Ryan Seacrest, Carson Daly and Pitbull all counted down to start 2016 on national television, but I know that the new year can't truly begin for all us until we know the top visitors to Sean's Ramblings in 2015. Like past years, this information is courtesy of Google Analytics.
Top 10 Number Of Visitors To Sean's Ramblings By City
1. New York
2. Chantilly, VA
3. Pittsburgh
4. Arlington, VA
5. Washington
6. Deerfield Beach, FL
7. Chicago
8. Los Angeles
9. Houston
10. Towson, MD
This is the third straight year New York finished in the top spot.
For many years, some variation of Pittsburgh, New York, and Washington always finished in the top 3. Washington has slipped the last two years, and my guess is that's because the popular blog, DC Blogs has gone dormant as has the DC blogger community. (There's a DC Bloggers MeetUp group that just started, but where the DC blogging community seemed dynamic about 6-7 years ago, it's no comparison to the current vibrant Pittsburgh blogging community.) The fact that I seem to write less and less about Pittsburgh sports is probably the reason my hometown finished 3rd.
As a reminder, if your city is not in the top 10, visit my blog from multiple computers or mobile devices in 2016 early and often and encourage your friends and family to do so too.
Top 10 Visitors by Country
1. United States
2. Canada
3. United Kingdom
4. Australia
5. Germany
6. France
7. Russia
8. Philippines
9. South Korea
10. India
Where did you go Brazil visitors? I guess you'll be back in 2016 since you won't find any better coverage of the Summer Olympics than here!
Finally, in the past, I shared the top 10 keywords used to find Sean's Ramblings. However, I'm not sure about how reliable this is anymore particularly since there are separate entries for Sean's Ramblings, Seans Ramblings, Sean Ramblings, etc. Therefore, here are the Top 10 Visited Posts In 2015 (even if they were published prior to 2015).
People still find my blog for this post simply because folks freak out when they see Sun Refining & Marketing on their credit card bills. This company is also known as Sunoco.
Korean pop superstar Hyomin threw out the first pitch at a Pirates game. I'm still convinced that the Pirates would have won the Wild Card game if she threw out the pitch at that game too.
Welcome to my 11th annual year in review, where I take the first few lines of the first entry of each month in order to produce a random and (hopefully) interesting summary of 2015.
January: Happy 2015! Now that 2014 is complete, it's time for my annual post where I share data about Sean's Ramblings visitors and how people find this blog.
February: Happy Tuesday everyone! Let's get right to the trivia today. Your challenge is to answer the questions based on the pictures below.
March: I don't understand Maroon 5. I mean, I understand that they have a string of catchy pop hits, but they're as big as they are solely because of Adam Levine.
April: Today’s post comes from Stephen of the Crank Crank Revolution, and is part of a special day of shenanigans from other Pittsburgh Bloggers. You can see my post over on Jelly Jars where I share a never-written about story about trying to impress my wife by biking on our honeymoon.
May: I received a message in my Spam folder recently from someone named BadGirl28. Yes, it really was a Spam folder. Anyway, I was curious about why BadGirl28 went by BadGirl28.
June: There hasn't been a Trivia Tuesday here in a while, and this one is unique. Your challenge is to answer these very random questions.
July: Meow Mix isn't saying anything, but I can see what's happening. They are discontinuing the wet cat food that Ziggy eats. I used to purchase Ziggy's wet food at Target, but they stopped carrying his specific food a few months ago.
August: I watched a lot of wrestling when I was in middle school/junior high. Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant, Jake "The Snake" Roberts, Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat, The Junkyard Dog, The Ultimate Warrior, The British Bulldogs, King Kong Bundy, Hacksaw Jim Duggan and so many others including Rowdy Roddy Piper who passed away on Friday at the age of 61.
September: We went to a birthday party at a park on Sunday, and as we were leaving, I noticed that a youth group that I was involved in during high school was setting up in a nearby pavilion. I approached one of the girls, who was probably about 16, and had the following conversation.
October: One of my favorite events of the year, the Fall for Fairfax KidsFest, takes place this weekend (Saturday, 10/3 & Sunday, 10/4) at the Fairfax County Government Center. This free event is a huge hit for my kids.
November: Many years ago, I was somewhat of a political junkie. I majored in politics, organized a successful voter registration drive in college and had internships with my Congressman and a State Senator. Like many people, though, I got tired of all of the partisan fighting.
December: I received a coupon pamphlet in the mail recently featuring ads and deals for local businesses. While there didn't seem to be anything worthwhile, I couldn't help but notice this ad on the cover.
Many television shows, magazines, websites and newspapers have best and worst of 2015 lists. Well, I do too, and while mine is probably not nearly as good as their lists, I think that my list is more entertaining.
