Showing posts with label Blogging. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blogging. Show all posts

Monday, September 23, 2019

It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns Q&A 2019

Wow! Can you believe it? Today is the day that marks It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns' 6th anniversary. How's it going my gumdrops? 

Before I forget, Happy Birthday to Whiskey Brewer on MeWe!

While still working for my uncle, I self-built this website on September 23, 2013. In a way, I cannot help feeling somewhat disappointed that I still have not accomplished as much as I really wanted this year.

Since 2017, I have endured a plethora of issues ranging from dealing with my mother's eternal health issues to chores, editing, revising, and submitting my short stories for publishing, contacting publishers, voice actors, editors, job hunting, etc.

Earlier this year, I was sick at least twice. For the 4th time in 19 years, I had bronchitis and a cold. Long story short, this year has been brutal.

Since this year's Q&A blog has a few jargon-filled questions, I tried answering them as best as I could by giving them the so-called "college try." Anyway, let's begin!

[It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns Q&A 2019:]

 Kersten's Questions:

1) What is the most difficult part about having kept a blog this long? 

2) Who is your favorite Horror artist?

My Answers: 

1) Creating a blog is nothing compared to self-building a website full of content. All the while, trying to generate exposure and attracting the right demographic. 

Also, spambots, site, and server glitches. Those have been my biggest problems.

In addition to self-building It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns, there is managing it, generating SEO, traffic, visitors, and loyal subscribers. 

At the same time, enduring social climbing opportunists, selfish and misanthropic "friends" pretending to care about me, indifference, jealousy, envy, the bitterness of others, and copycats.

2) When it comes to Horror artists (because they are more than just Metal vocalists and guitarists), I guess I would say Rob Zombie, Glenn Danzig, and Wes Borland. Even though Wes Borland is best known as Limp Bizkit's lead guitarist, he collaborates with other bands besides fronting his own.

Tard Tardnation: What's your favorite type of weather?

Answer: I love the hot summer weather. 

Then again, I was born ~1 week before Summer Solstice. Now that it's fall, I dread having to rake leaves and shovel snow again.

Meanwhile, rain and snow help set ominous tones to my short stories, since I mostly write Psychological Horror, Crime, and Psychological Thriller.

Jesse: Do you ever use Duolingo or Babbel to help learn a new language? I've just started using Duolingo recently because I am interested in learning German.

Answer: Yes, I have heard of both Duolingo and Babbel but have never used either. 

Even though it has been years since I last took German I highly recommend the book, Komm mit! You may want to visit the 50 Languages foreign language website and download their app, too.

Much like my family, I believe it is best to traditionally learn a foreign language with drills. Using apps make for great aids but it is best to have a quality foreign language book. My youngest aunt uses Duolingo to help her with learning Japanese.

According to her, Duolingo is not the best way to become fluent in a foreign language. 

Regardless of what foreign language you want to learn, you MUST have quality foreign language books with drills to help learn a foreign language.

DJ Scott: What's your fondest memory from blogging/blog responses?

Answer: My fondest memories actually predate building It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns.

For those, who didn't already know, I originally started blogging 13 years ago on Yahoo 360. This was months after graduating from Carthage College, while STILL battling a severe bleeding disorder at the time.

My English Literature Professor sometimes used my Yahoo 360 blog as an educational source for his classes. Compared to the last 6 years of blogging on here AND Blogster, more educational information was published on my Yahoo 360 blog.

Unfortunately, all good things always come to an end. This can most definitely be said about Yahoo 360. Yahoo always discontinues their best products.

Years later, I discovered the blogging community, Xanga. I regret not discovering Xanga years sooner.

Before The Xanga Team dumped their money problems into OUR laps by making it mandatory to pay to blog, which caused division within our community, I had both national AND international traffic, friends, and loyal subscribers. 

In addition, more readers genuinely cared about my content and I made top blogger AT LEAST  a few times, 6 years ago.

C. Afflerbach: Do you like crafting? Ancient aliens? Ghosts?

My Answers: 

1) The closest I will ever get to crafting is building this website. Otherwise, I always suck at crafting. As cool as crafts look, I never had that skill. 25 years later and I still suck at doing Origami.

2) I'm not a huge fan of ghosts and aliens. Blame it on Hollywood filmmakers like Steven Spielberg, for example and the media. 

