An Online Organizing Weekly Link Round-Up

There must be something genetic about spring cleaning. Cleaning is one of my least favorite things to do, but whenever spring starts throwing off winter's shackles, there must be something about that warmth and sunlight because I start looking for things to organize.

I've mentioned in the past few weeks that I've been organizing the shelves in my craft room, and I'm just about to reshelve some books, which is something I've always loved to do-- I find it soothing. Many of the people I've worked with over the years when asked to describe me have almost unanimously said, "organized," and I think they have a point. If everything is organized, you save time because you don't have to hunt for things, and if things are kept picked up most folks won't notice a little dust. (Told you I didn't like cleaning!)

What I often forget about during my organizational rampages, however, are online things, and that's what I've been working on recently. A lot of people don't see the point of Pinterest, but I don't care. I learned a long time ago that no two people see things exactly the same way. I'm a visual person, so Pinterest suits me right down to the ground. I'm in charge of The Poisoned Pen's Pinterest page, and when I saw that there was a new upgrade to the app, I was all for it.

I don't know about any of the rest of you Pinterest users, but I find it daunting to come across another user who has hundreds of different boards. Who has time to scroll through all of them? When Pinterest added "sections," my first thought was "'bout time!" That one thing has saved me a lot of work on The Poisoned Pen's boards, but I forgot all about my own until the past few days. Now instead of having one board per year of books I've read or my favorite reads each year, I can have one board "Books Read by Year" or "Best Reads by Year," and each one can have sections for each year. Two boards instead of fourteen. So I've been tidying them up and being much too pleased with it. Just goes to show that I'm an organizational junkie! And doing this has taken me down Memory Lane over and over again. "It's been five YEARS since I read that book? Impossible!" "Oooooh, I love that book!" "I wonder if that author has written a new book?" See what I mean?

Now that I've finished blathering about an uninteresting topic, it's time to head on out to the corral. (Some of you probably already skipped down to this part!) Head 'em up! Moooooooove 'em out!

►Books & Other Interesting Tidbits◄

• A brief history of taking books along for the ride.
• The Frankenstein manuscript shows the evolution of Mary Shelley's monster.
• Blame tailgaters for your traffic woes. 
• Will a new law forever change the German language?
• Meet the designers behind your favorite book covers.
• How the 1918 flu pandemic helped advance women's rights.

►Channeling My Inner Indiana Jones◄

• Dogs' discovery of Revolutionary War graves leads to a preservation victory. 
• Ancient Egyptian mummies have transformed what we know about tattooing. 
• The earliest images of breast cancer have been found in Renaissance paintings.
• The remains of a Revolutionary War-era ship was found on a beach in Maine after a nor'easter. 
• The wreckage has been found of the World War II aircraft carrier USS Lexington.
• A rusty Porsche barn find is expected to sell for $700,000 or more.

►Channeling My Inner Elly Mae Clampett◄

• Scientists caught the deepest-dwelling fish in the ocean on camera over five miles below the surface.
• Scientists have discovered a "super colony" of 1.5 million Adélie penguins from space.
• Ghost is deaf and was considered unadoptable. Now he's making K-9 history.

►Fascinating Folk◄

• Henrica Kiernan defended America during World War II and found love along the way.
• Tilly Edinger, the woman who shaped the study of fossil brains. 
• During World War I, many women served and some got equal pay.

►The Happy Wanderer◄

• Rubens' sprawling castle in the Belgian countryside is on the market.
• These were America's most-visited national parks in 2017. (I've been to all of the top five.)
• A 227-year-old tree planted by George Washington was pulled down during high winds on his Mount Vernon estate.

►I ♥ Lists◄

• Nine necessary works of non-fiction written by black women.
• Fifteen accessories from Target that every book lover will want to add to their shopping cart. 
• Buzzfeed thinks only a true book lover will get 10 out of 13 correct on this quiz. 
• The literary roles of Molly Ringwald.
• Thirty-three of the weirdest Philip K. Dick covers Literary Hub could find.
• The top ten spaceships in fiction.

That's all for this week! Don't forget to join me next Friday when I'll be sharing a freshly selected batch of links for your surfing pleasure.

Have a great weekend, and read something fabulous!