Blog Blog Baby

Wow, I'd forgotten about that parody, and what an awful song the original was! What a blatant ripoff of Queen’s “Under Pressure.” I think this clip was on "In Living Color." Recognize that guy? It's Jim Carrey. Now that I've stopped laughing, I'll move on to my topic, which is blogging.

I know, I know, we've all talked about it before, nigh unto death, but some interesting new statistics have come to light. Also, Cousin Shane's friend Doug (Hi Doug! [waving]) wrote to me and said that he wants to start a blog and would like to talk to me about it. We had a nice conversation, and talked about different platforms, ease of use, etc. So it's on my mind today, and I have to say that I was quite surprised to read some of the statistics.

My friend Dan (Milwaukee Dan #1...Hi Dan! [waving]) sent me a story on Facebook from the New York Times concerning blogging. Follow the link to read the entire article, which was quite interesting. According to the article, blogs have a higher failure rate than restaurants. For anyone who has ever thought that it would be "fun" to own a restaurant and did a little research and found out just how hard it is to maintain a steady clientele and income, that comparison is shocking. Restaurants drop like flies (although that's probably an unfortunate metaphor) every day, so I would think it would be hard to have a higher failure rate than that! Not so.

According to a 2008 survey by Technorati, which runs a search engine for blogs, only 7.4 million out of the 133 million blogs the company tracks had been updated in the past 120 days. That translates to 95 percent of blogs being essentially abandoned, left to lie fallow on the Web, where they become public remnants of a dream — or at least an ambition — unfulfilled.

95%?! That's astounding to me! What's even more astounding is to realize that those of us that update regularly constitute only 5% of the blogs on Technorati. Doesn't that make you feel a little bit special? It does me. I've said before that I send a salute to all bloggers who are able to keep it up and keep going. Of course, real life gets in the way, and not everyone has enough time to make regular entries--I'm fortunate in that regard. The article also mentions the popularity of MySpace, Facebook, and most recently, Twitter (which made the cover of Time this week, believe it or not). I think that those of us who made the transition from AOL Journals to Blogger have definitely noticed the drop-off of some regulars at AOL, and I think that some of that has to do with microblogging sites.

I like to mix it up a little. I still love writing here, but I love connecting with work friends and blog friends who use Facebook--I also love how easy it is to share articles or videos there. I never got into MySpace, although I have an account there, and I'm not quite as enamored with Twitter as so many seem to be at the moment. (Fame is fleeting Twitter...you've been warned.) I do sort of like posting random thoughts (à la Jack Handey), but I still prefer and need to expand a little more upon my thoughts. Maybe the next au courant site will consist of one word updates. Twitter is fun for stalking following the famous and semi-famous, and my latest acquisitions (makes me want to read The Collector again) are Russell Brand and Jason Segel (after watching "Forgetting Sarah Marshall"). Russell Brand is quite the enigma. But I digress. Back to the article.

Richard Jalichandra, chief executive of Technorati, said that at any given time there are 7 million to 10 million active blogs on the Internet, but “it’s probably between 50,000 and 100,000 blogs that are generating most of the page views.” He added, “There’s a joke within the blogging community that most blogs have an audience of one.”

Again, astounding. How cool is it to build up a little following, to know that there are people out there who want to know what you have to say? It's way cool, that's how cool. It makes me very grateful that I get feedback from you all, and to have people reading this other than family! I am very happy about that, and I thank you all.

To Doug I say "safe passage and bon voyage!" I look forward to reading what he has to write, and if he chooses to make his blog public, I will definitely put up the link here. He's a wonderful writer who was stationed in Afghanistan and recently opted out of the Navy and returned home. I suspect he might have plenty to say!

*****

One more topic, and then I think I’m done for the evening. I’m not letting this one go by without rebuttal. I read something today in which the writer included this picture of Michelle Obama and Carla Bruni at the D-Day tribute in France over the weekend. They interpreted it as Mrs. Obama having “issues,” and took it as some sort of indication of nastiness or hatred on the first lady’s part. The general attitude was that it was typical of her.

Oh, for God’s sake. And people wonder why I find such writings ridiculous, counterproductive, irrational, illogical, and foolish. Did I leave anything out? Oh yeah…stoopid.

