It's My Party And I Won't Cry

Friends of a Feather

I thought I should write about the events I’m doing back to back, the one yesterday, obviously is finished, so only one to go. The event yesterday yielded some okay numbers in the stats for my blog; the bitmap here shows 49 visits, which is less than what I finally got. But compare to ten visits only, the previous day. On average, I was getting 600 - 700 views per month for a while, or more than that, one month exceeded 1,000 views I believe, but since summer views have gone down to a trickle, the past quarter a lot less than I was hoping. It takes time to get readers, but then to keep them interested is even harder. I’m not disheartened or anything; I will keep the blog up as long as others are still going there, but I would prefer some interaction, a comment here or there. People are sharing the blog or certain posts, I do know that; and some people probably come back more than once. When I first started the blog, I didn’t share it or anything, except with friends, so it got close to 1,000 views only,(I can’t remember a ballpark number for it anymore, but I believe more than 600 and maybe a little over 1,000 views) in the first eighteen months.

A well-known Muslim asked me to write for his website, but I turned him down (not because I didn’t want to, necessarily) but because I didn’t think I could write creatively without sometimes saying things which are not appropriate for a website like his. And if I had accepted the offer, maybe I wouldn’t have thought of some of the stuff I have written and published to date. I like to think I am living my dream. I didn’t think it would be good for his website to have someone like me writing there or because I didn’t want to give up writing on my blog, the way that I like to write. Nowadays I feel less pressure, though sometimes I do feel anxious if I haven’t been doing a little bit of research or at least brainstorming ideas. When I stop publishing regularly I know my readers are likely to drop off. I am not ready yet to quit, though I was told that most Islamic websites become inactive and the owners quite within two-three years. If I have survived just over three years on this blog (though I had a previous blog which I didn’t quit, but I was told there wouldn’t be any blog there anymore or something like that happened with my Windows Live ™ blog, “My Islam Feed”. I saved those posts, (like “Not Everything Is Sexy”), some of which are on this blog. If I decide in the future to discontinue writing, I will tell everyone. The blog will still be up there, maybe I will eventually trim it down, but I have been too lazy to even review older posts, or do necessary changes and revisions, sooo that is not happening soon.

The downside of writing for myself (or my own blog and not someone’s website) is that I don’t have the exposure they do, and I am responsible for my own mistakes, and to do necessary research and corrections on my own – this is the area I have the most trouble with. Even when I was given the chance to have another person review my work, I just didn’t get back to her; she is a scholar of some standing but I have been to unorganized and also too casual about the whole process; I haven’t made the time to review and also get back to writing that is in progress or submit anything for review by her. Probably some of the proofs (hadiths, for example) need correct references, which I can’t find, and things like that.

As a rule I do mention on occasion that I am not a scholar, and that I am telling people what I believe, but also I do furnish “proofs” when I can, or express opinions which I honestly know are the mainstream, and which most Muslims also accept. I am not perfect, so of course there will be mistakes. But I am not trying to fool anyone and I am not lying about Islam. I really believe what I write and what I write is not an attempt to lie about Islam to paint a rosy picture which doesn’t exist.




A circle "FriendsSharingFriends"or v.11.3

 

Numbers

Stats don’t tell everything. For example, they don’t tell me (because I don’t have the wherewithal to get the right program or whatever, thought it exists, I think it is Feedburner™, which I tried to use - not sure what if anything happened, if I disabled it, or didn’t register it?) to know how long people are staying with one post, or if they even read more than a couple of paragraphs, or just jump from one page to another and give up. So I still don’t know what people think about my writing, and for another ( good) reason, I feel safer knowing that the numbers show life, and I don’t think knowing that someone thought something that I liked posting was awful - or would elicit a negative reaction. That’s why I opt out of descriptive words (too generative) at the bottom which readers could choose to tell me what they really think, or express at least in the ballpark of what they think – there are no expletives in the choices. If you have a blog or read blogs, you know what I’m talking about (I don’t think I have to add a bitmap). The drawback is that I don’t know, for the most part anything about readers’ reactions. And because no one comments, it is much less likely that anyone will comment.

So, I am living my fantasy, I guess. I can believe that lots of people out there really do appreciate and maybe even crave my writing. I suppose it would be natural to have a wide range of emotions while reading my blog, lol (also my comments on the internet).

