A fair number of people have joined us just as the blog was winding down, so I thought for their enjoyment, and as a look back for those of you who've been reading from the start, I'd do a little Day of X retrospective/greatest hits post to wrap up.

First, the top 5 most popular posts, based on reader feedback (thanks all of you who emailed in, commented, joined the Red Thing campaign or otherwise let me know you'd enjoyed these):

1. International Red Cross and Red Crescent Day (featuring the Grand Unified Red Thing)
2. Torture Accountability Action Day
3. Elder Abuse Awareness Day
4. World Knit in Public Day
5. International Remembrance Day

My own personal top 5, the posts I'm most pleased with (that weren't on the above list):

1. International Nurses Day
2. World Environment Day
3. International Children's Day
4. World Blood Donor Day
5. World Day of Love and Thanks to Water

And finally, I know a lot of you enjoyed the graphics and badges, so here are the remaining posts with graphicky things:

1. International Clinical Trials Day
   
2. World No Tobacco Day
   
3. International Panic Day
   
4. World Humanist Day
   
5. Milk Chocolate Day

Cheerio!

Blah blah blah girlfriends. Blah blah horrible e-cards. Blah blah satire.

Hollow laughter.

Okay, it's time to lay my cards on the table. It's no secret that the quality of the updates here has been dropping lately. Less funny, less original and less good.

I don't know whether it's my general state of mind (not so great lately), my general tendency to lose interest in a project once the novelty wears off, or just that I didn't have as much to say as I thought I did. Whatever the reason, what was once a fun and stimulating daily exercise has become a frustrating and intimidating chore, and I'm rarely ending up with something I'm truly happy with.

I want to thank you all for coming along to read Day of X, especially those of you who've left comments and kind feedback, and otherwise participated - you're the main reason I've kept going as long as I have. It's not you, it's me.

The site will remain here, of course, and there's a fair bit of good stuff in the archives. I may even end up coming back to Day of X in the future, if a particularly exciting new idea or approach strikes me.

If you're interested in what I do next, or on the offchance Day of X starts up again, you can join the email list (I will never spam you or share your details with anyone) and I'll post something on here to let you know what I'm up to.

I have some other web projects I want to look at now I have a bit of extra free time, some old and some new, and I may well have something interesting for you in the next couple of months. The heart of my online empire is Silverknife (also mostly on hold at the moment, for similar reasons), and that's the other place to look for what I'm currently up to and what I'm doing next.

For now, thanks again and take care.

That's your Day of X for the forseeable future.

Labels: Blah, girlfriends day, goodbye

Image by iharfilipau via Flickr

System Administrator Appreciation Day falls on the last Friday of July, and it's the day to appreciate the lucky guy (or occasionally girl) who keeps your computer(s), your network and your internet connection working, often despite your best efforts.

At one time there was pretty much nobody on the internet except system administrators and academics, so as you'd expect there's already a vast wealth of sysadmin humour out there.

The most famous example is probably the Bastard Operator from Hell series by Simon Travaglia, which is not only a fun (if very very wrong) read and an immensely cathartic experience for any techie, but a nostalgic journey through the history of institutional computers and networks from the golden age of Big Iron to the millenium.

So I'm just going to say a big "Hi there and thanks" to all you talented sysadmins out there, and to everyone else: For the love of God think before you open that attachment.

That's your Day for today.

Labels: Big Iron, Cable, computers, IT, networks, Simon Travaglia, sysadmin, system administrator, system administrator appreciation day

Image via Wikipedia

Happy Insulin Appreciation Day, everybody!

On this day in 1921, Frederick Banting and Charles Best injected a test subject, a dog called 410 (giving dogs actual names didn't catch on until the early 1930s), with pancreatic extract, and recorded a major drop in its sugar levels.

Sadly they were too busy to give the poor animal a Mars Bar, as they found they had discovered insulin, the chemical which our bodies use to regulate sugar levels.

Insulin Appreciation Day was apparently invented just this year by Clarence Haynes, a 91 year old diabetes sufferer from Canada.

Sadly it comes 48 hours too late to save the lives of the thousands of diabetics who were killed off by Milk Chocolate Day.

That's your Day for today.

Labels: Charles Best, Conditions and Diseases, Diabetes, Frederick Banting, Health, Insulin, insulin appreciation day, Pancreas

Image by rachel is coconut&lime via Flickr

Sigh.

It seems that the world's population are so desperate to justify their grotesque overindulgence that we're well on our way to having every single day in the damn calendar dedicated to a specific foodstuff.

Is this what we've come to as a society? No life-enhancing Celebration, nothing new to learn, no "try something you've never done before", just cram your greasy maw with more carbohydrates. Whoop-de-doo.

Celebration Suggestions:

Eat lasagna. Stuff yourself with pasta and cheese, and maybe, just for a little while, it will fill the aching void in your soul.

That's your Day for today.

Labels: food, lasagna day, World population