June 7, 2007

I’m feeling this intense desire to read blog comments instead of paying attention to my current writing task at hand, which involves using the annoying terms personal productivity system and, worse, actionable (SHOOT. ME. NOW), so riddle me this, Bat-Reader, how did you get introduced to blogs, or blogging?

My story: in the last part of 2001 JB and I visited southern China; during that trip there was one night when I was hanging around our hotel room waiting for JB, and tooling around on his laptop to pass the time. I can’t explain what happened next, except to say that I was probably feeling a little lonesome for Americana at its finest . . . at any rate, I found myself googling Jean Teasdale, which inexplicably led me to Wendy’s site. I read through all of her archives until it came time for us to head to dinner (where a waiter repeated what I thought was “Chicken hot! Chicken hot!” to me, and I nodded in understanding—hey, I can handle a little spice, my good man—and promptly bit into what turned out to be a chicken heart. Which wasn’t half bad), and from Poundy I eventually discovered many more excellent blogs (well, online journals, as they were called at the time). A few months later, I decided to try my hand at writing on the web, and I’ve been duly blathering away—and reading—ever since.

How about you? When did you start reading blogs, or writing a blog? If you are really feeling generous, you could also tell me how you stumbled upon my blog, because I’d love to know.

PS: if you haven’t seen this video yet, prepare for your day to get about fifty thousand times more awesome. “NOT FUNNY!” Oh, but it is. (Via MightyGirl.)

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MotherGooseAmy
MotherGooseAmy
16 years ago

I did not even know what a Blog was untill four months ago when my son was 14 months old and had his first all out tantrum. I googled “14 month tantrum” and I got a blog posting on sundrymourning where a Riley tantrum was detailed to a T. It also resembled my son’s tantrum so much that I started reading every single day!

lisa
16 years ago

I moved out of town for graduate school in 1999 to Richmond, VA. I bought my first very own computer when I moved, and spent many, many hours on it and the internet, as Richmond, VA was a horrible place full of unfriendly people and I needed some way to keep in touch with humanity. I believe the first blog I found and started reading was Robyn’s Bitchypoo, and through her blog, I think I found yours, but it wasn’t until several years later.

I didn’t have the time to figure out how to make my own blog while I was in grad school, but I wanted to create one from the first time I encountered one. I started selfpassage.com in 2002 and have been keeping it ever since.

Amber
16 years ago

My friend Kate referred me to your blog. She insisted I read an entry (I can’t remember which) and the next thing I knew I was shuffling through all of your achives, laughing my ass off.

As for my own awakening to the blogging world, she and I both love to write, and she suggested I try it online, since I’m too much of a wimp to actually publish anything with a spine and some ink. So I did, and I’ll just say my first few attempts were beyond pathetic. I’ve gotten better, thankfully, so hopefully now people who stop to read it will just roll their eyes rather than make gagging motions.

missbanshee
missbanshee
16 years ago

I have no freaking idea, other than I associate my early blogging days with Darn Tootin, Mighty Big TV and Tomato Nation. This would have been in…2000? 1999? Everything else pretty much grew from there.

Jenn Perryman
16 years ago

I know the first site I found was also Wendy’s- I was looking for the number of weight watchers points in phad thai and found her journal in the result. But from there, it gets fuzzy. I’m sure through some strange chain I found Weetabix, Trancejen, Pamie, Dooce, you, mimismartypants, darn-tootin, disco the kid, chauffi, big yellow house, bitchypoo, twop, tomatonation and a few others. I’ve probably picked up (and sometimes dropped) another 20 or so since then.
I found out I was pregnant right around the time Riley was born I think- though I later miscarried. Now I have a boy of my own (6 months) and I started a private journal to document my pregnancy, and have a more public one so that friends and family can keep up with the boy. I’m not witty though, and prefer reading to writing. The irony is that I started reading your blog when I lived in CT, and now I’m living in the Seattle area (Navy transfer) so you’ve helped me adapt to the wet and cold PNW just as much as motherhood.

