I must be awesome!

If this isn't a moment for revelry, then I don't know what is. It's not too often that a young man gets truly back-patted by the real world - usually that type of thing takes years of much harder work and dedication than the kind I'm used to producing. But here it is - check it:

Congratulations!
You have successfully signed up to receive your Texas A&M University System payroll earning information notification by e-mail. You will no longer receive a paper copy of your earning statement; instead, you will receive an e-mail message when your next statement is available on-line. This message was sent through an automated system. Please do not reply. If you have received this message in error, contact your payroll office.

I think in post-accomplishment interviews you often see people asked, "So how does it feel?" Well, it's fantastic... unbelievable... exhilarating... in a word - awesome. My only hope is that when you finally arrive at this pinnacle of human achievement, you'll be able to see what I mean.

Online communities

Seeing as I have a habit (or shall we say, tradition?) of prefacing everything I say, let me come out and say right now that I'm really just blogging to blog this time. But it actually does tie in...

I've been reading a lot of blogs the past few days, and am struck by how much people like connecting online. Some people are definitely a lot more interesting online (though I can't offer this the status of a general rule), some more self-disclosing, and though I haven't been visiting a lot of those blogs recently where people post pictures of their pets, I presume there also exists a fair number of people who are more boring online.

If you fall into that last category, then I've truly shot myself in the foot, because I'll have alienated one of the few people to ever read my blog. My sincerest apologies, and I hope to buy you a pony one day.

I found a couple of blogs where people mention that they have trichotillomania (which means they pull out their hair obsessively), which I also have, but until now wouldn't have thought I'd ever want to blog about. I tended to think blogging was for much cooler things, like talking about blogging and my relationship to it, or expounding upon my observations of blogging trends, or confessing something about my blogging habits, or et cetera.

But I'm glad for the brave souls who mentioned something on cyberspace about a rather embarassing disorder. I posted on their blogs. It's encouraging to me to be able to connect with and encourage someone else dealing with one of the same problems I am - one that would more typically lead me to hide myself and my actions, rather than bring them to light and expose them.

Don't get me wrong - I still like blogging for its inherent quality of showing how awesome my verbifying skills truly are, but maybe now I see a way into the type of blogging that also involves more people reading and connected than just yours truly (and my wife, too... who - get this - starting blogging after I inspired her to do so, now blogs more often than I do, about more interesting things, and even has another person who says they've read her blog! Maybe even two or three! I'm not guilty of jealousy or anger about that because whatever I am in relation to the state of my blogdom and hers includes both those things and is much worse. And it's justifiable.).

Okay, so in closing, though I didn't originally intend on doing anything like this, I'll end by summarizing everything so that it's clear exactly what I'm saying: SOMEBODY PLEASE BE MY FRIEND!