Chad Comello

Tag: blogging

  • Myself on Shelf Source

    Zachary Kai runs a series on his site called Shelf Source featuring “readers who share books they love on their sites.” He reached out about me completing the questionnaire, and as I am all too eager to talking about books and reading I was happy to obliged.

    Check it out here to learn which book changed how I think about the internet, which book I’ve recommended the most, and more.

  • 2025 in review

    See previous year in review posts.

    My view from the end of all things 2025:

    Joined my buddy Nicole Kidman at AMC for a 9:15am showing of Marty Supreme. Don’t think I’ve ever done such an early showtime before, but it’s a great way to start the day.

    Here’s a snapshot of what this year looked like for me:

  • Blogging as whittling

    In his year-in-review post, Tom MacWright lauds the benefits of blogging:

    Blogging has been, for me, an unalloyed success. It has connected me to people, given me a place to develop my thoughts, made some of my work on the internet – a place always decaying and forgetting – a little more permanent. I absolutely recommend everyone do it.

    I know why most people don’t do it: not enough time and too much fear of publishing ‘bad writing.’ Maybe ‘nothing to write about,’ too, though this never seems that real to me, given how the average person I meet has interesting thoughts and ideas to share.

    I second this sentiment. Next year will be my 20th blogging anniversary (!!), and at least for the way I approach it—as a personal, generalist, and low-stakes log of what occupies my interest and attention at the moment—it’s something you should be able to slide in between everything else in your life. That’s to me what makes it a fun and sustainable hobby.

    It feels like people think writing a blog post equates to building an ornate wooden desk: something that requires intense dedication and specialized skills and a huge time commitment. But really it’s more like whittling a stick: dash off a few (key)strokes, make your point, and you’re done. Then whittle another one. That’s it.

    He also mentions removing analytics, which is key. If you’re in it for the likes or views or revenue, then it’s a hustle, not a hobby, and you’re bound to abandon it or get burned out.

  • Blogging now and then

    CJ Chilvers:

    According to research by Neil Patel, 59.2% of traffic to blogs is driven by SEO. It’s the biggest single driver of traffic by far.

    Neil found that if your site is 10 or more years old, 44% percentage of the pages on your site could be considered “irrelevant” by search engines. The more irrelevant pages your site has, the more it suffers in search ranking.

    In other words, Google doesn’t understand what makes for good publishing on the web.

    My question is: irrelevant how, and according to whom? Google’s almighty black box of an algorithm that has already changed in the time it took to write this sentence?

    Imagine if your photo library was subjected to the same treatment. “Google thinks this cool photo I took is irrelevant, so I guess I’ll delete it even though it captures a meaningful moment in my life.”

    I’ve been blogging for 18 years and not once in that time have I considered the SEO implications of my writing. I don’t even look at view stats. I suppose that could be considered a luxury since my blog is not a business and I don’t have a large enough readership to capitalize on. I’m also fully aware that my full archive of 1,200+ posts to date are important to no one but me.

    Google is about now now now. That’s its business, but it’s none of mine. Blogging is about now and then. The experience of capturing what’s on your mind now and making connections with what’s come before.

    I echo CJ’s advice: 

    Don’t worry about what Google wants. It’ll change tomorrow. As will Google’s dominance.

    Post as much or as little as you want. It’s your place.

    Post whatever keeps you interested and publishing for the long term.

    Post whatever helps you build a stronger connection with your audience.

    Looking back at your archives helps you re-discover connections you’ve forgotten. It helps your readers do the same.

  • 2024 in review

    See previous year in review posts.

    My view from the end of all things 2024:

    A red-tailed hawk plopped itself on our backyard power line this morning, making for a colorful breakfast companion on an otherwise gloomy New Year’s Eve. May we all seek to achieve its steady serenity in 2025.

