I check in with posts like this every so often so people can get an idea of what goes through my mind with regards to the website they visit. I’ll also display my knowledge of analytics so maybe you’ll even learn a thing or two.

Here is the site traffic for this entire year, 2017.

You’ll note that I’m averaging over 200 people a day, but they aren’t staying. An 83% bounce rate is pretty bad. Under a minute stay certainly isn’t wonderful either. People land and leave.

This is where the traffic comes from. The vast majority comes from organic search like Google. Direct is people typing in rnningfool.com into their URL. Referral is mainly Bansheemann7.com. Social is Facebook and Twitter. I expect the high bounce rate from Organic but seeing the Direct is at 69% is discouraging. I’m hoping it’s people visiting so many times. The average time from people who want to come to the website is a little over a minute which is what I expect people to give me.

When you say, how the hell does rnningfool.com average over 200 people a day? Here is what people land on.

This should come as no surprise. Dan Bilzerian and Claire Abbott dominate the traffic. The 3rd place / is the home page, so I’m pretty pleased with a 51.98% bounce rate. Notice the only traffic the site gets is featuring hot women.

Being the one man operator behind the site, I ask myself, what direction should I head with this site? The answer is obvious…Boner Material! I went through the pages last night and made sure they all had original content. I had done the brunt of the work with the sliders a few months ago so I pretty much made sure the links worked and added a few galleries to keep them relevant. I expect the Katee Owen page to take off shortly. I also added a Sara Underwood boob on her page…which should get the site banned all over. I’m not real clear on the legality of adding these pictures with zero permission. If the site makes no money, I imagine there is nothing to go after.

Now this is where the oddity of it all comes in. Boner Material is not my passion. I’m not Mr. Skin. You can’t argue with the stats though. I don’t want to scour the internet for the hottest pictures of girls and post them all over my site. I do this because it gets the eyeballs. You can ask why do you want the eyeballs? It’s not that I WANT the eyeballs, it’s that I can get the eyeballs. That the work I do on this site with content, sliders, pictures, organization, and the like are skills. I know its bizarre to think like this, but I’m learning when I post Charlotte McKinney’s full sized breast, people take notice. Is it sick and perverted? I see how people could think this. However, WHY DOES IT GET THE MOST TRAFFIC? Everyone and their Puritan value system only wants to see titties. This is 2017.

I also updated the running log. I haven’t seen this take off in the traffic category…

Yesterday was one of the first days I’ve ever solved the WSJ crossword puzzle to completion. If anyone does the crossword puzzle, you’d know that Monday’s has the easiest puzzles and they get harder as the week goes on. So even though it’s not a monumental accomplishment, I knew it was going to be a good day.

Considering where I was playing from last Monday (in a puddle of self-loathing), and coming off of a nice Super Bowl win, I was in high spirits. Work was fine and then I proudly wore the Snakes hat into the bowling alley. For those who are unaware, the worst scoring bowler of our team has to wear the Snakes hat as they enter the alley and wear it until game time. I was feeling pretty good compared to the last two weeks where I was hangover recovering. I also incorrectly identified us on Facebook as Snakes on a Lane when we are correctly Snaking Back Monday.

We started out slow in the first game but the other team was way worse. We took game 1. We rolled a solid game 2 and it was pretty much over before it started. In the 3rd game, the Weens and I started, out battling with 4 straight strikes.  He dropped off in the 5th and I ran the strike total to 7 in a row before I hit a ringing 10. I  converted it to keep the game alive and struck out the rest of the way for a career high. Sam struck out from the 7th and our team registered the highest scratch game score of the entire league at 889 (222.5 avg). My 279 also is the 2nd highest score achieved in the league. Our 2360 total pins was our 2nd highest team score ever, missing our high water mark by 6. If this isn’t momentum, I don’t know what is. We proved that we can beat any single team if we bowl our best.

I also bet against the Sixers which is easy money at this point. Without Embiid, this team couldn’t cover against a WNBA team.

