1. I just got home from school supply shopping. Well, I’m used to checking out with heaping full cart, but usually that’s when I’m buying a week’s worth of food for ten people, not desk supplies for four little kids. Sheesh. Sheesh. Sheesh. Those kids hadbetter learn something this year. Two of the kids had flash drives on their supply lists from the teachers! Okay, that’s actually kind of cool, but still. When I was in 6th grade, we were using computers to run the following program:
10 PRINT “I LOVE UNICORNS”
20 GOTO 10
RUN
and then Mrs. Blanchard would get all mad because the boys were making the computer run “DEAD MEAT DEAD MEAT DEAD MEAT DEAD MEAT DEAD MEAT.”
2. In two weeks, I will have my first very own linky list! So get ready to share your SEARCH TERMS POETRY. This stuff practically writes itself, and sometimes tells you a little more than you wanted to know about what kind of thing you write about. For instance, every single damn day, at least one person finds me by entering “Horshack” into a search engine. I write about Bach; they want Horshack. I mentionadoration; they clamor for Horshack. I write about Horshack; they search for “when simchas go wrong.” I’m not making any of this up.
I don’t even actually know who this person is, this Horshack. But I realize that, in writing this, I’ve now eternally cemented my and his relationship in this strange and stupid place called the internet.
The only rule for SEARCH TERMS POETRY is that you may only use words and phrases which are direct quotes of search terms for your blog or website. Or if you want to add other words in, you have to make it clear (with quotation marks or italics or something) which words are direct quotes. Everything else – style, length, rhyming or not, etc. – is up to you. If you don’t have a statistical thingy on your site, you can install the free version of Sitemeter, easy peasy.
On Monday, Sept. 13, post your poem on your site, and leave a link to it on my blog, and we can all have a good laugh at the poor suckers who Googled “spiritual help” and ended up with you. Here is the search term poem I came up with. Spread the word!
3. The one and only, the fabulous, the indefatigable, the outrageous and yet humble, the incisive, the witty, profound, and now globetrotting Anchoress, Elizabeth Scalia, has done me the inadvisable honor of asking me to write guest posts for her blog atFirst Things while she is in Rome! Danielle Bean and Sally Thomas will be there, too! I believe that officially makes me the Gummo of this particular group, but I don’t mind. I will be cross-posting the same silly stuff here and there. Posting will probably start Tuesday! I still can’t believe she asked me!
Here is The Anchoress’ lovely introduction of Danielle, Sally, and me.
And today we celebrate...