On New Year’s Eve, I looked at my WordPress statistics to see which articles in The Earthling’s Handbook drew the most readers in 2012.  Interestingly, 9 of the top 10 were published before 2012!  I choose to believe that this is not because my writing has declined but because my older articles have ongoing relevance and accrue more publicity around the Internet each year they exist.  🙂  I scanned down the list of articles ranked by number of readers to determine the Top 10 articles written in 2012.  Here are both lists:

Top 10 Articles Overall

1. Important Information on Blood Types of Parents and Children.  Most people know that receiving a transfusion of a different blood type can be dangerous, and that an Rh-negative mother pregnant with an Rh-positive baby needs special treatment.  This article explains two other facts about how blood types are inherited, each of which can cause medical problems, and each of which took me by surprise in my own life!  My feeling that these facts aren’t publicized enough has been strongly supported by the search terms that bring readers to my site and by the number of readers who click on my links to authoritative sources that provide further information.  You need to read this article if you are surprised by the answers to these questions (a sampling from searches that brought people to my site just this morning):
   • “Is it possible that parents having blood group A and B have a child in group O?” YES.
   • “Can people with the same blood type have kids?” YES, that doesn’t cause any problems at all.
   • “Do babies get affected if mother blood type O and father blood type A?” YES, this can cause a serious medical condition.
2. Costco vs. Gordon Food Service.  This is a comparison of two bulk discount grocery chain stores, with details about specific items that are a better deal at one store or the other.  I also explain here why I do not shop at Sam’s Club.
3. Cauliflower leaves are edible!  This was a revelation to me, and I’ve seen that many people are asking the Internet if this is true.  Not only are they safe to eat, but when properly prepared they are delicious!
4. Why my child is not allowed to watch Teletubbies.  It’s because he attacked me while I was sleeping and quoted Teletubbies while doing so, after both times he watched the show, and he never did that at any other time, so I see a correlation and can’t risk continuing to allow this dangerous (and incredibly annoying) influence.  This article seems to have two sources of popularity: Teletubby-lovers who are so offended that it damages their reading comprehension and spelling ability, and worried people Googling questions like, “Are Teletubbies evil?” and, “Do Teletubbies brainwash children?”  You can see both groups represented in the comments.
5. Grocery Spending for a Family of 3 in 2010.  I wrote this after tracking our monthly grocery spending for a year and finding that we’d spent much less than the USDA says a “thrifty” family of our size would spend.  I explain here some of the ways we save money on groceries.
6. Agent of Change: What a long, lame Journey it’s been!  This is the detailed story of my Girl Scout troop’s experience completing a Journey, a new type of award-earning activity similar to a badge but longer and less flexible.  We didn’t like it much, though it did have its good points and would have had more if I had been a new leader or working with different girls, as I explain in the article.
7. The Magic Bullet does NOT work for me!  I tried a trendy food-chopping appliance and didn’t like it at all.  I suspect that part of the reason for this article’s popularity is that (as pointed out in the comments) Magic Bullet is also the brand name of a vibrator, so people probably wonder which one I am talking about.  Sorry, no reviews of vibrators here–I’ve just never been interested in trying that.
8. Organizing Girl Scout Troop Information.  I wrote up my organizational system as I was beginning my final year as a leader (2008-9) so it’s now out of date regarding specific forms and such, but the basic concepts still work.  It’s fun to see this one increase in popularity every August and September as new leaders look for help managing all the paperwork!
9. What to do when a baby repeatedly drops something.  I had no idea that my approach would be controversial when I wrote about it.  Some people think I broke my child’s spirit and prevented him from learning basic physics!  But I’m not worried, since my now-8-year-old hardly acts broken-spirited and is very scientific and sensible.
10. Menstrual Cup Mania!!!  Here I rave about the environmentally-friendly alternative to tampons that is superior in every way.

Top 10 Articles Written in 2012

1. Important Information on Blood Types of Parents and Children. I wrote this on a sudden whim in March, and 5,653 people read it over the course of the year!
2. I don’t wear makeup.  Not anymore.  Here I explain why I stopped wearing makeup and the advantages of cutting it out of my daily life.  Read the comments for some interesting recent discussion.
3. I drew the Earthling symbol for nothingness.  This is a response to seeing that phrase turn up repeatedly in the search terms bringing people to The Earthling’s Handbook.  I wondered what they were seeking…and I got a comment that explained it!
4. How We Survive Without Air Conditioning.  We make long-term choices that set us up for success, we make hot-day choices that improve our comfort, and we have the right attitude–and this article gives all the details.  My brother, a home energy auditor, posted a lengthy comment explaining some of the factors to take into consideration when deciding whether or not to use air conditioning.
5. Our Recipe Binder.  This explanation of how Daniel and I store our recipes–and how we set up the system without spending any money on materials–is one of my few articles with photographs.
6. Four More Weeks of Pesco-Vegetarian Dinners (winter).  This is the most popular in my series of posts detailing what we made for dinner for several weeks at a time.  We try to take advantage of local produce in each season while eating frugal meals of plant foods, dairy, eggs, and fish.
7. How the Dishwasher Changed Our Lives.  We lived without a dishwasher for many years.  Now we have one.  What difference does it make to the environment, my schedule, our household habits, and our utility bills?
8. Clothesline Hangers for Basement or Porch.  These traditional hanging boards, often found in older houses, are so rarely discussed that I couldn’t find a picture of them anywhere on the Internet!  Finally, I took some photos of ours and posted them along with an explanation of how to make them out of scrap lumber.  This became a featured post at Your Green Resource, a weekly linkup of environmental articles.
9. Thrifty Tips.  This is a collection of many of my best ideas for saving money, plus some links to great ideas on other sites.
10. Change diapers in bathrooms.  It’s a simple technique that gives your child a head start on toilet-training, simplifies clean-up of your hands and anything else that’s soiled, is more courteous to the people around you, minimizes the spread of germs, and is respectful of your child’s privacy.

One thing I notice looking over these articles is how allowing comments (which I didn’t do when I first started using blog software to write The Earthling’s Handbook) enriches my knowledge and makes my articles more useful!  Another thing I’m seeing is that, out of just 4 posts I’ve ever made that include photos, 2 are among my most popular.  Hmm, does this mean I ought to use photos more often?  It takes so much more time than just writing!  Even when I do it the easy way, taking the photo with my iPad instead of my good camera so I can skip the connecting-camera-to-computer step, it feels really tedious!  But it does seem that photos may be the only way to hook more people on Rambling Sprawl Estates…and there are some things that just can’t be explained so well in words as with a picture…so maybe you’ll be seeing a few more photos from me in 2013.  I made it all the way to 2012 without ever posting a photo, but that doesn’t mean it’s an Important Principle that I’ve got to uphold forever! 🙂

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