Lorelle VanFossen is a font of inspiration for bloggers everywhere, particularly those who work in WordPress. I like her because she’s creative, logical, fond of traveling, and wont to link to 10,000 Birds every now and again. Her latest link to this humble blog was the setup for one of her beloved Blog Challenges, which she offers up gratis to help bloggers explore and expand their powers of micropublishing. The gist of this challenge, “What is the Most Unusual Blogger You’ve Found?” is as follows:
I want you to do some research on who is blogging about what subjects and blog about the most unusual blogger and blog topic you can find.
I call this the “blogging going to the birds postâ€, and if you think blogging about birds (link to 10,000 Birds here, thank you) is unusual, think again. There are a lot of topics covered by bloggers and I want you to go out and find an unusual subject matter, hobby, or purpose and a blogger who blogs about it…
One reason I’m writing about this blog challenge is to clarify Lorelle’s underlying point that all blogs are weird. Still, I’m sure more than one nature blogger might chafe at the presumably widespread belief that bird blogging is outside the norm. Birding occupies, to one degree or another, that sweet spot between hobby and science, two categories that have launched literally millions of blogs. So don’t feel self-conscious for a second if you’re blogging about birding or nature in general. You’re part of a thriving international community of thousands of accomplished naturalists and writers (and me.) The fact that you blog about birding doesn’t make you weird in the least, but you should note that it also doesn’t absolve you of any pre-existing eccentricity.
The other reason for mentioning Lorelle’s Blog Challenge is so I can respond to it! In general, the more unusual the topic, the more compelling the blog. Look at PostSecret. The converse is that personal journal blogs seem rather prosaic, though this doesn’t seem to discourage the teeming hordes of diarists out there. What I’m trying to say is that I found this challenge deceptively difficult.
The question to answer was, “What topic would I never write or read about?” Considering how omnivorous my online diet is, only one answer came to mind as truly outside my appetite. The most unusual blogging topic I can think of is blogging about one’s pet cat. Corey and Nuthatch could surely set me straight on this, but I just don’t get it. Not only do I dislike cats as pets in general, but they comprise in aggregate an ecological disaster. Blogging consistently about one’s cat seems to channel many of the most narcissistic aspects of bragging about one’s children without the redemption of parental suffering. Like I said, I just don’t get it. Since countless people seem to blog about their cats, way more it appears than those who write about wild birds, the logical blogger to single out for the dubious honor of ‘Most Unusual’ is the dynamo who maintains the Carnival of the Cats, on issue #174 and still going strong. Cheers to you, IFOC, for taking on a topic I just don’t understand and making the web a richer place for it.
Take the Blog Challenge and share the most unusual blogger you’ve found…
Hi, Mike! Remember me? I posted to “I and the Bird” a while back with pics of Palestine Sunbird chicks in their nest.
Yes, the Web is definitely a richer place for Laurence’s presence.
As for catblogging being narcissistic: with respect, I’m not sure I agree. I think it’s just that people love their cats and enjoy talking about them, without necessarily taking credit for how great they are. To give one example: an acquaintance of mine took in an older cat several months ago. She can go on and on about how wonderful this cat is, but at the same time she acknowledges that she had nothing to do with the cat’s good disposition since she didn’t raise her. She simply loves the cat.
Keep the cats inside…and I think that you’re just bitter about Hunter (my cat) keeping you awake the night before we tracked down the Bicknell’s.
And the most unusual blogger I’ve found was when I was clicking from link to link and ended up clicking a link to a blog that a guy wrote about his bowel movements. That was disturbing…
It’s not exactly an unusual topic, but I feel fairly safe in saying that I will not be joining the carnival of the capitalists.
Thank you for your kind words about my humble blog, and you are right on that all blogs are weird when you stop and really think about it. 😀
Which is part of the challenge of really exploring what an individual thinks is “weird” which says a lot about how they think, thus how they blog. Brilliant that you “got it” when so many didn’t.
As for being a cat lover and bird afficiando, with a husband who is learning to love cats but absolutely adores birds, I have been able to train my cats over the years to ignore birds as game, and we keep them very much restricted. There’s a hummingbird feeder right outside the window where both cats sleep and look outside all the time and they rarely pay any attention to the hummers who roll in several times an hour for drinks. Total desensitization with familiarity.
But getting back to the challenge of identifying “unusual” blogs, it’s a task much harder than one would think, isn’t it.
If I blogged about our cat Cujo (dumped from a moving pickup truck 13 years ago) it would go something like this:
“Today was fascinating in the land of Cujo. She meowed 36 times in a row (record!) then threw up a nasty hairball. Then it was off to sleep for 23 hours.”
Blogging about our Doberman is more exciting, and I started a blog dedicated to him when we first got him (as a skinny stray) but haven’t kept it up… that was truly just for our family as a way to record some of his puppyish learning experiences.
As for weirdest blog… the first blog I read was about birding so I find a lot of other ones weird but I think blogs specifically about how to make money from blogging are a bit odd.
Learning what blogs and topics other bloggers find amusing makes for fascinating reading!
Hey Rahel. Of course I remember you and your sunbirds. I’m not saying that blogging about one’s cats is any more inherently narcissistic than blogging about one’s kids. Heck, I brag about Mason and Ivy to anyone who will listen. However, there are parallels to the two activities and while I’m personally interested in the latter, the former leaves me cold, much like when people compare their pets to their own children! Laurence has set up a channel for cat lovers to share their collective devotion. I think he understood where I’m coming from here.
Corey, you’re totally right except in that it was both cats that molested me in the night.
Lorelle, thanks for the compliment and the challenge!
John and Birdfreak, I think you’ve shed light on why most bird blogs don’t make money! On a more serious note, your weird blogs underscore the point that every topic, no matter how normal to some, seems unusual to others. BTW, Cujo is a very cool name for a cat.
Mike – a funny little story about the name Cujo… we had someone come to the door once and our three big dogs were barking like crazy but the cat was going to try and make a run for it outside and my sister yells “Cujo!” and the guy at the door just about filled his pants.
I think the only true way for a birding blog to make money is if there is some product like a book being sold and the blog is the platform to help promote it. Although adSense is great if you have 30 trillion visitors a minute.
I jst now found this on the PCH search engine. Altough I know it’s an old blog you might be interested in knowing that I think my boyfriend has the most unusual blog anywhere. His wordpress address is http://joepickell.wordpress.com. If you agree give me a holler. You can send me an email or leave me a message on wordpress. See the one thing I can think of thatI’d never read, watch or rite about is porn and he does but it’s humorous and more social commentary than anything else. So that’s why I’d say it’s unusual. He writes about other stuff too not just that subject, but everything he writes has a point of socil awareness to it.
Take care