What Is Blog?

What is Blog?

Is it me? What is me?

Is it you? Why you?

Who are we?

Is it what I ate for breakfast?

Is it what my mommy bought me for Christmas?

Is it the weather outside? Inside?

Is it the world outside? Inside?

Is it where I'm from? Is it where I'm going?

Or is it where I wish to go?

Is it a reflection or a creation?

Is it a thing unto itself or a vessel?

Is it meeting new people?

Is it meeting yourself?

Is it a waste of time? Is it a record of time?

Is it a waste of space? Is there a difference?

Is it live? Is it a draft? Is it for fun? Is it for money?

(It couldn't be for the money, now, could it?)

Is it questions? Is it answers?

Is it doubts? Is it strengths? Is it weaknesses?

Is it love? Is it blindness? Is it immoral? Is it callow?

Is it a manic Monday or a lazy Sunday?

Is it music or sport or cinema or politics?

Is it poetry? Is it literature?

Is it writing? Is it listening? Is it reading?

Is it page views? Is it comments? Is it clicks? Is it links?

Is it community? Is it a corporate whore?

Is it an entrepreneurial whore?

Is it grammar? Is it spelling? Is it long? Is it short?

Is it humor? Is it voice? Is it tone?

Is it expertise? Is it exploration?

Is it talking or is it shutting up?

Is it self-indulgence or self-discovery?

Is it man? Is it animal? Is it science? Is it God?

Is it woman? (It could be woman.)

Is it laughter and tears, ups and downs?

Is it glances and gestures, the in-betweens?

Is it copying and pasting? Is it banging on the keyboard?

Is it bold? Is it italicized? Is it underlined? Is it serif or sans?

Is it my favorite colors or is it easy on the eyes?

Is it the content or everything but the content?

Is it a good name? What's in a name? Nothing? Everything?

Is it freedom? Is it prison? Is it life? Is it death?

Is it a question mark or an exclamation mark? Is it parentheses?

Is it hiding from or is it showing off to the world?

Is it trying or is it doing? Or is it not doing?

Is it engaging the world or is it fighting it?

Is it engaging myself or is it fighting myself?

Is it both? Is it neither? Is it everything? Is it nothing?

Maybe it's nothing.

Maybe it's a long, poetic series of reflexive questions that have no answers, yet will demand comment nonetheless.

What is Blog?

Epilogue

Well, adventures into a spotless mind have concluded, but I just couldn't stay away. A new beginning, a new premise, a new hope -- Hypergraphic Haze -- will probably eventually devolve into more of the same from yours truly. But until I retire again, I'll use the most famously glib comeback quote in sports history: "I'm back!"

"The End" by the Beatles

I've been in quite the creative funk for the better part of a year, as far as writing/blogging is concerned. I've been at Chewing Gum, Coffee, & Slim Jims for over a year and a half now, and it's starting to feel like this blog has run its course. A lot has happened in that year and a half, I suppose. I can say with complete honesty that I was a completely different person when I created this blog, and had completely different expectations and goals. I've evolved a lot, and I'm comfortable with the way this blog has chronicled that journey, from M&T to Cinema Studies/Finance, from confused freshman to ready-for-anything junior, from emo to a-little-less-emo. I've had some great readers, and I really felt like I was doing some good blogging for a while, and I want to thank anyone who's ever reached out and left a comment, friends and strangers alike. But I think it's time to move on. I don't have much left to contribute to the blogosphere right now, and I'd rather be the type who knows when the end is the end than to drag things on uselessly, wasting everyone's time, including mine. Perhaps some day, perhaps even soon, I will make a triumphant return at some other URL, in some other space, in some other time, but for now, I am proud of many of the things I've written herein, and hope people continue to find something of interest here, albeit in the archives. This has been my favorite blog, of the all the blogs I've been at, and I started this one because I had deleted the other ones, and suddenly felt empty and anchorless as a writer to have nothing, instead of something, out there. But like I said, I feel proud of what is in this blog for the most part, so I feel no remorse in ending things here. There's simply nothing much left for me to say. I believe in cycles and circularity, which is why I've titled this entry, appropriately and prophetically, with the same title as my very first entry here, and so I'd like to leave you with the final words of my favorite band of all time, words which are perhaps all that I was trying to say in much less precise terms with this blog over 339 previous posts.

"And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make."

The End

Happy Birthday Blawg

The 1 year birthday of this blog is officially today. Isn't that special?

