The challenge of being a personal blogger is keeping it that way. I enjoy the added challenge of building my site and traffic and seeing it grow. I understand that most people are going to be lurkers, I don't comment on every single post or blog I stop at after all. So having a web counter gives you that little boost to see that it's not just yourself and a few friends reading your blog.

But, once you get traffic others want to benefit from it. People seem to expect they have every right to perch like a cow bird on my blog. I don't understand their attitude. It seems very arrogant to think I should want them here. I don't.

I get at least 2 or 3 emails each week from someone "writing for a client" or themselves telling me what a great favour they can do for me by putting ads on my site. Do you see ads on my site? Other than the one text ad thing which says I will make $1.91 eventually, there aren't any ads here. I could understand their attitude that I would want their ads if I was running an ad farm. But, I'm not. So clue in and try another blog.

What really really does peeve me, far more, are those who want to be my friend. Do you even know my name? No. How can you be my friend when you know nothing about me. You wouldn't miss me if I was hit by a bus an hour from now. The only impact my absense would have is the worth of having a link to my blog traffic. So peeve off and befriend some rock or something. I only want to be friends with people who at least have the interest in making a return visit and actually reading some of my blabbering.

I use my Technorati list for blogs _ I _ read. Yes, me, not you. I do not use it as a way of trading links. I do not expect anyone on that list to link back to me. It is nice if they do, I don't check into it. That list is for me. It is a list for me. Hope that helps some of those people who think they are my friends and should be added to my blogroll because we are such great friends. I don't trade links on my blogroll. Of course, it would be nice if any of those friends would read this. They won't. They don't read blogs they just use them.

Anyway, that is my little rant except for one last point.

The problem with having a personal blog and the ego to find traffic is that you put time and energy into promoting it and don't always have time and energy to post to it. Kind of silly. I aim to post each day but some days I am cheating to get content. I would prefer all my posts to be real blog entries and geeky looking stick figure drawings. But, I work, I have laundry and I like to sleep at least once every 24 hours or so. Some days a cheat is all I can do. But, I try to make them interesting cheats, not just another cheap cheat. :)

So there are my thoughts about blogging today. It's not easy being a personal blogger in a world of monetizing mania. But I'm not forgetting what I liked about blogging in the first place and I'm sticking to being a personal blogger, with pride in creating for myself and those who wander in for a look.

From Blog Talkers: Heart. What is close to your heart? Does heart disease run in your family? Would you say your heart is in good shape? Would you ever consider donating your heart after passing away? Why or why not?

I'm keeping my heart packed away in tin foil. It's been battered, bruised and broken enough for awhile. Not that I'm closed off entirely but I'm worn out from trying to be as giving and open as I used to be. A heart needs a few calluses if it's going to survive.

I would not donate anything if I passed away. I believe in reincarnation as a recycling process and all of us will be just a body (meat) when we die. Souls or whatever that element is, get passed along to become something else. But, still, I have the feeling that what was me on the outside should stay that way. Worms can feast on my remains but it just seems strange for someone else to be wearing my heart, my eyes, etc. Not a selfish thing just seems that something of me should be left private, not given away to someone else. I would feel very weird about having someone else's heart. I think I would rather not do that at all.

Have you ever looked at your hand and felt it was not really your hand? I have. It was extremely eerie. Suddenly I couldn't trust my own hand and it felt detached from the rest of me.

Thursday Thirteen: 13 Things I Would have Liked for Valentines Day

1. An actual real Valentine man, a My Funny Valentine kind of guy would be just fine.

2. A pretty locket.

3. A weekend at a bed and breakfast with my Funny Valentine.

4. A box (not massive) of Valentine chocolates, really good ones.

5. Cheesecake, really good ice cream and/ or very fresh fruit salad. (It's not all chocolate!)

6. A Valentine card, something really pink and flowery.

7. Valentine lingerie for more than full figure type. Something long and luxurious rather than skimpy.

8. A gift basket full of good things: chocolates, really nice smelling shampoo and soap, etc.

9. A car. Not that I actually expect to get something so expensive but lets just put it out there, just cause you never know...

10. A day out for fancy coffee, shopping at the bookstore, and a chick flick.

11. An evening of my Funny Valentine cooking dinner, cleaning it up and making a really good coffee for late night conversation.

12. Flowers, tulips would be nice or something fancier. Something with roots that can be planted in the garden this Spring would be great too.

13. Sex. Not average, man in charge sex, something a lot more fun for me.

Blog Talkers: Talking about Love

Love. What does love mean to you? Do you feel like you have found love? Are you still looking? Do you believe in love at first sight? Why or why not? Why do you think people try so hard to find love?

Love is something you build over time and being together and caring about someone. I think there is love at first sight between family members, a new baby and parents. I don't believe that really happens between two people. It might seem that way. But love is deeper than lust or affection. I love my family, in spite of good and bad in the past. I love them for all sorts of reasons. I can be furious with them and still love them. The love is not a part of whatever is going on in the present. It's deeper. I don't understand how Mothers and daughters, sons and Fathers and sisters and brothers can not speak to each other for years over some trivial thing. It seems a very shallow and selfish and extremely silly thing to me.

I've never been in love, I thought I was. I was married and then divorced from a man who said he loved me. I met others who said the same but had no trouble leaving me over small things. Love is a word misused, abused and thrown around when a guy wants sex, not love. I want a lot more than sex. I can have sex without a man in the room. As good as I am at that you'd think I'd love myself more. I'm working on it, the loving myself part.

I do think that you have to at least be working at loving yourself before someone else can love you too. How can you trust someone who says they love you unless you see yourself as someone who can be loved?

Your long lost Uncle Bailey, the one who ran away and joined the circus, says he is retiring and needs someone to carry on his act. He picked you. He sends you an airplane ticket to France, a pre-paid week long stay at a fancy hotel in Paris, and a hand written invitation to run away and join the circus. Apparently Uncle Bailey did well in the circus and reached his goal of traveling the world.

What happens between you hopping on the plane, discovering what circus act your Uncle Bailey has in store for you and your choice of choosing he circus adventure or coming back to your old life again?