Ten dippy things you may or may not know about my teepee (my personal blog)

Way back in 2005, when I belonged to a message board devoted to comics, sci-fi & other nerdboy interests (to this day I believe that forum was the inspiration behind The Big Bang Theory), I would often share stories about my friends, family & coworkers. 

Then one day, Ross S. (one of the members and someone I considered a friend as we talked outside of the boards) said “Doug you should start a personal blog.” 

I replied “What in the world would I blog about?” 

While I definitely had a bigger audience on that forum than I do here, I’ve very much enjoyed having this corner of the internet to share my life.  (Sometimes I like to imagine someone nice will come along, read some of my nonsense and ask where I’ve been all their life.)  The truth is, I rarely hear from anyone anymore and can’t help but wonder if it’s time I wrapped this blogging thing up.  

Anyway, just for the halibut, I thought I’d share a few dorky tidbits about my so-called teepee.  Here we go:

1.  ApacheDug’s Teepee did not exactly start out as a blog. 

I began ApacheDug’s Teepee in November 2006 on another platform, MSN Spaces.  Here’s how my teepee looked then:

This was before Facebook, and was only meant to be a place to display photos, a list of personal interests, book & movie reviews.  (An MSN version of MySpace… remember that?) 

A couple weeks into it, I thought of my friend Ross’ suggestion and added a “Doug’s Journal” module.   I haven’t shut up since.

Three years later, in the summer of 2009, I began hearing rumors of MSN Space’s demise and decided to migrate my written content to Blogger. 

(Oh and for the record, I’d just gotten those 3 framed art pieces pictured above & was trying to decide which wall to hang them on!)

2.  It was almost titled “ApacheDug’s Wiki”.  When I first set my page up and alerted family & friends to begin visiting regularly or else, my (Native American) friend Todd Tamanend said “Doug!  Apaches didn’t live in teepees, they lived in wikis!  More precisely, wikiups—or wigwams!”   I came close to changing it, until I did a little investigating and learned Apaches settled in wikiups (a more permanent structure) but still used teepees too. 

(Hmm…. I rather like the idea of ApacheDug’s Wiki now.  Maybe I should’ve listened to Todd.)

3.  The title is clickable.   Awhile back, someone said I needed a “Home” button on my blog to return to the main page.  There IS a Home link, in the sidebar on the top right, directly under Pages on the Teepee.

But all you have to do is move your mouse (or finger on a touch-screen) to the title at the top of my blog.  If you’re not on the main page, clicking on the title will always take you there.

4.  I have no control over which posts appear in the “Popular Posts” column on the right side of my blog.  Well, more like next-to-no control.  I can set the number of posts it displays (up to 10).  I can specify it to show visited posts in the last 7 days, 30 days or all-time popular posts.  But I can’t choose what posts appear there.

I wish I could make it display my own favorites… I’ve got some oldies but goodies out there!  (Do people still use that phrase, “oldies but goodies”?  I’m showing my age…) 

5.  My Visitors Map (supplied by MapLoco) is loco, alright.  While it IS good at tracking visits to my blog, I’m never sure where they’re from exactly.  When someone from back home (Waynesburg, PA) comes here, their location is shown as somewhere in Ohio. 

Is Waynesburg too small-fry for you, MapLoco??

6.  My 2 most visited posts (click on either to see what all the fuss is about).  I’m guessing they come up in Google searches because the titles contain people’s names (like Paul Shannon, who was a local celebrity in the 1960s). 

I should add more uncommon names to my post titles.  

 

7.  The only reason I have a ‘Movies in the Teepee’ page is because of my sister Shawn.  She’s always been very appreciative of those mini-reviews, but I think she’s the only person who reads them.

So don’t be surprised if that Movie page disappears in the not-too-distant future…

8.  I’ve published 368 posts to date:  this one is my favorite.   I made myself laugh while typing it (I swear every word is true) but a couple weeks after posting, my cousin Amy in Florida wrote & told me she read it over the phone to her dad (my Uncle Mike) and it made him cry laughing.  

It doesn’t get any better than that!  (Click on the image to visit this post.)

9.  There’s a “hidden page” containing my dad’s (and his brothers) music recordings from the 1960s-1970s.   You can only get to it from this post (by clicking on one of the 45 records).

10.  If you’re reading a post on the same date as the date shown at the top, you’re probably reading a poorer version of the post.   I always proofread my posts several times before I post them online.  (Checking for typos, run-on sentences & the like.) 

But for some reason, any poor writing doesn’t stand out to me until the day AFTER I publish it.  Then I frantically go online and edit half the darn thing!

So if the date at the top of the blog matches the date you’re reading it… trust me, it will be better tomorrow!