A Real First

I am now made to feel guilty for abandoning my blog for so long. Whilst I was being lazy, a friend and fellow blogger, Mel over at The Research Journal, gave me my very first blogger award. She deems me a Kreativ Blogger. I'm very honored. I'm also stymied. I'm supposed to nominate 7 other blogs. But, but, but. I read so many more blogs than only 7. *sigh* I guess I'll just have to limit myself.

Once you receive the Kreativ Blogger award you’re supposed to pass on the good cheer.

Here are the instructions:
1. Copy the award to your site.
2. Link to the person from whom you received the award.
3. Nominate 7 other bloggers. (how to choose only 7!!)
4. Link to those sites on your blog.
5. Leave a message on the blogs you nominate.

I pass along the good cheer to the following blogs:

1. Vet On The Edge
2. Haley Poulos Photography
3. Some Day All This Will Be Yours
4. Save The Pit Bull, Save The World
5. Living With Infidels
6. Three Woofs And A Woo
7. Just Another Dog Blog

(Ir)Regularity

My blog entries lately have been few and far between. For that you have my apologies. You'll recall that the last frequent entries I posted were regarding some bowel dysfunction suffered by both Boss Lady and myself. Between my frequent trips outside, and her extended stay in the bathroom and subsequent convalescence, blogging simply wasn't a priority. Now, I know what you're thinking. You're accepting this explanation as a good reason for the initial lack of entries, but you're wondering why it has lasted so long. Well, let me tell you, that was bowel related as well. Specifically, what Boss Lady is calling Writer's Constipation.

Writer's Constipation is similar to Writer's Block, in that it means no writing is happening. Boss Lady has coined this new term because she's had plenty of ideas, she simply hasn't been able to get them out. They just sit there in her brain, no matter how hard she works, and they just won't move. Aside from leaving you, my Loyal Readers, without entertainment, this condition leaves Boss Lady feeling bloated and cranky. As of this evening, though, the ideas seem to be moving again.

Hence, in the next few days you may look forward to new posts, some of which will probably be purges of incomplete, and now finished, entries attempted during Boss Lady's bout with Writer's Constipation. I can only hope my readers will come flocking back.

Seriously?

You people are weird, and, coming from me, that's saying something. Seriously, though, who would've thought the search terms "moose droppings" were this popular? Several times a week I get a blog hit because someone googles "moose droppings." I guess I should be appreciative that I get those extra hits, but mostly I'm mystified as to why moose droppings are so interesting. Anyone care to explain?

And that's not the only weird search that brings people to my little corner of the interwebs. In the past 7 days I've had hits from searches for: moose anatomy, dictionary of Christmas, dog vagina anatomy(2, I'm hoping the same person), obsessed with tennis balls, dog powered plow, and bubbly farts. That's the other one, bubbly farts. Do you know how many hits I've had from people googling bubble farts, or some variation thereof? A lot. Twice in the last week, in fact. A half dozen times before that.

I guess it just goes to show that you never know what you're going to encounter out here in the wilds.

Men Are From Mars

And blog readers are from Pluto. Pluto's not even a planet anymore, so I'm not sure what that says about you blog readers. Frankly, I just don't understand you. The things I think will be definite hits, like videos of me being rammed by the giant stick Colyn is carrying around, or the genius Yankee Doorknob, get nothing. Nothing at all. Then the random, less good stuff, gets comments and reactions. And I don't think it was the picture scaring people away, because I have a very inviting picture now and you people still aren't sticking around for more than 2 seconds. What gives?

Is It Better Now?

As you've probably already discovered, Boss Lady decided to do some major tweaking on the blog today. First off, she decided to go ahead and change the header picture. While she really thought the poo picture was perfect, a lot of you weren't so sure. The results of the poll were as follows: 1 of you thought it was awful, 8 of you thought it was weird (or maybe you chose that because you think I'm weird), and 5 of you thought it was perfect. I'm guessing that those who are familiar with myself and the blog weren't so bothered by the picture, and those who were passersby were a little bit squicked out by it. So, we'll try a different picture and see how you readers respond.

