Well, last night was the first Blog Free or Die, the New Hampshire Blog-Con, and it was wonderful. Here are a few things you who didn’t attend missed:
I could list all the blogs represented, but fortunately I don’t have to — Tony at The Concord Journal collected names and web sites for everyone.
Next time, we need to work on security. Despite it being repeatedly tagged as a “New Hampshire” event, one Masshole managed to wheedle his way in.After much debate, we made him spit on a picture of Ted Kennedy, then allowed him to stay.
(Just kidding, Mr. Solo. It was great to finally meet you, even though I missed Deb and the girls. I just couldn’t resist a chance to engage in some gratuitous Ted Kennedy bashing.)
There are a LOT of bloggers in New Hampshire. I finally met a couple of bloggers I’ve exchanged e-mails with (most notably the Weekend Pundit gang and the Pun Salad guy.
While I am quite proud of being a part of Wizbang, there is a certain charm and pride in having one’s own blog — with one’s own name. Choosing a name for your blog has to be one of the hardest and proudest and most important decision of a blogger, and I missed out on that. That was hammered home when I realized I was sitting between two women — one of whom talked about her quest for spirituality, the other who embraced her skepticism. And here I was, representing a blog whose name has been paraphrased as “explosive urination.”
While I would not trade a single aspect of Wizbang’s popularity and success, I noted something I’ve missed without even realizing it. I don’t talk too much about New Hampshire local issues and people and events, because I tend to think of the readership as being national — even international. I feel obligated to discuss matters that I can find some way to make interesting beyond the Granite State. That has its rewards, but its drawbacks as well. I haven’t done much to be a part of the New Hampshire blogging community, and that was driven home when I saw people with far, far smaller blogs meeting and chatting with happy readers far more readily than I did.
Parenting is a big theme for New Hampshire bloggers. Lots of stories of little kiddies were swapped.
All in all, it was a grand time. And it finally helped me get over my long-standing grudge against the Concord Common Man restaurant, the construction of which was preceded by the closing and demolition of the Capital City Diner, a 50’s-era themed diner (lots of chrome, waitresses in poodle skirts, Classic Rock, and wall-to-wall 50’s memorabilia — I kept waiting for Fonzie to show up) of which I was extremely fond.
Mr. Duckie spent most of his time in my pocket, but made a couple of new friends and even posed for a picture or two.
OK, when are we gonna do it again?
(Dang… web site link fixed. My apologies to the lovely lady from Chasing Grace.)
Ironicly this event happened on my anniversary of my birth. I say ironic because it was the idea of my birth that gave rise to many issues, and I credit myself with being one of the hidden layers of imput that inspired JT on his path to new heights of blogging and exploration. Although I credit myself with intelligence, I must admit it is JT’s blogging that actually inform me of news events.. essentially I use it as a movie critic might.. if JT has an opinion, then it must be at the very least interesting
and we all know the curse of May you live in interesting times
Jay — great to meet you yesterday. It is funny about how much of the talk comes back to kids (I was guilty of injecting kid stories into the conversation more than once) … but then again, if you’ve got ’em, you’ve got to think a lot about them. They have an effect on everything you do and the time you can spare to do it.
Still haven’t seen you correct your lie on Harry Reid the other Jay.
Regarding the comment about blogging on national and international events, it happened to me. I started by blogging about local and regional stuff and, next thing I knew, I was commenting on the Indian Ocean tsunami, Beslan, Korea, Africa, you name it.
I have to remind myself to check what’s happening locally.
Hum Jay, both embedded links (“quest for spirituality” & “who embraced her skepticism.”) lead ‘to a grain of salt’. Wonder if you were sitting twix two faces of Eve rather than next to ASHD…
I suggest you leave the local stuff to others.
And – once again – there is a comment that is off-topic by a troll. Folks, you *really* need to do something about that. I’m about to give up on clicking that link to read comments.
If you liked the Capital City Diner, I suggest you come on down to Derry, and check out MaryAnne’s in Derry. My family goes there every weekend.
We tried the Capital City Diner, but preferred MaryAnne’s.