What Does Good Mean?

time flies when writing is fun!

Something about the arbitrary passing of a year leads us to contemplate. I am not immune. I happen to have been born near the end of the year. By one measure, premature Mark was a gift of another tax deduction although I’m afraid the standard deduction was quite nominal in 1960. My birthday, in late December, reduced pressure for the year ahead. I had just lived through my 61st year (I was odd for a WHOLE year and that was okay). Now I am expected to translate my 62nd year. Since it is an even year, there is a bit more pressure to be level-headed.

As I related in my last post of 2022, I am not a big resolution guy. I am, however, a big believer in data and trends. How is this writing experiment going? I am proud of how much writing I’ve managed.

Today I decided to look back on the writing I’ve managed. I’ve managed about 175 posts, the first 60 or so in near total anonymity :) I started back in October of 2021 and wrote EVERY day for about 45 days and then about 4X a week through the end of 2021. I avoided even distributing my posts to my email list as I didn’t want to be a spammer. I posted till the end of March 2022 and then took about 3 months off to decide if I wished to continue. I have finally settled into a once-a-week pattern and that seems about right. I still have not, as yet, sent my posts to my email list as I am still not quite sure that is what I want.

I have found that organically growing my subscribers feels about right. I have come to enjoy a small group of Newsletters quite a lot and find that many of those people tend to be like-minded in their desires to read a diverse supply of stuff and might even share what they think of the writing they consume. All of this seems a bit like a community of sorts. I imagine that some of you have similar behaviors to myself in exploring a Newsletter. If I happen upon a given Newsletter, I go to the archive and peruse for a few. That generally is how I decide whether to subscribe or just hover.

As I mentioned previously I am a believer in data in most things. I surely have the favorites that I have penned but decided today I would defer to the wisdom of the crowd. These are the ten most visited posts I’ve managed over time. For me, the curious part is some of them have been read A LOT yet I might have only had 10 subscribers when it was originally posted.

Here are the ten most popular posts I have written. One theory is that since I always include a photo at the front, maybe that is what gets folks to give them a try if they are perusing my archive. If you are the type that doesn’t want to be dictated to, check out the archive and find one you may have missed. There are some good ones from the beginning of my posts. I feel I sort of “wasted” them as I went out of my way not to push my posts in the beginning and kinda was just writing for me. Some of them would hold up pretty well I think.

If you are a “believer” in data, here are the ten most opened posts I’ve managed so far. I think these are generally pretty good. The challenge is to click one of the blue texts below and open one that others seemed to like. If you decide not to click, then this week’s post is done in record time. See you next time.

Food Dreams | Our Finest Hour | Immigration Fraud | We Need Ice | There is No Formula | An Interesting Network? | Heme | All Hail Crucifer! | It's Good to be King | I Don't Understand

Here’s a short description for the ones listed

• Food Dreams — all about unusual food habits of my youth. Everything from Butter Lambs to Buff-Mex.

• Our Finest Hour — What affliction killed 300-400 million people in the 20th century and today is UNKNOWN. I think this is the greatest collective and cooperative effort in the history of the world. That is worth reading!

• Immigration Fraud — A bit about my family, where we came from and how bias creeps in based on how we name things.

• We Need Ice — Many of us will not make it to Antarctica. How much ice is there and is it important?

• There is No Formula — What governs who we connect with, who we remember and who we enjoy spending time with. All questions worth pondering. I conclude there is no formula.

• An Interesting Network — My very recent post about how trees communicate with each other!

• Heme — How do you like your burger cooked? This is a novel post about keeping your burger juicy.

• All Hail Crucifer — By some measures, cruciferous vegetables are amongst the most healthy things you can eat (if you wash them). What the heck are they and why do they call them crucifers?

• It’s Good to be King — I choose to be positive in my writing and posit this is the very best time to be alive. An old friend wrote a book of the same title as this post. I hope after reading this some will feel great about the wonders of our lives today.

• I Don’t Understand — How many people will you cross paths with in your life? For that person, you might be the difference in some great matter. If you feel you have something important to say, wouldn’t you want to make it easy to understand you? That’s how I felt about twenty years ago when I went to a religious service.

The Poll & Music

The best thing about not having a theme is I can pick any song I want! I always liked this one. Since there was not a ton of pressure in developing this post, I suppose “The Weight” is not bad :)

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What’s Next

Next time I return to ORIGINAL CONTENT! The title is Gallus Gallus Domesticus. Let’s talk about chicken!