Y’all, I’m in a quandary about blogrolls. For you non-bloggers, that’s the list of blog links on the sidebar. Do you click names on a blogroll?

I don’t know about you, but I don’t often peruse someone’s blogroll. Well, OK, I admit it….I look to see if I am on it. How vain is that? But it isn’t often that I click a name on a blogroll to go and visit other bloggers. A blogroll just doesn’t catch my eye. I’m curious to know if other people, or if non-bloggers click on those names.

Well…do you?

I’ve become blind to blogrolls, just as I am blind to advertising. To get my attention, the link has to be something “different.” I will click on a link in a Blogrush box, if the title entices me. I will click on the links in “More from BlogHer” at the bottom of those ads on the sidebar. But, the ordinary blogroll just doesn’t grab me.

I do, however, notice if someone doesn’t have a blogroll. To me that indicates that the person might not be the “generous” sort. That person doesn’t freely give Technorati links. To me, that’s what the blogroll has really come to mean. My blogrolls give links to blogs I read, bloggers who read my words, and folks with content I find interesting. I’m basically handing out Technorati links (for you non-bloggers, those highly coveted links measure our “popularity”).

I look on blogrolls as a “necessary evil.” Not that I think they are evil at all, but they sure are space hogs. I have mine on the sidebar, encased in a blogroll box with a slider. That keeps it from taking up the whole sidebar, but it isn’t easy to read. I have other blogrolls on a separate page.

Now, my sidebars get as cluttered as my feeble mind. Because of all the junk there, the blogroll slides waaay down, and I’m not sure that anyone ever even sees it. Those blogrolls that are on a separate page don’t do much good at all. NO one sees them, and neither do the Technorati spiders. The blogrolls I give on a second page are pretty much worthless for links.

Recently, at Oh My Stinkin Heck, I really noticed her blogroll. She has a wonderful “rotating blogroll” with snapshots of websites. Two pictures show at a time, and each time you refresh the page, two different blogs come up. She explains it in a post called “The Most Perfect Blogroll EVAH!”

Folks, if you show me a “purdy pitcher,” I’ll click on it! I found myself refreshing the page just so I could see who came up next and go visit. I was excited and consumed with “blog lust.” I wanted that blogroll on my sidebar. I wanted to show off my blogroll buddies in a way that would cause people to click on their sites.

The problem was that it requires much more than my meager technological skills, so I started Googling to find out how to do it. I discovered the flip side of the coin, so to speak. At In Case You Were Wondering, Brody talks about those rotating blogrolls in a post called “Rotation,” and there is a spirited discussion in comments. If you are considering a rotating blogroll, go read that post. He makes the point that on a rotating blogroll, the Technorati spiders only count a link to a blog if it is showing on the page when they crawl it. If a blog isn’t showing on the page, it doesn’t get a link.

Hmm. That defeats my purpose.

So, what’s the solution? Do I have a rotating blogroll (to get people to click and visit my friends) above my regular blogroll? Would you even click on a rotating blogroll? Do I just not worry about it? Bloggers, what are your thoughts? What is your answer to this blogroll quandary?

“If you really want something in this life, you have to work for it. Now, quiet, they’re about to announce the lottery numbers! “~Homer Simpson

Y’all, I have a “to do list” that is as long as my arm. Actually, I have more than one. I try hard to get things done. I work for the things I want, but I’m so easily distracted. I sometimes wonder if I really do have A.D.D., because I can never…oh, look! A blue car!

As I was saying, I have trouble staying focused; especially so when all is working well with my computer. For a few days there (when my blog disappeared) I was so totally productive that it was almost scary. I just walked away from the computer for a few days. Now, I’m finding all kinds of distractions again. Some don’t involve the computer, but I’m ashamed to admit most do. Here are thirteen of those for the Thursday Thirteen meme.

1. In looking at my blog statistics today, I noticed that someone came to my blog looking for “nude images of hasselhoff or selleck.” That’s what the search string said. I’m afraid when they got here that they were disappointed. However, the thought of a nekkid Tom Selleck kept me occupied for a few minutes. Ahem. Being curious, I followed the link to the page on AOL where they had entered that search. I clicked on “images,” but I didn’t find any nude pictures. Firefox told me that the word “nude” had been removed because I have “safe search” on. Drat. I don’t know how to take that function off of there, so I was disappointed, too. Don’t tell my husband.

2. My blog was looking very cluttered, so I spent hours removing things from the sidebars. I still have blogrolls, just click on this picture to go to the page.

I just didn’t want my blog to be as junky as my desk. I put a lot of spaces, so that the info stretches down the sidebar. I hope that makes it easier on the eyes.

