My blog’s Second Birthday

My blog, Visceral Observations, turned two on 16th Feb, 2009. 5 days after I celebrated my own birthday. 🙂

On this occasion, I wanted to dedicate my meagre blogging success to few of my blogmates. 🙂

Ishmeet: I found his blog googling Nach Baliye (yes, I was a fan of Nach Baliye till its second season). He had written a long post about a last season. Avid reader that I am, I was soon caught up reading about his life. I could identify with some of his frustration with ambitious parents, his confusion with what lay ahead later in life.

Ish promptly blogroll-ed me and was one of my regular commentators. Before I had discovered his blog, I hardly knew anything about commenting or blogrolling. His was first blog I ever commented on. Visceral Observations has always been huge on comments and discussions, I guess I must thank Ish into initiating me into that.

Ashish: Ashish was Ish’s friend, who promptly welcomed me into blogsphere. He created badges and headers for me. He solved me tid-bit technical problems a newcomer faces. He is also the first person to award me few times on his old blog. Ashish, thank you, for being such a motivator to me. 😀

Two of them (Ish and Ashish) still remain special to me. I still comment on their each and every post, though they are now very few and slow to come. Most people, initially, found my blog through them or this is what I like to believe.

Dev: Dev had written a comment on my blog advising me to write short posts for he felt I had interesting things to say. Being a new comer, you take every feedback seriously, (I don’t mean that I don’t take him seriously anymore. :P) I shot him an email to explain what he meant. Though I still have failed to take his advice (for I still write long posts), we are  regulars on each other’s blog. We have had our share of conflicts with him, but we have never let that affect our friendship. He has always been there, starting from Avant Garde Bloggies judgement. He may crib, but he is very dependable. 🙂 Dev has come a long way from being a ‘lallopallo’. (He will kill me, but I just couldn’t resist this last dig. :P)

Anshul: He is a friend (he is now a celebrity of sorts, has been mentioned in newspapers, NDTV and also MTV tickr). 🙂 He is also my unofficial editor. All that crap writing and typos you see here, blame him. He does a shoddy job if I call him “oye editor!” He demands respect, you see. 😛 Jokes apart, He always has right things to say without any expectations. What I like is that our friendship is unconditional. Just as I can disrespect him by calling him ‘oye editor’ anytime, he can refuse to be my editor anytime (FYI: He tried to resign, I didn’t let him. :P). Usually, he is sane, but he has his own quirks. Like you never know, he can later ask me to edit this part out. 😛

Vimal: I stumbed across his blog while looking for kindred souls, who were not as taken in by overrated Jodha-Akbar, as rest of the blogosphere was. Since then I have been a regular visitor to his blog, so has he been. He always credits me in his blogging journey saying he found a blogging circle through my blog. But the truth is Vimal is part of our blogging circle because he, himself is an ideal reader for whom a blogger likes to write for. He analyses everything you write and will discuss things candidly. He writes his blog as candidly, without any airs or pretensions. People identify with his warmth and genuineness. Vimal is also part of my one fav personal jokes that I share with every friend.

Vimal was part of my Scrutinising Committee for Avant Garde. So during one interaction, he told me that he thought I was a man writing under a woman’s name. I was bewildered. I don’t write under any pseudonym. And my name is by far most common female names around, there was no scope of confusion. Were my writings ‘manly’? Ahem, whatever that meant, I quickly forgot. Few days later, Reema told me that some spam communities of Tamil/mallu actresses (I am not sure of exact region) were added to my orkut profile (without my knowledge, of course). And then it came to me! Because I had these stupid communities added to my profile, Vimal ‘wisely’ assumed I was a man lusting after those actresses! Ha ha

Nita: Her blog is one the best blogs I know in my blogosphere. She writes very well-researched, insightful posts. It also happens to be very widely read blog, ten times my humble readership. She was also one of the revered judges for Avant Garde, I admire her perseverance and professional ethics. She is one of most regular and consistent bloggers around.

Reema: She created ripples in the blogosphere when she declared a painstakingly created list of awards in each category. I discovered several bloggers on my blogroll from that list. She awarded me Ms Best Blogger. 😀 (By the way, she still awards best post of the week. If you have written a masterpiece this week, make sure she reads it.)  She was also part of my Scrutinising Committee, and had a great eye for detail. I relied on her to point out genuine faults. She is completely a no-non-sense, pragmatic and efficient girl. She is only one from blogosphere who sent me an ecard on my birthday this month. In fact, she has remembered my birthday since long time, as evident from her comment in an old post. That reminds me I must thank all the other bloggers for their wishes. (Sulz, Dev, Arpit, Anshul, Sakhi et al, I hope I have replied to each of you individually.)

Amit: Amit’s About Me page is as if he has ripped it off from mine. Barring computer games, we share all other interests. I too am a movie buff, carry a book everywhere I travel, love to travel….and so on. Like my blog, his blog has no niche. He too writes about social issues, movies and books and so on. So I feel here is another kindred soul on blogosphere. He had also called me an inspiration for blogging in one of his posts (though for all wrong reasons :P). I specially remember gender-related posts (rapes in Orrissa, dowry and so on) from his blog. Wish we had more guys like him.

Praneshachar has been one of my regular commentator’s on the blog. He has always been an epitome of encouragement and benevolence. He also wrote a guest post about disability for my blog. I noticed later that his son too had commented on his father’s post with pride. I was honoured when Praneshchar invited me for his daughter’s wedding in Bangalore. Thank you, Praneshachar. I feel privileged.

Arpit: This boy who is in the last year of the school maybe a recent entrant to blogging. He is an ideal reader from whom one loves to blog. His comments are warm, happy, insightful and he always comes back to answer when you have replied to his comment. Commenting is all about communication and this guy knows how to communicate. I hope he utilises his skill to hilt and has a great future ahead. Best of luck, Arpit!

However, there have been other people who I must not miss. Chirag, who volunteered to create logos for my Avant Garde, I had other designers, but it was he held the fort for me in the end, [By the way, vote for him in I3 blogging design contest, we all are there in his design] Muse, who took up additional work even those she was back from surgery, Dinsan, who used to be usually first to comment, Shefaly who used to bring new things to the table in everytime her comments (I say ‘used to’ for she hasn’t commented here since long 😛 ), ever-dependable Sakhi who helped me with my sis’s diagnosis, Rupa, who may not seem around, but emails me when she finds anything worth appreciating, eccentric Falcon, exotic and enlightening Manofroma, absent Ruhi, interesting Sulz, Nikhil (my favorite publicist) and Smita (read her humorous recent rants) who pitch in their random insights and many more bloggers like nimble Vikas, perceptive Nimmy, and fiery Indian Home Maker who are new to my circle.

Related Posts: A Year of My Blogging Journey

Birthday cake picture courtsey Webweaver clipart.