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Daily Blah for... Friday, May 31, 2002
Gauls Galled by Senegal's Gall
After that last entry, I got my marching orders from Miguel in Puerto Rico. "Perhaps you should write a bit more about how you go about doing your job," he writes. "That might be interesting to people in Luxembourg or New Zealand. Or post your comments about the World Cup (or the Lakers or Australian football or Don Imus). Anyhow, I generally enjoy your observations about things."
Little as I know about the Lakers, Aussie footie or Imus, Miguel, I guess I'll either have to comment on the World Cup or my job. Happily, one dominated the day more than the other. I just spend the last few hours celebrating Senegal's triumphant upset over world champions France -- we Brits like underdogs, and we really like it when bad things happen to the French. So inspired was I by the tiny African nation's victory that I took it one step further on Fifa World Cup 2002, an Xbox game I've become strongly addicted to over the last few weeks of pre-cup fever. Taking on the persona of Senegal, I trounced France 3-0, lost to Denmark, drew with Uruguay and went through to a nail-biting African derby against Nigeria. In which, unfortunately, they lost 4-3 to a last-minute own goal. Still, little did I suspect when I awoke bleary-eyed this morning that I'd become so well acquainted with names like Moussa N'Diaye, Pape Sarr and Pape Bouba Diop. And that's just the reaction of one guy 5,000 miles away from the action. I love this world, this global sports arena, where the media can help create instantaneous multicultural heroes. Think of everything Senegal is going to get out of this: the name recognition, the tourism dollars, the pride.
Of course, most people in this country will barely have known about it. Yes, it's the moment that comes every four years where I have my standard gripe about the U.S.' profound lack of interest in the world's largest sporting event, like the big kid sulking in the corner of the field not joining in the fun because he doesn't like games where he finishes dead last. Of course, I don't mean to belittle the hundreds of thousands of Americans -- including some of my friends -- who are genuinely interested in the tournament. My beef is that many more who would probably enjoy it if the sports media deigned to give it any kind of prominence. This opening match, easily the most exciting opener in the last twelve years, possibly ever, was harder to find on American TV than skeet shooting. It was shown on ESPN2 (what, not even ESPN itself? What the hell was so important that they had to show at 4:30am?).
ESPN2 is not available in all regions or on all services; lucky I have satellite as well as cable. I might have been forced to watch the game on Spanish-language Univision, which admittedly is worth catching purely for the announcer's heartfelt celebratory cry: "goooooooooooooooooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaal!" We could do with some of that passion in the ESPN announcer, who doesn't seem to truly believe in the game he's commentating on, doesn't feel the tremendous release of scoring, and keeps using American sporting language -- assists and shutouts and all that -- which really doesn't work in a global context. Come on, ESPN. Come on, ABC world of sports. Get up off the grass and stop playing this game in such a half-assed manner. Who do you think you are, France? Hee hee.
Daily Blah for... Wednesday, May 29, 2002
America vs. the World
No, this isn't another dull-as-dishwater dissection of the War on Terror. I've just discovered that this Extreme Tracking thing can tell me the country of origin of all my readers in the last two weeks. Not surprisingly, the vast majority are from the U.S., with 13 Canadians thrown in for the hell of it. Being a Brit makes me disappointed with my poor showing in the homeland (only 39 readers since mid-May), although that doesn't count Brits with .com e-mail addresses. The rest of it just doesn't make sense. Why am I three times as popular in Luxembourg as in France, or have four times as many readers in the Netherlands as in Italy? It could be a reasonable index of how good each country is at English, I suppose. But then why do I have three times as many devotees in the Czech Republic as in New Zealand? And why, dear sister of mine, do I not have a single native reader in Spain?
And while we're about it, why did a massive 22% of you hit the reload button last Sunday? I never post on Sunday, haven't you noticed? What, you thought if you reloaded enough times I'd get the message that you want to read my pearls of wisdom? Do I look like I'm psychic?
