Getting the HITS UP

Okay, I'm sick again. 

You'd think I work in a hospital or something. 

Let's see, there was that really bad cold in October, stomach flu a few weeks ago, and now, a chest cold for my birthday. (Glad that flu shot was so effective.)

Honestly, I don't lick the banisters in the hospital's stairwells. The truth is, it's a family thing and probably a daycare thing. My family kept calling every day to see if I had "gotten it yet."  A few days ago, I'm sure I heard my brain slam shut and yell, "Okay, hit me."  Probably some childhood, Catholic guilt phenomena. (They're sick. You need to fit in...)

So, my ribs, my throat, my head and my... well, you get the point, I ache. And tonight I'm supposed to deliver the speech posted in my previous blog to 230+ people who were kind enough to show up for our 100th anniversary dinner.  It certainly is my plan to consume enough Robitussin to at least temporarily subdue the cough, but I'm not sure about being coherent for much else.

Anyway, early this morning I was out in the blogosphere checking out other blogs.  It was 3:30 AM and the fever and cough had me delirious. There were blogs with dozens of comments from readers regarding the ludicrousness of cell phones on one's belt and another one about hating to see naked guys in locker rooms...count me in on that blog. 

It struck me that, not unlike music, the better the quality of the material, the smaller the audience. You know, Classical music as compared to DJ Whookid or Cowpie Madness. It's that Britney Spears versus Diana Krall thing.

Well, I got especially concerned because the naked guys and cell phones had dozens of comments from readers. The WindberBlog, on the other hand, with hundreds of gems of wisdom, has only been read 15,000 times in the past 10 months. There are over 6 billion people in the world and there have only been 15,000 hits on our blog, most of which may well have been from me, the guy who maintains it, and the two employees who are most concerned about my latest rantings. 

What's wrong with 15,000 hits?  Well, we posted a scientific meeting on a website a few years ago and had 80,000 hits in one month. Hence, my feeling of uneasiness regarding our current statistics.  Could there actually be 80,000 scientists in the world interested in Windber?  Well, maybe.  On the other hand, we may have used a certain word or phrase that jump started the search engines.

Consequently, I've decided to spice things up a little. So, here goes: 

We don't have the antidote for bird flu yet at Windber Medical Center.

It's clear to me that if any type of major disaster hits our country, Homeland Security would take days trying to figure out what color the alert should have been. 

Our drum circles are really a big hit.

The 20th March baby was born the other day.

Miss America visited us a few years ago to speak about breast cancer prevention. 

There. 

That combination of words should get us at least a thousand more hits: bird flu, homeland security, Britney, Diana, drums, babies, Miss America and breast cancer.  Ladies and gentlemen, start your (search) ENGINES!

I'll keep you posted. 

Meanwhile, you can excuse this blog because I've been coughing all night and most likely am completely delusional by now. 

Comments

[asia]

People are less moral than 30 years ago

[Jan Jennings]

Nick:

You inspired me to put up a Blog: JanJennings.blogspot.com. We met with Elliance.com yesterday, our webmaster, and they said that the Google crawlers and spiders enrich content climbing on the search engine the more people you have that link to your Blog and the more people you link to other people's Blog. So, I would like to have your permission to add a link to "Nick's Blog". Is it possible for you to do the same? I did not see a link's point to blogs on your site . . . but there may well be one???

Please advise,

Jan

[Beverly Bowman]

Hi Nick, This is for you--if you should get it.
I'm new & mostly lost in this computer world but I have really enjoyed reading your "blogs"(another new word) Keep up the good work.

Cousin, Beverly

[Anonymous]

Nick, if (heaven forbid) a bird flu pandemic does break out, will the Homeland Security threat level be raised first to Ernie, or does it go straight to Elmo?