    A few highlights from the year:

    • This blog turned 18 and I wrote some posts on:
    • Did fun stuff as a family:
      • Went to our local zoo, arboretum, and forest preserves
      • Watched the solar eclipse
      • Spent Independence Day at the family’s beach cottage in Michigan
      • Did a staycation overnight in downtown Chicago for a friend’s wedding, exploring the River North neighborhood and trekking to The Bean
      • Stayed at Timber Ridge Lodge in Lake Geneva for the weekend with my family
      • Went trick-or-treating in Wild Kratts style: the boys were Chris and Martin, my wife was Aviva, and I was Zach
    • Did fun stuff with the 5 year old:
      • Classes for soccer, gymnastics, track & field, and fishing
      • Went to a minor league baseball game
      • Spotted a coyote on a suburban street on our way home from the park
      • Went to a mini golf birthday party
    • Did a bunch of stuff for Cinema Sugar, including:
    • Noted some choice quotes from the 5 year old, including:
      • “This bonfire is like a waving hand. I could stare at it every day forever.”
      • “It smells like days I remember.”
      • [to his baby brother] “Don’t distract me, this is one yummy taco.”
      • [about the toilet he just flushed] “It was as dirty as a mud puddle but now it’s as clean as a diamond.”
    • Acquired Criterion Blu-rays of Double Indemnity, Badlands, Days of Heaven, and Paper Moon
    • Read 9 books and watched 87 movies
    • Watched probably the least amount of TV in my life, sticking with just three excellent limited series (Masters of the Air, OJ: Made in America, and Midnight Mass) and one mediocre season (The Bear season 3)
    • Held a garage sale and made $52
    • Hosted my cousin’s daughter from New Zealand
    • Got my first new winter boots in a long time

  • 18 years

    Ye Olde Blog turns 18 years old today. Forgive me, but as a writer of a certain age I cannot help but think of the “18 years, 18 years” line from Kanye’s “Gold Digger”—a song that debuted just a year before this blog.

    Unlike in the song, though, there’s no question of provenance here. From the Blogspot I started in my freshman dorm room all the way to the WordPress-powered custom domain of today, my online writing life has abided through CMS migrations and many life changes to officially reach voting age. (Who would it vote for this year? Definitely not one of the candidates.)

    During my blog cleanup late last year, it was fun to see how my early posts in fall 2006 tackled philosophy and movies and poetry and other random thoughts, just as I’ve done in the nearly two decades since. Because I don’t make any money from this endeavor, the core ethos has always been to write about whatever I’m interested in, whenever I want, and that’s held true. No matter where you’ve joined me on that journey, I appreciate your time and attention.

  • Toward a simpler indie web

    Giles Turnbull on the future of the indie web beyond WordPress:

    If we want the future web we’re all clamouring for, we need to give people more options for self-hosted independence. If we seriously, truly want the independent, non-enshittified personal web to flourish, we need to make it easier for people to join in.

    Terminal commands are easy for you, but they’re a huge hurdle for most people to overcome. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve seen a link to a static website generator, which claims to be simple, and then the instructions start with something like:

    It’s easy! Just gem install blah
    then blah setup mywebsite
    then cd mywebsite
    then use nano or your favourite editor to write Markdown files! So easy!

    This is not easy.

    Heartily agree with this. I’m a longtime blogger with a self-hosted website using a WordPress installation, and I’m generally satisfied with that configuration because I’m tech savvy enough to be able to manage and tinker with it to my liking.

    That said, I’d be very open to a static website generator along the lines of what Giles is describing if they weren’t so technically cumbersome compared to WordPress—not to mention lacking a user-friendly mobile app.

    So bring on those easy indie publishers!

  • Tags, I’m it

    Along with moving my photo documentary project, I’ve been doing some more pruning and weeding and landscaping work ‘round this here digital garden of mine:

    • Picked a new theme for a visual refresh—another one from Anders Noren’s excellent collection of free WordPress themes
    • Revamped the archive page to allow for easier browsing of the most common tags and themes I’ve written about since 2006, along with some fun miscellaneous series and projects of yore
    • Added a link on that page for jumping to a random post, just for fun (try it)
    • Converted the ~20 post categories into tags to simplify things for me on the backend and better organize posts
    • Cleaned up the list of tags, some of which were either redundant or unused after 17 years of blogging (there’s still 1,719 of them, with books in the lead at 252 posts)
    • Updated some posts that were missing relevant tags

    It’s been very satisfying to make all these changes, if only for my pedantic urge for a clean and consistent website experience—for me and its visitors.

