Journal Entry #1

I’m tired and it’s late, so I’ll keep this focused* on the two things that have recently struck me.

First off, Subway now has a little oven that they can use to quickly toast your sandwich (pre-veggies, of course)—they’re obviously trying to take some of the air out of Quiznos’ (Quizno’s’?) sails. I gave it a go for lunch today, and found that it made for a damn tasty sandwich. And Subway, while not the cheapest place around, is still more price-competitive than Quizno’s.

And secondly, yesterday I started trying to remove some of the detritus that I’ve collected in my room. During that process, I ran across a whole bunch of letters I received from people over the years; most of them were from Brian (we have a pseudo-tradition of writing to each other when we travel), but a surprising number of the others were from (prom-date) Megan after she headed off into the world (aka “Colorado”). I had completely forgotten about those notes; it was nice to revisit them. There’s something warmer about handwritten notes that just isn’t captured in computer-generated text; it feels like the same difference between hand-drawn cel-based animation, and new computer-drawn animation.

In some ways (i.e. the ways that aren’t me making a desperate attempt to store some of my memories before I lose them forever), this blog has a similar purpose to those hand-written notes. It is partially an update on the happenings in my life—with the critical flaws of having too much detail in some areas, not enough in others, and the need to take additional care due to the nature of the internet. (I’m probably a bit too cavalier with respect to that last flaw…)

And, despite that similarity of purpose, this thing is a hell of a lot more cold and distant than a real-life letter. Part of that, I imagine, is that the message can’t be personalized; the rest is probably because of the comparative ease of creating these posts. It’s far too easy to “think on paper” when you type, as any errors you make can be corrected without having to start anew; handwriting even short notes, in comparison, can take multiple attempts.

The internet also reeks of transience—and this blog is thusly permeated with that sense—whereas a note can survive ages tucked away in some corner of a drawer. You can take notes with you, too; the ability to physically hold something in your hands shouldn’t be underestimated. Computers and hard drives die; the bits and bytes of this blog, or your life, could be easily lost to the ages. (Sadly, thanks to web archiving projects, it’d be easier to lose your personal data than all copies of My Creation…) Yet, on the other hand, I have lots of things—calendar pictures, say—that I am forced to eventually throw out, and wish I could save in a digital format for posterity. And data can be backed up; if the knick-knacks in your house burn, there’s no way you’ll ever see them again.

I’m not even sure where I’m going with this, any more. Probably best to consider this a stream-of-consciousness snippet (something you might have seen in my 12th grade journal, say), and move along.

[*Dammit]

 

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