Thursday in Keegan Country

It's just odds and ends today, with life, locally, as a flat calm. The weather remains cool, with this as the forecast for the next few days:


If we were not so dry, dessicated, it'd be not-too-bad, not at all. What worries you is the fire danger ... and the knowledge that several fires were lit by some lunatic in Belair National Park a couple of days ago!

I'd give you the update on the fire season situation, but Dave has already done this, and I'm going to give you the links instead:

http://alaskandavedownunder.blogspot.com/2009/02/australian-bushfire-updates.html
http://alaskandavedownunder.blogspot.com/2009/02/australian-bushfires-2009.html
http://alaskandavedownunder.blogspot.com/2009/02/adelaides-deadly-heat-wave-of-2009.html

The LEGENDS launch has been a terrific success. The ClusterMap at the foot of the page is taking forever to update, I have no idea why, but the true story is this -- depicted on a may generated by Statcounter instead:

You can enlarge the map with a click on it -- I uploaded it with enough pixels to make it readable. Not bad at all, for about 40 hours since the site opened. That's over 600 page loads.

The only thing people have to do now is to cotton on to the fact that they should notice the advertising and click something occasionally. (Thanks to those two people who did indeed, uh, click something. Now, if the other 200 would be as helpful --! Heaven only knows, it's not going to cost you anything...)

In fact, no one would be happier than me if the digital novel concept proves out -- and there's every reason to believe it will. Very, very early days, as yet, and already nice traffic. I received an email just this morning from someone asking if I'd be interested in this:

http://www.writer4me.com/ -- "Writer 4 Me," being the "World's most popular ghostwriter hire service." In fact, it's most interesting; it's also depressing, when you dig into the details and find that some illiterate twit of an entrepreneur can hire (!!!) an ICON writer for $25/hour.

An icon writer is a known name, long published, with a fan following ... who's so short of cash, s/he is hiring out for $25/hour, which is less than is earned by laboring hands.

Still, they have it rich by comparison with the website developers, who'll get $100 to build someone a small website (no shopping cart), and an extra fifty bucks for the time and sweat it takes to add the shopping cart. (Anyone here speak MYSQL gibberish?! Joomla?) There's talent out yonder working for $5 an hour -- sweatshop wages. I find it sad.

So let's talk about something happier: penguins. Seriously, penguins! Have you seen this:

http://www.bgay.com/news/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=759&Itemid=23

This little story ran on BGay.com a few days ago. Let me give you the teaser:

A pair of gay penguins at the Polarland Zoo in Harbin, China, turned out to be such a great parenting pair that their keepers thought they deserved a reward and let them marry.

I must be getting sentimental in my old age, because I gotta love that. A happy ending for a change. Go ahead, read the whole story -- it's short, and worthy of a smile.

And now I have to go back to work, so I'll leave you with these links to keep you up to date with my other posts to the other blogs:

LEGENDS, Chapter Five:
http://mel-keegan-legends.blogspot.com/2009/02/chapter-five.html
and, at DIGITAL KOSMOS:
Colonial Memories
Seward, Alaska: Where the boats come in


Cheers,
MK