Every week, we take a look at five different blog posts that caught our eye in the previous week. Here is this week’s collection.

Gus Fosarolli starts us off with a less than pleasant travel story. Thanks largely to the ongoing strike action at Air Canada, Gus had to go through quite the ordeal to finally make his way to Prague. He dealt with delays, lost luggage, and missed connections. That’s not how you want to start a vacation.

Annabelle is next with her list of five habits everyone should break. I don’t smoke myself, and I don’t think I go about wasting my money, but I am certainly guilty of comparing myself to others and always sweating the small stuff. We could all be better at what we do.

Mark Nichol recognizes that English is anything but a uniform language. There are differences between Australia and Canada, just as there are differences between Austin and Seattle. That’s why you need to know your regional vocabulary when you are writing on the web. You wouldn’t want to be misunderstood.

Enkay Blog has witnessed the end of an era. Web properties come and go all the time and now we are bidding adieu to another. MyBlogLog has disappeared. In the face of more prominent social networks and their ability to form different groups, the value of MyBlogLog has diminished and people aren’t using it nearly as much.

Leo Babauta has always been about minimalism. He has always been about keeping things as simple and straightforward as possible. That’s why he always tries to pack light when travelling, but we all run into the just in case syndrome where we start to pack just about everything “just in case” we need it. Leo thinks we should kick that habit.

Social media, by its very nature, is a social endeavor. Whether you are talking about Twitter, Facebook, or YouTube, the whole idea of these social networks is to allow individuals to socialize with one another. That also includes individuals who also happen to be businesses.

Far too many companies feel compelled to make sure of these “free” channels for advertising and marketing, but they are going about it in entirely the wrong way. They view Twitter and Facebook as nothing more than broadcast channels. That’s not where you find the real value.

The real value is when you actively engage with these online communities. Answer the questions that your followers, fans, and viewers are asking. Pose questions back to them, asking what they like and what they would like to see improved. Use these channels to learn from them and they’ll feel a greater connection with your brand.

If you’re simply syndicating content via an RSS feed to Twitter and Facebook, you’re missing 90% of the picture and 90% of the opportunity.

Last week, I wrote about a WordPress plugin called Social Metrics that allowed you to track the statistics related to social media when it came to the performance of your website or blog. This week, we extend the stat tracking with Feed Stats for WordPress, which has been reworked since the prior version stopped receiving support.

The idea behind this WordPress plugin is that it is able to provide you with all of the information regarding your RSS feed without you having to make a separate visit to your Feedburner account. You’re more likely to check your stats when you don’t have to go somewhere else to do it, which is the same reason why there are plugins for other services like Google Analytics.

With Feed Stats for WordPress, you can gain access to such statistics as the number of subscribers, number of hits, your reach, item clickthroughs and item views. All of this information can be found through the main WordPress dashboard section of your blog’s administration panel.

As usual, you can find Feed Stats for WordPress through the official Plugin Directory on WordPress.org. Screenshots and a handy FAQ are there as well.

It’s a question that every potential small business owner asks him or herself before taking the plunge: should I quit my day job and focus entirely on the new enterprise or should I keep my regular job and run the new business on the side?

Naturally, there are pros and cons to either approach. On the one hand, quitting your day job means that there are no other “work-related” distractions as you get ready to launch and run your new venture. You can dedicate yourself full-time, which not only helps to legitimize it as a real business, but it also means that you can probably get started (and become profitable) more quickly.

On the other hand, many small businesses will take some time before they are able to generate a steady flow of income. That positive cash flow can be quite the challenge and having a “regular” job with a regular income stream can provide you with that much needed assurance and peace of mind until your business starts turning a consistent profit.

If your financial situation allows, it’s usually better to take the first option rather than the second one. It carries much greater risk, to be sure, but it can help you determine more quickly whether the new business is viable or not. With the latter, you may always be left with the “some day” mentality of when you should quit the day job and focus on the new business.

There are many different tablets on the market these days and this surge has largely been brought on by the rise of the Apple iPad. This has paved the way for several Android tablets, but few can say they’re quite as rugged as the upcoming Panasonic Toughbook tablet.

Naturally a part of the Panasonic Toughbook line of tough electronics — the Toughbook notebook PCs are widely used by the military and law enforcement officials — the tablet runs on an unspecified version of Google Android. The 10.1-inch display appears to be matte, though it’s unclear whether it’s capacitive or resistive. Panasonic does note that it will use a stylus.

As can be expected from a Toughbook product, the tablet will likely adhere to military standards for ruggedness, withstanding all sorts of abuse via sand, temperature, and moisture. It will also come with optional 3G and 4G connectivity, which is very important for professionals when they are out in the field.

Not much else is being revealed at this point, but Panasonic has indicated that it is targeted a Christmas launch later this year.

All kinds of professionals choose to use BlueFur for their web hosting needs and one such professional is Dr. David Bond. Along with his associates, Bond runs an optometry office in the south end of Barrie, Ontario in Canada.

From that office, Dr. David Bond & Associates offers a full range of vision care services. These include standard eye health evaluations and vision assessments, as well as emergency appointments, laser vision surgery co-management, and full contact lens services. They offer particular expertise in computer-related eyestrain and vision problems, which are increasingly common in today’s digital age.

Along with Dr. Bond, the other major doctor working from the Barrie optometry clinic is Dr. Angela Miller. The office website not only provides information about the office and the services it provides, but also about ocular conditions, complete with useful diagrams and pictures.

Do you use BlueFur to host your websites? Let us know and we can feature you in a future blog post. Send an email message to blogfeature@bluefur.com with your name, website URL, and a brief description of what you’d like to see highlighted.