The Poddyland News

Just a quick update for today as I am busy…

The lens rankings took until about 2pm (EST) to update, some surprises as about a dozen of my lenses have had better than normal traffic in the last 2 days, but not all of them went up in rank.  I think traffic outside of Squidoo doesn’t always count as high as traffic from inside.  But over half of my Top 40 lenses went up rather than down at least.

I now have 2 lenses perched to leap into the Top 2,000, and several about to reach the Top 10,000, so things aren’t looking too shabby, definitely better than they were a few days ago.  I think an angel might be responsible for one of the lenses rising, not sure about the rest though.  But blessings are always welcomed here

In the Lounge my thread on the Agonies of waiting for the lensrank to update has taken off today, with lots of silly song lyrics coming in, as well as photos.  So don’t forget to check there in the Chatter Room and come up with some entries yourself.

LENS STATUS
Top 100       0
Top 2,000    9
Top 10,000   5
Lenses 66

I mentioned in my blog yesterday that I am looking to create a lens about what people do while they are waiting for the lensrank to update, since it’s taking longer and longer, and yesterday it was mid-afternoon (in the Eastern USA) when the updates finally occurred.

I initially thought that it would be great if people could send in a candid photo of themselves (or just a funny photo) plus a short caption describing what they did while waiting for the lensrank to update.

A am now going to add a second section to the lens - Song Lyrics!  Rock The Ice said in the forum yesterday that he hoped the rankings didn’t update, because last time it updated late on a Wednesday his rankings plumetted.   That got me humming the song I Don’t Like Mondays by The Boomtown Rats and changing the lyrics to I Don’t Like Wednesdays.   Rock is going to work on some new lyrics to fit his mood.  So please - think about what you do while waiting for the lens rankings to update, come up with a song to go with it, and post the lyrics to ohtheagony@poddys.com

The pictures and song lyrics will be added to the lens for everyone to vote on, and I will add links for each of the lensmasters that contribute back to their profile on Squidoo, so everyone wins - me hopefully for creating a popular fun lens and all the contributors for the additional publicity.

So come on - get creative - take some funny photos - think up some good lyrics - and let’s get this lens rolling…

It looks like only one of my posts from yesterday made it to the front page of Squidtop, Favorite Lensmasters - Debnet.  

I am not sure what happened to the previous one, maybe only your latest post gets added to the front page, but it did contain a few tips for using Squidtop, features of Wordpress that some of you might not be familiar with.   In case you missed it, and I suspect everyone did, Here Is The Link

It took forever for the lens rankings to update today, and during a discussion in the Lensmaster Lounge I had an idea to create a lens about what we do while we are waiting for the lens rankings to update.  It’s not only the change in rank that takes place, it’s the giving of the Green Light to new lenses, so it’s important to us all.   Do we tap our feet, pace up and down, tear our hair out, or what? 

If you would like to contribute to my lens, I need from you a brief description of what you do while waiting for the lens rankings to update, plus a candid photo to go along with it.  The details of how to submit your entry for the lens are in This Thread.

Meantime, the rankings did update finally early this afternoon, and here is my current status.

LENS STATUS
Top 100        0
Top 2,000     9
Top 10,000   4
Lenses         60

Today my Daily Jokes For August lens shot into the Top 2,000, but the Daily Jokes For April dropped 400 places and out of the Top 2,000, so my rankings are even again.

Last night I had hoped to start work on a Halloween lens, but first I wanted to update the Halloween Jokes section of The Poddys Directory, my original web site, that will be 10 years old tomorrow (if you drop in I know it needs a complete rewrite - as soon as I find the right software I will work on it)…   My seasonal humor sections have always done well, the biggest traffic being over Christmas, Easter and Halloween, and I figure that this year has to be one where I try and earn some serious money, so I worked on revamping the pages, all 22 of them plus the index.  Well that took longer than expected, almost to 11pm, by which time it was too late to start on a lens, but at least a lot of the work has now been done.  I am looking forward to creating a great Halloween lens.

My Daily Jokes For August was accepted on the Isle Of Squid yesterday, so that needed to be updated, plus I visited all the people who had left comments for me yesterday (as I usually do), viewed and reviewed some of their lenses, lensrolled etc, all of which takes time.

LENS STATUS
Top     100       0
Top  2,000       9
Top 10,000    16

The biggest mover today is Daily Jokes For August which features  funny baby pictures, which is now close to the Top Tier at 2,577, having had quite a lot of traffic yesterday.

Other than that, most lenses edged down a bit further, except an older lens on the author Zecharia Sitchin which has been gradually working it’s way up in the rankings due to increased traffic on the net about man’s ancient past, Planet X, Nibiru, and Doomsday theories etc.  If you haven’t heard of Zecharia Sitchin or read any articles about really ancient history, the recent archaeological finds and documentaries on this subject make his books a very informative read.  You just might be astounded and amazed, probably shocked, but they are truly thought provoking.  More and more history as we were taught it at school is being rewritten.

LENS STATUS
Top     100       0
Top  2,000       9
Top 10,000    16

As many of you know this has not been a good week, with my girlfriend’s visa to come stay with me in the USA for a year having been rejected, and as a result she now faces being turned back at Miami when she comes over on Friday night. So both of us have been highly stressed and the lenses have suffered. We hoped to be living together as from Friday night, having been seeing each other for over a year, but now even if she does get into the country, she is only here for 8 weeks, and then her chances of getting in again depend on applying for a visa again. It’s a big mess, and it now might be another year before we can start our lives together, the only time we can be together in the meantime being when one of us can travel between England and Florida. Well you can be sure I will keep you updated… My fingers are crossed, as she has given up her apartment, taken a year sabbatical from her job, and now will have to sort things out when she goes back in October. What is certain is that our hopes to spend a year in the sunshine are dashed, since she can’t ask for another year off now, the company she works for jumped through a lot of hoops to arrange it this time. WIsh us luck on Friday night when she arrives in Miami…

Well apart from that, I have been trying to do some work on my lenses, despite my mind being on other things…

Over the weekend I added a new lens, Daily Jokes For August which features instead of the usual jokes, funny baby pictures. I selected only the funniest baby pictures for this lens, and although some of you might have already looked at it, tonight I changed a couple of pictures, and also added a voting module. So please come take a look, or come back and vote. I guarantee you will find at least one of the pictures funny.

Tonight I also updated my Bournemouth lens, adding links for AFC Bournemouth, the local football team.

LENS STATUS
Top     100       0
Top  2,000       9
Top 10,000    15

My Claim To Fame is back down to #25 today and #2 in Entertainment - oh well I had My Five Minutes Of Fame I suppose at least…

I still have 9 lenses in the Top 2,000 right now, it was 10, and I didn’t create any new ones this weekend - falling behind on the goal I set myself, but I have a tendancy to procrastinate a bit, and when the time gets short I often manage to make a final sprint to the finish…   From having 40 days to create 40 lenses, I am now down to 32 days and 40 lenses, so that means more than 1 a day if I am to make my goal…

The time limit if self imposed, since my girlfriend is coming to stay with me, and once she gets here I know that I will be spending time with her and not working on lenses every evening and weekend.

A couple of my lenses seemed to hold up, but my total traffic took a real dive this weekend.
Not just Squidoo, my other sites as well…

I know it’s the holidays, and the weather was probably nice in various places, so people spent less time online, but I’m wondering if it was just a trend for me, or did anyone else see a drop in visitors as well?

It was wonderful to have My Claim To Fame at #1 in Entertainment and #12 overall, but I wonder what today’s lens ranking updates will bring…