Never mind. We're coming up to 7pm Pacific time on Wednesday which, by a curious coincidence, is prime time here on Daily Blah. Yes, apparently more of you read this guff between 7 and 8pm on Wednesday than at any other hour. Maybe in future weeks I'll do something more prime-timey, like streamcasting live mud-wrestling or drawing Lotto numbers. I don't know. What do you want to see in this space? Let's hear some suggestions. I'm tired of ranting on. Why don't you do the talking for a bit?
A Description of Hayden's Symphony #94
I've started using a service called Extreme Tracking (it's that little box at the bottom of the page, above the hit counter). Regular Blah readers know I will use any excuse to write about anything related to this site, but the tracking info -- which lists exactly how people get here -- really was food for my rampantly curious ego. Who was it, for example, who got here by doing a Google search on "Chris Taylor Time Magazine" earlier today? Hands up. Who are you, and why are you searching for me? Who got here by doing a search for "Queen Mum Yoda?" You should be ashamed of yourselves. How about "daily thoughts?" (I do apologize to whomever did that search; they were probably hoping for something much more erudite). And most intriguingly, who in the world ended up here on Sunday after entering the following into Google: "Describe Hayden symphony #94"?
Trouble is, now I feel morally obliged to offer such a description in case that poor reader returns. Well, Hayden's symphony 94, erm, also known as the "surprise" symphony (which seems appropriate in this context) is generally played by chamber orchestras and sounds, um, nice. If anyone has anything to add, you know how to reach me.
The Terror Generation
So it seems there's increasing evidence that September 11 caused a baby boom in America; obstetricians across the country are gearing up for an explosion of births this summer. Millions of couples saw those towers collapse and suddenly got all broody. Isn't that a fantastic example of nature replenishing herself, a flowering of life to overcome the grief and shock of so much sudden death? Well, no, since you ask. This is a baby boom, which means we're going to get yet another vast generation of self-obsessed whiners working their way through the culture like a pig in a python. Over time, they will suck all art and music and fashion into their gravitational orbit like a collapsed star. Not that I'm complaining, but my relatively small generation -- heirs of the baby bust -- will be squeezed between these two massive entities, the post-World War II baby boom and the post 9/11 baby boom. We'll get stuck paying for the Social Security of one and have to endure the moaning of the others. Oh, and I just can't wait for the kids to ask: "what did you do in the War on Terror, Daddy?"
It could be worse. At least I won't be living amongst the baby Osamas of Northern Nigeria.
Daily Blah for... Tuesday, May 28, 2002
Trent and I
A couple of readers have asked how on Earth I managed to meet Trent Reznor, and furthermore why I threw his name in so casually a couple of posts ago. The answer to the latter is I know next to nothing about Nine Inch Nails, and therefore the meeting meant very little (sorry, NIN fans). I had an appointment to talk to John Carmack about Doom III, an early demo of which I had just been shown. The demo was very, very spooky and the lighting effects in the game are going to be fantastic. I was ushered into a small meeting room where Carmack sat, appropriately, with a single spotlight above him. We had spent some time together at id's offices in Mesquite, Tex. a couple of years ago for the release of Quake III, and I was engrossed by how much he has changed. He has lost none of his evil scientist streak, but he is much more gregarious and approachable (the new haircut helps) and babbled away incessantly about how to achieve visual reality in computer games. Perhaps his multimillion dollar fortune and garage full of Ferraris has helped. Something has, anyway. Unlike our chats in Mesquite, I could actually understand half of what he was talking about.
So there I was, engrossed in the new, dynamically-lit Carmack talking his mad genius talk, vaguely aware that there are other people sitting in the room. Finally the PR flack interjects, pointedly: "maybe we should talk about the audio for the game." I turn to her and realize Reznor is also at our table. I only know it is him because he is wearing a name badge, and I only know he is a big deal because I'd bumped into my friend Noah Robischon from Entertainment Weekly, who was frantically trying to arrange an interview with him (he created the audio effects for Doom III). Reznor indicates he was as engrossed in what Carmack was saying as I was -- "No, it's alright, I was getting an education" -- but he's protesting too much. I get the sense he's trying to supress the part of him that wants to blurt out "I'm a big star, why don't you talk to me?" Trouble was, I had prepared nothing to ask him. Luckily, I also didn't care about his status, didn't get palpitations over his mere presence, and so my brain was functional enough to fake something that would allow him to feel he was being listened to. "Well, we've just been talking about deceiving the human eye -- how do you deceive the human ear?" was my gambit. It paid off, and he talked happily about how to enhance the audio of reality. Still, I would have swapped a roomful of Reznors for the chance to meet Robin Williams, who was also spotted at the show. That would have given me palpitations.
