The Disgruntled Grumpig

Hey guys!

So this here is my metapost, a blog post that will be explaining all there is to know about The Disgruntled Grumpig and its behind-the-scenes goings on!

First off I’d like to just express how much I’ve loved building this blog up. It has been a whole bunch of fun writing about my adventures in the Pokemon Universe, describing my favourites and telling you all about my personal history with each generation of games. Slowly but surely I’ve built up a small fanbase surrounding the blog, each day bringing a welcome trickle of views into my Google Analytics account!

The other day I made it to 760 views! Now obviously this number is actually not very high, compared to various other blogs and YouTube videos and whatnot, it pales. But this is my first time doing something like this so I thought it was something worthy of an eyebrow raise!

Learning about blogs and the internet in general in my Networked Media Production class at university, I thought I would try relate some of the things I’ve learnt with my blog and it’s constant flow of views.

The first thing we learned that is helpful to this particular blog is networking. Dr Sam Hinton presented a lecture all about Social Media, and in it he described all the perks and downfalls of networking, all the things it can accomplish and the things it can’t. Straight away I knew I could use this to better ‘A Disgruntled Grumpig’. He told us to immerse ourselves in various societies relevant to your interests, to engage and really be apart of them. This will establish yourself as someone who knows what they are doing and someone worth listening to. The internet is a place full of these societies and networks, so very quickly I had jumped head first into numerous Pokemon websites and communities. I was interacting with everyone left right and centre, telling them about my plans for the blog, as well as taking a big interest in their Poke passions. Obviously taking an interest in anything Pokemon isn’t very hard at all, so that was definitely a plus! Posting on sites like Reddit, Serebii, Tumblr and Bulbapedia (the most extensive Pokemon wiki styled site on the internet) really helped to get those first couple of views to trickle in. My first post on Serebii received 1,080 views, and the second received 623 views. These helped get my blogging name out there and start conversations with the Pokemon lovers hanging out on the internet. 

Networking in this manner resulted in something that I am very proud of. Through talking to users on the Pokemon forum community Serebii.Net Forums, I eventually started to build friendships with the regular posters. As time went on, a few of these people started to show a lot of interest in my blog, and I showed a lot of interest in their blogs. What resulted from this networking was a collaboration between myself and a Serebii user and blogger called Celebi-Rose, a young girl all the way from Liverpool, UK. We had a few conversations about the collaboration and ended up interviewing each other for our respective blogs. Straight away I noticed more views coming in from England, as her audience trusted her judgement and decided to give my blog a try.   

The second lesson I learnt was that of HTML. The ability to code in my own pages and content is invaluable. This idea of constantly expanding on the blog draws in new readers and keeps the older readers coming back. Through the stat-tracking application I installed using HTML I can check how many people visit the blog each day, as well as how long they stay on the site, what city they live in (slightly creepy, but cool nonetheless), and how many of them return for another read. 32% of my views come from new readers, while a whopping 68% come from returning visitors. This shows me I must be doing something right if people come back to read more!

The ability to create new pages allowed me to build my ‘About’ page. By telling people within my networks about this new page where I talk about why I am writing this blog, what I want to get out of it, and a few other quirky pieces of trivia, I was able to generate new readers. 

The final thing that has helped me to gain readers and views is tagging. When I say tagging I don’t mean HTML tags (the keyword imprisoned by a < and a > or />), I mean the simple act of tagging a word or phrase when posting in Tumblr. By writing the word ‘Pokemon’ in the tags box, it thrusts that post associated with Pokemon out into the Tumblrverse and out into the internet, so that anyone who is searching for cool Pokemon things can easily stumble upon your blog. This means that you can gain followers from outside of your immediate friend group, network and home town. It stops your blog from being a private, secluded island, and turns it into an international airport, with people from all over the world entering and leaving all the time. It’s an invaluable tool to some who wishes to put their work out there.

During the few months that I have been working on this blog I have encountered my fair share of problems. The first major problem I was having was with the code for the theme of the blog. I was trying to edit the look and colour of the theme, and somehow I ended up totally inverting the colour orientation. The layout also became very jumbled. The second major problem I had was when I was installing my Reddit widget. I envisaged a glorious sidebar filled with Pokemon goodness, instead I was left with a box of text that covered the top half of my screen. It wouldn’t go away!

To combat the problems I had I took to the web. I used the following websites and communities to figure out what I was doing wrong, to ask questions and to further my knowledge:

• http://www.reddit.com/r/css
• http://www.reddit.com/r/web_design
• http://www.reddit.com/r/csshelp
• http://www.reddit.com/r/HTML/
• http://www.reddit.com/r/tumblr/
• http://developers.whatwg.org/
• https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/
• http://codepen.io/
• http://validator.w3.org/

Using a combination of these websites here and there, I was able to defeat every problem that came my way. I now have a reddit sidebar that looks very snazzy, and a theme that doesn’t burn your eyes out!

