Sunday, April 17, 2005

Hey, What's This?

Or, "The Technological Caveman Dips His Toe in the Water"

Nothing much to say to start off, which is probably a bad sign. This hodgepodge of a column will feature a wealth of blab, a smattering of movie capsule reviews, dribs and drabs of sports commentary, and the occasional enlightening deconstruction of our democratic governmental system. Or not.

Obviously, this blog will update whenever I have time to write something, which isn't anywhere near enough (or, those three short stories sitting on my hardrive would have won the PEN Faulkner Award by now). Because I'm not one to rant when angry, nor do I have an ideological agenda to flog, the very idea of founding my own outlet of visceral verbosity sounds a bit off. I assure you, there is a very good reason:

My ego.

You see, back when I was a wee teen dreaming of becoming a much-honored muckraker, I started a high school newspaper column called "The Cockeyed View." Like most high school newspaper columns, it was very gimmicky: each week's entry was divided into two sections--one funny, one serious--that usually discussed two separate issues but always ended in a question. The idea was to get my readers thinking; the usual result was a question grafted awkwardly onto a one-sided argument.

Nevertheless, that column helped me get through high school. It gave me an identity, and my classmates suddenly had a peek at what kind of person that wallflower was. Heck, it almost got me a girlfriend. And since my love life today hasn't improved much since then....

In some ways, this blog is way to get back that feeling. But mostly, it will be my little niche on the Web where I can express myself the best way I know how.

Which is, go figure, what blogs are about.

How about that?