It Takes a Lot of Brains
"It's going to take a lot of brains in Russia to create a drain." That was George W.'s enigmatic Quayle-esque answer this weekend to a reporter who asked him about the brain drain of scientists from the old Soviet states. Sounds like the start of a new kind of lightbulb joke: how many Russian scientists does it take to build a drain?
Anyway, my weekend was also about a lot of brains draining, or rather brains at rest. A camping trip with many fine-minded, funny-boned and fabulously-dressed friends up in the redwoods of Northern California provided the perfect antidote to the vapidity and fashion-led vanity of la-la land. These friends are amazing cooks, so my stomach feels as well-fed as my soul. There's something else I have in common with the Bush boy, who also told reporters he was looking forward to the "fantastic food" provided by the French President ("I like Jacques," he added.) Just as well. With the subcontinent sliding towards nuclear war and the threat of more terrorist attacks at home -- any time, any place, anywhere, and this time they really mean it -- don't you feel much safer in the hands of a leader who has dined heartily on foie gras, escargot and chateau briand?
Daily Blah for... Friday, May 24, 2002
A Tale Told by an Idiot
And so the sound and fury that is the E3 games convention winds down. Tonight was the traditional Thursday night Sony party, where the company takes over a chunk of downtown LA, casts searchlights into the sky, covers buildings with video screens and brings on mystery performers -- tonight the rap group Outcast, in previous years artists like Macy Gray and Lenny Kravitz. It is an exclusive affair, and the little green wristbands Sony gives out for entry are much sought after. Why, I don't know. Yes, there is free booze and food all night long, and there were some interesting fire dancers, and the bands are cool. But socially, I've been to better parties at my college tutors' houses. These are mostly games geeks, and as such, they don't mingle very well. They like the pretty lights and the pumping techno, but what does it all signify? Nothing.
That pretty much sums up the whole E3 experience. Like LA itself it's all surface and little substance. A lot of big screens, loud soundtracks, booth babes and other eye candy, all to advertize products that are themselves, for the most part, all flashy graphics with little good stuff underneath. I could count on two hands the number of games, out of the hundreds I've seen these past three days, that I'm actually excited about. For the record, they are: The Sims Online, City of Heroes, Star Wars Galaxies, Sim City 4, Medieval Total War, Neverwinter Nights, Godzilla, Age of Mythology and Warcraft III. What they have in common is that they exercise the brain more than the trigger finger, and look good without trying too hard to look realistic. Except Godzilla, which is just good clean city-stomping fun, and you get to throw buildings at Mothra.
The whole games industry has long been on this Quixotic quest for realism, and they've started to loose the plot. Insiders marvel at how good the lighting and reflection is in games like Doom III or Deus Ex II, to the point where it is the only acceptable topic of conversation. It is what games people expect you to ask about. I got sucked into an hour-long discussion with Trent Reznor (of Nine Inch Nails fame) and John Carmack (creator of Doom and Quake) Thursday afternoon about the sound and graphics they created for the latest Doom game, and how it was going to leave less and less gameplay to the imagination. I asked them: isn't there something wrong with this picture? Why is everyone in this business so obsessed with filling in for people's imaginations? What about developing original plot ideas, characters and locations instead? If I see one more online role playing game in isometric 3D with orcs and paladins and skeletons and zombies, I think I'm going to scream. Carmack and Reznor thought it was a luddite point of view: you can't stop progress, you can't stop games systems getting ever faster and better at rendering, and you can't divert the search for ever greater realism. It is what keeps this industry going, after all. Original ideas can be hard to come by, and hard to sell. Get the kids buzzing about which game looks more lifelike, and Moore's law guarantees you endless opportunity to keep selling them newer and better games. Just don't let them remember that the criteria for what made a good game used to be more than just texture and shading.
