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This is what happens when you try to pet your Shiba with staticky gloves in the middle of a coat blow…

Petting your Shiba during a coat blow
31 December 2011

So WordPress wanted me to publish my annual stats last year, but I didn’t think it was worth reporting after only five months worth of entries and 8000 hits. Now, another year and 45K hits later, some navel-gazing seems more justified. This also allows us to give thanks all around.

I don’t really like the template provided by WordPress, so I’ll summarize here:

Our top 5 referrers, in order:

  • The Misadventures of a Shiba Inu, or the tell-all tales of two resident Shibas, Loki & Juju
  • The BRAT blog, an exemplary nation-wide (+ Canada), breed-specific rescue network that joins pet owners, breeders, and Basenji lovers alike
  • Our Shibal Inu, the best collection of Shiba comics on the net!
  • Inu Baka, a charismatic group of dogs and people that I’ve enjoyed getting to know
  • Demon Dog Sports, where Prince Zuko reports on life from the other side of the Bay

Most active commenters this year:

  • Jen from Inu Baka leads this chart! She sure knows how to make new dog bloggers feel welcome.
  • Losech from The Adventures of Conker has been running steady with a very active blog of her own, too.
  • Ting from Shio the Shiba’s Blog (now with mooore Emi!) pops in every now and then to leave a whole flurry of comments, like the blogger equivalent of a Shiba/Basenji 500.
  • Vicky, one of our most active commenters without a blog (unless she has an undisclosed one stowed away somewhere…)
  • Adam from The Dogs of San Francisco, another fun local blog that adds personality and charm to this bustling Bay Area that we both call home

The rest of the stats aren’t that exciting. But another cool 2011 blog event was when Mac and “PupChow” nominated us for a Liebster Award. Woohoo! Thanks guys! We’ve been slow about passing it along…

Apparently the terms of acceptance are as follows:

  • Thank your Liebster Blog Award presenter on your blog.
  • Link back to the blogger who awarded you.
  • Give your top 5 picks for the award.
  • Inform your top 5 by leaving a comment on their blog.
  • Post the award on your blog.

While [unsuccessfully] crawling the Internet for the origin of this award, I read elsewhere that one is supposed to nominate blogs with a readership of 200 or less. I tend to naturally gravitate towards the “small time” blogs (and I mean that in a good way), so this stipulation does nothing to winnow down my pool of nominees. I’m also never sure who’s willing to pass these things along (and I’m not offended if you don’t), and who regards them as a gimmicky nuisance… So in the spirit of discovery and starting off the new year by paying it forward, I pass this award to the following:

Hinoki the Shiba Inu, one of the latest blogs to storm the Shiba scene, with lots of great pictures to boot!

Dog Newbie (中文), breaking down linguistic borders. This blogger really knows her dogs, and is extremely active in training and dog sports — yet she still finds time to translate and compose original entries about the science of positive training in Chinese.

Musings of a Biologist and Dog Lover, who coherently and affably blends her studies of science and pets. Her regular features including Mismark Case Studies, Guess the Genotype, Unusual Breeds, and more are very educational.

Shiba Pursuit, an artistic couple with their adorable Shiba puppy, Kuma.

Junk Thief, who typifies what I think of “Basenji people” in the best possible way. The blog is not entirely about his pair of BRAT rescues, Shaka and Audrey, but the worlds he creates through his madly eclectic art should be more than enough to draw you in.