London is drowning and I live by the river

I'm here. Hi. How've you been? Oh, I've been fine. Good, good really. Just... not blogging. Busy, you know? Working and being and all that. But not blogging. Not here and not at my site. Not anywhere.

I don't know what to tell you, really. I'm not sure what changed, or how it changed, or for how long it will continue to be changed. I'm just not blogging. And as such, because I'm not really participating in the circle jerk that is blogging (how many fucking times can I say that word in one review?), I haven't felt like I'd have much to contribute here, really. Who cares what a nonblogging blogger thinks of other bloggers who are actually blogging?

But dammit, I'm here. And last week, by christ, I managed to wrench three whole blog posts from my wriggling and fetid entrails, so lucky y'all who know my real fake identity. Read 'em and weep. No, really: Have your hanky ready because the staggering downfall of my online writing career is a tear-jerker.

And again, I'm here. And I'm raging, raging against the dying of the light. And I'm going to give you a review today if it kills me.

It's kind of a shame, really, that I didn't get a shitbag of a blog to review. In my current bout of ennui, it'd be nice to dabble in some truly vicious asskickery. And then maybe I could have pulled off that superior bit, you know? Oh, I'm a limp dick of a writer right now, but I'm still better than this turdlet. But no. I've got The Daily Smoke.

It's a quiet, unprepossessing kind of blog. Black and white with a little red, the template is fine. Basic, uncluttered, fairly well organized. I'd go for some tabs, of course, but what do I know?

Her posts are almost always bundled and wrapped up in pretty packaging and well-paced. There's nothing slipshod about it. There's nuance and detail involved, and, yes, quite a bit of navel gazing. But her vision, I'm pleased to say, is just the tiniest bit skewed, which makes that gaze rather charming.

As an ex-pat blog, it's interesting to read about her experiences in London, and she's very self-aware and writes with confidence and grace. She does these quick little observations, a brief vignette of who and what she sees through the smoke, and it's delightful, really. A kernel of time and thought with nice grammar and a clever ending.

Lately, there's been some depth added to the blog. Some darkness and reality that makes her already interesting voice that much more captivating. But even that edge is tempered with her dry wit and a self-deprecating awareness.

Also, Clive fucking Owen.

So, I really liked this blog. I felt like I could come close and get to know Ellie. But not right away. There'd be some idle chit-chat at first. Then she'd casually reveal something not-so-casual that would make me think, "Huh. Interesting chick, here. Not quite what I expected." And then, still later, after fun times and insightful conversation and maybe a drunken bitchfest or two and a shared appreciation for hot men, all of a sudden I'd realize, you know what? I fucking love her.

I am at home with the me, I am rooted in the me who is on this adventure.

I knew a girl in college who wore long, flowing skirts and no makeup. Her hair looked how it looked with no product or styling or coercing. If she felt like dancing she danced, if she thought something was funny she laughed loud and long (I remember that laugh still: "ha, ha, HAH!" with her head thrust back), and if she wanted to touch you she would. She'd lean in close when she talked, in your space, looking you directly in the eye. Rebecca liked people, liked getting to know them, finding out what made them tick, figuring out how their minds worked, why they did what they did. She hated shoes and clothes and artifice. She liked boys and girls in equal measure, and typically they liked her, too. They couldn't help it. She was light and direct and earthy. And she was the most present and carefree person I think I've ever know.

Rebecca made me uncomfortable while she was making me interested. She just didn't hide. She'd loop her arm through mine and snug her chin on my shoulder, smelling like patchouli and sunshine. She confronted and questioned and she just was so very much her own person. You could take her or leave her and she wouldn't mind either way.

In some ways, Hope's blog Hopenminded reminds me of Rebecca. She has that same carefree directness, that same hippy-dippy, woo-woo peace and love mentality, where they just delve and ask and explore and analyze.

Hope has, by her own admission, a darker experience. There's an edge to her lightness. Her hopefulness is hard-gained and bruised. She is honest (if maybe a little defensive?) about who she is and where she's been. She really is open and hopeful, and based on the glimpses she's given of the life she's lived, it's really a wonderful thing to see. She's chosen -- and probably has to make that choice over and over -- to live simply, peacefully, and joyfully. And for someone like me, who tends to piss and moan about every little inconvenience in her my-god-I've-had-it-damned-easy life, this mentality is really rather instructive.

