Blog Travels

So since I'm new to blogging and such, I have been visiting other blogs to see what's going on out there in bloggoworld. And since I base my own self-worth on how interesting other people find me, I have been commenting on those blogs that I find interesting (ok honestly -- not too many!! So if anyone is looking at my blog right now because they followed the link to my blog after I commented -- consider yourself truly special!), because Nat, who has an inspiringly popular blog, tells me this quid pro quo is one of the best ways to get people to visit your blog and comment on it. So I'm trying. I've run out of money after all this Christmas and post-Christmas shopping, broken up with my boyfriend, and don't really watch television, so I don't have anything else do and I might as well give it a shot.

Right. Now, because I don't really know anyone (other than Nat) who blogs (and yes I do actually know her; she's my best friend, we met in college, yadayada), I thought that I'd use the handydandy little "next blog" button at the top right of *most* blogs. During my travels, I have discovered the following exceptionally annoying things about certain blogs:

1. Not everyone uses the "next blog" button. I mean, WHY NOT?
2. A lot of people have "test" blogs that for some reason they allow to stay live although they NEVER bear any fruit except "test 1" "test 2" and so forth.
3. There are a lot of bloggers who simply post photos of their wedding day, their kids, or their dogs. It's kinda weird, and generally not at all entertaining, educational, or inspirational. As if my blog is any of those things either.
4. WHAT is the deal with the blogs that redirect to some weird search page -- most often preceded by a lighting-quick glimpse of a blog purportedly designed for "apartment rentals" in various cities? These are annoying for two reasons -- a) they suck, and b) I have to hit "back" not once, not twice, but THREE TIMES just to get back to the crappy blog that bored me so much that I had to hit "next blog" in the first place!
5. People that use weird popup thingies before their blogs load, or have a movie or music playing when their blogs load. You can't navigate away from the popup thingies until you've gone through the entire series. And the movies/music is most often nothing I am interested in offending my senses with.

Now, on the positive side (yes I do have one!), I have also discovered these happily interesting things during my blog travels:

1. I learned the history of why Pricans switch their Rs with Ls... goes back to the African influence on the island. I should have copied the URL to the article but of course I didn't think I'd be writing a blog about this at the time.
2. The CUTEST blog EVER is here.
3. Blogging is popular everywhere. For a well-travelled, multi-lingual girl, I was pretty shortsighted about the reach of blogging. There are people from Japan, the Phillipines, Brazil, UK, and all OVER Latin and South America (yes I know Brazil is in SA but it's different cause they speak Portuguese). Anyone reading this post probably already knows this, but I didn't so let's just let me have my moment of wonder. Thank you.

Anyway, I thought it was all kinda cool -- even the annoying stuff was a learning experience (an annoying learning experience, but nevertheless...)