Reinventing Myself?

I do like to be beside the seaside.

My fine yeomen who are not olfactory challenged will be pleased to know that my time of being interesting is drawing to a close. (Note 1) As Yahoo only sewed the “interesting” tag into one pair of underpants, I felt obliged to keep wearing the one pair. It must be said that they are looking a touch grubby and have taken to wandering off in the middle of the night to raid the fridge.

Despite the rather strange atmosphere that surrounds me, I have some how managed to gather a number of new friends while keeping track of most of the old ones. So I am ready to sink back into obscurity and enjoy the statistics. My ramblings have attracted over 5500 visitors with over 23000 page views. Most pleasing and the thing that means the most to me is that I have received over 1000 comments. (Note 2)

Not bad really when you consider that I only started this on May30th. Since that time, I have only been seven days when I haven’t posted an entry. Over that time, I’ve introduced footnotes and clever formatting until you get what you see before you today.

All of this got me to weigh a few things up in my mind. Is all of this fancy formatting what my good yeomen want? Do you really appreciate three or four pictures per post? Do the fancy footnotes (when they work) add anything? Do you even want all of the strange links?

Being a weekend, when Yahoo gets a little slow. (Note 3) It seemed like a good time to consider whether I should re-invent my blog like the British seaside.

I would never have found this series on the BBC website had it not been for blogging. I found the link to the Whitstable story yesterday because the thumbnail picture was of the head of a fibre glass model of a jolly fisherman. Horrific fibre glass models have been a bit of a theme.

The BBC series on the seaside continued today with a little bit about Scarborough and a rather good ‘In Pictures’ piece on seaside architecture. The whole thing sparks memories of me and my brother as nippers in Brighton. The excitement and noise of the penny arcade. (Note 4) The smell of the beach, which my grandfather insisted, was healthy sea air (Although it smelt a touch agricultural to me). We would spend the day roaming up and down the front pigging out on Candy Floss and sugar mice before eating Fish and Chips on the pier before heading home. I fear that those days are long gone.

Well maybe, just maybe this reinvention of the British seaside comes not a day too soon. Climate change may well mean that the traditional package holiday will be consigned to history. Oh the irony of it all.

From 14th June, the industry standard Crozzy Standard has been applied to footnotes.

NOTE 1 : This is a bit of an assumption on my part. The thread that secures the “interesting” tag is coming loose – if not rotting as if the very fabric of the underpants themselves. Still, I reckon that this new found fame must have an upside. I reckon that if I dig out an old Plasticraft Modeling set, I could encase them in acrylic and get a fortune for them on eBay. (After all that I cannot find any links to Plasticraft. Can any of my fine yeomen help out? Can any remember Plasticraft?) Click to return

As a footnote to a footnote, I was doing some chores in the roof space today. As I was digging out some old boxes, I came across an old Plasticraft set vintage circa 1972. It was toy of the year you know. That still doesn’t mean I found any links.

NOTE 2 : It is testament to the friends system on Yahoo that my other blog on Blogger has yet to reach 100 hits. I think this is the bit where I’m supposed to launch into a long list of thank-yous, force out a few tears and be manhandled off the stage by burly security guards. Click to return

NOTE 3: My theory being that most people on Yahoo 360 are blogging to take their mind away from life on the corporate rollercoaster. At weekends we all should have a life to return to and can find something better to do. At some stage, Yahoo will offer to close down 360 in return for half a million dollars and the key to the executive restrooms. Click to return

NOTE 4: My gran used to dig into the pocket of her coat (No matter how hot it was, Gran always wore a coat) and bring out a two evenly matched piles of coppers – the old big mucky pennies. Mt brother and I would rush off to the penny falls machines and try to time out pennies so they set all the other pennies tumbling into the chute and into our hands. If we had a good day, our hands would be stained green by the time we were dragged out of the arcade. Click to return

TECHNORATI TAGS : Trivia ; News ; blogging ; life ; BBC; Comedy ; red1hols.