Friday, April 12th, 2013

Woo-hoo! It’s good to be home!

Alright, so I tried the magazine format and, after a few tweaks and fixes, it actually looked (sorta) good.

But there were problems. For instance, I couldn’t post videos, which means a hell of a lot to a blogger. See, posting brilliant mots everyday is what I say I do. What I do do, though, is come up with the occasional clever twist of the phrase. Very occasional. And with, say, Sarah Palin no longer in the public eye, I couldn’t simply lift her latest deranged statement, parse it, point a derisive finger at all the yahoos who acted as though she’d just come up with a cure for cancer and cellulite in one easy-to-swallow pill, and then make some creative remark about how this holy land is becoming stupider than the sheep barn at the state fair. So the pressure was on me to be fascinating and, failing that (which was often), to simply fill some space. And there’s nothing like a good video to fill space in a blog.

Watch:

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See?

I don’t even have to sweat coming up with more laugh-out-loud imagery to make this point. Easy.

But I couldn’t do that when The Pencil was in magazine format. I would have had to buy a widget for that. And I’d already spent a pile of good dough on the magazine template and a few other widget packages (not too many of which, BTW, actually worked.)

Anyway, as I say, there were problems. I won’t laundry list them here. I’ll only tell you what the biggest problem was: I lost more than 90 percent of my readership!Emmis. Verità. Swear to god. I pulled ten times more average daily hits here when The Pencil was in simple blog format and hosted by WordPress than when I had the fancy mag look. Aaaaaarrrrrrrgggggghhhhhh!And get this: my biggest day on The Pencil, the simple blog, topped 5000 hits. I came nowhere near 5000 total hits the entire time this was The Pencil, the big, bad magazine. You ever see a grown man cry? I’m not a big one on checking my numbers on Google Analytics and all the rest of the ratings systems that other bloggers follow like the Oracle at Delphi. But a couple of weeks ago, I decided to actually look at my numbers. That’s when the bad news hit. I immediately went into a deep funk (which I think will be the name of my new band — if I ever start a band.)

Anyway, I want everybody back and I hope this return to the old format and host will do the trick.

Did I say funk? Forget it, babies. I’m pumped. And it just so happens Patti Smith’s “Ask the Angels,” one of my fave songs, is booming over the Soma speakers as I type this.

Hey, now that I mention it, watch this:

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Man, what a luxury! That ate up the space of three or even four paragraphs. I’m living’ the life, kiddies.

So, what to expect now that The Pencil is back home. The same good old ass-kicking, taking names, borderline libel and slander (not to mention borderline personality disorder), stunningly fascinating, drama queen-y (king-y?), charming-but-smart-assed Daily Hot Air you’ve come to know, love, and expect.)

Yeah, that and the ongoing story of the Dudeks of Chicago in the late 1960s and early ’70s in my fantabulous serial e-novel, “Black Comedy.” (If I recall correctly, I left off on Episode 15 and should have run Episode 16 yesterday but, BFD, it’ll be late.) Worry not, loyal Dudek followers and newbies, I’ll re-post all episodes here just as soon as I get around to it.

So, buckle up Pencillistas, come to EP every day for your dose of therapeutic Hot Air. And definitely be here on Mondays and Thursdays for more episodes of “Black Comedy.”

And the next time I get a big idea, someone please, please tie me down until the fever passes.

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