A Year Ago Today

Blogging 67 Comments

The sitemeter here at SDA crossed the 1.5 million visit mark on Dec.31, 2005. In the past 365 days, there have been over 2.5 million more.
A big thank you to all who have supported the site with your donations, advertising, links, recommendations, media mentions, endorsements, votes, news tips, inside scoops, and lively commentary.
Thanks especially to the guest bloggers who so generously fill in when I’m on the road – Kathy Shaidle, Stephen Taylor, Steve Janke, Sean McCormick , Candace of Planet X, Paul of Cjunk and Damian Brooks.
On that note – you may have noticed Kevin Jaeger has been posting here on occasion. A pioneer of the Canadian blogosphere, Kevin walked away from Trudeaupia about 18 months ago. While there is no danger of SDA being converted to group blog, I offered a standing invitation to Kevin to post here whenever he gets the itch.
We don’t pretend to be all things to all people here – but it’s good to know the readership continues to grow, and with it, the expansion of ideas and discussion. Sometimes insightful, sometimes silly and sometimes offensive – I remind readers there’s a dead gopher at the top of the page for a reason.
On occasion friends ask me why I leave a comment up, or don’t rebut a post made elsewhere that attacks something I’ve written – the premise being, that I may somehow “suffer” if I don’t. My response to that can best be summed up in this way – “I don’t care. I have no ambitions beyond blogging. I’m not running for anything.“.
In the first incarnation of “small dead animals” (a fringe humour page originally hosted on my Katewerk.com website), a short exerpt from Mark Helprin’s “A Soldier Of The Great War” was featured at the top. In a way, it explains the purpose of SDA even better than the “yelling back at the radio” statement on the sidebar.

[Alessandro and Nicolo have just been spotted by the convoy]
“No matter what they say, don’t answer,” Allesandro told Nicolo under his breath, “and don’t move.”
“Why? What for?” Nicolo protested.
“To enrich their folklore.”
One of the women began to wail. Soon it was a chorus. The truck that had left the line quickly returned, and the farmers drive away, crossing themselves.
“In a thousand years,” Alessandro said, “this incident will be remembered. By then, of course, we will have become angels, devils, or a dragon that breathes fire — but we have given this rock a story that will be passed on.”
“What good is that?”
“It isn’t to our advantage, if that’s what you mean. However, it’s pleasurable to cast a line into the future, no matter how tenuously. You never know, the line may be unbroken all the way to the last judgment…. Nicolo, mischief is important….”

67 Replies to “A Year Ago Today”

  1. Kate:
    Please offer your recommendations on the proper sequence to proceed through Mark Helprin’s corpus.

  3. THANK YOU Kate for providing all of us with this excellent forum. May you have a happy and prosperous New Year. Five million for 2007?

  4. Happy New Year and congratulations, Kate.
    I’m sure most people mean well when they make suggestions, but you’re obviously doing it just right, or at least it seems so to me.

  6. Happy New Year everyone!
    And to really cheese the lefties off, for next year’s Weblog Awards, offer them 4-to-1 on the votes. That’ll really drive them nuts.

  7. Happy New year to all. Congratulations Kate.
    Because I’m a 90’s type of guy (sensitive), I didn’t comment on the SOW discussions on this board. If there was a vote for the top result/action/whatever I would vote for the way the ladies on this blog (and their own blogs) rallied for their beliefs regarding SOW funding.

  8. Kate I love the blog and make it my morning chuckle with coffee.
    I wish you all on here the very BEST of the New Year. Things won’t change world wide but we can hope and that goes for a Harper majority.
    Cheers

  11. Congrats Kate . . all the best from the 40 below Canadian.
    As the year ends and you want to feel good, watch the video link . . . the kid’s dad is part of the Canadian Embassy staff in Washington.
    Make him ambassador I say
    3w.youtube.com/watch?v=uSP2DHYxXIU

  12. C’mon Fred! Are you blind or something? The kid’s a loser – – he’s wearing a Leafs jersey.

  14. Happy New Year, Kate, you’ve overtaken some newspapers and magazines in readership numbers. Now, that’s a thought.
    Happy New Year to everyone.

