The Blogger – GoRetroGirl was born in the early 1970s. She is doing her part to preserve the memory of people, places, and things from the pop culture past so that they can be appreciated by future generations.

A Post We Luv – Classic Sweet Treat – The history of Sweethearts, the Valentine’s Day candy we all know and love.

Cheryl doesn’t collect beanie babies. Well, at least not that I know of. She does, however, have a collection of manual typewriters. Her passion expands to include nearly all pre-digital forms of communication – drawings, old film slides, typewritten documents, and handwritten letters. She shares this passion with the world through her blog, Strikethru, which focuses entirely on typewriters, typecasting, papercasting, and retro content.

Having been a dedicated blogger for nearly four years now, I thought I knew all about the many forms of blogging. But when I saw references to “Moleskine blogging” while perusing the Strikethru archives, I was a bit confused – but very intrigued. It seems that there are bloggers, including Cheryl, who write and doodle in Moleskine notebooks and then digitize and post the pages to their blogs. You can see Moleskine blogging at work in Papercast: Death of a Diarist. I checked out the other Moleskine blogging posts on Strikethru, and I just have to point out Moleskine Blogging: Flat Cats. Cheryl claims that she isn’t artistic, but I beg to differ. The flat cat in her Moleskine is absolutely adorable! The post even includes instructions for making one of your very own.

Another regular feature of Strikethru is typecasting. You’ll find a number of posts that have been created using old manual typewriters from Cheryl’s collection. She even identifies the typewriter used in each post.

So, what have I learned about Cheryl during my several visits to Strikethru? First, it comes as no surprise that she works as a technical writer. She obviously loves the written word, and being able to record her thoughts through the use of obsolete writing tools creates a sense of nostalgia for her. I’m willing to bet that she often looks at her old photos, reads her old diaries, and remembers what life was like as a child and a teenager. And though I have no particular interest in manual typewriters, I think that Cheryl and I have a lot in common.

If you’d like to take a stroll through time and find some pleasant reminders of days gone by, head on over to Strikethru. Maybe you’ll even be inspired to do some Moleskine blogging!

For more information Cheryl and Strikethru, be sure to read 10 Questions with Cheryl of Strikethru.

It’s fun however to go back and revisit those things that scared us years later. The folks at Kindertrauma do just that. According to their about page, “Kindertauma is about the movies, books, and toys that scared you when you were a kid. It’s also about kids in scary movies, both as heroes and villains. And everything else that’s traumatic to a tyke!” What a fun concept for a blog!

While spending a little time flipping through the Kindertauma archives, it didn’t take me long to find a post about yet another movie that creeped me out as a kid. I’m sure most people reading this will remember Poltergeist. Uncle Lancifer writes, “Don’t let the name Steven Spielberg or the PG rating fool you, this film has caused countless sleepless nights and it’s done so for decades.” No truer words have been spoken.

If there’s been a particular movie, tv show or book that has left you scarred for life, Kindertauma wants to hear about it! With KinderTrauma’s TraumaFessions feature, readers have the opportunity to chime in and submit their scary childhood confessions. For example, a reader by the name of Eric writes about the Beautiful Day Monster, which you’ve probably heard of if you’ve watched the Muppets. Thinking back on it now, I guess he was kind of creepy.

10 Questions with Cheryl of Strikethru

1. Describe your blog in five sentences or less.
Strikethru is a blog for nostalgic types who still remember the smell of ditto paper. Who still have a shoebox of earnestly-penned letters from school crushes. Who possibly haunt thrift stores and eBay auctions for Royal Quiet De Luxes and Remington Quiet-riters. Who are still in search of the perfect turn-of-phrase. Or, who just like reading about this kind of thing.

2. Link us to one post from your blog that best defines who you are.
Slide Film, Resurrected. This was a very early post that captures my attempt to find the human story behind ephemera like letters and pictures, a source of endless unread stories.

3. What sets you apart from other bloggers?
I spend a lot of time waxing nostalgic about obsolete writing machinery.

4. When and how did you first discover blogging?
I began blogging in 1999, uploading pages of a site called The Hall of Heads via FTP. This was before blog was a word and people used to churn their own butter.

5. What is your biggest pet peeve related to blogging or the internet?
The way comments or letters sections for controversial blogs (e.g., Salon’s Broadsheet) quickly become dominated by tearer-downers.

6. Name one plugin, blogging widget, or service that you can’t live without.
I’m going to turn this question sideways and say, I put a tag cloud on my blog, but I have no idea what it does. Can someone explain it to me?

7. If you could choose anyone, living or dead, to write a guest post for your blog, who would it be and why?
Oh, John Updike, for sure. I think the opening paragraph of “Rabbit Run” is the greatest writing I’ve ever read. I love what he said about old photographs in a recent issue of the New Yorker, which I, of course, blogged about.

8. How has blogging made you a better person?
Community. Learning about other people’s lives. Seeing behind labels. When I was nursing my daughter, I often read The Lactivist, written by a woman with very different political/religious ideas than myself. She’s amazing.

9. What are your tips for becoming a better blogger?
Be earnest. Irony is dead.

10. Name one great blog that you read on a regular basis. What makes it unique?
Uppercase Woman. Cecily is so open about her life and her flaws. She is not afraid of controversy. She is not afraid of taking a hard look at herself. And she does it with style.

In the words of Katy, the blog’s author, “The RollerBlog chronicles my journey into the decade of my birth, in which I discover movies, music, television, books, and more. Not to mention Wonder Woman, moustaches, the Heat Miser, feathered hair, and the occasional wookie.”

Featured on the RollerBlog are many different categories all spilling over with content paying homage to the seventies. I particularly enjoyed visiting the 1974 category, the year I was born, to see what kind of goodies Katy writes about. I was pretty delighted to find a post about the great old Christmas specials which air every year on television, particularly The Year Without a Santa Clause which was made in 1974. Cool! Of course I was just an infant when this classic was released, but I certainly remember watching it when I was little older. Good stuff.

Fast forward a few years and we find Katy writing about perhaps one of the cooler and certainly classic television shows born in the seventies, Doctor Who. What blog which focuses on the 1970s would be complete without Doctor Who? Katy seemingly leaves no stone unturned in her quest to celebrate the decade in which she was also born.

If you’re a child of the seventies or just have a love for the era, you can’t go wrong with The Rollerblog. Stop by today, grab the feed, kick back and let Katy take you for a trip down memory lane!