This year was tough all over. In addition to the world-wide pandemic disaster and the US election disaster, your humble correspondent faced treatment for deadly illness. (Ironically, I probably would have been homebound much of the year even without the pandemic.)
Nevertheless, the blog persists! Without interruption! The blog has surpassed 2500 days in a row of daily posts.
This year saw over 34K hits*, which is more than 90 hits per day on average. This is up 6K (>22%) from 2019.
Once again, much of this traffic has been a “long tail”, a hit here and there on old posts. With about 3000 posts from almost 7 years, these dribs and drabs add up.
From the stats I have, the traffic has been extremely bursty. Throughout the year, I see a week or 10 days with 50 hits per day, then 4 or 5 days with 250 or more hits, then another period of less traffic. (The standard deviation was over 97, with a mean of 94) This happened again and again, with no clear pattern or known underlying driver.
Combined with the long tail already mentioned, it’s difficult to draw conclusions.
(*I should note that I am only using the default stats provided by wordpress. I do not have enough information to know exactly how they are collected, or what possible sources of error or omission exist.)
Round Up
For convenience, here are some year end summaries.
Great Names For Bands
As always, I’ve noted some “great names for a band”. Dave Barry pioneered this joke for many years in his columns. My variation is mainly taken from or nearly quoted from actual, real, “I am not making this up” scientific and technical articles.
Here are this year’s bands:
Rocks from Ryugu
Rocks from Ryugu with Bennu Dust
Wing Models of Yi
The Great American Biotic Interchange
Venus Feelers
Skid n’ Bump – All-mechanical, Mostly Passive
Clockwork Cucaracha
Scotch Yoke Clinometer
Double Octopus
Compound Obstacles
The South Pole Wall (also ia great name for a cocktail)
Solar Canals of Gujarat
Bottlebrush block copolymer photonic crystals
Antarctic Frogs
First Fossil Frog
Eocene High Latitude
Gondwanan Cosmopolitinism
Tape-spool boom extraction system
Flux Lobe Elongation
Magnetic Pole Acceleration
Towards Siberia
Possible common capture events
Radially Symmetric Fertile Parts
Pendicle Bending
Wing Heart
Scent Pads
Failed Squid Meal
Prey Seizure
Books Reviewed
As always, I wrote short reviews of books I read this year, usually appearing every Sunday. Over the whole year, I reviewed 55 fiction and 24 non-fiction books.
Glancing at the list, I would especially recommend:
Fiction:
The City We Became by N. K. Jemisin
October Man by Ben Aaronovitch (And other stories by Aaaronovitch)
Non-Fiction:
Trekonomics (2016) by Manu Saadka
Braiding Sweetgrass (2013) by Robin Wall Kimmerer
Here are the links for all the reviews.
Books Reviewed in the 4th Quarter
Fiction
Dead Lies Dreaming by Charles Stross
Attack Surface by Cory Doctorow
Missionaries by Phil Klay
A Visit From The Goon Squad (2010) by Jennifer Egan
Cuyahoga by Pete Beatty
Quillifer the Knight by Walter Jon Williams
October Man by Ben Aaronovitch
A Wild Winter Swan by Gregory Maguire
Winter Counts by David Heska Wanbli Weiden
Non-Fiction
Billion Dollar Loser by Reeves Wiedeman
Braiding Sweetgrass (2013) by Robin Wall Kimmerer
A World Beneath The Sands by Toby Wilkinson
The Price of Peace by Zachary D. Carter
Time of The Magicians by Wolfram Eilenberger
Wagnerism by Alex Ross
Reviews From Q3
Fiction
Squeeze Me by Carl Hiaasen
Point B by Drew Magary
Crooked Hallelujah by Kelli Jo Ford
Sex and Vanity by Kevin Kwan
Love and Theft by Stan Parish
False Value by Ben Aaronovitch
Moon Over Soho (2011) by Ben Aaronovitch
Midnight Riot (2011) by Ben Aaronovitch
Whispers Underground (2012) by Ben Aaronovitch
Broken Homes (2013) by Ben Aaronovitch
Foxglove Summer (2014) by Ben Aaronovitch
Lies Sleeping (2018) by Ben Aaronovitch
The Hanging Tree (2015) by Ben Aaronovitch
Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell
Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell
A Beautifully Foolish Endeavor by Hank Green
Life for Sale (1967) by Yukio Mishima
A Star Is Bored by Byron Lane
Non Fiction
14 Miles by DW Gibson
Dark Towers by David Enrich
Trekonomics by Manu Saadka
1177 B. C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed by Eric H. Cline
Empires of the Sky by Alexander Rose
Reviews From Q2
Fiction
88 Names by Matt Ruff
Providence by Max Barry
Shakespeare for Squirrels by Christopher Moore
All Adults Here by Emma Straub
Afterlife by Julia Alvarez
Wake, Siren by Nina MacLaughlin
How Much of These Hills is Gold by C Pam Zhang
The Automatic Detective by A. Lee Martinez
Tyll by Daniel Kahlmann
The City We Became by N. K. Jemisin
Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng
Arabella of Mars (2016) by David D. Levine
Arabella and the Battle of Venus (2017) by David D. Levine
Arabella the Traitor of Mars (2018) by David D. Levine
The Orphan’s Tales, Vol 1.: In the Night Garden (2006) by Catherynne M. Valente
The Orphan’s Tales: Vol 2.: In the Cities of Coin and Spice (2007) by Catherynne M. Valente
Non Fiction
Istanbul by Bettany Hughes
Tacky’s Revolt by Vincent Brown
The Library Book by Susan Orlean
The Lives of Bees by Thomas D. Seeley
Unworthy Republic by Claudio Saunt
How to Hide an Empire by Daniel Immerwahr
Reviews From Q1
Fiction
Shadow Captain by Alastair Reynolds
The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich
Trace Elements by Donna Leon
Processed Cheese by Stephen Wright
Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu
Highfire by Eoin Colfer
The Feral Detective by Jonathan Letham
Hi Five by Joe Ide
Agency by William Gibson
Zed by Joanna Kavenna
Naked Came The Florida Man by Tim Dorsey
A Small Town by Thomas Perry
Trust Exercise by Susan Choi
Non Fiction
The Shadow of Vesuvius by Daisy Dunn
Leonardo Da Vinci by Walter Isaacson
Imagined Life by James Trefil and Michael Summers
Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener
The Great Pretender by Susannah Cahalan
Island People (2016) by Joshua Jelly-Schapiro
The Accursed Tower by Roger Crowley
Robert McGrath's Blog 