Last week, there was no update on the weekly report. Looking back on the week, there was nothing worth recording, and I don't want to write just for the sake of writing. It must be something meaningful to me. This actually involves a topic: Are we writing blogs to record what we want to record, or are we writing for the content that we hope readers will read? In the past, I may have been the latter, insisting on updating under the banner of "daily blog", hoping to get views, comments, and feedback. Now, I am the former, hoping to record meaningful content. If it happens to be liked by readers, I would be honored.
Cat Owner
My girlfriend adopted a silver gradient cat from someone else. It is currently three months old, very beautiful, cute, and small. I stayed at her place for a few days recently and spent some time with this little guy. I thought it would be very timid, so I bought some cat toys before coming, hoping to play with it and make it less afraid. Unexpectedly, the next day, it crawled into my bed and slept next to me.
This is what it looked like when it first arrived.
At first, everything was normal. It received its first vaccination, and my girlfriend took good care of it. She not only prepared all the necessary supplies such as cat litter, scratching board, and cat food, but also learned how to cook for it on Xiaohongshu (a Chinese social media platform). She steamed chicken breast, carrots, shrimp, pumpkin, and other ingredients together for it to eat.
But last week, some problems occurred. Its eyes started tearing up and there was discharge. There was also hair loss around its nose... Later, we found out that it was conjunctivitis, but there was no nearby pet hospital. So we bought eye drops online and used them for two days, and the symptoms improved. On December 7th, my girlfriend and I took it to a nearby pet hospital in the city to get its second vaccination. We also asked the doctor about the hair loss on its face, which turned out to be ringworm caused by fungal infection.
Since the ringworm was on its face, close to its eyes and mouth, we couldn't use topical medication. The doctor prescribed some oral medication and gave us instructions on how to use it. In addition, because its conjunctivitis had not fully recovered, we bought a Elizabethan collar for it to wear around its neck to prevent it from scratching its eyes with its paws, which would make the condition worse. As a result, there was an awkward situation where it wanted to scratch but couldn't reach. Every time it scratched, it scratched the collar. When it wanted to lick itself after using the toilet, it couldn't reach either. It looked cute and pitiful.
I read an article by Jack before, and he and his partner were very sad and upset about the death of their cat. I have never had a cat, so I can't empathize. But now, just because of ringworm, it has to wear an Elizabethan collar, constantly tearing up due to conjunctivitis, and occasionally meowing at you. Even though I have only spent a few days with it, I feel very sorry for it. People who abuse animals deserve to die.
Because it has ringworm, it cannot sleep on the bed, but it still can't be stopped. One night, it climbed onto the bed without me noticing, and lay on my pillow with its belly against my face. It was very comfortable and warm, but because it was too close, it was very hot. I moved it to the side, but unexpectedly, it turned around and fell asleep on me.
This kind of trust between humans and animals is really wonderful. I told my girlfriend that this feeling is different from the emotions between people. I can't find a more appropriate word to describe it, I can only say it is very wonderful.
I hope it recovers soon.
By the way, its name is Shadow, thanks to Dayu for the name, I really like it.
Content and Appearance
On Monday, I recorded an idea in Flomo:
"Share a viewpoint that may be wrong. I haven't done in-depth research, but from the blogs I have browsed so far, it seems to be the case.
Blogs that have been around for a long time generally don't focus on fancy appearances. In the first two years of building a blog, they have already spent a lot of time on how to make their blogs more beautiful and attractive, how to add more interesting features. This seems to be a stage that most bloggers will go through.
After tinkering with themes, plugins, and features, some people will focus on polishing the content, gradually paying less attention to the appearance of the blog, and turning to simplicity and plainness. Of course, some people continue to indulge in changing the appearance of their blogs, pursuing freshness and beauty.
Obviously, blogs that focus on content will last longer."
I shared this on Twitter and Telegram channels, and many people agreed.
For example, Lao Zhang's blog, which started in 2008, has recently been busy "simplifying the blog". Not only did he downgrade the VPS and reduce the number of domain names, but the blog theme is also the same as mine, reducing categories and pages.
In my previous articles, I have also mentioned that tinkering and writing are one of the joys of being a blogger. Some people are good at writing, some people are good at tinkering. There is no distinction between superiority and inferiority. Everyone has their own way of playing and interest. Today, I want to add one more thing: both content and appearance are important. Bloggers in the early stages will spend a lot of effort on the appearance, adding beautiful styles and interesting features, to please themselves and attract visitors. But this should not be the focus, and it should not be the aspect that needs to be cared about every day.
Compared to appearance, content better reflects the value of a blog. Whether the content is one's own thoughts or experiences with various tools and software, only by polishing them well can readers be retained.
News Queen
Recently, I finished watching a Hong Kong drama series called "News Queen" produced by TVB.
On Douban, this drama ranked first on the weekly Chinese-language drama list. Before watching it, I roughly browsed the internet and the most common comment I saw about it was: "It surpasses mainland Chinese workplace dramas." After watching it, I had a similar feeling.
