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This is my weekly column from the local newspaper.

First of all, Happy Early Birthday to my mom, AND to my twin daughters. Their birthdays are Tuesday, April Fool’s Day. Cannot believe the girls are 21 this year. How did that happen?

You watch the news and it’s sometimes very difficult to believe that God is up there. I mean, surely He’s got to be sickened by what He sees on CNN (and I don’t just mean Nancy Grace). School shootings left and right, families found dead, suicide bombings in Iraq - it’s just one big mess. So when I see good things happening to good people, I take notice.

One of the best places I’ve found to see the goodness in people is the blogosphere. I’ve been blogging for well over 10 years in one form or another and I’ve really come to know some fantastic people, particularly in the last couple of years. My best friend, Hilary, is someone I met through blogging, too.

You see it all the time: bloggers writing about their charities and causes, and other bloggers are pretty quick to step up to the donation plate. For example, last year I wasn’t in a financial position to make it to BlogHer, the annual women’s blogging conference. My friend, Karen, set up a donation fund and weeks later I found I had enough for my plane ticket. Pretty cool, considering I didn’t know over half the people who donated.

Remember last year when I went to Portland, Oregon for a blogger get-together called TequilaCon? It really didn’t have anything to do with tequila specifically. I mean, you can go and drink whatever form of alcohol you want. OK, so I’m sure there were a handful of people who weren’t drinking booze, but I didn’t see them. Maybe you’ll remember the story about me locking myself out of my hotel room at 3:30 in the morning, wearing nothing but my boxers. I was sleepwalking. Or drunk. Or drunk-sleepwalking.

Come May 2, I’ll be heading to Philadelphia for the TequilaCon ‘08. There ought to be at least 50 people there, I think. It’s a great time, really, and you get to meet some amazing people. This year, Hilary was in financial need to get to TequilaCon and so some friends quickly came to her rescue. Another donation fund was set up and this time Hilly had enough for a plane ticket within 12 hours. TWELVE HOURS. That’s incredible. Thirty-five people donated a little to make sure Hilly can get to Philly. Makes my heart cockle…or something. I’m not exactly sure what “cockle” means but I know my heart has some.

Another blogger friend does a great deal for the March of Dimes every year and set up a donation page on his blog. Not sure yet how much money was raised, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s in the thousands. A new friend of mine, British fellow, helped establish a fund for parents who have lost a child. Very nice guy - he came on my Internet radio show to talk about the fund - and I hope he got more donations out of it.

I’m always stating one of my mantras: “It all comes out in the wash.” And I believe that. When I have a little money to give, I give. When I don’t, others will. And yes, it all comes back to you in the end. For $20 I can help with cancer research, or the March of Dimes, or getting Hilly to Philly. And for a little while, all seems okay in my world. Then I turn on the news.

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So, you may be curious, what other blogging pet peeves do I have besides use of the ubiquitous "More" in blogs? I'm going to write a revision of my views on that, but one thing that really bugs me nowadays is something that Sizzle mentioned in the comments of yesterday's post. It's almost unfathomable in this day and age, but there really ARE still people out there with blogs that don't have any RSS feeds set up.

Listen, before feedreaders, I used my blogroll as my blog-reading launch point. I physically visited every blog I read, even when I wasn't leaving a comment. I simply can't do that any more. I don't have Adam's 380 feeds in my feedreader, but I do have almost 200. Visiting 200 sites a day? Just not doable.

Bottom line now: NO FEED, NO READ.

I may be home all the time, but I just don't have that kind of time. I still visit lots of blogs every day, of course, leaving comments. So do yourself a favor if you happen to be one of the very few without feeds. Go to Feeburner.com and sign up. Burn a feed through their site (it's the way to go, anyway) and now people can read your blog in Google Reader or FeedDemon or their reader of choice.

As we get closer and closer to the new 2HT site rolling out (are you sick of hearing about it yet?), I want to keep pushing on with this hellacious 100 Things thing. Once I get up and loaded on my new host, and I can't be sure when that's going to be, the new SecondHand Tryptophan will be revealed.

I'm not mentioning it again until I have actual news.