YouTube™

I commented on a guy’s channel last night when I should have been adding photos (or trying to find out where my photos got to, which somehow found a “goo gaa” and transported themselves somewhere away from the event where I had posted them)to the event. He says Muslims are hypocrites, which many of us might well be, or we might sometimes behave hypocritically, when it comes to certain issues; the subject was freedom of speech (no surprise there).

I think ‘if’ Salman Rushdie wrote a book some people ‘didn’t like’, or the Muslims ‘didn’t like’, but can’t do anything to get rid of the book, then they will be angry or upset about it; personally, I don’t think about it, unless it comes up, but when it does, I do get angry or upset – I think it is natural and I don’t hate myself for it. In fact if he dropped dead today I would be happy, and I don’t believe expressing emotion is a crime in any planet in the Universe. I am more upset however that Muslims are being slaughtered in Syria and some guy’s comment says, “The war is Arabs killing Arabs”. Often comments about sectarian violence and wars are met with comments like that, or “let them kill each other”, “good riddance”, and so on. If those people are not angry and upset, I don’t know what they are. So who is the hypocrite? “Boo hoo hoo” I wrote and something about the western (I met any secular government, I think the guy was Australian, I consider that “west” of the Persian Gulf, or of where I stand on the issue of FOS) governments having leaders who are hypocrites. Of course he will probably come back with a ‘lightning attack’ (Blitzkrieg, in German) against the Arab governments. This is obviously typical of discourse (I keep saying intercourse, I think I did back in the first couple of paragraphs, which is funny, and probably most people won’t even spot what is wrong with the sentence – actually I used the word “interactions” back there, and almost wrote “intercourse” the first time here, which made me think I had used it twice, so I revised this). Long story short, I also pointed out to another comment on the same channel, that “it isn’t Arabs killing Arabs, you SOB.” (Not in those words, but I wish I had said that).

I retired earlier than people in the West would have expected. I have been at the desk for two days and my shoulders and neck are stiff. I recently got an exercise bike, but this week I have been “too busy” (the usual lie people with health and fitness equipment tell themselves) to ‘get back on the horse’. Probably if I do get back into regular exercise I will feel better and not even care about the blog anymore – but that might be a bad thing. I guess writing is cathartic for me, as well.

Draw You A Picture?

The other bitmap, shows a circle which I visited, not sure, but I think I am in it. Just so I am not too annoying if I didn’t actually join at some point (but I must have because I comment , share stuff and like people’s stuff) I am sticking with v. 11.3, and ignoring the others. Sometimes I just go down the list of comments and +1 the lot of them. I think it is being nice. I know it isn’t just an altruistic act however (or I thought about that yesterday and realized that all those people will know I did that - if they allow notifications). I am far from comfortable with the experience I have had with social media in general; I am not great on the internet, I fumble through things, so does a friend of mine, in fact I haven’t even seen her on Google™ for the longest time. She had mentioned that she needed help with some things – “don’t look at me”, I thought. My chat message hangs there, like a lost puppy, waiting for her to ‘pick up’.

It is difficult to explain how to do things on the internet, and that’s why I don’t try very often. I have one exceptional piece of technical writing, maybe two, on my blog; the first one discusses how an app I used translates “not seamlessly” from English into Arabic. The other post which is popular for some reason, and is always up there in the stats (you will find it to the right of your screen, in the popular posts section.) is “How to Use the Link Button”. I think some of the posts are popular because they happened to be first in the stats so people gravitate to them (because they are always visible on the right). Once, I saw a post I do want to get more circulation going down in the stats, so I immediately asked some people on the net to share it, please! And they did!

Unfortunately, relying on kindness of others doesn’t work all the time, like yesterday, I wanted people to comment on my blog, and I don’t think anyone did. I asked y’all to post a comment saying “I was here” and I haven’t found anyone who did, yet. The blog is vast (or over 190 posts) so I could have missed it. So, people are not just mindless robots after all? I guess Alex Jones gets comments because he is popular and people feel drawn to him. It is also more fun to comment on videos and YouTube™.

I appreciate that people shared yesterday, and I thank the few who came to the event. There is another event today, not sharing the blog specifically, though that will probably kind of happen as I share the event on my blog and bitmaps from the blog at the event. I will be discussing how to be safe on the internet, which isn’t a subject I have done much research on, but I have some screenshots I think are interesting, which I can share, and maybe others can give their more expert advice (they probably can, but won’t, lol); Until then, farewell.




Don't Forget Invitations and Reminders for the Event