My Musings

PS-Ashley Rocks!

Wednesday, April 02, 2003

Changes and Toenails

Well, I can’t really post a new entry without first explaining why I’ve neglected this blog for over a month. So here’s some background info:

Many of you share the extreme and bitter contempt in which I hold the pitifully small AIM profile character limit. There’s so much stuff I want to put in there, yet so little space. Where to stick all those odd little stories and pointless bits of garbage? One way is to make a SubProfile, but I’m scared of those things, and anyway they have too much advertising clutter. I was so desperate for more space, though, that I was about to break down and make one, but then Ashley introduced me to blogs and so I made one of those instead. That’s right—this blog was originally only supposed to be an extension of my AIM profile. How it became a place for me to post long, coherent, carefully edited, and (hopefully) amusing essays is completely beyond me. Right now, though, I think I’m going to revert back to my original intentions.

The basic reason for this change is that when I actually work hard at my blog and try to make it good, the whole thing becomes too stressful. It’s sweet that people like this blog and think it’s funny, but when my readers like it so much, I become more concerned with what they will think of an entry than with writing the entry itself. I worry so much about making an entry “good” that I make entries less often, and then I worry that I’m not updating the blog enough, and then people egg me to update more frequently, and then it all somehow becomes a stressful, futile effort to update as often as possible and at the same time amuse my readers. My point is: I can’t do it. When my goal becomes to entertain and hold readers, to get a high hit count, to get praise for my blog—in short, when my goal is to satisfy the people who come here—I end up not satisfying myself. I miss the days when I would update this blog instead of doing homework, or when I would hastily post a new entry while my parents erroneously believed I was asleep. And those days will never return if I’m always worried about making this blog “good,” because when I write for quality, it isn’t for fun.

So anyway, I’m going to try to bring back the old blog, crappiness and all. Lisa’s diary has run-ons in it that would make an English teacher puke, yet it’s still one of my favorite things to read online. It shows that you don’t have to spend days on an entry to make it worthwhile for others. I might lose readers and get less hits, but if I try to keep things going the way they were, I’ll lose the fun of having a blog.

With that issue aside, we move on…

I am periodically asked about my long fingernails. “Why are your fingernails so long, Boris?” people ask. Lately it’s been getting worse, too—now Mandy not only asks why they’re so long, but insists on my cutting them. I’m not sure why. It’s not like I scratch her with them, or hang around in public with her all that often where she would be embarrassed to be in the company of one such as I who has long nails. And even if I did hang out with her a lot in public, it wouldn’t matter, because who the heck looks at fingernails, anyway? And even if they look, who among them cares? And even if they care, who’s willing to make a point of it?

But fine. I will humor you all and explain why I don’t cut my fingernails. It’s a lot simpler than you thought—I’m lazy, and I don’t care if they’re a little on the long side. At Mandy’s urging, I do sometimes grudgingly cut them sooner than I’d like, but I get my revenge. Ohhhh, yes, I get my revenge. I get it in the form of my toenails. Because toenails, as you are all no doubt aware, grow out of your toes, and toes extend from your feet, and your feet are covered by socks, and your socks go in your shoes, AND SHOES ARE OPAQUE MUAHAHA! The point I’m getting at, of course, is that nobody can see my toenails. So here’s my secret—my toenails are LONG. Really long!! Put THAT in your oven and bake it, Mandy!

.: posted by Boris 9:06 PM

Comments: Post a Comment