Happy B-Day to My One-Year-and-a-Bit-Old Blog!

Happy birthday to you,
happy birthday to you,
happy birthday dear… uh… Eastwood-Zhao-Happenings-in-a Nutshell,
happy birthday to you!

My blog is one year old!

Blogging for a whole year has been quite a journey. I’ll let the rest of this post do the rest of the talking:

The Past Year… In a Nutshell!

There are certainly highs and lows of my “blogging career” . When I first started blogging back in March of 2007, I was pumped with blogging-juice and produced some quality content. For a while, I was producing quality content and enjoying it all. I even got some short-lived fame ‘n glory when my blog was listed as a “Hot Community” in MyBlogLog, along with The Thinking Blog (they actually were doing quite well back then… no hard feelings, Ilker ) and ProBlogger. Ahhh… those where the days!

However, things took a turn for the worse as I battled with the tempting forces of evil. My blog dipped big time in quality and creativity starting from April 2007. During that “dark period” , I wrote a whole ton of cheap, low-quality reviews. My readership practically dropped down to zero, and my blog was getting pretty darn close to becoming a “splog”. Though I made a couple hundred dollars, I have to say this: the experience was definitely not worth it!

My love for blogging really started kicking back in starting Jan. 2008. I simply told myself this: write about whatever you feel like writing about. If you don’t feel like writing, take it easy, be kind to yourself. Don’t write for the sake of “ahh I gotta keep the posts coming or else I’ll loose subscribers” (not like I have a lotta subscribers anyway ). So along with my change in attitude came some really good posts. I started writing what I am really passionate about: driving (or, what I call defensive eco-driving — ooo I really want a Prius nowadays), music ( — the effortless mastery of), among others.

Another major change I made was removing all advertisements. It was clogging the blog up — making it look like a chicken market. Besides, I wasn’t any money that’s worth my while anyway. Surprisingly, not too long ago, after I made my changes of removing all the junk from my blog, there were offers that came in requesting text-link placements of $50/month. What did I do? I stayed cool and flatly refused .

• Very first post!
• My short-lived fame ‘n glory
• Post-quality dipping… but winning “evil” prizes
• A new year, a fresh start

107 Published Posts in Total Eh?

Out of the huge pile, I’ve picked out half-a-dozen or so of my favourite/most controversial/most commented posts. Check ‘em out:

Creative Writing

• The Fruit of Organized Sound
• My Canadian Identity
• SWE Write-Up
• Passage from “The Crossing”

Life (Blah blah blah… )

• Back from Italia!
• Photos of Beautiful Vancouver
• Dead… Exhausted… from Vancouver Sun Run
• Growing up… Running for Byng Arts President
• My Ride!
• Does Time Fly… or Waltz Away?

Defensive Eco-Driving (Oh believe me, this section’s good )

• Don’t Be a Jackrabbit!
• Bad Driving & Jackrabbit Encounters
• How to Deal with Tailgaters

While you’re at it, check out my “Top Posts” also. Maybe you noticed that I’ve left all the nasty political stuff out. For a good reason! I’m not exactly into these things nowadays. I prefer more to have a nice walk on the seawall on a beautiful, breezy day, then to point out the wrongs of our world (there’s simply too much to list)

You Are Here Because…

You are here because… I’d like to thank every single one of you for the support — no matter how much, or how little — over the last year. But… hey! I have a PR 4 blog : Spiderman’s uncle Ben once said (if I can remember this correctly), “with great powers come great responsibility” . Where I’m I going with this? The link-lovin’, of course! Listed below are some of my favourite bloggers:

• MartyBLOGs
• Tricia’s Musings
• Jon Phillips @ Freelance Folder
• Billion Dollar Baloney
• jemmille.com
• MYADDIKTIION
• Heike & Jumper @ The Dark Visitor
• Spilling My Own Thunder
• The D Spot
• Hummie’s World
• Holly’s Corner
• Maryannaville
• Cariboo Ponderer
• CellTechHub…
• My Journey To Recovery
• daily blessings
• Goodness Graciousness
• Christy’s Coffee Break
• education & tech
• Art Of ApOgEE
• The Impatient Blogger
• Dagupena Dreamer
• Chino Yray’s Blog
• Reflections of Time
• Unemployed in the City
• Chip’s Quips
• Xtraordinary Living Blog
• Share Market Comments
• Tech Lock-Rahul
• Echoes of Cold Moon
• manilenya
• Sing along
• Inside My Frontal Lobe
• disassociated.com
• Black In Business
• Diary of a Heretic

Do you have any blogging experiences that you’d like to share?