Referrals

I was taking a look at referrals to my blog to see what brings people to these pages.

One of the most-looked at entries is this one written December 28, 2006 about my fingernails. It is the photo which comes up in people's searches. I have visions of images of my hands in the windows of nail salons the world over. "If your fingers look like this, come in, we can help!"

Just for the record, I have stopped biting my nails. However, they don't really look a lot better. It takes a long time for nails to grow out when you've been rough on them.

I also get hits on entries about the Kodak Z710 camera I once owned and then got rid of because I disliked it. I switched to a Canon and about six months later bought a Nikon. I use the Canon with my newspaper work a lot; the Nikon I tend to use around the farm. I think the Nikon has richer colors.

Other interesting searches include "kill chicken with a knife" and "problem finding Drixoral in stores." The chicken thing referred to an entry I made about how easy it is to buy a chicken in the store.

The Drixoral reference is to a recent post I made about my husband's inability to find this over-the-counter drug. Amy at Virginia Scribe writes that she went so far as to call the drug maker. She learned the drug will be off the market for a year.

My husband is now using a generic of Zyrtec D for his sinus issues. It's a more expensive drug but it seems to be working.

Other hits include "3 Little Pigs Restaurant Botetourt" which I mentioned in a post about non-smoking restaurants, floaters and flashers in your eyes, and cupping (a procedure performed by my acupuncturist).

And several come to me through links from other webpages; thanks to you have me bookmarked on your sites. I hope I have reciprocated; I try to.

Of my last 100 readers, most are from the United States, with an abundance along the eastern seaboard, and a few in California (none in the Midwest); a number are from the United Kingdom and Canada. There are also a few hits from Russia, India, Romania and Malaysia.

It's interesting to look at these stats. But unless I want to drive up traffic by writing with keywords, I guess my traffic will stay about where it is. That's good enough for me!

Help!

If anyone has successfully migrated their blog to a domain name, (i.e., if I went from bluecountrymagic.blogspot.com to bluecountrymagic.com) I have a question.

Can you still access the site from the blogger dashboard, or do you have to do something else to make it work?

I couldn't find the answer to that specific question in the blogger help.

Thanks.

Blogger Problems - Still

Does anyone have a clue as to why I can't access my widgets in layout? It is weird. It's Blogger, not my computer, because I can't access it from my laptop either.

When I go to layout, the scroll bar won't move. So I can't scroll down to reach my widgets to change them. Which means I can't add links.

A few days ago I was looking at my blog (the page you're seeing now) and I noticed these little tool-like things on the sidebar. I clicked on them and the widgets opened up for editing. I had access! Yay. So I quickly made a couple of changes that I'd been unable to make.

But now those little tool things aren't there anymore and I don't know why they came up in the first place. And I still can't access my widgets in layout!

Blogger is strange sometimes.

Administrative

I am having problems with Blogger. I lost my spell check for several weeks. That was frustrating.

Upon its return, I find I am having problems accessing the page elements/layout.

When I finally did get it to work briefly this morning, I managed to add Jen's Bike Blog, House on Glade Hill and Going Crunchy to my links listings. And then it stopped being cooperative again.

At any rate, if you'd like to exchange blog links, just let me know and I will be glad to add you to my readers list, once the thing is working properly again.

Thanks, June

June over at Spatter last week gave my blog an excellence award, for which I am very thankful.

I am just now acknowledging it because I have been incredibly busy with work. I managed a few blog entries lately because of time constraints, but my mind was full of things I wanted to write.

Finally, I began making a list of potential blog entries, because I couldn't find the time to write the entries.

Today was the first day I've had a chance to visit my blog friends and try to catch up. I missed my near-daily visits to see some of you!

Anyway, I will pass on this honor to Jeff, Ms. E., Kitty at AROO and Becky at Peevish Pen. There are others I read who are worthy; June already tagged many of the blogs I take peeks at and I like to spread the love.