Audience Overview

Pageview Overview

Looking at my Google Analytics page I can see some interesting patterns. As you can see, the blog started out in fine form, racking up views left right and centre! This continued through February, March and April. Unfortunately, as the semester progressed, my work load for all my other units grew. This resulted in less time to get involved with the Pokemon community and fewer posts (however, the required number of posts was 14, but I dedicated myself to posting almost 30. I’m proud of that!). Regrettably, the views started to lessen.

An interesting anomaly occurred on March the 6th. I logged onto Analytics that night and nearly fell out of my seat when I saw that the blog had received 100 views in one day. This was in contrast to 20 views and 30 views each day, so it was a big surprise. Through using the Analytics ‘Track Sources’ function, I was able to see where all these views were coming from. The majority of them were the result of my networking over at serebii.net Forums, though a few came from Google searches and Tumblr searches.

To wrap up this Metapost, I would like to point out a few things that I am happy with. The first being that, through a lot of hours of talking to and discussing with Pokemon fans, I started to become recognised in the community, and various, more successful blogs have been reblogging my content. The second thing that I am very happy about is the amount of enjoyment I have taken from the creation of The Disgruntled Grumpig. It has been very rewarding writing about my adventures and my nerdy passion. I will definitely be updating this blog long after this course has ended!

Cheers guys,

thedisgruntledgrumpig OUT.

—-

My three chosen posts!

• A Wild Wall of Text Appreared! Go, Reading Skills!
• A New Friend, Celebi-Rose!
• Meloetta’s Mischievous Madness!

The next instalment in my 17 Types series is a Psychic Pokemon, and also happens to be, far and above, my favourite Pokemon. Of all time! Favourite Pokemon of all TIME! [Praise Lord Yeezus]

Type: Psychic 

Pokemon: Mew!

Mew is the most bada$$ dude. A little pink critter, who can fly, look cute, and transform at will all at the same time! Now that takes some major Pokeballs. Virtually unobtainable in the games, Mew was a rare as all hell Pokemon. This made him highly desirable, and so I began a quest to find him in Pokemon Red a few years back. I tried with all my strength to move a truck that, supposedly, was hiding him. No luck. I then read on a welcoming website (I actually managed to be the 1,000,000,000th visitor on the site, and won an iPad 2! The package is still on its way to me though I suppose) that if you pressed A + B + the down arrow at Bill’s house, you would jump on over his house and land behind it. This is where Mew will be waiting. BUT NOPE. He wasn’t there. So, finally, I stumbled upon a YouTube vid. I followed the steps…

AND A WILD MEW APPEARED! Lvl 7 and glorious.

He is pink, powerful, cute, powerful, can transform like THAT, and is powerful. Perfection.

Mew hanging out with Bruce Banner.

[source: http://feriowind.tumblr.com/post/29349221580/bruces-brief-encounter-with-mew-which-only-the]

[source: Pokemon: Mewtwo Strikes Back]

I grew up with Gen I (Pokemon Red and Blue), Gen II (Pokemon Gold and Silver) and Gen III (Pokemon Sapphire and Ruby). There was always a Gameboy hanging out in my backpocket or backpack, with a beautifully coloured cartridge keeping the dust out. Back then, wireless trading didn’t exist. Things were tough. You wouldn’t understand.

Now we are living in the age of technology, and while my old Gameboys are still damn cool, they can’t do all the things the new gadgets on the block can. For instance, they can’t connect to another console all the way over in Japan and challenge it to a Pokemon battle, or connect to Nintendo and receive ultra rare ‘event Pokemon’. But the Nintendo 3DS can do this. And, it just so happens, there was one of these ‘event’ Pokemon available in my humble Australian city. 

An event Pokemon is a Pokemon so rare that it is only released at certain game stores around the world. Fortunately, the local EB Games were participating! Finally, I would get my chance at one of these rare legendaries.

Her name is Meloetta, and initially I didn’t digg her. She is from Gen V, so automatically I felt a little bit removed from the charm. The newest set of games haven’t grabbed me as the past games have, however, as a Pokemon fan, I felt it was my duty to snag her up. And because I had never had the opportunity to claim an ‘event Pokemon’, this seemed like a perfect time to start. 

The event ran for about two months, ending on the 19th of April. Which is today. Last night I suddenly realised that I could have made a right cock up, and run out of time to get me a Meloetta! Additionally, I had a very important assignment due the next day (today), so time would be tight. 

