The Academy Awards' Oscar and The Premio Dardo Blogger Award, and Chain Letters... It's an Honor, just to be nominated. Really.

So on Monday I was awarded a "Premio Dardos" award by the wonderful Aerin, for which I'm really appreciative. (Thanks, Aerin!)

It's kind of a bloggers-acknowledging-other-bloggers award, just like the Oscar is film industry people cheering themselves on.

Except, kind of like a chain letter, each recipient of the "Premio Dardos" award is asked to accept the award, mention and link back to whoever bestowed it upon them, and then pass it on to 15 other blogs...

(Happily, unlike a chain letter, there's no threat of bad karmic outcomes if we don't!)

Now, I love being acknowledged as much as anyone, but I'm always curious about awards - especially if I'm the one winning it! So I took an HOUR of what should have been productive writing time (okay, it was more like two. And a half.) to back-track from Aerin to find out where this award originated.

You know, if it's an inverted Ponzi-scheme like pyramid, just by tracking back through everyone's "Premio" post (using the nifty search box on most blogger blogs - top left corner of the screen) I should be able to get back to the originator.

Aerin to Vasilly.

Vasilly to J. Kaye.

J. Kaye to FOUR different blogs...

and then the path backwards got more jungle-like. Dead ends. People who didn't mention their awarder, or whose awarders were private blogs I couldn't access. People whose awarders were blogs earlier in the list, creating tight, eddying circles of Blog A loves blog B loves blog C loves blog A... That I couldn't escape.

Then on to google searches.

I discovered three different spellings of the award:

Premio Dardos

Primo Darios

and, attached to the jpeg image that seemed the most consistent track-back element

premios-dardo

A consensus seemed to be that, whatever its spelling, it means "Prize Darts" in Italian (which, plural form aside, "Premio" does mean prize and "dardo" does mean dart in Italian.)


But still, no originator.

A few posts mentioned that

The aim of the Premio Dardos Award is to acknowledge

the values that every blogger shows in their effort to transmit cultural, ethical, literary, and personal values every day. These stamps were created with the intention of promoting fraternization between bloggers, a way of showing affection and gratitude for work that adds value to the Web.

or the similiar but not identical reason:

that it is given for recognition of cultural, ethical, literary, and personal values transmitted in the form of creative and original writing.

Now in my sleuthing, I stumbled upon other bloggers-love-fellow-bloggers meme awards, the "Butterfly Award" (whose logo slogan for "the coolest blog I ever know" seems both poetic and grammatically trail-blazing) and the Kreativ Blogger Award (also creative in their spelling!)

And yet I find myself reluctant to give over to the red carpet flashiness of it all...

Come on, Lee! Actors have TONS of self-congratulatory awards! There are the Tony Awards, the SAG (Screen Actors Guild) awards, and, of course, the OSCARS...

There are critics giving actors awards (Critics Choice), and journalists giving actors awards (Golden Globes) and honestly more people giving actors awards than I can remember right now...

So why should our blogging community be any different?

It also makes me think about high school yearbooks - like the voting on who's "Most likely to succeed" or "Most likely to be President" or "Most likely to win a date with a movie star and then puke on their shoes in the first five minutes because they're so nervous" Awards.


While I'm totally flattered (and I hope Aerin doesn't take any offense), I think I'm going to take the karmic heat on this one and, instead of passing on any more Prize Darts, remind everyone to check out the blogrolls on the blogs you read - That, in my opinion, is the real Prize Cache!

So the next time you see a blogroll, think of them as the Awards they are: The "Blogs So Great I awarded them with a direct Link so you can go there and check them out yourself" Award!

And Aerin, if you take a look on my blogroll to the right, you have a new award, yourself!

Congratulations!

And yes, I know.

It's an honor, just to be nominated. Really.

Namaste,

Lee