Daily Blah for... Wednesday, May 22, 2002
In the Clone Zone: An Open Letter to Lucas
SANTA MONICA -- It's been a long time, George ol' pal, ol' devourer of my childhood. It's been a long time since you made me feel seven years old. Oh, you tried, back in 1999. I felt a leap in my heart and an uncontainable grin on my chops when the opening credits of Episode I rolled. But try as I did to enjoy it, everything that followed betrayed the wonderment, the hope of ultimate escapism, that you instilled in me and a billion other fans with the opening trilogy. Tonight, at a special press screening of Episode II prior to the opening of the E3 games convention, you got a little credit back at the bank of wonderment. Not too much -- Clones is no Empire, and there are still many things you don't understand about what went wrong with Phantom Menace -- but enough to make me feel that when Episode III arrives in 2005, you might just about pay off your overdraft.
Let's start with those can't-help-feeling-like-a-kid moments. They were, in order: the opening credits (a purely Pavlovian response: play me the 20th Century Fox theme followed by the Lucasfilm theme followed by John Williams, and I'm putty in your hands); the flying car chase on Coruscant; Obi-Wan's discovery of the clone army and their terrifyingly familiar uniforms; the nick-of-time entrance of a dozen Jedi knights, lightsabers blazing; and of course, Yoda's stunning climactic duel with Christopher Lee. All of these scenes exceeded my expectations, but the last most of all. What a tremendously bold move that was on your part, to transform the little green guy into something out of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. He hobbles with a cane, he bounces around the room fighting the incarnation of evil, he picks up his cane and hobbles again. What an inspired illustration of one of the great themes of the series: the hidden forces at work inside us all.
But I don't need to tell you about themes, do I? You do love to repeat yourself so. You squeeze Tattooine, this supposedly insignificant desert planet, into the plot so much that the strain is showing. You repeat the line "I've got a bad feeling about this" in every movie, and each time it sounds more stilted. Repetition of theme is not in itself a problem; you've said many times that you are effectively creating a symphony, and I respect that aim. Certainly John Williams, with your direction, is knitting melodic themes together beautifully. The way his music breaks into the Imperial March towards the end of the movie is particularly chilling, enhancing our sense that the Empire is being constructed before our eyes.
But when Williams conducts a symphony, his instruments seldom sound as tired and discordant as yours. When did you stop directing actors, George? When did you stop caring about how lines sound? When did you stop caring whether the actors cared? Sure, the dialogue is hokey and camp; it always has been (and when you recognize this and have fun with it, such as the puns Threepio comes out with when he is trying to put himself back together, it works much better than when you take yourself too seriously). But go back and listen to the way Ford, Fisher, Hammil, Guinness and Jones delivered their lines. Whatever seemingly ridiculous nonsense they were talking -- making the Kessel run in less than ten parsecs, going to Tarsi station to pick up some power converters -- they always did it with feeling. Watching Ewan MacGregor, I can't help but feel his contempt for the script. There's a practiced blankness on Sam Jackson's face. Natalie Portman is still talking in monotone. Even Christopher Lee seems to be struggling with his lines. As for Hayden Christensen's portrayal of Anakin Skywalker, it veers so much into melodrama that I had a hard time believing him, too. In the early Anakin-Padme scenes, I almost believed I was watching a high-school play. Where has the genuine emotion gone, George? Whither the feeling that the characters care about this universe that you've created for them, the one that is supposed to be crumbling around their ears? My most truly emotive actor award would have to go to Dex, the four-armed cafe owner friend of Obi-Wan's, and he's entirely digital.
