Annie Dean has tagged me. She honored me with a nomination for the Thinking Blogger Award and mentioned this post as being one that made her think.

Okay, I’m hornswoggled that anyone would read blogs to think because frankly I do most of my blog reading either when I need to take a break from my work (i.e., from all that thinking I already do) or when I want to see what’s new with some of my favorite people online. But now that I know about this award, I plan on regularly writing articles and treatises and posting quizzes for you all. From now on, you are all getting graded. Now, please turn to Section Two of your reading materials, clearly marked as…

5 Blogs That Make Me Think

As I’ve mentioned above, I don’t really read blogs to think; I read blogs to keep up with my favorite people, many of which I list in my Other People’s Blogs list on the right, a list I need to update in a bit. But they all at one time have posted entries that made me go Hmm, so I will post those specific entries in tagging them … and then I will post some very thoughtful blog entries from random blogs that I don’t read regularly, entries that I have in some way bookmarked just because of the content alone.

So here we go, the bloggers I’m tagging:

My Cousin Zee, for this post—I read her blog regularly because (1) we’re cousins and we love each other, (2) she has an interesting life in Las Vegas as an extra in many feature films, and (3) out of the rest of my family she most of all stays on my radar by keeping in touch with me via e-mail, my own blog, phone, et cetera. But her blog post that I just linked to has given me something else to blog about later: list and write about 5 to 10 methods you use to create original posts. Not that I am currently lacking for topics, mind you, but it gives me food for thought, something to chew on later. So she gets my nomination for that.

The Mighty Jimbo, for this post—I read Jim regularly because he’s the only blogger on my radar who is actually practically local to me. He lives in Newport Beach, the city where I have my post office box, so when he posts, he writes about things I can understand … the great weather in Orange County, the beautiful plastic people, the conspicuous consumerism. And he posts photos I could have taken myself, of the same areas I’ve been to. Plus, when the muse keeps him company, which isn’t as often as it used to do I’m afraid, he writes something truly wonderful and thought-provoking. His blog post that I linked to was the most recent example of that.

Minnie, for this post—I read her journal regularly because she’s one of my best friends online. I was at her wedding in Rhode Island last fall, where she got real-life married to her online love Alex, and she’s just as sweet in person as she is in IM or e-mail. Her journal post I linked to touched me because it made me think of my cousin Binky in New York who is getting married in July this year. Binky, like the little girl in Minnie’s post, is deaf.

Nikki, for this post—I finally met Nikki and her family at Minnie’s wedding, but I’ve been reading her blog regularly even before that because she was already a friend of two of my online friends. She knitted me a Gryffindor-colored scarf, and I still very much owe her a Whimsytoon of her two daughters (I haven’t forgotten!). I like to imagine that her family is exactly what my family would have been (with me being like Alex, the eldest daughter), had my family not been so completely dysfunctional. Her blog post I linked to goes after my own heart because I’m a sucker for rhyming poetry, and I give her props for writing it.

Heather “Dooce” Armstrong, for this post—I don’t actually read her blog much any more, but I get her RSS feed, and I still very much look at all of the photos she posts. I’ve been following her since long before she was infamously fired from her job, likely for the same reason I read the mighty Jimbo; she lived in Los Angeles at the time, so she was fairly local to me. And she was hilariously funny. Her blog post I linked to is one of many that discusses her long-time struggle with chemical depression, which when she first revealed that fact confirmed a suspicion of mine that there was more to Heather than it seemed … because funny people are that way for a reason (their humor is a coping mechanism), which only endears them to me all the more.

NB: The Dooce is super popular now, so out of everyone else I’ve tagged, she is the most likely NOT to play.

And now for Section Three, the rules of participation. Remember, you are all getting quizzed on this because I feel I have to live up to this Thinking Blogger label…

The Participation Rules

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think,
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme,
3. Optional: Proudly display the ‘Thinking Blogger Award’ with a link to the post that you wrote.

And now for the links to posts that were thought-provoking for me, even though I don’t actually read the blogs themselves on a regular basis…

5 Blog Entries That Make Me Think

A Romance Novel Fable, on Romancing the Blog—a great way of saying that romance novels provide women with better examples of men than are often found in their own lives. But, for the paranormal romance sub-genre, does this mean that every young woman can find the vampire or werewolf of her dreams in real life if she simply opens her heart and mind to love?

Every Girl Wants a Stalker, on The F Word—if a guy does it, he’s persistent, but if a girl does it, she’s wacko. What The F?

Goodness and Badness in Science Fiction and Fantasy Art, on Nethermore—far too much stuff for me to think about when I’m doing my covers. Gives me hives.

A Fairy Tale for Writers, on Maya Reynold’s blog—I wish this would happen for Zilpha Keatley Snyder‘s Green Sky books!

P&Ls and how books make (or don’t) money, on Anna Genoese’s LiveJournal—Bummer! She has removed the article from public view and has made it available for a fee instead. Oh, well. When it was up, it made me think. But now I just want to give her a raspberry. :-p

Regardless … Zee, Jim, Minnie, Nikki, and Dooce have been tagged. And the quiz? Name five blogs that make you think. You may begin … NOW.

Share this post: