Thought Required; Pants Optional.

Tag: Blogging

  • 2013, and Back to the Keyboard

    2013, and Back to the Keyboard

    A few weeks ago, I wrote an open version of the year-in-review “Christmas letter.” At that time I related that, while I had started 2012 with a very definite agenda in mind, I lacked similar focus in 2013.

    It has been 2013 for a few days already, and I still don’t have a crystal-clear overarching life agenda. I have,succeeded in discerning, though, that more frequent writing has to be part of anything I do with myself this year. My closest and most candid friends in the world have told me repeatedly, “Brian, you need to write more.” This year, I have decided to believe them.

    With that in mind, I have resolved that in 2013 I am going to be more deliberate and frequent about blogging. I also hope to do other kinds of writing that I won’t publish here, but blogging will comprise a large portion of what I write. At its best, blogging has gotten me in touch with intelligent, perceptive friends and critics and helped me maintain writing as a frequent discipline.

    As the year unfolds, I hope to blog more frequently about all of my interests, but you will probably notice that much of my blogging will focus on a more tightly focused set of themes. I have vague ideas for larger projects I want to get off the ground in 2013, so my blogging will undoubtedly converge around the issues involved in those. Expect more about those soon.

    Part of my resolve involves greater attention to my blog’s design and structure. You see some of the results of this process already in the change to my site’s layout. Also, my blog is now at its own domain, briancubbage.com (although it is still hosted and maintained in WordPress). I am my own worst critic when it comes to design, so the site may go through multiple facelifts in the coming weeks. Bear with me through this process; I promise that if the site looks different tomorrow, the content remains unchanged.

    One big change I am considering is to the name of this site, “Thought Required, Pants Optional.” While it is clever, it is also a tad flippant and doesn’t quite match the site’s content. (You shall search this site in vain for discussions, much less photos, of any “pants optional” event or activity.) Thoughts for a new title for my blog/site? Share a comment!

    Another resolve: I will promote the work of other writers whose work is important and deserves a wider audience. It’s not as if I have a terribly large platform from which to promote others, but that doesn’t matter. It’s not as much about getting more page views for people I like (although that is nice) as much as it is about acknowledging debts I owe. It is, deep down, a spiritual and intellectual discipline.

    So: 2013 will be a year of more blogging. I want to send a huge “thank you” to all of my current readers, as well as to all of those others who may not see this but to whom I still owe tremendous gratitude. You make it worthwhile.

  • Of Blogging and Emesis

    I have a rather strained relationship with blogging. I used to write a blog, once upon a time, and for a while, I was close to being prolific in my output. However, life intervened, and I decided that I lacked the time and energy to devote to blogging. It can consume tremendous amounts of time and psychic resources if you let it, and since I set rather high standards for myself, I realized that I just didn’t have the resources to devote to it. So I stopped.

    This is the part where I’m supposed to say “but then…” . Don’t hold your breath. I am as resource-poor as ever I was, and that is not likely to change any time soon. What has changed, though, is that I no longer have a daily outlet for the piles upon piles of words that run through my mind. I can only subject my poor wife to so much.

    So guess what, Internet? You’re now my mental bedpan, a landing place for all of the words I can no longer keep in my head. I don’t care much this time around how many readers I get or how many people comment. I appreciate both those things, of course, but I won’t gauge whether blogging is worthwhile by that yardstick.

    If you’re reading this, enjoy! Expect posts on philosophy, movies, my son, philosophy, religion, some more about movies, and some other things too.