500

According to Blogger, this is my 500th blog entry.

That’s a whompin’ load ‘o writing, seems to me. Hard to imagine it, really.

I started this blog using some software that no longer exists and whose name I can no longer recall. Then, I moved it to Rapidweaver, when I re-did my whole website, using the same. But Rapidweaver has mostly crashed and burned on me. And so, a few years back, I switched over to Blogger. It was, frankly, a heck of a lot of work to transfer everything over. But I’m glad to have the archive now.

Facebook definitely cut in to blog readership. Back in “B.F.E” (Before the Facebook Era) I had several entries that got into the multiple-thousands-of-hits.

The most-read entry of all-time was this one, after the Dallas Mavericks heartbreaking loss in the 2006 NBA Playoffs. The pre-Blogger entry was read something like 25,000 times, or something ridiculous like that. Two of the radio shows on The Ticket mentioned it. It was reposted at several nations sports blogs. And it led to the creation of my sport-blog nickname: “The Bitter P1”

If you’d ask to to guess what my most-read blog would be, I never in a million years would have guessed that one. Go figure.

The second most read entry of all time was this one, about my song, “Prairie Chapel Road,” and my trips to Camp Casey in Crawford, Texas. I was fortunate enough to have something like 7,000 people stop by to read my thoughts about the experience. 3,000-plus folks downloaded my song, in those weeks of August, 2005. You can still find it at the link.

Like I said, there’s been a dramatically stark decline in blog readership, since the advent of Facebook. The only other blog to crack 1,000 hits since Facebook was one I wrote just last week, ironically. Every other blog in the list that follows is below 1,000 hits, though many not by much. Here’s the rest of the top reads, in order:

The Martyr of Black Friday

Please Do Not Listen to Pat Robertson

The Word and Our Words

Spiritual Reflections on “Occupy Wall Street”

The Parable of the Talent Explained

Almost all of these are less than a year old. Which seems strange to me…like there was some kind of lull in there. (Maybe people are reading blogs again? Or, perhaps Blogger has a really crappy archive-stats feature?)

Anyway, there you have it. Although it was a TON of work to “port” everything over to Blogger, now and then I gaze jealously over at WordPress blogs and think, “they always have more comments…”

Its that true? (That’s how it seems…)

Anyway, five hundred entries is perhaps also a good time to remind you that the blog has several major categories (and a ton of minor “tags”).

Thanks so much to anybody who ever stops by, even if just once.

Thanks to all who take the time to leae a comment or share on Facebook. I’m always deeply grateful to find that some of these thoughts actually help folks.

The writing almost always helps me. So, I’d probably keep doing that, even if nobody ever read it.

But I’m glad some yall do. Read, that is.

Thanks again….EF

(As always, if you like this post, then “share it” or “like” it on Facebook by clicking the box below, so others can see too…)  

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Eric Folkerth is a minister, musician, author and blogger. He is Senior Pastor of Kessler Park UMC United Methodist Church in Dallas, Texas. Previously, he was pastor at Northaven UMC in Dallas for seventeen years. Eric loves to write on topics of spirituality, social justice, music/art and politics. The entries on this blog reflect that diversity of interests. His passion for social justice goes beyond mere words. He’s been arrested at the White House, defending immigrants and “The Dreamers,” and he’s officiated at same sex weddings in his churches, in defiance of what some believe is Methodist teaching. Eric is an avid blogger and published author, and 2017 recipient of the prestigeous Kuchling Humanitarian Award from Dallas’ Black Tie Dinner. (Human Rights Campaign) Eric has led or co-led hundreds of persons on mission trips around the globe, to places such as Mexico, Haiti, Russia, and Nepal. He has worked with lay persons to build ten homes, and one Community Center, in partnership with Habitat for Humanity of Dallas. He’s a popular preacher, and often tackles challenging issues of social justice in his writings and sermons. His wife, Judge Dennise Garcia, is a State District Judge for Dallas, County. As judge of the 303rd Family District Court, she consistently gets high ratings from area lawyers, and was named “best judge” by The Dallas Observer. First elected in 2004, she was the first Latina ever elected to a county-wide bench in Dallas County, and is currently the longest service district judge in that district. She was re-elected for a fourth term in 2018. They have the world’s best daughter, Maria, and an incredible dog, Daisy. Find links to Eric’s music-related websites, at the top of this site’s navigation menu.

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