This Blog’s First Birthday

Today is my blog’s first birthday. A year exactly has elapsed since I started this new experience. I am awful at celebrations, but I’ll say one year has passed quickly enough, though sometimes my blogging hasn’t been the easiest to me because of this language, which is not my own, and because of my topics, complicated at times even to the writer (can you imagine to my average reader).

On the whole though a beautiful experience. I had the great pleasure to write, joke, talk or seriously discuss with people so various, which was one of my aims.

I know that in the post Are we going anywhere? I had promised a thorough evalutation of my first blogging year, but now I don’t feel like it. Is it so important? In any case, and since that post (April 15 2008: 35,000 hits, 47 posts, 395 comments), my blog’s traffic has doubled (September 9 2008: 74,000 hits, 70 posts, 741 comments) despite an access slowdown during July and August 2008.

People have stumbled upon my blog searching for these things (sorted by num. of views):

India, Anna Magnani, jungle, Roman sex, Dionysos, Stonehenge, Bob Dylan, buttocks, Indian people, Roman woman etc. etc.

Other popular search terms have been (unsorted):

old books, trojan horse, res3ia, young Roman boy, espresso, pompei fresco erotic, Roman limes, Prozac, ancient erotic art, Porsche 996 Carrera, Aishwarya Rai, marble Roman ass, love words etc. etc.

Some terms I am not so proud of, not because sex is to me something to be ashamed of, no, not at all. It’s only because it is too easy to get hits through it. My first Sex and the City of Rome post produced wholly more than 9000 hits! I also confess here aloud my vile sin of playing a bit with tags in order to attract readers.

Other terms used in search engines puzzle me instead: I can understand ‘buttock’, but why is ‘jungle’ so popular? Plus I didn’t know that our Roman actress Anna Magnani was so well-liked around the world (admire all her strength, passion and dignity in the picture below).

I dropped the Italian pages, lacking the time and being more intrigued by an international audience. The tone of my writing has at times become serious and complex, I know. Well, I’m sure my flippant side will pop up again, now and then.

A little bit I think I have achieved as regards my research on Roman-ness even though deep inside I feel that I have ‘tasted only the outer crust’ of it. We are going to see.

Charming discoveries have been the Indians, people from North America of Italian origin, one Chinese woman, Americans and Britons living in Italy and in Europe and other people I cannot list here.

I thank whoever has read anything I have written and above all I thank all my dear commentators, with their ideas, jokes, support and warmth.

I finally hope this blog has been useful to someone, even just one single person. It would be the most important thing of all.