Why a Blog?

Three reasons. Diaries are for twelve-year-old girls, journals are gay, and I didn't spend all that time in that 7th grade summer school typing class learning how to type with five fingers and a thumb so I could hand write in a ruled notebook. It's a bonus that my delete key will last infinitely longer than a pencil eraser, and that I'm not limited to how much ink is in my pen or how cramped my fingers get.

But the answer to "Why a Blog?" doesn't explain why I'm blogging.

I need an outlet because I'm distracted. I go out in public and see people engaged in behavior that makes me wonder if there was something they drank, other than alcohol, that shorted out their synapses of sensibility. I'm not just talking about people doing dumb things. I'm talking about the blatant disregard for rules that govern everyday life, everything from fashion to courtesy to hygiene to recognizing that by definition the word "public" means you are not the only one in the room. Or in the store, or at the airport, or on the road, or...you get the idea.

I need an outlet because my cranium is full of the grainy remains of my thoughts, grainiums, trapped in a filter of personal responsibility that stops it from free-flowing out of my mouth. Concepts, expressions, opinions, expletives. Questions with answers, questions with no answers. Unnecessary questions having rhetorical answers, rhetorical questions with unneeded answers.

For almost half of my life (as of this writing) I've worked in an environment in which, much like farting, I must look over my shoulder before I speak lest I embarrass myself or offend someone else. And as childish as it may seem, a good fart can be just as funny as a well-placed, conversational "fuck." Unfortunately, either has the ability to offend. If I didn't have personal rules of conduct, I wouldn't bother looking over my shoulder when I fucking farted.

You get the tone of where I'm going.

Understand as you read this blog, I'm not out to offend, I'm out to open my mind. I want to share my humor, my criticism, my disbelief, my opinions. I'm not naming names, so if you find yourself thinking it's you I'm talking about, that's your problem (even if I probably am talking about you). So don't read me if you've got thin skin, can't take a joke or laugh at yourself, or at me. And I encourage you to laugh at me. Because I'm part of humanity, and collectively as much as individually, we're a sitcom that hasn't aired.

Because I still fall within the bounds of a certain morals clause at work, I will temper my freedom of expression until such time as it doesn't matter. That would be November 24th, 2011, when I am formally retired. Harold Camping can call that date with more certainty than the coming rapture.