Ahem. Drum roll, please.
This marks my 200th post since starting my blog in 2013!
When I started this blog, I didn't have a clue about blogging
in general, other than it functioning as anything from an online diary to a teaching or advertising tool. I've learned
quite a bit along the
way, and have made
a number of online friends and friendly acquaintances through the experience. I've seen a lot of those original blogging friends fall off the map, so to speak, and I genuinely miss some of them.
I thought it might be fun to revisit the top posts of each year from then to now. If you're newer to my blog, please do check them out. They're a lot of fun! And if you were around back in the day, do you remember these oldies but goodies?
MyTop Blog Posts
2013
There were two top posts that first year, and they just happen to be two of my own favorites! The Green Eggs and Ham post was actually written by my Number Two Son, Jeff, then eighteen (he's now twenty-three and just got married last month). His "I don't know what to write" for a school essay tied with the original, very first, one-that-started-it-all Coffee Chat for the number one spot. This first Coffee Chat was special and fun, and in fact was so much fun that my readers asked for more, and
CC became a regular feature for a total of twenty-nine posts full of ridiculousness, suspension of disbelief, and even good advice at times.
2014
The number of blog visitors multiplied during 2014. Some of that was because we organized a
huge giveaway, Share the Love, where four authors and I did the Rafflecopter thing. They gave away books, and I gave away an editing package. There was also talk of such dodgy prizes as an empty Thin Mints cookie box, "Pong" (the original video game), and a picture of David Hasselhoff holding an armload of puppies, but at the last minute, the authors involved decided to keep those special extras and only send books to the winners. That was also the year I first participated in the
April A to Z Challenge, hopping all over the globe to other people's blogs while posting twenty-six times in April. However, those things aside, the real top spot went to Janie Junebug (who can be found at
Righting & Editing). During one of the coldest winters in Erie, S.K. decided to kidnap a guest from Florida to "bring sunshine" to my kitchen. I'm pretty sure Janie has never really recovered.
2015
Well . . . the interesting thing about 2015 is that I didn't blog at all. Not a single word. And it just about killed me. Just as my blog was gaining all kinds of momentum, I had a job switcheroo happen (not quite my choice, and not a bad job, but just super busy on top of homeschooling) and by the end of 2014, I had to acknowledge that there was just no time to write for a while. In October of that year, I announced I was
in need of a short break. And truly, it was intended to be only a few months off—just enough time to settle into a better routine and get my bearings—but a few months turned into a few more, and when I finally got to the point where I simply HAD to write, it was almost fifteen months later. But here's the cool thing. My post about taking a break ended up with tons of hits on it because some of you wonderful people kept checking in on me here and there. And I'm so glad you all didn't give up on me.
2016
Actually, all three parts of the POV series vied for the most-visited of 2016.
Part 1 discussed the first-person POV,
Part 2 talked about third-person point of view and the role of the narrator & viewpoint person, and
Part 3 focused on how many points of view is enough, and when the line of "too many" has been crossed.
2017
Reading for editing purposes is vastly different from pleasure reading. Whether I enjoy the heck out of a manuscript or not, the job still needs to be done well, because that's what I was hired to do. This post about the balance between enjoyment and duty ended up being the top post for 2017.
2018
Funny that a post on January 4 that talked about my previous year and the complete reboot halfway through it would be the most popular post of 2018, but there you go. The numbers don't lie. I think sometimes it's just nice to have a conversation with my readers, rather than trying to teach or inform, and I guess everyone else thought so, too. A close second was the first of my three-part series on
Best Books on Writing and Editing, still worth taking a look at for the book recommendations.
2019
We're not very far into 2019, so there weren't many posts to choose from, but this particular one definitely wins for most views in 2019. Editors have such a reputation for negativity and pedantic behavior that every so often, it's important to remind others that we really aren't anything like the stereotype.
So What's Coming Up Next?
The Future of This Blog
It's only fitting that my 200th post will be my last "real" post here on Blogger. I've decided, after much thought, wasted time (I'm a slow thinker), and a hard look at the analytics that it's time to move my blog to another platform. My website is on Squarespace, and given that Google has shut down an avenue (Google+) that was a social media failure overall but that made it easy to follow Blogger blogs, I think it's best that I make the change sooner than later.
I hope you'll all make the move with me, of course. The commenting on Squarespace is through Disqus, and you don't have to create an account anywhere to comment or use it—you can log in through Facebook, Twitter, Google, Disqus, or simply comment as a guest. I'm hoping this will simplify commenting, as I've heard from a handful of people that they've experienced trouble commenting on this blog more often than not.
