One year ago today at 3:38 pm I published my first blog post. I’m not sure why I started a blog. One of my former students and friend Ken Ristau had mentioned his blog and I had looked at it on occasion, but it was more of an impulsive move that led me to create Codex Blogspot a year ago today.

In the year I have made some 335 posts (not quite once a day) on subjects ranging from Dead Sea Scrolls to ancient toilets, Jesus junk to inscriptions, Hebrew language to Hebrew tattoos. Since 7 July 1005 (when I added a site meter), I have had more than 40,000 visitors; my average for the last six months is around 200 visitors per day.

I have to say that I have very much enjoyed the blogging experience. I have enjoyed the camaraderie between bloggers and the relationships I have developed with others.

In honour of my blogiversary, I think I will put together a “Best of Codex” post to highlight what I think some of my best posts have been. So stay tuned.

I look forward to see what the next year will bring.

Thank you for taking the time to visit!

D’OH! I am so sorry!

OK, let me explain. My wife left yesterday to go to Indonesia for business (she works in international adoptions), so I am single-parenting it for a week. As it turns out, I didn’t have a chance to check my blog statistics yesterday, and guess what? I missed identifying who my 40,000th visitor was!

Today when I checked I was already at 40,200+ and my basic Site Meter account only provides details for the last 100 visitors. I even upgraded to a pay Site Meter account thinking that I may be able to gain access to past visitors — but unless I am missing something, it can’t be done.

What this all means is that I am not able to award a free book to my 40, 000th visitor. I am very sorry. So, instead, I will award the 40,444th visitor. As I write this the visit count is 40,219. That means that by Monday there will be a winner, so stay tuned.

Again, apologies to (un)lucky number 40,000!

I apologize that I didn’t get around to announcing this earlier (I’m not sure what I was thinking when I said I would announce the winner on my actual birthday! I ended up being a bit busy!), but I have picked a winner in my “Tell-A-Friend about Codex” Contest.

The way the contest worked is that all you needed to do is either email a friend about Codex: Biblical Studies Blogspot and tell them to visit or post a similar note on your blog, and then let me know about it by carbon copying me the email. The contest closed on my birthday (April 1st). To pick the winner, I wrote down all the submissions on a piece of paper and picked one out of a hat (actually it was a tupperware bowl). Well, enough with the preliminaries… the winner is…

Scott Bailey

As it turns out, Scott, is a student at Taylor University College just entering his second year of studies. He is a bright student with all the makings of a good biblical scholar, so I am delighted to award him a book in the area of biblical studies or Hebrew language.

Now, just in case some skeptical souls in the blogosphere think the fix was in (especially considering the shadow of doubt on my integrity lingering as a backlash to my perfectly excecuted April Fool’s Day joke! :-)), let me assure you that the draw was done above board. Scott had the advantage of having more than one entry because he emailed (spammed?) quite a few people about the contest. Either way, it saves me shipping charges, so I am happy!

40,000th Visitor Contest

While one contest is now over, don’t forget about my 40,000th Visitor Contest. As I have done in the past with my 10,000th visitor (see here), whoever happens to be my 40,000th visitor will also be a winner! There is not much you can do but visit here often and perhaps even read something! Once I have hit the 40,000 mark, I will blog the time and location of the lucky visitor and then they can contact me via email and verify with their IP address.

If I have done my math right, I shoud reach the 40,000 mark within the next few days. To be fair, I have changed my site meter icon so that no one knows how close lucky number 40,000 is.

Things in my little universe are converging. The visitor count for my blog is approaching the magic 40,000 number. My one year blogiversary is also approaching on April 8, 2006. What is more, my own 40th birthday is fast approaching (I was born on the morning of April 1st, 1966 — and yes, I know that is April Fool’s day! And yes, I know how appropriate people who know me think that is! :-)).

At any rate, if I have done my math right, it may be possible to reach the 40,000 visitor mark on my actual 40th birthday! This will mean that my vistor count will also have to be a bit above average for the next three weeks. In order to meet this goal and to reward my 40,000th visitor, I have decided to have a couple contests.

Tell-A-Friend about Codex Contest

First, in order to raise my visitor count to ensure I hit 40,000 on or before my birthday, I am going to have a “Tell-A-Friend about Codex Contest.” The rules of the contest are simple:

• Email a friend about Codex: Biblical Studies Blogspot — whether about the blog in general or about a particular post that you liked — and tell them to visit. The email should say something about my blog (“It’s the greatist thing since sliced bread”) and include the url to the blog (https://three-things.ca/blog). Here’s the catch: you need to CC me the email at “contest[at]biblical-studies[dot]ca.” The cc’d email will constitute your entry. (Remember to CC me or I won’t know you entered.)
• Then after 12 noon on my 40th birthday (April 1, 2006, MST), I’ll pick an email completely at random from the cc’d emails sent to the above address and, presto, that individual will be the lucky winner. (Don’t worry, these emails will only be used to pick and contact a winner of this contest. I promise.)

So get those emails going! And remember to tell them to visit us here at Codex! Feel free to email as many friends/enemies as you want or have — multiple entries are more than welcome! (BTW: email lists will only count as one person!)

In addition, a post on your blog with a trackback or a link back to this entry or this blog will also constitute one entry. All you need to do is email me at at “contest[at]biblical-studies[dot]ca” and let me know about the post.

40,000th Visitor Contest

As I have done in the past with my 10,000th visitor (see here), whoever is my 40,000th visitor will also be a winner! There is not much you can do but visit here often and perhaps even read something! Once I have hit the 40,000 mark, I will blog the time and location of the lucky visitor and then they can contact me via email and verify with their IP address. To be fair, I will change my site meter icon once we get closer to the 40,000 mark so that no one just sits there refreshing the webpage!

The Prizes

The lucky winners will be able to select a free book from a number of possible options (that I will provide you) that relate to the focus of this blog (e.g., Biblical Studies, Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, Classical Hebrew, Faith & Film, Religion & Popular Culture, etc.).

Stay tuned for contest updates and good luck to everyone!

And the winner is… Talmida from Edmonton, Alberta. As it turns out, my 10,000 visitor has been a regular reader of my blogspot. In her blog profile Talmida describes herself as “a liberal zen catholic studying Hebrew who suspects that the proof of God’s existence lies in quantum physics.” However, from chatting with her in the last week, she is no longer sure how liberal, how zen, or how catholic she is! And although she still thinks God is visible in quantum phyics, she is now positive that God can be found in Biblical Hebrew.

Talmida loves languages. She went to bilingual schools (French/English), picked up some Latin and a smattering of German in University and used to be able to write notes to her school friends in the runes from the title page of The Hobbit. What is quite amazing is that she taught herself biblical Hebrew! After a few months learning online, her husband bought her a Biblical Hebrew textbook, then she came across my Answer Key, which eventually lead her to my blog.

While she hopes to study Hebrew at university some day, it may be a while. Until then, she is teaching herself and blogs about it (and whatever else catches her interest) at The Lesser of Two Weevils.

Once again, I want to congratulate Talmida for being lucky number 10,000. And in order to encourage her study of Classical Hebrew, I am pleased to present to her a copy of Christo H. J. van der Merwe, Jackie A. Naudeé, and Jan H. Kroeze, A Biblical Hebrew Reference Grammar (Biblical Languages Series; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000). Buy from Amazon.ca | Buy from Amazon.com