STAT COUNTER FOLLIES...

I got a stat counter in August, when I was basically reeling from moving out and spending WAY too much time going over this confessional with a fine-tooth comb, resizing pictures and tweaking text and generally not getting anything else done. I would pay cash money to have had the counter from the beginning, because it gives me such pleasure to be able to look and see who has been sending people out to Sea, and where they are from.

For a while, Greasetank was far and away the heaviest referral source, though what anyone who had been enjoying the magnificent if heartily creepy CG art of GT made of my postings is a bit of a mystery. And one guy from Anhui Province, China signed in over and over again over the course of a month. Probably trying to make head or tail out of what he'd been sent to... BiByDays, the BearMind, Ian and the Hurricane all send traffic over, as does Mr. Bigg, which I think is generous, since how he has time to do anything given his love life and work schedule, let alone his multiple blogs, is completely beyond me. I think that Ernesto Raul at "Day After Suicide" must be in the lead now, though, because I am getting so much traffic from South America. I just met my first American who had spent time in Chile the other night, and now I know two, both gay. And suddenly I have blog readers from Chile. It feels weird, but just about everything in life does these days...

Hits are identified by their ISPN number, which is still complete anonymity to me at least, and by location, unless it is cloaked. There are two computers which I sincerely hope are either at internet cafés or gay community centers -- they generate hundreds of hits in a month, almost 40 so far in October alone. I mean I know I write well, and my life is fascinating, but this is ridiculous...

I also worry about the people who check it every day; there are people in Bothell, WA, Wayne, NJ, San Jose, CA, Asheville, NC, Herndon, VA and Bangor, MI, who apparently have nothing better to do with their lives. I have traveled a fair amount in my life, but it still blows me away to think that whatever I cough up in my moments of despair is being read all over Europe, and as far away as Russia, China and Korea. [This is where the power of people like Greasetank and Tagame comes into play, I think; I can't imagine married gay men in Norway, Denmark, or Spain settling down to an evening of despair by sharing mine for no other reason.] It gives me particular pleasure to be read in places I have never been but would love to have been, like China or Johannesburg, and towns I have spent time in, including the Big City where I met "Tim the Swede" twice, so many years apart, though I can't say exactly why. People with too much time on their hands must be pretty much alike no matter where they live...

I haven't figured out how to get it to show me more than the current month, and of course what I would love to know is how things looked when I got started back in March. I'll just never know. I do enjoy checking it, though I often miss the end of the month, when the numbers would be most impressive and easy on the ego. If any of you far-flung lurkers care to check in via Troll Mail and let me know why you keep coming back, feel free [just click in the sidebar to the right].

It's a mad world, my masters.
And getting smaller every day.
Hang in there.