I don’t often look straight ahead while I drive.

I know, I know. That’s a pretty awful thing to claim, especially on a public forum like that internet. But I’m not saying I drive dangerously or anything. In fact, what I’m talking about is probably something you do too. Think about it: how much of your driving time do you actually spend staring straight ahead? You’re constantly checking rear and side view mirrors and blind spots and making yourself aware of your surroundings. You’d actually be behaving much more recklessly if you never took your eyes off of the road ahead of you.

So I’m not often staring straight ahead. I’m looking around, and checking mirrors and blind spots and all of that. And because of that, in my almost 25 years of life, I’ve only ever had one minor fender-bender that wasn’t my fault.

Nearly 25 years of life. That doesn’t seem right. Continue reading “Moving Forward and Looking Ahead”

On May 28th, 2011, I posted my first essay on The Greatest Blog Of All Time. It was a stupid look at the fact that we study and debate things that happened hundreds of years ago, and it set the tone much more than I expected it to. One year later, and I’ve not only made my website something that embraces the absurdity of life, I’ve gotten that way myself.

One year ago, I never would have expected that writing a blog would impact the way I view the world. I needed a creative outlet. Outside of college, I didn’t have the time to do all the stupid things that I used to in order to channel the energy I had. I couldn’t just grab a few friends and make stupid videos as easily as I used to. I figured a blog would accomplish that, and that’s all I wanted. Stanton Martin and I would joke around about becoming “Internet Famous”, because that’s totally a thing, but I had no desire to build an audience or anything. I just wanted to create something, and if people laughed, that was perfect. Continue reading “One Year Later”

It’s no secret that you have to be careful on the internet. One or two seemingly minor mistakes, and then you’re on the phone trying to explain that no, you are NOT making major purchases in a former Soviet state.

The amount of personal protection or publicity that the Internet provides can go wrong, though. You can’t reveal everything about yourself, because then that information is readily available to anyone and everyone, and that’s TERRIFYING. On the other side of that, it’s really easy to hide and never reveal yourself. It’s very easy to be fake in the process. And to an extent that’s fine, but also to an extent, that’s not cool.

Between all of the talk of building a platform and finding a niche, it’s really easy to become something different. To become what you really aren’t. Instead of building a brand, you’re building a persona. Continue reading “Person(a)”