An apology to people who found me through a Google search

I love WordPress. This isn’t a desperate attempt to get featured on Freshly Pressed (though seriously you guys, I’ll bribe whoever to get on that page, and I’m barely joking).

…now that I’ve squashed any chance I ever had to get Freshly Pressed by typing that sentence (though seriously you guys, I’ll delete the bit where I said that and will pretend it never happened, because really I was just joking) let’s get to my point.

I love that they use CamelCase in their title. I love how easy it was to set up my blog and faff with the layout settings. And I love, love, love the Stats page.

Automated graphs! Little tables! Even a map! I can see that I’ve had visitors from Bolivia, and Switzerland, and Canada, and Poland, and Japan, and everywhere!

Well, not EVERYWHERE. Come on, Russia. Pick it up. I like vodka. Be on my team.

I try not to get obsessive with it but I won’t lie, I check it a few times a day. Click click click, wondering who these new friends are that popping in to visit. Sometimes I come up with life stories for them in my head. Because I don’t know squat about geography, it ends up being like “Ok, a visitor from Nepal. Lovely! His name is probably… Derek. He lives in an… igloo. He has four… wives. He found my blog because he was searching for… ham?”

Speaking of, do I mention ham enough on this blog? I don’t think it is discussed enough, considering the frequency in my own personal-real-life that I talk about ham. Ham ham ham. Delicious! I put mine on toast then put eggs on top. My goodness it is amazing. I also like a good ham sandwich. Ham and cheese, bit of butter? Can’t be beat. And ham at Christmastime? Screw the presents, I look forward to the sweet holy merciful God of Ham.

(There you go Derek. That should help you out next time you’re searching for ham opinions while your wives tidy the igloo).

We have barely scratched the surface on how much I love ham.

There’s also a feature that tells you what people have typed into a search engine to find your blog. This is the section of the stats page that that brings me the most delight and also the most guilt.

Two people searched for parakeets and ended up here, probably not looking for a story of me chasing a budgie down the road. Four people wanted to find information on Lana from Shortland Street, probably not angling for information about my friend flashing me her knickers. A surprisingly high number of people don’t seem to love morning television as much as I do, as my post about the gym has had visitors looking for various incantations on “hate Petra Bagust”.

Last week someone ended up here by searching “signs you didn’t get the internship”, and yesterday someone found me by searching “forcing raw egg into her mouth”. I feel like of all of my referrals, these two people would have felt the most bereft upon their arrival here. Derek in Nepal has his wives to keep him company as he clicks through page after page for my thoughts on pork. But what of that poor graduate, waiting to hear about her job application? And the serial killer who has very specific and particular egg fantasies?

To them: I am sorry that I didn’t provide you with what you wanted. And to make up for it:

You can stand under my salmonella, ella, hey hey.

…and I’m sorry, sweetpea, but if you still haven’t heard about the job, you probably didn’t get it.