Lukewarm manifesto

Monday 18 July 2011

Welcome to the inaugural post of my new blog, 'lukewarm manifesto'. Nice pun, there, right? You know it is.

I hated blogs before I went on exchange. I subscribed to the usual non-blogger attitude that they're solipsistic and lame, and I refused to read any. Except Patrick Lenton's 'The Book I'm Drinking' and later, 'The Spontaneity Review', because they're clearly hilarious. But other than that, nothing.
 

Writing a travel blog would be different though, I told myself. Not like one of those regular blogs. It's that same old thing of hating something until you're on the inside of it, until you've experienced it. Like, for me, Star Wars, or Survivor, or Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Like a teenage boy who knows he's not allowed to like Twilight by the rules of the universe, but who thinks he'll 'just read the first chapter', y'know, to see how bad it is. Like a rapidly ageing single woman who's always chuckled disdainfully at her friends' suggestions of dating websites, until one late night when she's bleaching her lip hairs and watching Roseanne reruns with a box of Special K Raspberry Chocolatey Bars (those oft-vaunted multitasking skills of yours do come in handy, I'm sure, ladies), she sees an eharmony ad and thinks, 'It can't hurt to just make a profile ... see who's out there' (no doubt thanks to eharmony's extremely subtle and canny claim to 'match you on the deepest dimensions of compatibility, like character, intellect ... and values'):

Ooh, look! Vague, floating buzzwords! Buy, buy, buy!
(Image from http://www.davidweedmark.com/)

That was me with 'ordinary things, smashed and reconstituted'. In writing it, I accidentally initiated myself into the blogosphere. Once I'd signed up I thought I may as well follow the blogs of the few people I knew who had them, if only out of politeness and mild interest. Then strangers started following my blog, so I followed theirs, and they mentioned other blogs on their blogs, so I started following those, and before I knew it I had amassed literally TENS of followed blogs. Whenever I signed in there were fascinating, thought-provoking, hilarious things there waiting to be read and watched and looked at. It was great. I was converted, and this blog is the result of my conversion.

Here you'll find me writing about my passions and my opinions. Things that make me laugh, things that make me mad, and things that depress me. You'll find articles and reviews, details of my writerly pursuits, and links to things that I come across. I make no pretensions to regularity, so you'll never see one of those irritating 'Sorry I've been away so long, my two followers, if anyone even reads this anymore. Here's what's happened in the last six months (posted 6:38pm Monday 8 October 2004)' posts here. You also won't see any 'crazy ramblings and random musings from an insane and crazy mind' or 'stories of an average American family taking each day as it comes in this crazy rollercoaster ride called life as they try to live closer to Christ' (Thank GOD).

Thanks for reading,
 

LPL