Waters Launches Humor Blog
© 2008 George Waters

To paraphrase poet John Greenleaf Whittier, "For all sad words of man or dog, the saddest are these: 'I write a blog.'"

Sad as in "lame," because it is lame to jump on a trend long after everybody else has, but that is what I have done - I started a blog.

It used to be that if you were a blowhard, your venues were limited - the public park, letters to the editor, the presidency. No more. A blog allows anyone with computer access to yak large, free of charge.

A "blog" is basically a kind of public Internet diary in which one writes one's life experiences, favorite jokes or opinions, and in which total strangers can comment back mercilessly.

There are blogs on every topic conceivable, and many which are not. Entire online conversations go on among new mommies or model train lovers or vegetarian Evangelicals. In fact, the new-mommie-vegetarian-Evangelical-model-train-lover niche is very hot right now.

Blogging experts (who do exist, although no one has ever bagged one) say that having a specific niche is the best way to attract a lot of readers. If you attract a lot of readers, you may even attract advertisers and make money from your blog, but this is about as likely as monkeys flying out of my pants.

(Personal pre-blog likelihood of this occurrence: 5 to 1).

I call mine "The Wa Blog" (www.thewablog.com). "Wa" is a nickname I picked up in college because my friends, like all college students overburdened by the requirements of studies and lifting multiple cases of beer, wanted to lighten their load in every way they could. So to make their lives that much easier, to reduce the burden of pronouncing both syllables in my last name, my friends took to simply calling me "Wa" (pronounced like "saw").

Plus, "Wa Blog" has a great mouth feel, not to mention a woodsy aftertaste. "Wa Blog!" is also a great thing to blurt out loudly in a meeting if anyone asks your opinion of the sales projections. Or randomly on a first date. Seriously. I could use the exposure.

Monkeys! Pants! It's in your hands!

What will you find on The Wa Blog? Humor, hopefully. Nothing more profound. I make no promises to write compellingly of my love for model trains, for it was a fickle love, and only lasted the summer of '67.

I will be taking a backward glance at my teenage diary and writing humorous yet soulful commentary from a middle-aged perspective. There will be an embarrassing photo of me each week which you will be invited to caption. There will be wry and pithy observations. Oh, the pith will fly, my friends.

Basically, if you like what you find here in the column each week, The Wa Blog will simply bring you a daily dose, to which you may add your own voice.

The best thing about a blog is that you can subscribe. It's free, and when something new is posted, it comes to you, so you don't have to keep checking back.

So remember, it is "THEwablog.com." My first choice, "Wablog.com," was already taken by some guy who writes entirely in Japanese, because "Wa," as it turns out, is a Japanese word meaning peace and harmony.

Little did my college friends know when they lopped off the second half of my name so long ago they unwittingly coined a nickname which would so perfectly capture my essence.

Cue the monkeys!