Category Archives: Personal

2011 In Review. Sort of.

Reply

Lots of posts in the last few days about blog stats, mainly because of the stats from JetPack and wordpress.com that people use. Which is great – but I don’t understand why people like stats. Politicians and businesses need stats as they serve a direct purpose in shaping decisions and growth so those I do understand, but blogs? Why?

If you look at stats I imagine that you would like to see bigger numbers but if you start going after that then surely you start blogging differently, you start to look at each post more critically, maybe you increase your posting frequency but why do this? At what point does the blog become less you and more traffic orientated? And by what are you measuring stats? Just numbers? If you look at them then they must mean something to you.

My old site – tamba2 – has past 907,000 views and 734,000 visits which to some might be pretty good. But it only got 10,000 comments. That again seems good but it is only 1.1% of posts looked at that generated a comment. That number isn’t so good if you want to look at ‘engagement’. A way of looking at this would be if you opened your house up to visitors and every day 100 people walked through. 99 said nothing, they just looked. That last person will say something, maybe even just “Hi Nice house!”. Wouldn’t that 99 seem odd? (which is why spammers are so good, they say more. It’s false and exploitative but their comments are welcomed because of those other visitors who say nothing. They cater to people’s need for comments, for validation of their posts maybe.) Wouldn’t you rather write 10 posts and have 1 comment? That would be 10x the comment rate. Ah you say, I don’t write for comments and they really are a bonus but why then are you running stats? To see how many people don’t leave a bonus?

I have no idea what my stats are because I don’t run any stats. Even my blog dashboard stats aren’t reliable because I’ve lost posts when messing about with the database. So I can’t give you a stats view of 2011 except for “I blogged less. I wrote less personally. Comments were few”. Which is all okay.

If you want a real review: D is great, reached her 21st, started her Nursing Degree and has a job. P is great, she hit 18 and has a year left of College before she heads to University. J had a very bad year, is a lot more disabled than she was, quality of life dropped and is ill again right now. I had a bad year too.

The last post I wrote linking to my music stats at Last.fm – that’s all about stats though isn’t it. Yes, but I see those as being more personal. Music is more personal than a blog, it is based on mood right at that moment not what you care to share with the world and I don’t believe people think “Hey my stats at Last.fm need tuning out of Maroon 5 and into Aerosmith” whereas people do consider more what they write before clicking that blue Publish button. I really don’t care if you can see that I’m listening to a lot of Christine Aguilera right now.

Why don’t I write more personally which might get more visits and more comments? To be honest it’s because people will read them. There are long time readers who I would have no problem writing and them reading. But there are others who I do not want to know. I don’t want them reading between the lines, I don’t want them to be the “twitching curtain” where they hide themselves but always want to know about you and make assumptions. So it’s easier to write it offline then delete it. I find writing to be useful, cathartic in some respects so it still happens.

So should no bloggers use stats? Of course they should and for whatever reason they have but numbers aren’t the whole picture.

Political position

Reply

On 26 Aug last year I took the test at Political Compass.
This was the result:

I saw something about the politics of US politicians the other day, remembered I’d take this test so I did it again. I did not look at the above diagram and even if I had I’d not have remembered my answers to 6 pages of questions.
Today’s result:

So I’ve moved further to the Left which isn’t that surprising.

Pulp

Reply

Snagged a £102 Juicer for £35 in the Amazon Black friday sale. Very pleased :) I’m in the city tomorrow finishing off a WP install so I can head to the market after to buy all their fruit.

It’s my money

Reply

Impressive service (again) from Barclaycard VISA Fraud Prevention. Got a call asking me if I’d spent £56 in the USA yesterday which I had (I bought a WP theme) and asking if in the last few minutes I’d spent 39p online at The Pear Tree Inn in the USA or at a site in Brisbane, Aus. I replied No and my cards were cancelled and new ones are on the way.

Reply

Pointless fact: my hair is now the longest it has been since I was a teenager or possibly the longest it’s ever been. I can even put it in a ponytail.

A shoulder

Reply

I’ve probably mentioned my right shoulder before with pain / limited movement. Today I got the physio appt. Part of the exam was her – a much smaller lighter lady – telling me to push against her hands while my arms were in different positions. In most I was fine but with one my right arm had no strength at all. She pushed and my arm just went with her. Very odd. A couple of others there was weakness and discomfort but at least I could try and resist those. That plus prodding around the upper arm means I have a series of exercises to do several times a day and another appt in 3 weeks. She gave the green light to the splints I use for the wrist/hand which was good.

Quiet

2

Youngest is at her boyfriend’s house, eldest is out with the wife, the cat is quietly snoring and the dog is occasionally grumbling in his sleep. No music, no tv, no external noise other than traffic distantly humming up and down the M1. It’s as good as it gets for silence here and it is wonderful.

Perfectly annoying

3

P makes great mince pies and she makes them in great quantities because I eat the most. How many is most? If she made 100 I’d eat 80. So I am at the height of my festive pie eating right now or to put it another way I am taking up more space daily. Come the thaw the girls and me will start using an elliptical trainer which is in the garage. We could use it inside but it’s a little cruel to use exercise equipment in front of Jacq. Very cruel. So in the frozen garage it is and will remain unloved until there is a thaw. The weight must come off and that is one method. Anyway, I’m doing the washing up and I twist the broken finger. It didn’t have the splint on because I’m increasing the movement but it twisted and I said ouch. P called through asking if I was okay which it was. And that’s when I realised what the hand damage had shown me.

