End of the Year Warm Fuzzies

Hey, Friends.

It's the end of the year, and everyone is doing their reflections back on the last twelve months. Maybe it's already 2016 where you live.  How's the year look so far?  Good, good.

I just wanted to say a quick thank to all of you, Friends, for sticking with me and actually reading my ramblings here.  It is very appreciated.  It also means I'm not just talking to myself, which is awesome.

I don't look at the stats that Blogger provides very often because they can be very surprising, and basically lead to more questions.  I do like to look at the "audience" stats though, just to see who is reading.  (They are also far less strange and confusing than trying to figure out how a particular search term brought people here.)

Friends, we have a become a little family with readers worldwide!  Doesn't that just warm the cockles of your heart?  This little thing, which started out as basically only being read by a few close friends and family, is now being read all over the place!  We aren't huge and about to take over the internet by storm -- that's crazy talk -- but we are growing, and I owe it all to you.

So I just want to take a minute and say thank you and I love to you to my Friends in:

The United States
Brunei
Russia
France
Germany
Latvia
Portugal
The United Kingdom
Poland
Romania

If you aren't listed, I'm sorry and I love you too.  Blogger only gives me so much data.  Or maybe you are just a ninja at flying under the radar, so stealthy that your tracks to my blog are undetectable.

And for those of you dying of curiosity....the post that got read the most this year? Thug Squirrels.

Yeah.

I don't know what that says about us, Friends.

The second most popular post was about my epic battle with a spider in my shower.

Kind of makes my year seem like it was filled with weird wildlife issues....which I guess is kind of true.  At least my issues with Mother Nature and her creatures provided some amusement.

Thanks for reading, Friends.  I hope you all have a 2016 full of love, happiness, and good health!

I'll catch you on the flip side.

You Think My Blog Is Sexy?

(AKA  Never Look Too Closely at the Info Blogger Provides in the Stats)

WARNING:  DO NOT READ THIS AT WORK, OR WITH SMALL, IMPRESSIONABLE CHILDREN LOOKING OVER YOUR SHOULDER,  OR IF YOU ARE OFFENDED BY BAD LANGUAGE, OR DISCUSSIONS OF SEX AND THE INTERNET.  YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.  IF THAT BOTHERS YOU, I ADVISE YOU STOP READING NOW AND GO ELSEWHERE.

When you have a blog on Blogger, like this one, you can get all kinds of cool stats -- things that I would not have the slightest idea how to compile on my own.  

Normally I just look at how many views each post gets.  I still get very excited  that people are actually reading this thing.  I’ve only ever gotten two comments left on my blog, one of which is complete spammy garbage, but I leave it up as it is one of my two precious comments.  The little things amuse and excite me.

When looking at the stats recently, I decided to click on the “Traffic Sources” for my blog.  Never, ever do this unless you are prepared to be amazed and/or horrified by the results!  It will show you the Top Referring URLs, Top Referring Sites, and the Top Search Keywords that brought people to your blog.  It also tells you how many times each of them were used.  Pretty cool.

Facebook and it’s mobile version being #1 for Referring URL and site was no surprise.  I post a link to the blog on Facebook when  I write something new.  I want people to be able to click on it and read my ramblings.  So hurrah for that seeming to work!

Then it got strange.

One of the Top Referring Sites I had never heard of before.  I’m not going to list it here -- you do NOT need the surprise I got when I clicked on the link.  I, naively, judged it on it’s URL and thought it was going to be a website like www.meetup.com -- a legit page that people use for book clubs, writing workshops, coffee groups, etc.  The URL had a similar name.  I thought maybe it was for blogging, that’s why so many people had been referred from the site.  Makes sense, right?

Wrong!

I clicked on the link and was greeted by a big picture of a naked woman with “FREE SEX” written above her head.  OMGWTF!?!

I closed that shit down immediately, no lie.

Then I kind of freaked out and texted someone who actually reads my blog and is internet-savvy to tell him of my discovery.  Because OMG Why?  How? What?

I went to take another look at the stats, thinking maybe some kind of pop-up had hijacked my browser. That is when I noticed the top entry for search terms that had brought people to my blog.

“My husband in bathroom fuck me q…”

Fuck me what? Quickly?  Quietly?  Are you in the bathroom with your husband?  Is your husband in the bathroom and you are hiding somewhere else with another man (or woman)?

I have no idea.  That’s where the keyword search trails off.  4 times that keyword search has brought people to my blog! 4! More people have found my blog searching that particular phrase than have by actually typing in the web address.  I kid you not -- I’ve seen the numbers.

I really can’t understand how or why.  That particular phrase has never been used anywhere on my blog (well, until just now).  I may drop the f-bomb on occasion.  I have written about my bathroom twice: once with a middle-of-the-night toilet repair, and once when I thought my mouthwash might be eating my sink and creating a sinkhole.  I also have never written about the husband that I do not have.  I’m still confused as to how my blog got associated with that phrase.  I’m chalking it up to the marvels of the internet.

I would like to apologize to what I can only imagine are a lot of very disappointed people.  

I’m so sorry.

You got pointed here thinking you were going to find some free sex or erotic stories or the like.  You got my blog instead.  I write about creepy deer, a certain religious group’s unending campaign to try to convert me, people dumpster diving like it is a new sport, and random weirdness that only seems to happen to me (like being accused of stealing my own identity while trying to buy cough syrup).

My apologies.  From the number of hits there are many people who are disappointed out there….

Or else you found my blog by accident the first time, you actually like it, and keep coming back?  I like to think my blog is smart and amusing -- those are sexy qualities in a person.  Maybe, a la Justin Timberlake, my blog is bringing sexy back?

Probably not.

**It has been pointed out to me that this particular post might actually end up getting me more traffic from the websites mentioned above.  I guess we shall see what the stats have to say!