They love spreading (as I use the cliche term) "misinformation" and stupid ass stereotypes about the paranormal and extraterrestrials.

The contrived and unrealistic scripts and special effects in Spielberg's movies only validate all those skeptics, who don't believe in ghosts and aliens. 

Even though I'm not a huge fan of either, I know that both DO exist, especially the paranormal.

Whiskey Brewer: Are there any cartoons you grew up watching, that you'd actually like to see remade for youngsters nowadays?

Answer: When it comes to movies and shows, including animation, you could say, that I am more of a "purist." Today's filmmakers, writers, and animators should leave Classics alone.

Continuously remaking and rebooting movies, shows, and cartoons because they want to stay relevant only proves, that all these filmmakers lack creativity and originality.

The incessant political activism and correctness, which mostly consists of CONTRIVED tokenism to pander to politically correct hipsters are biggest problems with today's writers, filmmakers, cartoonists, musicians, etc.

Why does Ariel from The Little Mermaid suddenly have to be black?

Why does a famous superhero suddenly have to be non-heterosexual or female? 

Speaking of, have you seen the commercials for CW's Batwoman?

Batwoman Trailer CW (2019)

If anything, more network programmers should introduce younger demographics to Classics. 

Yes, they may look dated but as they get older, they might have a better appreciation for said movies, shows, and especially cartoons. They should be able to imagine what life was like during an era(s) that was before their existence.

For example, every time I watch a movie that was made before, during, and slightly after I was born, that film allows me to embrace and reflect on what life was like before we had cell phones, laptops, tablets, the Internet, social media, etc.

As a 37-year-old woman, I do miss the days of publicly socializing with friends and on my bedroom's phone line as a teenager, going to public places without someone staring at his cell phone, while playing video games on it, and being able to cherish memories WITHOUT some girl snapping selfies and recording the play by play of her vapid, daily life with poses on social media for instant praises by sycophants.

C.S. Michel's Questions:

1) Have you seen the trailer for the new Joker movie?

2) Have you seen Doom Patrol?

3) Do you like Erotic Anime?

My Answers:

1) Yes, I have and please reread my answer to Whiskey Brewer's question. The Batman franchise was meant to be campy. Since the time of the 21st Century, filmmakers have ruined Batman by dramatizing what was originally a campy franchise.

2) I had no idea what Doom Patrol was until Googling it, last week only to discover that it was ANOTHER DC Comic Flick.  

Batman, Blade, The Phantom, and The Crow are probably the only movies based on comic books that I liked. Otherwise, I was never a comic book fan. 

As as a teenage girl 20 years ago, I tried but reading comic books just don't resonate with me.

3) Erotic Anime or in other words, Hentai? Since I love Anime, I am not that fast to dismiss Hentai. It has been a long time, since I last watched any Hentai.

Over the last 13 years, I have watched more Ecchi, Seinen, and Josei Anime that somewhat border the lines of Hentai Anime than actual Hentai.

Donald's Questions:

1) Over the past year, what has been the best resource you have turned toward to promote your own growth, both personal and professional?

2) The notion of incremental improvement is a powerful one, compared to yourself a year ago how have you bettered yourself and in what ways?

3) What are the best books or lectures you have interacted with on the subject of personal development?

My Answers:

1) I would say... reading articles published by John Matthew Fox, Writer's Relief, Web Design Relief, and Authors Publish Magazine. Just last week, I read this enlightening article published by Thriller author, Joanna Penn about Comparisonitis.

2) While re-revising my short stories recently, I noticed that I am able to mentally re-edit certain lines as I type. I believe that spending HOURS editing AND revising all the blogs I've published over these last 6 years, from night to beyond sunrise made me a better writer.

Despite what pompous elitists (including a few delusional Fan Fiction writers) think, BLOGGING is a fantastic way to improve writing skills. Blogging is journaling for the most part.

3) Please reread Answer #1.

So, how did I do with answering all your questions?

By giving it the "good ol' college try," I answered each question to the best of my ability.

If I misunderstood your questions, I apologize. However, I will NOT apologize for MY opinions in regards to today's Hollywood entertainment and how political correctness is destroying it with contrived tokenism.

So, thank you my gumdrops! Please leave your feedback in the comments section below!

Sunday, September 23, 2018

It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns Q&A 2018

How's it going my gumdrops? Can you believe that 2018 will be over in 4 more months? I can't believe how much time has gone passed. 

