Trying to Join a Health Club, Again

Monday, 28 December 1998

A bit over a year ago, I decided that I ought to join a health club and get into shape. I live just a block away from the Prospect Park branch of Eastern Athletic, so I have a convenient if expensive option. Unfortunately, I got layed off while I was dithering over whether I could afford to join. My resolve, and my disposable income, have built up to the point where this starts to look like a good idea. I've been busy enough for the past few weeks that the part of me that's nervous about the whole idea was able to convince the rest of me to procrastinate, but since I'm taking this week off from work, that part has run out of ammuniation. I meant to wake up early today and join in the morning, but wound up sleeping late and then killing a few hours on the 'Net. Finally, around 5 PM, I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders, girded my loins, and various other clichés, and went over to the club, checkbook in one pocket, credit card in the other. But due to some sort of crisis, there wasn't anyone there who could sign me up. Tomorrow...

I got my first weekly activity report as an Amazon associate:

Click-throughs and sales by individual item
For the week of 20-Dec-1998 through 26-Dec-1998
Store ID pigsfish

                    ORDERED      YOUR
 ITEM CODE  HITS   DIR.  NDIR     FEE TITLE
---------- ------ ----- ----- ------- --------------------------------------
0671536079      1                      The Star Trek Encyclopedia : A Ref
B0000025BL      1                      Bat Out Of Hell
B000002A6O      1                      Bat Out Of Hell [Gold Disc] [GOLD 
---------- ------ ----- ----- ------- -----------------------------------
   Totals:      3     0     0 $  0.00

                                  ISBN/ASIN home page    search   other
--------------------- ----------- --------- --------- --------- ---------
Number of Visitors on 20-Dec-1998         0         0         0         0
Number of Visitors on 21-Dec-1998         0         0         0         0
Number of Visitors on 22-Dec-1998         1         0         0         0
Number of Visitors on 23-Dec-1998         0         0         0         0
Number of Visitors on 24-Dec-1998         2         0         0         0
Number of Visitors on 25-Dec-1998         0         0         0         0
Number of Visitors on 26-Dec-1998         0         0         0         0
--------------------- ----------- --------- --------- --------- ---------
Total Visitors this week                  3         0         0         0

According to the first part, there were three instances of someone following a link for a specific item (the Star Trek book or the Meat Loaf CDs), but not buying them. I'm pretty sure that at least one of those instances was me, checking that the link worked. I don't understand the second part, though. There seem to have been five cases of people somehow following links from my site to Amazon, but not links on specific items (the ISBN/ASIN column) or the home page link, or the search link, or any other kind of link. How does that work? There ought to be a non-zero number in at least one of those columns for each row, oughtn't there?

Oh, I've got it -- those are negative reports: Nobody clicked from my site to Amazon on those days. That makes sense. So the visitor on the 22nd, checking out the 'Trek book, is me. The visitor on the 24th must be one of you.