Weblog Awards 2008

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Voting has begun for the Weblog Awards for 2008. As I mentioned earlier, this blog is a finalist in the Best Small Blog category. Please vote for The Glittering Eye!

Voting begins the evening of January 5 and concludes on January 13. You will be able to vote in each category, as many or as few categories as you wish, once per day The complete voting area for all categories is here. You can go directly to the voting area for Best Small Blog by clicking on the Weblog logo at the top of this post, by clicking on the Weblog 2008 logo at right, or by clicking here.

Other notable finalists include

The Moderate Voice
Outside the Beltway

in the Best Major Blog category and fellow Watcher’s Council member

The Colossus of Rhodey

in the Best Up and Coming Blog category.

If you’re not familiar with The Glittering Eye, this is my personal blog and it’s, well, the most polite word for it would be “eclectic”, as suits my tastes. On any given day I’ll post about anything that strikes my fancy from cooking to opera to dogs to the addition we’re putting on our house to politics to foreign affairs.

Politically I am a moderate and tend not to be ideological. I do my best to examine any specific issue as analytically as I can, giving all points of view a fair shake, and then draw my conclusions.

I come from a family of vaudeville entertainers, saloon keepers, politicians, and lawyers. A pretty good preparation for blogging, I think.

This post will remain at the top for the duration of voting. New content appears below.

17 comments… add one
  • PD Shaw Link

    My vote’s a [bleeping] valuable thing, Dave. You just don’t give it away for nothing. What’s in it for me?

    Just kidding. Excellent blog, sir. I hope you win and attract more readers of the calibar that your hard work deserves.

  • Thanks, PD. We Illinoisans have to live up/down to our traditions!

    That’s basically the reason that I promote the Weblog Awards as heavily as I do. It’s an opportunity to attract readers who’ve never heard of the blog before.

  • Congratulations on the nomination. You’ve got my votes.

  • Kelly Link

    Since you’re up for a vote, will you tell us what the name Glittering Eye means?
    Or am I dumb and it’s obvious? If so, please remember that ‘obvious’ and ‘oblivious’ are separated by only 2 letters.

  • Happy to, Kelly. Believe it or not, although this blog has been active for five years, you’re the first one who’s ever asked.

    It’s from Samuel Coleridge’s poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

    It is an ancient Mariner,
    And he stoppeth one of three.
    `By thy long beard and glittering eye,
    Now wherefore stopp’st thou me ?

    The Bridegroom’s doors are opened wide,
    And I am next of kin ;
    The guests are met, the feast is set :
    May’st hear the merry din.’

    He holds him with his skinny hand,
    `There was a ship,’ quoth he.
    `Hold off ! unhand me, grey-beard loon !’
    Eftsoons his hand dropt he.

    The Wedding-Guest is spell-bound by the eye of the old seafaring man, and constrained to hear his tale.

    He holds him with his glittering eye–
    The Wedding-Guest stood still,
    And listens like a three years’ child :
    The Mariner hath his will.

    The ancient mariner tells his tale not because he wants to but because he must; the wedding guest listens not because he wants to but because he couldn’t resist. Sounded like a pretty good description of blogging to me.

  • Kelly Link

    Nifty!
    And a far cry from what I had imagined. The ‘eye’ image on your banner has always looked sort of bird-like to me, and I had this vague notion that it was some kind of reference to a glittering, proud, angry Eagle’s eye.
    I like your real explanantion much better.

  • That’s something else you’ve commented on that noone else has. My banner graphic was created by my sister, an artist. The eye is a combination of an eagle’s eye and the eye of a well-known actor.

  • Vincent Price?

  • PD Shaw Link

    I was thought it was a variation on Saruman and the Palantir.

  • Vincent Price?

    Nope. Guess again. You have the right general area.

  • Lugosi!

  • Again, close but no cigar. Think older. And a better actor.

  • Well, then I’m going to have to go with Lon Chaney, but I had less confidence in that than I did in Lugosi.

  • Yep. See this picture. One of my four or five favorite actors. Definitely underrated.

  • oh, that’s good. Usually I see him in the ghastly hunchback makeup. That photo makes me think of Kenneth MacDonald, who played unctuous baddies in the old Three Stooges shorts.

  • Chaney was stunningly good in his plain dress straight parts. I don’t think any actor has ever been able to portray on screen the pain of the outsider.

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