Terrible Twos

Yes, I got back from my Tsagaan Sar Gobi adventure this morning, and yes I’ve got ripping yarns and eye-popping pics and brilliantly hilarious and poignant Mongolian cultural observations to share, but no, tough noogies, you can’t have them today.

Today was devoted to sacred tasks – laundry, hosing the accumulated grit off my person, dopey errands, and re-bonding with my critters through our favorite group activity, the afternoon nap. It also takes a surprising amount of time to go through the images I take, and fiddle with them in the photo software so you can be much more impressed with my picture-taking skills than they deserve.

And anyway, I’m just in no mood to write as there’s been a death in the family. Much to her distress, it happened on Miss Lisa’s watch just as she began her apartment-sitting gig here. She tried everything – striving to interpret every gasp and wheeze, carefully monitoring fluids, consulting experts and, finally, resorting to anxious prayer. But it was just no use. After eighteen months Otis, my crappy Chinese coffee maker, coughed weakly and passed from this world. We’re all sitting shiva. There's brisket and gravlox on the sideboard.

So, for all these reasons, no Gobi post today. I hope you understand. Hey…hey! Crying’s not going to do you a bit of good, you know. Honestly, act your age. You’re behaving just like this blog.

And by that I mean that exactly two years ago today I tapped out my first post, “Auspicious Launch” (which is so dull I can't believe anyone kept reading after that), and slung Dreaming of Danzan Ravjaa out into cyberspace.

Stern Warning: Anyone who types “Happy Blogiversary” below will have their comments sent for review to the Committee for the Removal of Intolerable Neologisms and Gag-inducing Expressions (CRINGE), I promise you. “Blog” is not a clever or funny substitute for “ann.” It's not even clever or funny because it's not. It’s icky. I’m sorry, but it’s time you knew.

Anyway, I figured my mother, immediate family, and a handful of temple members might occasionally follow the adventures of a drunk punk turned Buddhist monk on walkabout in Mongolia, cracking wise when not succumbing to fits of crankiness, and spending baffling amounts of time behind binoculars staring at birds. Boy did I misjudge what an eccentric and peculiar world this is.

TypePad offered some basic stats from DODR’s inception. After I click “save,” this will mark 282 posts, in response to which you blabbermouths have left 1752 comments. As of this writing there have been 90,854 page views for an overall average of nearly 124 a day. That's all that program monitored.

But wait – I have not yet begun to reveal my statistical geekiness! At the beginning of this year, my RSS service, FeedBurner, added much more complete site stats. So far this year, DODR has been receiving an average of 150 unique visitors a day and we’ve had people checking in from at least 58 countries other than the US (we’re big in the former Eastern Bloc!). Not too shabby for a blog that occupies as narrow a niche as this, eh? As far as my paisanos, there have been numerous hits from a maddening 49 of our 50 States – um, Alaska, where’s the love? You never call, you never write...

Now, have all these folks dropped by because of their intense curiosity about the post-Communist revival of the Nyingmapa lineage of Vajrayana Buddhism in the Eastern Gobi Desert of Outer Mongolia? Or steppe-land avifauna? Or naughty puppies and kitties?

Not hardly.

I’ve probably published well over 300,000 words here, much of which constitute aimless wanderings well away from the subjects at hand. They're held in a permanent archive at TypePad World Headquarters, just to the left of the minty urinal cakes in the storage closet. This means that DODR pops up on the monitors of some very strange people who have typed some very strange things to run through various search engines in the hopes of satisfying their very strange compulsions. And because I care so very much about your entertainment and ongoing education, I have been compiling the oddest phrases that have beamed in to DODR from the remote outer fringes of our human family.

