Letters... oh we get letters

Seriously, I never cease to be amazed by the stuff that people find to comment/email about on this site. 

Here are two recent missives:

Dear Trep,

I noticed that your status in the TTLB (The Truth Laid Bear) Ecosystem keeps changing back and forth between 'Large Mammal' and 'Marauding Marsupial'.  What's up with that?

Yours,

Mike

Dear Mike,

The TTLB Ecosystem (for those of you who aren't bloggers) is a very neat, but essentially valueless rating system devised by an anonymous blogger/coder who calls himself N.Z Bear (update: NZ just outed himself - his name is Rob Neppell - in order to plug his new company, Kithbridge).  TTLB uses a complex algorithm based on a combination of site traffic, inbound links and a few other factors, to rank member blogs into cute categories. 

That said, treppenwitz has teetered on the cusp of 'Large Mammal' and 'Marauding Marsupial' for a couple of years now.  Apparently evolution isn't nearly easy as those show-offs in the Galapagos Islands make it look.  Seriously, here's how it works: Depending on how many people visit treppenwitz on any particular day and how many sites link to a particular post, my TTLB rating gains or loses ten or twenty points on my total 'relevance score', which results in my either being crowned king of the marsupials... or relegated to a mammalian also ran.   It's worth noting, however, that today I am #1 in the marsupial category... but Dave Barry's Blog is #2.  I'm just saying.  ;-)

The reason I find TTLB to be essentially valueless is that the list of blogs that I read regularly includes 'Higher Beings', 'Insignificant Microbes'... and representatives from just about every niche on the bloggy food chain in between.  The only useful aspect of the TTLB Ecosystem rating mechanism that I can fathom would be to serve as a means to avoid blogs of drastically different sized readerships having to compete against one another in popularity contests blog competitions such as the JIBS.

Which brings me nicely to another recent communique:

Dear Treppy,

I seem to remember you won three first place JIBS ('Best Large Blog', 'Best Personal Blog' and 'Best Slice of Life in Israel Blog') and one second place JIB ('Best Overall Post') in the last competition.   How come you haven't posted the JIB award icons on your site yet as you did in previous years?  Is this some sort of protest statement?

Yours,

A Fan

Dear 'A Fan',

I should begin by saying that either you have a remarkable memory for details or your use of the phrase 'I seem to remember...' is code-speak for 'I went back through your archives and looked it up'.  Either way I'm both impressed and touched.

I'd love to tell you that I made a conscious decision not to post the award icons on my sidebar as some sort of political protest or to make a statement of some kind.  But I'm just not that deep.  The real reason I haven't put them up yet is embarrassingly anticlimactic: Laziness.  That's it.  Bone-laziness, pure and simple.  I have the absolute worst work ethic of any blogger you are likely to encounter. 

I've been meaning to add categories, widgets, technorati tags and other newfangled tchotchkes to the end of my posts for ages.  Have I done any of that?  Psheah, right! 

I've got a list a mile long of people that I need to add to my blogroll, and a bunch of dead links representing bloggers who have moved their sites or stopped blogging.  Have I done anything about that yet?  Aaaaaaany time now... really!

My 'about me' page is the same one I dashed off the day after I got the bright idea to start this weeping eyesore site back in 2003.  It even has the original broken link in the banner that I always meant to fix!  I cringe when I look at it now... so full of 'oooooh look at me and my fabulously interesting life'.   I'm surprised I didn't put up a professorial photo of myself affecting a thoughtful pose with a pipe and tweed jacket.  But for all that, have I taken down that festering boil on the arse of the blogosphere and posted a helpful 'about me' page?   Guesses anyone?... anyone?  Bueller?!

So yeah, I'll probably get around to putting up those snazzy icons you guys were nice enough to give me sometime in the not-too-distant future... almost certainly in a month ending with 'T', 'Y', 'R', 'E', 'L' or 'H'. 

Keep those cards and letters coming.