A Bloody Valentine To Blogging
My longest running television husband has been Anthony Bourdain. Marriage is way easy when you’re sitting on the other side of a television screen, staring lovingly at the man you love as he surreptitiously drops the word “pube” on television as you dreamily imagine a fake relationship wherein you two take the world by foul-mouthed storm.
It’s pretty much a win.
And it’s evident that a good writer will be able to captivate his (or her) audience no matter what he (or she) writes about because I sat in the airport this weekend reading Medium Raw, his newest book.
Normally, I’d rather gnaw on my own toenails than read about cooking. I’m so not a cook. Lengthy discussions of complicated and pretentious ingredients makes me want to skewer my own eyeballs out and saute them in a nice truffle sauce. I’d rather do just about anything than watch a show about cooking. Food porn makes me nauseous.
Yet he’s a food writer. And I willingly both bought his book and read it. Proof that if you can write, you can write about anything.
The book, of course, is fantastic. If you like his sort of style, that is. I breezed through the food porn parts because frankly, reading about eating chicken ass doesn’t interest me, but overall, Medium Raw is precisely the sort of book you’d expect from Anthony Bourdain.
What I didn’t expect was this: bloggers are mentioned frequently. Food bloggers, but still. BLOGGERS.
I’ve been a blogger for so long that dust comes out of my fingers when I type and still, when I’m asked, “What do you do?” if I am not giving the flip answer (“I am a life coach”), I don’t really know how to answer that. Certainly my blog is a labor of love. Blogging IS a labor of love. Why else would we pour our lives out onto a blank WordPress Screen in the vain hopes that someone else somewhere else might read it and say, “Hey, I like this girl,” or “Hey, I hate this girl, let’s send her a fart in a jar?” It’s certainly not the glamor of it all.
Half the time I say, “I’m a blogger,” people look at me like I’ve sprouted a second head. “A BLOBBER?” They cry, as though I’ve just taken a poo on their car. Then I revert back to my second answer, “I’m a nurse.” Invariably, they know a nurse and want to know my specialty. When I reply, “I’m retired, it wasn’t for me,” they’re even more deeply offended by my answer. (aside: what the fuck?)
It goes to show that you simply cannot win.
It’s not as though I’m ashamed of what I do – far from it – it’s just that there are so many people out there who simply don’t get it. Not yet. They will.
Seeing one of my favorite bad-boy idols talking about the power of bloggers – even over that of print media – really struck a chord with me. I’ve never joined in those circle-jerk “we are BLOGGERS; we are so influential!!” conferences because, frankly, they remind me too much of the same sorts of pitches I’d get from any of the companies I’ve worked for: Our company is great, here’s a t-shirt for you wear to promote your company!!! TEAM PRIDE!!!!
I suppose I’d never really thought about the influence of blogs. Blogging is so self-important* and I never really wanted to be all *blank-eyes* “We’re CHANGING the WOOOOOORLD!” That’s a little too Drink The Kool-Aid for me.
But really, we are.
I don’t mean that the press-release-passed-off-as blogs are going to do much of anything. No one reads those anyway. I don’t care what rosy picture my hotel’s “blog” paints. I want the nitty-gritty. I want the dirt. I want to know who was murdered in my room. I want to know where the fucking ghosts are.
And bloggers, at least, the ones you want to read, they’ll tell you that. Why? We have nothing to lose. I’m way more likely to listen to a trusted blogger than anyone, well, else.
So thanks, Mr. Bourdain, for reminding me to be proud of what I am.
I’m a blobber, dammit.
*says the person who has been blogging regularly for 6-7 years.
Mmmm, food porn.
Wait, who died in the fucking hotel room?
Um. Someone broke in. STORY FOR ANOTHER DAY.
And YOU are the most awesomest blogger ever!
Where is all your Vegas badness? 🙂
You are such a pro at this game, the hell with those that don’t recognise you for old blobber status. Me, all those years back, had never heard of such a thing as blogging, which would have been quite the blessing for my hub as we navigated drugs, ivf and adoption, he would possibly have more hair and what he has would be less grey …
and btw, I didn’t want to be a nurse either – so Double fail
I love it! I still quite haven’t gotten the hang of it yet, but I am BLOGGING DAMN IT. Maybe I can change some views if not the world!
Changing the world isn’t done in grand gestures. It’s done quietly, with little fanfare. It’s about making someone smile on a day that they thought was their worst ever. It’s about giving someone else hope when they feel they are running out.
One person. One connection at a time. That’s what bloggers do. Those who do it well, anyway.
Like you.
I spent way too much time contemplating a fart in a jar. Welcome back.