  • A new home for ‘The Wedding Singer at NCC’

    Back in early 2011 I produced a photo documentary of the student-directed stage musical production of The Wedding Singer at North Central College, where I’d graduated the year before.

    I set up shop on Tumblr and documented the behind-the-scenes process over the 10-week period. It was fun to watch the show come together from the first rehearsal to the final bow, and I ended up with a nice audiovisual project for my portfolio.

    But when I saw the news that Tumblr was being left out to pasture, I wanted to find a new home for this project. So I created a fresh WordPress blog, transferred the posts and photos from Tumblr, cleaned them up a bit, and voilà:

    nccweddingsinger.wordpress.com

    It was fun to relive this journey as I set up its new digital home. I’m really proud of the shots I was able to get and the journalistic storytelling as a whole, which included cast/crew interviews alongside the day-to-day dispatches.

    Read it for yourself. I set up the posts chronologically, so you can start at the homepage and go from there.

  • 17 years

    Today marks the 17th anniversary of my very first blog post.

    Thanks to everyone who has read and shared my scribbles in that time. I’m very proud of the body of work I’ve made and hope you’ll continue following along.

    Wanna browse the archives? Check out my film and books pages, along with the various topics and passion projects I’ve touched on over the years.

  • It’s Chadabout time

    Well, I done did it—I started a newsletter.

    It’s called Chadabout and it’ll be a monthly digest of my writing from this blog, plus other things of interest from real life and around the web.

    No spam, no ads, no algorithms—just words and links sent with love from your favorite librarian, cinephile, and typewriterist.

    A newsletter, huh?

    I know, I know: Another newsletter by a straight white dude?

    Let me make two things clear: it’s not on Substack (it’s on the minimalist Buttondown) and it’s fully free. Not free for two weeks then paywalled—100% free.

    My readership, as humble as it is, has been pretty spread out between WordPress, my various social accounts, and individual-post email followers. I figured this would be the best way to have a direct line to people who are interested in an occasional update on what I’ve been up to.

    Fear not: writing on ChadComello.com will remain my priority and labor of love, as it has since 2006. This newsletter is just a supplemental tool for spreading the good word of my work.

    I’m in, now what?

    You can read the first issue here. It includes the origin of “Chadabout” along with some links I enjoyed, a recommendation, a quote, and a question I hope you’ll respond to.

    If you follow this blog via email or WordPress you should have gotten the first issue already. If not, head here to subscribe via email or RSS.

    Regardless, thanks for reading my stuff, however you do it.

  • Not a proper typewriter

    Among my blog’s available stats are search terms people used that brought them to my site. One recent search made me chuckle: “smith corona corsair not a proper typewriter”

    This most likely brought them to my post Cursing the Corsair. Let me tell you, I’ve called my Corsair far worse things than “not proper”.

  • My favorite newsletters

    Newsletters seem to be A Thing these days. To me they are a strange hybrid of public and private discourse, like a corner booth at a restaurant. You can subscribe and interact with the writer privately, as if you’re in the booth together. Or you can just eavesdrop from the next booth, so to speak, following their recommendations and links as desired without needing to interact.

    Personally I prefer blogs (or anything that I can throw into my RSS reader). They’re easily accessible, don’t require subscriptions, and have space for other pages. But I get the appeal of newsletters and why people would start one.

    Which got me thinking about how many I subscribe to. There’s not a great way to figure that out besides looking in my email trash folder, which is limited to the last 30 days. Based on a quick perusal, I was able to nail down the ones I like and have stuck with. (With email in general, I am merciless about unsubscribing.) Some are daily, many weekly or occasional. Some merely supplement a blog, podcast, or other endeavor. All of them I’ve found enriching in some way:

    Books

    Prufrock, Ryan Holiday, Mark Athitakis, The Atlantic Books Briefing

    Culture/General

    Jocelyn K. Glei, Dense Discovery, Chris Bowler, The Art of Noticing, Austin Kleon, Robin Rendle, CJ Chilvers, John August, Alan Jacobs

    Libraries

    Jessamyn West, Read for Later, Shelf Awareness, PW Preview for Librarians, Top Shelf Reference

    Events

    Music Box Theatre, my local movie theater showtimes, my local library

    Podcasts

    Pop Culture Happy Hour, Filmspotting

    Not included are mailing lists for several bands and the newsletters that publish too infrequently to be in my trash folder.

