It's always a little sad when the red dots disappear!

I use a utility called Clustrmaps which is just one of the ways you can get some idea of where your blog visitors come from. You may have noticed it on the sidebar of this blog.

It's always interesting to watch the red dots that indicate visitor locations building up on the map but at the end of each year the map is cleared and archived and it's back to square one. That happened this week. When his happens I like to keep a record of ‘the dots’ and have done so for the past couple of years on my website.

Not all visitors show up on the map but it always amazes me to note the range of locations represented. I know some visitors are likely to have just accidentally stumbled on to the blog and then made a hurried departure, having no interest whatsoever in its contents, but I'd like to think some people stick around and maybe come back again for a second visit or even more.

We all have our own reasons for keeping a blog and I didn’t set out when I started mine with the intention of attracting an audience, however I have always slightly envied those who boast huge lists of Followers and who have dozens of people commenting on their posts. I know I can’t compete on that scale but I would like to thank those of you who have been kind enough to post comments and also those who have become followers of my blog and also have popped comments in the guestbook of my website. It’s good to know that I have made some sort of contact with some other ‘real’ people out there.