Quote of the week
Greg Gutfeld, host of the Fox News program Red Eye, on a subject near and dear to some of us:
The worst five words you can hear at a party are, “Have you read my blog?” Blogs, really, used to be called diaries, hidden under the pillows by googoo-eyed twelve-year-old girls. They were usually covered with stickers of rainbows and unicorns (and rainbow-colored unicorns). But now everyone has a diary, but they call them blogs and they’re asking all of us to read them. It’s like pulling off a Band-Aid and saying, “I made it myself!”
Blogs are one of the most disgusting, narcissistic, time-wasting developments of the last hundred years (and I’m including racewalking). Nobody read your diary in 1776, so you never did get that opium shot of having some stranger sixteen states away telling you, “You have the soul of a poet.”
From The Bible of Unspeakable Truths (New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2010). Gutfeld blogs at dailygut.com.
canadienne »
29 July 2011 · 10:28 pm
I don’t read very many blogs (yours and one other one, unless you count the Adobe blogs). I don’t know who this guy is but when I went to his blog all I saw was a list of names, presumably his guests. I wasn’t interested enough to try to find any links, and I am not interested in his opinions. He reminds me of the opinionated boor at the end of the bar (‘My! Look at the time!”) I am usually looking for content. (And orange shoes).
My favourite thing about your blog is the music. Can’t stop listening to Janelle Monae (can’t believe I hadn’t heard about her before, although she’s becoming more known here in the Frozen North.) Also Deborah Henson Conant. You have an amazing range. One of your references got me to haul out the old Shonen Knife CD (712), which is a lot of fun.
Gotta say, though, that often when you write about personal stuff, you have the knack of making it universal, so your readers respond.
CGHill »
29 July 2011 · 10:48 pm
I figure anything good that Gutfeld’s blogged probably wound up in that book, in which case I’ve already read it. And I don’t stay up late enough to watch Red Eye, though I’m obviously not above using it for my own nefarious purposes.
And really, that’s the criterion for any personal stuff I do: “Can this possibly be of the slightest bit of interest to anyone else?” If I get a Yes, or even a Maybe, I’ll go ahead with it, though if it’s really outré, or really long, I’ll blow it up into a Vent. (The earliest Vents, back in ’96-’97, tended to be two or three paragraphs; now they’re usually seven or eight.)
Tatyana »
30 July 2011 · 8:46 am
he blogs, eh?
in one case he is right, however: his ramblings are of no interest to at least one person: me.
Firehand »
30 July 2011 · 10:27 am
A lot of blogs ARE diaries; but he overlooks the difference between a standard diary and a blog: links.
My God, I have no idea how much new information, how much news I’d have missed before, I didn’t miss because of a link on a blog I stopped by.
Brian J. »
31 July 2011 · 10:28 am
Funny thing, I had a sort of tangential problem at dinner with a friend a couple years back.
Every time I’d bring up something in the news or some story for conversation, he’d say, “I know. I read your blog.”
Pouring out every boring thought in my head onto the blog killed my ability to be a real in-person boor.