The Secrets of a Successful Blog

If you've decided to read my post because you're a.) longing to know the secrets of a successful blog and b.) thinking you'll find them here, then I'm very sorry for you.

Very.

Someone once told me that THE secret to a successful blog is to "post regularly, each day, and at the same time each day." I don't remember who the hell it was-- someone with a successful blog, apparently.

As I'm sure most of you who are by now familiar with my dickhead-may-care attitude, this piece of advice certainly wasn't given in response to my asking this person, "Hey, what are the secrets of a successful blog?" Most of the advice I receive is unsolicited, not to mention unnecessary, and unused.

Truth be told, (that's why you come here, isn't it?), I don't even know what a successful blog is, and, even if I found out, I'm not even sure I'd want one. Is a successful blog defined by the number of hits? The number of visits? The number of times some random person in Perth gets directed here by Googling the phrase, "foaming neck pussy?" Is it defined by the number of readers? The number of followers? The number of comments per post? Per week?

Jesus. It seems like, whatever success is typically defined as, it has an awful lot to do with numbers. Well, I don't do numbers. Just ask every math teacher I've ever had since 2nd grade.

Frankly, I think my blog is successful because I'm writing it, and you're reading it. And, if I haven't thanked you for that in the recent past, thank you. You rock this pissparty. Hard.

Whether or not it's a component of "success" or not, I do try to post at the same time each day. Posting every day isn't a problem for me, since I have obsessive-compulsive tendencies, blogging fits in nicely to the various routines I find so comforting in life. However, it's not always possible for me to blog at the same time every day. Take today, for example. Maybe, for some of you, at 7:31 (EST) you checked out My Masonic Apron and you were like, "What the fuck? Where is this little twattard?" Well, I was at the garage getting the oil changed in my wife's car. This requires much humorous banter with Soly & Jack, the Israeli and Chinese mechanics with whom I would spend every working day of my life if I had any mechanical competence whatsoever. So, that took a while. Then, I had to come home and walk the dog. Then I had to buy my wife an anniversary card (3 YEARS, PEEPS!) and, while I was doing all of these things, I realized:

"Wow. It's a good thing I'm a blogger and not a writer."

Because, really, you can't walk into your editor's office and be like, "Hey, Mr. Jimmerjims, sorry that piece was late-- I was bullshitting with my mechanics and walking my dog and stuff."

You know? You'd get a size 11 Florsheim in your crotch for pulling that kind of shit at work.

And I realized that I really, truly, madly, deeply, obscenely LOVE being a blogger. And it's, of course, you who have made me a blogger. So, I guess, in some weird, syllogistic way, I... love... you?

Whoa.

That's hot.

And maybe that's the secret of being a successful blogger: embracing your readers, and embracing who you are to them-- and who you are to yourself. Fuck what you're not. That's just a head case waiting to happen.

One thing is for sure: there are many rules of the blogging world that I don't follow. New templates. Advertising. Giveaways. Award regulations. Responding diligently to commentatortots. Keeping posts short. Adding music, pics, links, eye candy, suggestive pictures of self draped around telephone poles... um.... cute puppies and shit?

But I'm pretty sure I have a successful blog anyway. And now I (and you!) know the secret.