Time warp: Rocky Horror Picture Show is 35 years old this week.

Election Day to be split thusly to handle expected crowds: All Republicans will vote on Tuesday. All Democrats will vote on Wednesday.

Candidate of the week, Up North edition

So you think South Carolina has all the political weirdness (Alvin ... Alvin ... ALVIN!)? Or maybe California?

Check out ol' Jimmy McMillan, running for Governor of New York.

Too bad Al (Grandpa) Lewis from The Munsters isn't still around. He'd liven up the campaign.

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What's in your writer's toolbox?

I'll show you mine.

Check out Hubpages for the whole story.

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Writing in the old and new world

From Hubpages, 'cause some things just have to be said ...

"One of the results is that there is this gigantic push-pull between the need for quality writing and the writing that sells. OK, that's not a new story; people are more likely to read People Magazine than Atlantic Monthly. But the buyers at least had flesh and blood, and sometimes even a brain. But now much of the stuff on the Internet is pure crap with no discernible value, even though it's well-keyworded pure crap with no discernible value."

OK. Call it a screed. Anyway, check it out.

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Blogging: Everyone's doin' it doin' it

This blogging is a very cool thing, and it's too bad I've been so slack at it.

What's so great about blogging is that you can make anything you want of it.

Many folks use blogging tools to keep a personal journal, to tell all the things they've been doing all day. Others use it to unload some screed about a particular subject matter -- in my case I'll use this space to slap around some politician or give my take on the news. If you're interested in anything at all, that's a reason to blog.

I'm an ardent journal keeper. Have been for years. If I'm wrestling with a personal decision or just plain bothered about something, I'll write about it. But I'm old school; my first preference for a journal is an actual bound book, written in ink. It worked for all the great writers, so who am I to buck that trend?

My pen-and-ink journal is a thing of beauty. Some of it is neatly done, with all words carefully measured. Other times the entries are scrawled, with an odd disconnectedness about what is written. Sometimes there's a lot of free association involved with journaling, and it's like, well, like I just hurled all over the page (why do you think they call it catharsis?). I'm also a list-keeper, an outliner and a mind-mapper, so my bound journal has all of these things.

But there's a lot to be said for blogging. Unlike a private journal, this stuff is public. Maybe I need to air an idea for feedback. Maybe I need to start discussion. Or maybe I just feel like being controversial. That's OK, too.

Right now I have several blogs, and all have a specific purpose. My regular blog (The Column Reloaded) is sort of a catch-all, with a bit of everything. I also have The Jam Session Reloaded, which has my musical musings, and a tech blog called The Workbench Reloaded. In truth I haven't done much with these lately; I wrote the last Workbench entry Feb. 1, and have been slack about writing for the others.

In addition I have another political blog through The Examiner, another I haven't done anything with. I'm undecided whether I want to continue with it. I also have my HubPages site, which is where I keep some of my better writing. Of the lot, I probably have the most fun with HubPages.

If you want to consider blogging forms, you'd have to add Twitter. I tweet a few times a day, and I find it rather addictive. I can tweet directly from my cell phone, and I can post fast thoughts from anywhere. Twitter's interesting; there is a horrendous signal-to-noise ratio and you need some industrial-strength third-party tools to sift through the chaotic mess that is Twitter.

And yeah, there's a lot of mundane in Twitter. Like the one from a friend:

"Breakfast blend too tame to crank engine; need me some emeril big easy xtra bold or jet fuel."

OK, being a coffee junkie myself (just a pinch between your cheek and gum) I can relate to this, but many people can't. But I contribute my share of the mundane to Twitter:

"Thought about calling in dead @ work, but it's payday. Dead men cash no checks."

Which may be important to me, but in the final analysis, who really gives a rip? I tell you what, the Internet is the world's biggest garbage dump.

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I mention all this because my older brother, Rick, got bitten by the blog bug. He'll be a natural at this -- like everyone else in my family he has a wide range of interests and opinions aplenty about all these interests.

He just published his first post; his 19-year-old son Michael had a horrific car wreck and stepped out of his crushed Crown Vic.

Off Rick's description of the accident it's amazing Michael came out with little more than a few scratches. I'd seen my share of car wrecks, and I can tell you that hitting a utility pole at even 40 mph (and Michael was probably driving twice that speed) is the kind of collision that usually leaves no survivors. Rick is pretty unabashed here; he credits Michael's survival to divine intervention and seat belts. Knowing a little something about the power of both, he'll get no argument from me. It's now a question of whether Michael "gets it" after such a close call, but time will tell.

Rick promises his blog won't be that dramatic most of the time (which is a good thing because no father needs that much drama in his life) but he'll have -- like this blog here -- a little bit of everything. In other words, the stuff of a good blog.

Take a look, if you haven't already. And if you like it, subscribe. Feel free to comment.Link to it. He won't mind.

Welcome to blogland, Rick. We were expecting you.

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Chuck Yeager, the great test pilot, is 87 today. I met him 15 years ago & he still had the right stuff. I'll bet he's still got it.

This is only a test of a new system allowing me to make blog posts via text message. You may, at your option, ignore this. Or NOT.