I had originally thought to offer this list with my own wry bon mots, but maybe I’ll leave that to y’all. Which of the following (which I swear all caused linkage to this site and are presented exactly as they appeared) are your favorites, and what do you imagine the person was thinking as he or she typed them out? Behold:

• bhutan travel the procrastination stunning plan

• jokes and comics about PET scans

• parrot aviaries (pictures)swimwear (from South Africa)

• bhutan guru rinpoche Vermont

• buddha under buddy tree

• doing thing to make you smarter

• kill buddha transgender

• coot recipe

• big tit Buddhist

• buddhist monk sock

• woodpecker prison group

• Christianity Main Tenants

• eurasian toothache

• pig load out shoots

• buddhist seven bowels to offer water

• people in ct naked named donnalee

• Lamas syphilis spit

Oh, and you in Singapore? Yes you, the one who searches almost every single stupid day for "ani sarah thresher" and visits the same post from spring of 2005 where I wrote about her teaching in Darkhan (I am not linking it for you!), would you please either seek professional help or just bookmark the dadblasted thing?

All yuks aside, I’ve truly loved creating DODR these past two years and offering a window into this marvelous land for those of you who may never board a plane clutching a ticket stamped “Ulaanbaatar” (and even for some of you who have). The most rewarding part has been the internet’s incredible ability to attract such a diverse, global circle of virtual friends. I’m crazy about all of you (mmm, except perhaps the former French ambassador's wife...though she brought our beloved Christian to us!) and hope you stay on board. The way this year is shaping up, it’s going to be the most extraordinary yet.

Comments

[Roeland]

not a happy anniversary than if your coffee machine is worn down after 1 1/2 years of writing DODR :-)

[cyndie]

OMG, too funny. Coot? We won't go there. Sorry, I seem to be all out of coffee pot humor. Perk,--
Perk, ka perk,----
Perk, perk, perk,perk ka--
nope, still not there.
Happy year of the blog, not the fire pig.cw

[rho]

Oh NO on the coffee maker -- I would be catatonic in a corner without my morning coffee....

coot recipes -- I have a coot recipe ;D

[Judy]

Don't forget, a lot of us got here because of your cousin Ryan's blog, but we stayed because we love the way you write about things.

[kmkat]

"big tit Buddhist"?

The mind boggles. Happy ___versary ;-)

[Palzang]

Happy Blogiversary! There, I said it, so shoot me...

[Carol]

I feel much happier about getting back on a plane with my ticket stamped 'ulaanbaatar', knowing that I can take you out to dinner one night at that amazing indian/mexican place, and feed you in exchange for the number of times you've made me laugh in this last year. And yes, the search terms were disconcerting, to say the least!

[Vedran]

"Boy did I misjudge what an eccentric and peculiar world this is."
Gee, thanks Konchog...!

Happy 2nd you-know-what!

[Unenlightened]

eurasian toothache

[Konchog]

I was wondering who'd be the first. I shoulda guessed...

And Vedran, let's face it, I'm not the one who doesn't get a dog because he keeps an angry goose in the front yard!

[Jayna]

Thanks for keepin' on, keepin' on - wishing you enlightenment under the buddy tree!

[Christian]

lama poopies dried dalailama turds crottins smell dog diarrhea rainbow body naked reality Korean missionary positions

Here we are... Filling the gaps for a much better indexing. What a shame to be misinterpreted!

[minnie]

how about "Happy Blog Anniversary!"

as for this: "doing thing to make you smarter", what were they thinking? (ducks)

[Bessie]

ok, i almost lost my lunch (and that's hard cos it's past midnight) at some of your ramblings. Happy bleechversary to you for starters (he he) and to pipe in about my favorites: "people in ct naked named donnalee" and "woodpecker prison group." You will find search for "Buddhist Monk sock" you can easily find, and buy if you like, Shaolin monk socks. Very attractive! Also...you were a drunk punk? I was a punk, too. More the straightedge type, but probably about the same era (early 80's)...

[Donnalee]

Did we ever figure out who in Connecticut was naked and named my name, or wanted to find such...? I hadn't seen this before--