Now that I've admired the hell out of Hope and appreciated her for drawing out the memory of someone admirable and slightly complicated from my past, let's move on to the nuts and bolts of blogging, shall we? Good. Because Hope needs some help.

Getting the design stuff out of the way, there are three empty tabs. Hey how about taking them down until they're actually useful? You have way too much shit in the sidebars, and you don't need two of them. Get rid of the random posts and recent comments and either stick with the tag cloud OR the categories (categories, please), not both. And your blogroll? It's not really a blogroll. Take it down until it has something in it, or better yet move it to a tab. The design is fine, but consider bumping up the size of your font -- it's way too small.

Now, the writing, which is what Hope and I (and you) care most about. She faces some marked challenges in her writing, with (apparently) little training or education. It shows. But that's ok. You hear me, Hope? That's ok. You keep at it, dammit. You love it, and there's no reason you can't do this if you work hard enough.

But yes, to be honest because that's what we do here and that's what you expect and you can take it, your writing needs some work. You don't need me to tell you there are considerable spelling and grammar and construction mistakes, but I'll do it anyway: there are. You show your rookie roots with rambling, unedited, uncrafted writing. You write because you love it, because it's cathartic for you, because you have to. That impetus is fantastic and can't be taught. What you need -- and what can be taught -- is polish. You need to keep reading good writing that speaks to you, you need to sign up for a local writing group where you can learn from more experienced writers, you need to challenge yourself with writing exercises, and you need to edit the hell out of yourself.

This post here, where you're watching people and recording? That was good (and so was this). Keep observing. Keep figuring out what makes people tick. Write often and always go back and clean up your writing, find the good bits, prune the unnecessary bits, and get to the heart, the poetry, the art of your writing. Your passion is there -- now practice.





P.S. You have a category called "I'm Fingering it all out." I kind of hope that's on purpose. You finger the hell out of life.

My skeertuig is vol palings*

The other day a friend and I went to see "Julie & Julia," a sweet little film about a culinary giant and some girl who turned her whiny little blog into a book (and then into a movie). During the film, my friend turns to me and says, "Someday I'll say I knew you when you had a blog." I scoffed, "It doesn't happen like that anymore." And it surely won't happen to me and my sorely neglected little exercise in self-indulgence. But the thing is, as Madame pointed out recently, everyone and their mother and sometimes their cat has a blog now. The field is saturated and glutted and just overrun with folks wanting to be heard above the din.

But what's worse than all those mind-numbing and misspelled and mordant (although I kind of like that bit) forays into blogging, those wastes of space, those narcissistic little microcosms, are the ones who could be so much better but just aren't. Stu strikes me as one such.

He has the ugliest template ever. I wanted to click away immediately. The ads are sucking my will to live. It looks like a spam nest run over by a train wreck with gobbets of banality strewn across the pavement of the blogosphere. I mean, look: He made me use the word "blogosphere." Jesus lord, there are no dates on the posts! Where am I? Also, the whole shebang sometimes gets all wonky with the archives and crap moving under the post.

Just scrap it. It's total crap. It is a hinderance to your writing. It couches your blog in the most off-putting way. Find something simple, roll up your archives, get organized, and for shit's sake put a date on your posts. Stu, you don't need a tab for "blogging." The whole blog should kind of be for that, right? And that header image? That's the header image of a total douchebag.

Stu, your title is so annoying I want to rips its wriggling little guts out. I mean, fuck me sideways, there are ellipses in the title. In the title! I hate it on principle. And merit. And anything else I can hate it on.

But go check out his "About" page, which is really just his Blogger profile (dude -- don't do that). He sounds interesting, right? Ninjas, the word "hogwash," Aston Martins? Well, you never would have guessed from looking at his shit storm of a blog.

