Also, I just want to say, this article is an art piece. Everything tied in together well, all the threads got woven seamlessly, even the minute detail of the two footnotes. You did a very good job on this one.
Ok but as a reader wtf am I supposed to do now? Subscribe? Buy you a coffee? Vanquish our common enemies through increasingly convoluted machinations of vile treachery? Wait for the next installment? You can’t expect us to read this far and suddenly think for ourselves! Tell us what to do. Telllll usssssss!
Ok, so this is where I make a long discursive comment that goes down three different courses, somehow involves a personal anecdote and expresses my general level of confusion, I suggest that I agree or disagree with the essay, but if I disagree I don't feel like discourse around the disagreement because either A. I know more than you about the subject or B. More likely inevitably I will end up writing something about fuck you and fuck your family. There will be at least two references to Xanax, half a Moby Dick quote and three ancillary references to media or books so obscure that only three people on the platform would recognize them for what they are (and they're not reading this, and I'm absolutely abusing parentheticals for no reason) this was a fantastic read to start my day and then end abruptly on a non sequitur of some kind. Pussy money weed.
Thanks for writing this, I've been wanting to write non-fiction on here but so far I've only been able to write fiction. After reading this, I still don't know how to write non-fiction but at least you tried.
Funny essay. I'm sure I'm guilty of some if not all of this at times since I'm a bit of a noob. A lot of stuff on substack has that "I need to post something to keep posting and building my subscriber count" vibe of an SEO article. If you've ever had to squeeze six 500 word essays out about acai berries, you know what I'm talking about.
I can confirm that you achieved your goal of saying absolutely fucking nothing. I also suspect that it was as much fun to write it as it was to read it. 😎
Ah, yes…the drafts bin—that infinitely expandable repository of things that seemed like a good idea at the time, but eventually failed to prove their worth to one’s own satisfaction.
They say we are our own harshest critics. Nah…we’ve just learned (the hard way) to recognize…
Cringe, or…
Marginally coherent, quasi-focused blathering (perhaps like this reply 😎)
…when we see it.
When a piece is filled with Little Darlings™—those oh-so-clever little wordplay morsels that turn out to be inconsequential at best and barfworthy at worst, with the benefit of later perspective—and not much else, it’s destined for the Drafts Dungeon.
I’m not sure to whom or to what I should be grateful that I have a reasonably functional QA/QC (aka circumspection) plugin installed in my wetware, but I suppose I can at least be grateful to myself for those times when I have the good sense to pay attention to it.
Alas, even when I’m sure I have QA/QC’d the livin’ shit out of a piece, massaged the fluff out of it, circumspected the thing with the most diligent, pain-in-the-ass fact-checking, and tied it all together in a a logically cohesive, satisfying little package, I admit that I’m still surprised when a dickhead replies with a comment insisting that I mean what he wants me to mean, rather than what I actually mean.
I’ll probably get over that kind of surprise eventually; but I recently encountered a different kind of dickheadedness—one that caught me completely off-guard.
I don’t know whether you’ve yet had the displeasure of having some jackball accuse you of using AI to write, but if not, you have that experience to look forward to. The accusation was so utterly false that it caught me completely by surprise. It definitely pegged the WTF Meter.
I wrote a scathing rebuke in reply to his accusation, posted it, and then within the next few hours decided that the accusation was so preposterous that it didn’t even warrant such attention.
Later, I posted a Note about it, to which The Street Writer (Steve York) insightfully commented, “It sounds more like a confession than an accusation.”
Whatever it was, it was bullshit. The jackball’s assertion that “…my AI alarms have just sounded” was a monument to smug smart-assery. I don’t know whether he even bothered to read my initial rebuke before I replaced it with the simple advice that “Your AI alarms are in desperate need of recalibration.”
Predictably, my advice received a null response, confirming my suspicion that his saccharine derogatory, thinly veiled as a compliment—“Try drafting it yourself. It wouldn’t be half as windy and waffley, and I’m sure you are capable of it.”—was more condescension than genuine encouragement.
It would require actual integrity to acknowledge and recant his bogus accusation, if indeed his intent was to encourage me. People often reveal their true intentions as much by what they don’t do as by what they do.
Anyhow, thanks for your reply…and thanks especially for taking my comment in the complimentary way I intended it. I look forward to reading more of your well-crafted and entertaining authoring.
Lol. You are a riot my guy! Keep the articles coming 👍
Also, I just want to say, this article is an art piece. Everything tied in together well, all the threads got woven seamlessly, even the minute detail of the two footnotes. You did a very good job on this one.
thank you very much! :D
this is good. this is so good I almost closed it right away. omfg.