This year did not exactly go the way I planned, which is highly disappointing. Realizing this makes me feel unaccomplished.

Throughout every year, I always hope for the better but it seems like everything keeps getting worse. Anyway...

Today is the 5th anniversary of It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns. There are fewer questions this year. Here are the following questions I have answered: 

It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns Q&A 2018:

Zombified: How do you think things with your website will evolve in the future?

Answer: Honestly, I have no idea. Webs' engineers need to hurry with their repairs. They are that 1 straw breaking every camel's back. In other words, most of us, who use Webs as a platform for publishing content like myself and/or business owners are suffering.

As I explained to a Webs Customer Service Representative over the phone last Friday, we have been losing customers, subscribers, traffic, etc. It all depends on what that person is using Webs for.

I personally use Webs.com's platform for blogging at least 2-3 days a week along with publishing and sharing excerpts of my short stories for only members of It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns to read on my Horror/Thriller page.

Earlier this year (late January to be more specific), I stopped blogging on It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns and started experimenting again on Blogger.

After building my 2nd Blogger page, OMG, Anna! What's Going On?! I noticed there were less problems with publishing my blogs. 

Also, the features that us bloggers can use on Blogger like scheduling blogs to be published and meta tagging WITHOUT any glitches are free.

Not having to pay for more artistic designs on Blogger is another bonus.

Countless times over these last 5 years, I have said that WordPress is highly overrated and overpriced for vapid designs and is user UNFRIENDLY.  The preceding statement still holds true today. The ball is currently in everyone else's court other than mine.

Only YOU can help generate traffic to content by liking, sharing, and having discussions. Discussions especially generate THE MOST traffic to a website.

Marquis DeBlood: What inspired you to start writing?

Answer: This is a great question. Since elementary school, I learned how to create my own short stories. My 1st and 2nd grade teachers in made us draw our own pictures and write short stories.

By 3rd grade, my English teacher gave us a monthly chart with ideas to create stories with for assignments. 

Once it reached October, we had to create our own Halloween stories. You, as well as some other Horror fans would've loved those assignments in school. That year in October, I really had fun. 

I wrote short stories about werewolves, zombies, vampires, and Chucky from Child's Play. Looking back, I suppose that would've been labeled as "Fan Fiction," before Fan Fiction was ever a term or a website. Not that I support Fan Fiction, but you get my point.

After becoming a teenager, that was when I really became interested in Creative Writing.

As a form of personal catharsis, I wrote angry poetry, when I wasn't creating my own characters and writing short stories. 

During my high school senior year, I had a disparaging teacher for Creative Writing Class. That same teacher claimed, that all my stories and poems were "depressing." 

Maybe some of my poems were but NOT  my stories. You have read some of the excerpts of my short stories on my Horror/Thriller page to know, that they are NOT  "depressing."

After minoring In Creative Writing in college, my professors appreciated my work. Those disparaging remarks from my Creative Writing teacher in high school did NOT  stop me from graduating college with a Creative Writing Minor.

In a nutshell, that frumpy, red-headed, divorced cow (or pig) from high school, along with my asshole study hall monitor, who labeled me as "The Next Columbine Student" can go fuck themselves to Icy Hot.

BTW: I added more excerpts to the Horror/Thriller page. Whenever you have the chance, I highly encourage every member to sign in and read them.

Robert: What is your favorite album of all time?

Answer: That is a tough question to answer. After being exposed to numerous music genres, sub-genres, and albums by so many mainstream and underground bands and singers, I cannot name only 1 album. The following is a list of my favorite albums:

Gravity Kills' Gravity Kills and Perversion

Stabbing Westward's Wither, Blister, Burn, & Peel and Darkest Days

Lords Of Acid's Lust, Voodoo-U, and Our Little Secret

Stone Temple Pilots' Core, Purple, and No. 4

Type O Negative's Bloody Kisses and October Rust

KoRn's KoRn, Life Is Peachy, Follow The Leader, and Untouchables

Dokken's Breaking The Chains and Back For The Attack

London After Midnight's Psycho Magnet

Lacuna Coil's In a Reverie, Unleashed Memories, and Comalies

My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult's A Crime For All Seasons

The preceding list only names a few of my favorite albums.

With all that has been answered, did you enjoy learning anything new from today's Q&A blog? What are your thoughts?

In the near future, I always look forward to seeing more of you on It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns and on OMG, Anna! What's Going On?! Thank you!

