Happy Birthday, City Dangers!

Andrew and I started this blog a year plus one week ago and amazingly we've coughed up 30 posts. Granted, they aren't smoothly distributed through 12 months, but I'm impressed our pedestrian lifestyles are still producing enough nonsense for entries. We're only medium boring. Yea! [I'm dragging you down with me, bro!]

That's very generous of you, Amy, but really, I think I'm a little bit more than medium boring. My best idea for a blog post in the five months (which, mercifully, has gone unwritten) was to recount my first tick bite. Also, there was the time I cheated on City Dangers for a little while with a lazy blog photo blog, which I created because I thought I had some interesting camera phone pictures.  Let's reflect on that: "interesting camera phone pictures".  

A few things that blogging has taught us: 

Amy: People frickin' love the movie Willow. According to the stats, the number one keyword search leading people to City Dangers is "willow movie". Our random review of that film is the most looked at entry on the site by 115% over the second most viewed entry, the latter being courtesy of a guest blogger. So...basically people are ending up here by accident and/or not to read what either of us wrote. Success! Willow movie. Willow movie. Willow movie.

First of all, let's get one thing straight.
Pageviews are cheap. I make too much
money to ever count pageviews.
Let's get that straight. Okay? 

Andrew: Google Analytics is cocaine. New pieces of information stimulate brain function in exciting and unpredictable ways, and distract us from the crushing melancholy of routine. Like drugs! If cocaine came with adjustable charts and interactive maps, it would be called "Google Analytics". What can I say? I thought it would be fun to see who was reading the blog and then I never stopped looking. (Amy: Yeah, like that time you told me, "This person in Kentucky just LOVES our blog!" And then I realized my office computer defaults were set to La Grange, Kentucky.) ((Andrew: You must have been looking at the blog A LOT from work, as I am now.))

Amy: Blogging is hard! In the scheme of hard professions (think police, soldier, ER surgeon), blogging is a lightweight. Yet, I have no idea how professional bloggers keep up reader interest on a daily basis. Maybe you start a blog because you have a really good story idea and think, "Oh man, people will love this! I'm starting a site about this theme (cough, urban dangers, cough)!" Yeah, well, can you also think of 100 other stories on that topic that people might care to read? Is your life actually interesting? Because otherwise your blog is probably going to flame out. This very site proves that it's easy to set up a blog; anyone can do it! But can you do it routinely and well? Outlook cloudy. 

Goals for year two: 

Andrew: Writing this post has reminded me of a bunch of ideas I wanted to write about. Here's to me actually writing them in enough time for me to reflect on them for City Dangers' second birthday. 

Amy: Same. I think the key is just to keep writing, even if it isn't your best stuff, otherwise you get rusty too quickly. I'd also like to capitalize on people landing here accidentally, so I think we need to do more pieces on Harry Potter, Twilight, Justin Bieber, and Kate Middleton. (Andrew: PIPPA AND HARRY? BELLA AND DANIEL RADCLIFFE DIVORCING PARIS KARDASHIAN AND JUSTIN BIEBER'S BOX OFFICE SMASH? IS JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE THE NEW MARK WAHLBERG? BRANGELINA?)

That said, this post coming soon:
What shows are Amy & Andrew watching now? Hint, at least one involves vampires! Ha, and at least two involve Merlin!