The 2007 ROTUS Blog Awards

Because anybody can give an award. - and it works!

Recently my other blog (see the last post) was given a couple of blogging awards and, after a bit of investigation, I discovered that anybody with an internet connection can, and some do, give out an award to any blog or website that he, she, it or they want. Now, you might think that this makes these awards worth about as much as a square of tissue paper, but wait!

I put the code, to show the little graphic of my awards on my blog and, lo and behold, I started seeing traffic on Statcounter that was coming from the websites that had given me the awards and those people seemed to stay around for a minute or five. They were actual readers!

This is kind of like Amway, but you don’t have to try to recruit your family and friends to sell soap for you. In order for an award to work it has to meet the following criteria.

The blogs or websites receiving the award must actually be good.
They also have to believe in the magic just a little bit and put the award code up someplace on their sites.

The blog giving the award must be, at least, not horrible.
It also must post links to the award winners.

There must be several winners at the same time.

What happens then is that people looking at the award winning sites, see the award, click on it out of curiosity, and then click on, after they have seen the other awards, and look at the other award winners. Hopefully some of them will find something that moves them and will become regular readers.

Assuming that this blog is not horrible and without further ado:

The 2007 ROTUS Blog Awards

To Daddy Papersurfer For promoting merriment and creating a blog using a Mac in Great Britain.: A Strong Cup of Coffee.

To Windows to Russia For opening a window into the heart of Moscow: A Giant Bear Hug.

To My Art Becomes Yours for being artistic and wearing a beret in France: The Beautiful Blogger Award.

And finally, to ROTUS for actions above and beyond the call of good taste: A Dead Horse (so it can be mercilessly beaten.)

Why Did I Start This Blog?

I have another blog, that I started first, I'll Never Forget The Day I Read a Book! which probably should have been enough to keep me busy. I posted to that blog for about three months before I noticed that somebody was occasionally reading it. I think I get an actual comment one day.

So then I started to look at websites about How To Blog and one if the things I read was that you should post to your blog every day. -If you have been paying close attention, you may have noticed that I didn't post yesterday, ahem. - It's hard to post everyday to my book blog. One rule that I made for myself is that I have to actually read a book before I write about it. What with a day job, a family, other interests, social obligations, the need to sleep, it can take me a week or sometimes more to get through a good book. I don't bother to finish, or review, ones that I consider bad, whatever that is.

This blog, my post something and get on with your day blog. Has been getting more hits, more links, and more actual readers than the other, which proves the value of frequent posting, if nothing else. I'll Never Forget The Day I Read a Book! has won a couple of awards, though. But then anybody can create an award on the internet. In fact that will be the subject of my next post.

Stay tuned for the ROTUS Award!

(Image courtesy of Silicon Valley Watcher )

Open Mic Night

I'm getting ready to go out to open mic night tonight. Open mic night is when ordinary, sane, usually sober adults got up in front of a room full of people, sing and play musical instruments. It's a whole level above karaoke in difficulty and potential embarrassment.

I usually team up with my friend Johnson, the man with two last names, for open mic night. Tonight we are going to do two songs that we have never done before , and a third that we only bring out in December, so we don't remember it too well- Hugh Matin and Harold Blaine's "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas," first sung by Judy garland in the 1942 movie "Meet Me In St. Louis."



I'm the taller, handsomer, more talented and modest one, with more hair, in the picture.

Why do we expose ourselves to potential life altering ridicule once a month? It is very motivating, if you play a musical instrument or sing, to get up and do it in public. It makes you rehearse, improve your performance and it gives you an incredible adrenaline rush. Beer helps, too.

$50 Blog Challenge

A Blog About Nothing has issued a challenge:

"How would you spend $50.00 on your blog? One lucky and creative winner will get a check for $50.00 from me in order to spend on their blog however they wish. In order to enter just write a short blog post telling how you’d spend the money and link back to this article."

Well, see, this is a blog that spends nothing. It is on a free blog hosting service. I have, and continue to search for, free blog communities, free statistics services, free advertising, free links. Sometimes I wonder how the internet survives with people like me freeloading off of it.

If I had $50 my children would spend it for me on movie tickets, pizza and prepaid cell phone minutes. In fact I had $50 in my pocket just yesterday and today I'm packing a bag lunch.

