The Blog Ate my Homework

I hate Mondays.

So, yesterday, I got in early, filled my water bottle and set out to reclaim lost time and words in the Chris Condon Blogciliation Program. Knowing that my jetsetting lifestyle over the last two weeks has severly impacted my ability to bring the funny, I was already with a list of topics, some clever banter, and the motivation to bring YAB back to the first-class daily status that you have come to enjoy. I took a deep breath, cracked my knuckles, thought about all the people who don't like a good knucklecrack, and got busy.

It was all going so well.

Optimists work well under these conditions. You embark on a mighty plan, get rolling on the progress, and watch as the puzzle pieces fall into place. When I type these things, I try to be on top of my comedic game. And when I find that game, blogging becomes very easy. I can see where each vignette is going to head, what obscure Saved by the Bell reference I am going to invoke, even plan out the pop culture analogy that would make my high school English teacher cringe in fear (Newman...). You know that scene in Hackers where Zero Cool just enters that zone where nothing is going to stop him from bringing down the Gibson mainframe? (Of course you don't, nobody saw Hackers.)(But they should.) That's me. Well, without the help of the freakshow twins, Razor and Blade.

When I write, I wonder which reader I should call out with an obscure fact or memory that only they will know. It's my means of checking up on the daily reader base. So don't be dismayed if you don't understand what I'm talking about when I mock Chris McAleer or my college professor Captain Ron. Somebody does, and you'll get your turn to feel eerily included. That's a YAB guarantee. It's become less of a guarantee that I'll get a blog up each and every weekday/workday, but that doesn't mean I've given up on my backlog. That's why initiatives like the Chris Condon Blogciliation Program are embarked upon. (What? You thought it was because we had room in the budget? Silly reader.) Oh, and also because we here at YAB like to prove Princeton Tigers wrong. (there's another obscurity for you. Deal.)

Ok, so that was a Harfordian Tangent. Like I said, Monday started with a bang of a blog. It was sharp, crisp, topical, and funny. Normally, I'll settle for three of the four, but yesterday was a good day. Heck, it even took less time than I normally spend. I even started to daydream about knocking another one out of the park come afternoon. Let's see, put the final joke in, change the font to light blue, a little Verdana font action, and done.

Oh, it was done alright.

The Publish Post button is a strange bedfellow. 164 out of 165 times, you press the little rectangle, and voila!, you've got blog. Well, guess which time yesterday happened to be. Instead of releasing the "Fuel for the Fire" post to the public, I got the "This page cannot be found" screen that Internet Explorer musters up when they know they screwed up big time. Thanks, Gates!

This left me completely helpless. No recovery mode (save my work? of course not!), no nothing. This will derail any Blogciliation Program in a heartbeat. So I took the day to lend my writing skillz (the z is for zing!) to the 106 page term paper I had due for World Economy. I wish that I had once of those "Technical Difficulties" screens that tv stations have when everything behind the scenes goes to hell. Instead, you just had one more day of Celling the Drama.

So, yes, the Blog ate my homework. Once I am in the mood to reproduce "Fuel for the Fire" from memory, you'll see it. Until then, I will be banging my head on the keyboard.

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