Browsing Category

Writing

Writing

And One Day She Stopped

I have a boyfriend.

This may be nothing amazing in developments for Mankind, but for anyone who knows me, it is nothing short of incredible.
Or maybe it’s not.
Maybe it’s just mind-blowing to me.

You see, I haven’t had a boyfriend in a very long time. Instead, I mostly dated a string of assholes or, now that I’m older and have more objectivity I can say, “gentlemen who were not interested in me enough to date me and/or not at a place in their life where they were able to satisfy my dating needs or any other person’s dating needs”.

I dated the sort of guys that kind of said they “didn’t want to date anyone right now” but that didn’t stop them for getting all up in your grill like they were super interested in you, then disappearing, confusing the living shit out of you even though you should have been wise enough to decipher that “they don’t want to date anyone right now” really meant “THEY DON’T WANT TO DATE ANYONE RIGHT NOW” and that’s why they disappeared, duh.

I was twenty-something and they (more…)

July 22, 2011 by
Writing

What Makes You a Writer?

When you try to maintain a daily blog, it is easy to lose sight of your other writing goals. Blogging takes a up a lot of time, and if you work a more than full-time job during the day, coming home and writing one blog post is hard, let alone trying to write anything else. Or even tending to normal grooming habits. My eyebrows have retreated back to their 1995 state. When I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror, I am startled by the large caterpillars crawling over my face, only to remember I forgot to pluck. Five months ago.

There are times where I begin writing the semi-makings of a book or screenplay only to have them abandoned wayside like a Gosselin child. They start piling up in the graveyard of forgotten stories, occasionally seeing a sliver of light when free time and creative spark coincide- which rarely happens these days. Free time means relaxing. Writing can often be anything but. Where some people feel it is therapeutic, I feel that writing is a constant struggle, trying (more…)

July 20, 2011 by
Writing

A Letter to the Man Who Should Not Read My Blog, But Does Anyways

I wondered if you even existed when I would see a couple on the street.

At the rate I was going, it didn’t seem like I would come to meet you.

You were an elusive figure.

Someone I was left to writing about. A stranger I was to meet on a subway in a big city and discuss metropolitan topics with such as David Byrne and top hats. You were the fictional love interest to my semi-autobiographical, slightly solitary female protagonist. Existing only in words on the paper. But one day you materialized, in the form of a sandy-colored cowboy, and instead of meeting on a subway, we met at an eastside watering hole.

We talked about David Byrne and top hats.

In our relatively small gestation period, I have come to feel that I’ve known you forever. Maybe it’s because you were a character I constructed, or maybe it’s because you and I are reassuringly similar. That the traits I’ve grown to understand about myself over the past 28 years are akin to the ones you share. When you randomly buy a 1980’s sleeveless (more…)

July 12, 2011 by
Writing

How to Come up With Fresh Crap for Your Blog

source

The biggest obstacle I face with blogging is coming up with fresh content.
And not swearing.
Swearing may be my largest obstacle.

Mom told me that when I moved to Los Angeles I turned into a “raging swearing jerk” that she “no longer recognized”. After LA, I dropped the jerky part, but kept the swearing. It has not only become a problem with my blog and social media profiles (my 92 year-old grandmother de-friended me on Facebook because of “my language”), but also in real life where I often find myself dropping little tiny F turds every now and then at work or in meetings. But my swearing is not the point of this post. I’m not even going to “accidentally” place a “fucking” or “shit” anywhere in that past sentence to try and be humorous.

The number one problemo I have with the bane of my existence, er, blog, is coming up with shit that doesn’t bore people to tears. Ideas I don’t feel like I’ve rehashed, don’t give a crap about, or know that others could (more…)

May 26, 2011 by
Writing

Passive-Aggressive Note to Blogger

Dearest Blogger,

What the dealio, yo? That was a long ass time that your platform was down. Two days of not being able to blog feels like four days of not being able to Tweet and six days of not being able to look at Facebook.

You know, to people like me who obsessively refresh their page every 5 minutes to see if someone posted a new comment, the past two days have been sheer torture. At first I thought you shut down my blog because I talked about my pubes recently. Then I thought, “Maybe I posted a picture of a bunch of penises and totally forgot about it and someone called me in?” Every time I would type in my URL some weird Klingon-looking shit would come up on the screen. Luckily, trusty ol’ Twitter told me that I was not the only one facing this problem. In fact, come to find out, you f’ed up EVERYONE’s blogging day yesterday and today. Look! Now I’m forced to write this half-ass post because I couldn’t write on you last night or this morning.

