open up your item.block.inc.php

and add this to the top

	 <?php
 if($Item->ID%2==0) echo '<div class="evenright">';
 else echo '<div class="oddleft">';
 ?>

and add a closing </div> to the end of the file, obviously.

and align the post to the right and left via css:

div.evenright {
	width: 50%;
	float: right;}
	
	div.oddleft {
	width: 50%;
	float: left;}

you'll end up with sth like this;

http://i49.tinypic.com/2550qom.jpg

You get the idea..

It's not the best way to do it, but it gets it done i guess

Thanks for the suggestion.

In the end, I decided on removing the posts loop from the main page and added a free html widget instead. It's not quite what I wanted (but any of the options are a compromise), but at least this way the links can still be added and show up on the single posts page (and in RSS), and a few seconds more work on manually updating the list on the main page for each new link added. Suits my purposes without being overly strenuous to update.