I'm going to step away from the blog for the rest of this month. Between work, kids, holidays, a golf outing at Pinehurst next week, a business trip to Japan at the end of the month, and the paucity of any real change in the world situation of late, I think it best to take an extended break. I reserve the right to change my mind, especially if I am taken with some cunning quip that is so sharp you could shave with it, but I'm going to try and do this cold turkey.
I feel like I'm in a rut and some time away will help clear my head and allow me to generate some prose that more than about twenty of my closest blog friends might be interested in. I am profoundly grateful for the quality of the readership I have, but I will admit to wishing for some quantity as well. Hopefully, I'll come back with a fresh approach, some new ideas, a few good stories and a couple of surprises. Until then, feel free to look over my last week's work. There's a little bit of everything in there from agrisexuals, chicken catcher Torre, a prescient bit on Iraq being more closely analogous to Tet than to Vietnam, life imitating art in the guise of Monty Python, Jack Skelington rip-off Scourges, incestuous linking, bad puns, pop culture references, free word association, homonymic delusion, self-deprecation, and ruminations on the theatre of the absurd that is politics today.
In the meantime, if you have any suggestions on how I can stay under 100 at Pinehurst #2 -- what with only playing about two rounds since this spring, what to do (or to avoid) in the Ginza district of Tokyo, or if you just want to flatter me and tell me how essential this blog is to maintaining your proper perspective on life, the universe and all that, well, feel free. I'm not proud. I'll do anything to avoid being thrown onto the ashheap of the blogosphere. Well, almost anything.
See you in December.
DOWNDATE: Damn his hide, Richard Cohen is making it awfully hard to stay away. M...u...s...t n...o...t e...n...g...a...g...e ... ... ...
Enjoy your time off. Make sure you splurge on the extra dough for a caddy at Pinehurst. My looper had been there for 50+ years and there was not a put on that course he hadn't seen, not to mention having some great stories about toting the bag for some true legends like Tommy Bolt and Hogan. Enjoy.
Posted by: David at 11:30 PMHow to break 100? A famous golfer, whose name escapes me now, said the most important wood in your bag is the pencil. It might be your best shot.
Enjoy!
Posted by: Jon at 09:53 AMThere's another saying that the guy with the fastest cart never has a bad lie. Unfortunately, we'll be using caddies that day.
Charles, I disagree with you about guns but I sure envy you playing Pinehurst #2. As for your question about how to break 100, tee off with your 7 iron. And play to the center of those elevated greens.
Posted by: Ed Thibodeau at 12:59 AMBreak 100 at Pinehurst? BWAHAHAHAHAHA! May the Force be with you...there and in Tokyo. Maybe that's the answer to your so-called readership dilemna: make up some juicy geisha stories.
Posted by: Scott Chaffin at 06:53 PMYou should have picked me up and brought me along. Pinehurst ain't that far from UNC, dadgumit. I'm speaking like this, of course, for the benefit of Howard Dean.
Posted by: Kyle Still at 05:28 PMHope you enjoy your time off.
Sometimes we all need a break. Take care.
Charles, if you're still checking any of this, I have a question for you regarding business I was hoping you could help me with.
If you have a moment. asktheyeti@yahoo.com
Posted by: TheYeti at 05:33 PMYou know you want to write a Scourge, Charles. The Force is not strong enough in you to enable you to resist!
Scourge...Scourge...Scourge...Scourge...
Posted by: Andrea Harris at 11:55 PMYes Andrea. I desperately do..., but so far, I've been able to resist.
Posted by: charles austin at 06:09 PMHey, Charles --
In cleaning up and messing with my own blog I closed all comments older than three days old with the close-multiple-comments script I use. (It closes comments on all the blogs here.) It finally occured to me that you might not have wanted that done, so I reopened them for this post. Let me know if you want any previous entries opened; or you can open them yourself in the MT entry menu.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at 07:20 PM