Thursday, February 25, 2016

Blogger Is My Alternate


How's it going my gumdrops? You may recall that I published 2 blogs last weekend, on Blogger. Song Saturday and Cartoon Sunday are blogs I normally publish on It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns. Webs.com experiences glitches every so often. 

Since I'm already on Blogger, it's only fitting to publish Song Saturday and Cartoon Sunday blogs on here, whenever It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns goes down. I will just transfer those same blogs over to my website, after the glitches are over. That's basically what I did both today and yesterday.

Normally, I will share Song Saturday and Cartoon Sunday blogs to Blogger from It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns. Whenever I share those blogs on here, the links will redirect you to my website and vice versa. Isn't that fantastic?!

What would be even more fantastic is if Gen Xers and Millennials both liked, subscribed, shared, +1'ed on Google+, and left your feedback in the comments sections. I am online, during the evenings.

There is NO fee to join It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns. The incentive to joining is that you have a chance to read my "Horror" page. That's something outsiders do NOT have access to. Just think about it. 

If you are having trouble with the navigation, here is a blog explaining how to navigate around It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns.

http://goo.gl/kmXmUY

Anyway, thank you my gumdrops! I look forward to seeing you all very soon!

~ Anna H. 

Thursday, October 15, 2015

Hey, Generation X! I'm Talking To You!



How's it going my POTENTIAL gumdrops? You may think that the name, "gumdrop" is insulting but as for someone like myself, who is between both Generations X and Y, I consider it to be cute. Most people would consider me to be a Millennial.

A little while ago, I learned that I am actually considered Generation Flux. I was born in 1982 and my mother was born in 1962. We have a 20-year age gap. Because my mother was born in between 1961-1981, she is considered a Gen Xer. Also, because my parents are Gen Xers and I was born in 1982, I am technically considered to be a "Fluxer." If my parents were Baby Boomers during the early '80s, I would be a Millennial.

With me being a Fluxer, I was both a child of the '80s and '90s and became an adult in 2000. It's amazing how time flies! Don't you miss the 1980s and '90s? You know, before entertainment turned into the Shit Sandwich it is today?

This is where YOUR generation comes in:

On September 23, 2013, I created my own website, It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns for free. Originally, it was only meant to be my personal author website. In a way, it still is. However, I spend more time posting entertaining and informative blogs than anything.

Song Saturday and Cartoon Sunday blogs are the main blogs I post, during the weekends. Sometimes, I will post an extra blog throughout the week. It really depends on how I am feeling and what else I'm doing at the time. I have posted nearly 300 blogs on It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns. Therefore, you're not extremely limited to content. Although, the only major restriction I have is my Horror page.

The Horror page on It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns has samples of some of the short stories I have posted. Only members can view this page and FOR FREE. Otherwise, everything else is fair game.

If you want to learn more about me, check out It's Not All Gumdrops & Unicorns. Last but not least, I would really LOVE to have your feedback. What do you want me to share, in order to keep you as a part of my target audience, that does NOT center around politics?

Thank you and I look forward to your replies!

http://itsnotallgumdropsandunicorns.webs.com/

Wednesday, December 17, 2014

What's So Funny? Rory The Guinea Pig Makes Me Laugh!

How's it going my gumdrops? Are you in need of some laughs, during this stressful time of the year? 

I'm not a huge, self-righteous, political activist about loving animals like many people are today, however I do love most animals. This especially includes reptiles.

Over the last several years of being on social media sites, many have annoyed the hell out of me with their cats. Today's cat lovers tend to regularly act like they gave birth to Jesus. 

This may sound harsh to say, but some cat owners can be just as annoying as those proud parents, who think their children can walk on water and turn water into wine. 

Apparently, some of these cat lovers feel like acting self-righteous and morally superior to others because giving birth to children is somehow BENEATH them. Ugh! Enough is enough already! Give it a friggin' rest!

Aside from the preceding rant, I have chosen to share something cute and furry for laughs. Today's blog is more of a tribute to a friend/subscriber from Blogster. 

Scottster has been having a rough time on Blogster. Surely, most of my Xangan and Blogsterian friends/subscribers are familiar with that problem, which is all the more reason why I only comment on their pages compared to blogging on Blogster, now.

Meanwhile, I stumbled upon this cute and funny YouTube vlog last week by Rory The Guinea Pig. 