Out of all of my friends, I’d rate the action I give on sports near the top. Not necessarily in dollar amounts, but in the sheer amount of events I bet on. I bet NFL, CFB, NBA, EPL, MLB, NCAAB, horses, golf, and any other event that I fancy. My perception of what people think of this, if I were to say this, would be viewed as negative. This I don’t understand.

I have Y amount of dollars. I’m betting X amount of dollars. If my Y number is far greater than my X number, what the hell is the difference? It’s not like if I lose what I bet my life will be any different. Of course you could make the argument that this money can be put in better places but that’s a personal decision. Maybe you think a 100 dollar pair of shoes is money well spent and I think 3 hours of my time watching a game with the potential to win 100 is money well spent.

The real reason betting takes place is to put your money where your mouth is. If you truly believe in an outcome, betting on it is the surest way to express this opinion. Your backing your thought with a financial statement. Talk is cheap. That being said, the worth of being right is also fulfilling. I took the Heat last night against the Sixers. Knowing the Sixers. Knowing Embiid is out. Knowing the Heat have won 9 in a row. This wasn’t a tough choice and one of those easy games. I’ve learned that there are no such thing as easy wins, ever, so you take what you can get.

This brings me to the Super Bowl. The Patriots last 6 Super Bowls have been decided by 4 points or less. The spread is 3. This in itself is reason enough to bet on the Falcons. However, if I bet the Falcons, and the Patriots blew them out, I would have to shake my head and wonder what was I thinking betting against Brady and Belichick. I don’t even think the Patriots have that great of a team but Brady’s record over the last 14 games is 13-1. The question lies in those dangerous 3 points.

I have $246 in my gambling account and will be pressing it all tonight. I already have 20 on the blue Gatorade at the end and will put 20 on Devontae Freeman to score the first TD. I’m not really into the rest of the prop bets with super juice on them. Unless it’s a sure thing, which nothing is, it doesn’t make sense. So here’s to the Pats -3 and everyone reading to enjoy Superbowl Sunday.

In 2015, the Patriots won the Superbowl against the Seahawks on a Malcom Butler INT at the goal line. Unbeknownst at the time of the INT, Butler would develop into one of the premier CB’s in the league (4th highest PPF rating this year behind for Talib, Chris Harris, and AJ Bouye). At the conclusion of that game, I had some action on what color Gatorade would be poured over the victor’s head. I had chosen Patriot blue. This proved to be a money maker.

We’re back at it again thinking the Patriots will indeed win the Super Bowl and Mr. Belichick will be taking a blue, not clear (the betting favorite) or golden, shower. Is this easy money? HMMMMMMMMMMMM. I don’t think so. As much as my intuition tells me, “why is there any reason they would swap from blue?” I found this picture below.

There you go ladies and gents, here’s to blue money.

If you’ve played an RPG before, this is how my health bar looked on Monday. I was operating at about 25% efficiency. In my mind, I incorrectly reasoned that if I stopped drinking by 4pm on Sunday, I’d be fine. I ended up quitting at 6pm which wasn’t horrible, but my nutrition during the day is what made me pay the ultimate price. I ate a Healthy Choice frozen meal at around 11 and then some Ham and Cheese Sliders at 2pm from Misconduct. After trying to find the beer Pliney the Elder, and getting yelled at for talking to some dude’s girl, I went to Fado and caspered out around 6. I drank 1 glass of water for the day and wound up essentially passing out at 6:30 and sleeping until the next day. Productive Sunday.

The previous paragraph is setting up what it takes to recover. On Monday I knew I was hurt. I walked in to Dunkin and the music seemed like it was blaring. I ordered my coffee and felt like an unsure human driving to work. I sat behind my desk and tried to settle in but it was to no avail. I then went to the gym and ran for 30 minutes which was painful but I deemed it necessary. I then ate another small meal and chugged two coco-waters. I had bowling that night and knew that I was in trouble which proved to be the case. The team went 2-2, but I was about 60 pins below my average, which just doesn’t happen if I’m feeling 100%. Another negative side effect is you don’t sleep for more than 2-3 hours. Your body keeps waking you up either to pee or just because. Not fun.

