I wanted to take a quick moment and note that this is the 400th post on this blog. That’s a lot of words, and I’ve written on a variety of topics over the years. Originally, I was very into illustrated humor blogs, particularly Books of Adam and Hyperbole and a Half, so I tried my hand at that. While I feel like my art really started improving toward the end, it was one of those things that I didn’t like enough to keep up. The effort wasn’t worth it and distracted from other things I wanted to do.
This blog has, through various iterations, been a writing log, a place for comics reviews, for movies reviews, a place to showcase nonfiction essays in an attempt to pivot into a journalistic career, and probably a half dozen other things I’ve forgotten.
I thought it might be fun to make a list of my favorite posts to celebrate nearly 9 years of writing on this doofy little thing. Keep in mind that some of these posts are almost 9 years old. Some were written when I was 21. I’ve grown and changed a lot as a person, and hopefully as a writer, since then.
1. 7 Ways to Tell If You’re Dating a Zombie (7/31/2011)
Like I said, I did a lot of illustrated posts when I started out. This was one of the first where I started to notice my art improving. My style started to become more consistent, the coloring and inking was good, and the character design wasn’t too bad. Plus, this post is just silly and dorky. I don’t know, I guess I was feeling myself on this one.
2. Review: PROMETHEUS (7/6, 7/22, 8/17/2012)
This is overly long, but I still stand by it. An excruciatingly thorough breakdown of the plot (and failings) of Prometheus. I also quite like the art in places here. I wrote a lot of humor at the time, and I’m happy that I didn’t embarrass myself too badly here. (Honestly, the art is distracting. I’m glad I moved on from this style because it feels superfluous most of the time).
4. Flash Fiction Challenge: Cut It Out (9/12/2012)
I had a lot of fun with this premise, and I really got to play with my own style here. It’s not amazing, but it’s not embarrassing like I expected from so far back. It’s fun to look back and see how I’ve improved, though.
I miss these challenges that Wendig used to do. Not that I can’t do them on my own, of course, but it’s just not the same as the community all going around commenting on each other’s stories.
5. Halloween: Fear of the Murderous Pig Face (10/7/2012)
I just love the art here. I intended to do several more posts in a few different styles while sticking to the messy, “inspired by Tim Burton” look, but I was already flaming out on these posts by then and just too tired to keep doing them. This was an attempt to reinvigorate my love of drawing, but I just don’t have the patience or the time for it.
6. Southern Thoughts on Southern Pride (5/2/2013)
It seems like Confederate racist nonsense popped up every few years back before America as a country decided Nazis walking the streets and getting TV time was a-okay. This was in response to some really assheaded logic behind family and acquaintances defending the Confederate flag as “Southern Pride” that popped up around the same time as a very asinine Brad Paisley song. To summarize: “Southern Pride” is bullshit. But I do go into more detail on the history of why it’s bullshit.
7. A Sonnet Because I Was Bored (5/6/2013)
I was just finishing up my second year of teaching. I’d been dragging Freshmen through Romeo and Juliet for weeks, and I was miserable–partially because I simply disliked teaching (my personality wasn’t a good fit for it, but I felt like it was too late to do anything about it), and partially because I was still very new and stressed out. I decided to use my prep hour doing this because fuck it, y’know? I think it’s not bad.
8. The Weather Outside is Frightful (1/8/2014)
As the Polar Vortex finishes walloping the northern states this year, it was interesting to look back at the last time I remembered a Polar Vortex of this size, which was 5 years ago. It got down to -2, which is cold anywhere, and for Arkansas is basically unheard. It got pretty cold around here this year, but nothing like when I wrote this.
9. Dirt Road (1/8/2015)
The end of 2014 was the beginning of some financially tough times that we’re honestly just now pulling out of. It was also, emotionally, one of my lowest points since high school. At the time of this post, I was working at a marketing company, my old boss had left, and my new boss was a goddamned nightmare of passive aggression and duplicitous back-stabbing. I didn’t know it, but I had two layoffs in my future, one of which would lead to working for a new boss in the same company who was just as passive-aggressive and duplicitous. I was in the grip of a severe depression, but this was one nice day with my wife. It meant enough for me to write it down. It’s still a very nice memory. I’m glad I did.
10. Persevering in Poverty: America’s Weird Fetish for Bootstrap Narratives (2/16/2015)
I wrote this after reading a news story about a Detroit man who had been walking 21 miles round trip to work just so he could make ends meet. A crowdfunding campaign resulted in him being able to purchase a new car, and while the media was painting this as a victory and a heartwarming story of the Internet helping people in need, it struck me as a sickening, dystopian nightmare. The 2016 election was also just just heating up, so I got to rail against the GOP and their contemptible, greedy policies as well.
11. Racism is a Nationwide Problem (6/29/2015)
2015 was sort of the year of rage for me, I guess. Honestly, I should’ve seen how 2016 was going to go based on all this bullshit, but hey, hindsight, amirite? Something I was getting really tired of was seeing folks in northern US states pat themselves on the back that they weren’t racist like The South was, and I wanted to put that to rest. America is racist. Full stop. No qualifiers needed.
12. The Rise and Fall of a Cookie Empire (11/24/2015)
There was an online game that was a fad for about a month, maybe, in which you clicked on a giant cookie to generate cookies. It was called Cookie Clicker. It was stupid, so of course I was instantly hooked. This piece is an only slightly exaggerated mockery of my obsession with that dumb little game.
13. Coming Out (5/16/2017)
Cue the Diana Ross song. This is when I finally publicly came out as bisexual, although I’d been struggling with my identity for years. I go into it in the piece, but it took me a long time to sort through a bunch of internalized homophobia and toxic masculinity before I could admit to myself that I was attracted to men. I’m honestly still adjusting to it and what it means for me.
14. Let’s Talk About Confederate Statues (8/19/2017)
Another piece about racism in America. I actually had a post from a few years earlier where I touched on the monuments to traitors and racists that peppers our country and asked, “What do we do with these things?” Eventually, I came around to, “Tear them the fuck down because seriously.” I also took the time to dismantle a bunch of dumbfuck arguments in favor of the monuments and some myths about the Confederacy that are still taught in schools.
15. Money Makes the World Go ‘Round: A Look at CHEAP THRILLS (9/14/2017)
In this last piece, and one of my favorites I’ve done in the past couple years, I analyze the horror movie Cheap Thrills as an anti-capitalist art piece. It was not a joke. I was and am serious about it.
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Thank you to everyone that decides to pop into my doofy little corner of the internet. I appreciate everyone that engages with me. Always feel free to hit me up here or on Twitter if you want to chat more.
Here’s to 400 more posts (and 10 more years)!
Whirling Nerdish 