I know you sketched out the bare bones of each episode back in the 70's. But in fleshing them out, you've added too much digital flab and not enough muscle -- the integral, structural stuff. Take the Jedi. I was longing for some sort of establishing scene that makes us really care about the Jedi as an order, on a grand scale: something that brings home the majesty and the mysticism and the heritage and most of all, the numbers. This is a group of knights able -- just -- to keep peace in the galaxy under normal conditions. Why do we never see more than a dozen of them in any one scene? I know you want to drive home how imbalanced the Clone Wars are, and don't want to distract from the unveiling of thousands of clones. But these Wars -- note the plural -- are barely going to last ten seconds based on the numbers of Jedi we've seen by comparison, even accounting for lightsaber skill. And you've made them look extraordinarily stupid in the face of a takeover plot so obvious that any Coruscant journalist would sniff it out straight away. We really don't have much of an intrinsic reason to care about them. The least you can do is give them a majestic ceremony or two.
Of course, I don't want to jump the gun on Episode III. You've done a lot better this time. Don't be discouraged. But this is your last chance. Don't blow it. We're all really impressed with what you can do digitally; now show us some more spirit. Work off that flab. Build up an athletic level of muscle. And if you need some script doctoring assistance this time, my freelance rates are quite reasonable.
Daily Blah for... Thursday, May 16, 2002
Splinter of the Minds, eh?
An early but seemingly unassailable contender for freakiest flash animation of the year (which really should be a Webby category): Flashback.
Type in the Birds You're Looking For
Ever wondered why Google is such a great search engine? The answer is not what you might expect.
Daily Blah for... Tuesday, May 14, 2002
Blame San Andreas. It's His Fault.
It turns out last night's quake was not the most powerful since Loma Prieta. There was one two years ago up in Napa that beat it. But as long as the vines stay up and the oak barrels are secure, who the hell cares about Napa? The epicenter of this one was Gilroy, garlic capital of the world, just south of San Jose, so more people felt it. It was very shallow, four miles underground, so people felt it more. And worst of all, the rumble came from our old friend San Andreas, the bastard responsible for 1906. Apparently there's a 10% chance of him getting angry again in the next couple of weeks. Then again, it's better to see him blow off steam like this than to have him bottle it up and wait for the Big One.
I've been feeling very unsatisfied with my description yesterday, the one about the floor turning to jelly. Not only does it confuse my American friends (I mean Jell-O, folks, not jam), but the metaphor is terribly overused. When I was an earthquake virgin, I'd ask experienced Bay Area residents to describe exactly what it felt like, and that was all they could say: "It was like standing on Jell-O." I was skeptical: What, you mean concrete and clay liquefies? How is that possible? Do ripples go up and down the street, as if it were built on a giant waterbed? The only reason I used it last night, and perpetuated the cycle of bad metaphors, is that I could remember saying to myself: yes, I see what they mean now.
No, there is no liquefication involved, not as such. No, it's not like being on a waterbed (that would be much more fun). It's more of a perceptual thing. See, we're used to solid ground being solid: rigid, unbending. It makes sense for us to perceive it that way, to imagine that the concrete and the rock extends all the way to the Earth's core, to ignore the fact that we live on enormous floating rafts of crust. When the rafts begin to scrape and wobble a little at the edges, it is so completely contrary to everything in our evolution that our brains freak out. There's a certain queasiness, the kind you get when you're seasick, or if you've fallen asleep on an airplane and imagine yourself to be in your armchair back home when, all of a sudden, you run into turbulence. You look out of the window and there are the wings, these supposedly solid hunks of metal, bending and bouncing like Dumbo's ears.
Same with last night's earthquake. From what little I can remember now of that blurry, adrenaline-filled moment, there was a bad feeling at the deepest, most primal part of my brain: this is wrong. Ground should not behave like this. The pattern of shaking made no sense: it was heavier, then lighter, then heavier in another part of the room, as if someone underground was playing a giant upside-down keyboard. It was all new information, a new form of perception, a mind-altering rush. And in as much as I love new experiences, new ways of thinking, I suppose I should thank Mr. Andreas for that. Next time, whenever that is, I'll be ready.
