Thankful Anyway Thursday

I am going to move on from my last post but it has actually evolved into my Thankful Anyway post. I feel that people may have gotten me wrong, mostly due to the fact that I just wrote how I felt, didn't take the time to lay it out so that the tone of the post could be recieved by people reading and not talking to me. I am also not sure if anyone actually read the blog in question and I didn't elaborate on the points that perked up my ears about over protectiveness. Yes if you live on a busy street it is best that your children not play in it, and yes if you have a litter box you should block it off from your kid so they don't eat the lovely cruncy clay. Those were not the issues I was concerning myself with as they are common sense...anyway...I am washing my hands of it.
I have had this site for a year now...Whoopee! And in true Bullajabbar fashion, I have to change the name of the blog.  I don't know why, but I did.  I think this name fits it better.  I can't believe that I have been able to write about nonsence at an average of 6 times a month for the past year, that is pretty darn good. On average, one of my good blog posts takes at least 2 hours to write and edit. If it is insiteful, has lots of links and I don't have to put a disclaimer at the top it probably took me 3 or so hours to write. That is a lot of time invested for me to throw my ideas or "what I did todays" out there for people to read if they want.
Whenever I write like the one the other day, which I only took about 15 minutes to write, I almost always regret publishing it. It is kinda like that letter or email you write when you're mad, but instead of doing what your mother always told you to do and sit on it overnight, you mail it anyway only to say "oh crap! why did I do that?"
I return to my book about thrift and the chapter on Emotional Thrift. The British author and columnist, India Knight believes that we emote too much and here is her paragraph on it:

Now, it may well be that you genuinely believe you are the only thing that matters- many people do, to a lesser or greater extent. But surely you can manage to keep your egomania to yourself? It isn't the most attractive of characteristics, even if it is a very human one-and, to be perfectly frank, nobody cares as much about you as you do. Going on and on about yourself, or about a thing that has happened to you, is incredibly bad manners- it only makes any conversational exchange about you and you only. It also marks you out, in my view, as a person who cannot successfully function on his or her own, and constantly needs the praise ot interest of other people in order to feel like a functioning human being. This sucks. It is amazingly tiresome to have to deal with and I wish people would desist- not just because it would make me happy, but because I genuinely think it would make them happier too.

The Thrift Book: Live Well and Spend Less by India Knight, page 266.

That little paragraph knocks most bloggers right off the Earth. For what is a blog? A blog (short for weblog) is a site where people regularly express their thoughts and opinions in a public forum for others to read and then comment... a public journal if you will. This format has also moved on to include social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace, where all anyone ever does is talk about themselves.

Do I think this makes us egomaniacs?  Not really.  Mainly because you can read the post or not.  If  I was forcing it down your throat, well then I would be on FOX News (a most despicable channel).  And personally I like listening to other people, although as most people have noticed about me, I never ask people how they are doing, mostly because I know everyone says "fine" and that isn't what I was asking.  The British seem to be very non-elaborative when greeted with "you all right?" or "how are you?"  It is always answered by "fine."  My boss has had to stop me on many occasions to say " Jess, just say fine."  Well, you asked.  This is a cultural thing that I have found and an observation British author Dave Gorman made in his book America Unchained.  He writes:

Americans clearly get irony, they just don't tend tend to use it quite as often in day-to-day conversation because, unlike us Brits, they aren't afraid to say what they actually mean and will happily discuss emotions. (pg. 16)

So what does this all have to do with Thankful Anyway Thursday?  I have often referred to how my blog helps me not feel lonely...OK, we all get that (and D is a bit tired of hearing about it), I really like writing it.  It was really fun to review my posts over the past year...I went through all of them...and I learned a couple of things:

1. I can be funny, creative, sad, insightful, and darn right wrong.
2. My writing helps work my brain.
3. I am getting better at spelling, though not so good at the linear thought process, as my professors always critiqued.  I need to except the fact that I am creative and not so focused.  Just ask Ellie about my Maths skills.
4. I can sometimes make the uninteresting, interesting.
5. And I don't take criticism very well and need to work on tone in my writing.

These are the things I am thankful for.