Editors Note:

Since the point of tis exercise it to get a link on someone else's blog and since tis is a much nicer way to do it than to concoct a phony genius award, and since Brent linked me in his blog, here are links to the other entrants, to date, for this prestigious $50 challenge.

Zybron Thoughts

Homelife

Lost in Technology

It Doesn't Take A Genius

Well, the Blog Readability Test website says it takes a genius to read this site. I guess that the general level of education in the world has dropped considerably, then.



It doesn't take a genius to discover and remove the stealth advertisement that they added, either. These people think I'm little red riding hood, or what?

The idea of this award, as I see it, is to declare everybody a genius, get them to post this graphic on their website and collect click through advertising revenue from their websites. The graphic also has a link back to the source so that other "geniuses" can be recruited, too. Talk about your viral advertising scheme.

You will notice that if you click on the graphic now, you will be brought back to this blog. If you want to be a "genius" you'll have to go find the site yourself.

AP-Yahoo News Poll

I ran across this poll online this morning. You can see it at AP-Yahoo News Poll: Part II

I'm not going to comment about the answers in re: the war in Iraq or who was favored in the Presidential race but I did notice that there seems to be a disconnect in regard to how people see their own lives.

66% of the people taking the poll are either very happy or somewhat happy with how things are going in their lives, but:

37% frequently experience stress in their daily lives.

46% frequently or sometimes get the feeling that their lives are beyond their control.

33% say it is very difficult and another 33% that is is somewhat difficult for their families to get ahead financially.

Only 32% felt that they had a lot of control over their own personal finances.

65% said that you can"t be too careful when dealing with people as opposed to 34% who said most people can be trusted.

If you don't feel that you have control over your own finances and do feel that it is difficult to get ahead, if you are distrustful of your neighbors, if you are under stress - why are you so happy?

A whopping 36% identified themselves as born again or evangelical Christians. I thought it was just my neighbors here in the south.

63% are in favor of a government insurance plan that would cover all medical and hospital expenses for everyone while only 22% are opposed to it. I guess that Congress had better take notice.

Links Fixed In Blogs, blogs, blogs, blogs Post

How embarrassing.

Here's a little something from Blaugh to make it up to ou.

Sister Rosetta Tharpe - Up Above My Head

It's about time that I put a nice YouTube link on this blog. It will get me off the geeky blogging about blogging kick, anyway.

This is Sister Rosetta Tharpe. She invented rock and roll, not Al Gore. Sister Rosetta was playing these Chuck Berry licks back in the 30s when chuck was still learning cowboy chords.

Blogging Contest Lowers Standard of Decency at ROTUS Blog

Arrgh! This is becoming one of those blogs about blogging for the sake of blogging. What a geek I am! Well, here it is Black Friday, and instead of going to the mall to scorch my Mastercard I'm sitting at home surfing the bolgosphere when, to my surprise I find blog that is holding a contest with a fancy schmncy laptop as the prize.

The Thinking Blog is the culprit and they want me to write about it and you too, if you have a blog. (And who doesn't?) This transparent effort to drive eyeballs to The Thinking Blog is sponsored by Ruff PC, makers of the rugged, water resistant laptop called RuffBook Tech with magnesium alloy casing built to survive under harsh conditions where ordinary laptops fail. Just what I need for blogging on my yacht.

OK, fine, I'm a blog slut. And I haven't even been writing this blog for a week, yet.

Blogs, blogs, blogs, blogs

I started this blog, just a couple of days ago with a complaint about the absurdity of promoting one's own blog by madly "networking" with other bloggers, clicking on their profiles in social networking websites, marking them as "my friends" and sometimes actually reading their blogs. The fact is, though, that I have found some very interesting blogs to read by doing this. I'd like to share a few of them with you. Maybe getting a link on my ultra popular blog will give these folks a little boost. ;o)

Here's one: Jon Swift
Jon has a little suggestion for all Americans for tomorrows holiday. "Let's celebrate Thankstaking."

And another: Windows to Russia!
Kyle Keaton is an American living in Moscow. He has a lot to say about his new home and takes great pictures.

And then there is Doodlage: Trashcan Art Salvage in which doodling of all kinds is celebrated.

Finally, a bit of blogging humor: Blaugh , blogging's answer to Dilbert.

Thank you for your time, I hope you hit your back button and returned to this page many times in between reading these other blogs. Gotta get the numbers up, you know. Well, I have a hundred or so profiles to click on before I can sleep and five reviews to write, so that my blog will stay on the front page. Blogging is such a relaxing hobby.

