As I’m sure you’ve noticed, my blog changed.
This is what my blog looked like yesterday. Big change today.
It’s been more than two years since I changed the design of my blog, mainly because I really liked the old design. And the last time I changed designs, in December 2011, was a very pivotal point in my life. I guess my old blog reminded me of that. I subconsciously struggled to let it go. But today was time.
My new blog header is the brain-child of Fiver Löcker. In addition to being a good friend, Fiver is one of my longest-running and most loyal blog-readers. I’ve always admired her online drawings and decided there was no better person to create the new 2Summers look.
Fiver designed and drew this on her iPad. If you’d like to check out more of Fiver’s iPad drawings, visit her Tumblr feed. She also wrote a blog post about iPad drawing.
This header incorporates many of the things I love most about Joburg: boxing, minibus taxis, aloes, hadedas, coffee, sunsets, photography, and of course the Joburg skyline and the Melville Cat. The banner even includes a broken iPhone, which isn’t exactly a happy thing but tells a good story.
My new image is fairly unusual in the blogosphere, I think. Most blogs are moving toward simple, minimalist designs and this is quite the opposite. That’s what I like about it. The tagline of my blog is “An American in Quirky Johannesburg”. This image is nothing if not quirky and I think it says a lot about my blog and my life. Big thanks to Fiver for working so hard and patiently enduring the endless cross-continental back-and-forth.
Now that I’ve finally taken the plunge and changed my blog, I can’t believe I waited such a long time. This is so exciting. It’s like I went shopping and bought a whole new wardrobe.
Please bear with me while I get the new blog running smoothly – it still has a few kinks and I’ll be making some more format changes. The site also seems to be loading slowly and I’m a bit concerned about that. (Please let me know if it loads slowly for you.) But I’m sure I’ll get it all worked out soon. In the meantime I’d love to hear what you think.
How have I never blogged about 44 Stanley Avenue, the coolest shopping and dining complex in Joburg, which is only five minutes from my house?
I guess it’s wrong to say I’ve never blogged about 44 Stanley; I’ve mentioned it countless times over the years (see here and here) when writing about specific restaurants or shops that are there. But I’ve never written a dedicated post about 44 Stanley as a destination and it’s about time I did – especially now, with the holidays upon us.
I’ve been dreadfully uninspired lately, struggling to think of anything I want to blog about despite having a long list of great ideas (many of which you, my readers, provided in September). I’m finding it hard to feel positive about life at the moment. But on Saturday Thorsten and I got the chance to visit Indwe Park, an indigenous garden and sculpture park in Braamfontein, and I knew I had my topic for today.
In 2020, I published a blog post with tips for Americans living in South Africa who wanted to vote in the U.S. presidential election. I thought about simply resharing that post this year. But then I realized: 1) I want to write a U.S. election post that will be fun and informative for everyone, not just other Americans; and 2) Believe it or not, the U.S. presidential election stakes are even higher in 2024 than they were in 2020. So I’m introducing you to some really cool Americans in Joburg – one who I’ve known forever and two who I just met – and tell you a bit about who they are, why they live here, and why they vote.
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It makes me smile, when I see it.