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50 Reasons to Send a Shout-Out

If you’re new to the STACKS, you might not know about shout-outs. Basically, once you are logged in to your STACKS account, you can go to anyone’s STACKS Profile and send him or her a kind message. That person is usually so happy to get your message that he or she then sends YOU a shout-out, and a beautiful chain of love is started! We add new ones every month so the chain can continue forever.

If you need more motivation, ForeverElephant

put together this amazing list of reasons to send a shout-out.

• Someone sent YOU a shout-out and you want to respond.
• You’re bored.
• You read an amazing post and want to show your appreciation.
• Admit it. You’re procrastinating.
• Someone posted a sad post

and you want to cheer him or her up.

A user hasn’t been on the message boards

in a while and you want to let him or her know s/he hasn’t been forgotten.

You want to welcome someone to the STACKS!

Someone joined your club or participated in your siggy shop

or RP and you want to show your appreciation.

You read someone’s amazing fanfic

and you don’t know what to say except for, “You’re the coolest!”

You want to spread holiday/seasonal cheer.

Someone changed his or her avatar and you want to compliment it.

You asked for a friend request and want to accompany it with a warm note.

Someone asked YOU for a friend request and you are glad to accept it with appreciation.

A user feels unappreciated and you want to brighten his or her day.

Someone posted a goodbye post and you want to send him or her off with a tribute of ten pages of shout-outs.

You want to thank a moderator for doing her or his job so wonderfully.

You want to welcome and recruit new users to join the message boards. (Go to Stacks_Admin’s

most recent friends!)

You are feeling extra friendly and cheerful.

You want to be a really nice STACKer.

You want to get a billion shout-outs back.

You’re feeling upset and you want to know you have friends out there.

Someone’s post made you laugh out loud.

Someone just cheered you up and you want to say thank you.

You joined just joined a user’s epic club!

Someone was hit by a tragic incident

and you want to virtually hug him or her.

You need a distraction.

Someone complimented you in the boards and you want to compliment him or her back.

You and another STACKer debated about a topic, and you want to make sure he or she knows it wasn’t personal.

A user becomes member of the week.

A user is mentioned in the Ink Splot 26 blog.

You really like someone’s comment on an Ink Splot 26 blog post.

You really like an Ink Splot 26 blog post and want to say hi to the author!

You’re worried the power might go out, so you make sure you say goodbye to your STACKS buddies for a while.

You decide to join a new message board and you want to make some new friends!

You realize that a specific STACKer is really, really nice.

You just want to say, “Hi!”

You have something in common with another person’s My SELECTS.

It’s someone’s STACKS birthday!

A user passes a message board milestone (such as 1000 posts).

You feel bad about accidentally hurting someone’s feelings.

You absolutely love the books someone recommends!

Someone just taught you an HTML or message board-related trick.

You want to celebrate something such as National Harry Potter Day

!

Some new shout-outs were added and you want to try them out!

You want to reach out to someone who might not get the amount of shout-outs he or she deserves.

You’re waiting for something else to load, so you open a new tab and have no idea what to do while you’re waiting.

You haven’t been on the STACKS in a while, and you want to announce your return.

It’s your birthday, and since you can’t actually post about it, you want to send everyone a celebratory shout-out! (Of course, they’ll never know it was your birthday.)

You’re having a rough time with your friends from real life, and you need the support of your STACKS friends.

You read this post and were inspired to send more shout-outs.

What’s better than a sweet message to someone who needs it? Well . . . maybe chocolate, but this is the next best thing! I am totally inspired to send more shout-outs now

. How about you?
— Sonja, STACKS Staffer Add a Comment

Em, she of the haiku review, thinks my blog is cool. Pretty nifty, considering all the near mishaps involving liquid and computer screens her pithy little reviews have created for me over the last year or so.

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Part-time Empress of the Universe (that's Barbara O'Connor to you) has bestowed a Brilliant Weblog award upon me.

