[LMBTO] There's THREE Candles on this Eurovision Blog's Cake...

You can see why I'm a blogger, not an artist!  This is a very crude 'Paint job' adaptation of a picture of a cake given to Alex Larke on his 36th Birthday, just before the 2015 Final in Vienna - not sure why the cake only had three candles but it suited my purposes exactly!  It's July 17th and that means...

Three candles, three years old - that's is my blog timewise, let's see what that means as far as the blog is concerned.  Those with long memories will remember my first ever post, way back on July 17th, 2013..."Eurovision and Me":
It was all about why I chose the blog's title (I think that I made the right choice) and what I planned to do with the blog itself.  Never did get to go to Copenhagen in the end - will I go to Ukraine?  At least I have managed to post on average once a week (just, about 1.2 posts per week!) and each article seems to be more popular viewwise as time goes by - posting every post to all the Facebook Eurovision groups helps there...

I know, not one of my snappier article titles but indulge me, the blog was a year old!  My posting has increased since then, which is good to know as it means I still have the blogging bug and hopefully still finding subjects to write about that are interesting to read.  I have also kept up the good housekeeping promised by checking that all my videos work each month and I have spread the word on social media, including Google+, Twitter and more importantly Facebook.  I have obviously found a lot more and varied material to cover than I expected in 2014, as I have only just covered Katrina & The Waves 1997 win in the last month!  I will highlight more of my favourite artists and at some point may start reviewing my favourite entries as well (although they probably do coincide a lot!).  I did stick to my promise that I would give you lots of comment and coverage on as many National Finals and the big event itself as I could - I hope it has all been entertaining in that regard...

Last year's second birthday ("Happy 2nd Birthday, Eurovision blog! What happened last year?") saw me celebrate what I had done over that year just gone and I notice that I helpfully have done the maths then to show that I did indeed submit more posts this last year than ever before (74 compared to 62 and 46):
A lot of what happened to me over the previous twelve months was listed and to be honest, most of that has been repeated this year (I'm a bit of a creature of habit!).  For instance:

• UK Juror for the OGAE Second Chance Contest - check (x2 if you include that I have already submitted my scores for 2016);
• Attending my first Eurobash - yes for number 2, number 3 will be in Manchester, a new venue for me;
• Eurovision Beauty is still going, although due to work commitments and the success of this blog, it has become a bit of a sideline for me;
• Obviously no Greatest Hits Concert to attend this year but I did make it to the UK NF and the London Eurovision Party;
• I was more involved with Vision Magazine, the OGAE publication, in that I made it into Issue 101 (Summer 2015) as part of the Magazine's Panel and Issue 103 (Winter 2015), where I authored the '10 Essentials' section with "The 10 Essential Songs by Eurovision Beauties"!  The special ladies chosen (in chronological order)?

This has suddenly zoomed up the list to be number one over the last few months and I really am not sure why!  I suppose that I haven't seen any other 'alternate reality' posts in a Eurovision blog, which might be the reason for it, or maybe retro fans of 1980s New Wave music have found the article on Google!  I did enjoy thinking about 'what if?' - maybe I should do some more...


2) Helena Paparizou - "My Number One" (Eurovision 2005), 1123 views (03/08/2014)
As you all know, Helena is my favourite lady of Eurovision and was the subject, until recently, of my most viewed article.  I know that many Ms.Paparizou fans liked this post and I am sure that she will continue to pick up the odd male admirer along the way...


3) Guess who went to Eurovision's Greatest Hits Concert?, 1036 views (08/04/2015)

A lot of us went but I put my experience down online - for those who want a trip down memory lane, you could do worse than click the link...


4) UK Eurovision Winners : Bucks Fizz - Making Your Mind Up (1981), 1006 views (07/09/2014)
The UK winning entry I like the least is my current number 4 viewed post - no idea why, maybe it's the witty and well observed comparison between the band's routine and a football training ground move that has made it popular...


5) Eurovision 2016?  En Av De Bästa Någonsin..., 950 views (04/06/2016)
This was just four posts ago and it looks as though lots of viewers wanted to read what I thought of this year's Eurovision...and no-one corrected my attempt at Swedish, so hooray for Google Translate!  This piece was a pleasure to write, given that this year's Contest was such an outstanding success.  Ukraine has got some big shoes to fill (I assume that Måns has bigger feet than Petra)...


The only other stats to note before I tidy up the loose ends of this third year birthday edition is how many views I am getting now.  Last year I had made it to 72000 views - what is it now, as of July 16th, the day before my blog's third Birthday?
152,007 views!  And that includes my best ever month, May this year, where I had 13526 views alone.  How did this happen?

Every person who has read something from my blog is to be thanked big time - I am still enjoying writing my articles and being nuts about Eurovision, but if no-one read my posts then I would be at best disheartened and at worst I would have given up long ago.  These 152k views are all by other people - I learnt long ago on previous Blogger blogs how to turn off the tracker for my own clicks.  I hope that everyone still enjoys the posts and what I write...because it's a lot of work for a huge ego trip!

In fact, give yourselves an award:
Oh, sorry, not that one - I indulged myself after Stockholm.  As I couldn't make the big event itself, I purchased a limited edition 2016 Mini Glass Trophy as a lasting memory of one of the best Eurovision Song Contests I have ever seen and possibly the best season I have covered so far on this blog.  Only 100 made...wonder if it will become a collector's item one day?

As I am not a professional singer (nor a particularly good karaoke one, come to think of it), this will be the closest I get to a Eurovision trophy:
But who knows what will have happened during the next twelve months?  One thing is for sure - if I have anything to do with it...