In graduate school I was fortunate enough to take a Humor Writing course from the fantastic Pulitzer-Prize winning cartoonist Doug Marlette. I enjoyed the course immensely even if I did occasionally feel that his criticisms were along the lines of "Well, it would’ve been 10% funnier if…" 

My favorite part of the course was the habit that Marlette and I got into of walking out of the building at the same time. The University had given him a small apartment on campus that was near where I always parked my car, and so every week after class we’d end up walking together for about 15 minutes, and we had some fantastic conversations. Now that he’s passed away I wish to God I’d recorded them.

One of these conversations was about blogging. While not opposed to the form exactly, he did compare it to karaoke for writers, and he was right: blogging is a forum wherein anyone with the will to do so can write and publish and be heard by however large an audience there is at the moment. Like karaoke, the medium doesn’t presuppose any commitment to the artistry or craft in which one is engaging. It only supposes that you’ve decided you’re going to do it.

Needless to say, I have some mixed feelings about blogging. I love keeping this website and having the opportunity to share stories and photos with the universe at the push of a button. On the other hand, I worry that it’s taking time that I could be using to write books that would be "actually" published, or set up a photography exhibit at some little gallery here in town, or work on paying stories for my cool little alternative newsweekly.

The trick is something about managing the creative life, I know, having multiple artistic impulses and learning to properly order them. It’s all very interesting-uninteresting. The fact is that I enjoy having this website and from the feedback you guys give me, I think that you enjoy reading it. I’ve been frustrated in the past with feeling that this website doesn’t ever live up to the expectations that I have for it, but then I realized that personal blogging doesn’t have to have a mission statement, exactly, and that the secret is not to try harder to live up to a vague set of expectations but to figure out what those expectations are exactly and whether or not they’re good ones to have.

Almost done, I promise. The fact is that the thing I want to accomplish here is to bring you good writing, good photography, good links. I want to make you laugh and think. I want to give you the best I can without compromising the quality of and time I spend on my other artistic endeavors. I promised myself awhile back that I wouldn’t slack off or half-ass the writing on this website just because it’s a "blog," or rush posts out just for the sake of posting something. To that end I’ve been holding back and editing things before publishing them and trying to polish the writing here as much as I can. As a result I’ve become much more proud of the little place we’ve created here.

Here’s where you come in. We’ve made some changes, as you might’ve noticed: at the top of the site is a "Subscribe" menu that lets you nab this site’s RSS feed (which you could always do; we’ve just made it easier). I recommend subscribing to your favorite blogs and sites using Firefox’s Live Bookmarks tool; that’s how I keep track of mine. You also can feed the site through Google Reader and other similar services.

I’ve also got a Blogs page at Facebook. If you have Facebook I hope you’ll become a reader; I know it’s an application you have to add, and I sorta hate those, but I promise you this one is well worth it. Not only can you track this site, you can find ones like it, and follow some of my favorite blogs as well. Also, we’ve added an option at the bottom of posts and pages where you can share this site on your favorite social media and linking sites, and I hope if you find something you like here that you’ll share it with others. I think 2009 is going to be a big year for me as far as writing and artistry, but I realized recently that a certain amount of promotion is required to move things forward at this point. I appreciate everyone who reads this website and I hope you’ll continue to come back.