An old friend of mine, Jim DeBrosse, used to have a saying about writing: Sit and it will come. Each day, he used to start the day early, sitting in front of his CRT typing away. He wrote at least four novels, three of which I've read. One of which I own. I miss working with Jim at the Dayton Daily News. He always seemed so productive, especially considering he spent so much time raising several children, lusting over a minivan and using his network of spies throughout the newspaper to tip him off to the arrival of donuts. I once saw his sneak into a meeting, snatch a donut from his box, and tip toe out. And every day, usually around 11 a.m., he would start pulling an endless buffet out of his knapsack for a three-hour feast. Not that he was fat. Well, not overly so. He and several other workers often took a mid-day break to jog a mile or two, while I just stayed at my desk, tapping away. An awful habit. I really do need to get out more. Or at least force myself to sit behind the tube and write about life, write creatively for a few minutes every day, instead of just grinding out material for the daily news beast. My main problem is that I seem to be so deadline-oriented, only writing when a story is due imminently. I feel like I miss so many opportunities to catch the pulsing of the life, one minute flowing into the next, instead of just rushing to scramble the news. Of course, this is probably just an elaborate way to say that I'm feeling guilty, again, for missing yet another day in the life of ME. As if anyone would care. So, let me talk about Web diaries. The first Web one I ever read was a hoot. Written by some guy in Lubbuck, Texas. The title said it all: My diary on getting a girlfriend. Juvenile? Maybe. But we could all relate. This was written by a geek who was too shy to talk to any of the girls...well hardly any cute girls he kept spotting in class. A bit pathetic, but quite addictive. I kept checking in week after week, getting mad when Mr. Geek didn't share the latest gossip. Eventually, of course, the site died. The next one was even better: Banter, a Seinfeld reference. It was written by a tremendously sensitive and intelligent Aussie who always wrote terribly long journal entries and was always falling hopelessly behind. Trademark: He always began his journal entries with a Seinfeld quote. Or almost always. That too died. I think he moved to the States to be with his true love. Or something. Now my favorite is suck-my-big.org by a New York theater maven and Dorothy Parker fan, Catherine Skidmore. I can't believe she's an engineer. She could be a writer. She seems to appear often enough in fun feature articles and stories. All right. Nuff Banter for today.
posted by todd wallack 8/4/2000 10:12:05 PM
Damn. I've already missed a day. (August 1, I heardly knew ye.) But I was swamped with work. I wound up leaving the office at just before midnight, rushing to BART before the last train stoped running, past the urban denizens huddling up for the evening. A dozen teenagers soon boarded, howling about something or other as another tried to play hostess: "This is brittany, and this my friend josh, and this is Lisa, and that's RuPaul." OK. Not RuPaul. You never hear the name RePaul. Except for The RuPaul. Speaking of which, RuPaul narrated a hillarious movie I saw Monday: Eyes of Tammy Faye. It's a documentary. A very funny documentary. Think Crumb. Think sock puppets. The director used sock puppets to introduce each section, a reference to Tammy Faye's puppet show that helped launched PTL. (Full disclosure: My friend Jacq didn't find the puppets nearly as amusing as I did.) Turns out the Bakkers also helped launch the Christian Broadcasting Network (hosting the two most successful shows, including the 700 Club) and another television ministry. Tammy went on to host a doomed talk show with a Monroe from Too Close for Comfort. Go figure. She's bizarre as ever -- refusing to remove any mascara during a Hollywood photo shoot -- but surprisingly sympathetic. (Incidentally, the Internet Movie Database should send me royalties for all those links.) Web update: I finally got my own domain ( inkstain.org) up and running. You'd think I would have bothered to register an Internet domain years ago, but the cost used to be higher ($50 per year for registration, plus $40 per month for hosting.) It's a bargain today. $15 per year for the name at Dotster and $7 for the hosting at Your-sight.com. I'm still having trouble setting up the mail box, however.
posted by todd wallack 8/2/2000 7:58:18 AM
12:34 a.m. It's odd. I've been online for more than 15 years. I've had an Internet account for about nine. But I've only finally got around to setting up an online journal. Truth is I'm not sure if this is a good idea. I've read far too many journals on the Net where people reveal intimate details about their lives, only to shock their friends and relatives, who happened to stumble on the page. It would probably be much better to keep a journal by hand, stashed away in my closet or under a bed. But everytime I try to keep a journal on my own, I fail. It's easier for me to type than to write. And it's much easier to write for an audience -- even if the audience only exists in my head. So, silly or not, I hope to keep a much more faithful journal online than I could ever must in my stash of notepads.
posted by todd wallack 7/31/2000 12:42:44 AM