Virtual Vellum: Standing Room Only

I don't usually mention site statistics here. In fact, I'm pretty sure I never have before. It's nice to know that somebody's out there reading this stuff, but on the days when I've literally had 3 visitors (and there have been several) it's not as if I walk around in a funk contemplating personal harm. For that matter, I don't even modify what I'm writing (assuming I could even guess from the statistics which of my blog entries were more popular than others, which I cannot) out of any sense that it might or might not suit the audience. It is what it is - I hope you like it, but I mean that in terms of the general "you," not any particular individual "you" who might rather I discuss some topic than others.

Still, I do check my site's stats at least every couple of days just to get a sense of overall traffic. In general, it seems that I have a few dozen regular or semi-regular visitors, a notion that's corroborated by face-to-face and email conversations I have with most of those folks. My highest number of visits up to and including October 14th, 2009, was back on August 10th when I published the first draft of my short story here. On that day, I had about 150 hits, followed by around 50 the next day and then it was basically back to business-as-usual. That spike in traffic can be attributed to the fact that I specifically told people there was something here they might want to read. As opposed to my usual method of advertising, which consists of the occasional link in a forum or email signature that basically reads "I've got a blog. It's here -->".

So imagine my surprise when I checked the stats for yesterday, October 15th, 2009, and discovered that the site had well over 200 hits! To quote Neo from the Matrix, "Whoa." I have no idea what drove all that traffic, but assuming it wasn't an anemic attempt at a denial-of-service attack, all I can say is, "Welcome!"