This: “I’m a nurse.” Invariably, they know a nurse and want to know my specialty. When I reply, “I’m retired, it wasn’t for me,” they’re even more deeply offended by my answer.
happens to me all the time. It’s just with “doctor” instead. And my favorite? BUT YOU SPENT ALL THAT MONEY.
I know that wasn’t the point of the post but it’s just nice to know those idiots aren’t personal.
Oh and blobbers rule.
oh, for FUCK’S SAKE, now i see it! the little ‘comment’ icon in the upper corner, with a number next to it. durrrr.
i’m a fucking idiot.
anyway, i think you are one of the best bloggers out there, you always make me snort coffee out my nose with your posts. but i also appreciate that you can’t always be funny – that’s why i also love that you talk about amelia’s troubles, and that you started band back together.
even the ones who make others howl with laughter can be crying out in pain on the inside.
ewww, this is getting really gooey.
you. good. writing. is. funny.
Write on, sister! #lamepun
Ok, really, though, this is so how I feel right now because I’m trying to start a freelance writing career and people give me that “I don’t understand what you’re saying” head tilt like I’m 14 dreaming of being a millionaire. So what if it’s not big money and it seems like a made up job to some, we take it seriously. I’m trying and I hope I start making enough to pay the bills so I can say yes, this IS my job. It’s mine. I started doing it on my own. I’m my own boss. Suck it.
Glad you’re back, btw. I was DYING without Aunt Becky wisdom. And now I cannot wait to hear the “story for another day”!!
As a new “blobber,” I look forward to every one of your posts! Keep it up and please don’t shut your whore mouth!
*smooch*
Whew. Just keep your hands off Alton Brown. Nerdy chef is mine!
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40662731/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/?GT1=43001
so the bellagio was robbed…. you were in vagas….
Coincidence???
That was NOT a coincidence.
I MEAN…whoops!
OH, and your tv husband dexter is divorcing his wife… the girl that plays his SISTER??
so he should officially be available to you now if you can get past the on screen incestuousness
(quiet tears) I had no idea my imaginary husband was an imaginary polygamist. How many other women, Bourdain?
But seriously here, writing is writing is writing (as long as it’s not crap). You are amazingly hilarious, and you’re saving trees. I am only sorry I didn’t find you sooner.
*blushes* Thank you.
Anthony Bourdain spends a GOOD amount of time talking about his wife. Like, he loves her and stuff. Which means that I guess, we’re done. SAD.
I always figured the IRL wife did’t count; I always just felt that Imaginary Anthony was faithful to our passionate Imaginary Relationship. With relaxing food porn just for me. Le sigh. And I was having this Imaginary Relationship mainly for money, anywhoseit. I *suppose* I have an IRL marriage for love.
C’mon now, you know you’re going to conquer the world.
Seriously, it seems like people are either totally into blogs, or totally not. Well, at least the people in my life are. Like, I was with a very close friend (who knows I write a blog) and when I was introduced to another mutual friend, the friend said, “Oh, you write that blog, right? I love you.” and my friend was like, “What? Why do you know her?”.
Just wait until blogs are as mainstream as, say, BOOKS. Then you’ll really conquer the world.
I really look forward to being able to talk about blogging openly without feeling like a fumbling nerd.
I respectfully disagree; we don’t have any kind of influence unless we are popular. I mean, I blogged about my problems with Kmart, tweeted it, even put it on Facebook, and I still can’t get my fucking money back. In fact, I would venture to say that only a very, very minute number of bloggers have any kind of influence at all. How lucky you are to be one of them!
Oh, trust me, if I complain, no one does much of anything. It doesn’t matter. BUT, if you say “Kmart did THIS to me,” your readers will listen and remember that Kmart screwed their friend. People don’t forget that, even if Kmart’s corporate doesn’t give a shit.
My first experience with a writer who wrote about something I cared nothing about was A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson. Hiking the Appalachian Trail sounds about as much fun to me as slathering honey on my body and shouting out “Here Bears – Come and Get Me!”, but the way he wrote about the trail, his buddy who was newly sober, and – yes – bears, made me eat up every luscious word. If Bourdain is anything like Bryson, I just might have to buy a copy to read on my upcoming trip to Seattle!
When people ask me what I do I say I spend my time eating bonbons off the pool boy’s naked body. Or letting him eat them off of me, being an equal opportunity employer.
It’s a great way for figuring out with whom is worth continuing a conversation at parties.
I AM A BLOBBER.
Er, Blogger.
Er, I’m a librarian. Yeah.
And OMG guess what? I AM TOTALLY SEEING ANTHONY BOURDAIN IN FEBRUARY AND I CAN HARDLY KEEP IT IN MY PANTS.
I love Anthony Bourdain, he is totally cool in a grumpy honest way. I realky wish they wouldnt bleep him out on Top chef. I know u dont watch food porn, but u should watch just one. He is to die for!!