Rayne
16 years ago

Your blog was actually the first I ever read. My girlfriend created a blog that was open only to six of us and she posted a link to your blog. I was instantly hooked and stunned that I’d never even heard of such a thing. I still read every post you write but have only taken to reading a few so frequently. I finally started my own a few months ago.

Kimberly
Kimberly
16 years ago

I started reading blogs thanks to freshell.com – man that seems like eons ago. I don’t remember how I ended up here but thankful I did. I remember one night I was supposed to be working on a major paper for a class but had to read your archives until I passed out at my desk. I had to call in sick to work to get the paper done. Oops. Somedays, I wonder how I made it through college.

Jem
Jem
16 years ago

Um, man, I got the internet way back in 1998 for my 14th birthday and I started a website about then, although it wasn’t a journal, and I guess I don’t have to tell you that the content wasn’t that fantastic (not that anythings changed).

I stil call them online journals…anyway, I actually have no idea how I found my first one. I had a diaryland account of my own at some stage, then another one, then a LiveJournal (which I still use occasionally) which is when I kept at it. I do remember the first couple I read, miss-edith.diaryland.com and pura-vida.diaryland.com and I think what happened is pura-vida was nominated for an award, so I went to the awards site and you were also nominated for an award.

Someone had written “Sundry is the like the popular cheerleader of the journal community” or something, and I thought “I bet I am going to hate this girl,” and I automatically and stupidly imagined you all peppy and annoying and shallow (sorry). But then I went over to your page and you were so funny and awesome and I voted for you for homecoming queen or something.

Jem
Jem
16 years ago

Oh, and I mean I found you way back at the old diaryland site, by the way, because apparently I exclusively read diaryland journals only.

Amanda
16 years ago

I was doing a random google search for something and ended up stumbling upon Leah’s blog (agirlandaboy.com) and spent the next few hours poring over her archives and marveling at how her whole life was documented on the web. Then I started reading her links and got addicted. Then I started my own blog and have been in love with this crazy online world ever since.

I first found you via Kristin (Tall ‘n’ Lucky) because she always raved about you.

I just started Weight Watchers this week and you, along with Jonniker and a few other great bloggers out there, played a big role in motivating me to get off my chubby arse. So, thanks for that. :)

biscuit
16 years ago

This is so embarassing, but since you asked….

I came across your lovely blog when I Googled “big calves boots” or something along those incriminating lines.

Thank God it’s Summer so I don’t hafta worry about finding boots for the time being.

Marie Green
16 years ago

I got started by reading Bring Up Ben and Birdy on Babycenter.com. Catherine Newman is the bomb, and I was quickly addicted. I read a few of the other weekly journal there too, like Tending Violet, but never any blogs. I started to get this feeling the C was wrapping things up w/ Babycenter, and sure enough, she wrote her last entry there. I was LITERALLY sick to my stomach.

But Then! Someone linked to her new gig at Wondertime and also her blog. So for awhile, I only read her. But then I started reading her comments, and Swistle kept popping up, and so I started reading Swistle. I *think* that’s how I found your ClubMom site.

It’s a slippery slope, isn’t it? Because now I read lots of blogs, and have even started my own (mostly so I could stop lurking and speak up). I think like 2 people are reading my blog, but hey. It’s good mental exercise to write, right?

I really love your blog- it’s hoenst, funny, self-depricating (which I always find hilarious), and interesting. Keep writing- I love it!

Eliot
Eliot
16 years ago

What a great question! Four or five years ago, I googled “Clinique Bonus Time” because I was out of makeup and wondered if anyone was offering any freebies to go with it. I came across a journal that had Grace in the title and started reading it – for an hour, I think! As I worked through the archives, I discovered Grace’s journal had become Abeyance. I started reading Abeyance and discovered several other links to journals there, and started reading some of them. I think one of those journals linked here. I only read a couple of personal blogs now that aren’t people I know, but yours is one of my favorites, in part because of your sense of language and humor, and in part for the cute baby pics!

