We're Now Mobile Optimized

After more than 10,000 blog entries (not counting countless updates) since launching A Blog For All, we're now optimized for smartphones and other mobile devices. It provides a stripped down and faster look, courtesy of Blogger.

Administrative Updates

Some of you might have noticed a new commenting system in place. That's because the old one's functionality was quite limited and I've since switched to Disqus. The old comments are not completely gone into the ether, but until I figure out how to export the old comments into the new system, there will be a bunch of missing comments.

testing post

This is the first post using my new smart phone; the HTC Droid incredible.

It also means that I'll be able to post on the go and break news when and where it happens.

Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.5

Five Years Of A Blog For All

It seems like only yesterday, but it's been five years since I started up A Blog For All. That first blog posting was more than 6,000 blog posts ago and blogger can't even keep track of that many posts (they only provide direct access to the 5,000 most recent). I'd like to thank all my readers and those who have linked here in the past and those who value what I write. I'd also like to thank those who have contributed here - whether they've gotten hat tips or in the comments and especially Mrs. lawhawk, who has repeatedly provided entertaining links and to legalbgl who has stepped in when I've gone on vacation.

Still, I write primarily for myself, and hope to eventually gather up some of these writings and put them to good use down the road. They are as much a time stamp in history as anything, and because I extensively link to other sources around the world, they provide a detailed bibliography of sources that would eventually come in handy should I decide to write a book or other publication.

My traffic has gone up and down in fits and starts, but that's okay since I write primarily on topics that I care deeply about and if others have an interest, so much the better. Whether it's writing or photographing Ground Zero, discussing politics, or the Middle East, I hope that you come away with a little more understanding about the issues involved.

I don't care even if you disagree with what I wrote. It would be boring if everyone agreed, but can only hope that the disagreements don't get personal. So, I'll continue blogging about the stuff I like to blog about, the stuff I care deeply about, and do things my way. And if you want to come along for the ride, I'm happy to have you here.

Thanks!

-- lawhawk

Bad Break

Call me a klutz or just having a run of bad luck, but either way, I have a broken ankle after rolling it while walking home from work last night. I knew it wasn't feeling right even after doing RICE (rest, ice, compression, and elevation) so I went to the ER this morning and they saw a clear break on the X-ray.

It's going to be a few weeks of hobbling around, but we'll see what the orthopedic doctor has to say about that.

UPDATE:
The orthopedist confirms. It's an avulsion fracture of my distal tibia. RICE is the course of action, and I have a boot to wear for the next couple of weeks.

2008 Weblog Finalists Announced

And yes folks, I am among the finalists in the Best Small Blog category. The other finalists in that category are:
Chatting at the Sky
A Blog for All
Exurbanleague
Pirate's Cove
Nice Deb
Mutiny.in
The Glittering Eye
Woman Honor Thyself
Rumproast
Black Women, Blow The Trumpet

The full list of finalists in all the categories is here. Voting will open shortly, so be prepared to get your votes in early and often! Chicago rules are in effect.

2008 Weblog Awards Nominations Being Accepted

The 2008 Weblog Awards is opening up nominations today. You can submit your choices to a whole bunch of categories, and if you see fit this blog falls into a couple of possible categories, including Best Small Minor Blog (according to Technorati weighting).

Project Promise Launched

I've been a longtime supporter of the Project Valour-IT/Soldier's Angels charitable fundraising drives to help raise money to assist in the purchase of voice controlled laptops for soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen injured in the line of duty. Now, there's a new effort to expand fundraising in the form of Project Promise:

Project Promise Soldier is a new non-profit dedicated to helping soldiers. The group is simple in mission and broad in scope. Project Promise recognizes that there is an unspoken promise we, as citizens, make to care for our veterans and their families. Project Promise’s mission is to be part of the network of organizations that care for our wounded soldiers; to give something back to those who serve and protect our country and our citizens and to keep that unspoken promise.

Project Promise is a non-profit organization formed to collect money to aid several agencies that work with wounded soldiers. Beneficiaries of Project Promise will be: The Rhode Island VA, Soldier’s Angels/ValourIT, The New England Homeless Veteran’s Shelter and The Wounded Warrior Project.

As the organization grows, it is Project Promise’s intention to fund individual grants to soldiers and their families to help them get back on their feet when they return home.

All donations made to Project Promise are tax deductible.

The group is having a kick off event, November 7th – November 12th—to coincide with Veterans' Day. Donations raised during that period will go to Soldiers' Angels/Valour IT, the Rhode Island VA and the NE Homeless Veteran's Shelter.

It looks like a worthy cause, so if you are so inclined, check them out.

House Cleaning

Some of you might have noticed a few changes around here. I finally switched over to a three column design. I think it will help present all the information I have to offer in a better format.

However, it's going to take some time to get all the old stuff ported over, so you might few a few glitches in the meantime.

You'll also find that I now have post ratings and a few other tricks included. Use 'em, but don't abuse them.

Recharged

Some of you might have wondered what happened this past week with the absence of postings.

Well, that's pretty simple. Mrs. Lawhawk and I took a vacation to Arizona. We spent a week going from Tucson to Sedona and hitting a whole bunch of national parks and landmarks along the way. We hit Saguaro National Park, Montezuma Castle National Monument, Montezuma Well National Monument, Casa Grande National Monument, Walnut Canyon National Monument, Petrified Forest National Park, and Painted Desert National Monument.

