RyeBlog

My old host stunk, so I left them. I’m now on a new host. I decided to upgraded to a new version of Wordpress, and some of my plugins aren’t playing nice. Until I get time to reconfigure my theme, I will use this theme.

I have a little map down in my sidebar that puts red dots for all of my visitors. Sure, my blog has been rather dead recently - but I have a backlock of about five hundred articles that Google seems to love… and as a result I get lots of visitors on a daily basis. (200+ a day is usual)

Google loves me so much that it will send people to me when they search for crap that isn’t even on my blog! (I can’t tell you the last time I posted a PayPal coupon code - but probably twenty people a day come here from Google looking for them… Sorry to let you down folks… Don’t blame me - Blame Google!)

Yes, I have analytics tracking and I have a good idea of how many visitors I get each day… etc. - but ClustrMaps really seems to think I get a ton of visitors:

Here’s a verbatim copy of an email I just got from them:

Dear ClustrMaps user,

Although we do not want to monitor the ClustrMaps service too heavily, we have noticed that the number of visits per day logged on your site http://ryebrye.com/blog/ by our counter recently was 33970, which exceeds the normal daily allowed limit of 2500.

We try to treat the limit in a very lenient fashion, especially given that there can be local peaks or spikes in internet traffic. However, for anyone going over that limit on a fairly consistent basis, we send out this message.

If it helps put things in perspective: I don’t get even get 33970 visitors in a month - let alone a day… I think they are on crack.

If you have always thought “Man, I want a Gmail account, but now that it’s so popular it’s becoming the new hotmail… I really wish I just had the same features as GMail, but with a domain name that was exclusive and elitist…” - you are in luck. If any loyal RyeBlog contributors would like, I can set you up with an email @ryebrye.com - just let me know. I will email you with a temporary password and off you go!

Google finally responded to my request to beta test their new Gmail hosted stuff. Your login will be at Google, but all of your email will be sent and received from the “ryebrye.com” domain. If you already have a Gmail account, it doesn’t matter - you can get a RyeBrye.com account as well.

Note: This offer only applies to people I actually know.

We recently started a new category: Ugly Knitted Thing of the Week.
The Ugly Knitted Thing of the Week will be updated weekly by Nicole Gardner - an avid knitter with an uncanny ability to detect ugly knitted things on the internet. The image that goes along with this post isn’t technically ugly - more cute - but it’s provided to give you an idea of what knitted objects look like.

If you have an idea for a new category you would like to see on RyeBlog, feel free to submit it to me via one of the comments. If I like the idea, I might give you an account and let you have at it.

We have added the Torino Olympics Medal Count (powered by Yahoo) to the sidebar of RyeBlog.

If you don’t want to see the medal count - just don’t expand the menu. (This will allow you to avoid “spoiling it” if you are planning on watching the games and you realize that your favorite country didn’t get any new medals that day so therefore you know that athlete X will not win…)

Another less cool way of viewing the medal count involves Google. Simply searching for “medal count” on Google http://www.google.com/search?q=Medal+count (or anything roughly related to olympic medals will also work) and the current medal count will show up in a little box above the search results.

Update:
You probably want to rely on my medal count - Google doesn’t know how to count, apparently:

I was wondering why nobody was taking use of the “Email this” link on any of my blog entries. (It keeps track of how many emails it sends so I can verify that it hasn’t somehow been hijacked by a spammer). I tested it out and realized it was broken. Woops. I have now fixed it.

The email will send the image and everything to your friend. It uses STMP and originates from “mailbot@ryebrye.com” - but will show up as coming from you in your friend’s email box. In case you are wondering - no - your email address is NOT going to be given out to any spambots or anything. I will certainly charge them for it. (just kidding about selling them, obviously)

I decided to waste spend a lot of time updating the design. My previous theme looked okay, but it had some problems. The guy who designed it kind of hacked it all together, and that made certain plug-ins (like the email one) not work well. I cleaned up the PHP files that make up the theme - and I also added some little “pizzaz” to it.

You may have noticed that the image at the top of the page is changed. Get used to it - it will change a lot. In fact, it will change just about every time you view a page on my blog, because it gets a random image to put up there.

I also added some “expanding” sidebar items, such as “categories” or “related posts” (when you are on an actual post, related posts show up in the sidebar). Click on the little arrow to expand and contract those items.

It’s not likely I will have much spare time to make changes to the blog in the near future, so it will likely stay this way for a while.

Okay, columnist is a strong word - more like “blogger” - but however you want to put it down on your resume is okay with me. Recently, we have been inundated with requests for more good content. It’s impossible for us here at RyeBlog to keep up with these requests unless we increase our staffing. So - that’s where you come in.

To apply, simple leave a comment here with the following:

1. Your column name
2. What you would write about

Oh, and as is the case with any job - I will not give you any hint about what you will be paid until after you pass through a strenuous interview process and I extend you an offer.

You will only be expected to post new things in your column when you feel like it. You will feel like it once a week.

If you have any questions, contact me in the comments here. Thanks.

Every week I’ve got a blog “renting” space on my blog. This weeks tennant is “Haunted House Dressing.” It’s a great blog for the halloween season. Be sure to scroll down my sidebar and click on his image. One of the funnier aspects of his blog is his comic “Recycled” that he runs on the left-hand sidebar of his blog.