Friday, June 25, 2010

the least you can do is take a look at the incredibly detailed chart i made

Tonight I spent the better part of two hours lurking random blogs and scoffing at other people’s interests and mocking photos of their not-very-cute children.  Of course, in all fairness, you’ve seen what my standard is and it’s pretty hard to top the two cute fruits of my own luscious loins.

And in order to avoid being sucked into the black hole of the blogging world, I made a few rules for myself before navigating away from my very own blog (which is rather good-you should try it).

1. No clicking on blogroll links from these random blogs.  No matter how tempting.

2. Coming to a blog with no nav bar at the top… go back to own blog and start again with the >>next blog>> clicking.

3. Avoid checking own blogroll for updates at every “start-over” point.

4. Do all this in the nude, in bed, with Yankee candle on the side table wafting Fresh Linen Breeze into nostrils.

Now. I don’t know if I’ve just never noticed the >>next blog>> button at the top of my page, or if I’m too self-centered to click away from my own blog at any given moment, but I have never clicked it.  Never.  Cross my heart.  And tonight I found that really, it’s just worthless, so I haven’t been missing much.  It takes at least fifty-something clicks to get somewhere interesting.

Yes.  I clicked on it more than fifty times.  And after my findings at randomly selected blogs one through four, I opened a notepad to keep track of the stats since I couldn’t believe what was happening.

Jesus has infiltrated the blogosphere.  I have to admit, I rarely travel outside my safe little circle of selected reading materials on the interweb.  I’ve been forcing myself to open up and see what other people are reading and then what those other people are reading lately and I’ve really come across a whole shit ton of new stuff I’m following now, but without time to really follow.  Say la vee. C’est. Whatever. La. Vie? Who cares.  Long story longer- Jesus is what people are blogging about.  Not the people I read.  The people I read blog about fascinating shit like gallstones, vajayjays, balls, beavers, and beaches.

  Clicks one through four had bible quotes either in the Title, sub-heading, or About Me section.  Or all of the above.  Four clicks and I already knew I was onto something. Actually, I might’ve said {holy mother of jesus that’s a lot of jesus blogs} out loud. 

aside:

I don’t mind Jesus.  Nor do I mind people who like him and love him and pray to/for/at him.  I’m not a religious person, so if my lack of knowledge about bible and jesus puts you off- just chalk it up to my idiocy and point me to my flaming wheel. Also, I’m pretty sure the j in jesus and b in bible are supposed to be capitalized, but I barely do it when the grammar lady tells me, so just deal.

Back to science.  Because this is essentially an experiment (however podunk it seems).  Let’s go back to the scientific method.

  • Ask a Question: what do random bloggers blog about?
  • Do Background Research: i have millions of clicks worth of this “background research”. as do you, i’m sure.
  • Construct a Hypothesis: i hypothesize that when I click on next blog it will be about jesus, dogs, knitting, or large clans of blonde children
  • Test Your Hypothesis by Doing an Experiment: see results below
  • Analyze Your Data and Draw a Conclusion: spoiler alert-> wayy more jesus than children and dogs (combined)
  • Communicate Your Results: you’re looking at it

Now I remember a little about science class and this whole process because my science teachers were all a little kooky and because I just googled the shit out of the scientific method…so I know I needed some sort of variable just to make the whole thing “fair”.  I opened a new window and started a whole other random blog search starting from my own page again.  Jesus ruled in all windows and tabs.

Now for something I call:

The Completely Official and Scientific Data I Collected Scientifically In My Birthday Suit…Scientific

(the more you say scientific, the more scientific a thing becomes)

click topic(s) my thoughts*
1-4 jesus hmm.
4-10 jesus very interesting (doing thinky face and tapping on chin)
11 super-blonde family of six children of the corn
12-22 jesus yawn
23-26 knitting/sewing something new!
27-31 jesus ugh.
32 orthodontics/jaw surgery “adventures in” really?
33-38 jesus oof.
39 chickens WTF
40-46 jesus zzzzz
47 pro-life “jesus”
48 dogs meh
49-50 jesus must quit now
     

* I know my opinions are not a valid part of the research, but it’s my data and my blog, so suckit.

 

So what’s next? A pie chart!

superscientificchart 

And, no, you don’t get a legend or a key because it took me an hour to make the pie chart and I’m already tired of talking about jesus blogs.  So…Green is for jesus.

yay.

 

::::Please give me a moment to analyze the data:::

  My conclusion is that many people blog about dogs, jaw surgery, knitting and their chickens/children, but not nearly as many as those who blog about jesus.  

From every decent experiment, things are learned.  Like “a lot of people write for jesus” or “chickens are not nearly as interesting to people that don’t have chickens” or “your own backyard is the safest place to look for blogs”.  Tonight I will say a bloggy prayer and thank the Blog-gods that I have quite the collection of stuff to read on the interweb and am not desperate enough to go on random searches for stuff to read. Again. Unless it’s for science.

 

 

 

If you’ve made it this far, you deserve a special badge.  I can’t help you with that because just look at my pie chart… you’re better than that. Know in your hearts, though that I cherish you and your um… perseverance.

12 comments:

hanevehul said...

This made me laugh. Your conclusions are so true! Whenever I find myself clicking the "next blog" button the blog is always either in a different language, or about the person's faith.

What can you do. ;)

Megameghan said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Megameghan said...

Hey Steph. When you are done making pie charts and blogging about blogging, there is a real life friend a mile away from you on 1st street every Sunday, waiting for you to come visit her.

Or you could just visit me here if it's easier for you...

http://fakebarsanford.blogspot.com/2010/06/come-have-seat.html

MaryAnne said...

wow, I never noticed that "next blog" thing. Fascinating research, loved the chickens/children grouping =)

Stephanie Meade Gresham said...

@ Hanna: And like I said, I have noooo qualms with these Jesus bloggers. I was just so astonished at the ratio of Jesus bloggers to not-Jesus bloggers. Blew my mind!

@ Meghan: Sorry, friend. It's hard for me to get away on a Sunday evening. Or any evening for that matter. Jed usually leaves before the crack of dawn for his jet-setting adventures in Software Sales on Monday mornings. *sigh.
If you're ever alive during the daytime...

@ Maryann: I think children and animals were the second largest grouping. I clicked that button probably a hundred times, but just couldn't fit all of the info into my super detailed graph and pie chart...

Sarah said...

So funny! You crack me up. I've only clicked the "next blog" a few times and more often than not, I am on a blog of a different language and can't figure out what it is saying!

Thanks for the scientific research :)

Octohawk said...

Every time I do it, I get like 50 blogs in a foreign language before getting to one about el jesus. And that's my scientific (to the nth power) research.

Molly said...

Amen!

(thanks for the link love)

Megameghan said...

It's hard for you to get away for an hour to drive literally two blocks from your house eh? Ok. Fair enough.

JG said...

Wow. What a timely post. I bought a book to read traveling this week called "The God Delusion".

erin said...

The sad thing is I'm tempted to just randomly click through blogs right now rather than make my children breakfast. Why!?!?!!!

J said...

I blog about Jesus, chickens, AND children (not blond ones usually). So if anyone only has a few minutes to get a glimpse of what's going on in the blogosphere, head on over! Love the pie chart!