And then she had her first hit of crack comments.

Word on the street is that comments are addictive. There is a very funny blog post about the stages of blogging that describes the progression from receiving an occasional comment to becoming a "comment whore" where you lose your sense of self just to generate comments. If I can ever remember where I read it, I'll post a link! Philosopher-Mom flirted with the idea of disabling comments so she could "see how blogging 'into the silence' differed in character from blogging with feedback via comments"... in the end, however, she choose not to.

I just had my first experience with comments. My first hit from the pipe of comment crack. I participated in a reading challenge and at the end, I went around to read other folks' wrap-up posts and basically wrote the same ineffectual comment on almost all of them. I have finally figured out the blogging etiquette that if you visit you should say something - even if you really have nothing to say. (The back story to this part "why I have nothing to say" is that the reading challenge that I stumbled on seemed to lean towards Christian fiction. So I would read entire lists of books and not recognize a single author or title because my reading preference leans towards profanity filled smut - not really but it felt that way by comparison. There was the exception of one blog that had a book list of science fiction slash soft porn that was both fascinating and repelling at the same time. Kind of like Nip/Tuck.) So I clicked and commented all over the Internet and then it happened. Many of those bloggers clicked over to my blog, read my wrap-up post, and left a comment. It was a flurry of comment activity! And it was fun! And I immediately contemplated whether or not I should pursue more comments - should I become a comment whore? Because what you want immediately after your first comment is your next comment.

A careful review of my previous blog posts revealed that I lack that "certain something" to become a comment whore. And that "certain something" would be humor. The blogs that get lots of comments have authors who are consistently witty. You are practically guaranteed a chuckle, if not a LOL, just by clicking. They are funny "haha" not funny strange. And so my fleeting time in the spotlight will end here. BUT...I have already planned to participate in the Spring reading challenge so I am looking forward to the deluge of comments to be expected sometime around May 2009.