A contributed piece by Jerome Keating. What next – the Peking Duck opera?
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Blogging the Night Away
The night passes;
I remain at the screen.
My spouse/significant other/partner complains,
I should be in bed.
My other tasks lay
Like abandoned orphans
On my desk.
My glass of scotch/vodka/tea
(Pick your poison)
Is drained,
But I carry on.
Do I seek a different, well-lighted place?
Am I secretly struggling to avoid nada?
Do I look for information, an argument?
Confirmation, sharing, or
A platform to proclaim dated beliefs
Sometimes I’m a voyeur.
Look there go Ivan and Math
Good God, here comes China_hand
Rushing to the scene.
Keir and Davesgonechina join in,
It’s getting nasty.
Other Lisa injects
A voice of restraint;
She’s often a peacemaker.
But, I leave for another blog.
Why do we all do it?
Why do I do it?
Perhaps it’s a human need
To tell the world,
“Look, I am here.”
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Good question, why we all do it. Masochism? Egoism? It’s certainly not to make money. Maybe it’s just fun.
1
By OtherLisa
Hee hee!
often procrastination, in my case.
April 11, 2006 @ 11:03 pm | Comment
2
By Ivan
OHHHH, Jerome, you must have known that you were throwing down the gauntlet to me, with this.
🙂
Here is my first installment, inspired by how your poem reminded me of the last words of Jacob to his twelve sons (Genesis 49):
“And Jacob called unto his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which will befall you…..Simeon and Levi are brethren, instruments of cruelty are in their habitations; Judah is a lion’s whelp; Zebulun shall dwell at the haven of the sea….” etc etc
And so: a reading from the Book of Duck:
Richard called unto his commenters, and said, Gather yourselves together….and Father Richard said (well really Ivan said, but I speak for God):
Jerome is like unto an owl, he watches in silence and disturbs the night only from the air;
Lisa is a tigress who defends her kin from the shadows;
Davesgonechina has the gift of prophecy. If he thinks you’re an idiot, then you really are one;
Sojourner is among the youngest, and yet among the greatest;
Ivan is just fucking weird, but yea, who is weirder than God? Not even Ivan is weirder than God, even though Ivan think’s he’s smarter than God;
Math is an idiot child, and God protects all idiots.
Let no on lay a hand on Math, lest we lose our village idiot;
Panzi is like unto a self-hating Jew on crack;
China-Hand is a racoon, yea, a racoon without rabies. God is merciful to China-Hand because his trash is easy to clean up, and God gets a laugh out of watching China-Hand make an ass out of himself.
ACB is like unto another kind of self-hating Jew in his own way;
Dish is a Pekingese with a brain the size of Gibraltar and a heart the same size;
(anonymous) is the first and best among the Lost Tribes of Duck. We yearn for his return.
And the twelfth is the Unknown Troll, whose faces are legion. May they all find peace of mind so that they never trouble this tribe again.
Here endeth the lesson. Go in peace, to love and serve the Great Duck in the Sky, or his other avatar the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
April 12, 2006 @ 12:25 am | Comment
3
By Lao Lu
Aaameeen to that, Ivan !
Btw, Jerome, I am trying to set up a little blog myself (not very succesful yet) and my first post I think exactly captures the same feeling on why we are blogging.
April 12, 2006 @ 5:09 am | Comment
4
By Jerome
I feel like I have unwittingly unleashed the forces of the Ark of the Covenant in a past Indiana Jones movie.
Nietzche had his Zarathustra but the Great Duck in the sky has “Thus spoke Ivan.”
Lao Lu, did you come up with any conclusions to share?
April 12, 2006 @ 5:25 pm | Comment
5
By Lao Lu
Jerome,
Just some copy/past of my article and my musings on the attraction of blogging:
“But why, then I wondered, is blogging seemingly such a huge succes ? What’s the attraction? While I was pondering the question, it was this song from Patricia Kaas that came to my mind as (maybe only just part) of the answer:
“Entrer dans la lumière,
Comme un insecte fou …”
(To enter into the light,
like a crazy insect …)
Isn’t that part of why we all do what we do on our blogs? For sure, we don’t all belong to the class of the bold and the beautiful that get followed by the spotlight wherever they go, but we all want our five minutes of fame. At some time, we all want to be under the glow of that light shining on just you, to be there up that stage and the audience at your feet, holding it’s breath in awe of your every move. So we have come to flock to that biggest stage on earth that has become the World Wide Web, we are attracted to it like the insect at night is attracted by the light. And we perform, we blog about whatever comes to our mind. Some may harvest big rounds of applause, some will have to do with just one shadow sitting in the back of the theatre and walking off without a sound. But at least, we will have been there and we’ll know how it felt. The rest is up to each of us.”
April 12, 2006 @ 6:14 pm | Comment
6
By Jerome
Thanks Lao Lu, I do find blogging will certainly give psychologist plenty of fodder for future years.
With all the bloggers on this site, I am a little surprised that so few have ventured their views of why. Perhaps introspection and confession are not always good for the soul.
I am partially reminded of how in 18th–19th century England it was commonplace to have a diary which one shared only with one’s closest friends and swore them to secrecy. Afterwards you could be angry with them if they did not at least divulge it to some quality people.
April 14, 2006 @ 9:27 pm | Comment
7
By Jerome
BTW Ivan, I did enjoy your poem and got a lot of chuckles from it.
I agree with Pascal, it is only the true philosopher who can make light of philosophy and the true theologian who can make light of theology.
April 14, 2006 @ 9:34 pm | Comment