Daily Blah for... Monday, May 13, 2002
Shaking All Over
Sometimes the universe has a twisted sense of humor. Tonight I experienced my first San Francisco earthquake -- 5.2 on the richter scale, enough to make the news -- and it came right in the middle of a dinner for the launch of a September 11th photography exhibit. The exhibit is in the atrium of One Market; a location which, we had earlier been reminded, is very similar to the atrium in the World Trade Center. Now guests and staffers from Time, which sponsored the showing, were having dinner in the adjoining restaurant. There were several September 11 survivors in the room with us -- including Salty, a guide dog who helped lead his owner down 70 flights of stairs to escape from the North Tower. We were onto the creme brulee and Time publisher Ed McCarrick was regailing us with his 9/11 story.
Suddenly the floor turned to jelly. It was like nothing I'd ever experienced. My first instinct was to grab onto the table, as if that would stop the room shaking from side to side (it's in times like these that you find out how much of a control freak you are). We felt a deep rumble. McCarrick, a well-built man, was still walking and talking. "Earthquake," people piped up.
"Is it?" said McCarrick. "I thought that was just me, moving around."
Cool as anything, he waited a few moments for the shaking and the chatter to cease, then kept right on talking. The quake had lasted about 15 seconds. It was exaggerated for us, because One Market is right by the Bay, built on sand and landfill. Poor Salty -- he had a look on his face that said "Is this happening again? Hey, people, shouldn't we be getting out of here right about now?"
For me, the quake had lasted just long enough for a few troubling thoughts to pass across the brain: What happens if this gets worse? Will we be safe here with all this glass around? Will my home be safe? Will my friends be safe? I looked around and saw the same questions flashing across other faces, although the experienced San Franciscans quickly laughed it off -- that, they said, was nothing. But just for a moment there, we had a sense of shared powerlessness, a vast vulnerability. It was, in short, very September 11.
Daily Blah for... Sunday, May 12, 2002
Self-promotion, Part 94
There's nothing like tooting one's own horn, and there's nothing that enables said horn-tooting like getting three hefty stories in this week's issue of Time. There's my six-page Global Business special on the worldwide music slump, including a sidebar on dealing with download guilt. There's this week's Personal Time technology column on Graffiti vs. keyboards. (My mother, at least, will find this one interesting, since she's featured in it -- although I'm not sure how she'll take to having her name Americanized throughout, to "mom." What a gum-chewing, baseball cap-wearing embarrassment I must be ... just kidding, "mom.")
And then there's a three-page expose on Enron's dirty dealings in the Golden State, wonderfully titled California Scheming. Now just because I've given you links to all the stories doesn't absolve you from the responsibility of going out and buying the magazine itself. There are lots of nice pictures you're missing out on, and besides, someone's got to pay my salary.
Daily Blah for... Saturday, May 11, 2002
Nod Vigorously While Reading
This is a fascinating example of what I suppose you'd call self-persuasion, or simply evidence of how gullible we all are. From my reading matter of the moment, Malcom Gladwell's The Tipping Point:
A large group of students were recruited for what they were told was a market research study by a company making high-tech headphones. They were each given a headset and told to test to see how well they worked while the listener was in motion ... All of the students ... heard a radio editorial arguing that tuition at their university should be raised from its present level of $587 to $750. A third were told ... they should nod their heads vigorously up and down. The next third were told to shake their heads from side to side. The final third were the control group ... All the students were given a short questionaire, asking them about the quality of the songs and the effect of the shaking. Slipped in at the end was the question "what do you feel would be an appropriate amount for tuition?" ... The students who kept their heads still guessed $582 ... those who shook their heads [guessed] on average $487 ... Those who were told to nod their heads up and down ... wanted tuition to rise, on average, to $646. The simple act of moving their head up and down, ostensibly for another reason entirely, was sufficient to cause them to recommend a policy that would take money out of their own pockets.
Alright, dear readers, from now on I would like you all to nod vigorously while reading Daily Blah entries. Further instructions will follow.
They're Number Three!
Six months after I wrote about blogging in Time, U.S. News and World Report discovers it.