Second of all, you'll notice that everything is a little bit wider. Boss Lady likes it better this way. Being wider also allows me to add the "reactions" feature. The reactions are: Moosalamoo, Pine Hill Park, or Walk Around the Block. These are different adventures and mini-adventures I often experience and their value coincides with the value of the adventure. If you need further explanation, here you go. Moosalamoo=hiking, which is great; frequent off leash opportunites, which is wonderful; and the option for short afternoon hikes or long day hikes, which is just perfect. Pine Hill Park=hiking, which is great; always on the long leash, which is better than the short leash; and only short afternoon hikes, which is good. Walk Around the Block=walking, which is better than nothing; on the short leash, which is better than nothing; and not longer than 1 hour, which is better than nothing. In short Moosalamoo is a great rating, Pine Hill Park is a good rating, and Walk Around the Block is a kind of blah rating. After this long winded explanation, I expect to see a lot of you using this feature.

In the next few days you can expect to see more tweaks, of a much more minor aspect. Pictures will surely be added. The template might be changed a little bit more. I might even institute a regular weekly poll.

I encourage you to post replies, responses, and thoughts regarding the layout, content, etc. I promise to take all under consideration.

P.S. My sincerest apologies for forgetting to mention that the most wonderful person in the world played an integral role in helping me collage the new header picture. I'm very grateful to her. You should be, too. If it wasn't for her, you'd still be looking at the poop picture.

Well, We Try To Be Environmentally Friendly

Boss Lady was perusing her presence on the internet last night, because she had nothing better to do, and she came across a bunch of stuff she'd written on another website several years ago. Much of it was about me. She'd forgotten how much she wrote. Now, she wants to reclaim it. To do so, she will be recycling it through this blog from time to time. So, in the near future you might find yourself reading stories that seem a hair of out place. Don't worry, though, I won't let her go too crazy.

So, what gives?

I, Boss Lady, am going to address you, Loyal Readers, directly today in an effort to diagnose what seems to be a problem: lack of Loyal Readers. Heck, lack of any readers. I realize that I am not as prolific a writer as one would wish. I strive to post daily, although it more often ends up only twice or thrice weekly. But, I seem to have a severe shortage of visitors. Even during the times when I'm successful at posting daily, I only get a few visitors a day. What's worse, the visitors I do get don't stick around long enough to even read anything. According to my hit counter, the majority of my visitors leave immediately. When I pimp my blog, I do tend to get more visitors, but the visit lengths still don't increase. Far too many people leave before they even get through the door. I try to get around to other blogs I like, and even leave comments in the hopes of increasing my visitors. I'm not sure what else to do.

So, you've got to tell me what's wrong. Is it my voice? My writing style? My content? Is it simply that I don't write often enough? Is it really that picture at the top of my blog? Because I happen to think that picture is awesome and creative and just perfect for this blog. But, if the readers really think it's scary, I guess I can replace it with something friendlier. Or am I just stuck in a dark, unpopulated, little corner of the world?

You're Fired

I think I've mentioned that the Boss Lady is my typist. She's also my do-er of all things internet related. Which means she's kinda sorta pretty much totally in charge (and control) of this whole blog thing. And, as of the other day, she's fired. Why, you ask? Because she broke my blog. *I did not break your blog. It still works perfectly fine.* Yeah, well, it looks all ugly now. I'm a handsome dog, I can't have an ugly blog.

It all started when she saw the little update thing from the blogger people about this new "reactions" feature. Considering that my readers don't seem particularly willing to leave feedback in the form of comments, Boss Lady thought this "reactions" feature might be helpful. Plus, she had some great categories all thought up (we'll get into that later.) She went ahead and turned on the reactions feature, only to discover that her category names were too long. She pared them down and tried again. She finally got them all listed, then looked at the blog and discovered they aren't visible. So, she played around with the blog layout, and the format, and all that sort of thing. In the end, she still couldn't make the reactions categories visible and now I'm stuck with this ugly blog. I don't know exactly what's different than before, but I know something is. And I don't like it.

As for those reactions categories, here they are:

Shrew(woohoo!)sbury (always off leash, always fun)

Moosalamoo (sometimes off leash, always fun)

Pine Hill Park (never off leash, still lots of fun)

Walk Around The Block (never off leash, but at least it's not:

Stuck In The House (rarely fun)

You, Loyal Reader, may feel free to post one line comments including whichever reaction category you think best describes your enjoyment of any given entry. Or you can continue to not post comments, leaving me feeling unloved.