Links

I've only the vaguest understanding of this whole link thing -- I've seen blogs with links running for pages and pages and pages. I guess the newbie blogger protocol of reciprocal links gets you off the ground and into Google where more people can see you and come back again and then you get so big no one expects you to link back. What happens when you get to the point that your old links from your newbie days start to look, you know . . . awkward? You've moved up in the rankings, and wizzlegig.blogspot.net hasn't really taken off, and you still like them but you can't talk to them about your bandwidth problems and the struggles you're having about google adwords and floozybuthappy.com is sooo funny _and_ has their own domain name and is sort of wondering why they aren't at the top of your link list what with their Google Page Rank of (insert semi-impressive sounding number here I certainly don't follow this stuff enough to know). It's sort of like a sophomore year of a long-term college relationship when someone begins to get the idea that maybe they can do a little better. Only I expect the web thing probably happens in six weeks.

The odd thing to me is how anybody holds an audience for more than three months in the first place. I'm often interested in new stuff, it's always interesting to see how other people think and see things, but if these things don't evolve they get kind of predictable. There are certain dogs on the internet that have, apparently, exhausted their creative space, and I expect you know who I'm talking about. The people behind these blogs are still growing and changing, but it's like watching the grass grow while the internet zooms by. And yet we've got blogs out there moving serious traffic with pictures of pasta and pets. Who am I to argue with the wisdom of the crowd? But I just don't get it.

Anyway, I've figured out the link thing and added my vote for the wit and loveliness that is Eden Kennedy. I don't understand myself any better than the crowd, but there's some humane and literate and present in the moment about her writing, something that seems formed by what she's read and what she's writing. That determination to be formed and form one's self, and to find a way to do so with letters, is compelling, and fascinating to those of us forming ourselves by, ah, well, let's just say more controversial paths. Now, if I could _write_ I'd try to communicate the essence of that experience, but then again, you'd probably get that best by reading her for yourself, so there is the link and go find what you can for yourself. At this point I should be rewriting this mess and maybe then finding something actually worth saying, but it's getting late and the motto (today) is just fuck it and write. Which seems to be pretty much all we've accomplished today.

Well, that, and risked pissing off a fanbase that could swamp this thing's comments with all sorts of mean-spirited but true remarks about how crappy it is.