Don't Even TALK To That Alice Chick

Yet another reason to love Fametracker Forums: a terribly witty thread that has been evolving for several months, about fraudulant "true life" books such as "Go Ask Alice," which many of us were completely duped by when we were overly credulous young readers.

Don't believe "Go Ask Alice" was a fake? No less an authority than Snopes debunks this favorite oldie. Of course, that didn't stop William Shatner, Andy Griffith, and verifiable actual teen drug abuser Mackenzie Phillips from starring in the 1973 TV movie version.


I mean, really. Anonymous young authors, scribbling tales of drugs, sex, and despair on bath paper and fast food napkins? Cobbled together by grieving parents who hoped that their child's tale would prevent the downfall of others? How did we believe this?

(*Photo from a play done by a children's theatre group in Kansas.)

Because these books underlined a basic "be good" message we were getting so many other places. Because many of us were falling in love with books and words, and part of that required that we give ourselves over to the story. Entirely. It's sort of refreshing, really, to remember that there was a pre-irony, pre-skeptical, pre-critical version of ourselves, who wasn't bothered much by the thought that people might be anything less than honest, and who had faith in the truth of the printed word.

The funniest part of the thread? The collective realization that the book's exquisite descriptions of the effects of drugs on the senses left several posters terribly disappointed when, later, they actually had a chance to try some of the stuff for themselves.

Two example sentences from "Alice's" ecstatic descriptions:

Later Rich brought a sheepskin rug out of his room and we began walking through the thickness of it and there was a sensation in my feet that was totally indescribable, a softness that enveloped my complete body, and quite suddenly I could hear the strange almost silent sound of the long silky hairs rubbing against each other and against my feet. It was a sound unsimilar to any I have ever heard, and I remember trying desperately to give a dissertation upon the phenomena of each individual hair having perfect pitch within itself.

Dude, that '70's weed must have been some wicked stuff. No, wait, that's not the point. "Alice" was a big fat liar. A totally untrustworthy grownup. So remember, dear readers, "Just Say Het!" or Nancy Reagan's giant killer bunnies will get you.

(3/23/05 - note - Fametracker Forums, six years strong, are no more!)

British Crime Is More Literary and Complex Than American Crime

Does it sometimes seem like while Americans commit terrible crimes like murder for banal and blindly impulsive reasons, the British have eight page New Yorker article crimes, full of literary parallels and thick historical context?

In March, a leading authority on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes character allegedly committed suicide in such a way as to make his death look like a murder perpetrated by his arch rival, an American policy strategy analyst who works in Donald Rumsfeld's office.

Accounts of this crime also mention the severe schism that has evolved in the fandom of Doyle's Holmes, with a key distinction being made between two apparently irreconcilable groups, the Sherlockians and the Doyleans. Doyleans have felt a need to branch off from the Sherlockians, who focused on the character to the exclusion of the author. Sherlockians, presumably, spend a fair amount of time nibbling sour grapes, and pointing out the inherant flaws of the Doylean affection for the author.

You Whippersnappers and Your Blogs and Your Soda Pop

...Or, "Why Can't I Figure This Thing Out?" "Why Do Kids Wear Those Terrible Baggy Pants," and "How Can You Call That Racket Music?"

(Hopefully this will be the last post that makes references to my experiences creating the blog itself, because, really, how boring is that? And don't try to make it sound cool by describing it as "meta.")

I'm struggling to figure out how best to compose (in Word, then cut-and-paste? directly in the posting box online? I'm making a mockery of continuity with this fontage) and edit and blah.

But I feel compelled to mention that there has been a significant span between my last experiences learning internet skills and today's initial assault on your sensibilities.

During college I enjoyed an internship at a local BBS (which was becoming a BBS/ISP during my time there), an opportunity that came my way mostly because of my scintillating online chatting skills. (PSA: In my case, children, the anonymous guy in the chat room with me and my friends was the cool business manager of an internet company who offered me a neato job...but 99.9999% of the time he's a pervert weirdo and you should not talk to him.)

During my time there I quickly gained skills that helped me confidently navigate the Web, approximate the duties of a public relations pro, and pull off that "looking busy while contributing nothing to the greater whole" thing that many of you may be familiar with.

I soon had the desire to create my own web presence, despite an utter lack of anything to say (deja what?), but was frustrated with the software of the day. The tech boys (yes, I was the only girl in the office...a condition I was practically designed for) suggested a shareware HTML editor called HotDog. It was supposed to be intuitive and simple to use, and therefore confused the hell out of me. I broke it down and simply wrote HTML code in a text editor. I never created anything more complicated than a table, and I pretty much learned by stealing code and graphics from web pages I liked, but the point is, I eventually figured it out.

And, with Linus Torvalds as my witness, I will eventually figure out this whole dang blogging doodle!

So stick with me here. I'm starting with a generic template and no add-ons whatsoever, but I'll learn as I go and punch up the cool quotient when I can.

Early Experiments Produce Mixed Results

Hooray, my first post. A blog is born.

Because the human's relationship to the Internet should not be just "take, take, take."

Because February 14 is about love.

Because work is a little slow, it's cold and gloomy outside, and sometimes a little mindless wordmashing is an effective distraction from work-related physical pain. I repeat: hooray.