Greatest hits of the first year

I decided that the confluence of JBS's first blogaverary with the passing of the 10,000 unique visitors milestone merited a little retrospective. An interesting trip back through a rollercoaster of hope and frustration, political anguish and cultural rumination, led to this attempt to come up with the Best of the Best. These posts are less the Most Shocking/Fascinating Events documented here than they are those to which I felt I made the most original contribution, of writing or synthesis of differing sources, the posts of which I was most proud for my part in the analysis, not just the publicity. So here, in chronological order, are the eventual winners after several rounds of winnowing:

1. A look at the 2004 election results through a good news/bad news lens.
   
   
2. Some advice to get over your germ obsession and just wash your #$%*@! hands.
   
   
3. A tangential expression of all I can really say about the war in Iraq.
   
   
4. A tribute to Susan Sontag upon the occasion of her death.
   
   
5. Some glimpses of the Martin Luther King we tend not to roll out on his holiday; perhaps a more challenging voice than we know how to address.
   
   
6. A personal response to the hijacking of Christianity by the right, spoken through the voices of others.
   
   
7. Strong words about the notion of Intelligent Design disclaimers in the public schools, both as bad science and bad educational philosophy.

In the perhaps less gruelling category of Most Fascinating Things I Bumped Across, top winners include mind-bending analysis of the undecided voter, delightful experiments with toll booth attendants, disturbing parallels in intellectual repression, a simple design change that could save lives, a pointed depiction of what it means to be poor, and a fabulous charity that connects people to people. Tough choices, all of the above, and lots of amazing things falling by the wayside. Thanks for giving me a reason to put fingers to keyboard.