    Subscribe to a newsletter you think I’d like? Let me know.

  • Get thee a blog and an RSS reader

    Two belated New Year’s resolutions:

    1. Get more of my intelligent, articulate friends to start blogs.

    Maybe some of these intelligent, articulate friends aren’t the writing type or won’t have the time or inclination or find Instagram sufficient for digital socializing, thank you very much. Still I will try.

    (I halfway succeeded already with my friend Tone’s Mustaches and Tiaras, though she was already working on it when I gave her a final push.)

    I’m in my 13th year of blogging. I’ve not made a dime from it, but it has been one of the most rewarding endeavors of my life. The satisfaction of owning my turf and trying to make something worthwhile of it cannot be duplicated elsewhere on the Internet.

    If you’re reading this and don’t have your own blog, consider starting one. (While you’re at it, subscribe to mine.) If you have a little bit of money and are moderately tech-savvy, consider self-hosting with a custom domain. Then email me with the URL so I can add it to my RSS reader.

    2. Get more people to use an RSS reader

    An RSS reader, for the tech-challenged, is basically an app for following blogs or other regularly posting content.  There are several other options, but I use Feedly. Here’s what mine looks like currently, with all the latest stories already read:

    RSS is a much more pleasant way to get news and opinion than Facebook or Twitter, where instant emoting rules and thoughtful context drools. Some blogs post multiple times a day, some once a week or less. I don’t read them all, but whether I do or not I never miss a post, because there’s no mysterious algorithm deciding to hide certain posts from me like on social networks. Just a dumb, straightforward technology that provides me everything I ask for and waits for me to act on it. As good technology should be.

  • 2018 in review

    See other year in review posts.

    What am I doing New Year’s Eve? Looking back at my 2018 calendar and logbook to remember the notable happenings that made up my year. In roughly chronological order:

