Temporal Island

I did read a little more about Jayson Blair and the New York Times, starting with (I think) 'Editor of Times Tells Staff He Accepts Blame for Fraud' (New York Times, May 15, 2003). Romenesko gives heaps of references. What a nightmare... how messed up must Blair's brain have become? Did he want out of the career into which people are now saying he was fast-tracked? Did a fib or two go unnoticed and he figured that, actually, it didn't really matter what he wrote so long as it was published? Was he under too much pressure or was the pressure not enough? Did he need an added high gained from writing fiction published as fact? Was he just kinda wondering if anyone cared enough about the quality and accuracy of his work to pick him up on it... was he, with increasing anger or nihilism, wondering when his writing would matter more than the paper's policies on diversity? Maybe he didn't care. I'd really like to know but I bet Blair doesn't know the answers himself.

Checked out Blogdex to see what others are blogging. Interesting blogged bits included the BBC's report 'Saving Private Lynch story 'flawed'' (May 15, 2003).

I'm totally into the ads appearing at the top of my blog, courtesy Blogspot and Google. Ads for writing sites, language translators, vitamin suppliers (all topics related to blog entries) and then, most 'wow' of all, an ad promoting stays in Margs (that's not the site in the ad but that's where to go if you are genuinely keen to visit!) have appeared. Only glitch I can see is that I live close enough to Margs not to need accommodation there and I'm also likely to be the only person regularly reading my blog (except for maybe friends/family, who are welcome to stay here any time they're down south!). But it is kinda fun to see my life and writing reflected in advertising... Did I mention I'm thinking of starting a diet in the hope of losing weight, or perhaps shopping around for cheap CDs and, I don't know, antique guns?

ResearchBuzz, my favourite e-zine, referred to Cool Graphics Treasure Chest, a page of links to graphics resources that weeds out only those resources that don't come with a confusion of popups and reciprocal advertising blather.

Just read the terms and condition of use for The Chaser News (ripped off, I was hoping to have someone to sue for wasting my remaining vision) and I've decided it's best not to agree to them.

Writer's group was cancelled because of a very sick cat. Calling round to cancel, I learnt about an Exiting Opportunity for Regional Writers (or maybe an exciting opportunity - unless your short story should be accepted and you receive $750 from ABC Radio's Regional Production Fund, allowing you to leave regional Australia. Just kidding!).

So yeah, I should be writing a short story and not mucking about here.

Wow, it's after 10pm WST and The Age gives over 100 links to articles about SARS on it's main page. Articles listed dated back to March 23, 2003 with 'World alert over 'killer flu' threat'. Okay, I've reloaded the page and we're down to one SARS item now!

My word for the day... 'tony' - an adjective meaning "marked by an aristocratic or high-toned manner or style" (according to Merriam Webster). Never before have I seen the word in a sentence but 'toniest' was written in an article I glanced over tonight. A Google search shows it to be in common use, at least in the US.