Having a blog is an embarrassing and often downright tedious extension of the self, rather like having smelly feet and asking your friends if they'd be interested in sniffing them once or twice a week. It is a particularly pungent form of electronic body-odor for which the only available deodorant is a link to the Onion website.
In fact, the very existence of your blog is a dirty little secret that most people would prefer to remain undisclosed. Your blog is an Internet version of Mr Rochester's mad woman locked in the attic; an online equivalent of Dorian Gray's deteriorating portrait; an HTML simulacrum of ... oh I could go on and on - this is a blog, after all - but I think you get the picture.
Of course, as far as embarrassing and often downright tedious blogs go, a blog that is increasing preoccupied with your own health problems must be the lowest of the low. Surely it is a monstrously selfish act to burden your loved ones with the responsibility of reading interminable paragraphs about clogged arteries, blood pressure fluctuation, cholesterol pills and hardcore constipation. Even the most thrilling of thriller writers would fail to make an electrocardiograph session sound interesting. Consequently I don't simply tell people I have a blog these days, I break the news to them as gently as possible:
"I have some good news and some bad news."
"Okay. Well, give me the good news first."
"I'm pleased to say that my creative juices are flowing again."
"Great. That's awesome. And so what's the bad news?"
"The bad news is that they're flowing into a blog."
"Oh. Gosh. I'm sorry to hear that. That's terrible news."
"Yes, I know. Believe me, I feel really bad that you have to read it all the time."
There are alternatives to blogging, obviously: social networking sites, for instance, are eponymously not as misanthropic as owning a blog. The mercifully brief format of Twitter might be ideal for disseminating important reports concerning my condition: "Experienced new twinge just now. Calling hospital #pain #anxiety #etc."
Or maybe even Facebook could provide a convenient forum for uploading pithy updates about cholesterol contaminated foods, combined with graphic pictures of my incision scar: Vlad the Impaler Likes This, and so on.
But, alas, mine is an old-fashioned and self-important intellect. My ego needs to stretch and unwind, requiring adequate elbow room for its longueurs, semi-colons, extended metaphors and patronizing allusions; and only the unlimited storage space of a blog will suffice.
So I am left with but a single hope and aspiration, only one excuse: that some fellow heart patient seeking comfort in his darkest hour will read these words and think: "The surgeon will be cracking my chest open tomorrow and attaching my heart to a machine, but at least I'm not a loser blogger like this American Fez person."
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he's back! good.
by which I mean you've got a grip now and are running madly along, the rest of us dragged willingly, askewly with you.
Posted by: Mia Wolff | September 14, 2011 at 06:54
I recently came accross your blog and have been reading along.
Posted by: cycling clothing | September 15, 2011 at 01:41
There are worse fates than reading your blog, oh great Fez, and you will soon be so, "up & at um," you won't be muttering and murmuring about your health. The fact you realize your own obsession with talking about it tells me you are well on your way to getting on with your life. Besides you are fortunate in your friends and family and that truly counts for something. Your wit wisdom and twisted humor is a good deal why we continue to stravage along behind you, so ramble on my friend and be content. You are man most blessed.
Posted by: Giric | September 16, 2011 at 15:01
Besides your euphemistic feet couldn't possibly smell worse than the real medical cannabis growers patch of marijuana, two doors to the west of us.
Oregon, gotta love it.
Posted by: Giric | September 16, 2011 at 15:09
Oh no, please don't go Twitter on me.
I already lost one blogroll-resident to its devious charms, to my never-diminishing chagrin. Incidentally, his last full-size post is about his stay at the hospital...hmm, what is there in the hospital food that makes people to edit to extreme?
Posted by: Tatyana | September 16, 2011 at 18:57
We are de-evolving here. Which is why I refuse to text, twitter, or I.M. I prefer to put some fore-thought into my words as well as speak in full sentences.
But since this is a great place to go off topic I will add by saying that I have a stuffed platypus known as Vladymus. Vlad for short, he is great for wiping off the dust from my lap top.
Have a great day all, I'm off to hunt chanterelle mushrooms. I love the forest this time of year. It rained yesterday and the air is brisk and clean this morning. A great day for a hike in the woods.
Posted by: Giric | September 17, 2011 at 13:58
But even those who find these images repulsive can understand that there is satisfaction in seeing a tyrant brought down. Gaddafi, and all he had come to symbolise to the Libyan people, had been reduced to nothing more than a bloated, broken body. Despite objecting to the killing of Gaddafi, Christopher Hitchens, writing for Slate, admits that it is "satisfying to see the cadaver of the monster and be sure that he can't come back".
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