Because the blog turns, as an MT blog, 4 today. Happy birthday, blog.
I say "as an MT blog," because I've been blogging, if not always on a blog, for far longer. I'm talking, of course, of that famous Tonto series of yore, Marius' Rants of the Day. These have always been available (mostly), from my Writings page. However, for this birthday, I decided to do a few site changes.
1. The Writings page is no more. In its place on the Things To Do list is a direct link to the Quotes page, which is all I've kept. The stories are no more, but I don't think anyone read them anyway.
2. Marius' Rants of the Day have been integrated into the blog proper, with dates as far back as September 2000. You can find the intro post here.
3. The link to Tonto Clan no longer links to a dead link. Instead, I've snagged Tonto_Regina's Eulogy For Tonto and linked to that.
4. The About Rabbits page is substantially changed and updated after being some years out of date.
5. There are a few other little site nav things, with maybe a few more to come. We'll see.
Let me talk for a moment about statistics type stuff. With this entry, we're at Post #597, with 1,795 comments, almost none of which are spam. In terms of entries per year, I've actually been declining each year - 89 in 2006 compared to 115 in 2005, 155 in 2004, and 184 in 2003. On the other hand, I think actual quality is as high now as its ever been. Most of my 2003 entries suck. 2004 was a great year, but that's because I was in England. On the other hand, 2005 and 2006 are fairly consistently amusing, with some really great things said by lots of people (most of whom were not me). Too, I did a lot of photoblogging in 2006, which I think has been a good addition.
So we find ourselves pleased.
But what you really came here for is the actual list of best posts, so with a nod to the 2005 version, let's begin:
*shrug* (Suzanne's Darth Fuzzy/Squirrel Alien poker artwork)
The Infallibility of Youth (Actually a link to Whir's blog. The famous Halor convo, which brought us so many catchphrases)
Cavort to the Music (Live) (My trip to PA)
Invasion of the Rabbit People (Sarah's origami rabbit and Suzanne's deerphin drawing)
Know Your Roots (A number of my best moments in photography)
Teh Funny (If WWII were an RTS... Not mine, but funny anyway)
Alas, Babylon and Proving the Point (Outtakes from my epic last Civ 3 game)
Ph34r! (My inner MT self revealed)
The Best of Marechalisms (Need I say more?)
Party Like It's 1995 (Because we'll always need good computer stories)
The Ravings Of Tired Rabbits (Suzanne's plots, revealed!)
Butt-Kicking, For Goodness! and Part II and Part III (All of my BG2 bloggage)
Today In History (My 10th anniversary of MUDing post)
Skills To Pay the Bills (The first work bloggage, and my first shave in years)
Your PA Calls Will Be Graded (Work humor)
Hard At Work (The infamous work play)
Where the Streets Have No Name (Cross-country trip bloggage)
Wide Awake In America and the Remixes (NYC trip bloggage)
In That Epic Struggle, Part One (D&D stories from old. There will be a Part II, I promise)
Mr. Rabbit's Neighborhood (Hamden photobloggage)
Blast From the Past (MUDing 11th anniversary and my written area retrospective)
Too, there were plenty more posts that could have made this list. Narrowing down was pretty hard, because, as I say, quality control around here has gotten way better. Some of that is me, but a lot of it is you guys. Thanks for stopping by. Thanks for reading. And thanks for saying so much funny shit for me to post.
Happy 4th, blog.
Posted by Dwip at March 12, 2007 12:48 PMWow. 4 years already? Time sure does fly doesn't it?
And that's a mighty impressive pre-blog chunk of new blogness you've got there. I hope one day I have a list of archive links that long. I also hope I have entries as varied and interesting as yours some day. But we all know I suck, so we may as well forget that :P
I'm also quite impressed with your ability to block spam. Or the ability of whichever plugin is doing that for you. You sure I can't make a Sandbox user out of you? Hmmmmmm? :)
Posted by: Samson at March 12, 2007 7:28 PM"Shit!" I said when I was doing the ROTDs, "I have almost 40 of these? I thought there were like 10!" I think there are a few more that died in board crashes, too. Oi. Then again, that's 3 years worth of stuff.
You too, will one day get there. Just type a lot and say really random shit. It works for me. ;)
My archives links are actually getting a little unwieldy at this point. I know what I'd like to do with them, but lack the ability, so here they stay.
My spam block is actually really simple. Except for about 2 entries back, all of my posts are closed to comment. I do it manually, so some slips through, but I delete it, because I see it when it comes in. I find this to be much more reliable than any other filter I've used, though I'm still cleaning up a few remaining bits from back in the day.
I'm not rampantly satisfied with that, but in 4 years, I've had ONE comment on an old entry that was worthwhile, and several thousand times that in spam, so. People still comment on the new entries, and I get basically zero spam. I'm ok with that.
As to Sandbox, well. We may yet talk about that.
Posted by: Dwip at March 12, 2007 7:42 PMIf you are feeling in need of stats you could always add some Google Analytics code to your page and start tracking all kinds of cool data. And Maps!
Posted by: Sgt. B. at March 12, 2007 8:39 PMGoogle Analytics is good stuff. I use it on my blog and on all of the QSF Portal sites I've got. Best used when you first open to get good trend data, but hey. Even 4 years later doesn't hurt :)
Posted by: Samson at March 12, 2007 8:48 PMNerds.
Posted by: Whir at March 13, 2007 12:15 AMhttp://www.boredatwork.net/funny-video/a-drunk-squirrel/
Posted by: Weave at March 13, 2007 7:51 AM