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By Brian Kalish

August 19, 2012

Wausau– Well folks, we finally did it.  Hooray for us.  1,000,000 hits.  I had a speech all prepared for this moment (I wrote it back in February, 2010), but I seem to have lost my notes.  I was going to thank so many people…  I just… I don’t want to leave anyone out…  Excuse me for a moment…  This is a very emotional time for me…

Ahem.  They said we’d never make it.  Actually, I don’t know if anyone ever said that or not.  I’m assuming someone must have said it at some point.  And you know what?  Whoever said it– we just proved you wrong.  So take that.

Actually, it’s kind of funny to look back on some of the early communications among the CWS staff.  Like we were floored when, early on, we got 300 hits on one day.  That was a huge deal!  And look at us now.  One million.  Pretty awesome.

I would like to thank the CWS team of Coach Stankowski, Big D, Carrie, Jake Fox, Nate Woelfel and the countless other people who have contributed their time and energy to making the site awesome.  Paula Tesch and superfan Cheryl Stevens come to mind.  I’ve never actually met Tom Whipps in person, but you are a CWS Facebook All Star.  Chad Middleton has been a big help with the behind-the-scenes stuff.

I would like to also take this opportunity to once again thank all the spam bots out there for constantly attacking our site.  You guys (particularly the Russians) are doing a terrific job.  And no, I’m not really interested in your Chinese-made, poodle dog-looking, designer knock off handbags.  At least today I’m not.

Oh, and computer developers who make plugins.  You guys are just awesome.  I love it when you make plugins that crash my site (see last weekend).  You guys are the bomb.  Literally.

In all seriousness, I would like to thank our audience.  When I left a certain “local” website a couple of years ago, I knew that the only way to make a website successful was to focus on conent.  After all, there’s no reason to go to a website if there is nothing on it (hint, hint).

Anyway, we’ve worked extremely hard to provide the best sports and outdoors content in the area and will continue to do so.  As you might have noticed, we have completely updated the look and feel of the site.  This design gives us some powerful new tools to continue to deliver the best content to you.  We think you’ll enjoy it.

To reward our rabid fan base and thank you for your support and loyalty, Big D will be available to sign autographs on US Highway 66 somewhere between Rudolph and Stevens Point at noon today.  We can’t give away the exact location because of possible crowd control issues.  But he’ll be real close to that one hay field.  Don’t worry, we got permission from the landowner.  So it’s all good.

In closing, I would again like to say thanks.

Thanks a million.