Isn't bright and shiny?
(100 bonus points if you can ID that quote. Hint: February 23, 1939)

I'm still not quite sure why Barbara likes a whippersnapper like me so much, but I'm glad she does.

So now I'm commanded share the love.

The rules, which I will partially ignore:

1) Put the logo on your blog.
2) Add a link to the person who awarded you.
3) Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
4) Add links to those blogs on yours.
5) Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs.

Just to exercise my imperialism, I'm naming only two blogs, neither of which are bookish:

Both are really frickin' funny with edgy, saucy overtones to keep you on your toes. Try a sample and then decide, Who would YOU rather go to Disney World with? Yeah, it all comes back to Disney with me, lately...


(Click here for the answer to that random trivia question.)

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Do me a favor. Open up Miss Spitfire to the dedication page. This little guy here is the selfsame Harold D. Gass, back in 1923:


Since then he's been a farmer, a school bus driver, and an insurance man, traveled to over a dozen countries from Japan to Ireland, but always comes back home to the family farm in Imlay City. After retiring, he raised nearly $300,000 dollars for the Shriners children's hospitals, and he's given scholarships to the local chapter of Future Farmers of America for 35 years. (They call him "Grandpa Gass," too.) But he's still got time to visit his last living schoolteacher. Not a bad resume for the last 86 years.

Here he is with his Shriner buddies in their Tin Lizzies:



You haven't lived until you've seen a flock of fez-wearing retirees zipping around in those things.

Happy birthday, Grandpa!

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Today just happens to be the birthday of one Camilla Mannino, owner of the imcomperable yet now defunct Halfway Down the Stairs Children's Bookshop. (If you want to know how old Cammie is, check out the copyright page on Goodnight Moon -- they debuted the same year.)

Why am I telling you this if the shop's gone? Because remembering Cammie's birthday got me all nostalgic and I surfed on over to the shop's website. Turns out, there's a cool thing posted which I believe I completely neglected to tell you about when the shop closed in January.

Growing Up with Books:
A Halfway Down the Stairs Guide to Children's Reading



For weeks and weeks leading up to the shop's closing, the staff brainstormed, sifted, and debated to compile a list of all our favorite books for kids from birth through high school. The list holds everything from our tried-and-true standbys to the rising stars that hit the shelves just before we closed our doors. That's 20 years of bookselling experience in one handy package. Honestly, we were so pleased when that little booklet arrived from the printer, you could smell the pride on us. It seems like we were justified, too -- grief-stricken customers snapped up our month's supply in just one week. Lucky for you, Cammie bowed to demand and consented to put the list online.

A word to the wise: don't just bookmark the list. This is what those hyperactive marketing folks would brand a LIMITED TIME OFFER in big shiny letters! The HDS website is going to come down in May, so if you see things you like, cut and paste your little heart out to avoid disappointment later.

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That little scamp happens to be my grandma, probably longabout 1925. Her mother made that coat and hat - blue to match her eyes, and trimmed with gray rabbit fur.


By the 1940's she'd grown up and gotten a job at Imlay City's dimestore, allowing Grandpa to boast forevermore, "I Found a Million Dollar Baby in a Five and Ten Cent Store."


Lucky for me, she also grew up into an I Love Lucy fan. It's taken a couple years of Monday nights, but we're on our second tour through all nine seasons. (With a little Shirley Temple, Judy Garland, and Bette Davis thrown in for variety.) Here's to plenty more Mondays!

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by Yukihisa Tokuda illustrated by Kiyoshi Takahashi Kane/Miller paperback 2006 originally published by Fukuinkan Shoten Publishers, Japan 2003 Do you know why the pill bug lives near humans? Do you know how a pill bug deals with an ant? What about a frog? True or false: a pill bug eats concrete. True or false: a pill bug eats its shell once it's shed. True or false: a pill bug sheds half it's

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