Truly, the only reason for me to ever go somewhere touristy like Myrtle Beach or Times Square is so that I can blog about never going there again.

See Shell, this is the part where you think you're doing something good, but I turn it around on you - BAM! Did you see it? See how that worked - BAM! Want to see it again? Didn't think so. Focus groups? I'm the only focus group that matters.

I will now unleash the power of blog comments upon you, AG!

Blogging isn't dead. I blog all the time.

Kudos to Ryan Shell, candidate for City Council, for learning to kiss the appropriate ring so quickly. From blocking porn at the library to erecting more bus benches in less than two weeks. Well done. It usually takes much, much longer.

Although my last post promoting my latest column didn't generate any comments, that doesn't mean that people aren't privately emailing me about it.

Just in case you were wondering.

Full disclosure: I will whore out advice to anyone who will take it.

First, Junior Davenport goes after nurses. Now, teachers. Perhaps beauticians next?

I wish I could quit this blog.

Damn it, Clarey. You know I don't get out of bed for less than a month's worth of dividends in the trust fund.

Sometimes I get comments. Sometimes I get letters to the editor. Sometimes people email me directly. Here's a typical email:

Ed Cone is God.

Thanks for reading.

One random thing about me.

1. I am too pretentious for Facebook.

Recession checklist. Hoard gas. Neglect children. Turn handicap into asset. Get haircut. Chain somebody up.

Recession update. I get so much free stuff, I just give it away.

Despite the trust fund and despite my now being employed, I want you to know that I feel your pain and that I'm frequenting Greensboro's upscale restaurants less often. We'll get through this. Together.

If you'd have told me some years ago that Jeri Rowe would have outlasted Lex Alexander at the News & Record, in fact that Jeri Rowe would still be alive and coherent enough at this late date to write Lex's obituary, I'd have told you that we'd more likely become a socialist republic under a Democratic administration.

You better hope nobody confuses the two of us when I have to go the hospital, Chuck.

It seems that I may have gotten a job.

Have I ever mentioned on this blog that I was a writer at Forbes? It's where one is groomed by those senior to them.

For reasons known only to them, the high schoolers are still coming.

Hey! Guess what, everybody? We decided that ConvergeSouth wasn't boring enough.

As an added bonus, we're bringing in Guilford County's top IT students so we can give them a preview of the rest of their life.

Update: Next year's sponsor.

The next time you get sick, JR, how about checking yourself into the Joe Koury Memorial Hospital.

The GGO is making its way up the Google rankings.

Joe Killian has some obvious thoughts about the silliness of thinking that the Bible is true and predictably some silly people get upset.

Having helped Obama secure the nomination, I will now realize the power of my man-crush fu. The one known as 'Munger' is chosen.

Gentle readers: as if dozens of you would send me the fake Maureen Dowd column.

Anglico: "I want you to join Pricey and others in making mountaintop removal one of the central issues in this year's election cycle. I want Pat McCrory to have to tell North Carolina where he stands on the wholesale destruction of North Carolina mountains in order to get a few more years worth of coal. I want Beverly Perdue to meet that question as well. And Liddy Dole. And Kay Hagan. And Sue Myrick. And Virginia Foxx.

And once we save the North Carolina mountains from the coal miners, let's make the protection of the North Carolina panhandle our next central issue."

It's the calm before the storm, Cavuto. If we can't have Skybus, then Chicago can't have UA.

I had dinner with Paul Begala.

(I will leave it to you, faithful reader, to deduce whether that means Paul and I sat down one-on-one for a three-hour gabfest about the current state of Democratic politics over Shiner Bock and brisket or whether it means I was one of a thousand in a ballroom eating rubber chicken, drinking Miller Lite and listening to Mr. Begala give a speech for which he was paid.)

Clarey attempts to extract money for a French Riviera vacation from Keanu Reeves.

Shadowy figure revealed. It is Ed Cone's mom. She has taken over the flogging. It is particularly brutal.

Still being flogged. Shadowy figure has emerged in the background.

Pretending failed. Now being flogged.

It appears that authorities that are not of the local kind are at my door demanding my Jerry Bledsoe/Mitch Johnson cagefighting videotape collection volumes 1 through 4. I will pretend to not be here.

When I decide to call you an anti-Semite, Sam, you'll know it.

Perhaps Jim Rosenberg will offer to mediate and we can put this whole ugly business behind us.

Someday Cunning Realist will have been right about something and I will have linked to it.

My wife has taken a picture of everything there is to take a picture of. She will now begin again.

Skate or die.

Listened to Woody call the game today.

Greenway. Maybe good. Maybe bad. Who can tell me?

Spitzer hooker.

Clarey, if you're that hard up for material to put between Ogi and the Deep Purple influenced drummer in search of a Slipknot inspired bassist to form a sonic rhythm section the likes of which Pfafftown has never heard, then you have permission to publish this blog in its entirety. You may keep the proceeds from increased ad revenue.

I wish for my kids to grow up to be degenerates.

Fred Lind played a good game once. Long time ago.

