You put into words what I could only articulate as “grrrrgh”.

From the moment this post started moving from my heart to my mind I intended to have one more crossed-out achievement.

It was to be a picture of Odin.

How can any man take credit for a child.

1 sperm… No 9 uncomfortable months… No hours of painful childbirth (and in Odins case emergency caeser as both mother and child were about to die), no chaffed and bitten nipples. Just the odd dirty nappy after the fact.

I’d like to see someone say I (or any man) can’t take credit for their child, I doubt this post would come close the the expletive force. Yet it would still recognize the *part* played in the achievement, rather than taking full credit.

Personally I don’t buy into the ‘I only blog for myself’ stuff. Yes writing can be cathartic, enjoyable and many other things that benefit only the writer, but if you wanted to write only for your own benefit, then why do it in public? If you publish your writing it is because you want someone to read it. It might be that you want to make connections with people, or that you want to receive feedback, or that you want to educate. But the very point of a blog is to put your writing into a public space. Page hits are, in part, and with caveats, a measure of your success at interacting with other people via your blog if that is what you set out to do.

I can also understand why you were angry enough to post this. I cannot understand how it is unacceptable for you to advertise your hits and thank your readers, but it is acceptable for Oestrus to post something that deliberately attacks other members of the blogging community for achieving success by their own measures!