After a few tense days of anticipation, the 2005 Jewish and Israeli Blog Award page sponsored by the Jerusalem Post and Israellycool is finally up, and I am honored to be nominated in three categories!For each of those categories, to be honest, I wouldn't vote for myself. There are much better blogs than this one in every respect. Specfically, these are who I believe should win my categories:
Best Designed Blog: Jewlicious is a fantastically designed site. Even my designer, the beautiful and talented Daughter of Ziyon, agrees that it is better than the job she did here.
Honorable mentions to The View From Here and Oceanguy.
Best Israel Advocacy Blog: Very tough category. Iris was not nominated and it is my current favorite just for its sheer completeness - I now go there as often as Daily Alert to get the latest news on topics I write about.
Of those nominated, I like IsraPundit, Soccer Dad, the Muqata and Smooth Stone, but I have to admit that I am not yet familiar with many of the nominated blogs. Which is one of the reasons I love these awards - to get a chance to see blogs I missed this year.
Best series: I have to go with Aaron's Story at Elie's Expositions. Brilliantly written, absorbing, terrifying and heartbreaking. It is the single best piece of writing I have yet seen on the web.
I was disappointed not to see Rose's Story nominated - it is well worth reading and very well done.
I am looking forward to checking out many more of the nominated sites. It is a shame that many fine blogs were not nominated or did not properly get nominated; perhaps next year a nomination form would make more sense. This is not to take away from the amazing job that Dave at Israellycool has done in getting this organized - yasher koach and thank you! Thanks also to the Jerusalem Post for hosting the awards this year, adding much visibility to the still-young JBlogosphere. And, again, thanks to those who nominated me.
Preliminary voting starts January 9th, so there is plenty of time to check out all the great blogs listed.