However, since I understand that many people are bored by numbers I figured that I’d just lay out some of the statistics that are available regarding JerseySmarts.com. I’m not talking about hits (though I’ll include them below), but rather other somewhat interesting statistics…

Since I merged JerseySmarts.com with Joe’s Journal in November 2009, WordPress has stopped over 140,000 spam comments from being uploaded to the blog. Some 34,000 of those spam comments have been received in the last two months.

There are over 2,100 real comments from fine readers like yourself scattered throughout JerseySmarts.com. Thanks!

As of today, there are 1,951 entries on JerseySmarts.com. A few months ago I read somewhere that some guy won an award for having written the most original blog entries or some such crap. I don’t remember how many entries he had actually written, but I do remember that his number was much lower than mine – I definitely have that guy beat!

Since the merger of JerseySmarts.com and Joe’s Journal back in November 2009, this blog has received over 156,000 hits. While that’s not bad, it’s not where I’d like it to be. Although I guess some better news is that 2010 had more hits than 2009. And, so far, 2011 is on pace to increase the total number of annual hits by over 40% year-over-year. Again, that’s not bad for a personal blog of this size.

There you go – some quick, harmless facts about JerseySmarts.com.

The Joe’s Journal & JerseySmarts.com Merger
Without getting into too many details, the merger of Joe’s Journal and JerseySmarts.com has been nothing short of a major success. On any given day, either of the two blogs averaged some 40 or so hits (JerseySmarts.com would get 5 or 10 hits each day and Joe’s Journal would range between 60 and 80 hits each day). With the new, merged site, there are some days where we’re over 300 hits, some days over 200 hits, and we’re now averaging between 100 and 150 hits each day. What’s exciting is that these hits aren’t really people reading the blog in the morning, afternoon, and night (though you should be checking in as often as possible). Rather, the hits are largely being generated by unique visitors. That’s awesome!

Also, the financial end of this blogging business has been great. Between the sponsors that you can find all over this blog and the program-specific advertisements that I’ve been setting up here and there, Joe’s Journal on JerseySmarts.com is making a healthy living for a small, personal blog!

The Stock Market
What a mess!? Many of you know that I started investing in earnest a few months ago and since that time I’ve taken a hit in the market just like everyone else. The difference, though, is that the hit that I’ve taken is small compared to those folks who have big time money in the markets. First, I don’t have big time money to invest at this point in my life! Second, I started investing after the market was already down.

When I began investing I knew a few of my stock picks for sure. I knew that I was going to invest in Sirius XM because – no matter what the biased internet media may say – this is a good long-term stock for the small time investor’s portfolio. I also knew that I was going to invest in the automobile industry and that I would probably go in to Ford heavier than GM…which turned out to be a good move!

I’m invested in a few other stocks, but what I didn’t know when I started investing (and I still don’t know now) was how I would diversify the industries represented in my portfolio. Right now I have all of my exposure in the retail sector. I’m thinking of investing in some smaller, solid banks to get into the financial sector. Just a thought at this point, though…

Usable Web Solutions, LLC Doing Well
My small business is doing very well in this rough economy. All of my clients have signed on to extend their business relationships with my company and I’ve actually begun to bring in a few new clients; only two clients at this point, but two very strong organizations. For the longest time I stopped taking on new clients because I was getting some of the weirdest requests from some shady characters. But it’s good to be back creating new websites again.

The other part of the website business that is doing well is the advertising revenue. Perhaps my suite of sites has been lucky, but we’re all doing very well with selling ads and getting some income from those ads.

Teaching at the Local College
Two quick points on my adjunct professor position at the local college. Number one – I suggested a new course for my department and it was accepted! Starting next spring I’ll be teaching Community Public Policy (i.e. Community Development)! This is pretty exciting because I designed the course from the bottom up. Very cool!

Number two – well, here we go. Remember a few months ago when I had a problem with a colleague of mine at the local college? Turns out that for the class I’ll be teaching next fall, not only will this person be teaching in the same classroom that I’m scheduled to be in on Monday, but on Wednesday, too. What joy (sarcasm)! I’ve already filed a request to have my room changed because no one should have to put up with racism, sexism, or ageism – especially not on a college campus of all places!

Update – April 13, 2009: My class reassignment request was granted. Thankfully, I won’t have to deal with this person again!

There you have it, folks. A quick, random update on some of the things going around in my head. I’ll be sure to put some more random ideas up soon!