Documenting Age 30: 365 Days, 365 Photos (Or: How Google Feels About Turning 30)

Now that this site has been live for nearly a month, it's high time we set our sights on toppling some of the current Google results leaders for 30-related terms. Sites like Washington DC's 9:30 Club, which tops a Google search for "30"—we're coming for you.

The Google leaders for two other 30-related search terms are, however, well earned. Taking the honors for "30th birthday" is well-known blogger Mark Pilgrim, who on the advent of his 30th last November wrote 2,428 words on the topic, beginning with this immortal lede:

This is how I turned 30: standing in my bathroom wearing nothing but a pair of latex gloves, holding a wet cat in mid-air.

Yet, not even Pilgrim is fit to hold the wet cat of Adam Bill Keaggy. A man with one of the trippiest homepages we've ever seen, Keaggy keeps an online collection of other people's grocery lists and blogs exclusively about sandwiches. But these endeavors, however moving, are topped by what began on January 12, 2001, the day Keaggy turned 30. That day, he began "a simple project: Take a photograph of myself every day of my 30th year." (Technically, it was his 31st year, but we're hardly mathematicians, and besides, we're losing the narrative thread.) Keaggy followed through on his goal, documenting highs and lows throughout His Year, including this gripping moment from two years ago today:

Keaggy's caption: "The 2nd Annual meeting of the MissileFits Model Rocketry Club went great, even though it was only me and Andrew this time."

Keaggy and Pilgrim, we salute you. If Book Of Ages The Website manages to topple you in the Google ranks, we know this: We will have earned it.
How I Turned 30 [diveintomark.org]
Bill Keaggy, Age 30 [keaggy.com]