If you didn't see the first part, then go check that out and come back. Here, then, are the next 10 items.

1. I like to play (and watch) poker. Specifically, Texas Holdem, which is by far the most popular game out there now. I don't make any claims to how great I am. I'd say I'm probably in the middle of the pack, talent-wise. Not about to plunk down $10,000 to play in a Vegas tournament, though, that's for sure. Thing is, if it wasn't for the card cameras on TV that let you see the players' hole cards, it would be as boring to watch as paint drying.
2. I don't play any instruments. Except maybe for the kazoo. I took a year of clarinet in 6th grade, but hated it. More about why in a minute, but I was totally pissed that they wouldn't let me play the trombone. Course, I was maybe 2'3" at the time and had arms no longer than that of a Barbie doll, but still. The trombone is bad-ass! It's got all those slidey-bits and things.
3. I suck at sports. Name the sport, I suck at it. For this reason, I hate sports. I used to have nightmares (still do) about having to go to physical education class in school every day…playing football, basketball, baseball, all those fucking things that I had no clue how to play. Never learned the rules of the sports because I hated them so much.
4. I am probably a big spoiled sport. I don't like doing anything I'm not good at, or that I don't have any inclination toward. It's a horrible habit - if I can't do something good right away, I pretty much quit and never try it again. Unless we're talking about sex.
5. I have always had a rather warped sense of humor, from ever since I can remember. It's gotten me in trouble many times, and I'm sure it will again. If anyone can stick his foot in his mouth, it's me.
6. My official mental diagnoses: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), severe deppressive disorder, bipolar disorder, and enormous penis disorder. What? That's mental…it's totally in my head. So to speak.
7. I graduated high school in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Yes, I'm from New York, and I was pretty much raised there until I was 15. Then we moved to New Mexico, over Christmas break in school. Sucked. I hated it at first. Tiny little town of 35,000 people, not a freaking thing to do. Kind of like Sebring (where I live now), but much smaller and less exciting. Funny thing is, now I love the place. I miss the mountains.
8. I'm not particularly fond of change of any kind. Thus, moving schools in the midst of 10th grade was as close to a nightmare as I could get at that time. It took me a long time to make friends and I had to leave my NY buddies behind, only to freak out about finding NEW friends in Alamoghetto.
9. I am much more comfortable around a group of women than I am a group of men. I have less in common with the men, it seems. Don't like sports, don't give a shit about cars…what is there to talk about with guys? Hooters girls? That I can do. Most of my best friends are women (hello, Hilly) and it's why (even though I'm socially phobic) I'd much rather face crowds at BlogHer than crowds at…um, BlogHim.
10. And yes, that's right. I'm socially phobic, too. I know, it's hard to believe because I'm so wild and crazy all over here, but it's true. I fight to leave the house. Glad I fought my instincts to stay home last night, or I would have missed an awesome time with Bossy and everyone else. Some might call it "shy," but it's really an extreme thing at times. Much more advanced than merely shy. Makes me avoid all sorts of potential social settings. Suppose that makes it weird that I sing karaoke in front of people, but that's another number altogether.

Woo hoo! Only 80 more to go.

fuck.

BTW, no Secondhand Radio today. I'm going to see the Beach Boys this afternoon.

Filed under 100 Things, BlogHer, Memes | Comments (15)

Yeah, the shrink appointment? Well, funny thing…I went to the appointment, only to find out that the appointment is actually Monday. I think the shrink is fucking with me. If I show up Monday morning and it's scheduled for another day in the week, I'll know that my paranoia is well-founded.

So Friday afternoon I set out on the 95-mile drive to Orlando for my dinner meet-up with Adam, Britt, and Bossy…and others, too. I made fairly good time, considering it was Friday and rush hour to boot. Plus, Hilly and I talked on the phone for about 45 minutes, so that was cool.

I'm kicking myself because I left my camera at home. Nevertheless, it was a good time. I sat right next to Bossy herself and listened as she regaled (bragged) on and on about how Saturn is sponsoring her trip and they gave her a car to drive for this trip and how she's meeting all kinds of bloggers and staying at their houses and shit. Despite her being supremely better than me (as can be seen by her billions of comments every day on her blog), I managed to put the beat-down on her.