The Ebb And Flow

I used to want to update my blog every day. Multiple times a day, even. I had such an urge to just write write write, all the time, that I actually had to curb it. I had to consciously prevent myself from updating, telling myself I was overdoing it. I'd even write stuff and save it in backlog to use later, until I started developing so much of a backlog that I'd never be finished. Those were the days. I should have indulged myself in those days. Because now, every post is a struggle. I have nothing to say, nothing to write, ever. This blog becomes a responsibility more than anything else. Just another responsibility over my head, like everything else in my life. I have to fight hard to scrounge up something to write about in my blog now. I'm struggling at this very moment to come up with the next word, the next sentence. It's become so hard. And the quality! Don't even get me started on the lamentable decline in quality...

Maybe this blog is over? Has my search for the eternal sunshine of a spotless mind come to an end? Should I pull the plug on this dying thing being propped up by nothing but life-support machines? I suppose only time will tell, and only I can know when. But it's weird. I never really thought about the end of this blog before. Today is the first day I have become aware of the mortality of my blog. The end is coming. It always has.

Inspire Me

Somebody give me an adverb. Someone else give me an adjective. I will then attempt to write a short story with that two-word title. It will be dedicated to you, if you are the first person to give me either an adverb or adjective. Real words please.

Blame it on the city of Plano, blame it on the state of Texas, blame it on general suburban malaise, blame it on teenage ennui... but I am very uninspired right now. So help me.

Haloscan

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog. Thanks to everyone who has ever commented on this blog through Blogger's own commenting system. I decided I didn't like their system, however, and that Haloscan's is much better. I'm sorry your old comments can't show up anymore. Please feel free to comment again, though! All those 0's are looking mighty lonely.

Me vs. Blog, Round 3

A brief recap of the rivalry between me and my blog up to this point:

Round 1 - Blog getting too personal, I wanted to be a better writer, decided to never write about myself ever again

Round 2 - Read other people's blogs and felt like writing about myself again, finally decided I could sometimes write about myself and other times write random stories or poems

Which brings us to today, Round 3. I feel unappreciated as a writer when I post something I'm proud of and get no response, as if I had posted it in a vaccuum. So now the battle is this: what is the point of posting online? I know in some measure, it is to be read. It is the quickest and easiest way to be read by other people. But if nobody is reading, or if people are reading but don't really care, is my desire to be published and read being fulfilled? Only marginally. And that is sucky. Would anyone have honestly noticed if I just stopped updating completely? I believe people would just stop coming. So what is the point of being published if I go unnoticed? Get ready, blog, I'm strapping my big red boxing gloves on as we speak...

Blank Check

I have so little to say right now, I could say anything. Tell me what you want me to say, and I'll say it. I have so little to say right now. Consider this a blank check. I'll say anything.

Cliffnotes

In case you missed it, there are now Cliffnotes for "When the Quartet Left." They are the third comment for the entry.

Chewing Gum Reports For Duty

Chewing Gum: hey guys, what's up?

Coffee: *sigh* Pondering weighty issues in high-brow culture today, such as the state of modern opera, the medium shift happening in contemporary art, and whether or not neo-impressionism can revitalize the floundering oil-on-canvas genre. *deeper sigh*

Slim Jims: 'Sup, Chew. I'm just tired as shit right now. Long ass day, didn't sleep much. Fuck...

Chewing Gum: well i wore a tie today! it had smiley faces on it! it was fun!

Coffee: *sigh*

Slim Jims: Fuck...

Quaker Porn

Apparently, searching for "Quaker porn" can somehow lead you to this blog. Three things:

1) How?! I've never written about "Quaker porn" in my entire life.

2) Who the FUCK searches for Quaker porn???!!! And,

3) WHAT THE FUCK IS QUAKER PORN???!!!

Sometimes having a Site Meter tells you about things you never wanted to know...

This Post Has Been Deleted

This post has been deleted due to excessive boringness.

The Triumvirate That Rules My Brain

NOTE: This is not some twisted version of "Aqua Teen Hunger Force," which is an awesome show. This is actually rather personal, despite the ruse...

Chewing Gum: omg, so like, today, i like, totally was like what the hell, i dunno, maybe we should stop writing these stories you know? like totally just start writing about ourselves man, because writing about ourselves is so much easier, right?