    • Started a paper logbook (a la Austin Kleon) in a Moleskine notebook I got for Christmas. Have actually kept it going regularly, and enjoy it much more than my previous journals in composition notebooks, probably because it’s not lined. This encourages me to do things like magazine mashups and tape other life ephemera and keepsakes inside. It’s a much richer diary because of that.
    • 2/24/18 log: “Today at work an older guy was looking for White Heat, Yankee Doodle Dandy, and For Whom the Bell Tolls. I found them on the DVD shelves and he said, ‘You’re the nicest guy on this side of the tracks.’ Thank you?”
    • Started going to a local independent barber shop and love it
    • Wrote or quoted some opinions about Donald Trump and have yet to be proven wrong
    • Got a real, professional massage and why don’t I do that more often?
    • Saw I’m With Her in concert at Thalia Hall
    • Wrote several Refer Madness columns for Booklist
    • Bought a Royal Arrow typewriter and then sold my rickety Royal Quiet De Luxe
    • Saw 2001: A Space Odyssey at the Music Box in Chicago
    • Saw The Okee Dokee Brothers at Lincoln Hall
    • Went to a college friend’s wedding at my alma mater
    • Switched to Firefox, fixed Twitter, and made other tech improvements
    • Hosted a type-in at an Evanston bookstore
    • Went on a pontoon boat with family in Madison
    • Had octopus and a sake bomb for the first time in Wicker Park with college friends
    • Went to Midsommarfest in Andersonville, where I bought my first pair of real Birkenstocks and got roped into a Swedish dance circle
    • Learned my wife was pregnant with our first child, visited Starved Rock, then saw Hamilton on stage, all within 24 hours
    • Walked the Custer Street Fair with friends, got dinner and dessert and talked tech ethics
    • Acquired, cleaned, and quickly sold a gorgeous Royal Empress
    • Went to wife’s cousin’s wedding at Illinois Beach State Park
    • Visited Colorado for my friend Tim’s wedding in Denver: stayed at a gorgeous Airbnb in Maintou Springs, hiked in the Rocky Mountain National Park, rode a vintage Otis elevator at the Hotel Boulderado, ogled the stunning Boulder Public Library, toured the Celestial Seasonings headquarters, wended through the hoodoos of the Painted Mines Interpretive Park, shot billiards until 1 AM, cried and danced and gave a speech at Tim’s wedding
    • Won my case on Judge John Hodgman
    • Celebrated 10 years of filmlogging
    • Spent a few days fishing and lounging in the restorative Northwoods of Wisconsin
    • Saw Rayland Baxter at Lincoln Hall
    • Went to a Cubs game on a super hot day
    • Gave my Royal Futura 800 to a neighbor who needed it
    • Went to another Cubs game on a super beautiful day
    • Got a Fisher space pen for my birthday and it’s fun to use
    • Visited Colorado again for my friend Taylor’s wedding: whacked balls at Top Golf, beheld the Crush Walls, sang the processional along with the wedding party, cried and danced hard
    • Tried to make a typewriter emoticon happen ‘(:::)
    • Canned homemade applesauce with the family
    • Dressed as Fred Rogers for Halloween
    • Went to Green Mill Cocktail Lounge for the first time and sat in the Al Capone booth
    • Saw sound designer Gary Rydstrom speak at Northwestern
    • Acquired a new Olympia SM7 with an interesting story
    • Had fun putting together a LEGO Delorean
    • Released a full-length album of old demos called The Wonder Of It All
    • All things Baby C: baby showers, appointments, clothes, toys, books, classes, and so much more
    • Got a portable washing machine
    • Wrote some good blog posts, like:
    • Watched 70 movies (old and new) and read 72 books, according to my logbook
    • Read 2 presidential biographies: John Tyler and Harry Truman
    • Watched several good TV shows: The Crown season 1 and 2, Big Mouth season 2, Queer Eye seasons 1 and 2, The People Vs. O.J. Simpson, and Big Little Lies

  • 2017 in review

    NYE2017-windows

    See other year in review posts.

    This is the view from my New Year’s Eve. Since I can count the number of degrees it is outside on one hand, I decided to stay in this morning to look back at my 2017 calendar and remember the notable events, trips, and people that made up my year. In chronological order:

