Uhhh...

The blogosphere is a strange place at times, and blog comments can be interesting, to put it mildly. Not that I get very many. I do love it when real people (especially ones I know) manage to leave ideas or share info in the comment box, but the vast majority of my commentators (and blog watchers) are spambots that don't make a lot of sense. Spambot comments come in batches, and I usually read them just in case a real human being's comment also comes through. But I delete once I'm sure it's all computer generated -- usually some sort of half-gibberish message that tries to flatter an aspiring writer to begin, offers a bit of vague advice, and ends by flogging a link like "houses for sale in mumbai" or "free gucci bags."

Here's just one example. I think I need a translator:

I loved as much as you'll receive carried out right here. The sketch is attractive, your authored material stylish. nonetheless you command get got an shakiness over that you wish be delivering the following. unwell unquestionably come further formerly again since exactly the same nearly very often inside case you shield this increase. Check out my link, new xbox games free.

Huh??? This one was all gibberish. With friends like these...

Thanks, Laeli!

My friend Laeli over at another blog (now defunct) nominated me for a Very Inspiring Blogger Award, which was really kind of her. I love Laeli because she's just so... Laeli. She's very honest, and her posts at her old blog, Soular Sister, often made me laugh... or think about things in a new way. I'd like to nominate her right back, but I'm kinda clueless as to how to do that.

This whole experience has made me realize that I'm probably not your average blogger. For example, I don't follow many blogs. I have a few that I read out of curiosity or sheer appreciation, but I'm not a big commenter, and don't subscribe to the idea that I need to get me a ton of readers by following and commenting on tons of blogs. I'm writing for the love of writing, and the fact that I've made friends with Laeli (whom I have yet to meet) is an unexpected bonus.

Just for the record, I also enjoy reading/viewing these peoples' thoughts and images:

Iglesia Descalza -- which translates to Barefoot Church, and is often translated commentary from those on the margins of the Catholic Church.

A Gena-a-day Artist's Blog -- an amazing water colour artist I've moodled about before.
Things We Forget -- "Sticky notes left to their fate in public places."
The Queen of Green -- all about ways to live more sustainably, which is right up my alley...

and the blog my eldest daughter keeps. Unfortunately, it -- like some of the others I have enjoyed reading -- seems to be abandoned at the moment. But maybe she'll start it up again when she leaves for Russia, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Norway (and maybe some other countries, who knows?) next week. She'll be gone for two months+, and a blog would be a great way for her to keep us all informed of her adventures. 

The blogosphere is a funny place -- I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Over the past month or so, I've seen a huge uptick in views (200+ a day, a lot for me!) because of a Mother's Day story I posted few years back, just because it's the first thing to come up on a particular Google search... but now that Mother's Day has passed, everything is back to normal. If blogging is a normal pastime. Which, I guess it is for some of us who may or may not be a bit behind the times with Twitter and all those other social media websites, but are still friends via our blogs. Like Laeli and me.

The blogosphere is a funny place

It's been a busy week. The garden, my work at L'Arche and St. Vincent de Paul, and today, laundry, have taken up a lot of time, and I haven't moodled since Monday. But Simple Moodlings has had more hits this week than ever before. The picture below tells why... if you can see what my computer screen is telling me.

It's not a great picture, I know, but it's a shot of Blogger's "dashboard," which gives me all sorts of information about what people are reading here. It shows statistics of how many readers find Simple Moodlings in a day, the search engines that bring them, and how many views my posts are getting. It also says that I'm getting a lot of referrer spam from Russia (lit up in green on the lower right hand corner). What amazes me is the graph... all those spikes mean people have been looking at something... and the list under Posts seems to indicate that even though I've hardly posted anything this week, my Mother's Day Short Story #6 is getting a lot of attention, perhaps because mom appreciation is a fairly universal experience. Well, for me, 185 readers for one post in a week is a lot of attention, since most days there are just barely a handful of readers, period.

Which makes me wonder at the world of blogging. I try to write a little each week for the entertainment of family and friends and a few sort of regular readers that I've noticed from the little Moodlings Map on the right side bar (the towns of readers show up there, so I can sort of guess when I've been visited by a cousin in Halifax and a friend on the BC coast... and I notice when other readers I don't know visit from interesting places like Council Bluffs, Iowa; Neuwied, DE; Paris, FR; Delhi, IN; Dubai, AE; Johannesburg, ZA and lots of other cities and towns I'd love to learn more about). But maybe I've moodled enough that this blog could garner readers for a couple of years without my posting a thing! Not that garnering readers is my goal. I'm just having some fun here, exercising my writing muscles, and making a few friends (who sometimes leave comments, and often don't -- blast that captcha-word-verification-prove-you're-not-a-robot-thingy that discourages internet friendliness).

This past week, I've seen all sorts of interesting places show up on the Moodlings Map. If I could, I'd love to learn a little about the people who come to visit because of a Mother's Day story, and how you plan to honour your moms this weekend. Here, we're having a little barbecue on Sunday night in my back yard under a beautiful, blooming pear tree.

The blogosphere may be a funny place, but at the same time, it's a place where we realize how much we all have in common. Happy Mother's Day to you, and/or to your mom!