I love Anthony Bourdain, he is totally cool in a grumpy honest way. I realky wish they wouldnt bleep him out on Top chef. I know u dont watch food porn, but u should watch just one. He is to die for!!
I just tell people I’m a “stay at home mom”. They always look at me like they feel sorry for me. :::shrugs:::
I love food blogs!!! And I love all bloggers! We are the best!
People are just jealous, because they can’t sit at home in their underwear and make awesomeness on the internet.
I never really understood people’s confusion over what other people do. I mean, the honest confusion – the “I don’t really understand what it is you do” – is OK. It’s the “How do you make money at that?” that gets me. Our neighbor’s daughter-in-law told me what she did, and I have no idea what she was talking about. I have a BS in fucking Biochemistry. I have always excelled at reading comprehension…and yet, when she told me what she did, it did not compute. It was as if she was speaking Farsi. I felt like it was rude to continue to express confusion, so I just let it drop. But sneering at someone because you think their vocation is unworthy? Ugh. Unless it sounds like much more fun than work, asking if someone pays you to do that is just obnoxious.
Blobber…hahahahahahaha!
Amen! I get my news only from blobbers.
You could write food porn, too, if you wanted. <—huge compliment.
Well said, Becky. Man, reading your blog makes me miss mine. It too was quite the labor of love. Aaaaand this is now me letting is go.
Time to start a NEW blog. That’s all that means 🙂
here here! (I never really got that saying)
here’s what I get: oh you’re a blogger? cool! isn’t that kind of selfish? (as if the whole world isn’t a game of narcissism.)
or, aren’t there a million bloggers out there? (like there aren’t a million doctors and salesmen and whatever else job.
eh, screw ’em. we legitimize ourselves. 🙂
I always thought it was “Hear, hear!” as in this was really worth listening to…
And it is.
I’m totally not sure. Mostly because I’m illiterate. Or illegitimate. WHATEVER.
Being narcissistic is full of the win. Who cares?
I have three of his books! I love Bourdain’s books because they talk about restaurants and traveling which I love & because he is the mantis. I periodically enter the kitchen to do the dishes & put away the groceries. My husband does all the cooking. It runs in the family plus otherwise we’d starve. I have informed his family that I loathe all discussion about cooking and organic ingredients so am comforted by the thought that they are now actively torturing me 🙂
angelinequick.blogspot.com
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Any discussions of organic food make me twitchy.
You go, Blobber! If anyone can, you can…
BLOBBERS UNITE!
You are one of my most favoritest blobbers of all time.
And it’s good to know that I’m not the only one who sounds like a complete asshole when asked about blobbing. One of my coworkers found my blog and asked me about it and I was all, “Uh, well, it’s just, you know, for fun…”
For fuck’s sake.
Blobbing will eventually be more respected…but I suspect it will take the mainstream media to really support it first. I mean, advertisers are still pretty wary of even the biggest blobs. (STUPID)
You are one of MY favorite blobbers, FYI.
I remember when I first started blogging a million years ago and people IRL would find it I would be so embarrassed like theyd walked in on me masturbating or something. Now I like handle it more like Mitch on modern family in the Troga episode, and make them feel like they are so lame because they don’t know something that everyone else does. Ive even named it , it’s called giving people “the Mitch”. Sadly, my immediately circle tends not to recognize my comedic brilliance.
I’m all about finding that and watching it. Because EXACTLY. Like, WAIT, DON’T LOOK AT MY BLOB! IT’S SO EMBARRASSING!!
Except my first blob was much more awesome than this one.
Okay I love you like a cellmate but the whole “blob” thing is making my eye twitch. The episode is called Strangers on a Treadmill. Now, I’m assuming you mean you need to check BACK to the episode because of course you watch Modern Family, right? Cause my imaginary best blogger friend watches the brilliance that is MF. (just like my imaginary best actress friends [movie/tv], my imaginary novelist friends, my imaginary rockstar friends etc.)
Of course I do. Or I will. I need a new TV husband.
Anthony Bourdain can be your TV husband, but he will always be my TV secret lover. That man is pure awesomeness…and I gladly scarf up anything he writes.
You should be proud to be a blogger. You’re a damn good one.
I, although only mediocre, am proud to be a part-time blogger, full-time crazy woman.
You are not a mediocre blobber. Shut your whore mouth.
I don’t know about the world as a whole, but blogging (I’ve been writing online in one place or another since 2001… insane to think about now!) has definitely changed MY world. Without it, I would not just be kind of crazy, I would be motherfucking bat-shit bouncing off the walls in a padded cell crazy.
Also. I need to know if “blobber” was a typo or intentional humor. Either way, I’m cool with it. 😉
It was intentional.
Viva la BLOBBERS!