In the Spotlight

I thought I'd mention some of the bloggers I enjoy reading.

Check them out!

Ms. Eleneaous has returned after nearly a month's absence. Today she writes about her experience with a new computer that only had a two-month life span. A few days ago she had a brilliant entry about freelance writing.

Becky at Peevish Pen writes often about writing, poetry, farm life, etc. She and Ms. E. are two of four bloggers I have met in person.

The other two are Tom at Creativity blog, who also recently started posting again, and Fleitz at the Roanoke Firefighters blog. Tom writes about life, spirituality and takes good pictures and poetry; Firefleitz writes about the fire department. I met Tom at a council meeting; he may not even remember. I met Firefleitz when I picked up a copy of his book, Firefighting in Roanoke, as a present for my husband. He probably doesn't remember that either.

Jeff at Jefferson Street Realist posts about life in Roanoke. Today it looks like he's burning up the airwaves (blogwaves?) with words about music.

When I started seeking out the work of other area bloggers, one of the first I found was Colleen's wit and poetry over at Loose Leaf Notes. She has such enthusiasm about life that I always leave her site with a smile on my face.

Some newcomers to my must-read list (well, in the last six months or so, so they're not that new) are June at Spatter, and Beth at Blue Ridge Blue Collar Girl.

June, as best I can tell, lives in both Floyd County and in Florida. She writes great entries about a myriad of things - check our her January 19 entry about Huckabee for intriguing thoughts on that political candidate. She also does something she calls a Friday Fact. They are always interesting reading. Beth has been absent for a while but her January 14 entry explains that she is in the process of moving/buying/selling, etc., and all that entails.

If I had an award thingy I would offer it to each of these bloggers, but I don't. I hope you enjoy them all as much as I.

The others on my list on the right are also worthy of a mention - unfortunately, I've run out of time! Do take a look at their work sometime.

Humbled

A few days ago, Beth over at Blue Ridge Blue Collar Girl handed me a Community Blogger Award. This award celebrates people "who reach out and make the blogger community a better one," as I understand it.


This is my first recognition ever for blogging. I am very humbled to be acknowledged because there is a lot of nice writing on the web, and a lot of people visit and offer stories and advice and friendliness.

Blogs create a nice community and I enjoy reading what people do and think and experience. I wish I had more time to spend on visiting other folks spaces so that I could "see more of the world," as it were.

The world is one big story and we're all characters in it, each important in our way to the patchwork that makes up the whole quilt. Without our individual achievements and efforts, there would be holes.

Another person whom Beth nominated was Shannon at Going Crunchy, who wrote a very nice entry about her award. I was not familiar with this blogger so I was happy to be introduced.

The award came to Beth via June at Spatter, another blogger I read. June has a lot of interesting things to say.

Beth is a gentle blogger who takes vivid pictures and has a great sense of humor. I delight in her entries.

In the spirit of moving this award along, I would like to recognize and give the award to:

Jeff at Jefferson Street Realist. Jeff writes about life with his young family. Some of his entries tickle me when he talks about his boy. Others are reverent and sad, such as when G'Diddy passed away. His writing rings true to me.

Ms. E. at Ms. Eleneaous in Roanoke. Ms. Elenaeous has an interesting take on life in Roanoke. Wait until you read about her house haunting. She's also one of two bloggers I have met in person!

Becky at Peevish Pen writes about writing and rural life. She's the other blogger I have shaken hands with!

Happy blogging, everyone!

Administrative

Made a few updates to my bloggers link list. If you're on the "blogs I read" and should be on the "local bloggers link" let me know. By local I mean anywhere in SW VA.

Housekeeping

I made change to the links on the sides where I list other blogs I look at. I deleted some that hadn't been updated in months and added new ones that's I've visited from time to time.

This was prompted by the fact that postsecret suddenly vanished and gave me a broken link, and so I decided to check the rest of my links.

If you find a bad link, please let me know. If you'd like me to add your blog to my list and would like to trade links, let me know that too.