on about him tonight.

That's where you come in.

Are you one of John Scalzi's many fans? Was it because of him that you first learned how to upload a photo or a video, or had at least one thing to write about each weekend? Has By the Way or the Ficlets blog always been a "must read" for you? As time ticks away to the end of the year, when Scalzi's AOL contract runs out, would you like to show your appreciation for his four years of fun and inspiration and community building, and share your favorite Scalzi memes or moments with other readers?

If so, we've got just the journal for you!

It's called

ScalziCelebration

and it just went live Wednesday night. Carly (whose idea this was), Steven and I have put it together on AOL as a centralized place in which we can all thank John Scalzi for all his good work, and leave links to our own tributes, favorite Monday Photo Shoots, Weekend Assignments, Ficlets or other Scalzi-related fun. We've got three entries to get things started, and we'll be adding more over the next three weeks, featuring YOUR links and tributes, plus several surprises. So click on over and see what you think. Let's gather our scattered journaling community one more time, and give our Blogfather a big send-off!

Karen