Tag Archives: blogging birthday

Happy Belated Blog Birthday!

Posted on May 29, 2026 | 3 comments

This past year has been so busy that I forgot to wish my blog a happy 21st birthday last month. I know that my writing has been inconsistent the last few years, but I’m still proud to say that my blog is one of the longest running personal blogs in the world.

Don’t believe me? Here’s how ThePhilFactor came to be: I first started writing for fantasy football websites in 2005. Then after three months I decided that I had things to say to the world, and on April 2nd 2005, The Phil Factor was born on the Blogger hosting service, where the first several years of it still exist.

My first complaint to the world was about American Idol, which was all the rage back then. I think it’s become a contest between my blog and American Idol to see who can last the longest.

After a few years I moved my blog to Posterous, which was the first blog posting website that would send your posts to all your socials. After a few years Posterous went out of business and that’s when I moved to WordPress for good.

Then in November of 2014 came the post that almost broke Reddit. Twitter People vs. Facebook People only got 15 comments on WordPress, but when it got shared to Reddit by a stranger, I got 17,000 views in one day. It had pages and pages of peoples comments on the social media war. It was the #1 post in the Reddit humor section for over 24 hours. I’ve written a lot since then, but have never had anything go viral like that since. Once I did get mentioned on a radio station in Birmingham, England. For you American’s reading this, Birmingham is the second largest city in England.

Blogging has also given me the pleasure of being able to interview some of my favorite authors and occasionally interviewing some great people from the entertainment industry that we’ve all seen on television or movies.

My favorite thing about blogging is the great friends I’ve made. How old is your blog? What do you enjoy most about blogging? What have you gotten back from blogging?

Thanks for reading! ~Phil

 

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Happy 18th Birthday To The Phil Factor

Posted on April 8, 2023 | 16 comments

*Actual picture of me

Am I the only one on the internet who celebrates their blog’s birthday? I hope not. I may not post as often as I did in the past, but I’m still proud that The Phil Factor is one of the longest continuous running blogs in the history of the world.

My blog is legally old enough to join the military, commit felonies, drink legally in Canada and buy weed in the States, so who knows what I might blog about in the next year.

As I do on my blogs birthday every year, I’m going to post the first blog post I ever wrote in April of 2005. Here it is:

What Up Dawg?

Is it just me or is everyone sick of Randy Jackson’s act on American Idol? How many times can we hear, “What up dawg?” Or his other favorite, “It was a little pitchy in spots,” or “It was just ahh ight for me.” The dude is like one of those action figures where you squeeze him and he has three pre-programmed phrases he rotates through.

Nearly as bad is Paula Abdul. Has anyone else noticed that this season she seems drunk every week? She loves everyone this season and seems to find an excuse to physically grab Simon Cowell every week. Considering her recent charge of leaving the scene of an accident after she clipped another car on the freeway, how ironic is it that her big 1988 hit song, Straight Up, included the line “caught in a hit and run”?

That was it. And I’m still proud of it. Especially that last line.

That’s how I introduced myself to the blogging world and I was rewarded with ZERO comments or likes. Also, I’d like to give a shout out to my longtime blogging friend Jennifer of Not Quite Perfect  ,and several other blogs, who has been blogging longer than me and is still at it. Visit her site and give her a like or comment.

I do have a couple blog posts planned, so like Spring, maybe my writing drive is being reborn.  Lastly, I want to say a sincere thank you to each and everyone of you that has visited, liked and commented on my blog for the last 18 years. You have made my life immeasurably better. Have a great weekend!

~Phil

16 Comments

Posted in Humor, pop culture, Uncategorized

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Happy Blogiversary to Me!

Posted on April 5, 2022 | 8 comments

Yes, on this very day, at this exact time, on April 3rd in 2005, I put my writing legs up in the stirrups, leaned back and gave birth to The Phil Factor. Yes, the image was meant to make you cringe a little.  If my blog was a person it would be starting to curse at it’s parents and experimenting with alcohol while failing geometry. There’s not many blogs in the world that have been active as long or longer than mine, and I’m proud of that. Earlier this year I surpassed 2000 posts where I have talked as if someone is listening.

My Blogger sidebar before I moved it over to WordPress. I love that at the bottom it shows 2005.

Yes, I know that over the past two years, I haven’t blogged as often as I used to. I’ve had a lot of real life going on in my life and I’ve discovered that for me writing is something I do a lot of when I’m happy and not as much when I’m stressed. I’m starting to feel a bit more settled as all the changes in my life have become the norm for me. So, as I traditionally do, I will copy and paste my very first blog post so that if you missed it, you can enjoy it as if you’re watching a re-run from an old show.

What Up Dawg? Is it just me or is everyone sick of Randy Jackson’s act on American Idol? How many times can we hear, “What up dawg?” Or his other favorite, “It was a little pitchy in spots,” or “It was just ahh ight for me.” The dude is like one of those action figures where you squeeze him and he has three pre-programmed phrases he rotates through. Nearly as bad is Paula Abdul. Has anyone else noticed that this season she seems drunk every week? She loves everyone this season and seems to find an excuse to physically grab Simon Cowell every week. Considering her recent charge of leaving the scene of an accident after she clipped another car on the freeway, how ironic is it that her big 1988 hit song, Straight Up, included the line “caught in a hit and run”?

That’s how I introduced myself to the blogging world and I was rewarded with ZERO comments or likes. Also, I’d like to give a shout out to my longtime blogging friend Jennifer of Not Quite Perfect  , and a few other blogs, who has been blogging longer than me and is still at it. Visit her site and give her a like or comment.

