All about the Sweete Shoppe
Welcome to Ye Olde Woman's Sweete Shoppe! As you may have figured out, this is not really a shoppe, and you'll find no candy here - at least not the literal variety. The point of this site is to present the best in engaging halal fun on the net - and hopefully gain something sweet by it, inshaAllah (God-willing). But what do I mean by that, and who on earth am I in the first place? To answer these and other questions, I present to you this pseudo-FAQ (the queries have been made up, but the answers are real):
So what is this again?
I started this blog to motivate myself and encourage others: to show that free time can indeed be spent in a way that's halal, fun and fruitful at the same time - and that your soul will feel better for it. Like most people, I was trying hard to relax and amuse myself in halal ways, but found that I had to navigate a web that was composed of every frivolous, useless and nonsensical way to waste time. It was hard to find halal fun in general; harder still to find good halal fun. Trying to relax, I would often end up resorting to random web searches (website, movie or photo), crawling through blogs/journals that contained little substance, reading commentaries that were basically disguised backstabbing, and generally pandering to the plethora of brain-draining soul straining "treats" on the web. Worse still, I wasn't much amused and relaxed by it anyway. Occassionally, I would come across something great - something that satisfied my sweet tooth for interesting and engaging amusement that I could feel good about. I would bookmark these gems and rue the fact that there wasn't a site purely devoted to my craving for pure halal, things that gave you the quick pick-me-up needed while complementing your spiritual self, rather than distracting you from it. As my favourite list grew, I decided I really wanted to share my finds with all friends of a similar mind; so naturally, I blogged it. I still consume web junk, but I'm hoping that this will encourage me to go naturally sweet with no artificial colours, flavours or preservatives (metaphorically speaking, of course :) ).
What do you mean by halal?
Halal is broadly defined as "permitted by God/Islamically permissible," its antithesis being haraam. For this site, I try to choose simple and pure material with no ambiguity in merit for all jurisprudence (with no partial content that may be classified as either makrooh(disliked) or haraam(prohibited)). I also try to pick things that are educational, or intellectually stimulating. The aim is for everyone to be able to easily relax in a spiritually rejuvenating way.
So is that all this blog has to offer?
No; I'll also include short points to ponder and lengthier pieces on spirituality/self-improvement that I've learnt or gathered, as well as useful resources. Although I started with dessert, that's the main course.
What's with the name?
The title of the blog came as a natural consequence of my nickname, Old Woman. I wanted to start a blog gathering good links on the web for sweet stuff, and this fit both name and theme. It worked out that soon after, I began studying Middle English. Unfortunately, that's when I realised that "Ye Olde Woman's Sweete Shoppe" pronounced correctly sounds more like "Ye Olde Woman's Sweat Shoppe." Ahem, no hidden metaphors there...
Are you really an old woman?
No, I'm an olde woman. "Old Woman" used to be my self-appropriated nickname for a time (and still is in some circles); a pun on my real name. I stuck with the nickname on the net after getting contacted by annoying males eager to chat with any eligible female-sounding pseudonym - it served me well, they lost interest thereafter! I changed it to "Olde Woman" to be more honest: because I was not really an aged lady, but could come across as one. Eventually, I stopped using it when I learned that one ought to chose good names for oneself that would be a cause for motivation. I chose Shajara, which means "Tree;" I am fond of trees.
But I still think the name is weird and not very informative -
Ok, if it makes you feel better, you can say OLDE stands for "Only Legit Delicious Entertainment." Pick what you believe is the least corny :)
Can I have a chocolate from the Chocolate Box?
Alas, there are no physical edible treats in the Chocolate Box. However, there are a bunch of categories of good stuff, as follows:
Eye Candy - Artwork, photography, and other visual media good for the soul and easy on the eyes
Sweete Sounds -Listen with your ears, hear with your heart: Anasheed, Quran and other audio
Sweetplay - Games that massage your mind and don't increase your blood pressure
Fruit for thought - Chew on this: spiritual and intellectual snippets of wisdom
Lollipop - Humorous detours.
The Sweetest... - Where I share what I believe to be the best resources in the web (and sometimes real) world. Example: "The Sweetest...free graphical art programs"; links added/updated periodically.
Sweeete! - Something particularly cool.
Spoonful of Sugar-(* labeled, but not in category list)A short-and-sweet snippet; something I've come accross in my day worth pondering. I'll try to post a new one daily!
What is a "Nasheed"?
A nasheed (plural anasheed) is an Islamic song/sung poem; while the word is originally Arabic, anasheed have been sung in many languages. It is also sometimes translated as an "Islamic chant." Pure anasheed (those usually picked for the Sweete Shoppe) are a cappella. Though many anasheed are direct spiritual reflections/praise, topics are extremely wide-ranging, from wedding songs ("afraah") to personal struggles.
Did you really post this on the first of January, 2001?
No - and I didn't post this on 2004 either, contrary to the permalink! It was August 2007, if you must know. And yes, as you may have guessed, I just changed the timestamp so that it would be the first post and not show up in the main page. Why am I telling you this? It was bugging me and I had to be honest up-front! Haha, silly olde woman.
