A Visit to the Stats Department

Since I’ve been writing this blog for more than a year, I figured it was time to share some site stats with you guys. I am, admittedly, a site stats junkie. I visit them every day, sometimes more than once a day, just to see how many people are reading and why. I’m not trying to make any money from the blog – I’m just writing for the hell of it – but I still want to WIN at blogging. I don’t know what winning at blogging entails, exactly, but I figure I’ll know it when I see it. And now I provide for you a fascinating (or not) peek at this site’s stats.

Highest visits in a single day: 90, on 20 July 2010, the day after I published my review of Ten for Charlottesville Restaurant Week (which got the most hits that day).

Most popular posts (everything with 50 or more views), in descending order:

• Baby Talk, or How Can I Be 32 Years Old and Still Not Know What I Want?, 195
• Flashback Friday: 4 March 2011, 103 (this one is the most baffling to me – this is just a photo of my best friend and a grad school pal; I have no idea why it’s apparently so popular!)
• Girls Weekend 2011, 92 (also not sure why this recap of my girls weekend with 5 other friends is so popular)
• Cville Restaurant Week: Ten, 89 (all the restaurant reviews are pretty popular)
• Cville Restaurant Week, January 2011: Horse & Hound Gastropub, 83
• Career, Vocation, Calling, Job, Whatever, 80
• Top Five Reasons I Don’t Swim in the Ocean, 75 (lots of people have ocean phobias, apparently!)
• Cville Restaurant Week: Ristorante Al Dente, 73
• Stumptown Smorgasbord, 68
• Geeking Out on Google+, 62
• Why We Still Remember, 57
• Relay Foods: Our First Experience, 57
• Do People Still Go to the Mall?, 54 (lots of people have this question too, I guess!)

Most common, expected search terms that led to my blog:

• some combination of being 32 or 33 and wanting to have a baby or not wanting to have a baby or wondering if the searcher can still have a baby
• swimming in the ocean or not swimming in the ocean
• calling, vocation, or the searcher not knowing what to do with his/her life
• john cage on ally mcbeal (this comes up a LOT, especially considering my post on John Cage didn’t break the list of posts with 50 or more views, coming in at only 42)

Weirdest search terms that have led my blog:

• oops castration (really?)
• when i swim in the ocean for a long time my boobs start to hurt (ok, REALLY?!)
• lisa loeb egg donor (who searches for this?)
• sandman yourself (I know this led to my post on the The Sandman, but I have no clue what “sandman yourself” might possibly mean)
•  بسكويت دانس (I don’t speak Arabic. Don’t know how to type Arabic characters on my keyboard. I copied and pasted this. I have no idea how this could possibly have led to my site.)
• american girl doll powerpoint presentation (someone made a PowerPoint about American Girl dolls? And someone else searched for it?)
• should i let my husband watch hbo shows (wait, what? Are you married to an 8-year-old?)
• monkey versus ostrich (heh heh – I know exactly what post brought this person here, but the search term cracks me up, that someone would look for this)
• kudzu sprouts (oooooookay…)
• hitwoman (clearly someone was looking for services I don’t offer – they must have been very disappointed)
• pole dancing jesus amanda (I…I don’t even know what to say about this one.)
• ass in child x2 (that x2? That means this search term has brought people to this site TWO SEPARATE TIMES. *shudder*)
• you may lova x4 (for a nonsensical search term to bring 4 separate people here? Bizarre.)

Did anyone else make it this far? If you did…what cracked you up/disturbed you/grossed you out/puzzled you?