As I write this, snow is falling outside my window and I consider the outdoor activities of the season  shoveling (a rather distant relation to my beloved digging, at least it gets me outside) and xcountry skiing -- as mere placeholders til gardening season starts. I dip into NE Gardening on GW about every other day in the cold months. I constantly admire the cheerleaders of posting for trying to get us slugs to respond. I do read blogs, mostly garden blogs, but a few every day, and I have been doing this for years. I have favorites, and I try dipping into links to these. Some become keepers, others one would never want to visit again. A blog is an experience of one individual  when you read blogs consistently, you get to know the person (gardener) and his/her garden and style. Photos are also an integral part of blogs. I have given some thought to why I read the blogs I do, and it really comes down to how good the writing is, and mostly because I share some of the same sensibilities as the blogger. Also reading blogs allows you to follow the continuity of something. One thing that I have noticed is that all the blogs I read are in cold climates more like our own -- there is a big garden blogging community in TX, but I havenÂt been tempted to follow anyone there, or in California either. But on GW, one feels like a contributor, not an audience. And itÂs fun to see how all of us different people respond to the same topic. Sharing and gathering Info, yes, but giving commentary and experience too. Sometimes I just want to know what others more or less around here have to say about a particular thing. We are a community too IÂm not on FB (and never will be) nor on Twitter  I personally think this is more of a generational thing. At Xmas also, I saw my 20-something daughter discreetly check her Blackberry periodically. I read the New York Times every day but in my department at work it is only us fifty-somethings who actually read the paper version. My assistant, like my daughter, both read it online. I think the internet is so big that there is room for discussion forums and social networking and blogs and research sources of all kinds. And then there is browsing for shopping. I adore going thru my catalogs, but I have found unique websites of very specialized nurseries whose catalogs I would never have received in the mail  actually they probably donÂt mail catalogs out. And now all we have to do is wait til awful winter is over, and the ground calls to us.

I'm not sure setting up a public facebook account...telling the public you are at home and very sick is the best idea. If you are sure to set up the page as private, I guess it couldnt' hurt. But, I think most of your helpers (elderly people who are retired) may not have facebook pages anyway. Unless you have a very close relative who can take off weeks to be with you, I don't think you are going to be able to coordinate volunteers to always be with you. People just don't have the time. I have a good friend on bedrest for a pregnancy, and to even get people over there everyday for a couple hours is hard. You probably need to come up with a different solution if you have to have someone there with you constantly.. I would think you may have to hire a nurse, or helper of some sort. Good luck.

They changed it recently so that if you just hit enter (return), it submits your comment. (So if you want to make a new paragraph instead of submitting, I think you have to hit shift+enter.)

I maybe should have started a new thread instead of putting this here, but I'd like to know about something some of my friends have joined, an app that is supposed to tell you who has visited your photos, profile, etc. I can't figure out if people who use that app will be able to identify anyone who looks at their profile, or if it would only identify people who use that particular app.