HH – UD Highschool BBall Game

I survived a tough Monday and knew it was only going to get better. Not quite. On Tuesday, I did start to feel like a normal human but there are dehydration symptoms that don’t go away in a 24 hour period. You think all you have to do is drink water but this doesn’t work. Your body can only take so much water so the more water you drink, the more times you pee it out. My mouth stays dry. My brain is still not fully smart. My shits aren’t normal. You belch up acid and pray to god it goes away. I was at least able to eat some food which, when you can’t do, is when you have the ultimate length in recovery time. I went to the gym where I powered through another work out and then went to Upper Dublin basketball game and got through it.  I watched some TV and actually got a full night’s rest.

This brings me to today. I was able to write the trip blog post which I hadn’t been able to do. Frankly, you can’t do anything when you feel like this to its full potential. It’s sort of what it feels like being the slow student in school. You can’t pick up ideas quickly and everything you do is below your ability. This weekend was coming off of my trip and essentially 3 weeks of not doing any think like this to my body. It sort of confirms my thought that these issues stem more from my environment than my personal addiction to drinking. It’s not like I crave a beer. It’s like I drink because I’m at a bar watching a game. I share this info so other people read it and know that you don’t want this. I also probably write it so I know that I don’t want it for myself. It’s not the best way to go through life. This is obviously not the first time I’ve gone through such a process so I’m sort of like an expert on it now so that’s the other reason I post.

If I was smart, I would have spent my Sunday finishing my entries for the Euro trip because then I would be done. Instead, I went to the bar and drank for a few hours and pretty much ruined my Monday. Not only did I feel horrible throughout the day, I was pitiful at bowling after being a maestro over the weekend.

I sort of combined this with an 8 hour poker session on Saturday which trailed into the early hours. I did end up winning about 2 hundo, but the amount of money I tip on drinks and won pots could have easily made it 400. Either way, I’m almost through the full recovery mode and will be back to normal tomorrow where I hopefully continue the aforementioned posts. Just an FYI why I haven’t been posting.

I boarded the train to Innsbruck at 8:25 am. The train departed at 8:40 am. Fun fact about me is I’m a bit of a nut when it comes to timing. Some people would see a train schedule of 8:40 am and arrive at 8:39 am. I would have a meltdown if I had to travel with this person. There is a re-assuring, stress free, feeling when you show up ahead of schedule. Not only do you usually get first choice of seats, you aren’t rushed. For this particular journey I spent 5 extra Euro to reserve a seat which was unnecessary. If you’ve never took a train in Europe, you wouldn’t know that you can reserve seats. On crowded trains, I would recommend spending the money. There is nothing worse than not having a seat in a country you don’t speak the language.

The train ride is 4 hours and the views are spectacular. The Alps surround the train and you could take the same picture of the mountains over and over. The only point of interest on the train ride was in the last hour a couple sat down next to me. I was seated in an area with 2 seats facing 2 other seats. The seat in front of my was occupied by a foreigner (or native depending on how you look at it) and an English couple sat down next to us. They started chatting and speaking English which is obviously enjoyed by me. They spoke very eloquently with an English accent. At some point I asked where they were from and they said England. The man’s teeth were all over the place so I should have known. We talked for about 45 minutes on the train ride to Innsbruck and I kept honing my listening and engaging skills. I enjoyed the ride.

I got off the train and met up with my contact. We got some pizza and discussed shop for a few hours. We ate dinner at a very authentic Austrian restaurant and I had some pork, vegetables, and some noodle type food which was delicious. We capped off the day with a few beers and I went back to my hotel. BBC was usually the only channel that I would put on and Trump was all over the airwaves. I know this day wasn’t my most entertaining but it was one of the true “business” days.