Blog Network

I heard Twitter described today as a ‘mini-blog’. Very helpful, as I had not otherwise figured what Twitter was about, although I tried it a few times. Somehow, writing down what I am doing at just this moment seems monumentally boring, not only to the writer but also to the reader. Facebook has a similar feature and it has about the same mashed-potato quality to it: recognizable, clearly food, but not very tasty on its own. Needs gravy, salt, cheese, onions, something. With a real blog, I think you get more of the tastiness. Or at least you should.

I read a lot of blogs, but mostly I read political blogs. So, it may be puzzling that I don’t want to write a political blog. The reason, I think, is that there are plenty of people far more knowledgeable about politics than I am. I follow politics closely; I worked for a U.S. Congressman some years ago, I read obsessively about it, but I don’t feel any particular need to put it all together into a single picture. By contrast, writing about Point Roberts seems more manageable: it has the advantage of being a strange place and one’s views about it are unlikely (usually) to elicit strong reactions; the kinds of feelings that cause friends/relatives/strangers to vent their disagreement with and disapproval of you.

Since my blog isn’t one that has a lot of reader comments, isn’t a bid to create a ‘forum discussion community,’ it may not seem, to the readers, to be much in the way of a network. The readers know a lot about me, but they don’t know each other for the most part, and I don’t know them either (with the exception of close friends, children and grandchildren). But I do know more about them—about you—than you/they think.

My blog has a google counter on it and it tells me something about you all. I know how many of you there are in any given 30-day period (usually 300-400 unique individuals who look at the blog during that time at least once) and how many of you there are on any given day (15-40), I know what continent and even what country you are from. I know in what city your internet server has its place of business., and I know about how long each visitor from each place spends in an average visit, and how many pages he/she reads. I know what internet browsers people use (47% Internet Explorer, 40% Firefox, and 11% Safari—apparently the Mac crowd isn’t interested in Point Roberts). And, finally, I know whether your connection is by cable, DSL line, OC3 line, or a T1 line. Why I would want to know this latter is beyond my technical capacities, but I offer it because it may have more meaning to you.

The information changes from day to day, from month to month, and so I have some sense of you out there and your responses. But, of course, I don’t really know anything about you. Recently, someone in Hawaii visited the blog and spent about ten minutes each time. There were three such Hawaiian visits, though I don’t know whether it was the same person each time. But I want to say that I hope the weather is beautiful there now.

Right from the beginning, there has been a steady stream of visits from Plano, Texas. I don’t think I know anybody in Plano or even nearby Plano, but there are a lot of visits from an ISP there, and I want to take this opportunity to say thanks for coming by. And to the rest of you too, the Americans, Canadians, Brits, South Africans, Australians, Italians, French, Mexicans (all from this past month). At a miminum, you brighten my day just by your being there, even if I don’t know exactly who you are. Beyond that, you are the audience whom I think about when I write, so you are very present in every page, and I think about the writing as something of which we are both a part. I’m not here just talking to myself.

However, I can’t send you a card because—despite all I do know about you--I don’t know your name or email address. So, this one’s for you: Good Wishes, Good Times for the Season, Much Thanks, and I’ll Be Seeing You Always.