Normalcy

For as long as I’ve been writing this blog, I’ve never had a period of time like this. This isn’t writer’s block, per se, it isn’t apathy or depression, it isn’t a hatred for writing. It’s none of these things. What I’m going through right now is much more difficult to overcome. I’m suffering from…

…normalcy.

I’m shockingly normal these days.

It's a relative term.

Honestly, there’s not too much going on in my world that’s overtly remarkable, certainly not enough to warrant posting. And the things that ARE somewhat interesting are things that either take too long to get into, or would prevent me from playing Cafe World on Facebook if I chose to write about them. I open my browser every day, I see the link to WordPress, and I say “well….maybe I’ll post something tomorrow.” And then tomorrow becomes next week, and the next thing you know, I can’t remember the login and password to my blog account. True story.

The problem is one of my own making. When I first started the blog lo these many, many moons ago, I did it because I had all these weird, quirky, and funny stories that I told people over and over again (not to the same people. That would be obnoxious.) I had two main objectives for the blog:

1. Do not make it a journal/diary/bland “this was my day” blog
2. Do make it funny

Of course, I’d like to say that I was successful on both fronts. I have nothing against journal bloggers – hell, one of my very best friends, HotDrWife, uses that format and it works exceedingly well for her. For ME, though, I couldn’t fathom that my life would provide enough fertilizer to post that regularly. Plus, I really wanted to focus on the intense crazy that I found (find) myself in from time to time, which would make the more mundane postings out of place. HDW is so gonna kick me for calling her out. I know she will. My coccyx has her shoes’ name written all over it.

Toldja.

Additionally, I knew that I never wanted to use this forum to expose too much of myself. It wasn’t my desire to share my deepest inner thoughts and feelings with the whole world – hell, I have a hard time doing that in person to people I know and love, much less to a wider, unknown audience. So with my parameters in place, I set forth to create some seriously funny shit. And I think I did. Then a few things happened.

Thing The First: Much, Much Less Drama

For several years there I had a LOT going on. I was in an active, up-and-coming hard rock band, I worked at a couple of curious places, I had crazy friends and people I encountered, my kids were a hot mess…life was intensely interesting. That’s not to say that life right now ISN’T interesting, it’s just not interesting in the same interesting way. (Interesting how often I use the term ‘interesting’ when discussing interesting things.) I’m no longer in the hard rock band (though I did play a kick-ass New Year’s Eve gig with that group last week), so a lot of nutty stories from that realm have faded away. I love my job, and I’ve been there for 3 and a half years now, but it really doesn’t provide opportunities to post funny/stupid/crazy things, because they just don’t happen (although I did interview for another position back on my birthday, along with my nearest cubicle neighbor, but didn’t get it, and now the person they did hire will be sitting right next to me, and oh did I mention that the hiring manager is a good friend of mine? Yeah.). I still have crazy people and friends with whom I intermingle, but I guess we’re all older now and just don’t generate that many exciting stories (although I did go out just last night to a gay country western bar, even though I’m neither gay nor country western, and if pressed on the topic, I’m not real sure which of those two I’m least likely to be. Also, there’s nothing funnier than watching an older man doing the two-step with a young man and spinning that man so much that he could barely stand upright afterwards). Even my kids aren’t as drama-inducing (even though we’re considering sending 10YO to a math and science gifted school next year, and he’s still kicking ass at taekwondo, and 7YO is a major soccer pimp who put a move on a kid that was so sick, the whole crowd went OOOOOOOOOOO when he did it). See, there’s just not that much going on.

Thing The Second: Facebook and Twitter

If Facebook isn’t the actual killer of my posting, it has at least poked the body with a sharp stick and didn’t call the cops when he found it. Facebook is basically the kids from “Stand By Me”, but with much less Corey Feldman.

And really, who needs MORE Feldman?

Sometimes I do have witty comments and observations that I want to share with the world, but rather than formulating thought into well-constructed lines and paragraphs, I condense them into one-liners that I post as status messages. The very fact that I’m sitting here right now writing this post instead of changing my FB status to “I should post something on my blog. Meh.” is a testament to my guilt over not writing something for so long. Couple that with all the games and quizzes and surveys and Lamebook.com and you have the formula for blog neglect.  And if Facebook is the primary distractor, then Twitter is that little dog Chester from the “Merrie Melody” cartoons that followed Spike the bulldog around, yapping at his feet until Spike  smacks him and says “Shaddap”.

Yeah, I'd slap him too.

Tweeting is so fast and easy that it’s tough to justify spending an hour or more to blog post instead of spending 37 seconds to say “Damn it’s cold today – I bet I could sell gloves to snowmen”. Higher quality? Certainly not. Way easier? Why, yes. And I’m all about the easy these days, folks. Couple all that with the fact that I can do both Facebook and Twitter from my cell phone (and since I don’t have a Crackberry or an iPhone, I can’t blog while on the toilet at the Burger King down the street from work), and there you have it. Blogging is HARD.

Thing The Third: Laziness

I freely admit that I’m a lazy mofo. Hell, I started writing this blog post 4 days ago, and only finished it up now because I’m sitting here watching the Cowboys – Eagles playoff game, and have nothing better to do at the moment. I’m LAZY. I’ve thought about posting stuff quite frequently, but in the end, I’d rather just hang with the family or veg out or play video games or chat with friends than to gather my thoughts and commit them to digital paper.

I have very seriously considered doing this.

I mentioned earlier that I applied for a new position at work. The position is “User Experience Engineer”, which sounds like nonsense but is in fact a pretty sweet job that involves designing graphical user interfaces. However, I don’t have any past work experience in this area, so I’ve been an apprentice for the last 6-7 months, helping to design interfaces part-time while doing my regular job full-time at the same time. As you might imagine, it’s not easy to do 1.5 jobs at the same time, particularly when that 0.5 job is one that you’re trying to learn. When I get home at night, I am mentally drained. I don’t even want to think. Blogging, for me, requires massive amounts of thinking, especially when I’m trying to find goofy pictures to match up with the text I’m writing.

Like this. Wait, no - not at ALL like this.

I was also taking a class at night to help me learn more about this new role, and then there’s taekwondo a couple nights a week, plus soccer, plus my coffee shop band…when I do have a moment to myself, I want to keep it to myself. Since none of you wonderful readers has stepped up to give a brotha a salary or stipend or per diem or NOTHIN’, you’ll get what you get and you won’t throw a fit.

So what’s a guy to do?

I could simply wait to post until strange/cool/interesting (there’s that word again) things occur to or around me, keeping in mind that those events are much fewer and farther between. Or I could transform my blog into more of a journal-style, giving you smaller but more frequent posts about things that are a little more everyday. I’m not real sure which is better. I do know that I don’t like not posting for so long. I feel like I’m depriving myself of a valuable outlet, and depriving all of you of some laughter and occasional reflection. Anyway, I need your help. Tell me what you think by voting below. It’s no guarantee that I’ll do it, but it’ll at least let me know what you’re thinking.

Blog Polls

Peace.