Year: 2012

So…

My stress level is pretty much off the chart right now to begin with and will be for the next ten days or so.

What does not help is long, rambling 25-minute phone calls from my dad, strategically placed at the precise moment when I’m trying simultaneously to deal with work, a busted computer monitor, and the fact that apparently everyone who’s ever worked in mortgage lending at Bank of America is either an idiot or a flake who can’t return phone calls or email. Or both.

I liked my dad much better when he hated using the phone. And I liked Bank of America much better when…well…I never liked them, but at least I used to never have to interact with them either.

Yes, I realize this is a completely pointless rant, but I needed to yell about it somewhere before going to bed after not getting a damned thing done all night. It was a really bad day. I may need another Portlandia.

 

Randomly Wednesday

Since I’m unlikely ever to move back to California nor to be married, yesterday’s ruling has no personal impact on me. But it may impact a lot of people I know. And it’s kind of cool that a federal court–albeit probably the most liberal federal court there is, in a rather narrow ruling–has now actually ruled in favor of same-sex marriage.

I’m mildly worried that the this path to the Supreme Court may be starting a bit early. That might lead to an premature and unfavorable ruling which would cause problems for years to come (sort of a Plessy v.Ferguson for the 21st Century). But I’ll go ahead and be excited anyway. The time will come soon. However, let’s also not lose sight of the fact that even the most basic nondescrimination legislation is still not in place in a lot of states–my own, for example.

More exciting news for a Wednesday night:

  • Happy discovery: Coming off my AT&T family plan doesn’t necessarily mean losing my grandfathered unlimited data plan. Cool, eh?
  • Grant application season craziness is almost over. Will they be crazy enough to give me a quarter of a million dollars? We’ll find out in June.
  • Got approved to so a presentation at ALA in Anaheim this summer. Anyone wanna go to Disneyland?
  • I continue to hate Bank of America. But that’s not news.

Plan B

20120209-055829.jpg

I guess I won’t be going to Clifton’s on this summer’s LA trip after all. I somehow missed the story about its having been sold. I’m glad the place is to be preserved (and as a cafeteria, yet) but I’m always suspicious of renovations, particularly in gentrifying areas. I love the decor but I also love the dowdiness and I hope it doesn’t get sanitized too much.

This brings up another preservation issue as well: The modern facade was actually in place for much more of Clifton’s existence than the original. Which is really the more “historic” version? But it’s too damned early for me to think about that.

S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y Night

Spending my Saturday night setting up my new phone. It’s sort of like watching paint dry. But I’m still excited.

A friend just texted me that apparently all the rock and roll drag queens of my misspent youth will be at the big queer bar in Greensboro tonight, including Atlanta’s (and formerly Greensboro’s) very own Lily White. For a brief second I considered going just to see some old friends. Then I contemplated the logistics of driving thirty miles each way (a drive I already make five days a week) in the cold (19F tonight) after being up and busy since 7AM (I was scrubbing the toilets by 8:30) and bed started seeming much more appealing. And after the last time I did so, I  sort of promised myself I’d never walk into a North Carolina queer bar again, anyway.

The new phone is now functioning nicely and I am in fact going to bed. I really don’t intend to do much of anything when I wake up either. I finished most of my grant stuff on Friday and celebrated that night by taking myself out for lasagna at Cagney’s. Today was about errands and taking care of things. I will continue the celebration tomorrow by not working (for the first Sunday in three weeks), not thinking about family stuff, and maybe not even leaving the house. Siri and I may spend some time together, but that’s about it. I’m rather looking forward to it.

 

Stats

I don’t often talk about stats these days because…well…there’s not much to talk about. But over the past year, my top traffic-generating metro areas have been:

  1. Greensboro/Winston-Salem/High Point and environs
  2. San Francisco/Oakland/San Jose and environs
  3. Seattle/Tacoma (almost a dead heat with SF, which makes me very happy for some reason)
  4. Washington
  5. Albany/Schenectady
  6. Dublin (Ireland, not Ohio, says the librarian in me)
  7. Buffalo and environs
  8. Philadelphia
  9. Toronto
  10. San Diego and environs

Interestingly enough, I get a fair amount of hits from the Triad that don’t seem to originate from me, although I never hear from any of these people and have no idea who they are.

Mac penetration is high among my users, at 25% (30% if you count iOS). Microsoft Internet Exploder penetration, on the other hand, is mercifully low, at just under 30%. Firefox is tops, with 32%, followed by IE, Chrome (19%) and Safari (17%). Users are just about evenly split between new and returning visitors, with 16% of all visits coming from users who hit the site more than one hundred times per year. The average viewer looks at 1.88 pages per visit and spends a whopping minute and a half on the site.

The most popular posts over the past year?

  1. The Ghost Mall
  2. Best Dilbert ever
  3. Minnie and Yogi and Arthur and Roy
  4. Robert Plant’s crotch
  5. Something to build on

As far as years go, my users prefer 2011 to 1999. I’m not entirely sure I agree. And the number one traffic source that’s not a search engine continues to be this page at deadmalls.com, which explains the top-ranked post above.

This, mind you, is the traffic for Otherstream. In case size matters, Groceteria gets about ten times the traffic of this site and does not skew nearly so pro-Mac nor anti-IE.