A Fitting Start

Blogs frighten me. I'll put that out right now. With the imminent downfall of traditional media, everyone has already loaded up the blogging bandwagon and decided to head out to the metaphorical West - wherever that might be.

Meanwhile, I've felt left behind. Despite the fact that I've been a part of the blogging world since 2003.

Let's make it clear: Livejournal is not a blog. It is a repository of desires, high-school drama and wasted lives. Everyone I know who is of any significance in my life has stopped posting there or imported blog posts to their Livejournal accounts. The design of LJ pages is enough to induce claustrophoiba. Defined links are usually near the top, with any options for escape presented at the forefront. Then the page descends into mindless ramblings about love life, isolation and that little button to offer alms - register and comment, but only if you're a friend.

Then there is the devious nature of "friends only" and "private" posts. Anyone who posts a friends only post apart from others is entering a hallway of demarcations that cut the real and digital world into any number seperate social circles, dividing themselves in the process. Why do people post privately, anyway? Instead of writing it on paper, on Microsoft Word, on the cells of their own mind, they put it on a rinky-dink do-it-yourself internet website only they can see. Maybe they can reveal it those around them eventually, but with a single misstep they might reveal it to everyone. This not only risks personal grief, arguments between friends and hurt feelings, but, if you're a Washington call-girl, a few lawsuits.

Livejournal is a memory dump. It's like the file cabinet in a home office. You start out thinking you're organized and efficient, but eventually you get frustrated and can't figure out which way to arrange everything. Then you start throwing anything you don't have a place for in there - CDs, pictures, receipts you have no use for It keeps piling up until one day you decide to arrange that messy cabinet for good. That is, until you mess it up again, inevitably.

I can keep my bedroom that way, but not my thoughts. That's why I stopped posting in the LJ and have started here.

However, the subject matter leaves something to be desired. For those who are fans of British Comedy, the title may be familiar. If it is, you'll understand how this directionless this blog is. For everyone else, watch Alan Partridge.

This blog will likely find a few posts throughout the summer. It will really get going when the college exile ends in late August.
Until then, I'll post commentary on events around Madison, the music community and anything of political pertinance that doesn't come off with complete ignorance.