BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

Please note that this is not NPR. However, I would like to welcome you to Morning Edition…

Day 2 of 2009: A WillyCon Odyssey (The following takes place between the hours of 5:30AM and 12:00PM. Events occur in real time) <— I tried to get Sutherland for that bit of narration, but he was busy….

5:30 AM – AWAKE!

@mrsellars – There is no java in my room and the Student Center doesn’t open til 7… Oh, Coffee, why hast thou forsaken me?

@mrsellars – Watching morning TV in Wayne NE… Original Adam West Batman movie on… O_o

@mrsellars – Local news is well… Local. Rather be watching @VirginiaKerr and @PaulCooked…

@mrsellars – Jeez… I’m pretty sure I have socks older than that news anchor…

6:30 AM

@mrsellars – @cellphone: boop, boop, beep, bahp, beep, beep, boop, bahp, bahp, beep, boop… Ring… Ring… Ri!

@EK – Hmnomnip?

@mrsellars – Are you up?

@EK – Yam nonno nam nip mmm.

@mrsellars – Okay, just making sure. Didn’t want you to oversleep since I’m not there to wake you up like usual.

@EK – Uhmm nimna hibbit nomma.

@mrsellars – Okay, I’ll let you go then. Love you.

@EK – Wubtoo moo.

@mrsellars – Shower. Check… As coach Verby used to say, “Clean minds, clean bodies.” Well… At least my body is clean.

@mrsellars – Students call cafeteria here the “Gag”. Funny… Noms here are wayyyy better than when I was in College thir-koff-koff years ago.

@mrsellars – Srsly. Noms here really good. A ton to choose from too. Sandwich bar, tostada bar, soups, prepared meals of the day, etc… And they switch up all the time according to what I’m told.

@mrsellars – Had Swiss steak (Northern version = mushroom soup instead of tomatoes and onions, but not bad), steamed veggies, and a salad for dinner last night.

@mrsellars – Salad bar even had beets and unsalted sunflower seeds. How cool is that?

@mrsellars – Looking forward to good noms for breakfast.

@mrsellars – Someone above my head is moving furniture…

@mrsellars – Hmmm… That thud didn’t sound good.

@mrsellars – Wonder if there was a body involved?

@mrsellars – Why yes, now that you ask, everything REALLY IS book material.

@mrsellars – Local weather dude calling for foot of snow, blowing drifts, whiteout conditions.

@mrsellars – SF faculty advisor tells me they’ve been hearing stuff like that for the past couple of weeks and it never comes to fruition.

@mrsellars – Maybe their weather guy needs to talk to Matt Chambers in STL… Pick up a few pointers.

@mrsellars – Hmmmm. Is it Nebraska or is it the fact that it’s a college campus? Man in shorts when 24 degrees not fazing anyone.

@mrsellars – Of course, students are wandering about in t-shirts and ripped jeans. I probably fit right in.

@mrsellars – Familiar odor lingering on the air as I walk to student center. Cow manure. Smells like back home in Kentucky.

@mrsellars – {attack of nostalgia}{wistful sigh}

@mrsellars – Morning noms good. Eggs, pancakes, sausage, mini blueberry muffin, and COFFEE!

@mrsellars – Wonders what these kids would have called the cafeteria where he went to college. :-/

@mrsellars – Hmmm. Place looks almost empty. [Looks Around]

@mrsellars – Oh, wait… A couple of the SF club students I met last night are sitting over there. I should probably sit with them so they don’t think I’m full of myself or something.

@mrsellars – Walkies…

@mrsellars – @students_at_table: Good morning!

@student_1 – [STARE]

@student_1 – Goom nana. Ermm.

@student_2 – [STARE]

@student_2 – Grunt.

@mrsellars – @students_at_table: How’s it goin’?

@student_1 – Nerm goona, arbba tay. Ar ermmm. Nib.

@student_1 – [STARE]

@student_2 – [STARE]

@mrsellars – Umm… Yeah… Klattu Verada Nikto.

@mrsellars – [move to end of table. Enjoy morning noms in silence]

@mrsellars – Remembers his college days… Silently empathizes with the two students.

@mrsellars – Visited with faculty advisor. Signed book. Signed poster. Got more free nom passes for cafeteria.

@mrsellars – SCORE! Found coffee shop on campus. I haz large StarMakeABucks in hand. Life is good.

@mrsellars – Dorm room is about 12 x 24. Two smoke detectors. Must be looking for some pretty sneaky smoke…

ON TWITTER:

@mrsellars – Curse you, Perry the Platypus!

@ perryplatypus – @mrsellars GrRrrRRrRrrRRRrRRrrRr

@mrsellars – Bwuhahahahaha! That just never gets old…

BACK TO PSEUDO TWITTER:

@mrsellars – Temp at 5:30 AM – 24… Now, at 10:30 AM – 44. Supposed to hit 57 before it starts into a nosedive. Then the white shit falls on our heads.

@mrsellars – Camera is loaded and ready.

