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Saturday, July 13, 2002
But you might ask another asshole for a second opinion 
| | Last night at the party somebody asked me where my blogging ideas come from. Irritable Blog Syndrome, I said. "I just write about whatever happens to annoy me." |
| | Doesn't matter that it wasn't really true (nothing is bothering me right now, and look). What does matter is that Martin Devon later improved the phrase by giving it an actual definition: |
| | It's when your blog has a problem with you. |
| | Somebody give that man a beer. |
L.A. Party Report
| | On a total of several hours sleep the night before, I left yesterday evening at 7:10pm for an 8:00pm party at Brian Linse's house in Laurel Canyon, 85 miles down the 101. (Here in the Southland, your highways, like, y'know, take definite articles. No idea why.) I followed tail lights at close range for the next 2:20, parked way down the hill on Brian's street and arrived wasted & ready. |
| | And I'm here to tell ya, it was a great party. |
| | It was surreal to meet all these writers I'd known only in Outer BlogSpace. It was as if we had come to Earth for the first time, amazed to find everybody looking and sounding like flesh-and-clothes human beings. They weren't just pixel-voiced pundits, speaking from pages. |
| | I didn't recognize Matt Welch with his glasses and without his cowboy hat. Lacking a visual clue about Charles Johnson, I thought he looked exactly as I had imagined... except I hadn't really imagined anything other than something vaguely sort of what he ended up looking like. It was interesting to learn that he's a major league musician, and far more of a techie than I am. (Here's his party report). I learned that Matt and a bunch of other people in the blogging network had Santa Barbara in their past (and in some cases, their future as well... it's a town that can't help inviting its ex-pats back). I recognized Eric and Dawn Olsen (she more than he). They were the guests of honor, stopping by en route from Hawaii to Ohio. |
| | I instantly recognized Mickey Kaus, even though I had no preconceptions about him. Strange how that works. He also turns out to be local, even though I had pegged him as a San Franciscan, for some reason. |
| | There were also plenty of folks I barely knew online or didn't know at all -- so it was good to make the connection in partyspace. One was Martin Devon, better known as Patio Pundit. I ran into him on the patio, in fact. Visiting from San Francisco was Bill Quick, better known for his science fiction before he became the alpha Daily Pundit. |
| | Unfortunately, I missed talking with Tony Pierce, to whose blog I was once pointed by Ken Layne, I think. Ken wasn't there, which was a bummer. Same with Eugene Volokh, whom I believe was also on the invite list (unless I missed him). Same with Armed Liberal. |
| | I sat at a table with Madison Slade of Moxie.nu, though I didn't know who she was at the time. I heard her describe herself as a "blondorexic -- you can't be too blonde," when asked about her height. |
| | Now that I'm reading Tony, I see he has a thing for her. Understandable. Makes me think Tony might have been one of the guys hanging with the circle of babes sitting around smoking and laughing in the other corner of the patio. [Next day... The connection was made, as Madison herself reports here.] |
| | One thing I'm sure about is that I was the oldest guy there, probably by a 2x factor in a few cases. But hey, I thought, Isn't Hef about 4x by now? |
| | Anyway, talked to a bunch of these people (though not enough of them), plus some nonbloggers, such as Os (or is it Oz? ...not sure), who has a Linux-based hosting service. I think this is it. [Next day... It's Oz Tyler, and the link is right.] |
| | When I left, sometime after 2, the party was still going strong. So was I, for about fifty miles. Then the sleepies hit me, and even rubbing ice on my face didn't do the job. Two or three times I pulled off the road to rest, but each time I stayed awake thinking about Michael Jordan's dad. |
| | After singing loudly with oldies induced halucinations, I drove the rest of the way screaming at the top of my lungs and pounding my head against the backrest like an autistic psychotic. Guess it worked. |
| | I've never felt more relieved to pull in a driveway. |
| | Anyway, a great party. Thanks, Brian! |
| | Hey, given all the Santa Barbara connections, maybe we should convene the next one up here. |
Good news
| | I hear Marek is headed home from the hospital. I'm sure we'll see more on his blog soon. |
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