my sister said she thought she might send out her christmas letters via e-mail this year. struck me as rather gauche. christmas letters never really felt just right to me. sure, it's a nice idea to annually send updates to those you don't correspond with regularly. so that's a good idea. and a christmas letter folded neatly inside a christmas card, that's a neat idea. a christmas letter in lieu of a christmas card never really felt right to me either. but then, if you've read much of what i've written you know i'm a traditionalist.
not that we send lots of christmas cards. for in spite of being the traditionalist, i also feel that cards to those you talk to, e-mail to, chat with, regularly are mostly unnecessary. so i guess it goes without saying that i'm not much for christmas cards these days either.
but a christmas letter via e-mail? is that ok? would amy vanderbilt roll over in her grave? isn't she the one that wrote the bible on etiquette? any vanderbilt? probably she didn't live to see the advent of e-mail to begin with. but i doubt she'd sanction the idea. is she still alive?
then i noticed another friend posted the christmas letter on facebook. efficient. and to her credit, seemingly she sent these out to many, and those of us that are distant friends still get to read their news thru the facebook posting. good idea. and i think it's totally acceptable as a back up to the mailing of the original to those she'd normally mail. i vote "good idea" on this one.
so i got to thinking about writing a christmas letter and just posting it on my blog here. maybe not the most acceptable method, but not many read this thing anyhow, so who's really gonna complain?
so, where to start. i've never written a christmas letter before. surely there has been news throughout the year. but what news there's been i've pretty much written about. so my christmas letter needs to say "read prior posts for the family news during this past year". how's that?
i've ranted a bit about things that bug me. one i haven't mentioned centers around christmas time. namely . . . xmas. i'm not fanatically religious. i term myself spiritual instead. but for godsakes, have enough respect for the meaning behind the season to not replace "christ" with merely an "x". i don't even use the "x" to abbreviate crosswalk. but it's entirely unacceptable to replace "christ" with an "x" in christmas. if a retailer does that, i'm boycotting. i encourage you all to follow suit on this. in the spirit of my "it is what it is" posting, i ask your assistance in restoring the tradition of christmas and eliminating the "x" factor.
and if you paid any attention, you may be wondering why my title also mentioned a "new look". and if you really paid attention you'll notice that the ads that once graced the side column of this page are now missing. well, seems as though the google ad-sense ads have been withdrawn from my page. just happened. i had nothing to do with it. i'd "monetized" this blog back in april or so, just to see if i had enough activity to create any revenue. at four or five months i had amassed a whopping 28 bucks or so. and they don't pay you til you reach a hundred dollars. but i got some sort of sadistic pleasure watching my wealth accumulate from these ads.
then i mentioned to a friend that blogs could pay. especially if you were lucky enough to write stuff that people actually wanted to read. so he decided to make it work for him. he wrote some interesting enough stuff. he monetized. then posted on facebook, and maybe elsewhere, openly asking folks to read his blog and click on the ads. that's a contract no-no with google's ad-sense. i guess google thinks that blog readers don't know that we can get paid by having people click.
well, my friend cruised to a hundred bucks in a few days. and had his ads pulled. apparently because they determined he'd violated the terms and conditions of the ad-sense contract. he told me about it. and i laughed at him. and funny, at the same time my earnings grew from 28 bucks to 72 dollars in just a few days. apparently my buddy was also encourage others to view his friends' blogs and ad-click them. then by association alone, google pulled my ads. just as i was about to reach the magical hundred dollar mark. and they'd have to pay me.
i protested to google. i'd really done nothing wrong. guilt by association, i guess. that was three weeks ago, and i've had absoultely no response to my plea. so i guess google with keep me terminated so they will never have to pay me. which in my opinion is tantamount to false advertising.
so i'm now boycotting google as well. thing is, however, google controls my blog hosting site. they may just kill my entire blog when they read this one. if they do, well thanks to all who have read. thanks even more to those that enjoyed. and to google . . . well, no thanks.
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