    • The Packers beating the Giants and the Cowboys in the playoffs.
    • Going down to Florida for my cousin’s funeral was the definition of bittersweet: horrible reason for being there, but good opportunity to see family we don’t see very often.
    • Sold two typewriters for more than I bought them for. It’s a seller’s market out there.
    • Went to Ann Arbor, MI, for the first time for a baby shower and hung out with far flung friends.
    • Starting a two-person book club with my friend Josh, where we get together to eat and discuss the book, along with politics, religion, and everything under the sun. I call them our “save the world” sessions because we sort through the miasma of current events and decide on the proper way to fix them. If only D.C. would listen in!
    • Bar trivia with Jenny and her cousins. Weren’t close to winning, but reminded me I should do bar trivia more.
    • Had neighbors over for dinner, which reminded me we should have neighbors over for dinner more.
    • Saw my grandma the day before she died. Though by that time she was unresponsive, the timing was fortuitous.
    • Long weekend trip to the Twin Cities to visit friends. Hung out with their awesome kids and gallivanted around town.
    • Hosted a marriage proposal in our apartment by people who used to live in it.
    • Saw Sandra McCracken at The Union with Jenny, three of my favorite things.
    • Got quoted in Rod Dreher’s The Benedict Option, then hosted a discussion about the book at a local potluck.
    • Went to Durham, NC, for a wedding and loved it.
    • Continued playing ultimate frisbee Sunday afternoons when I was able, and loving the feeling of a perfectly thrown touchdown.
    • Got to facilitate two dozen very cute interviews between 3rd graders for a local history project at my library.
    • Saw the Cubs lose to the Brewers at Wrigley Field on a cold and rainy day. Highlights within that include seeing two of Jenny’s cousins there, and Nick Offerman walking directly past us after singing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame”.
    • Went to my first local ward meeting, in a post-election effort to become more civically engaged.
    • Had a quick and haphazard solo recording session of some of my songs. Won’t be able to use most of it, but it reminded me of the agony and ecstasy of recording.
    • Took several quick trips to Jenny’s family cottage in Michigan, including over Independence Day weekend.
    • Celebrated two years of marriage to my bride, who supports my weird hobbies and makes me want to be a better person.
    • Went to ALA 2017 in Chicago. Seeing the Librarian of Congress was a highlight.
    • Called or hung out with several friends, new and old, to catch up and get to know each other, all of which I appreciate.
    • Drove to Toronto for a family wedding. The 8-hour drive wasn’t so great, but being there for the first time was.
    • Convened with family in Cape May, NJ, for a reunion of sorts, then caravanned to Elkins, WV, for grandma’s memorial service. Saw lots of extended family for the first time and got to hang with my cousins’ kids, who grow too fast.
    • Played golf for the first time in at least 15 years in Elkins the morning of the memorial. Grateful for my cousin’s husband’s caddying and encouragement the whole rushed 9. Sank one sweet putt and had one great approach shot, otherwise: A for effort.
    • My sister visited to see Billy Joel at Wrigley Field. We were planning to just listen from outside the ballpark as I did years ago with a friend for Paul McCartney, but on a whim we checked the box office for tickets and decided to jump on them as an early birthday present to me. Awesome show.
    • Saw The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, California Typewriter, and Columbus at the Music Box Theater.
    • Hosted several friends and family overnight on our pullout couch-bed, having each of them leave a note in our guest book.
    • Went to college homecoming for the first time since graduating, and got an alumni discount on a t-shirt as a reward.
    • Got an advance copy of Tom Hanks’ typewriter book, which I reviewed, then photographed with one of my typers, which got on the news. Then got a letter from the man himself.
    • Met up with friends in Asheville, NC, which was gorgeous and fun.
    • Wrote a post a day for #Novemblog2017 instead of trying and failing to write a novel I wouldn’t enjoy doing anyway. Some favorites: This is my alarm clock, Want to Read (∞): on becoming a good reader, Google Past, and In praise of wedding reception air drumming.
    • Got invited to a Friendsgiving and tried to build a gingerbread house with a kid who was super stoked about it.
    • Welcomed long-awaited nephew Olin Charles into the world, and began taking pictures of him immediately.
    • Got some books, a Merriam-Webster t-shirt, a banjo capo, and other fun little things for Christmas.
    • Encountered lots of great books, movies, and music, and wrote more entries in Cool Civil War Names and Refer Madness.

    2017: Not Bad!

  • Say hi to Mosul Eye

    The AP has an incredible story about an Iraqi man named Omar Mohammed who courageously chronicled the savagery of the Islamic State as an undercover blogger, using the moniker Mosul Eye:

    For nearly two years, he’d wandered the streets of occupied Mosul, chatting with shopkeepers and Islamic State fighters, visiting friends who worked at the hospital, swapping scraps of information. He grew out his hair and his beard and wore the shortened trousers required by IS. He forced himself to witness the beheadings and deaths by stoning, so he could hear the killers call out the names of the condemned and their supposed crimes.

    He wasn’t a spy. He was an undercover historian and blogger. As IS turned the Iraqi city he loved into a fundamentalist bastion, he decided he would show the world how the extremists had distorted its true nature, how they were trying to rewrite the past and forge a brutal Sunni-only future for a city that had once welcomed many faiths.

    Working at Mosul University when the city fell in June 2014 to the extremists, he decided to start gathering information:

    By day, he chatted with Islamic State fighters and vendors, and observed. Always observed. By night, he wrote in his native Arabic and fluent English on a WordPress blog and later on Facebook and Twitter. The city turned dark, and Mosul Eye became one of the outside world’s main sources of news about the Islamic State fighters, their atrocities and their transformation of the city into a grotesque shadow of itself. The things IS wanted kept secret went to the heart of its brutal rule.

