Eccentric Flower:200906/January 2000
From Eccentric Flower
January 2000
As I am watching the web report the future, with my other hand I am sitting here reformatting the past.
After the joys of December 1999, which may have been a peak in good pithy writing for this journal, January 2000 was a letdown in many ways for me. Rereading the gender entries hurt - gave me a feeling like I have been punched in the stomach.
People who were here then and now (a reasonably large set) and who have bothered to read any of the old entries (I suspect a very tiny set) will notice that I don't talk about gender in the personal sense nearly as much now, except when I have the occasional Bad Gender Day. Back in the day, I was talking about my gender experiments all the time. What changed? you may wonder. Well, in this entry and the latter-day comments atop it, I explain all. Briefly: I found the answer, and it's a good answer, but time was not on my side then and it's less on my side now.
Other than that, it's a slim month when one of your favorite entries consists entirely of amusing things other people said, another consists of you getting humorously defensive about a silly Louisiana quiz, and another is mostly you tearing William Burroughs to shreds. (Admittedly, it is always fun to tear Burroughs to shreds. I could do it over and over.)
However, there's one genuine high point: "War and Illusions," which is - if I do say so myself - damned good prose. This is what I would like to be writing every day.
Fiction followers (this is back when there was still fiction) please note that, in addition to the second-string story I have inserted as the previous entry, this month saw a couple of real stories which you can find in the story area, and one bit of not-quite-fiction which I am not sure how to classify, but which is of interest only to me anyway.
Oh, yes, and there are some photos, which I should probably link so there's a page listed here you'll actually go look at.
(Sorry. Feeling a little lonely and ill today. Don't mind me.)
Pft. If I was internet famous back then it was only because the internet was so small. (I do wonder what has become of some of these people; I feel like I should be making a "where are they now" list).
However, that aside, I'm pleased you're enjoying the old entries! Some of them are pleasing me too; others - well, they're still enlightening to read, but pleasure is not the word I'd use.
-- 22:15, 15 June 2009 (BST)
Iain:
You know, I'm going to be very glad when you can finally get the Mouth Organ archive up and running. I have not the slightest memory of any of the stuff in "Game of Boy and Girl". It's the first one of the entries you've brought back where you mention our correspondence that's left be going, "Eh? What? Huh?" And there's no way to tell what the Tribune magazine article was.
"Bullwinkle's Eyes" is creepy yet annoying.
"War and Illusions" is, indeed, damned good prose.
-- 22:23, 15 June 2009 (BST)
I am amazed at the number of times the journal entries from this time period reference mouth organ - and I can't remember what any of them were about, either. Rereading those is going to be ... interesting.
-- 22:29, 15 June 2009 (BST)
By the by, Iain, I think the content of the Tribune article is at least adequately summarized further down the entry. Pity the link's dead, though; I'd have liked to go reread it.
-- 22:31, 15 June 2009 (BST)
The archives are interesting to me because sometimes you talk about me and I can't remember the context. There's a Nov. 1999 entry where you talk about something you don't like about my life, and circa 1999, I have no idea what that would be. My continuing hopeless crushes on the wrong guys? My work as a desktop publisher? My reluctance to leave Austin? I guess I could go read MY archives but I had enough sifting through the past recently when I cleaned up my paper files, and am not yet ready to do it again.
-- 03:09, 16 June 2009 (BST)
Often I don't remember either. As in this case. Are you sure you aren't thinking of my ambivalence about houseguests? Because you came to visit in November 1999.
-- 03:53, 16 June 2009 (BST)
The sentence in question: "I have some gripes with the way she's living her life which I had no right to mention to her, no right to fuss about ... and I did it anyway."
I can't even remember this. Heh. I do remember going to Eric's for Thanksgiving this year and I thought it was funny to see you characterize me as being relaxed and having a good time, because although I may have looked that way, it took an immense amount of effort.
-- 17:00, 16 June 2009 (BST)
The alt tag that I briefly saw while the photos were loading made me laugh out loud in surprise and amusement.
(A nit-picky navigational preference -- any thought to duplicating the next and back links at the very top or very bottom of the page? When I get to the end of the comments I have to shift-space back up a few times, and that is not very efficient.)
-- 02:00, 25 June 2009 (BST)
I've avoided it because I fill in those links by hand and it means editing two sets, but I have the very same problem you do and I'm starting to wonder if it would be worth the pain.
Also, welcome! Sorry it took me longer than usual to approve you, I only FINALLY just got my email computer back together tonight. I was waiting on a replacement video card.
-- 04:15, 25 June 2009 (BST)
Peebles:
I have been having a blast reading your old entries, personally. I only read your journal sporadically in those days (mostly because you were internet-famous, and I was totally intimidated), and it's really nice being able to put those fragments into context.
-- 22:08, 15 June 2009 (BST)