JovialJMan - 100 Posts Special

"Because writing 100 posts is comparable to having a birthday... right?" - OddballGreg
"Who brought the 100 candles?" - JovialJman

98 Days ago (on the 18th of June), we started writing daily blog posts. Today, we've written 100 posts, (imagine that ...) Let's talk about some of the interesting things regarding the journey here, and crack a few jokes too.

Did you notice that there are more posts then days? (I didn't until yesterday). The reason for that is the fact that OddballGreg published 3 posts on one day, (I think he got a bit too excited ...) There have also been 2 days which the post were a bit too late and were not counted and indexed for that day; Greg's post yesterday ,being one, as he had no internet access (I am sure he facedesked when he realized that he could not post it on time). The other being Greg's Blogging Music post which went up at midnight but was seen as the next day.

This is my 19th personal post , and boy has it been a strange journey here. I have had the very kind help of Greg, to help improve my writings, and he has said it has improved, (let us know in the comments if you agree or disagree). Ideas are limitless but when I have to think of a post for a day, then all the options seem to disappear, like magic, (somewhat strange for a novice magician)

TCSA has been going for 38 days, if you start counting from Greg's last Storytime Sunday, which, of course, I do, (that is over a full month of OddballGreg and JovialJman's joint ramblings on TSCA, (who would have thought it's been that long).

On 30th of July 2014 OddballGreg achieved 1000 total pageviews, (OddballGreg was all by his lonesome then). Today we are sitting at ± 2600. What an achievement! I would like to thank each and every one of you who have shown your support. Thank you.

Let's recap on some of the post that has seen a fair amount of attention (their page views are accurate as of the 23rd of September) :

The Magic of Performing Magic (75 views)

This was my 4th post and a somewhat follow up to my first post, The Disillusion Of Magic, which was recommended by a dear friend of mine, Clinton. I am rather passionate about the topic, which I really think shows in the amount of views it has gotten. It is my favorite post I have written so far as it allowed me to talk about a favorite pastime of mine.

Parkour and Muscle Damage (60 views)
"A story about a younger me jumping around on things, swinging on things, and hurting myself like you would expect. Also, turns out that parkour is still really fun even though I tend to hurt myself. I quite enjoyed telling this story about my usual bad ideas, and was quite proud when Parkour South Africa shared the article on their Facebook community."-OddballGreg

Tabletop Roleplaying Games (44 views)

"I may be a nerd, I may play Dungeons and Dragons, but so do a ton of other people in world, even though we have computers and videogame consoles. People really enjoyed reading this article, and I really enjoyed writing about a really awesome hobby. In fact, perhaps Jerome and I will write an article about the escapades of us playing DnD eventually." - OddballGreg

Statistics (And The People That Believe Them) (37 views)

"You probably still believe statistics, but since they make up such a large part of our lives, we can probably let you off the hook for that. Apparently, a fair percentage of people like reading about the potential statistics have for being wrong, but hey, percentages can be fudged now can't they?" - OddballGreg

The Truth About Spongebob (34 views)

This post was one that was recommended or suggested by my sister. I was struggling for an idea on the day and she said Spongebob is a representation of the 7 deadly sins, and thus the post had formed. I was still learning how to write a post with more accuracy so Oddball had to help a bit with that one. While doing the research for that one I came about a fair deal of other cartoons and their supposed connotations.

With the top page views as they are, if we were to speak about Spongebob giving magicians statistics of Role Playing games, after his accidental muscle damage from parkour, would that be the most popular post so far? maybe, (let us know down in the comments, what your idea would be for a popular post). Geocaching (Glorified Treasure Hunting) is less then a week old, but it has already climbed to the 6th position of the most viewed post. It goes to show that if the right audience is achieved, the amount of views should go up, and since there are people out there ,that I know of, that would like to start or already have started Geocaching they find it somewhat interesting and share it with others.

We have had views from many different places, here is a list of some; The United States, South Africa, United Kingdom, Germany, Poland, Netherlands, Turkey, Canada, Kenya, Italy, Ireland, France and the Philippines. We have a very diverse audience but it is scary to think that we have gotten a few more view from America, than South africa, they represent about 44% and 41% of our total pageviews respectively.

Do you have any thing that you would like us to talk about, or have any questions, please ask away down in the comments, over Facebook or on Twitter. Thank you for taking the time to read today's post. If you know of anyone that you think might like the blog, please share this with them, as I am sure they could find it of some interest. If you would like to see the newest posts as they are published, please like us on Facebook and/or follow us on Twitter. Thank you for your support and I hope you have/had a wonderful day. I shall write again overmorrow

Enjoy National Heritage Day (aka. National Braai Day) tomorrow buddies.

Website Wednesday - 30 Day Special (One Month Of Oddballery)

Hello and welcome to Website Wednesday; the day of the week where I point out that I've been posting to this blog for 30 days concurrently, and then crack some terrible jokes while recapping some of the better posts of those days.

This may be the most technically advanced header image I've designed for this blog. I'm not sure, but I may have put more work into this one than any other... Maybe.... Not really... Nope. Shush. 