Guess what? A "belter" is apparently a hot chick. Just FYI. Learn something new every day. I thought it had to do with people who can really belt out a song, like maybe Babs. But no. Hot chicks. How original. Although I'm pleased to report that the brunettes seem to outstrip (that might have been a poor choice of words -- or a perfect one) the blondes.

Something else I learned? South Africans say "y'all." I can't quite wrap my head around that.

Look, the guy's entertaining enough and he's kind of funny, but do I really need to read another site where a guy drools over hot girls, hot cars, and moderately funny things posted elsewhere on the web? No. No, I don't. And neither does the rest of the world. It's not until about three months into the blog that we get an actual post with more than a paragraph or two from Stu without a picture of a hot car or a bikinied babe or something pilfered from somewhere else. And, you know, aside from some sloppiness and ellipses overkill, it's actually amusing.

Stu, Stu, Stu... cut the crap. You're an amusing guy and your voice is engaging, but you lose me with all the extra nonsense you pepper into your blog. It's useless, overdone, and it completely undermines your genuinely likable writing. You can do better. Strip it down, tune it up, and get real. I stopped reading after about four months because I had to wade through all the flotsam and jetsam of Internet wreckage to get to YOU. And you're lucky I got that far.

You get a flaming finger because you are failing to live up to your potential and your template sucks hind tit. Clean it up, start actually writing, and I might reconsider. You've got something -- you're just hiding it. Stop.






*My hovercraft is full of eels. (Afrikaans)

When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.

So, um, hi? Miss me? Yeah, look, sorry about that. I kind of took an unintentional hiatus there. It's just, damn, there's this whole summer winding down thing and my rampant ennui and there was, like, stuff to do where I had to meet deadlines. And then I got this rager of a headache that totally incapacitated me and all. But, you know, sorry. Not your fault, guys. It's all me. Me and my excuses.

But I'm getting back into it, you know? Psyching myself up, getting pumped, giving myself a stern talking to about responsibilities and commitments and follow through and keeping my eye on the ball and strike first, strike hard, no mercy SIR!

And look! It's working. 'Cause here's my review.

Batspit. Bat spit? Bat's pit? Bats pit? I haven't a clue. I don't know what it means. I don't know why. Or how. The about page is short and sweet and doesn't tell me, so I'm left to my own devices, which means I think it's bat spit. But do bats even spit? If they do, is it venomous? Or is it rich in nutrients like their shit? Thoughts to think, stuff to ponder.

Whatever the hell it means, her site has a very minimalist design, and it's image-friendly, which is good because she posts a lot of her own photos. And they're pretty, with an interesting perspective.

The writing is much the same. Lea writes these poetic and nuanced and powerful posts about small things and big things. There are posts I can relate to, and her writing is spare and lovely. She's an anthropology student, which doesn't surprise me as her attention to detail is reverential and her interest in others palpable. Lea is a word nerd, and and I have to love anyone who uses the word "skirr." I mean, honestly. Say it. Skirr. You want to roll the R, don't you? Lord knows I do.

I admit, I haven't read the whole thing yet. Yet, mind you. I fully intend to and I'm adding her to my reader. I started at the beginning and have worked my way up toward last November. I'm disappointed that she hasn't posted since August 13, but then who am I to talk, Miss Ennui Notbloggington herself? But Lea has captured the blogging crisis for academia, and for us. And she's so very, oh, what do I want to say... earthy and organic. There's nature and life and joy and detail, such pristine detail in her writing. It's like she's cupped the world in her hands and is examining it piece by piece as it comes along, taking its picture and putting it up close, close, close to her eye so she can see it and write about it and savor it just so.

So, what can I suggest for Lea? Just keep writing. I'll keep reading.

Waxing Scatalogical

Every time I get a mommy blogger to review I say some variation of this: I'm not a mom; I don't want kids; parenting is beyond me and I just don't get it. And it's true, every time. But I'll be damned if there aren't a lot of you parents out there blogging away. You've snuck right up on me so that here I am at 34, still befuddled by the thought that people try to get pregnant. I know; I'm kind of a late bloomer.