I’ll tell you what. Let’s say we have…oh, how about a hundred? That’s a nice round number, although it’s probably much more than that. Let’s have a hundred photographers from all over the world follow you around at, if not every waking moment, every time you appear in public. Let’s say that each of those hundred photographers takes a hundred pictures in the space of an hour—again, a very conservative estimate, because most photojournalists will take many more than that. Let’s then say that you spend five hours in the public eye, with those hundred journalists taking one hundred pictures per hour. [picture me wearing a green visor, an armband, and punching in numbers at an adding machine]

By my calculations, that is a conservative estimate of 50,000 pictures.

So you’ve got 50,000 images of every expression you make while you’re out and about. Every grimace of pain as a pebble works its way inside your shoe. Every sideways glance you make. Every squint as the sun proves to be a little too bright, and since it’s impolite, you can’t wear sunglasses at certain times. Every time you get a wedgie because your panties creep up on you. Every moment that you aren’t smiling. Every time you feel a muscle twitch or experience a pain in your neck or back because you worked out a little too vigorously the previous day. Every time you experience all the little aches and pains and twitches and irritations that we all experience every fucking day, you’ve got someone there snapping a picture of you. Think about what sort of pictures might be captured of you.

Cut it out, people. This is bullshit, and you know it. If any of you want to say, “But Beth, you put up pictures of Sarah Palin’s office, and talked about that!” Yes, I did. That is a physical space, a reflection of her philosophy and her environment, and not a split-second snapshot of her face interpreted as something sinister. Putting up such a picture and portraying the first lady as angry or elitist or feeling contempt for other first ladies or for ceremonies honoring those who have served in the military is foolish, it’s hateful, and it’s an incredibly stupid argument that shows nothing of substance, only the contempt and hatred you feel for the President, and apparently for his wife.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

First Lady buzz

Idle thought while laying in bed this morning, shortly before I got up: Oh...that's why they're called the Baltimore Ravens! Huh. I never made the connection.

Isn't it amazing where your mind goes--and what it finds--when you let it roam?

A quick answer to a comment on my previous entry. Laura asked "I loved the description of the wedding. Did you have tall hair, too?" Although the 80's is known as an era of Big Hair, no, I never did, but it was a function of my hair type. It is straight as a stick, and sort of slick and smooth--and thin. It won't hold a curl, and most barrettes or other hair doodads won't stay in. I could sort of "rough it up" a little bit with lots of product, and make it look thicker and wavy, but I've never liked spending a lot of time on my hair. I went old school and did the hippy chick thing--long, straight, and bangs. (I even used to wear headbands! Ha ha!) I still have it that way. It's easy to take care of, and I can put it up in the summer and get it off my neck. Maybe I'll cut it one day, but I'm in no hurry.

The President and Mrs. Obama are in London for the G20 summit. I know my British friends and their countrymen will take care of them and show them great hospitality! (Although there will be protests, as there are at every G20 meeting.) What's amazing to me is all the buzz about Michelle Obama. People seem to love her, and are fascinated by her! This will be a very complimentary entry about her, so if you don't care for her at all, you can probably skip this.

I have to say that I share their fascination. I think the woman is remarkable--smart, beautiful, cool clothes and great style, strong. Considering that much of the buzz is about her arms, I guess she's strong in more ways than one! She's so tall, too. She reminds me a lot of my former supervisor, Mary. Mary is also a tall, smart, and beautiful black woman. Maybe that's why I liked Michelle right off the bat, because she reminded me of Mary. Michelle is focusing her efforts on education, which is something I also care deeply about. And she put in a garden at the White House! I think she's just as cool as can be, and it really surprises me when I hear haters hate on her, because I wonder how you cannot like this woman. Much was made about her comment during the election about for the first time in her life, being proud of her country, but I think her words were purposefully misconstrued. I got what she meant. Of course, she's always been proud of her country, but as a black woman, how much more pride must she have felt with her husband running for the highest office in the land?

Anyhoo, I think Michelle Obama is a great role model, not just for black women, but for all women. I think she's wonderful, and I look forward to seeing her for the next four, maybe eight years!

Exciting bird news--a new sighting! I glanced out and saw several finches, house and American Goldfinch, at the seed feeder. One of the house finches looked a lot redder than usual. I whipped out my trusty binoculars and took a really good look, even though he was just 15 feet or so away. He didn't have a brown cap! His head was all red, or as my Indiana book describes it, raspberry red. (Hey, he's wearing a Raspberry Beret. Hahaha!) He wasn't a house finch, he was a purple finch! In going on seven years at Nutwood, I had yet to see a purple finch, although I don't think they're all that uncommon. They're winter birds here, so I feel fortunate to have seen him before he headed back up North. This is a picture I found on the Web. I tried to get a picture of Mr. Purple and his wife, but they flew away both times I saw them.

