Party hopping has never been a favorite Christmas pastime for me... I do enjoy the company of friends and associates in non-work situations, but the crunch of so many parties within a relatively compressed timeframe exhausts me somehow. Lest I sound like Scrouge, I thoroughly enjoy the joy that comes with the holiday season, the music, the food, the nip of winter's air, the food, concealing bulky sweaters, the food, Cristmas cards, the food...OK, you get the point.
I find myself talking technology, blogging in particular, at parties...and I am amazed at the range of people who have never even heard the word blog. At one such recent gathering, I was chatting with a young woman from a public relations firm who graduated from a major state university just a few years ago. According to her, personal web publishing was mentioned in class one day in a rather negative light. She had been taught that publishing web pages was the job of trained web designers (professionals) and that people in public relations should concentrate on the message rather than worry about how the message gets delivered. When I mentioned to her that Technorati tracks over 5 million blogs and that TTLB ranks over 15,000 blogs by traffic and that the top 100 receive over 3,000 visits each day...she nearly passed out (well, maybe the empty wine glass in her hand may have influenced her reaction). She then asked me about my blog, how I began, etc....and eventually asked, "How many visitors do you have each day and how does your blog rank?" When I told her that I generally have 30-40 vistors each day and that I just broke into the top 10,000 blogs, she replied: "Well, perhaps web pages should be delivered by trained professionals after all."...at which point, I asked if there was more punch and stuffed my face with a finger sandwich. Did I mention that I really enjoy the food at Christmas?
...note to self: take a break.