Amie
16 years ago

I’ve been blogging since about 2001 myself, I think. It’s been a while. Several incarnations, name changes, cause I’m flakey like that. Mmmm…croissants.

I found you years ago through Diaryland, which was where I originally started blogging. I’ve been hooked ever since. :-)

kara marie
16 years ago

I just felt the desire to keep an online journal. I don’t remember finding out about them, it’s like they always just sort…were THERE. I did a search for free online journals or something, and got started on Diaryland. That’s where I found you, of course. I’ve done my LiveJournal and Xanga time, too, but have settled in at Blogger. I didn’t really read very many blogs (just a few) until my time at Xanga, though, because it was so easy, what with the subscription feature.

kara marie
16 years ago

Also, I guess I’ve been blogging since around 1999 or 2000.

Brenda
Brenda
16 years ago

I belong to an online Mommy group and someone mentioned Dooce one day. I started reading and found others. I found yours through ClubMom.
My must reads are yours, Amalah, Dooce, and MissZoot! It’s funny how 3 of you all have babies about the same age.

amy (southkona)
16 years ago

I used to visit Mediarama bulletin boards back in the nineties where Danny Drennan wrote hilarious recaps of Beverly Hills 90210. (The founders of TWOP used to hang out there before they started TWOP.) Anyway, met Jenistar there and started reading her on diaryland. Pretty much all the blogs I read now started with one of Jenistar’s links. I read you, The Family Blender (used to be Go Figure,) Plain Jane, Smitten Kitchen, Happily Ever Now which I found through your comments (she was living near us for awhile,) and then a bunch of my real life friends on Xanga and Myspace.
I started my own when we moved to Hawaii and I couldn’t keep up with the email from everyone wanting to know about our crazy adventure. It is mostly a way to keep up with friends and family- I keep a lock on it so my husband is more comfortable with the way I am pretty free with personal information :)

eileen
eileen
16 years ago

in 1998 i was 16 and spending a summer in Brazil with a host family. I was so very homesick and I had one “Mademoiselle” magazine I had bought to read on the plane. I practically memorized the magazine I read it so many times over the summer (Heather Graham on the cover, article inside discussing her part in Swingers). On the last page of the magazine was a Facts about Claire Danes blurb. One of the facts linked to a girl’s diary who went to Yale with the quote “Claire Danes was falling asleep in class today..” I went online to find the website. I kept reading that girl’s journal and one day she linked to Diaryland and there you go!

Donna
Donna
16 years ago

I can’t believe no one said Plain Layne! I actually had a reporter email me wanting to interview me about the whole thing, freeky deeky shit there……
Actually I think it was layne to slickery, to darntootin, to you. And strip mining for whimsy and ryan rhodes, and a small victory and rachel lucas, and eject eject eject. And a 12 point font.
I totally am a blog whore, I’d read them all if I could. Or maybe a voyeur….I dunno but BLOOD, NOT FUNNY! I laughed hard and then had to see the chick with the alien baby in her tummy. You tube is my new addiction, I. just. cannot. get. off. their. website.!

JMH
JMH
16 years ago

I was looking up parenting articles when I discovered your other blog (Purple is a Fruit) It was one of your parenting poetry posts. I laughed so hard I almost peed my pants. I had to keep checking back for more, and now I am hooked. I read you and Swistle religiously.

thejunebug
16 years ago

I was introduced to Diaryland by a friend in 2000, though I never got into writing consistently until 2002. My diaryland diary was paper-rose; it’s locked now. I switched to LiveJournal when I stopped being able to update Diaryland without paying $100/yr for it.

