A little later this month this blog, Okie on the Lam, will turn three years old. During these last 36 months my WordPress dashboard shows that at ‘Okie’ there are “1,847 posts and 1,064 comments, contained within 109 categories.” I also notice that WordPress will have its next iteration, version 2.3 released on the 24th, which will be the actual anniversary date for this blog. I’m a pretty committed early adopter, but due to the many plugins and widgets that are used here, I’d best wait a bit until the dust settles before rushing out and breaking the whole silly thing. On that day I’ll post my SiteMeter stats, not all that impressive I’m afraid, with some additional comments.

What I would like to do over the next couple of weeks is to look back upon a few posts, mostly for my own benefit. You see, being a blogger in the long tail is like someone that has joined a group, or like a newbie in a religious faith — at first you burn with the fire of conversion and seem to have endless energy. You’re also intent upon telling anyone and everyone you meet about your new-found self. Messy gut spilling is also par for the course, as well as late-night and weekend blogging — both of which your stats counter will finally convince you are Quixotic at best, futile time-wasters at worst.

In my very first post, which was actually on a Blogger version of ‘Okie’, I introduced myself just a touch, resisted the urge to issue a manifesto of intent, and then charged right into the issue of interest for me at the time, the MSM reaction to the 60 Minutes’ faked National Guard memos.

The mainstream media seems to be having a very hard time adjusting to the proliferation of information outlets on cable, talk radio and the internet, especially those that resonate with a conservative voice. The youthful campaigners for change from the 60’s & 70’s are now the old men of hide bound tradition, and they are fighting as hard as their forebears did to maintain the status quo. Having gone through the university system during the 70’s, I actually find this hilarious.

The masses now have many different sources of information, opinions and styles of delivery to sample, making it shameful if one is not well informed. Like it hard and brutal? Try Hannity & Colmes on Fox (Conservative) or Chris Matthew’s Hardball on MSNBC (Liberal). Rather laugh? There’s Dennis Miller (C) on MSNBC or The Daily Show with John Stewart (L) on Comedy Central. Slate will give you a liberal perspective while the main commentators of conservative thought can be found at the Townhall. And of course, there are all those blogs!

Maybe Time, Newsweek, CBS, NBC, ABC et all are wringing her hands over the shift in influence, but I’m having a great time tracking this election cycle. It’s even cutting into my car magazine reading time. Can’t wait for election day, or maybe the day after when those Kerry/Edwards stickers I see on all those Volvos around here start getting covered up with HILLARY in ‘08. Geez! Let’s get the war done and start getting Condi ready to run . . .

My, my goodness — three years and not much seems to have changed, except for names and places of course. But, fake news? See TNR and the Scott Beauchamp scandal that is still playing out because like with Dan Rather and Mary Mapes, TNR’s editor Franklin Foer just keeps doubling down and wishing it will all go away. It won’t. We have a Blogosphere now in case those wascally wriberals can’t wrap their craven little Lefty minds around actual truth.

I still see Kerry/Edwards stickers here on the Westside, and I still won’t put GOP stickers on the family vehicle for fear of keying or other vandalism, although I do think I’ll get one of those full rear-window graphics for the Envoy using my blog header design — that should get some attention. Heh!

Hillary stickers are showing up, but no real talk of Condi running anymore. The woman is probably too smart for that . . . why take on all that extra grief? As an aside, take a gander at photos of any of the 2-term presidents and see how young they looked compared to those taken in their last year, even Reagan. It’s a brutal 8 years, easily aging them a good 10-15 visually. Can you just imagine what Hillary will look (and sound!) like in 2016? Check that year — we’re making decisions that might hold through 2016! Yipes!

Of course, I still clearly remember Election 2000, sitting in my Mom’s little front room in late November (she was still alive then) watching the endless recounts in Florida, the legal machinations of mister-global-warming himself, Al Gore, as the Democrats tried to recount some of the votes, keep some uncounted, and just do whatever they could to negate the actual outcome of the election. Even with the help of the MSM, who had called Florida for Gore before the panhandle precincts in the Central Time Zone had closed, they still lost Florida’s electoral votes — a defeat that I don’t think the Democrats will heal from in my lifetime. It’s been almost 7 years now and they sure haven’t gotten over it as yet!

So, that’s how this all began. I never would have imagined that I could, let alone would, write so many words as have been pounded out on this and other various keyboards. Along with all that spewing forth of personal opinion and hopefully reasonably-enlightened comment has come the joy of constant reading. I’ve met and learned from a lot of bloggers, some in person some in cyberspace, more interesting folk than I had interacted with in many a blue moon, and I’m extremely grateful for that.

When I began blogging I tried to close each post with a little zinger, or pertinent comment, or open ended thought. I closed out that initial post with this promise:

I’ll get better at this, really I will . . .

I guess the reality of whether I kept my word on that is up to you, ‘Okie’ readers. Thanks for comin’ by — sit a bit, read a spell . . . and, to quote an ol’ TV hillbilly, “Ya’ll come back now, ya hear!”

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