I’m very pleased to have a new sighting. Cool!

Ghouls, and ghosties, and long legged beasties

I hope everyone had a good day, and has all kinds of ghoulish fun planned for tonight! I anticipate that we'll be watching a scary movie tonight, and next up on our playlist is "Thirteen Ghosts." I hope it's good and creepy. We don't get trick or treaters out here, so we won't need to worry about that. If a stray one shows up, we'll just give them a bottle of wine. We have a little stash.

As Mark would say, I keed, I keed.

Wow, what a gorgeous day! I didn't even have to wear a jacket when I went to the store. I got my errands run, arranged for a delivery, then spent a little time getting some bulbs planted. Some hyacinths and some little ones called...snowdrops? Not sure, but they come up pretty early. I remembered! Glory of the Snow! I don't know if any of them will make it--I should have planted them last year, but for whatever reason didn't get to it. I only planted a couple of dozen, so it wasn't too bad. One year, I got a whole bunch of bulbs free from some bulb catalog and ended up planting 150. That about did me in, so I'll stick with the lower number!

Back to the horror thing. I got an email from my uncle today. (sigh) I love him to pieces, but I'm at a loss. This is the uncle who sent me some stuff a while back about Obama, and I wrote back and responded to some of the erroneous information in the forwarded email, and asked him to not send me that stuff anymore. He seemed okay with that, but I got another one today about...get this...the false story about Michelle Obama chowing down on expensive room service items at the Waldorf-Astoria. I found the Snopes article that debunked that lie (she was in Fort Wayne, Indiana on the day she was supposedly stuffing her face at the Waldorf), and the article included the statement released by the New York Post (always a bastion of truth) that their report was a complete falsehood. I sent the article to him and asked him to read it.

His reply was that he doesn't know what to believe anymore, that he is trying to figure things out, that this election is part of Biblical prophecy, and that Obama is a Muslim. (heavy sigh) I wrote back and said that no, he's not a Muslim, he's an evangelical Christian...just like you. I went on to say that I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, but in the meantime, please don't send me more forwards about this, because I have already cast my vote.

I made the choice to not pursue the subject and not argue with him. I provided the information that it was a false report, I stated how I felt, and if I did pursue it, neither of us would manage to convince the other in the end! Sometimes you just have to let things go, right? It makes me feel sad, though, that there are some who are so ready to believe such lies about a person.

We're getting close to the Big Day. It looks like McCain-Palin are concentrating on Ohio at the moment, and the Governator is with McCain in Columbus right now. He's actually talking about how Obama needs to beef up his scrawny legs and build up his skinny arms. Hahaha! That's pretty stupid. I prefer mental muscle! Okay, I can't listen any longer. Sorry, Governator.

It will be interesting to see what happens with Ohio. Based on what my friend LJ says, and from what I'm reading, things are tough all over, but they're getting really tough in Ohio. She knows people in her city who are getting laid off, and unable to pay for heat, food, and medical bills. It's a fairly industrial state, and industries are suffering right now (but she also says that she knows a lot of people who won't vote for Obama because he's black). Here in Indiana, we're seeing layoffs at places like Whirlpool. Our next-door county, Elkhart, has an economy based mostly on manufacturing, including RV's. As you can imagine, they've taken some huge hits. I heard recently that their unemployment rate is up to 11%. THAT is scary. It's not as bad where we're at, because our county is more service-oriented than manufacturing-oriented, but we're taking hits, too. Ken and I both feel fortunate that his job is secure, and if I ever had to, I know my job would also be a hot commodity. But I think about how it must feel to have that uncertainty hanging over your head...wondering if your hours will be cut, or if you'll come to work one day and find out that your plant is closing down or your job is being eliminated, and to know that hardly anyone is hiring, so your chances of finding another job are not good.

When I was driving home from the store today, I saw that gas was down to under $2.50. I had a moment where I thought, "Cool!" and then I thought about why it's down so much: the economy sucks right now. I know it will recover eventually, but in the meantime, we've got some people who are in dire straits right now. It bothers me greatly, and I hope that we choose the right person to lead us out of this mess, and that those who are struggling can get some help.

But for now, just have fun with faux scary stuff, not genuine scary stuff, and enjoy hearing things that go bump in the night. Watch out for a cold hand reaching up from beneath your bed, caressing your ankle with a bony finger....