That feeling when you realize when you've been doing something for 30 days straight; that is somewhat rather scary. It's also quite fun in a way. If you have found yourself reading the risible ramblings of a certain Oddball called Greg, then you find this recap on what I've been up to entertaining, if only as I question why I would do the things I do.

I feel like I have the latest T-shirt design having been at this for 30 days. "I survived 30 days of blogging and all I got was this lousy T-shirt." It's been an interesting experience so far, and certainly demanded a very large change in lifestyle in order to accomplish. Like anything, I walked into blogging expecting it to be easy. (Naivety appears to be a trait I cannot shake apparently.) To be frank, I wasn't entirely wrong, but I was right for reasons other than what I expected.

Firstly, getting up early is an action with visible consequences on my physical and mental health. School made it feel easy, but getting up early enough to churn out a new post or two each day is comparable to punching yourself every day and enjoying it. Having finished High School last year, I spent 6 months this year doing very little productive, and that's a very hard habit to shake. (Unless you find sleeping in productive, in which case, I was a professional by the time I decided to get this blog working.)

Interestingly though, I have found that I have become a far happier person for having found something that is both productive and fun to do with my days; this is despite the difficulty of coming to terms with the fact that there is always work to be done, whether you like it or not. As a social person, it's been an experiment in planning and forethought to ensure that there was a new blog post each day, regardless of my access to my computer. Since I've not missed a day since I revamped this blog on the 18th of June, I would say that I've been highly successful in that regard. (Or, you know, at least not failed.)

In any case, listening to me talk about a small success isn't particularly interesting, even for me, so lets talk about what you're actually here for, the blog posts. Specifically, some special mentions for the 3 most successful posts of these 30 days, in order of view count.

1. Parkour and Muscle Damage. 

First and foremost is, ironically, also the first ever Storytime Sunday post I ever did; from the days before I had thought of making header images for each post. Believe it or not, that is something I've only been at for the past 10 or so days if I'm not mistaken. (To be fair, they add a fair 10 minutes to the production time of each blog post, but I think they are well worth it for the effect they have on making the images feel more related to the blog, and better introduce the topics. They're also great for Facebook previews.) 

In any case, Parkour and Muscle Damage holds the record of being the most viewed post on this blog, (for now), and details how I "cleverly" managed to injure myself by trying to be a parkour traceur without training. It doesn't matter how many times I tell that particular story, I still feel very stupid for it. Thankfully, having written a post for it, perhaps it'll stop some other keen individuals from accidentally injuring themselves, so it's worth it in the end.

2.  Crazy Cat People (And Crazy Cats Too)

When I consider the fact that the second most read post on this blog is about weird cats and the weird people that own them, (such as myself), I begin to wonder if the world is as sane as I think it is? (Or maybe I'm not as insane as I think? Possible. Probably not; but one of me feels comforted at least.) Crazy Cat People was, strangely enough, also the first blog post for which I created a... (wait for it)... unique header image for. I thought I was talking about the most popular things on this blog, not the first time I've done things. (If your mind is half as corrupt as mine, you may have laughed at that statement.) 

3. Learning Languages (Frugally)

Hey, guess I'm not the only cheap person around here. (Teehee) In the first post on this list that wasn't the first post to do anything special, Learning Languages was a fun little article I did about a very nifty website that allows the user to learn a couple languages for free with an online course. I started learning French with their service, and have successfully made myself look ignorant by trying to speak French to someone who can actually speak it. Thankfully she appreciated the attempt and didn't try to castrate me or any other similarly unfortunate punishment.

If anything, I think the fact that Learning Languages is the third most viewed post just shows that you, the readers, enjoy reading things as randomly as I like writing them. None of these posts bear any more relation to each other apart from the fact that I wrote them and tried to be funny while I wrote them, (Which I hope I succeeded at.)

Interestingly enough, these 3 posts in particular are the most visibly popular posts on my blog, with the rest having page view counts so similar, it was easy deciding to only mention these 3. Maybe I should just talk about freebies, cats and hurting myself from now on? (Not really, that would be boring as hell.)

In any case, it shall be interesting to see what happens over the course of the next 30 days of blogging. I've got some interesting new posts lined up and will be trying out some new things as time goes on. (That's a guarantee I suppose. Stagnation never was that entertaining.)

In any case, I'm writing this at 11:15 at night (*facedesk*) since I will be spending tomorrow with a friend. (The agony I go through to keep you entertained. Teehee) As such, I think I'm going to stop for today. If you wish to leave a comment, such as a suggestion for something interesting you'd like to see in the coming 30 days of blog posts, please leave it in the section below. Also, don't forget to share this with someone. I'm too tired to think of a good reason why, but I would appreciate it. And of course, if you would like to see some more of my crazy thoughts and writing or are interested to see what I have planned for the next month, consider liking my Facebook page and/or following me on Twitter with the associated button on the bar to the right. Regardless of what you do, I thank you for taking the time to read this, and I hope you have/had and AWESOME day. I will see you tomorrow.

Later people *Goes to sleep*