That's all *I* could think of; if you have any real questions, post a comment. Otherwise, feel free to enjoy some metaphorical desserts. I hope you like them.
-The Olde Woman
So what is this again?
I started this blog to motivate myself and encourage others: to show that free time can indeed be spent in a way that's halal, fun and fruitful at the same time - and that your soul will feel better for it. Like most people, I was trying hard to relax and amuse myself in halal ways, but found that I had to navigate a web that was composed of every frivolous, useless and nonsensical way to waste time. It was hard to find halal fun in general; harder still to find good halal fun. Trying to relax, I would often end up resorting to random web searches (website, movie or photo), crawling through blogs/journals that contained little substance, reading commentaries that were basically disguised backstabbing, and generally pandering to the plethora of brain-draining soul straining "treats" on the web. Worse still, I wasn't much amused and relaxed by it anyway. Occassionally, I would come across something great - something that satisfied my sweet tooth for interesting and engaging amusement that I could feel good about. I would bookmark these gems and rue the fact that there wasn't a site purely devoted to my craving for pure halal, things that gave you the quick pick-me-up needed while complementing your spiritual self, rather than distracting you from it. As my favourite list grew, I decided I really wanted to share my finds with all friends of a similar mind; so naturally, I blogged it. I still consume web junk, but I'm hoping that this will encourage me to go naturally sweet with no artificial colours, flavours or preservatives (metaphorically speaking, of course :) ).
What do you mean by halal?
Halal is broadly defined as "permitted by God/Islamically permissible," its antithesis being haraam. For this site, I try to choose simple and pure material with no ambiguity in merit for all jurisprudence (with no partial content that may be classified as either makrooh(disliked) or haraam(prohibited)). I also try to pick things that are educational, or intellectually stimulating. The aim is for everyone to be able to easily relax in a spiritually rejuvenating way.
So is that all this blog has to offer?
No; I'll also include short points to ponder and lengthier pieces on spirituality/self-improvement that I've learnt or gathered, as well as useful resources. Although I started with dessert, that's the main course.
What's with the name?
The title of the blog came as a natural consequence of my nickname, Old Woman. I wanted to start a blog gathering good links on the web for sweet stuff, and this fit both name and theme. It worked out that soon after, I began studying Middle English. Unfortunately, that's when I realised that "Ye Olde Woman's Sweete Shoppe" pronounced correctly sounds more like "Ye Olde Woman's Sweat Shoppe." Ahem, no hidden metaphors there...
Are you really an old woman?
No, I'm an olde woman. "Old Woman" used to be my self-appropriated nickname for a time (and still is in some circles); a pun on my real name. I stuck with the nickname on the net after getting contacted by annoying males eager to chat with any eligible female-sounding pseudonym - it served me well, they lost interest thereafter! I changed it to "Olde Woman" to be more honest: because I was not really an aged lady, but could come across as one. Eventually, I stopped using it when I learned that one ought to chose good names for oneself that would be a cause for motivation. I chose Shajara, which means "Tree;" I am fond of trees.
But I still think the name is weird and not very informative -
Ok, if it makes you feel better, you can say OLDE stands for "Only Legit Delicious Entertainment." Pick what you believe is the least corny :)
Can I have a chocolate from the Chocolate Box?
Alas, there are no physical edible treats in the Chocolate Box. However, there are a bunch of categories of good stuff, as follows:
Eye Candy - Artwork, photography, and other visual media good for the soul and easy on the eyes
Sweete Sounds -Listen with your ears, hear with your heart: Anasheed, Quran and other audio
Sweetplay - Games that massage your mind and don't increase your blood pressure
Fruit for thought - Chew on this: spiritual and intellectual snippets of wisdom
Lollipop - Humorous detours.
The Sweetest... - Where I share what I believe to be the best resources in the web (and sometimes real) world. Example: "The Sweetest...free graphical art programs"; links added/updated periodically.
Sweeete! - Something particularly cool.
Spoonful of Sugar-(* labeled, but not in category list)A short-and-sweet snippet; something I've come accross in my day worth pondering. I'll try to post a new one daily!
What is a "Nasheed"?
A nasheed (plural anasheed) is an Islamic song/sung poem; while the word is originally Arabic, anasheed have been sung in many languages. It is also sometimes translated as an "Islamic chant." Pure anasheed (those usually picked for the Sweete Shoppe) are a cappella. Though many anasheed are direct spiritual reflections/praise, topics are extremely wide-ranging, from wedding songs ("afraah") to personal struggles.
Did you really post this on the first of January, 2001?
No - and I didn't post this on 2004 either, contrary to the permalink! It was August 2007, if you must know. And yes, as you may have guessed, I just changed the timestamp so that it would be the first post and not show up in the main page. Why am I telling you this? It was bugging me and I had to be honest up-front! Haha, silly olde woman.
That's all *I* could think of; if you have any real questions, post a comment. Otherwise, feel free to enjoy some metaphorical desserts. I hope you like them.
-The Olde Woman
posted by Stylus Virus at 1:01 PM
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