I’ll be thinking of you
Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, singers/song writers
This could be the last time. May be the last time, I don't know. But it’s been fun, it’s been a thrill and it’s been time consuming. Yes friends, The Misanthrope is saying good-bye, but not necessarily so long, which means I could and most certainly will pop up from time to time, but I'm not going to be around daily as I have been, at least writing. Like any habit, I have gotten used to checking in on a handful of blogs rather regularly and that will continue.
My hat's off to my two colleagues figuratively and literally. B2 and I work together, which is my pleasure and makes the commute to work less hell (note, it would take more than B2 to make the drive a pleasure). B2 is the one who suggested a blog last year when I told him I used to have a dot net site called The Misanthrope, but I didn't want to do it again, alone. He said he would participate too and came up with the great name Toner Mishap by running misanthrope through an anagram site. I equate B2 to Nicholson Baker with his ability to find the unusual in the quotidian.
On The Mark and I have been best friends since the 10th grade when we were on the same misfit basketball team, so On The Mark will generally agree to some of my writing ideas. As you have seen, he is an excellent writer and has keen eye for reading between the lines and getting to the heart of the matter.
Both these guys are tremendous talents.
Highlights. We are going to put our best of pieces up shortly. The first time Boing Boing picked up a B2 post and the numbers jumped by a couple of thousand in a day, you would have thought we won the lotto. The second B2 post picked up by Boing Boing was just as thrilling and the numbers jumped by almost 10,000. What were the items? Something about Chewbacca and the other one was a post related to Star Wars from a B2 grocery store excursion, and if we could get royalties on those posts, we'd still be raking in the dough. I was also thrilled to be picked up by AOL blog news and finally Waxy picked B2's coffee table book-sized post about the Simpson’s in Spanish, and hence we will break 100,000 probably Wednesday is my guess. A post that was not picked up by the big blogs was Hopper Rolls Over in His Grave, this is an outstanding and entertaining piece on how a classic work of art has been high-jacked for all kinds of commercial purposes. If we don't post another item the hits will continue through the magic of Google images. On The Mark's Russian posts were terrific and very interesting.
Online Friends. Blogging has created some online friends for me: Jack at Random Thoughts; Lorrianne at Horded Ordinaries, Janet at the Art of Getting By; Dr. Stephen Taylor at Poliblog; Dr. B at BitchPh.d; Q at Simply Put; Anita at Fighting Interia; and of course, our most regular commentor Chandira at Diary of a Hope Fiend. I have learned one thing or another from all of you, thank you! I don't want to forget Alice at Through a Looking Glass; Andrea Lewis at scratching surfaces; Panthergirl at The Dog's Breakfast or Laura at Daxohol.
Still Around. Really all this means is that we are stopping daily blogging. No one told us to blog daily, but we felt that to build readership and keep it we needed to blog daily.
The upshot of all this writing has inspired my creative writing, which I really want to focus on for a while without the distraction of the blog. When you combine the day job and dealing with the outside world, blogging creates additional pressure that I just don't need. I am hopeful if you have us blogrolled you can see when we have updated and you'll stop by. Already I want to write about congress considering taking away or reducing tax deductions for homeowners. I have truly grown to despise political hacks in both parties.
See you around,
The Misanthrope
14 comments:
I have enjoyed the ride and meeting all of you. Glad to hear that we will still see you.
And may I encourage you all to keep up the posting, this place has been fun. I have enjoyed the interaction.
Well this is a bit of a bittersweet post now, isn't it? I understand and relate to the pressure of keeping up with a daily blog, and there's only on one of me, not a team of three.:)
Still it's good to know you'll still be stopping by and writing for yourself from time to time.
If you ever have something you want to get off your chest, you know where there's a guest blog chair always open!
Oh I hope you won't be TOO much of a stranger... I always appreciate your posts and your comments on my blog. Thanks for the shout-out!
(I have to say I was really surprised that you guys don't know each other in RL! It just seems like such a good fit.)
:'( Whaaaaa! Whatever shall I do, Rhett? Wherever shall I go?
Seriously, I'll really miss reading you guys every day. Thank god you're not going to completely disappear into the ether! I would be crushed.
And you gotta keep in touch, b/c who knows: if I manage to make my way to LA, we'll have to get together for coffee (or whatever you all drink down there).
Thanks for the kind words, Mick … I mean, Misanthrope. I don't know how I can miss someone who professes to hate the human race, but I'll miss you anyway.
Q
Thank you all. I’ll be here and there, I won’t disappear that easily.
Daxhol, you were one of the first to comment on our fledgling site. I do hope you can bring your show to LA sometime.
Jack, you’ll hardly know the difference. We are closer literally, but virtually I feel like we are neighbors.
Janet, I may take you up on that guess blog sometime, maybe something to do with a classic rock band.
Panthergirl, I will continue to check in. You have some of the best adventure and family stories.
Ms. B. We would love to have a drink with you; we’ll even get a good bottle of wine.
Q, you gotta know I don’t hate the human race. My motto is taken from Willliam Hazlitt, To think ill of mankind and not wish ill to them, is perhaps the highest wisdom and virtue. (1778–1830), English essayist.
It's just that we humans refuse to change, since the beginning of time. We have just gotten more efficient at fighting, killing and greed. And, some people even view that as a good thing, I'm just not one of them.
Well, I must admit that I feel a certain sense of relief that you are still planning to read blogs . . .BUT, I definitely will miss my visits here to Toner Mishap. You three definitely came up with some great, thought provoking posts. I am very, very sympathetic to the desire to pursue creative writing without the pressure of daily blogging. I've been working on a novel since May and am on chapter TWO. It's ridiculous. Keeping up a daily blog is not compatible with creative writing . . .so pursue that avenue, but know that we all look forward to your postings, even if they'll be less plentiful.
Anita, the blog was always a good excuse for not writing creatively. Now, I just have to make sure that I write and not sit and read books. My reading time also took a dive this year. Congrats on writing a novel, two chapters is nothing to discount.
As a fellow reader, I'm very sympathetic, Misanthrope. So many great words, so little time.
I'll miss your trenchant remarks, but hope you will post from time to time. As for me, I thought I'd give NaNoWriMo (not sure about the capitalization) a try. (Writing a novel is a bitch, but getting one published is worse. I've done the former, not the latter -- but I was 15 years younger then and had more energy.)
Like Janet, I was surprised that On the Mark and B2 have never met --you've made a great team.
Stop by sometime....
Daxohol that will be great. I will send you an e-mail and we can work out a plan.
Cool! I still am reeling over the fact I've been reading Mick Jagger all this time. Who knew?:)
Janet, wasn't that just the perfect picture? I was so pleased when I found that. I still look at this post to admire my selection of that photo waving good-bye.
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