Briefly voiced by Ricky Gervais, Rory read some of the hilarious insults about his physical appearance from his Twitter account.

Before watching that video, here's an informative Animal Planet segment about guinea pigs.

Animal Planet's Pets 101: Guinea Pigs

At the age of 7, my mother bought my original guinea pig, Christopher. Christopher lived for 5 years. 

After acquiring mite, he started having scratching seizures and had to be euthanized. 

For my 13th birthday, my mother bought my 2nd guinea pig, Fantastical. He was the craziest guinea pig I ever owned!

Fantastical seemed more like a human trapped inside a guinea pig's body. He constantly strategized ways of climbing outside his tank. 

As I was leaving my bedroom years ago, Fantastical literally climbed on top of his water bottle and hung from the rim of his tank. With good timing, I luckily bolted over to catch him from falling.

The next incident involved my youngest aunt and I eating breakfast, in our living room. We sat on our living room floor at the table, while watching MTV and monitoring Fantastical in his cardboard box that we carted him in for babysitting purposes.

Once I let Fantastical outside his box, he strolled across our living room floor and BIT  my aunt's bacon. 

Had she actually set her plate on the living room table, he would've been unable to reach it. 

Fantastical biting my aunt's bacon was hilarious! He almost lived an entire year. He would have lived at least 3-4 years longer had my great-grandmother's evil friend not put some Juju on him.

At 16, I bought my last 2 guinea pigs. Altivo (meaning "superior" and "haughty" in Spanish) lived for only 3 years. Ookii (meaning "big" in Japanese) lived for 4 years. Between the 2, Altivo was my favorite.

I believe I favored Altivo more because of the way the other guinea pigs mistreated him at Pet World. I saw another guinea pig bite his face and he started whining. I REALLY wanted to reach over that cage and smack his bully on the butt!

A month later, I bought Ookii and he became Altivo's next bully. The bullying was to the extent that I had to buy 1 extra cage to separate them from each other. 

Altivo and Ookii only shared a cage together, whenever I had to clean their cages every so many days. Had they always shared a cage, I believe Ookii would've killed Altivo.

Even though Altivo was my favorite next to Fantastical, Altivo would sometimes get an attitude with me. I made a joke about using his body heat to keep me warm and he got angry. Altivo's cheeks looked inflated and he started grinding his teeth.

I didn't say I was going to kill him for his fur or anything! I only joked about using his body heat to keep me warm and he took offense to it!

Psychologists claim that animals don't have feelings. I don't believe that for a second! I know when animals are happy, sad, angry, etc. 

After joking about using Altivo's body heat to keep me warm, he snubbed me! The next day, I went to take him out his cage and he literally did his paw at me!

Altivo looked like he told me, "Talk to the paw cuz I ain't listenin'!" 

I had a Michael Kelso moment from That '70s Show. You know those scenes of Kelso shrieking, "Oh!"? 

Yup! That was my reaction to Altivo giving me "The Paw." Talk about rude!

After giving me that attitude, I snuck up to his cage and flashed him! Within seconds, Altivo literally did a 360 bolt around his cage.

His 360 bolt around the cage was a slapstick moment. It was hilarious much like Fantastical sneaking and biting my youngest aunt's bacon.

Years later, Altivo and Ookii for some reason died days before Christmas. Their deaths were 1 year apart from each other. I was devastated when 3 of my 4 guinea pigs died. 

I was a little sad, although I wasn't heartbroken over Ookii's death. He always loved biting me.

During 10th grade, Ookii bit my ear once and I had to wear a band aid on it. 

My college sophomore year, he died, which was shortly after coming home from UW-Parkside for Christmas Break.

The year before, I cried tears and mourned Altivo's death because I watched him die, when I was in the middle of working on my Advanced Composition research paper. 

Our last dog, Alexis also seemed depressed because she viewed Altivo and Ookii as her puppies. That sounds strange, but it's true.

Anyway, I've talked enough about my guinea pigs. With that being said, here are 3 YouTube vlogs featuring Rory The Guinea Pig.

1) Rory The Guinea Pig [Voiced By Ricky Gervais] Promotes Just Sayin' App (2012)

2) Rory The Guinea Pig's Pets Add Life Interview (2012)
3) Rory The Guinea Pig Wishes You A Happy Holidays From Pets Add Life & The Talking Animals Channel (2013)