And now I think you spread your (more…)

May 13, 2011 by
Writing

Twelve Ways to Boost Your Blog Traffic (Without Getting Naked)

I am ridic sick today.
Like, every time I read back the words I wrote they look like dkljpotughfgnjasa.
I can’t even form coherent sentences. I can’t even think of words! It took me roughly 58 seconds to think of the word “coherent”. There is a good chance I’m drooling on myself right now but can’t feel it.
I had to abandon the post I was working on for today. In the meantime, I dug up an old post that I wanted to polish off and revisit. There are some helpful hints in here- ones I should even remind myself.
——————————————————————————
You have nine followers, and one of them is your mother.
You wonder why the hell you’re even blogging.
You speculate if anyone will ever read your words.
You ponder if life is worth living.
Well look no further!
Listed below are twelve sure-fire ways to drive traffic to your blog and instantly boost your self-worth.

1.) Join Blogging Network Sites– The best blog networking website is Twenty-Something (more…)

May 9, 2011 by
20-Something, Hipstercrite Life, Writing

We Are Squirrels

spaz

Along the same lines of my recent post about Millennials and their work ethic, “The Generation of the Confused Working Class“, here is me going blah blah blah some more about the terrible “problems” my generation faces. 

I have the attention span of a squirrel on cocaine.
This is a recent development.
As a child, I was way too self-involved to be distracted by anything.
Being an only child will do that to you.
Sitting for several hours by yourself talking to Trolls will do that to you.

Now that I’m a big kid, I’m self-involved, society-involved, media-involved, and technology-involved.
Now my head is filled with a million notions of what has been and what could be.
Now I drink to make the voices stop.

On-set ADD sucks ass- and I don’t even have ADD. I’m one of those self-diagnosed folks. You know, the ones that figure it’s easier to give a name to something they won’t take responsibility for? Like totally flaking on your friend’s wedding shower because (more…)

April 26, 2011 by
Writing

The Girl Looking for a Connection

Earlier this week, I happened to catch a tweet from a writer in Minnesota directed at the Austin social media community. The writer had come across a suicide note posted that day by an Austin blogger and was wondering if anyone could help. I clicked on the blogger’s link and didn’t recognize the face she attached to her self-penned obituary. The face looking back at me seemed happy. It was a cherub face with a slight smirk. Above, in the blog header, another smiling photo with her three kids. Her blog bio explained that she was a divorcing mom and in the process of trying to figure out what life is all about. The obituary added that the blogger was not able to find what she was looking for, that she hasn’t and will never be able to connect with anyone, and that it was best to move on.

I immediately scrolled down to the comments to tell her to stop. It was difficult to find the words. Cookie cutter phrases like “Don’t give up!” and “People love you!” crept up in my head and I tried to (more…)

April 22, 2011 by
Writing

Blogger versus WordPress

source

When I first started Hipstercrite in 2006 as the shittily titled PlasticLA- which garnered about 8 visitors a week- the only blogging platform I knew of was Blogger. It was common and easy to use. The templates were simple and I didn’t need anything fancy. I stopped blogging for awhile and started back up in 2008 where I jumped from 8 visitors a week to 10. I really only began taking blogging seriously in 2009 when I moved from LA to Austin to work on my writing and where I saw my followers jump from 4 to over 1,000. This was due in part to receiving Blogger’s Blog of Note in December of 2009. Blogs of Note is when Blogger features a blog of their liking for the week. My blog wouldn’t be where it is today without that honor. Between all my social media profiles and blog feeds I have almost 6,000 followers thanks in many parts to Blogger.

However, as time has gone on and Hipstercrite has expanded, the inevitable has happened. I want to move to a more professional (more…)

April 6, 2011 by
Hipstercrite Life, Writing

Moms and Facebook

You’ll never forget the day your mother joined Facebook.

You thought, “Aww man! This is awesome! Now Mom and I can share cute messages on each others’ walls and I can see photos from that wine trip she took with the family and got super loaded and she can see photos of me and my new hairdo and criticize it. It will be great!”

Then you started to think differently when your Mom began liking every God forsaken thing you ever do on Facebook and she posts ADD-like messages on your wall that say, “Where is a photo of this new guy you’re seeing?” or “I remember when you were just a little thing. Why did you have to grow up? WHY?”

Sometimes she Facebook messages you demanding to know where you are and why you’re not picking up your phone, and if that doesn’t get your attention, she moves on to 12 Facebook friends of yours/complete strangers of hers and asks where you are.

Sometimes all Moms do is get on Facebook to berate you for swearing on your profile and call you out on your (more…)

April 5, 2011 by