Happy Thankstaking, everyone.

The G. A. S. Foundation

Guitar Acquisition Syndrome strikes another American every thirty seconds. It spreads through viral contact with Musician's Friend, Zzounds.com , Music 123 and the dreaded Fender Discussion Page . G.A.S. causes ordinary, middle aged, middle class males to develop delusions of rock stardom, spending their life savings, their children's college funds and borrowing heavily to purchase expensive electric guitars, amplifiers and bowling shirts sporting flame motifs or guitar manufacturer logos.



Geno was a government contractor with an healthy, happy family and an suburban home. Today, due to G.A.S. he lives alone with 48 guitars.

Clark spends all of his time in his basement "studio" playing short snippets of songs on one of his many guitars and reading the F.D.P. incessantly, ignoring his family's pleas to come up for dinner.

John is gone from home three, sometimes four nights a week, playing surf music in dingy barrooms.

Help us to find a cure. Give to the G.A. S. Foundation today.

Let's Go Geocaching

Geo what?

Geocaching is a sport, or more precisely a giant global fantasy roll playing game in which people using hand held GPS units go out into the wild and search for hidden treasure. I got dragged into this game by my wife, who became an avid geocacher after going to a demonstration sponsored by the local Unitarian church.




The treasures are plastic food containers, ammunition boxes, magnetic key holders and other
mostly water tight objects, filled with trinkets, small toys, collectible items and a logbook. They are everywhere! I have found them at the public boat launching ramp, on a footbridge, on a college campus, on the undercarriage a permanently parked railroad car, attached to the base of a statue and way back in the spooky old woods. Each find is logged on the geocaching.com website Here you see the ugly mug of this blog's author, who is holding a cache container found somewhere on the shore of the Chesapeake bay.


Caches can also hold items called "travel bugs" and "geocoins," which travel from cache to cache in the hands of their lucky discoverers. Each of these items has it's own log so that their owners and other interested parties can track their progress through the world. The photo shows the "Hopewell's Snow Wolf" geocoin which I found in the middle of downtown Salisbury. I put it in another cache, but I'm not going to tell you where.

Pretty objects, like geocoins sometime disappear from geocaches, so some cachers have begun to put pictures of their coins into caches and keep the actual geocoin in their own treasure trove. Occasionally a cache will be "muggled," or found and disturbed, stolen or vandalized by persons unknown. Geocachers are always on the alert for "muggles" when they are out geocaching. Stealth is required so as not to be observed finding and opening a cache.

There are geocaches hidden in every corner of the world. Even if you didn't get a letter from Hogwarts you don't have to be a muggle all your life. All you need to do is register online to join the Order of the Geocache.

The Groundspeak Geocaching Logo is a registered trademark of Groundspeak, Inc. Used with permission.

Blogging: One Big Happy Incestuous Family

I'm kind of new to the blogging phenomenon and maybe I'm entirely wrong, but here are me observations so far. First you start writing a blog and it's sort of for your own private use. You don't care whether anybody reads the thing. In fact it might be kind of embarrassing. Then you get a few hits on your blog and someone makes a nice comment about your writing and you start to think, "Gee, this is kind of fun."

Soon you learn about blog directories and social networking sites. Now your into it. These sites are places where you set up an account, make friends with other bloggers and beg them to read your blog. And to get those clicks you have to work those sites. Soon you are spending hours every day reading those websites, clickin on other bloggers profiles and sites and trying to drive readers to your own. Here's the problem: The people who are reading your blog, or at least clicking on it, are doing so because they want you to read, or click on, their blog. And to get those clicks you have to work those sites. Soon you are spending hours every day reading those websites, clicking on other bloggers profiles and sites and trying to drive readers to your own. Have you found readers, people who are interested in what you have to say?

The next thing that happens is that you find out through these social networking sites that you can make money from your blog. There are people out there that will pay you for clicks from your blog on ads that they place there. "Make $hundreds of thousands$ a year from your blog! Be a professional full time blogger! Make money at home! Blogging For Dollars, oy vay.

I found a site that had a counter that showed individual reader clicking on and the city - and country- that they were coming form. There was a new reader about every four seconds. That site had CONTENT! The quality of content that a blog needs to garner that kind of attention is astounding. Well, I'd like to think that this blog will have that kind of quality, pfffffffffft!

Me, I'm blogging for dollars.