Kudzu String Band and Chess

     1.3 million. That’s how many visitors this blog reached yesterday. I don’t know if that means anything, but the average is about 450 views per day. 
     Most of the visitors are from the U.S. with Russia and the Ukraine a distant second and third. The UK, Canada, the Netherlands and Germany are way back. 
     I was interested to see what subject matter is the most popular...engines, openings, biographies, tournaments, etc. Oddly, no one category stands out. 
     Posts on engines are popular, but what really surprised me is that one of the top viewed post is the one about Bobby Fischer’s girlfriend...the one where I “borrowed” her picture from another site and it turned out to be a young Hillary Clinton. They do favor each other though. 
     Not far behind in the number of views was my comparison of the Chess Assistant and Chessbase programs. A post titled Nanny McPhee of Chess featured one of my ugly, wart covered games, so I'm not sure why it had so many views.  Perhaps the attraction was the post title?!  Very close behind was GM Rosendo Balinas and a Sugar High...Real or Myth? 
     It seems odd, but my update on a (then) new, but very short lived, server site called Chesshood racked up over 12,000 views. Supposedly the lady who owned the site (Emilie Ropers) was killed in a shootout, but nobody ever located any news of the shooting or her obituary. I traced the incorporation to a private address in Florida. It was all very strange. 

     By far the all time leader for views is a real surprise as it had nothing to do with chess; it was a video of the Kudzu String Band from Marion, Alabama. They play what they call "regressive bluegrass," music that pre-dates legends like Bill Monroe and the Stanley Brothers, Ralph and Carter. That post has over 16,000 views! 

Legendary buck dancer Thomas Maupin