3. Of course, as soon as I took everything off of the sidebar, I started adding new stuff. I put my “pitcher” on there…see? No, scroll back up to the top. There! I combed my hair just for you, so I hope you are happy. Now you don’t have to talk to the hand.

4. And, I put under it a link to me telling a story. If you have RealPlayer, you can hear it (that link is for a Mac, but you can get it for a pc, too). The story is one that is often requested by folks at festivals who know me. They think it’s funny. I can laugh about it now, but at the time it happened it was tragic. I recorded it for use at The University of North Texas for a storytelling class.

5. I also put a silly quote on the page, and a couple of links to things I like. The plan is that I will frequently update these and change them out so you won’t get bored. We’ll see how that one works, won’t we. I scattered them around on the page so that it could be like an Easter egg hunt for you.

6. You might even find that I’ve got a sidebar link to one of your posts! That’s another thing I’m wanting to do. Just add some posts I like on the sidebar so that my friends can meet each other. I’d rather have your picture on there. Maybe I need y’all to send me a picture that represents you or your blog, so I can rotate those around and give you each an opportunity to shine. There you go, I’m getting distracted just sitting here.

7. In those links, if you will just go and look, you’ll find a story about Share A Square that I thought was pretty cool. Muriel of Crafter by Night, who lives in Austin, TX is putting together one of the afghans. She tells a story that is one of those “it’s a small world” stories, called “Kismet Perhaps.”

8. For any of my Share A Square friends who drop by, you might want to visit Muriel’s “Crafting For Charity” page. She will give you something to keep yourself busy, for sure.

9. I also spent time following another search string to Who Links To Me, which claims to be the ultimate SEO tool. If you are a “stat obsessed” blogger, and haven’t found the site before, you might want to check it out.

10. A better site is “Website Grader.” Seriously! Marcia, at Tumbled Words told me about this many months ago. The first time I entered my web address, I got a grade of 85, “in terms of its marketing effectiveness. The algorithm uses a proprietary blend of over a dozen different variables, including search engine data, website structure, approximate traffic, site performance, and others.” It showed me a few simple changes (it took me less than an hour), and my score was raised to 97. My page rank went from 1 to 5. Not only that, once I did the changes my traffic started to increase! I was lucky to get 350 unique visitors a day back then. Now, I average about 650-750 depending on the day. Might be worth a shot for you.

11. I got lost in StumbleUpon. Don’t follow that link unless you want to waste hours.

12. While I was on StumbleUpon, I came across the Pandora Music Genome Project. It lets you create your own radio station with the music you like! I’m listening to my Blues Mix right now. I created it today while I was stitching together an afghan for Share A Square. Pandora Radio is totally wonderful and FREE! Let’s see if this will take you to my radio station. You can create your own just by putting in the name of a musician or band you like, then giving the thumbs up or thumbs down to the music it plays. Cool!

13. Finally, I learned how to download games on this Mac! Oh, people, that’s bad news! It didn’t come with games on it already, like a pc does, and I was weaning myself. Now, I’ve learned I can download a game, play it on demo until they ask me to pay for it, and then delete it!

Will one of you please save me from myself?

Seems that my blog is playing games with me.

But, I’m not having fun!

Yesterday, Lola contacted me and asked if there was a problem with my blog. She said my blog had disappeared. She’s in Spain, so I thought there was just some “issue” going on with my blog trying to swim across the ocean. I mean, I could still see it and I could still post to it. But, she was right.

This morning, as I sat down at my computer at 4:00 a.m., I couldn’t access my blog! I have three computers sitting at the desk. Granted, the two pcs are just barely working, but my blog was nowhere to be found. Not on any of them! I couldn’t access it through Word Press Administration. Clicking on the link in a comment e-mail didn’t send me there. What was up? I didn’t know!

So, I contacted my server to discover that they had “migrated”(wouldn’t it have been nice if they had told me??). I had to go change the Domain Name Servers, so that my blog would come back on line. It did for the rest of the world, but not for me. I tried unplugging my router and plugging it back in. I turned off the computers and re-booted them. I cleared the caches on every one. Nada. Zip. Zilch.

I was told that it might be 72 hours before I’d be able to access it. I decided to drive to my local coffee house and try to access it from a different ISP. Voila! But, I’m not going to sit here and blog. The smell of coffee is making me drunk. It’s back home for me, and if my computer will now recognize the site I can work some more.

Otherwise, I’m assuming that the Universe has other plans for me. Like resting my back or working on Share A Square or something. Y’all be good, and if you can’t be good—-have fun.