The First Post
I know what you’re thinking: "Wow, just what the world needed: Another useless blog!" That’s right, there just aren’t enough self-serving hacks spewing forth about any topic under the sun that tickles their fancy or blathering on about whatever got them worked up on the commute home from work that day. Now, if you’re anything like me, and I believe the world would be a better place if you were, your next question will be "Fine, then what makes your blog any different from the millions of other blogs out there?" The answer is that I am not doing this to amuse or entertain anyone except myself. I fully expect the readership of this blog will never exceed the small cadre of people who can tolerate me in person and have probably heard the same rants and observations live from my mouth.
Why am I really doing this? There are two reasons. One is because I come up with a lot of clever stuff on a daily basis, most of which I’ve forgotten by the time I’m deciding whether I want to stay awake for that night’s guest on The Daily Show or flip the channel and watch the last five or ten minutes of Futurama or Family Guy, whichever Cartoon Network is airing at 11:00pm that night. (They’ve switched the two shows every few months for no apparent reason.) I'd like to be able to recall some of this stuff when I want to.
And the other reason? Posterity. Sure, a written diary could serve the same purpose, but anything put on the Internet these days will be archived somewhere, while a small book can easily get lost. Since I’m not creating a journal of my innermost feelings, I don’t have a problem with complete strangers reading my works. But it nice to know that in ten or fifteen years, my kids will be able to dig this stuff up and learn just what it is about their daddy and how they were raised that’s forcing them to choose between college and psychotherapy.
At this point, the typical new blogger takes it upon himself to prepare an introduction and provide some insight into his life so that future blog posts will have a canvas against which they can be compared and contrasted. For example, if I told you I’d been raised on a farm, it would make a lot more sense if I then wrote a post filled with glee and wonderment about going to Las Vegas for the first time. Well, the good news for you readers is that I don’t feel like doing anything but the bare minimum as far as introductions go. For anyone who knows me, none of this is a surprise. Here goes:
Why am I really doing this? There are two reasons. One is because I come up with a lot of clever stuff on a daily basis, most of which I’ve forgotten by the time I’m deciding whether I want to stay awake for that night’s guest on The Daily Show or flip the channel and watch the last five or ten minutes of Futurama or Family Guy, whichever Cartoon Network is airing at 11:00pm that night. (They’ve switched the two shows every few months for no apparent reason.) I'd like to be able to recall some of this stuff when I want to.
And the other reason? Posterity. Sure, a written diary could serve the same purpose, but anything put on the Internet these days will be archived somewhere, while a small book can easily get lost. Since I’m not creating a journal of my innermost feelings, I don’t have a problem with complete strangers reading my works. But it nice to know that in ten or fifteen years, my kids will be able to dig this stuff up and learn just what it is about their daddy and how they were raised that’s forcing them to choose between college and psychotherapy.
At this point, the typical new blogger takes it upon himself to prepare an introduction and provide some insight into his life so that future blog posts will have a canvas against which they can be compared and contrasted. For example, if I told you I’d been raised on a farm, it would make a lot more sense if I then wrote a post filled with glee and wonderment about going to Las Vegas for the first time. Well, the good news for you readers is that I don’t feel like doing anything but the bare minimum as far as introductions go. For anyone who knows me, none of this is a surprise. Here goes:
- Name: Call me Elf.
- Real Name: You either know it or you don’t. I’m not telling since I do value what little privacy we have remaining under the Bush administration. (Oh yeah, Fuck Bush.)
- Age: 39. For now.
- Birthplace: Brooklyn, NY, though I was dragged out to California with my family when I was eight and I like to think I still haven’t quite adjusted. I’ve never called anyone "Dude" and if I’ve ever said "Have a nice day," you can be sure it was dripping with all of the sarcasm and cynicism I could squeeze into that statement.
- Location: San Fernando Valley, California
- Marital Status: Married since April 1995 to "Wife," "Daughter" born in late 1996, "Son" born in mid-1999.
- Job: HealthCare IT Geek.
- Health: Tenuous, but working on it. I’ll probably end up posting my cholesterol numbers here on a regular basis, just for my reference so I can look back and see how much healthier (or sicker) I was in the past.
- Politics: See Name section above. I think you can figure it out from there.
- Religion: I'm against it. Don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll expound on this topic a whole bunch in the future, but the bottom line is that there is no god, and religion is the worst thing that ever happened to mankind. Hmmm, maybe I won’t have to say too much more after that, though I’m sure I will anyway. (I have to wonder if any first time readers are just going to stop reading right here. Religious zealots can be so fucking sensitive. And as far as I’m concerned, anyone who makes any effort to practice religion and/or identifies themselves as belonging to any "organized" religion is a zealot.)
- Outlook on Life: Cynical. How could anyone arrive at a different outlook on life after realizing that 98% of the world’s population are idiots?
posted by Elf at 10:26 PM
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