I had more sympathy / concern over my hand (which admittedly is a fairly useful bit of the anatomy) than I have from being bipolar and all that entails (and minds are more essential than hands) and yet online you cannot see the effect of a broken finger (I can still type) but you really do see the effects of my mental health. It comes through in so much I write. I’m sure I could map the ups/downs through twitter at least and me writing this now in an indication of a frame of mind.
There was a meme about invisible illnesses went around some blogs earlier this year. I did all the answers and nearly posted it here but was wary of who would read it. Wary because you cannot un-reveal something. (Found a site called unsuicide yesterday while looking for something else – and no, I’m not – and I wondered how you would unsuicide exactly. If you can’t unsee then unsuicide is well, impossible? I got the point of the site). If you are going to reveal you have to trust. There are people I will never know reading this and I don’t care because we know nothing of each other, some readers I really do want to meet and I genuinely trust them and there are others I either have met or will meet who I trust and do not trust. This goes back to being bipolar and the fact people will read this blog and make their minds up before we meet. Or they will look back and decide in retrospect that something done genuinely was done because of my mental health.

5. Most people assume: That what I am saying does not count because they think I’m too happy, too sad, too mad. “Oh he doesn’t mean it” or they conveniently forget about the bipolar when it suits them.

It’s very very annoying. It’s bad enough me wondering just what’s going on without having to deal with conflicting messages even though I am the reason for them. It’s my fault but it’s also not. Which isn’t a cop-put, it’s just difficult. So is this a way of asking for sympathy? No because you can’t give it. So why mention it in comparison to my hand? I don’t know.

In other news I still cannot play MW2. But a tentative few goes on BCBF2 went well so that is the game of choice for a while. I am Level 5 Specialist II so I have much yet to learn.

And finally I was looking for a domain for someone else and found one I just had to buy. The design (which is crap, I know but I have never pretended to have any aesthetic abilities whatsoever)  is the original for the tattoo I have on my chest – and if you knew all the meanings captured in that design you really would know me very very well. http://perfectly.me/

Hand Pt3

Reply

Index finger is all shades of pink, purple, yellow. The splint it has cannot be removed for 3 weeks from injury apparently. I have about 10 degrees of movement at the first knuckle and not much more at the second. The index finger also appears to be bent slightly more toward the other finger. Imagine the index finger was only half straight from this original injury pic.


It’s like the doctor in Casualty didn’t manage to straighten it. The middle finger I have around 60 degrees of movement at the first knuckle and 30 degrees at the second. The exercises I have to do 10 times daily are obviously focussing on increasing the bendability. I can’t get a photo good enough to show the bruising. It covers half the back of my hand, the left side of my palm above the thumb area, both knuckles on the middle finger (particularly the last one) and all the index I can see.
Gaming. I just tried to play Modern Warfare 2. First game was Bailout and I ended up 19 kills, 3 deaths, game winning kill with the Chopper Gunner (score was 7400 when I got it and went straight to it). It was too painful to continue into the next. It’s not the holding, it’s not the pressing a button. It’s the twisting. So as one part of the hand or the other hand starts one action the rest braces the controller – and that hurts both damaged fingers but especially the middle. I’ll try again when I’ve had more physio. When I saw her she asked what I did and actually said I shouldn’t. Well… what she actually said was “Do you touch type?” and when I said No I wasn’t that good she said I should stop. Lots of little shocks down the finger are not good right now. I made promises to type as light as it could be done – I told her the kb I have (one of the Apple slimlines) and that calmed her so she’s okay now. Complicated bits of kit are hands, I’m not going to endanger this one. (and she said the rings in my hands were great, interesting. Had no concerns at all).

So I grabbed some books: Notes From The Underground (Dostoevsky), Crime and Punishment (Dostoevsky), Heart of Darkness (Conrad) and War and Peace (Tolstoy). That is the order I want to read them too when I find the time. But that’s a whole different post if indeed it’s ever written here.

Hand Pt2

1

It’s called a Volar Plate Avulsion Injury apparently. Hand is now swollen and the metal ring in the back of the hand cannot be seen.
Little finger escaped damage. Ring finger must have been stretched as it’s painful when used to grip. Ring finger remains swollen, solid and has at most 45 degrees of movement down. Both knuckles are shades of purple, first section of finger is twice normal size. Index finger isn’t too bad but then it’s splinted. Can move last section and it too has 45 degrees from the knuckle. Seeing the physio on the 22nd, can’t do anything until then. I asked about typing and the answer was if I was gentle on the keys when I type I should be okay. I’m not.
In other news I’ve not switched on the PS3 since I tried that one game of MW2. Unless I’ve been out the country it’s never been off so long. PSP dusted off and I’m playing Jeanne d’Arc (87 at Metacritic) instead.

I described the stairs and stairlift to the physio when he called to make the appt. I asked how he thought it happened. His opinion was that the index caught the stairlift rail and the hand carried on past. His lovely description was to imagine falling over near a kerb. You put your hand out to stop. The index finger makes enough contact to stay where it is on the flat top of the kerb but the hand keeps going down which forces the finger up very quickly. Now there’s a mental picture as you make a fist while thinking about it.