Tuesday, May 04, 2021

Do I even remember how to blog?

 I seriously don't know! 

But what I do know is that throughout the past decade I have offered up my thoughts, consistently, on the Book of Face, and where does that get me? Shares, likes, and peeks into the lives of people I haven't seen in years are all fun and algorithm games -- until suddenly it's not as fun anymore. It seems that fb is trying to steer us more into groups; why is that? Can anyone explain it to me from the monetary perspective?  Sure, I could quit all my fb groups and then fb would have to show me individual fbriends (amid the ads) but, thing is, I WANT the group info, just not at the cost of the people. Also, I am quite curious about things I can never know, like whether fewer people are seeing my posts since I started posting gender critical rants, which is my totally unconfirmed suspicion. And the flip side of that coin being how very many individuals who have swallowed the prevailing not-wisdom public discourse about various ideologies are less fun to interact with in the first place with their repeat-the-catechism politics. The trumptydumpty era was awful and consumed so much of my book of face even when I refused to type his name. I want us to make it better and fun again...but I don't know if that's likely to happen as big tech works toward its data-grabbing post-human singularity or whatever. 

On that note, I still am not a TV watcher  (and still not a binge-er) but Silicon Valley remains a thing that I love and that makes me laugh out loudest with both a sense of maddening absurdity and recognition. I have also got a season or two into The Good Place, whose philosophy I was assured I would very much love, and it's true! I do! I am more like Chidi than anyone I have ever met. And the ways I am not like Chidi? Are the ways I'm like Eleanor. I love that show. 

See, this is making me sad.  I wish I had spent the pandemic blogging instead of facebooking. 

Things I should have blogged about instead of posting to the book of face: 

1. My 100 Days of Nature Walks -- now with 10% more walking! (Because I ended up doing 110 days)  I spent last summer taking a walk outside every day in a different park/nature preserve/hike from my 60 Hikes Within 60 Miles - Chicago book/other outdoor nature walking locale. It was an amazing streak! 

2. Quarantine life -- WHICH I LOVE. And no, I did not make any sourdough or watch your stupid T*ger K*ng. I did not binge anything.  I did not get bored. I thoroughly enjoyed ceasing commuting, came to appreciate teaching online, and discovered the greatness of working remotely is working from various locations around the country. 

3. Black Lives Matter. Our nation's long overdue reckoning with white privilege matters. 

4. I reached my escape velocity from Chicago and flew South for the winter, where I am enjoying my #Atlantaresidency. Why am I not blogging about it? 

5. Recent film projects! 

At some point in quarantine summer, I finished watching all of the Best Picture Oscar Winners! One of my many-years-in-the-making off-and-on projects! I even talked about it on the O.C.C.: Oscar Category Completist podcast episode #35: all-Time Oscar Completist -- Best Picture with Linda Napikoski

Then, over the winter I finished up the AFI Top 100 original list of 100 Years...100 Movies that I have been slooowly sporadically working on since 1998. I had a lot of opinions about some of these flicks!  

And then, during this most recent awards season, I did not step foot in a movie theaters but I watched Every. Single. Oscar. Nominee. In my living room. What an interesting year! 

Why should only people who are on fb with me get to hear about these things? 😅

So, I say, let's remember how to blog. 

Of course I have questions. Among them : 

Who's still blogging? 

What blogs and web sites do you read regularly?  

What questions do you have? 



1 comment:

Brian said...

Ahhh, so much better.

We know the FB algorithm is irredeemable. But I wouldn't say it's as simple as gender critical rants, though there's probably something to the politics angle. I know because when I do the that same thing- whether it's a photo I screenshot or an article I post or just a plain string of text- it doesn't get seen as much as a silly happy birthday photo or an iced coffee meme. There are also seems to be less of a crowd of interesting people who willingly engage with discussion on FB than in better times in the past. Unfortunately, a lot of the types who still do are insufferable one.

I like to think there's a still a place for soliciting opinion and debate on FB. But the prospect of you writing stuff on your own in bloggage form is much more worthwhile, I think.