Turning the Pages of 2017--books so far

You can tell a lot about people by the books on their shelves, or by the bedstand, or in our case, scattered throughout the house.  Draw your own conclusions.So far this year--

Currently reading

Susan Rice, Quiet, The Power of Introverts in a world that can’t stop talking

Books completed in 2017

Art

·     Zoltan Szabo Paints Landscapes—watercolor, used

·     Betty Lou Schlemm, Watercolor Secrets for Painting Light, used

·     Oliver Meslay, Turner, Life and Landscape

Fiction

·     William Least Heat Moon, Celestial Mechanics

·     Anne Hillerman, Song of the Lion

·     Michael Crichton, Lost World

·     Robert Ludlum, The Matlock Paper

History

·     Nathaniel Philbrick, Mayflower

·     David McCullough, The Wright Brothers,  

General non-fiction

·     Smoke over Oklahoma—The Railroad Photographs of Preston George

·     Nan Shepherd, The Living Mountain

·     William Least Heat Moon, Here, There, Elsewhere

·     Steven Pressfield, Do the Work

·     Steven Pressfield, Turning Pro

·     Barry Lopez, Arctic Dreams

·     Robert MacFarlane, Landmarks

·     Peter Wohlleben, The Hidden Life of Trees

·     Hugh Prather, Notes to Myself, 1970

Poetry

·     John Erskine, Sonata, 1923

Partial

·     Richard Jefferies, After London, 1885, fiction

·     Peter Davidson, The Idea of North

·     Eliot Weinberger, The Ghosts of Birds

·     W.G. Sebald. The Rings of Saturn

·     Robert Friedman, The Next 100 Years

·     Linda Gratton & Andrew Scott, The 100-Year Life, Living and Working in an Age of Longevity

The aging blog--a year of change facing unknown journeys

Aging journey, 4" x  5" watercolor

The blog(ger) is aging as an old year departs and a new one arrives.
It began almost eight years ago, into new media and unknown and undiscovered travels.
Like the blogger, it has changed, been vibrant, been ill, grown and grown older.
For a while, 2016 seemed like it was comatose in the depression of the fall campaign, but it awakened if not refreshed, at least lucid and creative.
Consider the few number of posts this year, with about a third of them in December--rescued by the blogger's Christmas cards and essays.
This blog led to the blogger creating a new class, Blogging for Journalists, and it occurs to him that this year's students--now juniors and seniors-were early teens when the old journalist launched into this new journey. Much has changed in technology since then--demanding more creativity to just be relevant.
The blog needs to change even more because 2017 will demand more creativity in a year of approaching journeys. As it was in 2009, those travels head for undiscovered territory, as does the solitary traveler in the little painting above, on a path past a tree.
Milestones for the blog this year included more than 32,000 page views, tweaking the layout, coming out of the coma, and reaching readers in 150 countries, up 10--the fact that intrigues the blogger the most about this journey. 

In 2016, the blog had readers from these 10 new countries:

1-9--Zambia
2-13--Syria
2-25--Mozambique
3-5--Uzbekistan
5-3--Benin
5-9--Senegal
5-10--Anguilla
5-11-South Sudan
5-18--Paraguay
12-20--Yemen

Here are the 150 countries of the readers

• Africa--Morocco, Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Togo, Ghana, Ethiopia, Ghana, Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, Nigeria, Tunisia, Gabon, South Africa, Mali, Mauritus, Mauritania, Cameroonx, Zambia, Mozambique, South Sudan, Senegal, Benin, Angola, Botswana,  --26
• Asia--Russia, China, Taiwan, Cambodia, S Korea, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, India, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Thailand, Kazahkstan, Azerbaijan, Japan, Mongolia, Armenia, Georgia,  Nepal, Uzbekistan, Macau, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Burma (Myamar), -26
• Caribbean--Caymans,  Sint Maartin, Trinidad and Tobago, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Dominican Republic, The Bahamas, Anguilla, Netherlands Antilles,  St. Kitts and Nevis, Bermuda-11
• Central America--Panama, Guatemala, Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador-5
• Europe--UKx, Isle of Man, Francex, Spainx, Germanyx, Italyx, Switzerlandx, Monaco, Czech Republicx, Polandx, Croatia, Greecex, Macedonia, Netherlandsx, Icelandx, Norwayx, Swedenx, Denmarkx, Finlandx, Latviax, Lithuania, Estonia, Belarus, Ukrainex, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Austria, Sloveniax, Belgium, Irelandx,  Bulgariax, Turkey, Portugal, Luxemborg, Slovakiax, Albania,Slovenia, Leichtenstein, Montenegro-42
• Indian Ocean--Maldives, Seychelles-2
• Mediterranean--Maltax, Cyprus,-2
• MidEast--Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, UAE, Kuwait,Qatar, Bahrain, Palestine, Lebanon, Oman, Yemen-, Syria-14
• North America--US, Canada, Mexico-3
• Oceana--Australia, New Zealand, Philippines, Indonesia, Guam, New Caledonia, Fiji-7
• South America--Colombia, Peru, Chili, Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Bolivia, Paraguay-12

(Ignore the little x after some countries--those are countries I've written about on the blog. Also, the Flag Counter in the left sidebar is inaccurate, added after many of these countries had already be on the blog.)

Perspective: I don't have total page views by country by 2016, but here are the top 10 for the life of the blog, with 234,000+ total page views:

United States	133456
Russia	12661
China	11467
Germany	11057
Ukraine	10886
France	8872
United Kingdom	3801
Turkey	1396
Poland	1235
Canada	1158

Year-by-year postings

•  2016--137: December--39   
• 2015--136: December--26
• 2014--276: December--33
• 2013--252: December--39
• 2012--203: December--2
• 2011--134: December--15
• 2010--292: December--9
• 2009--339: December--47 (Started May 3)

(Note--most blogs start off strong (Note my record posts in 2009, even though the blog started May 3), and then sort of fizzle out. While mine has fluctuated, I'm proud it is still going, and being read. Thank you.)