If ignorance is bliss

I should have been ecstatic about my blog stats yesterday, but I wasn’t:

At about noon yesterday, I looked at my stats for this blog and saw more hits on my blog than I’d ever had before from two countries, Russia and Portugal. Russia and Portugal were semi-frequent (in the case of Russia) or frequent (in the case of Portugal) visitors to the blog.

So, what’s the problem here? Webcrawlers. Bots. Robots. Spiders. Slimy bastards. Computer programs that investigate a blog to mine information, whether it be an email to send spam mail to (No, I don’t want to be a REAL man!) or who knows what purpose! If you look below at the circled diagram, you’ll note that the action started close to noon and peaked at noon, which is more activity than I get when I publish (see the spike at the far left).

Russia, according to my friend Dann (hi, Dann!) is a hotbed of bot activity, whether to feed addresses to a spambot, influence US politics, or look for coded messages. I hope to heck Russia’s looking for coded messages, so at least I can get a good short story about mistaken identity out of it. I had always imagined Russia to be an adolescent female who wanted a writing career. I’m disappointed to find out she’s not.

The US is probably not using a bot — I actually do have at least 16 friends who read this blog. But I don’t know most of them.

Where this really disillusions me is Portugal. I know nobody in Portugal, so that was my favorite mystery. I imagined Portugal to be a Secret Admirer, which is really a silly thing for a fifty-something woman to fantasize about, isn’t it? A younger fellow who’s too shy to actually give you meaningful information but courts your curiosity, and elicits laughter but no jealousy from your significant other? Women my age are more likely to get “Hi, surrogate mommy!” which is not flattering at all.

So I have lost a little spring in my step with the loss of my Secret Admirer fantasy. It’s okay — as I told Dann, I prefer the truth always.

But the fantasy makes for better stories.

First Snow — postscript

We received four inches of snow here in Maryville, Missouri to give us a white Christmas. Because it didn’t fall until after 10 PM, we could not celebrate First Snow last night, and so we celebrated it this afternoon with a big festive bowl of snow in the living room and a small mug of mighty Irish coffee to share.

It was Richard’s first First Snow, and as he’s the first one I’ve initiated into the mysteries of First Snow in over 20 years, it was fun to hear his toasts. His toasts addressed very concrete realities of our political and social environment, which is not surprising, given his Master’s degree in History. My toasts addressed more creative/mystical/connectedness themes (those of you who have ever known me, your ears should be burning!)

While Richard poured the last sip of the Irish coffee out into the snow, I followed him out with a snowball in my hands and pelted him with it. I guess we have a new part to the tradition 🙂

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Merry Christmas, Joyous Yule, Happy Hanukkah (late, right?), Happy Kwanzaa, Happy Birthday to all you Christmas babies. Can you say “Happy Festivus”, or is that a contradiction of terms? Happy Holidays to all.

As always, I invite you to write back. If you want to do so by Twitter, I’m lleachie on Twitter. I’m also lleachie on Instagram.

Let there be peace on Earth.

For the love of a mystery

I confess: I love a small mystery. I don’t just mean big mysteries of murder and espionage, although I adore Agatha Christie. I mean an answer that begs to be revealed, a message that needs to be decoded, a package without a sender (and without wires, grease marks, or the smell of explosives), an anonymous letter with only a line of poetry.

I find mysteries tantalizingly frustrating. Frustrating because the mystery turns over and over in my mind, like a beautiful wooden box with no entry. I fumble at the box, trying to find the twist or turn or shake that will get me access to the box because I desperately want to know what’s inside. Tantalizing because the mystery is by definition a message, and the message by definition is a mystery.

I find mysteries romantic. By romantic, I do not mean “only permitted from a significant other or, if single, a potential suitor”. I mean that mysteries carry a whole story — why is the information concealed, kept secret, or denied? What is the importance of the information? What are the consequences of the information being concealed — or revealed?

I have been the recipient and the perpetrator of many mysteries. My aunt sent inspirational poetry to me anonymously when I was ten, and trying to solve the mystery of who the sender was got me through a very difficult period in my life. I once sent a line of my poetry to a guy I’d met in high school, and when we started dating, I discovered he’d put it on his wall, not even knowing it was me (and I proved myself a goddess when I claimed it). An old college friend anonymously sent me a CD for a 20-year reunion concert of my favorite local band — or at least I think it was him.

I find myself putting small mysteries into many of my novels. The protagonist asks, “Who sent me this message?” or “Why do I recognize this?” or “Why did this person say that?” or “What does this dream mean?”

My wish list for secrets:

No nastygrams — if you want to be nasty or mean, say it to my face

No postal bombs or anthrax

No pictures of your junk

Yes to subtlety

Yes to difficulty in solving

Yes to something you’d like to share

Coffee is always good

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Now at 32,000 words. Today’s writing included a dream sequence, calligraphy in a foreign language, and doubts about a character’s “insanity”.

Love you all. Talk later!