I found your journal way-back-when on Diaryland, though I’m not sure if I ever commented in it. I started reading you regularly when you started this blog. I was checking up on old diaryland favorites & saw you had moved base. :)

stan
stan
16 years ago

I found diaryland back in 2003 when I did a google search fro some song lyrics. The first I read regularly was might’s (no longer there!). She was a librarian who wrote very frequent clever and witty entries of just one or two lines. I came across yours about 2 years ago, got interested because of the photos you posted of Seattle and Tokyo (two places I have visited) and have stayed because of your brilliant writing. Currently yours is one of only two blogs I read as others have stopped writing. Don’t even think about doing likewise!!

Eric's Mommy
Eric's Mommy
16 years ago

I think I came acrossed your blog when I went to parentdish. I haven’t stopped laughing since! We have the same sense of humor.
I have a 5 year old son and Riley reminds me a lot of him, some of his expressions.
I also noticed some of your references to They Might be Giants! I am also a fan, I saw them in Boston when I was in HS.

“I’m your only friend I’m not your only friend but I’m a little glowing friend but really I’m not actually your friend………”

Rebecca
Rebecca
16 years ago

Hey! I also somehow found Wendy and she was the first blog I read…funny…

Kim
Kim
16 years ago

Yours was the first blog I ever read, and it, along with your others, remains my very favorite. My sister told me about it, who found out about it from her brother-in-law, so it’s all in the family with us!

Tess
Tess
16 years ago

My first “online journal” was on DiaryLand. It was the blog of an estranged friend of mine. We were really close, and our relationship abruptly ended. I needed some closure, so I broke into her e-mail account (stupid, I know, but it was high school), and read a few e-mails, eventually stumbling upon her URL. Well, since it was on a blog network, after I read hers, I explored around and found myself hooked. That was also 2001. I have tried to start a couple blogs, but nothing ever stuck; I am more of a reader than a writer. I found your blog linked by somebody on DiaryLand, but I have been reading you for so long, I cannot for the life of me remember who it was. Thanks for sharing your stories, I love your blog!

Niki P.
Niki P.
16 years ago

I stumbled upon Bitchypoo.com while doing a weight loss search back in 2002 (I still read her everyday!) and somehow that linked me to you in a 6 degrees of separation way. I do not blog on my own, maybe I will try it this summer and add one more thing to my already full life–2 pre teen boys, a demanding full time job which I LOVE, a BF who travels 2 weeks a month, football, soccer, baseball, my horse….. OK- maybe NOT!
I love what journals have brought to my life- the humor, the compassion, the tears, the laugh out loud ridiculousness of “normal” life. It’s good to see that my kids and my relationships are just like everyone elses! Dysfunction-palooza all around!!

Thanks Linda!

Becky
16 years ago

Pamie’s was the first blog (we used to call them “journals”) I found, and I was intrigued enough to start my own angelfire site, the first of many free blog sites I sampled. I waffle between liking the mental benefits of writing publicly and freaking out about privacy. I figure now there are so many blogs…I’M INVISIBLE!

I’m not sure how I found yours, probably from TranceJen. I do know that I was immediately hooked by your honest and entertainig writing, and how you just went ahead and posted JBs butt! Now it’s all about Riley. Kidding. I love the way coming to your site is like visiting a friend and that is so cliche and stalkerish but also true.

Carrie
16 years ago

Way back in 2002 I googled something about weight loss (desperately) and somehow ended up at ….whats’s her name?? The really popular Twinkie girl at Diaryland? Anyways, I ended up there and she was so funny. I clicked on her favorites and there you were. Your humor and honesty really struck me and I followed you from Diaryland to this fine site, and now to Purple Is A Fruit and Sundry Buzz. And to the ends of the earth baby! Heh.

