About Page: Redundant

 Almost Ten...

1. Emoticons: Not on a boat, not with a goat. I will not. But that's just me. Other people do it all the time and I actually believe that those modern day hieroglyphs add character to what people write. Those emoti-thing-ma-jigs just aren't my cup 'a tea.

2. Smilies (or Smileys): No. While those smilies are definitely an upgrade from their kissing cousin, the emoticon, I just would not, could not. Just ain't my style.

(Is it just me...or does the right side appear darker than the left?)

3. Tweeting: Just say "No!" is a good policy. Look, I haven't smoked crack. Quite frankly, I have no desire to. If I ever found myself in a situation where the skills and know how of seasoned Tweeter would be appropriate, I'm quite confident I'd end up earning a Darwin Award for not paying attention.

"Come on man...it's free."

 (For 'the record', I do understand the main difference between crack and what is pictured above. Snorting your cocaine initials is a lot more expensive.)

Especially the stuff that tries to pass itself off as 'cute and harmless', that can end up devouring untold amounts of everything.

Nothing is free. At least that's the way I see it. Does anyone remember The Seven Laws of Money? Instruments of social media are kind of like hard currency with regard to the 6th Law. Hold on, let me plagiarize for a moment:

"If you are not paying for it,

you are the product."

There is probably something somewhere that I haven't read in relation to google and their free blogger service that will, at some point in my life, have me playing back that Tom Waits song in my head, especially that part that goes, "The large print giveth and the small print taketh away. "





4. For Sale: Nope. This whole blog kick started off only recently. Believing that I'll somehow make money off of what is written here is antithetical to what I am trying to do. It's not about trying to make money. I'm not trying to be a 'writer'...those respected freaks people are special in my book. This blog just takes what's available, makin' stuff out of discards, bits and pieces of words, images (sometimes moving), and sound. 

For more on how this all ties in, see #6.

Good writers...I don't mind paying them for what they do. I prefer the shop local approach when it comes to purchasing books.

5. Theme, Style, and Organization: Haven't quite figured this one out yet, but it relates to why there is a very short blog roll. In the beginning, there were only meant to be five posts. The first four were written within a week, the last three of which were on the same day, a Friday, I think. Well, cyberspace ate those posts, II-IV, so I had to go back and try to remember as much as what I'd written as possible. II-IV are waiting for the right time. V...that's another story. 

6. Blog Roll: There are simply too many blogs out there to focus on, so my range is intentionally limited to a very small number. I don't subscribe to all but maybe one or two blogs for the reason that, if everything was auto-delivered to my gmail account, I feel like I'd somehow not be able to really focus on who I was visiting. One of the blogs that I've somehow managed to respond the most to is one that I don't have a subscription to. When I read most blogs, it sometimes takes me a while to 'get' what the person may be trying to communicate. If I'm going to be spending time thinking about something, I'd like the time to count for something productive.

 


Blogging is addictive. If I'm going be addicted to anything, I'd like to benefit from the experience, not just rack up points for something that exists just to create space for advertising. See #4.

7. Comments: Comments can expect to get a fairly lucid reply or response. 


8. Editing: Important things in life tend not to come wrapped in neat packages, at least the ones that I find are essential. 

9. Seriously: Humor...most elements in the blog are deliberate and can be figured out. Just about everything has a story or some kind of purpose. Some are just more obvious than others. Very little original material gets altered, like the image below. Aside from cropping, the only thing that has been enhanced is the color.

Push Me

Part of the challenge is using what is available: the discarded, ignored, and overlooked. At this point, I'm more interested in understanding the Seventh Law.


10... This is a good place to stop for now.

Anyway...