Lastly and most importantly I’d like to say thank you to all of my blogging friends who have made this the wonderful, welcoming blogging community that it is. I have appreciated every read, like or comment over the past seventeen years. Without you, I probably wouldn’t have lasted a year.

Cheers to all of you and I hope we can share a glass of champagne some day. Have a great Tuesday! ~Phil

8 Comments

Posted in blog, blogging, Humor, Uncategorized

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Happy Sweet 16 Blogiversary To Me!

Posted on April 3, 2021 | 9 comments

Yes, on this very day, at this exact time, on April 3rd in 2005, I put my writing legs up in the stirrups, leaned back and gave birth to The Phil Factor. Yes, the image was meant to make you cringe a little.  If my blog was a person it would be starting to curse at it’s parents and experimenting with alcohol while failing geometry.

My Blogger sidebar before I moved it over to WordPress. I love that at the bottom it shows 2005.

Yes, I know that over the past year I haven’t blogged as often as I used to. I’ve had a lot of real life going on in my life and I’ve discovered that for me writing is something I do a lot of when I’m happy and not as much when I’m stressed. I’m starting to feel a bit more settled as all the changes in my life have become the norm for me. So, as I traditionally do, I will copy and paste my very first blog post so that if you missed it, you can enjoy it as if you’re watching a re-run from an old show.

What Up Dawg? Is it just me or is everyone sick of Randy Jackson’s act on American Idol? How many times can we hear, “What up dawg?” Or his other favorite, “It was a little pitchy in spots,” or “It was just ahh ight for me.” The dude is like one of those action figures where you squeeze him and he has three pre-programmed phrases he rotates through. Nearly as bad is Paula Abdul. Has anyone else noticed that this season she seems drunk every week? She loves everyone this season and seems to find an excuse to physically grab Simon Cowell every week. Considering her recent charge of leaving the scene of an accident after she clipped another car on the freeway, how ironic is it that her big 1988 hit song, Straight Up, included the line “caught in a hit and run”?

That’s how I introduced myself to the blogging world and I was rewarded with ZERO comments or likes. Also, I’d like to give a shout out to my longtime blogging friend Jennifer of Not Quite Perfect  ,and other blogs, who has been blogging longer than me and is still at it. Visit her site and give her a like or comment.

Lastly and most importantly I’d like to say thank you to all of my blogging friends who have made this the wonderful, welcoming blogging community that it is. I have appreciated every read, like or comment over the past sixteen years. Without you, I probably wouldn’t have lasted a year.

Cheers to all of you and I hope we can share a glass of champagne some day. Have a great weekend! ~Phil

9 Comments

Posted in blogging, Humor, Uncategorized

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Happy 11th Birthday to The Oldest Blog in the World!

Posted on April 2, 2016 | 49 comments

birthday

To be honest, I don’t know if I have the oldest blog in the world, but until someone else can prove that theirs has been around longer, I’m going to assume it’s me. I’m not usually a pat me on the back, “look at me, look at me” kind of person, but c’mon, it’s my blogs 11th birthday! Indulge me a little. I think 11 blog years is like 110 in people years.

Some who have doubted my claim as the longest running blog in the world have asked me, “If your blog has been running for 11 years, why don’t you have more followers?” Fair point. Here’s my story: I started blogging in January of 2005. I wrote a fantasy sports blog. That one ran for about 3 months until two things happened. The first was that I got hired by a fantasy sports website to write for them. The other thing that happened caused the birth of The Phil Factor.

I was hanging around the office of my day job being a smart ass about something (I know, hard to believe, right?) when a secretary named Erin said to me, “That’s pretty funny. You should blog about that.” So I did, but the first Phil Factor was on Blogger. I blogged on Blogger for 6 years. Then I went to a blogging platform called Posterous, which was one of the first to allow you to share your blog posts to Facebook, Twitter, and other places with just a click of the mouse. After two years on Posterous, the blogging website closed, and that was why in the Spring of 2013  I moved here to WordPress and met all of you wonderful people.

If you want to read it, here’s the link to  the first Phil Factor post ever from April 2, 2005. I made fun of American Idol, which was in year four then. It’s now wrapping up it’s 15th and final season. I’ve blogged through two American Presidents and three Popes. One of my first posts was about Pope John Paul II passing away and my desire to be elected next Pope. My blog began before the show How I Met Your Mother came on the air. In September 2005 when Barney Stinson said, “This is SO going on my blog!” I was thrilled that my odd little hobby had been validated. Here is a picture from my old Blogger site proving that I’ve been blogging since April 2, 2005: (Scroll all the way down to the bottom of the pic to see that I posted 134 times in 2005)

IMG_0823

Yes, I was a little light on the posts in 2010. I was kind of busy. Also, some posts have been deleted for various reasons, including that some were included in my book 50 Shades of Phil, which includes the best fifty posts from my first eight years of blogging. If you have a Kindle, Nook, or just a Kindle app on your device, that e-book is the best 99 cents you’ll ever spend. Funny 500-600 word essays are perfect for passing the time when you’re in a doctor’s waiting room, on the subway, or on the porcelain throne.

Here’s another interesting Phil Factor fact: In 2011 The Phil Factor was also hosted on the website of Perky Jerky under the title of The Sarcastic Jerk. I should have stuck with them. A fun company and their beef and turkey jerky is delicious. They sent me a box full of it.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Sorry about the self-indulgent post. I’ll return to my usualy idiocy in future posts. Have a great weekend! ~Phil

49 Comments

Posted in Humor, Social Media, Uncategorized

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