I’ve been doing some thinking about this blogging business lately. I wonder why I bother writing it. Sure, I tell myself I write it for me, and I do… but it’s not like I have any descendants who are going to care about it when I’m dead. Besides, since I’m posting this on WordPress, someone has to pay for it to exist. Once I’m dead, no one will be around to do that.
I think Bill likes the blog, but he’s about eight years older than I am and he’s a guy. So chances are, I’m gonna outlive him. I actually kind of hope I don’t, and given my aversion to medical people, there’s a good chance I won’t. But I do expect to outlive him, because I have a lot of relatives who continue to live for a long time. My mom, for instance, turned 85 yesterday. Even my dad, who was an incorrigible alcoholic, lived to be 81 years old. His mother died at almost 101; my father spent just seven years without his mother in his life, and for most of those seven years, he wasn’t in his right mind, anyway.
Some of my posts are popular, but they tend to be about true crime or celebrities. The deep thinking posts usually go largely unread. At least I know, though, that sometimes even really talented, popular people go through the same thing. Check out this song by Tim Minchin, who is just amazing…
Not that I would ever compare what I do to what Tim Minchin does… he is genuinely and insanely talented on so many levels. He’s a great singer, songwriter, keyboard player, beatboxer, entertainer… I could go on and on. I write silly blog posts that are sometimes serious or helpful. Sometimes, I get paid. Like, I just got a $102 payment from WordPress for ad revenue. That was cool. It took a long while, though.
I guess I write this shit because it’s my way of making a mark on the world. And it’s better to write about it in my blog than on social media, because if I write about it on Facebook, it’s more likely to offend or annoy. I know a lot of people don’t like it when folks get on a soapbox, even when they do it on their own Facebook pages. So, I put this stuff in a blog, where a person has to make a conscious decision to visit. But not that many people do visit most of my posts. The ones that get traffic tend to be about specific subjects, some of which are pretty creepy.
For instance, when I first started writing this version of my blog, I wrote a post about wife spanking. That post gets a ton of hits. I could write more about that to generate more hits, but the types of people who go looking for those kinds of posts are probably not the audience I’d want on this blog. Still, it was an interesting topic to write about once or twice. I was a little creeped out, though, when I noticed people looking at my “about” page after spending several minutes on that post. Yikes!
I also get lots of hits on certain opinion posts, especially if they’re about true crime cases. A few of my book reviews are good performers, although most barely get noticed. It occurred to me the other day that my YouTube channel now tends to get more views than the blog does… I mean, it’s not more popular on a daily basis, because I don’t post videos every day. But individual posts get more views than most of my blog posts do. I expect that if I keep posting videos, my channel– which doesn’t even have a compelling name– will outperform my blogs. Most of my newest videos have well over 100 views, which is a lot more than most of my blog posts have. Because I post more often on the blog, my overall hits are higher here.
I hate to even think about the travel blog, which was legitimately popular for awhile. Yesterday’s post currently has two hits. Why bother with it? I know that there will be a day when I don’t travel so much anymore… at least in Europe. The blog will be a reminder in the future– of the good times and the bad times. But won’t it also be depressing? Isn’t this just a waste of time? Wouldn’t it be better if I did something more constructive?
And then there are the occasional rude, nasty, hateful comments I get… although I will admit that turning on comment moderation helps a lot with that. When I was still using Blogspot, I didn’t really moderate comments. Consequently, I got some feedback that was downright vile. I usually turn nasty comments into blog posts. Sometimes, I even get really creative and turn them into songs! I haven’t done that in awhile, though.
I did recently write about this phenomenon, how failure is a part of trying, and sometimes failure is necessary for success. But hell, I’m getting to be an old lady. Maybe it’s time I took up bowling or something.
I guess it’s a typical Monday, isn’t it? Poor Bill is getting the week off to an unpleasant start. He’s currently at the dentist’s office… not our usual place, but a local one in Wiesbaden. He broke a molar last week and has to have it extracted so he can eventually get an implant. Come to think of it… we were talking about this last night. Bill was irritated because he called our dental insurance carrier and was told implants aren’t covered. I told him to look up the benefits and, sure enough, they ARE covered at 50 percent. But then Bill said, “Hell… it doesn’t matter. I have enough money to pay for the implant outright.”
“But we pay for dental insurance, so they need to pay their part.” I said.
It occurs to me that when we first got married, this situation would be extremely stressful. We didn’t have the money for expensive dental procedures. Bill was climbing out of financial hell, thanks to his marriage to Ex and their subsequent divorce. I was trying to get a job. Now, we have a pretty comfortable lifestyle. So, maybe we’ve done some things right, even though I spend my time writing blogs that people either don’t care about or want to blast me for writing. 😀
Maybe I’ll make a song today, although Mr. Bill will soon be home from his dental visit and will probably want to rest… So, I think I’ll end this post and play with my guitar… or just keep adding new songs to my “funny ditties” playlist while I wait for the laundry to finish drying. And I’ll probably be back tomorrow, even though there’s no bloody point to any of this. 😉
ETA: I haven’t hit publish yet, and Bill is already home… they had to cut his tooth into three pieces because it was below the gum line. Ughhh!!! But he’s okay.
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