I discovered LibraryThing a couple of weeks ago, and I’m in book lover’s heaven! I could instantly see major potential here, and I’ve already started to get a couple of long-term goals accomplished. Ever since I started writing at Quilt Epiphany, I’ve wanted to make a Library page, showing all the quilt books in my collection, and either linking to my review of the book (if there was one) or to the book at Amazon.com, or both.

I do have a Worpress plugin called Amazon Media Manager (AMM) which makes it possible to insert a pretty picture of a book or product into my posts and have it linked directly to Amazon where readers can buy it. Oh, and the veritable river of cash that flows from the Amazon Associates account into my wallet is staggering, as well. However, while AMM works great for one at a time inserts, or lists of two or three books or CD’s in the sidebar, I just couldn’t see spending the amount of time it would take to input 140 quilt books into my AMM list, and then program the thing to display them on a separate page. Never mind.

Here’s why LibraryThing is such a killer app. I made a free account at LibraryThing (a one step, two word process, believe it or not), and added a couple of books to my Library. It’s a simple process, since you can either enter the ISBN of the book, or search by title or author, and then select from a list to add the book to your Library. You can see the contents of your library, add tags, write reviews, share your profile with other users, see what other users are reading, etc. This is social networking for book lovers, Read the rest of this entry »

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When I saw the new Portable Design Wall, I thought, “Great, just what I’ve needed for ages!” and I was happy to find it on sale at Nancy’s Notions in February. From there, the story and product review is all downhill. I ordered online at Nancy’s Notions, which I will probably never do again, but that’s another rant for later. Suffice it to say that I did finally get the thing, but before I even had a chance to set it up, I received a call from Nancy’s Notions explaining that it would probably be difficult to set it up at all. Some of the parts for it were being remade, and I’d have to wait 4-6 weeks (!) for delivery of these parts that weren’t right to begin with. They asked if I wanted to wait; I thought this was kind of a weird question, since what else was I to do?

In any case, I waited for the parts. Meanwhile, I decided one day to try to set it up, since they didn’t say it would be impossible, just difficult. They didn’t lie, let me tell you. The poles were too long, and the clips that hold the cross supports onto the frame were flexible rubber, and absolutely wouldn’t stay connected to the frame at all. It was difficult to set up to say the least, since you need a space on the floor that’s at least six feet square so that you can lay it flat on the floor to put it together. I don’t have that unless I move my dining room table. The poles were also filthy dirty, and left black marks all over the flannel design wall and my hands.

I stuffed it all back in the bag, and emailed Nancy’s Notions and the manufacturer to ask exactly what parts I was waiting for, Read the rest of this entry »

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