Don't go killing yourself because someone typed something.

Hey Zack, how many speeches you gave to the Rotarians, motherfucker.

Zack Matheny, my friend, you think you've been kissing the right Greensboro rings. Care to begin your education?

Lisa Scheer took this photo in Durham. Of course.

The N&R would have you believe that football is a good thing.

I love the smell of chickenshit in the morning. Here's to yardbirds roosting on Willoughby. Simpler times, friends, simpler times.

Lisa Scheer took this picture yesterday.

I'd like to see notes about the 'Black Book.'

Would someone please tell me how to identify the next bubble and when it will pop so that I may get in early, sell at the right time and leave some other poor sap holding the bag.

53-0.

Bledsoe doomed.

America is on its last legs.

NH GOP pulls out of Fox's Paul-less debate.

Happy New Year.

The older I get the more I appreciate the new year. I used to think it was gimmicky - another hallmark of a run amok capitalist society which I hate, but understand, which forces my fellow liberals to always hold me at arm's length and view me with a bit of suspicion. However, as the solstice has passed and the days lengthen, the ice will thaw and the spring planting will begin and renewal comes to all things.

This moment is unique. Maybe no more unique than any other moment, but unique in its own right and it deserves its special place although that place is no more important than any other moment's, mind you, yet, it is important for the moment itself. There's no denying it. However, we also don't want to bruise its fellow moments, but that is neither here nor there. For this one particular moment things are as they should be. Of course, things will be as they should be or things were as they should have been for all other moments future and past, but let's not let that diminish this moment's place in the sun.

At any rate, this moment is easier to remembr than most. As unfair as that might be.

Also: It's possible I've been drinking just about all day.

Huckabee's latest ad.

Liberty thrift store.

But thank God my dog ain't too cool for the room. w00f.

You'd think someone as bright as me could have raised less world-weary kids. w00t.

Why don't one of you funny hipsters go parody someone who actually deserves being parodied.

Greensboro Disease ©.

Ambition + ego + naiveté = Ovittore!

More importantly, can one be a kingmaker without actually ever making anyone a king?

UPDATE: Why don't you ask the trees at Cornwallis and Lawndale.

Somebody, somewhere, Eden maybe, put this photo on their front page. Their taste is exquisite. Love ya, babes.

Abortion.

For the record, let me state that having Bubba for a brother-in-law is as difficult as you might imagine.

Lisa Scheer.

WHOOOOOO! Huckabee!

No N&R column this week. Due to their schedule not your humble author's lack of ideas.

I will continue to link to people predicting a recession, without making such a prediction myself, until one of them, and thus me, gets it right.

If anyone can think of any other way that I might pimp out Jay Ovittore, I'm open to suggestions.

UPDATE: Thanks, Sue.

Someday a local politician with a blog will win an election. Mark my words.

Lisa Scheer took this picture.

CS rocked! If I do say so myself.

Have I noted recently how much I hate the Eagles?

Please, please, please come to ConvergeSouth.

In case you didn't get that last post, what I mean is for you to come to ConvergeSouth.

In honor of the highest energy prices since 1977, there will be a Jimmy Carter fireside chat with Jason Calacanis. Wear your sweater! The thermosat will be set at a balmy 64!

You are hereby commanded to register for ConvergeSouth.

Mortgage brokers are in trouble.

Damnit Doug, don't be invading my turf.

Lisa Scheer took this photo recently in GSO.



A commenter at Lisa's Flickr site says:

Looks like a pile of trash to me.

Liz Seymour, hardest working anarchist in America.

I'm pretty sure I prefer virile Sam to this new neutered version.

UPDATE: But make no mistake, no matter how much he kisses my ass now, I'm not forgetting that upside down Cone thing.

Why would anyone parody a local web site? Don't you people have anything better to do?

Let's see. I don't own a newspaper. Or even run one. However, if I can get the N&R to do my bidding by virtue of this blog and not run front-pagers on antiquated Baptist rituals, it'll be just as good.

More drought stories, N&R, more drought.

AT&T has no idea who they are dealing with.

Please note, AT&T, that you have now been taunted a second time.

Art by the wife.

Brit, we knew we knew ye.

It would be an honor just to be nominated.

Ben Holder. MWAH.

Joe Killian. MWAH. MWAH.

There will be no parody at ConvergeSouth. There will especially be no parody from people who appear, from their videos, to be unstable and who may possess the attributes necessary to commit violence against the event's organizers.

A series of photographs of and by Lisa Scheer. She may have had a beard at the time. I can't remember. Too much Châteauneuf-du-Pape perhaps. Anyway, sorry for the headache you're going to get looking at this thing.

Just as if God didn't exist, it would be necessary for us to invent Him, so too if Bubba didn't exist, it would be necessary for me to invent him.

How better to destroy my conservative baiters than to hold up a mirror?

When you get woke up at 4:00 am in 2009, don't come crying to me.

My motives are pure, people.

Lisa sent this shot from Peterhof.



She missed me.

Political Radar. You have no idea who you're fucking with.