I started up a new save file on my copy of Pokemon Black, and frantically raced to the point of the game where you are able to trade and therefore receive the event Pokemon. You have to beat the first Gym Leader, then complete a few side quests, and then the option will be available to you. I had my work cut out for me.

I chose the Water starter, Oshawott. Remember how I wrote about always calling my starter Ozza? Well guess what? I didn’t name this little guy Ozza. I named him Ozzawott. +10 RadPoints to me.

From then on my thumbs were lost in a flurry of button mashing and adrenaline. Finally, just before getting off the bus to go to work for the night, I had played far enough to be able to accept Meloetta! With 1:49 showing on the ‘Time Played’ screen, I was a happy man.

Halfway through my shift selling sneakers swiftly, I bustled into EB Games with a workmate and flicked on my 3DS. I followed the directions given to me by the dude behind the counter, and in minutes I had my Level 50 Meloetta! 

My first Pokemon event. A success! 

My level 15 Ozzawott will be in fine company.

Now…I wonder if she is any good…

Great artwork done by TheBoogie!

In my opinion, Fire types run the whole game of Pokemon. Who wouldn’t want a cute little puppy who can spew fire? Or a slug made out of magma?! Just imagine the awfully fun challenge it would be to keep that thing from melting down through the earth! Challenging and rewarding! Despite saying this, Growlithe and Slugma aren’t my favourite Fire types, Typhlosion is.

Type: FIRE

Pokemon: TYPHLOSION

If you’ve been reading from the start of this humble blog, you might have seen this from the beginning. My first post was about my first ever Pokemon, Cyndaquil. And, as you might imagine, Pokemon have to grow up an evolve one day. So my little buddy morphed on into a Typhlosion. What a monster he was! Typhlosion is in fact based upon the badger, honeybadger and wolverine… now add fire to the mix! FireBadger!

Me and my main man Ozza the 1st

[Source]

Amazing artwork of the whole family.

[Source]

[Source]

Aaaaand finally: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fwlAn8Ox64

Holy crap its been twenty days since my last post about my adventures in Sinnoh! So much has happened since then! A lot can get done in roughly three weeks! While I’ve been telling you all about my favourite Pokemon from each type, behind the scenes I’ve been busy racing around in Pokemon Pearl finding all types of cool things to do. I battled some dudes, beat them convincingly, then waddled off to the nearest PokeCenter. THAT HAPPENED!

Anyway, I should fill you all in to what has happened since last time! I’m aiming to bring the story up to the present, so if it seems as if I’m going too fast, then leave me a comment saying so. But that probably won’t happen as I have a tendency to ramble!

So last time I wrote I had a team of four. Ozza, the rambunctious Grotle at Level 21. Kierkegaard, the whimsical Kadabra at Level 20. DreamEater, the pretentiously named Misdreavus at Level 21. Kendrick, the fiery faced fire pony, Ponyta, at Level 18. I’m pleased  to say my buddies have grown since then, and I’ve managed to fill out my team to six kickass Pokemon. 

After leaving Eterna City and getting myself a bike, I traveled on down to Hearthome City. Having a bike is such a joy! Though not such a step up from running shoes in the newer generations. In Gen I and Gen II, the bike was a godsend. Walking was so damn slow, it was incredible to grab hold of those pixelated handlebars and zoom on off. From Gen III on, we were given running shoes very early on, making the game a lot faster a lot faster.

Hearthome City was wondrous. Women pushing their baby-filled prams, weird clowns wandering the streets, and fat hikers giving out free Pokemon Eggs. Free eggs! I waltzed up to the man and demanded an egg. Shaking, he looked down at my 10 year old self and gave in, handing me a pink and white ball. With the egg in my pocket I cycled as fast as I could back and forth throughout the city, hoping to hatch it as fast as possible. Finally, after what felt like an age, the egg hatched! And out popped the weakest looking Pokemon to ever exist, Happiny! But, despite the underwhelming stats and underwhelming design, I somehow fell in love with the bugger.  I named him Vincent (the only name that really made sense) and went on my way. Now, Vincent had a good future in front of him. He would soon evolve into a Chansey when our friendship climbed (awww), and then from there Vincent would blossom into the buxom Blissey. Blissey has absolutely terrible Attack and Defence stats (some of the worst in the game), and a crappy Speed stat. But, and thank god, her Special Defense stat is great (135), and  her HP stat is out of this world! It’s the highest stat on any Pokemon ever, and comes in at a whopping 255. Add to the mix a respectable/pretty good Special Attack stat (75), and you’ve got yourself a pretty awesome, though quite complicated, beast of a Pokemon.