    As you’d imagine, the IS thugs weren’t too happy about the Mosul Eye:

    When the only Mosul residents left were fellow Sunnis, they too were not spared, according to the catalog of horrors that is Mosul Eye’s daily report. He detailed the deaths and whippings, for spying and apostasy, for failing to attend prayers, for overdue taxes. The blog attracted the attention of the fanatics, who posted death threats in the comments section.

    Spoiler: he makes it out OK, but read the whole story to learn about a modern hero.

  • 10 Years

    Yesterday was my tenth anniversary of blogging. I started the second month into my freshman year of college, which also would have been right after I joined Facebook. Away from home and beginning to learn new and exciting things, I think like most writers I desired an outlet that felt at once private and public: somewhere I could express ideas into the anonymous void of the internet, but also allowed for others to respond.

    I’ve used a few blogging services over the years: first it was Blogspot, then WordPress, then temporary stints at Squarespace and Tumblr before becoming self-hosted with my own domain name. As I learned HTML and CSS I created a few simple designs along the way, but the constant fiddling got tiresome, so I just start using pre-made templates.

    In honor of my ten years blogging, I went through my entire archive and picked out two posts from each year I thought were representative of my interests or writing style at the time. It was fun to see trends emerge and decline over the years: lots of Oscar-related umbrage early on, current events commentary in the middle period, and many more book and movie reviews in the last few years. I suppose that’s the fun/terror of keeping a blog or diary: it’s a living archive of where you’ve been, how you’ve changed, and what you’ve thought about at any given time. And it can’t lie.

    These aren’t necessarily my best posts — just some choice memories, meditations, and meaningful mutterings from a decade of writing on the ‘net.

    (I decided to exclude the posts that were originally published in my college newspaper; you can see those here.)

    2006

    you’re coming alive to me — Just some freshman year philosophizing.

    The Prestige — The first of many reviews I put online.

    2007

    Soundtrack of the moment, part II — One of three “soundtrack of the moment” posts that provide a great snapshot of the music I was into and getting into at that time.

    he’s very good — On my encounter with Henry Winkler.

    2008

    Kristen Wiig = Hilarious — An appreciation of an exceptional SNL cast member.

    Introverts: A Misunderstood Bunch — Still the blog’s most-read post.

    2009

    Breaking News: Jesus Christ Registers As A Republican — My attempt at Onion-style satire. Definitely not as funny as The Onion.

    The Ten Commandments Of Watching LOST In A Group — This was a thing at the time.

    2010

    Sarah Palin is Not a Serious Person — She was a thing at the time.

    On the River — A short essay on a kayak trip. If you detect a hint of Hemingway, it’s because I was reading a lot of him at the time, as overly introspective young men are wont to do.

    2011

    7 Beautiful Movie Music Moments — Man, they all still get me.

    Love And Illusion In Midnight In Paris And Me And Orson Welles — I’ve done a few comparative analyses of two films, but this one’s my favorite.

    2012

    Bringing Old Orthodoxies to a Boil — A review of Fergus Bordewich’s Bound for Canaan and its modern implications.

    Best For The Best: Nights of The Animal Years — Why I love one of my favorite albums.

    2013

    Rutherford B. Hazy — In my ongoing quest to reading a biography of every U.S. president, Hayes has been my biggest surprise.

    Silence is Beholden — Walking on silence in Shasta-Trinity National Forest.

    2014

    Encountering Robin — On meeting Robin Williams and the burden of celebrity.

    This Is Martin Bonner — A meditation masquerading as a movie review.

    2015

    Wherein I Missed Third-Grade Field Day and Encountered Cosmic Futility — Exorcising some old demons as I walked through my grade school for the first time since leaving it.

    No Quarter — I pillaged my U.S. state quarters collection for laundry fare, which my grandma would have found amusing.

    2016

    The Shepherd’s Life — Some reflections on one of my favorite books of 2015.

    How to Win My Vote — Still relevant on the eve of this terrible, horrible, no good, very bad election.