Search Me

WTF? Google

This single post, The Cars of the Beast, is responsible for nearly 60% of the traffic on this blog. Folks are coming from around the world to see that page. It's been viewed from one hundred countries just since February     What's up with that?

The Cars of the Beast, on LostBob's Blog

A Google Web search for cars of the beast, the title of the post, shows nothing unusual. My Blog is listed part way down the first page.

Note: Clicking on the images below will repeat the Google Search as I entered it, opening in a (single) new window.


If I put the search string in quotes Google's response is more specific but still nothing to compel folks from around the world to click on it.

A closer look at my StatsCounter reports show that over 77% of my visitors arrive Google Image Search, less than 4% from all other searches and only two of nearly 2000 from Google Blog Search. Isn't that curious?

A Google Image search for the cars of the beast yields this:

OK, the shiny black Porsche Carrera and Lamborghini are pretty cool. I'd click on those. Seems to explain why folks find that post. But watch what happens if you put the search string in quotes:

Every picture displayed, save one, is by LostBob, every link is to this blog. Those on the second page too. Most of the images shown do not appear on the Cars of the Beast post. In fact, clicking most will take you to places in the blog where the car of the beast photos cannot even be seen. Some take you to posts with photos different than the one shown.

WTF? Google

And here's a surprise. If You leave the s off of cars Google gets really personal, ignoring the car photos completely. I think Google is trying to scare me away from Flickr and onto Picasa.


Big Brother really is watching.

Dylan's Children's: Book Forever Young

This clip from Bob Dylan was a great find surfing YouTube.

Checkout Bob Dylan's Children's book     Forever Young

Old Blog gets New Life

Once upon a time in a blog much like this one, incompetence and circumstance led to duplication (sort of). A few old posts languishing in the blogosphere. Stories about Hillary Clinton, the girls of Mumbai and an apartment in Kazan. Pictures of a bar in India and some Churches in Rome. All gathering digital dust with nary a virtual viewer.

Such was the fate of LostBob’s Old Blog (sort of). until the discovery of bloggers magic cut-and-paste time machine. That little ‘Post Options’ drop down in the edit window. Suddenly it's 2006 again. My old posts can re-appear in a blog that wasn’t even around then. They have been reincarnated.

Most of what was once there has moved here. So if you’ve stumbled here or there via some wayward link or if Google has lured you here for something that was once there but is no longer. It’s probably here. So there you are.

Actually, it’s here

The pictures are links to the most popular old posts
The Car of the Beast?	Seaview Hotel
Loading Oil in Dubai	The Girls of Mumbai
Ponte Vittorio Emanuele	Santa Maria Maggiore
The pictures are from the old posts. The links take you to the post's new home. The post about "The Car of the Beast" was revised and is now the most popular post on this blog.

Remembering John Cephas

Legendary bluesman John “Bowling Green” Cephas dies at 78

“More than anything else, I would like to see a revival of country blues by more young people … more people going to concerts, learning to play the music,” Cephas once said. “That’s why I stay in the field of traditional music. I don’t want it to die.”

I met John Cephas in the early 90’s at Oliver’s Pub in Hagerstown. A genuinely friendly man, he spoke of how much he enjoyed playing in Hagerstown.

From his agent, Piedmont Talent’s Steve Hecht

A descendent of slaves, Cephas was born in Washington, D.C. in 1930, and acquired his “Bowling Green” moniker from his childhood days in Bowling Green, Virginia. Cephas discovered gospel as a child, but soon learned the blues from a guitar-playing aunt while his grandfather taught him about eastern Virginia folklore.

I have put together a little playlist of John Cephas clips on YouTube. The clips show him solo and as part of Cephas & Wiggins with long time partner Phil Wiggins on harmonica. The clips show him doing what he did best, playing and teaching. Spend a few minutes and check them out. Or if you are too busy just minimize this window and enjoy the music of John Cephas for a few minutes.

Fellow Hagerstownian Grudnik captured a nice shot of John Cephas at the Western Maryland Blues Fest in 2005. See it on his Flickr photostream.

Note that links in this post open in a single new window.

Samos is Amos

but Sanon ain't Anon

If Samos is Amos and Amos is famous then Sanon ain't Anon no more.





The photo is of the entrance to Luna Park in Melbourne, Australia.
Clicking on it will take you there. Go ahead. I’ve already changed the subject.