The following is a guest post by Craig Butters (@craigbutters), who
blogs over at www.craigbutters.com and has
suffered the past 102 days - what seems like an eternity - with the
plight of an American girl, desperately seeking employment I don’t know
what anymore in good ol’ Blighty.
It’s been over seven months
since I last blogged here (no one ever said I would be contributing regularly),
but the last time I did put my words on this very blog post you read in your
hundreds and I, Craig Butters – an Englishman on an American blog – held the “most
read post” from August through to December.
And then….
….and then Katie wrote
something in December that you apparently all wanted to read and my post was
relegated into second position on the hit parade. <Insert sad face here>. So, rather than sulk and be upset, I’ve
decided that I can live with the competition, but thusly I’m back to reclaim my
spot with the most read post on this blog – so here it goes, and tell your
friends!
Living with an American
is, as we discovered in my last post not an easy proposition for a Brit used to
living alone, but for those 102 days I managed and I kept heading in onedirection – onwards! I’ve now lost count
of the total amount of days it has been, but that’s only because I’ve been
having an absolutely blast instead. I’ve
lost count of the amount of times I’ve laughed and had to invent new ways of
keeping this kid entertained; who else had two Christmases?!
Not that it has been a
total one way street of course – I’ve been introduced to spa days, massages and
proper English tea (who knew you could drink tea in England?).
The one thing that has
changed entirely though is that my passion for baking has been re-ignited –
never have I had such a willing victim volunteer to sample my kitchen
delights; breads, cakes, pies and experimental bakes.
But that is not what this
post is about, this post is about driving traffic and letting you enjoy my
words; as Steve Jobs’ of Apple once said “It’s more fun to be a pirate than to
join the navy.
Catch Up
What to write about
then? If you’ve been following this
blog, then you already know exactly what I’ve been getting up to with Katie, so
that’s out as far as subject matter is concerned. I could write about Microsoft, which I often
do over on my own blog. I could tell you
all about Surface verse the latest iPad or the advances of Windows Phone
compared to the iPhone or Google’s Android operating system. But those subjects are a perhaps a bit too
techie and you may think me a geek if I bore you with the intricate details of
the varying technologies on offer today.
I could write about the
wonderful sport of Formula 1 and my beloved Ferrari team, but F1 doesn’t travel
well when it comes to the Americas and I’m going for maximum exposure here – it
is the only way to reach and reclaim the top spot.
The Future
of the World
I can tell you about the
last book I read (“Abundance”), which I thoroughly enjoyed, which explored the
future of our very own planet Earth and how our various scarce resources are
being stretched, only for our human being genius to innovate our way out of
problems such as the generation of clean drinking water for all, power consumption
needs are met, food is readily available, the environment is balanced and most
curiously of all the exact reason why Bill Gates wants to invest his money on
re-designing the humble toilet….
….but that would be
vastly unfair, as you really should buy the book yourself on my recommendation
and form your own opinions on the state of the future of the world!
Passport
I could announce the news
that I’ve renewed my passport – but there’s not much of a story to it and
technically, I’ve already just told
you of that news! I could tell you about
the films I’ve seen recently and I could tell you stories about all of the
latest gossip and going-ons; but I won’t because you can, quite frankly, get
more interesting gossip and (probably) far better film reviews from your local
Starbucks barista – and enjoy a great latte at the same time!
Work
The stories I could reel
off about my work are absolutely endless – most of you don’t know, I often have
a great story from work and on those occasions that I do not, I most likely
have a complaint or a grump to bemoan that I could, given time and the
inclination, write endlessly about in a most appropriate and entertaining way
(most of them would likely make good reading for a future book deal should
anyone be interested in financing me at some point in the future?)
I’ve worked most weekends
this year, so the stories and events have certainly stacked up.
So What
Then?
So, what do I want to
tell you in this blog post? It’s easy,
the only thing that I want to tell you and all relay in this blog post message
is that all is well and there is lots going on here! It’s that simple. Life is good and I’m happy and we hope that
you are too.
It’s that simple a
message.
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A Final Admission
Ok, so maybe that isn’t the end of this post, there is a bit more. I am, after all as I confessed to earlier a
competitive soul and as I stated in the sixth paragraph right under your very
nose “this post is about driving traffic”, which is why you’ll have noticed
that the entire thing is littered with pop culture and references that are designed to stretch this post into the indexes of the search engines.
That’s right, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). I may not be an SEO expert, but even I know
that by mentioning just a few of the very popular key terms some traffic, no
matter how small, may stumble across this very blog and vault me back to the
top of the hit parade once again. Just read back through and you'll see
the following:
Lady GaGo
One Direction
Steve Jobs
Bill Gates
Apple iPad / iPhone
Android
Microsoft
Surface
Google
Formula 1
Ferrari
Starbucks
It’s a dirty, cheap tactic, but the
competition in me is far too great to pass up an opportunity and prove that I
can attract the audiences to my writings – and for that I thank each and every
one of you who read along.
My final promise is that my post on this site will be a little more
interesting….that is, if I’m ever permitted to guest post here again. Till then, stay safe, stay well and remember;
“It’s far better to be a
pirate, than to join the navy!”