I have so many TV lovers, I struggle to keep them all straight. The predictable doctors at Seattle Grace take up most of my time in the on-call room. Dex swings by nightly (sorry, I know you like him too). Sigh. So many boys, so little time.
Blogs are the new thing, yo. You’re a frontier-woman. I like that the blog-o-sphere has as many awesome women as it does. I have never heard more chicks drop the f-bomb, and that can’t be a bad thing.
TV husbands are so much easier to manage than real lovers. And Blobs are really worth a hell of a lot more to me than any other form of media (besides the occasional book). I don’t know if that says anything good about me or not, but it’s the damn truth.
I only now – despite a lifetime of arranging words into specific orders and sending them off to various places for inclusion with other’s carefully ordered words – say that I am a writer.
I still say I’m a speech pathologist, I mean, I friggin’ went into DEBT to get THAT degree, and it is still the thing that pays bettter, but…
I say I’m a writer. And when people say, “Oh, what do you write?”
One of the things I say is, “I write a humor blog.”
(Thus ensues the “Oh, have I read you?” Question which I think statistically it is safe to say, “Uh, not a chance in hell…” But that’s ok.)
You rock babe, and you rock cause your a kick-ass blogger.
And we’re all good with the term.
I’m okay with calling myself a writer, but, like you, I still feel weird doing it. It’s only recently that I’m a little less weirded out by it, and how dumb is that? I was a nurse for like a week and I can still say “I’m a nurse” and I’ve been a blobber for 6 years.
The very first time I watched Anthony Bourdain’s show he had the following to say about the place he was visiting:
“It smelled like egg salad scrapped off of someones taint.”
And I have loved him ever since.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Exactly.
You’ve exposed a terribly undermined niche blog market – where, oh where, are the blogs telling you about hotel murders?
FREAKING WHERE??
I think we need to start a website drudging up hotel murder blogs. You know they exist, right? The blogs, not the websites.
What? How have I missed this vital part of the Internet? Clearly our website is desperately needed.
If we don’t do it, I’ll cry.
SHHHHH! If we tell other Blobbers about what we’re doing, we can’t take the market by STORM.
Of course – we must be werry werry quiet to catch a new niche market.
And I’d do anything to stem your tears.
So I’m in.
You should know… as a blobber, you have changed my world. And in case you weren’t sure, that’s a good thing.
BLOBBERS RULE.
BLOBBERS CHANGE THE WORLD. *sings that Clapton song*
Blobbers ARE changing the world… just without the headlines, parades, and confetti. It’s much more graceful that way.
Yours is one of the first blogs I started reading, and now blogging is my lifeline, my obsession, and my mistress.
Plus- I always wanna know where the fucking ghosts are. Always!
The ghosts are what make us all interesting. Also: I LOVE YOU.
love love love anthony bourdain. and you’re so right, those who don’t get blobbing yet, will. it’s the real deal. the grit. not the made-up polished plate of food porn you normally get served.
Blobbing is only inspiring when you can connect with something. Or get something out of it.
I have a personal blog that I neglect with great regularity. I have a professional blog for the daily newspaper where I work that has a companion bi-weekly column.
I write about pets. True. Dogs and cats. Occasionally lizards and ponies, but usually canines and felines.
Anyhoo, being the pet blogger in a small city is hardly celebrity. That is, until you go to the local vet that specializes in cats, where every well-heeled blue-hair in town takes her precious Fluffy.
There? I am a damn rock star. I am recognized and adored. They all read my blog and my column.
My point is that blogging is important. And it can change the world. Even if it’s just about cats and the people who love them. And your blog is wonderful. You are a real rock star.
BTW- I also edit the book page (newspapers downsized, so we multi-task) and I reviewed Bourdain’s book last summer. He’s a fantastic writer. You two would have very literate, beautiful imaginary babies.
I may have just framed this. Also: BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I don’t know that anyone has ever recognized me outside of blobbing conferences. But if I wrote about cats, I’m sure they would.
Amen Sister!
I have had my well neglected blog for um I don’t know like two years … I started it to help promote my business. But I could never ‘get’ into it … I was trying to hard to be politically correct. I finally decided fuck that & now I have an easier time blogging. I am just me – love me hate me – I don’t care!
It’s WAY easier to blog when you’re not trying to be something you’re not.
Aunt Becky, you inspire us to be the best blobbers we can be. And HELLO Anthony Bourdain! That makes me admire your whore mouth even more.
Anthony is an excellent choice for a television husband. Funny, intelligent, hot, and he has a cool job. I read his book, Kitchen Confidential and have never looked at a restaurant the same way again. I must go download his new book to my Kindle…how exciting!
It’s a really good book! I really hope you like it.
BLOBBERS UNITE!