stephanie brown
16 years ago

I was young, and immature and dating a guy that was still jaded from his last relationship. I wanted to know everything I could about the girl and it just so happens she had a livejournal as well as a diaryland. So I created a diaryland. Livejournal was paid accounts only at the time, which ended up being a good thing because diaryland is how I discovered you! I can be one of the most nosey people, so blogging helps me to keep my “real life” relationships from crossing any “too personal!” lines but also fills my nosey little heart with all the nosing food it needs. And since finding you I have found so many cool blogs that I read on a daily basis. I’ve been reading you for about 4 years now and it has been a total and complete pleasure to watch your little family grow. :)

Christina
16 years ago

My girlfriend had a blog about her life. She is a HUGE DMB fan and would follow the band around so mostly it was about that then she got pregnant and it was about pregnancy and now it is about her son and her life. I have been looking for a creative way to pour my heart out to what seems like no one since I do not have any readership barely (ahh poooor me) but it has been good for me. It pushes me to think outside of the box, to work on my grammar and story content and that all makes me happy as a lark. Plus it gives me a place to express myself because as a full time working mommy I sometimes feel like there is none of me left to give so my blog is my place to go and be me for the most part.

This same girlfriend (http://www.weenino.blogspot.com/) has your Purple Is a Fruit website linked to her blog. I started reading that one and some how I stumbled on this one (which I like much better but mostly because you are a little more loose on this site both with language and thoughts which I like.) You are funny, relaxed, and interesting and I think the thing that probably most people like about you is that we can all see ourselves hanging out with you because most of the reason I read what you write – it is what I am also thinking most of the time!

Finally, I never had a chance to say thank you for your help with things to do in Seattle. My dad/bro actually live in Everett and my mom in Mukiteo – so they are fairly suburban as well but we had a great time checking out a few really cool parks in that area (omg but one in Everett had condoms – USED – hanging off it early one morning… we left needless to say!) We visited downtown a bunch and our son was wonderful the whole time – he loved the Aquarium and Children’s Museum the most and we had oodles of fresh fish and coffee (which just delighted me beyond words – I grew up in the bay area and I so miss fresh fish…) At any rate, thank you for getting back to me and sorry I never got back to you to say so!

Lisska
Lisska
16 years ago

yeah. so. my best friend started cutting a pasting bits from your blog into emails for me and sending them on to make me laugh…frankly, i’m a bit suspicious of the internet in general, so i was very unlikely to find them on my own. they were so funny…and so like…well…like us…that i started reading the archives when i wasn’t busy at work and now it’s part of what i do everyday. there’s something lovely and reassuring that there are other people out there going through the same crap and feeling the same sorts of discomfort/anxiety/strangeness as you [well, me, in this case].

this morning she had sent me a paste from when you were first pregnant and reading about people who EAT the placenta which absolutely freaked me out. i’m a vegetarian anyway…that people eat a PART of their own body is just beyond foul.

thank you for being so generous with your own life…and well…with the inside of your own head.

Jenipurr
16 years ago

I’m not entirely sure how or when I found your blog, although I know it was before Riley was born. Your writing style hooked me and I’ve been reading ever since. I was introduced to the concept of online journal back in 1999, when someone pointed me at Pamie’s. I started mine in January of 2000, and I’ve been posting online ever since.

robin
16 years ago

I believe I found you through TranceJen too. I read you here and there but it wasn’t until after we both had babies that I started reading daily, or whenever you update.

You are definitely one of my faves.

Amy M.
Amy M.
16 years ago

Wow – some people have been blogging/reading blogs for a long time!

I’ve come in pretty late in the game. My MIL sent me to Amalah’s site since we were pregnant at the same time. I think she had a link to Purple is a Fruit in her blog (or her ClubMom roundup) & I now spend a good chunk of my workday reading these & a few others!

Maybe I’ll start a blog someday, but being a math person, am a terrible writer & don’t think anyone would want to read my ramblings.

