Blogging and Porn - Addictive Behaviours 101

from http://roflrazzi.com/2008/10/29/celebrity-pictures-hugh-laurie-robert-sean-leonard-trapeze-nice-touch/

I'm starting to prepare for my late spring teaching gig, and I'm beginning to wonder if I'm doing the right thing.

I'll be leading a course entitled Share Your Brilliance: Blogwriting for Beginners, and I'm worried it will create a classroom of addicts.

Last night, I tuned into House, MD with great interest; previews had revealed that the POTW (patient of the week) was a woman blogger. There were another subplot that intrigued me even more: House and Wilson were going speed dating. I couldn't wait for the funny to begin. Ultimately, I was a little disappointed because the speed dating bit was pretty short and most of the best parts were in the preview. Of course, when it comes to any opportunity to watch Hugh Laurie being clever, I am totally insatiable, so perhaps my expectations are unrealistic.

There was also SPOILER ALERT! a fabulous subplot about House discovering that Wilson had been in a porno movie when he was younger. House, being House, tormented poor Wilson mercilessly about this. It started when House rented three films from a local shop, Wilson returned them before House watched them, providing a flimsy excuse for doing so, piquing House's curiosity. House then re-rented and viewed them and spotted his colleague wearing a most fetching bear skin. There are more twists and turns, but you get the idea.

It was only later, after watching the addictive behavior of the blogger patient who felt she had to constantly post about every aspect of her life that I began to think about House and his actions related to porn. Sure, he jokes about it a lot, but renting the films shows he follows through. And three films? I mean, aren't they all basically the same thing? As Ronald Reagan observed about trees, you've seen one, you've seen 'em all. Aren't there better things to do with one's time? Better films to watch? Maybe even spend time with actual women?

My class has nothing to do with that type of addiction - unless my students intend to create racier content than I think they will. But it raises the same sorts of questions if students wind up falling down the rabbit hole of blogging addiction. The blogger character in last night's program talked about the sense of community and interaction with people through her blog. She was constantly grabbing her laptop to share new developments in her life, even as doctors struggled to figure out what was wrong with her. Her loving husband stood by, trying to talk with her and make decisions about the future as she turned away to communicate with Bloggyland. It was annoying. And I recognized some of the behaviors as my own.

This Sunday marked my second totally awesome Oscar Party at Bad Mom's house. A gang of super fun women gathered to watch the festivities, eat scrumptious food and drink amazing cocktails concocted by Bad Mom's wonderful husband. We dressed in our best red carpet finery (I chose black velvet, red lipstick and sparkling rhinestones) or incognito celebrity airport outfit. We laughed and gabbed in the classic tradition of what Professor X lovingly dubs a hen party. Except two of us were high tech hens. We hunted and pecked our keyboards, live blogging (on Facebook, don't look for it here) the Oscar action. We also multi-tasked, chatting to each other from our laptops although we sat a mere foot apart.

We had ginormous fun. But are we losing that personal connection? Are we becoming so dependent on our little silver devices that we're not able to interact properly? Am I going to spread this type of aberrant behavior by teaching the class? Is this the downfall of society?

Stay tuned for more thoughts on this troubling topic.

Some brilliant youtube producer combined clips from House with the stirring song "The Internet is For Porn" from Avenue Q - Enjoy!

The Meme Stops Here

Hugh Laurie's character House is addicted to Vicodin.

I am addicted to Hugh Laurie.

My brain is growing so much since I began my journey in the blogosphere! It has to make room to hold all the incredible new things I'm picking up along the way. Those I follow drop little gems of wisdom that amaze and delight me.

Today, I'm writing on assignment. Contain your sense of wonder. Yes, I know you thought I couldn't handle direction. (Even though I am an excellent traveler. Get it? Direction? Like in being directed to do something, but also the points on the compass. Ha ha ha. I make such funny jokes.)
I've been hit with a meme. You seasoned travelers of blogland undoubtedly know what this means, but for anyone who doesn't, (like me, six minutes ago) I will tell all. Or at least some.
My exhaustive research led me here, The Daily Meme. It's an interesting place, and you should go there. But don't depart until you're done reading my post du jour. Essentially, it defines meme thusly: In the context of web logs / 'blogs / blogging and other kinds of personal web sites it's some kind of list of questions that you saw somewhere else and you decided to answer the questions.

Except I did not just decide to answer this question. It was delibrerately assigned to me. The very humourous and lovely Shana at So Not Zen tagged me and four other bloggers to write about this meme. This is a great honour. She charmed me by referring to me as one of her "happy hour homegirls."

So without further ado, The Meme Question...as phrased by Shana:

The rules are list five things that I am addicted to and then pass it on to five more blogs.

1. Travel. I really like to go places. Getting there is half the fun. (Cliche du jour!) Just the thought of making a trip somewhere gets my heart to go pitty pat. I think I'll go plan a trip as soon as I'm done with this.

2. History. I suppose this is connected to #1, because I prefer to actually visit historical sites rather than just read about them. My friend Stephanie gets this. We spent three and a half hours chatting, eating coffee and croissants yesterday. I wish you could have seen how dreamy-eyed she got while recounting her visits to places in Paris and London where famous writers lived and worked. What a dork. I love her for that. Because I get equally mushy. We may not have perfected tardis technology yet, but we can walk into the same bathroom that our historical heroes did.

3. Tangents. As you well know, if you've read anything I've written or listened to me talk for more than two minutes, I am easily distracted and can expound on tangents. This can be considered charming or irritating. I prefer to believe it is charming in me, although sometimes irritating in others. I will not speak further of this here, to avoid the risk of going off on a ....you know.

4. My children's laughter. I know this is sickeningly sweet, but please just deal with it. My two kids have the best sounding laughs on Earth. And I thrill to the sound of them like a junkie on really good drugs. This is not to say that anything which pours from their mouths is uniformly pleasing. I can live without the backsass quite nicely. (Does that cut the sticky sweetness for you?)

5. Breaking the Chain. Whenever I receive something that mandates I send it out to 6 friends or 10 women I like or 23 other fellow steak eaters or everyone in my address book, I rebel. I make the conscious decision that whatever it is, it ends with me. Finis. Of course, I break that rule frequently when the something is a vital political action alert because I know that asking my chums to take action will make a difference. Then goodness will spread over the land.

So I'm not passing this meme on because I am a chain breaker. Of course, if anyone wants to blog about five of their addictions, they are free to do so. Because this is a free country! (Bonus cliche! Lucky you.)