I'm not good at summarizing the plot of a drama, so I recommend referring to the introduction on Douban. Looking back at mainland-produced workplace dramas about women, the reasons why female characters succeed in the workplace are largely influenced by men, both positively and negatively. For example, family failures due to husbands' infidelity or being calculated by husbands. But "News Queen" is different. They are focused on their careers, they want to achieve something, they want to be directors, deputy directors, they want to do news well, and achieve a successful career simply because "I want to." I hope to make a difference in the workplace.
In the drama, when Zhang Jiayan's fiancé asked her, "Is your job important or am I important?" Zhang Jiayan asked him back, "What do you think?" and then hurried to her workplace without hesitation.
By the end of the drama, I and other viewers had the same feeling, not understanding Zhang Jiayan's transformation into a negative character. Zhang Jiayan is a very positive and moral character in the drama. She is neither a member of the Wen family nor the George Party. She does not participate in office politics, but focuses on reporting news and telling objective facts. But in the end, in order to advance her career, she showed extreme bias in reporting a certain news. I saw the trading of power in it.
In addition to workplace women, another theme of the drama is news. At the beginning of each episode, there is a quote, such as:
- The English word "Anchor" for news anchor originally means the fixed body of a ship, which metaphorically refers to the soul figure who stabilizes the news team.
- News programs should prioritize the needs of the audience, not the suppliers. - Ding Zheyun's "Sun Shixi's Pulsed News Study"
- "Truth" has many different versions. News does not have the ability to record all of them, so it can only focus on one and create a selective "truth". - Alain de Botton's "The News: A User's Manual"
- The responsibility of journalists is to firmly hold onto one core principle, to examine the corners of society that are not noticed by others. - Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel's "The Elements of Journalism"
- Mishearing the truth is worse than lying. - William James's "Varieties of Religious Experience"
There are a total of 26 episodes. The quotes in the first 25 episodes are real, but the quote in the last episode - "Interpretation of Goodness, Skillful Transmission of Truth" - although attributed to Lu Xun, is actually an advertising slogan from McKinsey & Company.
The content about news in the drama is sublimated here. Every image and every word we see is filtered through design. Even the most appealing content needs to be verified, and the same goes for news content. In recent years, with the rise of short videos and self-media, we are faced with various information every day, with falsehoods and truths alternating. In this fast-paced life, it is easy to lose oneself. In such a situation, it is even more important to stick to one's original intention and have a clear understanding of what one wants, and learn to distinguish external things.
Interesting Things and Objects
- Blogger Ya Yu created Bearblog themes for WordPress and Typecho, which is the one I have been longing for. It has a minimalist style. Maybe one day in the future, I will use this theme.
- There is a user on GitHub who created a cover maker called "Cover Paint". The layout style is similar to my cover image, but the layout is slightly different. I use Pseudoyu's template, which may not be as convenient as the mentioned tool, but for the sake of style consistency, I will continue to use it.
- Test is serious: "Small dining table, construction site grabbing food! Why can't working people afford a fast food meal?" After watching this video, I secretly envy companies with employee canteens. The company I interned at during the summer, although the employee canteen is not big, the dishes are rich, and regular employees receive meal subsidies every month, so they hardly have to spend much money on meals.
- Lao Jiang is reliable: "October's Popular Online Topics | Cold Knowledge: New Year's Eve has never been a statutory holiday" After watching this video, I found his viewpoint more interesting than the Wang Ziru incident. He mentioned the issue of Chinese people celebrating foreign festivals. Nowadays, young people in Shanghai seem to be just participating in a cosplay event.
- MyLens: This website is great! Input an event, and it will present it in a timeline format. It supports multiple languages, and the language of the output seems to be determined by the event. For example, if I input "Brexit", the result will be presented in English; if I input "Emperor Wu of Han", the result will be presented in Chinese.
- Ecosia: This search engine is great! It is a search engine based in Berlin, Germany. They donate 100% of their profits to non-profit organizations for tree planting. As of July 2020, Ecosia has planted over 100 million trees and absorbs over 50,000 tons of CO2 from the atmosphere every month.
- December 3rd: "Is it possible for blogs to make a comeback?" If it weren't for the emergence of apps like Douyin and TikTok, a blog comeback might still be possible, but currently, it seems to be limited to a group of people quietly writing blogs as a niche hobby.
- December 9th: Bought chestnuts at Lishanghuang, queued to pay. The woman in front of me was paying with her phone, and I noticed that her phone was obviously bent. At first, I thought it was a foldable screen, but when I looked at the phone case carefully, I realized that the entire body of the phone was bent... I took a glance, and it seemed that the phone was still functioning smoothly.
- December 9th: Inspired by a blogger, I created a new tag #中文独立博客分享 (Chinese Independent Blog Sharing) on Twitter, calling on everyone to actively share their independent blogs. You can quote, comment directly, and it would be better to include the tag. You can also write a few sentences to introduce your own blog. The most important thing is to remember to fill in the website URL.
These are the things from this week. I hope to review my week in a relaxed and calm manner, and I hope that the readers who subscribe to my blog can calmly read my shares and continue to love their lives. Life is not just about nonsense.
The background image is from my self-portrait, taken with my classmate's Canon EOS M50m2.