So I broke down and opened up a Twitter account. If you want to follow me, I\u2019m at twitter.com\/stallioncornell. I don\u2019t know how or why I\u2019ll use it, but there it is. The first few days, my updates consisted of such one-word entries as \u201cpoop\u201d and \u201cClytemnestra.\u201d If that turns you on, then sign up to see what other nonsense I\u2019ll come up with next.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m quite enamored of Facebook \u2013 I enjoy connecting with people I know and seeing what they\u2019re doing. Twitter, I don\u2019t really get as of yet. Near as I can figure, it\u2019s just like this blog, except every entry has to be 140 characters or less, and there are no real long-term discussions. Is there an advantage to this that I\u2019m missing?<\/p>\n
One thing I like, though, is I can post Twitter updates via text message. That\u2019s so easy! Now if only there were something worthy of posting. And if anyone cared. Because I don\u2019t. But I now have the option open. Perhaps I\u2019ll use it effectively. (And I didn\u2019t want Languatron to register my name over there.)<\/p>\n
The entire Internet seems to be moving in a Facebooky direction. That is to say, every news article now allows you to \u201ccomment,\u201d which usually means people get to facelessly rant and insult people. Blogs like this one feel like they\u2019re a dying breed, which led me to reconsider whether I wanted to restart this at all or just focus on my Facebook page instead.<\/p>\n
Part of the impetus for revisiting this blog was the discovery, by the lovely Mrs. Cornell, of my personal journal, which extensively covers a time period from Christmas of 1980 to May 28, 1985, with a depressed, angst-ridden rant written as a postscript in October of 1986. (I\u2019d tear that page out if I could, but that would destroy the preceding 1985 page.)<\/p>\n
Rereading the journal is painful in the extreme. It\u2019s saturated with adolescent melodrama, and one would get the impression that I spent my entire adolescence well nigh unto suicidal, when such was not the case. But I didn\u2019t write in the journal when I was feeling cheerful; I wrote when I had some drama to expunge, which makes for very turgid reading.<\/p>\n
Some representative excerpts:<\/p>\n
\u201cI am not particularly attractive, and my constant stupidity is the main factor in prolonging my agony.\u201d \u2013 August 19, 1982<\/p>\n
\u201cI tend to be obnoxious. I also feel like I\u2019ve accomplished nothing. I\u2019m extremely lazy, and everything I do is mediocre.\u201d \u2013 October 21, 1983<\/p>\n
\u201cAll the way home on that abominable car ride I fantasized about jumping out the door and splattering all over the freeway.\u201d \u2013 December 24, 1983<\/p>\n
You get the idea.<\/p>\n
But even in the midst of that grunge, there are wonderful people and events that I had forgotten that are now recorded forever. Some more pleasant excerpts:<\/p>\n
\u201cWe heard the Gay Men\u2019s Choir of LA sing. They were all gay, but they sang well.\u201d \u2013 January 23, 1983 [Note: I know this is not politically correct. I was only 14, and attitudes were quite different back then. I think it’s impressive that, while I had to derogatorily note their sexual orientation, I gave them kudos for their talent.]<\/p>\n
\u201cOur current hobby is harassing a radio pastor [Dr. Gene Scott] over his toll-free hotline.\u201d \u2013 October 21, 1983<\/p>\n
\u201cI got two detentions from my English teacher for harassing a substitute. Brett told me to break dance, so I sat and spun on the floor in the middle of the class.\u201d \u2013 December 1, 1983<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Summer Olympics have begun, and the entire city is caught up in the magic of the Olympic year. My brother and cousin Steve (as well as his friend Rob A.) are taking an active part. They have signed on as official security guards for the XXIIIrd Olympiad. It keeps them off the streets.\u201d \u2013 August 6, 1984<\/p>\n
\u201cThe next day was my birthday. At 8:00 AM in the morning, I went to the DMV to take my driving test. Much to my paranoid mother\u2019s chagrin, who broke into tears once while I drove the car to McDonalds, I passed with flying colors.\u201d \u2013 August 22, 1984<\/p>\n
\u201cI told an overblown story of how I bumped into a stoner, was chased by the narcs, grabbed and frisked, and implicated in a drug deal due to the stoner\u2019s small bag of marijuana in his sock. I escaped in the nick of time after lying about my name (Mike Jeffries) and what my wallet was doing in my crotch. I told the narc \u2018that\u2019s my d—, and I\u2019d advise you not to touch it again.\u2019 \u201c \u2013 Feb. 4, 1985<\/p>\n
Perhaps not the stuff that will appear in the next Mormon Journal in the Ensign, but fun to remember.<\/p>\n
Which is why I\u2019m going to keep going with this blog. This has become an online journal, and its public nature will keep me from indulging in the more adolescent, embarrassing stories that make my teenage journal such a chore to read. I can\u2019t count the number of times that I have referred back to an entry of this blog to clarify or explain my thinking.<\/p>\n
So I\u2019m going to press forward, undaunted. I\u2019m game if you are.<\/p>\n
We put our German Shepherd to sleep on my birthday in 1983.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SoI broke down and opened up a Twitter account. If you want to follow me, I\u2019m at twitter.com\/stallioncornell. I don\u2019t know how or why I\u2019ll use it, but there it is. The first few days, my updates consisted of such one-word entries as \u201cpoop\u201d and \u201cClytemnestra.\u201d If that turns you on, then sign up to ... Read more<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4767,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29\/revisions\/4767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}