  15. I’m here in Toronto. Born, raised and making a living – without government help – though largely alienated politically, as one might expect. Thanks to Kate and everybody here, I have a new appreciation for real Canadians and the fact that the common sense, brain-eating virus hasn’t effected us all.
    Here’s a letter that was recently published in the Post, I hope you all get a chuckle, as much as I did:
    “One of Canada’s greatest mysteries is the existence of the Liberal party. Our government is like a tennis match between the Conservatives and the NDP. However, there is an odd, assorted group that runs all over the court, swinging their rackets with great enthusiasm, but with no apparent understanding of the true nature of the game.
    Equally mysterious is the group’s considerable following, which seems to consist of those genuinely confused by political philosophy, those merely impressed by theatrical displays and those simply too nervous to make a real choice at election time.”
    –Iain G Roulds, Spruce Grove, Alta.
    Happy New Year, and may the 2007 be even better, at least in Canada, with a Harper majority.

  16. Kate, I DON’T CARE. You live in farming country, Bull Shit. You don’t put in the effort and the time that you do and not care. Consider that SAME, I DON’T CARE attitude, and put it into another useful endeavor, politics. A very large dose of reality is needed and I think you could supply a good deal of that commodity.
    Have a good New Year and thank you for the opportunity to vent my frustrations.

  17. All the best for 2007 to you, and your many posters and readers, Kate.
    Thanks to all, for the stimulating discussions.

  19. Hi Kate,
    Congrats…as a long time reader of SDA I must say way to go…2.5 million in 2006!
    HAppy New Year.
    K

  20. Happy New Year Kate and friends here. I’m okay with you not entering politics Kate…this blog is serving a real purpose…please keep it up!

  22. To the person who said 5,000,000 in 2007, there is a very good chance she’ll be hitting 7 million by this time next year.
    Continued success to everyone!

  23. Good evening ladies & gentlemen, it’s Vitruvius here. Well, it’s another new year’s eve, on which I wish you all a happy new year: may it bring good to you & yours.
    As we look forward to another great year in the slow but slow increase in the quality of human civilization, I would like to invite all my interlocutors to view this classic parody of our exercise:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xpNj9nhoH4
    And thus we return to our debate on the value of “good”.
    Happy new year, everyone, and as always, thanks, Kate.

  26. The authentic SDA experience is reading a particularly egregious piece by Jim Travers or any other statist mouthpiece in the MSM, bookmarking it for a future thread, and having our gracious host Kate dissect it before one gets home from work. SDA is not a blog site, baby; it’s a KILLER app; thank you, Kate, for doing your thing and letting us all comment here.

  27. Kate, your blog amuses, educates and sometimes aggravates, but it is never, ever boring.
    Since I discovered your blog during the Gomery (Inquisition) Inquiry, I have learned so much – about this great country, the people in it, and some of the idiots we’ve allowed to run it. My life is much better for it.
    Thanks for allowing me to participate, as both a commenter and the occasional guest blogger, both are a privilege.

  29. Happy New Year Kate. Keep up the good work. I look forward to many insightful posts in the years to come.

  31. Er, thanks for the link and HNY to you as well. Just one thing worth mentioning — it’s urbanrefugee.ca, not urbanrefugee.com. Not a big deal as I took a month off from blogging, anyhow, so there’s not much to read at the moment.

  32. Way to go Kate. I know you hate my guts and that we violently disagree with each other about 99.9% of the time I do like your blog. Carry on sister.

  36. Kate – you are a breath of fresh air in this “socialst” country. If you ever feel that you are not making a difference, just look at how often you are called names and your posts disputed on the Leftie blogs. You have given us a forum to learn and to vent. Thanks and keep up the good work!!
    Kate for Blogger of the Year 2007!!!!

  37. Happy New year Kate. I very much appreciate the offer to guest blog and I resolve to make the occasional contribution here this year – hopefully with a special effort on those days you’re travelling.

  38. happy new year to everyone and I see another huge increase in the number of visits to SDA in the next year, hopefully as a result of an increase in the number of (so-called) MSM outlets that go belly up.