Still, every time I get a blog that's demonstrably mommy in nature, I cringe. And this is entirely unfair because, lord, how many people out there have kids? Some of my favorite people are parents. Some of my favorite bloggers are parents. My parents are parents and I love the hell out of them. I am so much in the minority as to be almost freakish. And they're just people, after all. They haven't been infiltrated by evil parent aliens from the planet Annoy the Fuck Out of Me, where their god is The Mighty Scrapbook and their government -- My Offspring Did the Cutest Thing Today -- demands a kid-centric regime. At least not all of them have.

So I renounce my anti-parent blogger bias and promise to no longer sneer and roll my eyes automatically when I see a page devoted almost entirely to progeny. At least I'll refrain until I've determined whether they are, indeed, aliens.

Which brings me to today's reviewee, Creepy at Tiptoeing Through the Tulips. It is, yes, a mommy blog. You can tell right away -- look at the huge honking childish scrawl that takes up your entire browser window. It kind of gives it away. It also kind of drives me insane. There's also the tell-tale collection of darling pictures of children paraded down her sidebar. Initially you might think, as I did, "Oh holy fucking christ, another fucking mommy blog. I bet her kids shit rainbows and fart lollipops."

Well, you and I would be wrong. Because her kids just shit shit. Lots of it. (Be glad I didn't link to this post. Oh, wait. I did.). A lot a lot. If I didn't think the whole tulips thing was very appropriate, I'd suggest she change her blog title to something along the lines of "There's Shit Everywhere," or "Shitastrophes," or "Ew, What's That Smell?"

But don't let the poopapalooza throw you off. Creepy is worth pinching your nose to tread through all that loaf pinching. She's all kinds of upfront about who she is and what this blog is about. Yes, it's a mommy blog. But if a mommy can say these two things, back to back, I'm down: "*I love my kids so fucking much I want to squeeze them 'til their little heads pop off. *My kids drive me so fucking crazy I want to tear their little heads off." Because that's kind of how I think it should be, me with my neverhavingkids self.

There's a lot of "this is what we did and how it went and aren't my kids the cutest little shitpants on the planet" writing, but Creepy is likable and irreverent and honest and twisted and enraged enough to pull it off. Also, we totally share a birthday. Aries holla!

So, it's not the most carefully crafted blog, and maybe the kid stuff can get a little ho-hum for a nonbreeder like me, but she makes up for that by telling a very honest, meaningful, and relatable story about raising a special needs kid. My day job deals with exceptional education, so I know how valuable sharing experiences can be for parents of kids with special needs, and I respect Creepy for wanting to document her experiences. It makes a difference, and I suspect it will make a difference to her son some day.

However, Creepy, I'd still like to encourage you to branch out more. Frankly, I'd like to know more about you now. The blog feels a little like it's outgrown its beginnings, with Graham thriving and growing and little Dottie, too. It feels like it might be time to drop the umbrella of "mom who blogs about her kids" in exchange for one about Creepy, who is a mom and more.

Some suggestions: Your design is innocuous and boring, but not eye-bleedingly horrible. I'd move the archives up above the pictures of the rugrats. Good job on having separate pages for important things, though. In terms of writing, you have an engaging and funny voice that I suspect is very true to life. But there's a slipshod quality to some of your posts. I know you're a busy mom, and you say you're not a writer, but I suspect you are. Or could be. Spend some more time on crafting your posts and editing them. And please, for the love of Daniel Craig's sweet, sweet ass (<--- my version of heaven), lay off the fucking ellipses.

'Cause in the city we're ourselves and electric too

I'm not a city girl. I'm not a country girl, either, for that matter. Nor am I a country club girl or a suburban girl or a southside girl or a campus girl. I'm not precisely sure what location descriptor might fit me best, really. Perhaps I'm a midtown girl. Whatever I am it's not city. And this depresses me a little bit because, oh, the lights and the pace and the sights and the culture (yeah, sure, junkies in the park counts as culture, don't you think?). But I'd be overwhelmed down in the thick of it for more than a couple of weeks, honestly. I'd want some trees and a little space before too long.

