I had planned the changeover to naternet.com to be finished by now, but it turns out that, once my site is pointed toward Tumblr, it’s not as easy as I thought to point this site toward naternet.com. Sigh.
So, until I can get this all figured out, please head on over to naternet.com.
Just as a fair warning to those of you who are kind enough to frequent my little corner of the interwebs, clicking on the link that leads you here will, in a few short days, take you somewhere else entirely.
Where, you ask? naternet.com, that’s where.
That’s right, I finally bought my own domain name and will be pointing this WordPress address towards it by next Monday. In the meantime, I’m ironing out the difficulties of combining my Tumblr and WordPress blogs onto one site. For the time being, I’m going with the Tumblr format. I’ve been going back and forth over which blog format to commit to once and for all and, as often happens, I can’t decide long-term. So, I figured the best way to do things was to just break down and buy my own domain name and, if I get tired of Tumblr or tired of WordPress, I can just switch back and forth at will.
naternet.com is up and running right now and you can head on over any time you like. I’ll still be writing longer-format posts, but they will be interspersed with video, photos and audio of things that I find online. My Twitter feed is also integrated into the layout, so you can even follow the yawn-inducing minutiae of my fleeting thoughts. Yay!
See you on the flip side.
Sara and I are in Bismarck, North Dakota for our good friend Kelly’s wedding. Weddings are funny things. I’ve been involved in only three in the past ten years, one of them my own, and by far, this is the most relaxed and laid back. Kelly and his lovely wife-to-be, Annette, have taken a relatively stress-free approach to the whole thing that I think is indicative of many wonderful years to come for the both of them. So many people look at their wedding as the be-all-end-all, extravagance rules, no expense spared event where everything has to be perfect. And we wonder why half of marriages end in divorce. Looking at just one day as the culmination of everything your relationship stands for is surely a harbinger of doom for many. Case in point:
That is the look of a doomed man, and a bride who can never be pleased. And yes, that's a cake.
On Thursday night, at the joint bachelor-bachelorette party (which was another example of their laid-back approach, and a great idea, to boot), Kelly’s younger sister noticed that he was actually wearing his wedding band on his left ring finger. She was shocked. I have to admit that I was surprised, but only because I’d never seen anyone do that before their wedding. On the other hand, he was decidedly nonplussed in the face of her stern opposition to his bucking of tradition. A few days didn’t really make a difference to him. That’s a stance taken by someone who plans on wearing that ring for a long, long time. A few days in the face of years upon years really doesn’t matter much, when you get down and think about it. (But, he switched it over to his right ring finger anyway.)
Instead, they’re looking at their wedding as another step along the way. Without intentionally doing so, Sara and I did the same thing. When we got married seven years ago this month, we were fresh out of college (one day removed from our graduation, as a matter-of-fact) and simply didn’t have the time or the resources to make a big display out of it. It wasn’t really our nature, anyway. What we did without thinking, Kelly and Annette seem to be doing on purpose and I couldn’t be happier for the both of them.
The wedding itself is in a few short hours and I still have to change into my tux and find my way down to the park where the actually ceremony is going to be held. It’s a beautiful North Dakota day, too. Sunny, warm with a cool breeze and nothing but blue skies. It’s going to be a good day and, for Kelly and Annette, I hope the start of a great life together.
If you’re a fan of the band Wilco, or just a fan of music in general, you’ve probably run across Jay Bennett at some point over the past 15-20 years. Jay was a member of Wilco during, arguably, their most creative period, releasing Summerteeth and the much-lauded Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. He died early yesterday morning in his sleep in Urbana, Illinois. He was only 45. At this time, the cause of death is unknown.
Jay was a talented multi-instrumentalist who joined Wilco as a tour musician right after their first albm, A.M., was released. He later joined the band and became one of the driving forces behind the band’s growth over the following seven years. His messy break from the band was chonicled in the 2002 documentary, I Am Trying to Break Your Heart.