Daily Blah for... Tuesday, May 07, 2002
When Sam Met Will
Here's a stunning new movie Bill introduced me to: Pandaemonium. It's about Coleridge and Wordsworth from their early friendship in the revolutionary era through the Lake District and laudanum days. I can't speak for its historical accuracy -- was the unrequited romance between Coleridge and Dorothy Wordsworth that intense? Did they really go tripping on thornapple? -- indeed, I suspect it is intentionally playing fast-and-loose with facts, part of the premise being that Coleridge can somehow see far into the future, into our world. And yes, the ending isn't so hot. But as a piece of cinema, it is unlike anything else I have seen in the last year, and as an expression of the art of being a writer -- of the grounded left brain (Wordsworth) struggling against the Dionysian right (Coleridge) -- it is unlike anything I have ever seen. Watch for the scene where Coleridge explains how the opium has set him adrift in time while wine glasses scatter in slow motion. Enchanting.
... Y Viva Espana
Speaking of getting grief from my readership, my dear and only sister Ruth writes from Spain:
checked out your web site - very good i might check in more often. but the kkk lookielikies are called nazareños not nazarenes. also you said your ideal would be to have manhattan and great britain in 'frisco bay - what about me?!?
Good point. Okay, here is a revised list of all points east I plan to have towed through the Panama Canal and brought up here just as soon as we can locate the proper cutting equipment: Manhattan; Great Britain and Ireland; the entire Spanish peninsula. Since my globetrotting sister has also been sighted at various points in Paris and Italy, we'd best have them airlifted in. Just in case.
The Vampire Strikes Back
Profuse and profound apologies, dearest reader. I've been away in New York for the last week and a half -- yes, I know, they have the Internet there too. But that damn city can so easily turn you into a sleep-deprived vampire. It's hard to readjust to a 24-hour town when you haven't lived in it for two years. I felt full of energy that I spent by staying out and up virtually every night till 4 or 5 am -- in velvet-roped clubs where they sell vodka and cranberry for $12 a glass, or simply putting the world to rights with my old friend and Daily Newshound Bill. He doesn't sleep much at night either. Oh, and he likes to talk about bulls. (Sorry, Bill.)
I was in town for my J-school reunion two weekends ago, finding out what the rest of our class -- an unusually close one, for reasons that will become obvious -- has been up to this past five years. That Friday I spent in the Time-Life building, back on the 23rd and 24th floors where Time magazine itself resides and where I was located from 1997 to 2000, back among the well-versed writers and sanctified editors I still call collegues. The business editor buttonholed me and, over a couple of bourbons, requested that I stay in town for another week to close a six-page story I was writing for him. How could I refuse?
Daily Blah was always on my mind, of course. But heck, I couldn't even finish the story I was writing until I stayed in the building one night until, yes, 4 or 5am. I am painfully aware that the blog has now become a means for my friends and family to check up and check in; it's like I'm married to the damn thing, for better or worse. My mother called me earlier today just to make sure I had returned from New York. Part of her concern: "you haven't updated your website ..." My friend Kaila writes from Florida: "Are you alive?" All in all I can sympathize with CNet writer Jennifer Balderama, who wrote in My blog, my self:
Eventually you gain an audience that has expectations that you're going to have something witty, profound, helpful or humorous to say on a regular basis. If you don't update your blog, the e-mail starts trickling in: "What happened? Are you dead?"
Quite. I feel like training all the large dogs in the neighborhood to type, so that if I end up half-eaten by one -- pace Bridget Jones -- they can at least make a Daily Blah entry informing all and sundry of the fact.
Of course, I'm sensitive to the concern, and my ambitious ol' self is even more sensitive to the point Bill made: a constantly updated blog leads to exponentially improved page views. A rarely updated blog will barely attract readership. I may not have written entries while in New York, but I still checked out the hit counter at the bottom of the page. I could see it was slowing down. I hate the thought that I'm causing people to click away and I want to make wild promises about this site literally living up to its name. But of course I can't. Because who knows when two glasses of bourbon are going to send your life in a radically different direction, at least for a short while?
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