So as you can imagine, I was pretty keen on evolving Vincent from a weak lil Happiny to a stronger Chansey then to the outrageously healthy Blissey. After quite a bit of grinding and battling, I managed it! Vincent evolved into Blissey at Level 28 and I couldn’t be happier. Unfortunately, her attacks sucked. She did have the ability to heal my other Pokemon and herself at all times, but her physical attacks were rubbish. So I raced to the nearest PokeMart, and managed to buy myself a TM! And, believe it or not, it turned out to be Hyper Beam, a really damn powerful move. I slapped it on Vincent and walked off with a Hyper Beaming ball of fat and love.

Now, onto the final spot in my team! After cycling and running everywhere, I realised I might just need a Pokemon who can use the move Fly. This allows you to zoom all of the place instantly, much like Quick Travel in Elder Scrolls IV and V (Oblivion and Skyrim). It’s helpful as helpful can be. Then I realised I had exactly 0 Water Pokemon on my team, so I couldn’t use the move Surf, which allows you to travel across water. With my brain ticking over, I pondered what Pokemon I should choose. A Flying type so I can Fly, or a Water type so I can Surf? Then BAZZAM, inspiration struck and I suddenly realised I could have the best of both words! My matey from Sapphire, Ruby and Emerald, Pelipper! Pelipper is a Pelican. Can you digg it? I can. So I hopped onto Bulbapedia to see if I could even catch Wingull (its first form) in Pokemon Pearl.

Lo and behold, I could catch a Wingull about fourteen steps from me in a patch of grass I’d run through a thousand and one times! I hopped in that grass and stamped my feet around till a wild Wingull popped out and pecked me on the nose. I promptly caught it and named it Snoop, which seemed reasonable. After a small while grinding, I evolved Snoop into a pelican and smiled a big smile. Team COMPLETE!

It was here that I realised that every single of my Pokemon is a female…How strange! I don’t have a clue as to why that happened, but I guess it was fate. I guess it’s just a tad bit unfortunate that I named them all blokes names. Oh well!

And so now we are up to speed! Pretty much. I did play on a few hours and actually get the two HMs, Fly and Surf, and taught them to Snoop right then and there. But, here is the team as of now!

TEAM:

Ozza: Lvl 34 (now a terrifying Torterra! So cool)

Kierkegaard: Lvl 32

DreamEater: Lvl 32

Kendrick: Lvl 31

Vincent: Lvl 33

Snoop: Lvl 31

If you made it this far, congrats :P

Peace!

Serebii.Net is a website dedicated to Pokemon that has been around for a long time. It was created in 1999 by a young man by the name of Joe Merrick, who was 13 at the time. Since then it has grown and grown and grown, and is now one of the largest fan sites on the net. It grew so large in fact, that it needed a whole seperate forum to house all its users. And thus, Serebii.net Forums was created! 

After trawling the forums for a while, I came across quite an interesting person. And, she has a blog of her own! Time to promote! I recently interviewed her and here is that small interview!

I present to you: Celebi-Rose!

• Me: So Celebi-Rose, what does your blog focus on?

• CR: Well I focus more on my adventures in Pokèmon, rather than on Breaking News and new info!

• Me: Awesome! Sounds similar to what my blog is about! What can we expect from your blog in the future?

• CR: Well, you can look forward to chapters of the fan-fiction I am currently doing, called Ethan’s Adventure, about a boy called Ethan and his Jynx in an icy city. Also, discovering new sites is always a plus :-) 

• Me: And the obvious question, what is your favourite Pokemon?!

• CR: My favourite pokemon are Celebi, Mewtwo, Vanillite and Oshawott.

• Me: Mewtwo hey? It just so happens that Mew is my favourite! Hmmm I wonder who would win in a fight..Anyway! Back to the interview! So, what is your favourite thing about Pokemon? What keeps you coming back?

• CR: My fave thing about Pokemon is raising your Pokemon. I play Pokemon traditionally; I don’t EV Train. [For those who are wondering what EV Training is, I will hopefully be explaining it in an upcoming blogpost! Stay tuned! - disgruntledgrumpig]

• Me: And finally, in what country do you live!

• CR: I live in England, Liverpool to be exact!

And that concludes the interview! A MASSIVE thanks for Celebi-Rose for coming onto the blog and having a bit of a chat, and also for running a very cool blog over at Blogspot. If you are into Pokemon you will love her page, and I’m assuming most people reading this are into Pokemon so go check her out! She is a young up-and-comer, and is very good at what she does! 

Her blog can be found here! 

Once again, thanks for reading and I’ll see you when I see you :D