@mrsellars – Fox squirrels EVERYWHERE. Fat bastards too. Used to see them in MO, but all I ever see there these days are the smaller greys.

@mrsellars – Named one of the reds Skippy this morning. He sat with me and ate acorns while I drank coffee. No shit. Damn near right next to me.

@mrsellars – Tamer than the family of greys I feed at home, and they’re pretty damn tame, so that says something.

@mrsellars – Prevailing theory – the squirrels buddy up to students and sell them the answers to exams. Squirrels are sneaky like that.

@mrsellars – Taking camera with next time.

@mrsellars – You know… Now that I think on it, animals can predict weather even better than Matt Chambers…

@mrsellars – My “country boy sense” is saying these little farts are telling us the sky really is going to dump on us tomorrow.

@mrsellars – #fuckme

11:30 AM

@mrsellars – Coffee empty. Library with coffee shop across campus… Go for more, or relax for a bit and get some when I go for noontime noms?

@mrsellars – Decisions, decisions…

And there you have the morning edition…

More to come…

Murv

Before you get all huffy and send me a nasty email, put that sentence on the back burner for a second and read the blog entry itself… The sentiment in the grandiose title is definitely not my own.

You see, a while back I penned a blog entry about, of all things, writing blogs. Yeah, pretty redundant, I know, but what can I say… It was a slow news day. At any rate, in a nutshell that particular entry investigated the whole concept of how, as an author who is also a blogger, I should only be writing about writing, (yeah, even more redundancy, go figure…) And, I was to do this all for the express purpose of disseminating information to other writers, and/or aspiring writers, so that they may learn from me.

Truth is, I didn’t even know I was qualified to teach, so as you can imagine this whole idea came as a shocker to me.

Well, if you happened to have read that particular entry you already know I found the above notion funnier than all hell. Still, even though I had, and have, every intention of continuing to write entertaining blogs rather than such self-serving B S as previously noted, I thought maybe I’d go out into the proverbial blogosphere and have myself a look see. You know what I mean… Do a little investigation on my own to find out if maybe I was missing a bus or something. Hey, I’ve made my share of mistakes, so it could very well be that this whole entertainment thing is a crock, and being a pompous ass is where it’s really at… What better way to find out than to do a little digging?

So, I tossed my cyber-shovel over my shoulder and away I went.

I read blog after blog, written by authors I had never heard of, but who purported themselves to be experts in the field of authoring. Know what I found?

A load of self-serving, pompous B S…

Yeah… I was disappointed. I wasn’t overly surprised by any stretch of the imagination, but I have to admit that I was definitely disappointed. I mean, after all, I was hoping to learn something. That’s what the whole writing about writing thing is all about, correct? Lesser writers like myself getting an education from the elite wordsmiths… (Of course, like I said, I had never heard of any of these elite authors, but that didn’t matter. They said they were the best of the best right there on their blogs, and they wouldn’t lie about something like that, would they?)

Well,  I have to admit that even though I found exactly what I was expecting to find,  I did in fact learn something. I learned that I was correct all along…

I  definitely do not want to be one of those types of bloggers, or even authors for that matter.

The harsh reality of the blogging world is this – there’s more than just a  convoy of turnip trucks full of us out there. The number of blogs currently on the web is way more than I can count, even if I take off my shoes and socks. Yeah… There are a whole lot of blogs, and each one is vying for attention. So, people – unfortunately, quite a few authors in particular – sometimes decide that in order to attract attention they should become self-appointed experts, then hand out advice from on-high.

“On-high” being the pedestal upon which they have placed themselves. And, unfortunately, the advice they dispense takes the form of criticism, more often than not.

Now, don’t get me wrong here… Everyone is entitled to an opinion, and even to expressing it aloud in most cases, whether critical or not. Of course, I should mention that one shouldn’t always express an opinion out loud… There are times when one should keep one’s opinion to oneself. It’s a matter of discretion and common sense.

At any rate, I readily admit I’m as guilty as anyone when it comes to the whole opinion expressing thing… Hell, I’m doing it right now. And, this might even be one of those occasions when I should be keeping my mouth shut. Who knows? I guess we’ll find out soon enough.

But the thing is, I always try to make note of the fact that what I am saying is merely my personal opinion, and that disagreeing with me does not a moron make.

So, opinions are not my issue. My gripe is when self-important people treat their opinions like they are hard, cold fact that everyone must cleave to lest they be labeled an idiot.

Well, actually, I should back up a second… I have to be honest. I really don’t have a gripe at all. Truth is, I found all of the stuff I read to be fairly amusing, but mostly because it’s so damn obvious the people who wrote it take themselves way too seriously. And, based on their rhetoric, if you can label it such, apparently they are effin’ brilliant, and I’m… Well… I’m not.

Just like it says in the title of this blog entry. And, to borrow one of this genre of bloggers favorite expressions, “I should know, because I [insert important sounding sh*t here].”

More to come…

Murv