"Oh yeah? Think you're so great?" I said. "Well, you don't have a penis!"

She just laughed dismissively. "P'shaw. I can get one of those any time I want."

What a bitch. It's true. Women can get penises any time they want. All they have to do is look at me with a raised eyebrow and - BAM! - I'm naked and ready to donate my dick for a romping 30 seconds of fun.

It was incredibly difficult to hear at TGI Fridays, where the 9 of us met for dinner. What do you expect? Popular bar/restaurant on a Friday right after work lets out. Yeah, loud.

Everybody else had their cameras, so I expect to see some photos of the event in the next day or two. At any rate, Adam and his wife, Amy, suggested we go to their house for more chat after dinner. By then it was past 9 and I was thinking, "Ninety minutes of driving ahead." Still, I couldn't pass up an opportunity to see Adam's house.

And I wasn't disappointed. Once you push through the hanging chains-and-whips curtain at the front door, and then move past the twin love swings (now with built-in butt plugs!), it's a pretty normal house. Very nice. There's a lovely pool in the back yard, filled with alligators and people that like to fuck alligators, and a marvelous screened-in porch where we set about having all the group sex. I'm still wiping Crisco out of my ass, even after a shower. Fortunately, the Twister board is made of vinyl, so that'll make for easy cleanup. I was most impressed by Adam, swinging from the light fixtures by his penis.

We talked about blogging, of course. I mean, what else are a bunch of bloggers bound to talk about? Various things, really, such as the fact that the word "More" annoys many of us to no end.

What am I talking about? When you go to a blog and see just a snippet of a post before it says "MORE" with a hyperlink to read the rest of the post…annoying. I hate that. Not nearly as much as I hate people that only post excerpts in their feeds, instead of just listing the entire post. But still, I don't like that "More" thing for some reason.

Fact is, if you only post excerpts in your feed, I very likely never read your blog. I fully understand that everyone wants people to visit their actual blog, and that may be why some people post excerpts only, but fuck that. Listen, if your content is good, I'm reading your blog. And every time I comment, I have to actually go TO your blog to do it. Maybe that's not every day, but hey - you're still getting traffic. I don't have time to physically visit every blogger's site to read their posts. That's just fucking ridiculous. So do me a favor…post your entire post in the feeds, not just snippets. You're quickly headed for the slush pile otherwise.

We also talked about hate mail we get for various reasons. With Adam, it's obvious. I mean, he brings that shit on himself. But with Britt? With me? With Bossy? Weird, the shit that people get freaked out about. Adam and I agreed, however, that if you're getting hate mail because of your blog, you're doing something very very right.

Britt was hilarious…and for someone who rarely drinks, I must say I've now witnessed Britt drunk both on video and in person. Well, maybe not drunk, but buzzed. She had these enormous blue drinks at Fridays and then Adam made her some concoction made from half Crystal Light lemonade and half moonshine. She made a sour face at first, but that didn't stop her from finishing that sucker right down to the ice.

I'm now planning to kidnap Britt's husband so I can lock him away in my closet and then move in to calm Britt's broken heart and snag her for myself. By the time TequilaCon rolls around, she'll be mine, all mine.

At midnight, I was shocked to find that I was still sitting in Adam's house and not at my house, 95 miles away. So I said my goodbyes and hit the road. Made it home at 1:35am. Went to bed a couple of hours later and had some viscious nightmares. None of them involved Britt or Adam or Bossy, but I did have to fight pirate zombies from hell.

Anyway, so that's pretty much my experience with Bossy's Excellent Road Trip. She's on her way to Tallahassee today and I hope she has a safe journey over the next month. Mostly because I want to see her again at TequilaCon. Turns out she lives in Philly, so she doesn't have to worry about hotel costs or roommates. She can just show up, get drunk, and go home.

I'm just hoping I don't lock myself out of my hotel room in my boxers this year. Maybe I'll go for total nakedhood this time around. Naked bowling…now THAT'D be a party.

Filed under Local Goings On, TequilaCon, Weblogs | Comments (21)