The Pictures on my Blog

I've just changed my blog design - this is the fifth design in the last year. The first was a default blogger design. IT was fine, but boring, and somewhat ugly. The second was a moth centric one, that was fine, but which I accidentally destroyed while helping Ms Nymeth fix something on her blog (my stupid, not Ms Nymeth's, who never would have done something so terribly idiotic, I'm quite sure). The third was one I was very fond of, it might even be my favorite of the four, but it was only up for a few hours (I think Ms Nymeth saw it, the one with a Portuguese word on it, and Amanda, but that might be all...). Amanda gently had to point out to me, that the design probably implicitly suggested that I was a female. While I honestly have no particular attachment to my gender, I thought this was probably somewhat deceptive. The fourth was the 'screw it I give up' design - plain brown background, plain one column layout. I am laying this one out because I'll be putting all of my reviews here, from now on, since 5-squared seems to be petering out more or less, and I didn't want my 7 or 8 readers to have to stare at my ugly 'I give up' layout all the time.

Really, the layout is pretty spare, the only thing that is complicated are the images on top. Since I chose the images very carefully, and since this my primary blog now and sort of going through a rebirth, I thought discussing the images would be a nice way to introduce my blog and it's intentions. So, over the next few weeks, I'll be putting up little posts (well, I'll intend them to be little, but I imagine I will fail) about each of the images. For now, it will suffice simply to tell you what they are, in case you don't recognize them:

1. The Two of Swords (tarot card)
2. Emma Goldman (early 19th century American radical anarchist)
3. A Tree in the Snow (a tree. you know. in the snow.)
4. Princess Ozma (from the Oz books by L. Frank Baum)
5. Emily Dickinson (19th century American poet)
6. The Skin of my Inner Wrist (the soft underbelly of my arm)
7. Polyphemus Moth (Antheraea polyphemus, a giant silk moth)
8. A Keshalyi (traditional fairy folk from the Rroma)

Between the eight of them, these pictures sort of paint out the way that I write my blogs - or at least the way that I try to write them. I don't imagine they are the pictures someone who knows me would pick for me, and in many ways they certainly don't typify me. But to some extent, that's to the point of the blog. The world is where I exist as I am - a blog is a grand, silent opportunity to try on selves, to find out who I am underneath who I profess to be. As such, this blog will be pretty useless stuff, much as it has been in the past. I go through periods where I post things that have nothing to do with books - I will work to create a reviews-only feed for those of you who aren't interested in hearing me pontificate about politics, gender issues, or Emily Dickinson in Photoshop. In the meantime, feel free not to subscribe, I promise I don't mind - if my blog got popular I'd be deeply terrified anyway. But, if you do want to hang around, feel free to let me know.

PS - I know my profile page is useless. I'd like to put together an FAQ, like I've seen on other blogs to introduce me to people who are interested. But, I'm not really popular enough that people ask questions, much less frequently. So, are there any questions you think you'd like to see in an FAQ?