We have a winner

10,000 visits!

Claire at A Little Piece of Me wins the 1,000 Entrecredits for sending me a screen print with the Sitemeter showing 10,000 hits. I'm transferring the credits right now.

Thank you Claire.

Here's her screen capture (click to enlarge):



Here's a print screen of my Sitemeter report. Claire's visit is circled. The visit below her was the actual 10,000th visitor -- someone visiting from Lacrosse, Wis.



Thanks to everyone who played along with me. That was fun for a few minutes. (A special thank you to that mystery person who'd been refreshing for the past hour trying to capture the magical number.)

Random ramblings ~ Just because I can

Happy Birthday, Big Sis! I hope you're not working too hard today.

Lots of birthdays happening in this two-week stretch. Brother-in-law, nephew Drake, Marriott, Kyle. We're hosting a 40th-birthday party for Kyle tomorrow night. Tying it in with The Guess Who performing at one of the local summer festivals.

Went to a Jack Johnson concert last weekend at Alpine Valley in Wisconsin. Remember that place? It's where Stevie Ray Vaughan's helicopter crashed back in 1990.

Never going back to Alpine Valley for a concert. Two hour drive, and the most unholy system of getting people out of there. Took over an hour to exit, most of which was spent in total bash-your-head-repeatedly-against-the-dashboard gridlock. Didn't get home until 3 a.m.

The show itself was good, though. I'm not the big Jack Johnson fan in the family, but I enjoyed his performance.

Driving up to Milwaukee Summerfest this afternoon. We have tickets to see Rush tonight. I've lost count of the number of times I've seen Rush over the years. Probably about 10 times since Power Windows came out back in the late '80s. Hmm. I think I have that Power Windows T-shirt still. I might wear it.

There's a comic book convention in town. I passed the Green Lantern on the way to work. Nice costume.

I've been really busy at work this week, wrapping up a test plan. Writing test plans is my least favorite part of my job. Thankfully, that's over now -- until next time.

Had some lumps checked out on both dogs. Since Loki had a mast-cell tumor removed last fall, we've been really careful about having the vet look at anything suspicious. He told us that everything looks benign. Whew.

Ted Nugent and Joan Jett are both playing Naperville Rib Fest next weekend. I think we're in for both of them.

Not doing so well reaching my writing goals. Sunday will be my first opening in the itinierary to sit down at the computer. Pencil me in.

Guitar Hero Aerosmith comes out Sunday. Picking up a copy for myself and as a gift for my nephew. It'll be good to have some new songs to work on. Maybe I'll master the hard difficulty level yet. Really want Rock Band for the Wii, but can't justify the expense right now.

I've been listening to an audio course on the History of the English Language. Really enjoying it. Did you know your body is your bonelocker? And your mind is your wordhoard? To unlock your wordhoard is to speak. There were some fun words in Old English.

So I conducted this poll on preferences in reading. The poll is closed. Not sure what I'm going to do with the results yet.

I've been looking at my site stats again. Surprised at the number of people looking for photos of Lindsay Wagner. People with a lot of celebrity news must get a lot of Google hits. I'm intrigued, through, at the person who was searching "demonstration speech on how to stack a dog". How do you stack a dog? Why would you stack a dog?

Finally got new sofa cushions installed on our sofa. A certain dog managed to vomit on one of the cushions three months ago. It soaked into the core and could not be cleaned. Fortunately, we had bought the upholstery protection, so the cushions were covered. Oh, the joys of dog ownership. :)

And now to totally bring things down...

Good friends (the Hillies) had a fire at their townhouse last night. Their grill started it. Everyone, even the cats, got out OK, but there's lots of damage. Like total loss between the smoke and the water damage. Husband's with them this morning helping where he can. That's all I know for now.

A Beacon Time Capsule - April 20-26

A brief look at where this blog has been:

A year ago, I was blogging about:

That elusive chemistry -- a link to an article about what makes for good chemistry in fictional characters.


Two years ago, I was blogging about:

A forte for comedy? and What's next? -- Where I discover that, in my acting class, some people think I'm funny, then I try to figure out what my next step will be. Spoiler: I haven't yet, two years later, signed up for another acting class.