While that film added to my personal distaste for parts of Bennett’s personality, it solidified my deep respect for his musical talent. Like most of us, he seemed like a real bastard to get along with at times, but was so incredibly talented that you’d let it slide. He was definately over-looked during his too-short career. I hope that, as time goes on, he get’s his due. We’ll miss you, Jay.
Go back to sleep now
My darlin
And I’ll keep all the bad dreams away
Breathe now, think sweet things
And I’ll think of all the right words to say-Wilco, My Darling
Ever since my last stint at Nike’s Consumer Cultures group, I’ve been more and more focused on forms of web 2.0 media other than simple blogging. I have a Lifestream over at Storytlr, I’ve revived my Tumblr persona and I’ve started Twittering (Tweeting, Twooting?) in earnest. What can I say? All of the other kids were doing it so I thought I would, too.
For the most part, I’m sure that you, the average reader of this blog, could really give a shit. And that’s fine. I’m kind of right there with you. Even though I’m trying my hand at these other mediums, it’s usually in a lethargic, hap-hazard way. But that’s kind of the brilliance of things like Twitter and Tumblr; they’re built for people to share bits and pieces of their lives and interests without much effort or thought. Supposedly, this leaves more time for you to be able to have an actual life. Which, of course, you’re encouraged to come back to the web and document. It’s never-ending cycle, to be sure.
That’s where I have a problem with this whole thing. I like to stay on top of each and every persona that I have on the web, and in the past, when I haven’t been able to do so, I’ve just shut them down. One example is my Myspace account. I haven’t been there in almost two years. I think I even shut it down, but I really don’t remember for sure. I don’t even care enough to go and find out.
So, what am I supposed to shut down this time around? Twitter takes only a second or two and it’s ideally suited for little thoughts that I have. Most of the time, they’re inconsequential soundbites that, if they were worth anything, would be whole blog posts. So, I’m neither losing anything or gaining anything from Twitter.
Still, I like it, I like the accessability (most of the time, I post from my phone) and I like the immediacy. I’m going to keep that one. You can find me at twitter.com/natesjol.
Tumblr is essentially a dumping ground for the shit that I find around the web and the things that people send to me. I also have my delicious account, Twitter feed and, yes, even this blog funneled through there, so just about everything that I do on the web can be found there. That’s a valuable service, that Tumblr.
So, you’ll still be able to find me on Tumblr at naternet.tumblr.com.
My Storytlr account is essentially my Tumblr account with the added ability to follow videos on Youtube that I add to my favorites. So, it’s pretty expendable and not something that I necessarily have to work at contributing to. Still, do I really need it? I guess not. You haven’t even heard of Storytlr, have you? Be honest… I thought so.
So, you will not be able to find me at Storytlr any longer. Not that you reallty were in the first place. Luddites.
Of course, I’m not leaving my blog right here at WordPress. I did that a few years back and soon realized that trying to maintain a verbose blog on Tumblr was simply untenable, and it still is. With no hit count and no way to leave comments on posts, it’s just not quite the same thing. Besides, I’ve been blogging for so long in this format, I think that I’d miss it too much if I stopped. I’m old-fashioned that way, I guess.
I’d have to say that there’s not really much accomplished in this post, in the end. But, I probably shouldn’t be writing this while a) eating dinner and b) watching the Nuggets somehow sticking around against the Lakers at home in Game 2. Then again, it’s not like I’m writing a dissertation or a novel or even a column for a newspaper (if they weren’t extinct already) here, this is a blog. You’re not coming here expecting Chaucer or even Dean Koontz. And if you are, well shit, I don’t know what to tell you.
For me, it’s back to watching the Nuggets play with my emotions with their up and down, hot and cold play tonight. One trip down the floor, they’ll move the ball flawlessly and take advantage of the right mismatch, the next, they’ll throw a pass ten feet over the head of a wide-open Kenyon Martin. DERRRRR!!!