Coffee: Easier is not necessarily a good thing, Chewing Gum. The artist can only truly create something compelling and meaningful through intense, genuine struggle. Look at "100 Years of Solitude" by Garcia Marquez. All about struggle. All beautiful. If we want something meaningful, we will continue to struggle in the recent vein of writing not about ourselves, but writing things that are completely made up. Unless, of course, we write about me. I am the artistic part after all, so if we only write about me, it'll also be meaningful.

Slim Jims: Coff, you're such a snob. Chew, you're such a ditz. Both of you are wrong. I hate living with you two, you guys are the shittiest roommates ever, you know that? We should just write whatever we fuckin' wanna write, whenever we fuckin' wanna write it. We can fucking take turns. No one has to dominate. The blog has all three of our names in it, it belongs to all three of us. So it should alternate among all three freakin' voices. Coff, you can keep writin' your story, or poetry, or whatever, I don't care. Chew, you can write whatever you want about what's going on in our lives, too, I don't care, as long as it's not too long. And I'll write whatever funny or sarcastic or profane or meaningless shit I'm supposed to represent, whenever, too. You know, I can't believe you two are both males, you both act like fuckin' bitches all the time.

Coffee: That is actually a very profound idea for our blog, Slim Jims. It would add a lot of fluidity to the writing process. My only reservation is that the division of voices not be so explicit next time, like it is here. This is extremely coarsely done, way too overtly obvious, and, quite frankly, somewhat juvenile. I can tell this was Chewing Gum's idea to do this... play dialogue thing...

Slim Jims: No, it was my idea. So fuck off, cockass. Then we're all agreed?

Chewing Gum: sooo... i get to like, talk about myself and stuff then right?

Slim Jims: Yes. Try to use capitalization, though. This isn't AIM.

Chewing Gum: omg totally awesome. ok i'm in.

Me vs. Blog, Round 2

Quoted from http://professordyke.blogspot.com, who is a very interesting read:

"My reasons for blogging (both pseudonymously and otherwise) are numerous and complicated, but in either case, I do know that I blog to engage in a public and informal mode of writing, to interact with an on-line community, and because it's fun. To be allowed a glimpse into other people's lives through the window of their blogs is endlessly fascinating to me. (Especially since I'm a writer, and therefore, a bit of a hopeless voyeur).

"And while I'm comfortable and pleased to have readers look inside the window of my blog, I certainly wouldn't want them actually standing around my real-life house, peering into the windows, and perhaps it's this metaphor of internet vs. real-life windows that best articulates my desire to blog pseudonymously."

Other things she writes are also pure genius. I am now currently battling an internal struggle of sorts concerning what to do with this stupid little blog of mine, again. In the end, all I want to do is write well, and the reason I stopped talking about my own life and myself was because I felt like that kind of self-indulgence wasn't allowing me to write well, and was causing the imagination-muscles in my brain to atrophy. But then I read these other blogs where the writers write about their own lives so easily, simply, elegantly, interestingly, and articulately, that it just blows my misconception of what writing "well" is out of the water.

So now I don't know what to do with this blog.

A Change

I think I'm going to be implementing a slight change in format from now on. I'm going to stop updating on my life for the most part. Everything here will be a work of fiction or poetry, from now on. I need to work on my imagination. I also need to stop looking internally all the time. There's nothing wrong inside. So yeah. This probably also means updates will become fewer; I am not that creative. On the other hand, I am also going to try to maintain a second blog I've created, http://mtvsucks.blogspot.com, because I have realized that I have a very strong sense of what I think good music is. It's all just my opinion of course, and if you absolutely love MTV, that's totally fine (and extremely sad), but it will be a place where I get to indulge myself a little and just talk about music, instead of trying to be artistic or something all the time here in this blog.

Of course, I will be going to China in 3 days, and since I don't see myself coming up with any epic poetry or novel between now and then, this is most likely the last update until after August 14. Maybe I'll write a short story about the trip afterwards. Of course, you won't know what parts are real, what parts were simply inspired by real events, and what parts I completely made up. That's the beauty of partial disclosure!

I realize that this will probably cause the two or three people who have ever commented to stop commenting, because nobody can relate to anything I try to write artistically. That will make me kind of sad for a while. But comments are for whores/Xanga users anyway. So I'm going to try not to care.

IRRITABLE BOWEL SYNDROME (IBS)!!!

LOOK AT THE ADVERTISEMENT AT THE TOP OF MY BLOG! THEY'RE USING MY BLOG TO ADVERTISE ABOUT IRRITABLE BOWEL SYNDROME (IBS)!!! THAT'S SO AWESOME! I FUCKING RULE!