Vancouver Blogger Profile: Mostly Lisa Bettany

Every few months I do a slough of Vancouver Blogger Profiles. Admittedly, some of the profiles are not for those in or from our fair city, but they’re important and entertaining all the same. I should have a few mini and formulaic interviews lined up for this week so here’s the first on this season’s series, featuring Mostly Lisa.

Photo Credit: Red Pilot Media on Flickr

Who are you? I am Lisa Bettany aka Mostly Lisa.

What is your blog? I blog at MostlyLisa.com. I’m currently looking at doing some guest spots on a few mac geeky sites, but right now I find it challenging enough just keeping my own blog up to date.

Are you originally from Vancouver? I’m a Prairie girl by birth. Saskatoon specifically, but I spent most of my childhood in Victoria, BC. As soon as I was finished high school, I trekked all over Canada to pursue my ice dance dreams. Male figure skating partners are hard to come by, and the ones you do find rarely have an amicable personality or a personality that didn’t clash with mine, so I had to move around a lot in search of a new partner almost every year. After I was badly injured (dropped by partner from lift onto back… ouch, I returned home to finish off my Bachelor’s degree and Master’s degree in Linguistics at the University of Victoria.

When I graduated, I moved to a gorgeous, but tiny and overpriced apartment in Coal Harbour. After 6 months of trying and failing to find a job in my field, I decided to throw in my academic towel and do something creative. I put more effort into my acting and modeling careers, started a blog, wrote some music, learned photography, video editing, and started a multimedia company. Just like that: one, two, three: Easy peasy…. Mostly.

What’s your favourite thing to write about? Anything I can be sarcastic about, which is pretty much anything.

In your eyes, what is the BEST part of blogging… or if you prefer, the worst? Best part is the connections you make with amazing people, and getting to peak into the happening of their life. The feedback is also lovely. Sometimes it’s just nice to know other people are going through the same things you are.

The worst part is the 404s that literally crop up everyday. I am a perfectionist to a fault, and I edit and re-edit my posts, even after I’ve posted them. It’s never ending. Sometimes I find a typo on an old post, or just some bad grammar and I literally turn bright red.

Do you write for yourself, your readers, for Google, for a living? Tricky question. I’ve always had a passion for writing. I was in a journalism program in university, before I switched to linguistics. I started my blog as an anti-blog of “diary-style” bloggers who write about every mundane, inappropriate, and sexually explicit thing in their daily lives. So from the very beginning, I wrote for the sheer joy of expressing myself.

Lately, I’ve found myself posting a lot for my readers by keeping my blog dynamic and constantly changing. If I talk about tech stuff for a few days, I’ll flip it and do a photo post, or a silly video.

But, I would be lying if I said that I never consider the google, digg, technorati bot in what I write. I think every blogger is pushing for a bigger readership, respect, and recognition. There is a point where blogging becomes more than a hobby and starts infringing on the amount of time you can spend actually earning money. So at that point, you have to push your blog to next level and go after sponsors and ads.

Would you ever censor yourself/Do you feel the need to censor yourself? I don’t swear. Ever. Unless, like my mother, you consider “bollocks” a swear. I don’t talk about politics or religion or really controversial issues. I want people to come to Mostly Lisa be entertained, not get angry. I’m not interested in angry debates. Sunshine, lollipops, and iPods!

Photo Credit: Red Pilot Media on Flickr

PC, Mac or Speak n’ Spell: I am quite partial to my Speak & Spell as it is sharp as a whip and without it I might not be able to spell very gud. But my Mac is my everything. I literally hold it in my arms and feel all my dreams coming true. Well, until an app crashes. Then I curse all things Steve Jobs.

Blogs you read or would recommend: I subscribe to about 100 blogs and sites that I check frequently. First, how could I not read Miss604? I would not know a single happening in Vancouver without it.

I also check my good friend, Christina Warren’s blog , who writes for TUAW. She has some serious sass and tech know-how.

For Photography inspiration, I hit up Strobist.

For design inspiration I’ll go to Best Web Gallery, or Web Designer Wall.

For productivity advice, I love Merlin Mann’s 43 Folders and the sweet illustrations & advice at Put things off.

& to find out the latest, greatest 2.0 trends, I go to iJustine’s jam packed media smorgasbord. I also love Gavin Strange’s weekly super long posts of his life as a skateboarding designer extraordinaire. And Jake and Amir is always good for a laugh.