Blogging Highlights

No special milestone, except that I was tagged by Prathama here. I thought it was an interesting tag to pickup. Having been blogging for more than 3 years now, the tag provides me with an excellent opportunity to look back - a recap of all the 186 posts I have done so far. It was interesting to go to the archives and reread my own writing and soak in the waves of memories of the years gone by. (Here's my centennial post that also coincided with My Musings' second anniversary.)

Yes, blogging is worth the time and effort; don't you think so too? So thank you so much for the tag and here I go...

1. Blogger must be nominated to take part.

Yep, nominated.

2. Blogger must publish one link from his/her blog for each of the following categories:

•  Your most beautiful post...

Have to do a lot of thinking here - so many aspects can define beauty...okay, so I feel that my most beautiful post was the one on sunset - "In My Sky At Twilight" - it has pictures that I had taken from my patio of the setting sun, interspersed with poetry from Pablo Neruda and Wordsworth. I go back to it a lot of times just to read my favorite lines and relive the splash of colors.

• Your most popular post...

I am going by Blogger statistics here. The post that has been most visited, that is the post with the maximum number of page views, is Tom and Jerry: Just a cat and mouse game? I have got a lot of mails on the post from so many people around the world (I swear I mean it literally :)).

• Your most controversial post...

Obviously, Anti Corruption and Anti Hazare. I had vehement supporters and aggressive opposers. I got so many anonymous hate mails too!

• Your most helpful post...

This is a tough one to decide. Helpful to whom? Aah, yes - it has to be De-tanning! I wrote about some easy home remedies to get rid of a bad sun tan and the post has been fairly popular with a lot of people writing back saying the tips really worked!

• A post, the success of which surprised you...

It has to be High Five! I never expected such a wonderful response from not only people who follow my blog but random visits by blog walkers too! Not only did the women show whole hearted appreciation but a lot of men folk "liked" it too :).

• A post you feel didn't get the attention it deserved...

This one has to be one of my earliest posts. I had just started writing and didn't have too many readers. I think if I had written Veni, Vidi, Visa - I came, I saw, I shopped more recently, it would have been more popular :).

• The post that you are most proud of...

I like all my posts - I mean that's why I write them, right? :). On a serious note, I am quite proud of all the original poetry that I have published as part of this blog. Some of my personal favorites are: Living 'Life', Washed Away, Demystification, Consolatory?, Light?, and Arbit.

3. Blogger must nominate 5 or more bloggers to take part, who in turn publish links to their blog posts and nominate other bloggers.

A lot of bloggers I follow have already done this tag or something similar. So, here are the people who I think write awesome blogs and have not done this tag. Please take this up if you have the time and the inclination :)!

- Steve E at The Fourth Dimension

- Aparna at Adventures in Mommyland

- Akum at Live While You Are Alive

- Shimmer at Meaningless Scribble

- AJai at Aj's Take 

And, I am done :).

Tequila Sunsets

I was thinking what better way to welcome March than post some of the last of the sunset fiestas of the season. Soon it will get warm and then hot, and hotter. The skies will become languid and I'll miss this splash of colors at twilight.

"Splendor of ended day floating and filling me, 

Hour prophetic, hour resuming the past, 

Inflating my throat, you divine average, 

You earth and life till the last ray gleams I sing...

...Wonderful to depart!

Wonderful to be here!... 

...Wonderful how I celebrate you and myself 

How my thoughts play subtly at the spectacles around! 

How the clouds pass silently overhead! 

How the earth darts on and on! and how the sun, moon, stars, dart on and on!...

...O amazement of things--even the least particle!

O spirituality of things!... 

...I sing to the last the equalities modern or old,

I sing the endless finales of things,... 

...O setting sun! though the time has come,

I still warble under you, if none else does, unmitigated adoration." 

[Excerpts from Song at Sunset by Walt Whitman]