Clutching at Straws

This is another of those days when nothing substantial digs in the rib pressing to be blogged. From a window-side armchair looking out at the cold but sun-splashed morning I take turns at daydreaming, reading a few pages of Patrick O’Brian, and wondering where the blog post and ragbag thoughts will lead me today. A few hours later and my thoughts fall across two ideas.

In the past, helpful blogging ideas have come from the blogs I read daily, and so it happened today. Before anything else, let me tip my hat to the always interesting Pocket Blonde, and the newest member to my blog roll, A Few of My Favorite Things.

Pocket Blonde

Diane put up a great post yesterday on the Exacompta FAF Un Bloc Pad. This is a simple, white notepad screwed into a very handsome steel base, or framework, and Diane’s description of that as ‘stylish and minimalist’ is perfect. She goes on to detail the FAF completely, and we come away certain that her review leaves nothing out. At one point she writes, ‘…the smaller size, which is more purse/tote/bookbag friendly.’ This is where my question arose, which must be admitted is a small and trifling point hardly worth mentioning.

‘Tote/bookbag friendly.’ Mmm… The Un Bloc Pad would be welcome on my desk, but for something portable or bag friendly I can’t imagine choosing it over an all-paper notepad. Diane later suggests the Exacompta pad might turn heads at a meeting, and I can only hope that meeting would be at, or around my desk. Otherwise, I would grab up my same-sized Life Premium all-paper notebook and head across the hall for the meeting. Surely my own personal taste, but I usually want something lighter if it’s going in my bookbag, briefcase or away from the desk. But to reiterate, these comments are in no way meant to slight Pocket Blonde’s excellent review of the Exacompta note pad. More perhaps, a case of my trying to hype one of my own made-in-Japan favorite notepads, the Life Premium and Noble Note series.

A Few of My Favorite Things

What a great looking blog! This is one I snagged off of Pocket Blonde’s site and was instantly impressed. The whole package is beautifully done in an elegant minimalism (that word again) that eschews everything but the absolute necessities. Nothing short of sensational, the look of this blog site is the result of Apple hardware and software, but I am eager to know more about how the site was built. I use Apple software also for many things, but can’t recall a program to help build blog pages. Could be that I simply don’t know how to do blogging with the Apple software I have.

Would I trade my blogspot.com template for an Apple version? I’d have to consider that food for thought. Reason being, I like a number of the add-ons, or widgets I use with blogspot, and wouldn’t want to sacrifice those for the sake of all that sharp, good-looking minimalism. But by all means take a look at A Few of My Favorite Things if you haven’t already.

My thanks again to the two bloggers who are the focus of this post.