Ok but as a reader wtf am I supposed to do now? Subscribe? Buy you a coffee? Vanquish our common enemies through increasingly convoluted machinations of vile treachery? Wait for the next installment? You can’t expect us to read this far and suddenly think for ourselves! Tell us what to do. Telllll usssssss!
Now, Dear Reader, we stand together under the infinite sky of possibility!
Ok, so this is where I make a long discursive comment that goes down three different courses, somehow involves a personal anecdote and expresses my general level of confusion, I suggest that I agree or disagree with the essay, but if I disagree I don't feel like discourse around the disagreement because either A. I know more than you about the subject or B. More likely inevitably I will end up writing something about fuck you and fuck your family. There will be at least two references to Xanax, half a Moby Dick quote and three ancillary references to media or books so obscure that only three people on the platform would recognize them for what they are (and they're not reading this, and I'm absolutely abusing parentheticals for no reason) this was a fantastic read to start my day and then end abruptly on a non sequitur of some kind. Pussy money weed.
🥹❤️
Haha, accurate!
Really useful pointers ;)
A great laugh!
I resonate with this, this is a thoughtful post, exactly so.
'really at this point nothing you’re saying has much to do with anything, but, haha word count go brrrrrr and nobody really reads these anyways'
I support that idea, that's a compelling perspective, for sure.
EH x
Thanks for writing this, I've been wanting to write non-fiction on here but so far I've only been able to write fiction. After reading this, I still don't know how to write non-fiction but at least you tried.
Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.
Funny essay. I'm sure I'm guilty of some if not all of this at times since I'm a bit of a noob. A lot of stuff on substack has that "I need to post something to keep posting and building my subscriber count" vibe of an SEO article. If you've ever had to squeeze six 500 word essays out about acai berries, you know what I'm talking about.
I can confirm that you achieved your goal of saying absolutely fucking nothing. I also suspect that it was as much fun to write it as it was to read it. 😎
:D
I have a pretty consistent policy that if I’m not enjoying myself I either rework it or consign it to the drafts bin.
Ah, yes…the drafts bin—that infinitely expandable repository of things that seemed like a good idea at the time, but eventually failed to prove their worth to one’s own satisfaction.
They say we are our own harshest critics. Nah…we’ve just learned (the hard way) to recognize…
Cringe, or…
Marginally coherent, quasi-focused blathering (perhaps like this reply 😎)
…when we see it.
When a piece is filled with Little Darlings™—those oh-so-clever little wordplay morsels that turn out to be inconsequential at best and barfworthy at worst, with the benefit of later perspective—and not much else, it’s destined for the Drafts Dungeon.
I’m not sure to whom or to what I should be grateful that I have a reasonably functional QA/QC (aka circumspection) plugin installed in my wetware, but I suppose I can at least be grateful to myself for those times when I have the good sense to pay attention to it.
Alas, even when I’m sure I have QA/QC’d the livin’ shit out of a piece, massaged the fluff out of it, circumspected the thing with the most diligent, pain-in-the-ass fact-checking, and tied it all together in a a logically cohesive, satisfying little package, I admit that I’m still surprised when a dickhead replies with a comment insisting that I mean what he wants me to mean, rather than what I actually mean.
I’ll probably get over that kind of surprise eventually; but I recently encountered a different kind of dickheadedness—one that caught me completely off-guard.
I don’t know whether you’ve yet had the displeasure of having some jackball accuse you of using AI to write, but if not, you have that experience to look forward to. The accusation was so utterly false that it caught me completely by surprise. It definitely pegged the WTF Meter.
I wrote a scathing rebuke in reply to his accusation, posted it, and then within the next few hours decided that the accusation was so preposterous that it didn’t even warrant such attention.
Later, I posted a Note about it, to which The Street Writer (Steve York) insightfully commented, “It sounds more like a confession than an accusation.”
Whatever it was, it was bullshit. The jackball’s assertion that “…my AI alarms have just sounded” was a monument to smug smart-assery. I don’t know whether he even bothered to read my initial rebuke before I replaced it with the simple advice that “Your AI alarms are in desperate need of recalibration.”
Predictably, my advice received a null response, confirming my suspicion that his saccharine derogatory, thinly veiled as a compliment—“Try drafting it yourself. It wouldn’t be half as windy and waffley, and I’m sure you are capable of it.”—was more condescension than genuine encouragement.
It would require actual integrity to acknowledge and recant his bogus accusation, if indeed his intent was to encourage me. People often reveal their true intentions as much by what they don’t do as by what they do.
Anyhow, thanks for your reply…and thanks especially for taking my comment in the complimentary way I intended it. I look forward to reading more of your well-crafted and entertaining authoring.