A place to collaborate and Playing with the PBWiki -- I discover a site called PBWiki and try to use it to collaborate on a writing project. Spoiler: Ultimately, we didn't use the site to its potential.

Romance appreciation -- About my writers group's annual dinner to network with booksellers and librarians.

Contests update and Keeping the Golden Heart in perspective -- Where I talk about some of my results in some romance-writing contests.

I just don't get it -- Musings on my first experiences using MySpace, and why I chose to cancel my account there. Spoiler: I end up opening a new one because I do, ultimately, figure out a use for the site.

Cute overload! -- A link to a site with really cute dog and cat photos.

I'm watching you -- My first reactions to using SiteMeter to track website traffic, and for some reason I try to scare off all my readers with ominous-sounding threats. As a random update: I don't know why, but I stopped getting hits based on the "Next Blog" button on the Blogger NavBar. Anyone else notice that too? Does no one use the "Next Blog" feature anymore or did I somehow blacklist myself?

Mario Kart Racing -- Where I go out and have some fun with my nephews.

Mini fantasies -- Where I contemplate how I can stuff two big Bernese Mountain Dogs into the back of a little, ity-bity car.

Prior to that:
This blog didn't yet exist, and I haven't back-posted anything that qualifies.

Things I've discovered this first week of March

~random ramblings and reflections from the past seven days~

I still have the stamina to pull an all-nighter
I'm not sure that's a good thing. I mean, I wish I was motivated enough to finish the task during normal hours. But if I need to stay up all night to finish something and still function at work the next day, I'm capable. Let's just not make a habit of it, OK?

I'm an old-school emoticon kind of girl
Yeah, I like my emoticons built out of old-fashioned text characters. None of this flashy animation for me. :P

This photo is generating hits
I don't get it. This photo is horrible. It's available light using my camera phone. It's not even flattering. But my SiteMeter says at least three or four people have visited my site in the past week because of this photo. Huh?

My journalism professor was right
Way back in the late '80s, before the Internet age, my favorite journalism professor, Bob Woodward (not *the* Bob Woodward of Watergate fame), liked to tell me that my byline should be "haleyhughes, one word, lowercase." This week, as I was typing my name for the umpteenth time on some web form, I realized that the Internet has proven Professor Woodward right and, indeed, my byline is now "haleyhughes, one word, lowercase." And I like it that way.

I write at a sixth-grade level
A post I read on Bloody Computer! reminded me that Microsoft Word has a feature that allows you to judge the readability of your writing. It's through the spelling/grammar check tool. Anyway, after reading the post, I copied the text from my blog's main page into Word and ran the check. It came back as a sixth-grade readability level, which I think is great, because that means it's easily readable, like they taught me in J-school. I'm not trying to write a dissertation here. An enjoyable reading experience is the goal.

Avon Romance Blog
I've been reading romance novels since I was 13 years old. Some of the first that I read and many of my favorites have been published by Avon Books. So imagine my surprise when the Avon Romance Blog dropped an EntreCard on my site and then requested to place an ad here. OMG, Avon! I have since become a regular reader of the blog. If you like to read romance novels or if you're writing a romance novel and want to learn more about the acquiring editors, go visit this blog.

CoComment
A cool way to keep track of comments you've made on other blogs, and track followup discussions. Unfortunately, a few comments do manage to escape its tracking system, but I'm not sure how. Maybe if there's no RSS feed?

AdSense
I haven't felt the need to place advertising on this blog before, simply because I know the return would be minimal. Plus I'm not blogging for the money, although money is nice. Sometimes, though, my curiosity gets the better of me and I sign up for something just to see it from the inside. So, I signed up for AdSense (see the Google ads in the right column) and I've been discovering the inner workings. I think I've earned all of 1 cent so far. :)

Not everyone has an EntreCard widget yet
Every blog I visit now, I find myself searching for the EntreCard widget so I can drop my card. When I don't find one, I wonder: Why hasn't this person signed up yet? Are they afraid of the extra traffic and exposure? Seriously, follow the EntreCard link, take the tour, create an attractive 125-by-125 pixel calling card for your blog, sign up and see what happens. (I'm talking to you, Don M.F.H. And Wook. And Stanimal.)