More to come...

But this won't be about mystery novels.

Worst thing about having blogs with one's name attached...

Even here I can't say all the smartass things I think on a daily basis. And honestly, I wouldn't want to. There's a reason we develop filters as we grow older.

God knows I sure needed to.

That is all.

I want to update this blog more often...

It's hard to break myself of the quick-posting Tumblr habit, though. Not the quick-post element, actually, so much as the Tumblr community. Blogger has made strides in that direction and I'm pleased that I have 4 followers now, but the Tumblr dashboard setup is so convenient and user-friendly--and honestly, intimate in a conversational way--it's hard to turn your head around as a blogger and move away from that.

The other option is to have both blogs but I'm not sure I'm all that interesting. I get ideas that seem like they'd be a better fit for posting here, but then I think they'd also be a better fit for magazine X, weekly newspaper Y or a site like The Daily Beast so I then feel obligated to go and try and sell whatever that idea might be.

I'm keeping it for now, though, and have two big posts about stuff in draft that I'll complete this week and just see where it goes from there.

Phone blogging because it's Thursday

I mean, if you really need a reason.

The image has nothing to do with the post save that my son drew it in MS Paint and I think that's pretty cool. I partly wanted to see how well this app handled inserting images.

The idea of blogging from your phone has always intrigued me & I'm going to start experimenting more with that here. This isn't new by any stretch but it us new to me, to some degree.

I mean I've frequently used my phone to post to Posterous and Tumblr, but those are both more straightforward and at the same time a little limiting. I want to see how feasible it is to do it with this program.

Other than that I got nothing right now.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Tumblr is back!

Image created by awesome Tumblr user MisterHippity

Tumblr has returned to the Interwhatzahoozis!

You can go back to asking, WHAT THE HELL IS A TUMBLR?

No, this is a good thing. For almost 24 hours the web was deprived of 6-year undergrad girls in arty tees holding their hassled-looking dogs up to webcams.

I have actually loved using Tumblr (since late 2007-ish) and would recommend it to anyone who wants a web presence but doesn't really know what to do. Tumblr sort of teaches you how to do this blogging thing as you go.

Also, the way Tumblr set up the dashboard (where you edit your blog and read other Tumblrs you follow) is borderline genius and the thing that draws you back to the site again and again. It makes blogging much more personal and intimate, more of a conversation.

Weirdly, conversely, for some people (I'm one), this also makes it a little hard to take Tumblr all that seriously sometimes. I've rarely done what I think of as real blogging on Tumblr, simply slapped stuff up there with a quip, much of the time. It honestly just didn't seem like it was worth the trouble. I've spent hours reading others' posts on the dash--and for that I'm grateful--but I never felt like composing anything there.

So I have a strange mix of responses to Tumblr's problems--I feel a mild irritation that I can't look at friends' blogs but I'm also amused at the idea that some people might have freaked out about it.

Long live Tumblr! Tumblr is, for me, still kinda dead.

Things I think while watching the Today Show

Normally I torture my Twitter followers with these observations but my non-stop ragging on Tumblr (down for half a day and then some) has sort of poisoned the well there.

- I'm pretty sure I will never forgive the Today Show for introducing me to the phrase "aerosolized fecal matter." Never.

- My desire to slap Dan Brown is not writerly jealousy at all. It has a lot more to do with his haircut.

- Is there a reason Today followed a segment about "aerosolized fecal matter" with an interview with Dan Brown?

- OK, I did make this observation on Twitter but it bears repeating: any news producer out there thinking about pitching a new story on "INVISIBLE GERMS IN YOUR BATHROOM/KITCHEN/ANUS"--please, DON'T. Take a refreshing nap under a steamroller instead.

- Seriously, do they have "HOW TO PITCH INVISIBLE GERM STORIES" class in broadcast school or something?

- I really do enjoy the outside segments on Today, in part because it's a reminder we Americans are some fat sumbitches. I don't feel so bad, then.

- Yeah, actually, I do feel bad.

- I've checked, and I still don't forgive the Today Show for the phrase, "aerosolized fecal matter."
- Dear Today Show news segment writer(s): is there such a thing as a "non-violent" jihad? Seems like the phrase "violent jihad" is essentially redundant.
- Wait, I answered my question. I'm on a non-violent jihad against stupid TV. So there's that.

WE VISITED SALEM, MA THIS SUMMER. STILL MISS THE CREEPINESS.

One of the many awesome sights to be seen in downtown Salem, MA.

Just working the mobile blogging thing

I'm testing out Blogpress on my iPhone. They've improved the heck out of this app since I first tried it over a year ago.

- Posted using BlogPress from my DAMN iPhone

Blogging sucks or: no, it doesn't, not exactly

I started blogging in early 2001 and eventually, by 2005, I was making a living at it. Sometime in 2009 or so I began to hate it.

The reasons for that hate are many and sort of picky and it's pointless to outline them here. My hatred of blogging had way more to do with me and my own personal issues than anything else.

I kept up some Tumblr blogging and that was fine... but it never felt quite like blogging. Tumbling feels like toy blogging to me--even though I sincerely love many things about Tumblr, a lot. I have at least one Tumblelog I'll make it a point to maintain from here on out, in fact.

I feel like the first kind of blogging I did, though, is where I'm most comfortable. Not truly crowd-sourced blogging, aiming at a certain limited audience's approval, but an endeavor that's one guy or gal's thing, for them to take wherever the hell they want.

I've tried niche blogging--made my career at it, in fact, in crime blogging--but each time I've tried to renew that on my own, it has felt false. I have more than one interest and my interests cycle constantly. I want a blog space where I can just write about whatever and do it at length, if I want--and not feel like anyone who follows the blog regularly on a blog dashboard (Blogger has one now, the dashboard is key to the Tumblr experience) is going to be annoyed if I just go off for a few thousand words. That'll happen regardless, but something about the Blogger setup makes it feel like less of an impediment.

Here's what I'm gonna do with my other blogs--two Posterous blogs will stay as is, but one will essentially just have duplicate entries of stuff you'll find here because Posterous's interface for a certain type of quick-draw blogging beats everything out there. My Daily Huff Tumblr will probably go dark. My niche Tumblr, The Occultist, will be updated regularly--it's too much fun. Those posts won't be cross-posted here.

From here on out, my most active web address will be this one (and Them Twitters, of course). I may redirect the Daily Huff URL to this spot but I'll make that decision later. The point is this--I will only be actively blogging on my own (not being paid by someone) at two addresses (to be clear: here and The Occultist Tumblr) and tweeting at another. I might pop in on Facebook once in a blue moon, too.

As for content here--if you're accustomed to me crime blogging, you may find some of that. But that is not the primary purpose of this blog--hence the broad term "Big" in the blog title. I'm in many respects an extremely non-serious dude and that may be reflected here as well. On rare occasions I talk about politics--very rare. I've carved kind of a career out as a newsblogger, too. So definitely some newsblogging will take place.

Maybe going back to Blogger as opposed to sticking with newer platforms like Posterous, Tumblr or Wordpress is old-fashioned in the Internet scheme of things, but you know, at 43, I'm fine with that. Blogger permits users to do some things many of these other sites don't and I'm conversant enough with the setup to have no problem with that.

So--here we go.