Now is the time for all good men to come to their senses and launch a website. I’ve been typing for long enough to know that times change just like the ribbons on my old Underwood. Unless I want to adjust my middle name to “Tyrannosaurus,” it’s time for me to embrace the new media world order.
So here we go.
I’m not against progress. That actually was the foremost thought in my head just last night at around 4 a.m. I had been working for a couple of hours on making this website happen when I fell asleep in my chair, my chin falling onto my chest,
a little drool down my chin, the laptop magically remaining balanced on top of my lap. I might have made it all night like that except for a noise outside the house. It woke me up, and I groggily took a disoriented look at the clock next to me — it read 4:03 — before stumbling over to the window to see what was happening. Ah, it was the street cleaner.
Now there’s something that has not changed with the times. And it surely should have. I remember being a little kid and seeing the street cleaner roll down the street, steering around whatever parked cars were in its way, and thinking,
“These things don’t do what they say they do. The street’s not any cleaner than it was before.” More than 40 years later, same old story. The damn things still don’t clean the streets. They just swirl the dirt around. And make noise.
OK, so there’s an observation that exemplifies the beauty of this blogosphere we have here. How liberating to be able to riff a stream of consciousness about the stuff that bugs you, or amuses you, or bores you. Back when there was this thing called the print magazine, this is the kind of writing that’d sit at the bottom of the slush pile. Now it’s the poetry of a generation. That sounds like I’m being cynical. Maybe I am. I’m also feeling freed, like I do as I’m leaving the bathroom after reading a David Sedaris essay or T.C. Boyle story in The New Yorker.
The toilet. There’s another thing that hasn’t evolved over the years. Same old flush handle, same tank, same flapper as when I was little. I’d say if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, but the toilets in our house always are breaking, and every time I try to fix one, I’m again reminded how old-fashioned the technology is.
But I’m not too evolved of a high-tech guy to embrace my roots and the convenience of a seat where you can do nothing but think. Almost nothing.
So here we go.
Jeff Wagenheim 
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