VIRAL !

I am not especially computer literate. In fact, if you read my recent blog entitled "Customer Service", you might agree with my two sons in their twenties that some of my knowledge and actions, computer-related, are what they would consider lame. There is no doubt in my mind that the Time-Warner repairman who had the opportunity to rescue me from my recent dilemma has an accurate picture of my computer sophistication.

With the foregoing as background, I want to share with you the mixture of pride, shock, and amazement I just experienced while sitting at my iPad a few moments ago and discovering for the very first time how my blog is doing in the world. Apparently, unknown to me, a control page is provided to all blogsters(?) like myself where all kinds of statistics can be found. Until now I had no idea whether anyone besides a very small group of immediate family and friends even knew it existed.

To be perfectly honest, as they like to say these days, I have mixed feelings about bringing these short essays to the attention of people who know me. While it might increase readership, it would also restrict my ability to be forthright about things I was writing about.

This brings me back to the subject of the results of my efforts to date. You can believe me when I say that I was shocked (not phony shocked, like Claude Raines in the movie "Casablanca") to discover that this blog is being read by people all over the world. I entitled this piece "viral", and honestly this is totally tongue in cheek. It is nowhere remotely close to what that term means in today's computer world. Nevertheless, I discovered from this service that my blog has found readers all over the world ! Aside from the US, which is the overwhelming majority as you would expect, there are dozens of hits from Russia, Germany, and Ukraine. There are even hits from places including Australia, Latvia, Malaysia, and one from Mexico.

This is a wholly unexpected and exciting feeling. Hopefully my next stop will be an invitation to appear on a late night talk show, like Charlie Rose or Piers Morgan. Seriously, I recognize totally that this is the Walter Mitty in me talking. But it also gives me a little more insight regarding the power of the Internet to effectuate communications and how events like the Arab Spring could be generated by people as insignificant as me just tapping out our thoughts, hopes, and dreams on a screen while sitting at home and then watch others use their computers to direct people's revolutions. Imagine how quickly that "Let them eat cake" comment would spread today and how fast things would happen.

Thanks to all my readers worldwide and the tabulation service for making my day !