  39. Kate, your sitemeter stats are quite humbling to relative newbies such as myself. You are a great inspiration to me. I appreciate the time you took to give me a few tips about dealing with trolls.
    This is what I have to remember: “I don’t care. I have no ambitions beyond blogging. I’m not running for anything.”.
    Thank you Kate. Congratulations on a superb year. We all wish you many, many more in the blogging world!

  40. Kate,
    2.5M hits last year! And you won top Canadian blog by getting 3,255 votes out of a grand total of 6,048 cast! Does that tell you something about the impact of the blogosphere?
    Vitruvius,
    thank you for the priceless link. You could have added Nietzsche’s equalizer: “That we, all of us, take ourselves seriously, is not merely ridiculous.”

  43. I don’t know what I can add besides HAPPY NEW YEAR!
    I love your site, it is a breath of fresh air. To Kate and all the blogers all the best in 2007!

  44. Happy New Year Kate. Thanks for the forum. The aim of state terrorism be it Fascist, Communist, Liberal or whatever has always been to isolate and paralyze its own citizens making them more compliant sheep as a result. SDA provides a much needed forum to break the terrorizing power of the MSM and statist institutions aiming to cow the Canadian citizenry into silence and obedience. You give us the confidence to shout back and question. Keep up the good work.
    (And, gulp, gag, . . . well said Jose!)

  45. Happy New Year!!!
    Hey, maybe this is the year your offered 100,000,000 for your blog. (O:}

  46. Big Jack – I don’t know that I have an answer for that. There are several books of short stories – that may be a place to start. I might do it this way though, when it comes to the novels; read “Memoir From Antproof Case” first – it’s the lightest, and most disarming. Then, “Winter’s Tale” – his first best seller, it’s a fantastic, romantic read. Leave “Soldier Of The Great War” for last. It’s easily the best, and I’ve found that reading the others afterwards, they don’t quite measure up.
    The latest, “Freddie and Frederika” has its moments, and as all Helprin’s novels do, gets better the further you get into it. It’s politically autobiographical, which is intersting those who’ve followed Republican politics.
    Something I can’t urge strongly enough – stick with them, as Helprin novels tend to start out slowly, and make you commit to them before hitting you in the gut. Or ripping your heart out.
    His writing style is demanding, though. Beyond descriptive, and meticulously detailed. You can’t read Helprin with a tv talking in the background.

  47. Happy new year, and thanks, to Kate, for this blog. And please, don’t go into politics.
    Your blog has more influence and more power than any politician can have. Politicians are constrained by having to remember the electoral power of the great mentally-unwashed middle. Your blog has no such constraints and can explore and tell the truth – the real truth.
    Can you imagine – a public site that tells the truth; that has, time and again, forced the political MSM to recant their propaganda; a public site that argues, debates, explores and educates us all. No political role has such force. Stay just the way you are, and thanks for being that way.

  48. “Bloggers will continue to believe they are supplanting the mainstream media, when – in fact – the data will show that the growth and influence of blogs is waning;” .. Warren Kinsella, one of his “predictions” for 2007.
    I guess WK does not know what a ‘site meter’ is.
    And he never heard of CTV, CBC and others changing corrupt headlines after sda took them to task.
    And forgot the Christina Lawand/CBC fiasco.
    And doesn’t realize that the reasons WK won’t “work” for the Liberal Party of Canada anymore are some of the same reasons that Kate keeps pointing out. Corruption, Media bias, Old Power Corp players, Adscam mentality, no morals.
    It is evidence of being a small, small man when he will not give credit to a women who is constantly proving her superiority over him.

  49. maybe off topic
    ;-)Just came across of “Great Dismantler’ puts ideology into action” by dimitry – nice Canadian name – must be “first nation” guy/gay. I can only ask – do you love Canada Dimitry? or you work for putin?

  50. “The aim of state terrorism be it Fascist, Communist, Liberal or whatever has always been to isolate and paralyze its own citizens making them more compliant sheep as a result.”
    a little mental exercise: replace “fascist, Communist, Liberal or whatever” with ”conservative, liberal or whatever” and “state” and ”statist” with ”corporate”. What do you get? The ideology of sda.

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