Lawyerish
16 years ago

I was so late to the blogging party! I started a LiveJournal (heh) back in…2005? Or late 2004, something like that. I wished I’d had a clue and discovered blogging circa 2003, as I was on a leave of absence from work and doing the struggling actor/writer/dancer thing, which would have been fun to blather about online. Anyway, from a friend’s LiveJournal, I linked to an entry on Dooce (the crazy peeing pregnant lady post) and was all, “Hello, what’s this?” and I read her archives and up to the then-current stuff, and then I probably somehow found Amalah and Mimi Smartypants (swoon!).

I started my own site in early 2006, and then from a comment on Dooce, I think, I linked to Jonniker, who is now a close friend, and from Jonna I found … you!

Tracy
16 years ago

I got introduced to blogging by googling the name of the guy I had just started dating. He had a pretty cool blog, actually, and linked to this other person, who had an even cooler blog. He told me she was his “working partner”. Yeah. I found out later they’d been dating for years. Well, she linked Robyn of Tampa Tantrum, so I discovered Robyn that way, and therein followed the rabbit down the hole. Robyn, Todd, Statia, and Yvonne built me my first blog about five years ago, and I’ve been at it more or less ever since.

I would say my blogging has “devolved” though. I used to spend time trying to write interesting, funny posts. Now I just write about my day, mostly. Not as interesting. Not as many people read. I’m ok with that.

birdgal
birdgal
16 years ago

At first I only read some blogs my friends from college created, as a way to stay in touch with their lives as we got further flung around the country. Then one day my friend linked to Dooce (hers was a knitting blog but she was very upset about some work situation but held her tongue, citing Ms. Armstrong). Being curious I followed it and spent most of the rest of the day laughing my ass off at her stories of being pregnant (I was pregnant at the time and was the first in my circle of friends, so had no one to really commiserate with). In the beginning I just read her but then she linked to finslippy and fussy, and I was hooked from there. I found your blog through ClubMom mainly, though I’d seen you linked elsewhere.

Operation Pink Herring
16 years ago

Thank you, thank you, thank you. My current tasks for the day are a giant wave of boredom looming over me, and now I have all these comments to read instead. Phew. I thought I was going to have to do some actual work today, and it’s against my religion to do anything productive on a Friday.

A family friend moved from NYC to Amsterdam for work about 2 years ago, and she started a blog to keep in touch with her friends over here. I’d never heard of these blog-thingies before that. I was immediately hooked on hers, and it didn’t take long before I was also reading several of the blogs she linked to, including Amalah. I got here via Amalah’s links page, and I’ve been reading here for about a year or so.

Beej
16 years ago

Wanna hear how dumb I am?

I used to read your site when you were still on diaryland. Just TODAY I realized that your blog wasn’t on DAIRYland. I would literally read it as DAIRYland.

I am stoopie.

Robbi
Robbi
16 years ago

Hi Linda,
I just recently found your blog through Amalah, and LOVE your writing. I have read all of your archives since back when you found out you were pregnant with Riley, and it has definitely saved me from boredom at work :) I’m also totally inspired by your diet and exercise plan, you rock!

Kristin
Kristin
16 years ago

I had been reading Catherine Newman forever, and one day Swistle commented to Catherine that she should read Jonniker’s site (during the great menstral cup incident), which led me there and then from there to you. Thanks for such a great blog!

Frank
16 years ago

I read other blogs for years before finally starting my own due to Beth (So the Fish Said) badgering me. I really don’t remember who I read first although Xeney and pamie were up there. I don’t remember how I found your site now since I’ve been reading for quite some time. I’m sure it was on someone’s recommendation, but again I have no idea from whom, but its been an interesting trip.

ian
ian
16 years ago

I was extremely bored at work and decided to google random words and/or phrases. The only thing that could come to mind was “goo”.

So, I googled goo. Up came Rob Rummel-Hudson’s REALLY old site “Pages of Goo”, which I began to read. It took me close to 6 months to get through all the archives and by then he had already finished up Kalamazoo Days – which I also had to read – and so on and so forth.

