Dear Diary, A Funny Thing Happened To Me On Friday…

 … I got laid off! To be honest, I’m not taking it as tough as the guy from Wayne’s World, I just really like Ed O’Neill and his work in that clip.

But yes, I am no longer with Patch. As a result, I probably will be writing a bit more in this thing. Considering that my last entry was in October 2012, and I only had 24 entries total in 2012, well, I haven’t really set the bar particularly high for myself!

I have been yearnin’ to write some pages recently though, and to inexplicably review video games and movies that you probably already finished with months and months ago. I have that going for me, as well as taking pictures of my cat and other things on Instagram and writing insincere cutlines for them.

And finally, just to put this out there as a teaser – I’ll be making my podcast debut this coming week, if all goes well! So, if the idea of me talking to someone you probably don’t know about subjects you probably aren’t aware of is appealing, heck, this is an exciting time in your life!

To close things out, here is Boston Bruins announcer Jack Edwards laughing manically, in case you’re feeling glum. I know it always cheers me up.

Hey, Who Wants To Be More Famous-er?

So, as part of work, we're going to start having blogs on my site, here, along with that cute picture of my sister's cat that I'm now taking care of.

If you're interested, shoot me an e-mail or leave a comment. Basically, you'd just have to copy-paste your existing Blogger posts over to Patch, which is pretty simple. As long as you're writing about general topics - parenting, fashion, movies, video games, etc. - I can probably feature your writing on my site.

Anyway. I promise, I haven't forgotten about this thing! I just keep getting busy with vitally important things, like playing Rock Band 3 and Dragon Quest IX.

Don't call it a comeback.

Much like LL Cool J, I've been here for years. But where have I been?

Well, unsurprisingly, running a news website is a bit more work than being a general assignment reporter. I mean, especially with the stuff I was doing, which was mostly court beat and Friday night emergency coverage – Unless something was blowing up, I generally had five to 10 free hours a week at “work.” Yay for journalism!

Now that I am the boss again, and more importantly on salary, the dynamic changes a bit. There is more of an incentive for me to do things quickly and correctly, especially since I work for an online news site. (In case you're unawares: Narragansett Patch. It's an AOL venture, and now in 22 states; you can see if one is near you by clicking here. If you want to help me out, feel free to randomly click on a bunch of stories all over the place - Relax, I won't tattle.)

The first couple months have been ones of adjustment – Both from the perspective that I suddenly have more work to do, and from the perspective that the company I work for is still young and trying new things out. It's pretty exciting, and I can honestly say I haven't been this psyched about a job since I ran my college newspaper. (Then again, one of my friends dubbed my Patch site Version 2.0 of our college paper, since half the staff are people I knew from college. Hey, gotta network.)

So, I have been looking to restart this blog for a couple weeks now. At first, my plan was to do so on or about January 1, but life interfered. Likewise, I thought February 1 was a splendid day, but unfortunately, I've alternated between chills, sweats, fever and flu. Also, I did finally get a Playstation 3, so I've been picking away at Final Fantasy XIII for the past month or so. (General impressions: Like the game, especially like story.)

Consider this my “welcome back to blogging” post. Thanks for all of you who have gently and not-so-gently needled me into this – It's nice to see I wasn't completely forgotten. (Somewhat sad note though: My average hits per day increased by 50 percent ever since I left. Go figure.) I will be dropping down in post frequency and length, from seven days a week to just three – Monday, Wednesday and Friday. However, more posts will be time-delayed and queued up, so I should be better with sticking to the 7 p.m. EST schedule. (We'll see!)

The photo comes from this site, and you can buy it on a shirt! Awesome!