Don't Call Me Marge: Happy First Blog Birthday!

Woot you guys, guess what! Today is my first blog birthday! Don't Call Me Marge is one year old today!

Huzzahhhhhh!

And to think, when I first started this thing, I thought, “Well, this will last for a couple of months. Six, if I don't get bored.”

But oh my gawd you guys ONE YEAR LATER and look at me go! My little blog is growing up and I'm so proud! *sniff*

Of course, I couldn't have done it without you! That's right, YOU. I know I don't usually get all cheesy and stuff, but if it weren't for you guys, hanging around here and giving me the thumbs-up all the time, there'd really be no reason to keep blogging. It's pretty depressing to writing a blog that no one reads, and I should know, cause this is my third one.

In celebration of my first blogaversary, I'm going to recap some of the things that have happened over the past year here at Don't Call Me Marge. Don't worry, I'll try not to bore you.

My first blog post, one year ago today, was “I really love seaquariums, even though I'm really scared of fish.” In it, I talked about my deep-seated fear of fish, which goes back to childhood and is the primary reason I am afraid of the water. I hate going into the water because I just know something's going to eat me, unless it's a swimming pool. As I explain in the post, I cope with this fear by going to seaquariums and taunting the fish.

Yo Mama's so fat, she drives a spandex car. ~ Andrepiazza

About two months later, I won my first award!

Sweet!

I got it from Violeta Nedkova (@LynMidnight), who writes the blog Lyn Midnight Against theOdds. She's really cool, sweet, and well-mannered, unlike myself, so it's a wonder she speaks to me at all.

I proceeded to receive three additional awards, because I'm awesome like that.

The Finger Award is my personal favorite.

Popular posts in the beginning were “9 Reasons You Didn't Get a Third Date,” “6 Reasons I'm Single,” “How Not to Talk to Women” and “4 More Stupid Things Men Do,” which apparently cost me some dates, but only with douchenozzles, so that's okay.

"So, do you think you'll ever have kids?"

Actually, “4 More Stupid Things Men Do” sparked a flame war in one of my Facebook groups, and gave me my first taste of social controversy since high school.

It also earned me a reputation as a “feminist” blogger, because apparently all you have to do to be a feminist is complain about the behavior of a man or men, once.

Also, I guess being a feminist is a bad thing?

So I wrote “How to Be an Independent Woman (for Realsies)” and totally forgot to put in “Squash your own bugs,” because I fail.

Seriously, though, I really thought I'd piss off more people more often, especially when I bragged about being a genius (which, as everyone knows, is just plan rude) and again when I criticized certain tenants of the Christian religion (also rude). But, I guess I just can't do wrong in your eyes, dear Blog Fans – or at least, not too much wrong.

You're scared of me, aren't you?

I exercised some total SEO mastery with “Rapture tomorrow, don't forget your helmets,” which jumped to the top of Google results for the keyword “rapture helmets” within ten minutes of my posting. Pure luck on my part, as I didn't realize there actually is such a thing as a rapture helmet. Didn't realize the rapture required protective headgear, but I guess the faithful are afraid of colliding with airborne birds, aircraft, meteors, etc, and sustaining head injuries on their way to everlasting life. Because God won't put in the extra effort to protect His Chosen? Or does it even matter, since I suppose you're technically already dead?

Are you a zombie, at this point?

I'll admit I struggled a little coming up with blog topics sometimes, but creating the Fun Friday Facts column really helped with that. Even though I didn't actually do them every Friday. Most Fridays, though. I'm not a total loss.

Sometime in September, probably, I made the acquaintance of Solitary Mama, one of my two Blogging BFFs. She introduced me to Bubblegum Cari, my other Blogging BFF, and together we formed the Bitchery Triad. If you're wandering what that is, it's a whole heap of awesome, rolled up and compressed into a fun-sized package. Every month or so, we get together and blog on a shared topic, in a manner described as “addictive,” “more fun than TWO barrels of monkeys” and “well out of line.” Check out the Bitchery Triad page of this blog for a complete list BOTH of the posts we've done so far!

And, of course, I quit smoking, over two months ago now! Thanks for sharing that journey with me, but don't worry, it's not over! There will be further updates on my exciting new life as a non-smoker, especially when I'm stuck for blog topics.

What have you enjoyed about the past year? What's been your favorite post? Tell us in the comments!