HAPPY BIRTHDAY JIDE SALU DIARY (JSD)

November 12^th 2009 is JSD’s birthday

It was on this day last year that I posted my first diary entry.

I had one objective in mind, to chronicle my life in Nigeria as a recent returnee from the U.K after almost 20 years of “sojourn”. I made a personal pledge to be objective and to report what I experience.

From where I stand, I am nowhere near my goal yet. I know I still have a lot to do.

There have been ups and downs as expected with a a personal blog such as mine.

Cyber friends have become friends along the way. There have also been controversies and snide comments. But, hey, I am took and still taking all on the chin.

Numerous emails and comments from readers have encouraged me. My dear Uncle Biodun Omole inclusive. Thank you sir.

It was never my goal to write and post every day. I did not plan to; however, it has turned out so, more out of my passion for writing. At a point in time, the bar was so high that I feared the fun of writing – because of the huge expectations of readers – would diminish.

Hence, my post on this particular day where my ordeal was narrated and began to count down to the day (which would have been today) when I planned to throw in the towel.

I read comments and emails of encouragements and suggestions and therefore took a breather and decided against quitting. As a result, the pressure of posting every day, like a vapour, evaporated. Thank you so much for all who contacted me via emails and comments. There was no way I would be at this point without you the readers and believe me, this is no cliché.

A little bit of statistics for you;

• 365 days(No. of days in the year)
  
• 106 days (minus no. of Saturdays and Sundays in the year)
  
• 259 days (Total no. of days left to blog)
  
• 302 posts (an average of a post per day for the year)
  
• 2,328 comments (as at today)
  
• 6,051 destroyed spam comments ( and still phishing, little buggers)
  
• Readers from 201 countries (and still rising)
  
• 134,500 views (and still rising)
  
• Rated 9^th most viewed blog in Nigeria (Courtesy Afrigator)
  

I want to take this opportunity to say a big thank you to Gerard Onochie, I doff my hat to you sir and thank you so much for all your words of encouragement. I really am looking forward to meeting you in person one day.

And to you all, I just would not risk listing names. All I want to say is that I am most grateful to you all for stopping by and leaving comments, which I must say is “air” to a blogger.

And to many more years and I promise you with a series of surprises.

Watch this space.

God bless you all.