Straight up, what did you hope to learn about here? If I was someone else, would this all fall apart?
What makes a post popular is not necessarily when a lot of people read it the day it’s published. What makes it popular is when random people do Internet searches and stumble on it, day after day.
For example, by far my most read is Capital Punishment, In Theory, which at the moment has had 889 direct hits. That means nearly a thousand readers have come to my site because they wanted to know more about the morality or immorality issues of executing criminals. So it’s safe to say that more random people have come to my site to hear my thoughts on capital punishment than for any other specific reason.
Statistically speaking then, the other main reasons people wash up on my shore is to read my thoughts on The Bachelor, LOST, healthy eating/organic lifestyle, and oddly, mustaches.
Honestly, when I write, I never think about what the reader might want to read about. No offense. I write about what I personally would want to read about it. Then from there, the readers can sort out what they feel is worth reading past the first paragraph of.
My definition of successful writing is the ability to write about anything (from The Golden Gate Bridge (I Wish You Would Step Back From that Ledge, My Friend) to an old abandoned amusement park (Canyon Land) and make it interesting and intriguing and to hopefully reveal some kind of truth in the process that wasn’t obvious before.
But far all the times the metaphorical spaghetti has stuck to the wall, there were also times it didn’t. I have made it easy to revisit my most popular posts with pages like Best of 2009 (statistically the most popular posts from last year) and Reruns (a collection of all my different series), but today I will celebrate my least popular.
That doesn’t mean they weren’t popular the first time they were published, because many of them were. It just means no one has read then since. In other words, they evidently don’t have much replay value.
Bottom Ten Posts of All Time
The Friendship Police: Why the Heck Not?
Dr. Deja Vu: The Interstate to Memory Lane
That was fun. But before I’m done with this subject today, I also need to acknowledge some of the random Internet searchers who came to scenicroutesnapshots.com, only to be disappointed. I’ve seen all kinds of random search terms that people have typed in to get to my site.
Surprisingly, only a few of them have been kinky. And a few were deliberate pranks, like “Nick Shell that I dated in high school”. I never did find out who did that. But just in the past few weeks, grazing the floor of search terms, I have definitely come across some oddities:
“Chris Harrison shirtless” I’m sorry, sir or ma’am. I know you really want to see what’s underneath that tuxedo, but he’s the host of The Bachelor, not a contestant. You wish.
“Buzz Aldrin shirtless” Okay, same person. Chris Harrison was one thing, but leave the 80 year-old astronaut alone.
“where can I get a remake of Starry Night?” You mean a reprint? If you want a remake, I’ll do it. I haven’t painted since the 4th grade, but I can make this work. I won’t even charge that much. Fifty bucks sound good? It may end up looking more like the abstract version of the original, but I’ll get you your remake. Nice doing business with you.
“to increase your salary, simply mustache” Alright, buddy. Yes, it’s true. I can actually help you with that one. Men with mustaches have higher salaries (Must Not Mustache). But never, and I mean never, say the words “simply mustache” again. Not cool, man. Not cool.
“Lynyrd Skynyrd song that goes- oh that third eye blind” I’m no Casey Kasem, but I think you’re referring to their song “That Smell”: “Oh, oh, that smell. The smell of death all around you.” The actual lyrics were a lot different than you thought, I know. Yes, because “third eye blind” and “that smell” sound so much alike.
“personality that causes cancer” That would be “the Kate Gosselin”, but I haven’t written about that yet. Good for you for reading my mind, though.
“road turns into mouse” Oh, I get it. I’ve heard about guys like you. Look, it must be pretty cool to test different kind of marijuana for pot dispensaries in Denver for a living, but maybe you should cut back on your Internet searching while you’re “working”.
