I'm back in town. Joy of joys, wonder of wonders. Mike picked Jeff and myself up from the office about two hours ago, so a big public thank you goes to him for his generosity.
Why, one might ask, am I still up? I'm nuts, baby.
I checked in on a few blogs upon my return. I was amused by Jackie's post on things she's looking for in a husband. I was amused by TJ's lack of an update, given his lack of presence. I was amused, if also a little disturbed, by Katie's massive overshare. I was even subtly amused by Jacob's not-mention of kicking me out of the band. I got to Jill's post and was not amused (and after that list, and at 3:30 in the morning, and after a 12-hour bus trip, I'm really saying something in this).
I was of course set thoughtful by the nature of her post, and instantly set about researching and figuring out as much of the matter as I could without prying into anything so personal that it wasn't publicly available. Sue me, that's what I do. The thing that got me, though, was the statement involving blogs being petty. If you scroll down a good while, you'll find my first post. I don't archive. Sue me. My general attitude on blogs was that they were a silly outlet, a bypass of self-defense mechanisms. In short, blogs let us say to people what we are too intimidated to say ourselves, under the false premise that our intended and actual audiences differ from one another. This, to me, was silly.
I miss Jill, of course, and am not encouraged by the idea that the only real channel of communication I have with her right now is not only petty by her own admittance but currently being used to fight a war that is petty, also by her own admittance. That's not the important bit though.
What I have slowly realized is that I wasn't wholly right. I was mostly correct; Even my own diary-form blog was leaked viciously out by yours truly, and went from being a source of private prophecy and dreams to public rant and nonsense. However, there's a certain attraction to the public rant and nonsense, and I know first-hand that blogs aren't always a performance art.
I reviewed some of my more recent posts and found an interesting set of trends. First, I remember what I was thinking when I wrote each post, and audience was rarely a consideration; the only times I considered my audience was just before this last post. The interesting part about that lack of consideration is that I made inside jokes and references to things that only certain individuals might be able to understand, but without a single thought to who those individuals were or whether they would read the post at all. Most of my posts occur at odd hours of the day, or night more commonly, and don't really have a point. Therein lies the concept.
The posts that I make that do happen to be without thought of an audience (or rather thought of who my audience might be; it isn't in my capacity to continue posting under the belief that nobody is actually reading anything that I write) aren't 'contaminated' in the way I feared they must be. I don't particularly care who reads what post or who understands what reference, just so long as I can hold on to the thought that someone is reading. I'm more than happy to explain anything that I wrote too vaguely, or clear up a misunderstanding as to the intent of a post, but I don't really think of any of that while I'm writing.
This is why I spent an hour learning HTML so I could add a comments section and some links. I may as well have a blog that's functional.
If you're reading this, put up a link to my blog. Why not?
To get back to the petty matters of my life, the conference was fun. We watched movies and slept on the way up, and we watched movies and slept on the way down. This mostly makes up for the fact that we didn't have time to watch movies or sleep while we were there. It was non-stop information absorbtion, and I hope I can remember a week from now even half of what I learned.
I hit my second promotion, so hurray for me. It's currently 5:40am and I'm doing the happy dance.
Before I left, I went up to Gainesville with Mike, Jeff, and Kevin. We visited Ming. It was cool. We didn't really do anything except play video games and eat.
I want to get more exercise, because over these three trips I've gained back half of the weight that I lost. I never realized how much of a difference sitting in a car makes. More running, more climbing, more biking, less gaming.
More sleep. We will meet again.
Why, one might ask, am I still up? I'm nuts, baby.
I checked in on a few blogs upon my return. I was amused by Jackie's post on things she's looking for in a husband. I was amused by TJ's lack of an update, given his lack of presence. I was amused, if also a little disturbed, by Katie's massive overshare. I was even subtly amused by Jacob's not-mention of kicking me out of the band. I got to Jill's post and was not amused (and after that list, and at 3:30 in the morning, and after a 12-hour bus trip, I'm really saying something in this).
I was of course set thoughtful by the nature of her post, and instantly set about researching and figuring out as much of the matter as I could without prying into anything so personal that it wasn't publicly available. Sue me, that's what I do. The thing that got me, though, was the statement involving blogs being petty. If you scroll down a good while, you'll find my first post. I don't archive. Sue me. My general attitude on blogs was that they were a silly outlet, a bypass of self-defense mechanisms. In short, blogs let us say to people what we are too intimidated to say ourselves, under the false premise that our intended and actual audiences differ from one another. This, to me, was silly.
I miss Jill, of course, and am not encouraged by the idea that the only real channel of communication I have with her right now is not only petty by her own admittance but currently being used to fight a war that is petty, also by her own admittance. That's not the important bit though.
What I have slowly realized is that I wasn't wholly right. I was mostly correct; Even my own diary-form blog was leaked viciously out by yours truly, and went from being a source of private prophecy and dreams to public rant and nonsense. However, there's a certain attraction to the public rant and nonsense, and I know first-hand that blogs aren't always a performance art.
I reviewed some of my more recent posts and found an interesting set of trends. First, I remember what I was thinking when I wrote each post, and audience was rarely a consideration; the only times I considered my audience was just before this last post. The interesting part about that lack of consideration is that I made inside jokes and references to things that only certain individuals might be able to understand, but without a single thought to who those individuals were or whether they would read the post at all. Most of my posts occur at odd hours of the day, or night more commonly, and don't really have a point. Therein lies the concept.
The posts that I make that do happen to be without thought of an audience (or rather thought of who my audience might be; it isn't in my capacity to continue posting under the belief that nobody is actually reading anything that I write) aren't 'contaminated' in the way I feared they must be. I don't particularly care who reads what post or who understands what reference, just so long as I can hold on to the thought that someone is reading. I'm more than happy to explain anything that I wrote too vaguely, or clear up a misunderstanding as to the intent of a post, but I don't really think of any of that while I'm writing.
This is why I spent an hour learning HTML so I could add a comments section and some links. I may as well have a blog that's functional.
If you're reading this, put up a link to my blog. Why not?
To get back to the petty matters of my life, the conference was fun. We watched movies and slept on the way up, and we watched movies and slept on the way down. This mostly makes up for the fact that we didn't have time to watch movies or sleep while we were there. It was non-stop information absorbtion, and I hope I can remember a week from now even half of what I learned.
I hit my second promotion, so hurray for me. It's currently 5:40am and I'm doing the happy dance.
Before I left, I went up to Gainesville with Mike, Jeff, and Kevin. We visited Ming. It was cool. We didn't really do anything except play video games and eat.
I want to get more exercise, because over these three trips I've gained back half of the weight that I lost. I never realized how much of a difference sitting in a car makes. More running, more climbing, more biking, less gaming.
More sleep. We will meet again.
posted by Casey at
05:43