This introduction led to many more blogs where I lurked and read and lived vicariously through the exploits of all you wonderful writers.

Googling goo really was a worthwhile exercise after all.

Ali
Ali
16 years ago

Well, truthfully, you were the 1st blogger that I ever started reading. I never really thought about blogging until I came upon your site. I’m a regular on an elephant support board and one of our members was pregnant at the time. During a discussion of her pregnancy, another member posted a link to your site when you had the 4D ultrasound pictures taken of Riley and I’ve been hooked ever since. Now there are several different blog sites I read regularly. But yours is always the 1st I visit. So thank you! Due to your excellent writing capablities my work production has decreased by 10.7%! :o)

Blythe
16 years ago

I worked at a university where we launched some online student ‘journals,’ and in the name of research, I surfed around to see if anyone else in the world was doing the same thing. Duh. I found some blog award site, which led me to Dooce, which sucked up about three days of my time as I read through her archives. Then I started my own blog when we moved overseas in 2005. I had more time to read more blogs (they all link to one another! why, it’s like a web! a world-wide-web!). I found you through Jonniker’s link to the Shrink-Yer-Butt salad (which I made for dinner two nights ago).

Allie
Allie
16 years ago

I found you through a friend at work, she was sitting in her cubicle laughing and I looked over and said, “What?” And she told me to go to your website and I did. I think the first blog I read had a picture of Dog with a saltine box on her nose. That day I read all of your back blogs and have been hooked ever since!

gabby
gabby
16 years ago

Wow…Um, I read an article in Writer’s Digest about Raspberryworld.com and blogs in general seeeeeeeveral years ago. So I checked it out and that led to finding others. I started reading Rob Rummel-Hudson’s blog and Parsley and pamie and over a couple of years, my reading evolved and I started looking at links and one of them linked to you (athena? parsley? Someone…) and I started reading you! I rarely read anyone that I found back then any more, though! I think only one from that original list is still a must read for me.

Had my own right before the boy was born, but unfortunate things happened and I took it down. Way too much happening for pregnancy hormones to take! But I will probably start again sometime.

KT
KT
16 years ago

I found ljc (which is now ljcfyi.com) forever ago, probably in 2000, and when I’d get bored, I’d check what craft she was making or product she was recommending. Probably in 2002 or 2003, I was visiting my boyfriend (who lives in another state), waiting around in his apartment forever while he worked late, and so I was wasting time on the internet. I found you because someone posted on ljc’s comments that her entry on chopstick rests reminded the reader about your post about the couple at the sushi place who would make elaborate origami chopstick holders.

http://www.ljcfyi.com/2003/09/aaron-and-i-were-sitting-at-sushi-bar.html
(I bet it’s this one, but the comments have since been reset. I’m guessing I found you Nov. 2003.)

Anyway, I started reading, loved your style and humor, and read through the archives as the sun went down. I was actually kind of disappointed when my boyfriend eventually showed up because I wanted to keep reading! Something you wrote in your first post struck a cord with me:

“I’ve been unemployed since July and have far too little to do. And yes I know I should be like volunteering or giving blood or recycling or something, but I’m just a really horrible person, you know? I hate being out of work. Hate it. … I hate hearing any reference to anyone working, ever, because it makes me feel all inferior and useless and shit. I hate that I have all these feelings of self worth tied to something that takes 40 hours out of your week and usually sucks, because what the hell does that mean? ”

I was feeling kind of useless myself at the time (and to be honest, with the part-time job I currently have, I still do), so I’ve taken comfort in the fact that you once felt the same way and now you have a cool job and a cute baby and a great husband! Well, you already had the great husband, but you know what I mean. :)

Anyway, I’ve been reading ever since, and yours is the only personal blog that I consistently follow. Thanks! (I think it’s funny that I found your blog while waiting in a strange land for my boyfriend to show up, and you found blogs while waiting in a strange land for your husband to show up!)