Thank you, readers! 5 million views

Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub passed the 5 million viewers milestone between 9:45 and 10:00 p.m. Central time, March 5.

Thank you.

5 million views? Equal to the number of immigrants protected from deportation by President Obama’s 2014 executive action, providing an enormous boost to the U.S. economy and reputation. Mother Jones image.

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5 million, counting slowly

5 million, American. Image from Instagain, whatever that is.

Is the heyday of the blog over? Or did I just foul it up?

At one time Millard Fillmore’s bathtub got about 2,000 hits per day. In the last 16 months, that’s dwindled to just under 1,000 per day.

Still, at that rate, the Bathtub should overflow with the 5 millionth hit, sometime in the next 5 days. It’s funny, but if I counted spam we’d be over 8 million already. 100 spam comments for every real comment, approximately.

No wonder elections turn out so oddly.

For 5 million sincere hits, I thank you, readers, and thank you especially you faithful readers.

Would you tell your friends to come check it out?

For comparison:

• Phil Plait says the Sun converts 5 million tons of matter into energy every second
• 5 million kids in public schools are English language learners, NPR estimates (Hey, kids! come on over to MFB and check things out!)
• If I had a dollar for every hit, I could buy a 30-second ad on the 2017 Super Bowl, New York Times says
• 5 million is way more than the crowd at Trump’s inauguration, and probably quite a bit more than the actual crowd at the Cubs’ World Series victory parade

3.5 million and counting

Which is considerably more than Rutledge Taylor can get to see his crappy movie, even with the assistance of his famous girlfriend.

Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub turned over 3.5 million readers today, or about a day’s worth at some of the great pseudo-reality sites like Watt’s Up, or the popular sites like P. Z. Myers’ often-brilliant and much more scientific Pharyngula.

Thank you to each and every reader.

More:

3.5 million is:

• About equal to the number of people who experience homelessness in a year in the U.S.
• Equal to the number of people who bought Diablo 3 in the first 24 hours of release
• About equal to the number of people estimated to be without electricity after the storms in the Eastern U.S.
• Equal to the number of firecrackers popped off in Fargo, North Dakota, in this 2004 video
• More money than I have
• Also see:  Keeping Clean with the Presidents (carlanthonyonline.com)

3 million and counting higher*

I estimated wrong.

Millard Fillmore's head, from Futurama, tallying hits at Millard Fillmore's Bathtub.**

Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub passed 3 million hits sometime this afternoon:

• 3,000,536 views all-time (7:51 p.m. CDT)

That’s about a month’s traffic on P. Z. Myers’ blog, Pharyngula (I’m estimating wildly); that’s a couple day’s traffic on Anthony Watts’ blog, Watts Up, even though most of the time you can’t find out what’s up from that blog, even if you need to know just the facts.

Which brings two aphorisms to mind:

1. A lie can run around the world before truth gets its boots on.  (Let’s attribute it to Mark Twain, just to tweak the fans of Charles Haddon Spurgeon; even Spurgeon said it was an aphorism.)
2. We’ve been fighting ignorance since 1973.  It’s taking longer than we thought.  (Paraphrase of the motto of the “Straight Dope” column.)

Truth takes longer, even for a guy who writes quickly and can post non-stop, like Myers.

For those few readers who have stuck it out, thanks.  For those new ones, stick it out for a while.  To all of you:  Hey, would it kill you to leave a comment when you drop by?

Thank you.  Thank you a lot.  Thanks, and come again soon.

_____________

*  Yeah, it’s a jab at Rutledge Taylor’s ill-tempered mockumentary, “3 Billion and Counting.”  No one can say what the 3 billion things are, and the movie is wildly error-prone, even for a mockumentary.  Plus, it’s not funny, like “Best in Show.”

** No, it’s not really from Futurama (but wouldn’t that be cool — Filllmore and Nixon together?)  I linked to the photo at Presidents “R” Us.com — but they were kind enough to link to that same photo at the Bathtub, earlier.