Bacon Fat blogging - Or -Why Portland is famous in Malta

I've been writing MetroKnow for about six months or so, and along with the steady-as-she-goes increase of my weight from limiting my exercise to excessive typing and scrollwheel calisthenics, the sizzle of the typewritten bacon fat that I'm cooking seems to be picking up a little.

Like me, I'm guessing that most bloggers do the following: my self-absorbed, egocentric side compels me to watch my little site meter 18 hours a day to try to find out as much as I can about how people end up spending 0:00 seconds (or, heaven help me, more) on my blog. And then write more about that. And that little bugger, my increasingly visible alternate persona, who I was tempted to name before remembering that it is one of the worst writing faux pas that there is (to name part of yourself and write it down - read into that what you will), is dominating my thoughts into states of massive non-productivity and undiagnosed mild dementia.

So, Portland friends (and my posse of literati in Tuvalu - that's a shout out to my "peeps"), I need some help. Here are some fascinating little tidbits of frivolous data that I am looking for answers on. To be truthful, I guess I don't really need help with it, so much as I'm using the request as another excuse to write about myself and see it permanently engraved on a blogger-hosted hard drive, accessible to millions. That, friend, I may need help with, but I doubt that too many licensed professionals are reading this, so it looks like I'm going with this plan for now.

Example 1: WordCrap. Its not just for dinner.
I recently wrote a couple of entries in a new series that I am affectionately calling, "WordCrap." Nothing revolutionary here; basically just attempts at semi-humorous diatribes on words and phrases that irritate me. An example: I do not care for the word, "cornucopia." Why? Bad experience with a wicker basket? Trouble at the Molalla bingo hall? Dunno - I'll need some self-medicated hypnotherapy to figure that out. But I am sure that there is something funny in a word that has the sounds, Corn, Cop, and U*Pee in it. Or, maybe it truly is, just me.

But here's the point: I keep getting pageviews from people in obscure places that are searching Google for the made-up word, "wordcrap," to the tune of several hundred hits this week. Now even in this blog-induced stooper of self-absorption, I am not so deluded as to think that my witticisms are making me a star in Gaberone. Hell, I don't even translate into English half the time, much less Setswanan (yes, thank you Google - As a product of the Public Schools system, I thought Gaberone was a female Portuguese tennis star). So, to savor the suspense, I am preventing myself from exhaustive searching in favor of asking the brilliant minds of PDX: Why, Portland, Why? Answers? Theories? Quips? Witticisms?

Example 2: Curtains? At this club, that's gonna cost extra.
Getting back to the data, my favorite search term so far? From a place named Leaside in Ontario, Canada (put your hands together for the Leaside Flames! Go Flames!), someone performed a search on Google for "funky curtain valences," and clicked my way. I just Googled it myself, and from this region, MetroKnow is on the second page for funky curtain valences - number 18 in the results. Not bad, considering I never wrote about curtains (mental note...). Of course, it turns out that it is referencing an old entry on my newish Subaru (digression: as I recall, they told me at the Clackamas Express DMV that I had to drive at least one Subaru and own a single-speed commuter bike to qualify to take the written test) where I talk about side-impact curtains, "top-impact valences and sconces," and used the word, "funky," to describe Portland (now that is a word association that hasn't been overused in this noble township).

So, At this point, I don't have a lot of answers on the why's of Google's algorithms generously pointing readers to me, but I must confess I am enjoying the exercise.

For now, until I get an answer from someone that says WordCrap means, "Hey lady! Have you been tested?" in Maltese, I think I'm gonna' be writing just a few more articles in the WordCrap series. And maybe one on the curtains of Portland (hey its my idea pal - back off. And for the love of god, please do not tell Chuck Palahniuk. He could write me back into my little wet paper bag on that idea if he wanted to). In fact, I think I'm going to create a new blog about it, in hopes of furthering my loyal fanbase of 0:00's to Tromelin Island.

After all, who, really, can resist the smell of bacon?