More than 1,100 miles were driven in the week, courtesy of a 2008 Dodge Avenger. The car handled pretty well in mountainous terrain and the Sirius Radio was a big hit.

We wish we could have spent more time exploring Sedona, but with a whirlwind trip, we didn't have much extra time. However, we did take on the Pink Jeep Tour, which I highly recommend. You get to see parts of Sedona you can't normally visit and we were able to schedule a sunset tour, though the sky wasn't exactly perfect due to haze from wildfires and prescribed burns upwind around Flagstaff. Still, some of the photos did take on a very ethereal quality as a result of the haze.

As for food, I'd like to thank all those who provided recommendations on where to eat, especially in Scottsdale. You have lots of great options there, and I'll get into those choices in future posts.

I'll be posting photos shortly as I upload them and detailing my itinerary and I'll be updating blog postings soon enough.

Another Year In the Books

Back on this day in 2005, I started up this humble little blog. Thanks to all my readers and to legalbgl for helping out from time to time. More than 5,341 posts later, we're still going strong.

All those posts have gotten me more than a few media mentions, and plenty of mentions by Charles Johnson at LGF, Glenn Reynolds, Michelle Malkin, Hot Air, Don Surber, and many others. Thanks to everyone who saw fit to link to me.

Those links have also helped this blog become the 11th most informative blog on the planet according to a study by Carnegie Mellon University.

I write this mostly for myself, to occasionally give Mrs. Lawhawk a chuckle, and to keep up on politics, current events, business, and entertainment. If you enjoy reading my stuff, thanks for sticking around.

--- lawhawk

Horn Tooting Time

If you've been reading my blog for a while now, you'd probably know this innately. Now, there are statistics to back this up - reading my blog is extremely cost effective. In a Carnegie Mellon study of blogs, mine ranked 11th overall.

I think they've missed a few - LGF and Hot Air for starters. I'd be real curious what others think about the methodology used, and how those omitted blogs would fare. I suspect that they'd rank quite high - both in the top 5.

But Soccer Dad was number 22 and Gates of Vienna made the list at 83. Kudos to them!

PJ Media was 18. The top five are: Instapundit 1 (an obvious choice), followed by Don Surber (another fine choice). Science and Politics was number 3, Watcher of Weasels was number 4 and Michelle Malkin came in at number 5.

Gateway Pundit came in at number 50, which is quite low since Jim is often breaking international news.

Gothamist came in at #12, which is a credit to their site, which covers all things NYC.

Experimenting With New Ads

If you've been noticing more ads on the blog, that's because I've been playing with ad placements and other ways to improve the monetization of the meager traffic coming through here. Please let me know if the advertising is too obtrusive or whether you know of better ways to monetize your blogs.

Site Admin

I've unbanned a bunch of IP addresses this morning so if there's an increase in spam or other nonsensical ravings of lunatic minds, I'll be forced to reinstate those banned IP addresses.

Comments Troubles

If you have had your comments swallowed up by Haloscan or Blogger, I feel your pain. I haven't deleted any messages but the transition to the upgraded website has been painful and in fits and starts.

The workarounds I put in place appear to have worked for a short time, but now don't work for the comments. Trackbacks still work.

In the meantime, if you see your comments flicker or disappear, you know the reason has nothing to do with my deleting them or removing comments from the site. It's merely a technical glitch that I hope is remedied soon.

Warning: Hard Hat Area

You may be noticing that comments, trackbacks, and other features have been missing and reappearing, along with various other elements of this page. Well, I switched over to the new and improved Blogger yesterday and while that means I have new features, my old blog was so customized that I have to make quite a few changes so everything works properly. So, to all you folks who have been wondering where your comments went, do not fear. I didn't delete your comments or shut down comments.

I've got a few elements that still need to be fixed, but that's in the works as well.

Upgrade Complete

If you were trying to reach A Blog For All for the past couple of hours but couldn't get past the busy signal, it's because we were moving to the upgraded site. I'll be adding quite a few bits of functionality to the site in the next few days, so stick around. It's going to get interesting.

UPDATE:
Well, I'm still trying to get the style figured out, but converting the existing template into one that includes the functionalities that I want appears to be more involved than I hoped for. If anyone has suggestions for adding the kind of information I have in my sidebar to the new blog templates, please let me know in the comments. It will be very much appreciated.

Site Tweaking

If you haven't noticed by now, I'm tweaking a few things with the site, so if it acts a wee bit twitchy, hit reload or refresh to see the most current version.

Thanks for your patience and continued visits.

UPDATE:
I'm continuing the tweaking, including the new graphic header. All the photos were taken by yours truly on my travels. Going from left to right, the photos are The Western Wall - taken Summer of 1993, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah's Kodachrome Basin State Park, the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, Grand Canyon NP from the South Rim, AZ, waterfall in the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, Richmond County Ballpark, Staten Island NY, and July 4th fireworks in Ramsey, New Jersey.

Minor Tweaking

I've undertaken some minor tweaking of the site, including adding links for digg and Del.icio.us. I've also added a direct link to Legalbgl's inaugural post, for those that want to know more about my co-blogger.

Other changes will be forthcoming...