The Unbearable Banishment, however, straddles the line between suburb and city, sometimes embracing his banishment and sometimes pining for his lost city (which isn't really lost, since he works there, but still). He's a Midwestern guy who moved to NYC and stayed for twenty years but got sucked into New Jersey suburbia and family life.

This is the dullest design ever. Oh, it's fairly innocuous. I'm not seeing any antifreeze green or anything. But it's such a downer. Seriously, folks, get with the program. This isn't 2004. Find a better template. We've got loads of links for you to find something better. UB, you take lovely pictures of the city and your family. Snag one of those and make it your banner. The design you've got now says, "Ask me about purchasing medical supplies," not, "I'm a cool, arty, urban dad with a sense of humor." I will say this, it's not cluttered. Although you'd be better served with tabs for an About page (create one, please) and your blogroll.

UB is a bookish city boy and the father of two girls about whom he writes sweet and funny posts. He reminds me of my brother if my brother were straight: neat, organized, intelligent, well-spoken, artistic, and politely irreverent (that sounds like an oxymoron, but it's not). He's into theater , theater, and more theater (Why do I feel like I need to be spelling it "theatre"? Because I'm all snooty-balooty, that's why.) and art and books.

There's amusing commentary on NYC/NJ life and funny references to Bond, which is aces in my book. Anyone who can quote Goldfinger is all right by me. But he's also remarkably down to earth and his writing is approachable and conversational. And he's a marauding cell phone jammer, a practice of which I wholeheartedly approve. He needs a fucking cape.

Most of the blog is light and funny and erudite and sort of carefree, but there are some posts that reveal what's going on in his life and his heart, and these are very fine, too. I'd like more of them.

The morning is moving on without me, and I've got to get this review posted. But what I really want to do is settle back into this blog and read some more. It's being added to my feed reader as we speak, although there's one minor problem: I want to know more. There's not a lot of talk about Mrs. Wife, which is either a little off-putting or terribly protective and sweet, I'm not sure which. And we get a lot of now, but not so much then. I'd like some more exposition, but then I always do. "Take it off, take it all off" seems to be my mantra. I get that not all blogs need to explore the sharp, rusty edges of our souls or sift through the decaying pages of our sordid pasts, but, come on. Just a little?

The giggle of eyelashes*

In graduate school I learned to sing the body electric. The program I attended was more about souls and songs and art and heart and expression than it was about lectures and footnotes and appendices and theses. We created and explored. We put font to music. We made books and paper and poetry.

At first, I balked at the artsy fartsyness of it all. I wanted to be a serious student, with serious success, large textbooks, late nights at the library over microfiche, bibliographic complexity. Instead I got professors who encouraged us to open class with an African blessing to the dawn, who wanted artistic presentations on feminist gods, who expected me to dig, dig, dig deep into wells of pain and self and remembrance and hope to create art. It was all so much kumbaya and not enough cross-referencing. At first. But gradually, with eye-rolls and exasperated huffs and hesitant inchings toward release, I succumbed to the power in their poetry, the worth of their wonder. And I'm a better writer for it.

Today's blogger reminds me of that time in graduate school, when I sloughed off some of that rigid academia to embrace the tickle of words. Maya at One Paragraph at a Time is a poet who would have fit in nicely with my crowd of wordmongers in graduate school.

I hesitate to tell you her blog is almost entirely poetry. But wait! I know. I thought the same thing at first. A whole blog? Over four years of posts? With nothing but poetry? Pass. But stick with me here because Maya can write some damn poetry. I actually like it. Kind of a lot. Her writing is contemplative and introspective and deliberate and lovely and tactile and thoughtful. She writes about nostalgia and sex ("he was all hers, one locked muscle of utter fealty") and lies. Her poetry is honest and mature and revealing. Every word is revered, precisely chosen, and treasured.

I just read an entire blog of poetry. I can't believe it, either, but I did. And I loved it. Oh, the template is boring, and Maya could stand to roll up her archives. But the template doesn't even matter because her artistry is on the screen, in those words I want to roll around on my tongue, those words that delight my eyes. This is not some angsty teenage blithering with rhymed, insipid dreck. This is real, this is art, and this is good.








*My title is stolen from Maya @ One Paragraph at a Time.