Best TV Show of 2015: Fargo
Game of Thrones is always amazing, and while I don't see every episode, Last Week Tonight with John Oliver is both educational and extremely entertaining. I also always enjoy Brooklyn Nine-Nine. However, my favorite show this past year was Fargo. Although season one was in 2014, I didn't actually watch it until late 2015. And I couldn't stop watching it. Billy Bob Thornton was incredible in such a fascinating character, and the rest of the cast was amazing. I've recorded all of season two and am finally going to start watching it any day now.
Worst TV Show of 2015: The Mysteries of Laura
I've never actually seen this show, but the fact that it wasn't cancelled cost me The Ted Marshall Open TV Death Pool championship for the 2014-2015 season. I seriously have no idea how this show got renewed and is still on the air.
Best Song of 2015...
My rule is that the best song must be from a video that I posted on my blog in 2015. Your nominees are:
Renegades by X Ambassadors Ex's and Oh's by Elle King Uma Thurman by Fall Out Boy Beggin for Thread by Banks Kathleen by Catfish and the Bottlemen
And the winner is: Kathleen!
Worst Song of 2015: Dooo It! by Miley Cyrus
The Video is NSFW due to language...and for it being a terrible song and terrible video.
Best Movie I Saw In The Theater: Trainwreck
I saw two whole movies in the theater in 2015. That's double what I saw in 2014! Trainwreck was much funnier than I expected. Surprisingly enjoyable appearances by John Cena and LeBron James. Oh, you may have heard that Amy Schumer was in it too.
Worst Movie I Saw in The Theater: The Martian
Okay, so The Martian was better than Trainwreck, but it was a weird experience for me. I finished the book only a few days before I saw the film, so I compared the two constantly. While I won't give away much, there was a part in the movie where Matt Damon drives thousands of miles across Mars. In the book, this was quite an eventful trip. In the movie, driving across Mars was as difficult as driving from New York to Chicago on the interstate in perfect weather. I was also frustrated by the ending. It's really my fault though. I should have known better than to finish the book and see the movie so close together.
Best Book I Read in 2015: My Sunshine Away: a novel by M.O. Walsh
Here's the description: A man reflects on the summer of his fourteenth year, where in Baton Rouge he fell in love with a golden-haired girl across the street before an unspeakable crime shattered illusions in his seemingly idyllic neighborhood.
My Sunshine Away is a coming of age book, but quite dark because of the crime that I guess I can't speak about. The book was very well written and the neighborhood certainly had some fascinating characters. I highly recommend it.
Honorable mentions: Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng and The Martian: a novel by Andy Weir.
Worst Book I Read in 2015: Go Set A Watchman by Harper Lee.
To Kill a Mockingbird is one of my favorite books all of time, so I felt like I had to read this book. It actually felt like a homework assignment reading the "new" Harper Lee book at times. There were parts that were really good. Lee also gave what appeared to be an accurate description of what it was like to live in the South during a specific time period. However, Atticus Finch, though fictional, is supposed to be perfect (at least in my mind) and some of his views in Go Set a Watchman don't mesh with how most people in the real world view him.
Best Sports Moment: Max Scherzer's No Hitter
I didn't like the fact that this occurred against the Pirates, but seeing a no-hitter live and at my son's first baseball game was priceless.
Worst Sports Moment of 2015: The Pirates Losing the Wild Card Game
The Pirates had the second best record in all of baseball and were rewarded by getting to host the NL Cy Young Award Winner. Naturally, Arrieta dominated. Here's what ESPN's Jayson Stark wrote about Arrieta:
1) Over his last 18 starts of the season, the Cubs went 17-1 -- and in the only loss, they got no-hit (of course they did) by Cole Hamels. (2) Over his last 20 starts, he hit as many homers as he allowed (two). And (3) if you'd started your clicker on Aug. 1, you'd have counted 269 pitchers who allowed at least four earned runs in an inning. And while all that was going on, Arrieta was also allowing four earned runs -- in two months.
Stupid Cubs. Stupid Arrieta.
Best Blog Post: (Tie) My Summer of Sean series & a special TMI Thursday
The Summer of Sean series chronicled part of my incredible summer of 2000. Unfortunately, I only wrote a few posts. When I have free time, maybe I'll continue this series. I also shared what really happens in my bedroom on nearly a nightly basis.
Worst Blog Post: My Interview With Dr. Christopher Geary About Big Ben's Injury
Based on his position as an Orthopedic Surgeon and Chief of Sports Medicine at Tufts University Medical Center, you would think that Dr. Geary would be better than sharing wild Tweets. He also didn't give much in my interview with him or come close to apologizing for declaring that Big Ben was out for the season.
I hope that you had a great 2015 and a better 2016!
Welcome to Sean's Ramblings! If you're looking for thoughts on pop culture, music, fun and informative links, random DC and Pittsburgh info, sports (particularly Pittsburgh sports), and just what's going on in my life, then you're come to the right place.
Any questions, comments or links? Contact me at seanramblings[at]yahoo[dot]com.
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