Hello, and welcome!

Hello, my name is Joe and I have been attracted to Blogger out of some inherent need to read and write, a thing I am just discovering about myself.  To be perfectly honest with you, I have not quite formulated exactly what I plan on writing here, or how to arrange it, for that matter.  I imagine that I should start at the beginning and hope that rhyme and reason slowly coalesce from the random interstellar dust of my thoughts.

There are many "beginnings" that have brought me here so I imagine I should mention when and why I began writing.  Like most former students, I have blundered through the trials and tribulations of book reports and term papers and the like with nary a thought to anything other than a good grade.  Ages ago, in high school, I would hope that my ill-prepared shallow ramblings might be perceived as mature thinking, while later, in college, I would hope even more strongly that my thoughtful, meticulously planned essays would not be mistaken for juvenile garbage.  This however, I do not count as a beginning.  What I would count as my discovery of the fact that I enjoy slapping sentences together would be in 2009 when I took a love of obscure films and built a review site out of it.  Although I had a few hundred readers at the end, my site and perhaps even my reviews themselves, would doubtfully win any awards. Only a small portions of the population, it seems, cares about french vampire films.  I would say, however, that my site was a beautiful shining diamond amongst a sea of coal and some days I still miss it.  The site itself, unfortunately, was a bear to maintain and terrifically time consuming ( as well as poorly, poorly hosted...A pox on the house of Godaddy.com!) and so I have recently allowed it perish. So, each pour some of your coffee or juice-box or 40-oz malt liquor onto the closest thing resembling soil and lets move on.  What I discovered from this experience was that I enjoyed assembling my thoughts and I liked to imagine that other people were reading them, regardless of whether or not they actually were.  Strangely enough, this never really translated into a love of Facebook or twitter.  I think it has to do with the lack of content.  I don't want to criticize those who have found meaning, enjoyment, or social experience out of these networking sites but a posting of what you had for breakfast and six others approving of your comment does not provide a fulfilling experience for me.  Then again, to be fair, my "musings" are really just a pretentious version of the same thing.  That is why I have decided to turn this into a virtual book club of sorts.

I have a deep seated desire to read the classics, or really, to have read and understood the classics. I make this distinction because my *intention* is often overpowered my *attention* (or lack thereof).  In other words, finishing a book that is not modern fantasy, sci fi, or horror is a big challenge to me.  I can read a book a week if its sci fi but getting through the Illiad is a challenge even though I really want to read it.  Intellectually speaking, I wish I could plug my brain into the Matrix and upload it so I don't actually have to read it.  But, I am not the Neo of literature.  I have to earn my scholarly chops the hard way.  More to come about my virtual book club.  Thanks for reading and check back soon.