the straight dope

I'll give it to you straight. For me, getting awards from fellow bloggers brings with it a certain amount of self-loathing. First, I don't think I really deserve 'em. I'm not saying that out of modesty, or fake-modesty-that-makes-you-love-me-all-the-more-because-you-think-I'm-all-humble-and-self-deprecating-but-I'm-really-just-saying-it-because-it-makes-you-think-I'm-humble-and-self-deprecating-and-you-love-me-all-the-more. I don't deserve these honors—yet. Wait until I've won a few Pulitzers, gotten onto a few bestseller lists, done a few book signings. Then hit me up. Then I'll feel like I've earned it.

There's also that subversive, cynical, nonconformist corner of my brain. The bit that hates blogging awards and everything they signify about the blogsphere, the Internet, and e-community at large. The conservative portion, which can't stand the idea of everybody getting an award, and those awards being dispensed by the proletariat instead of a qualified panel, and these awards being dispensed at random, at the award-giver's discretion. It's the part of me that says Oh, golly-gosh. An award? Really? A blogging award? From the blogsphere? Whoopity-f@#$ing-do. That sure means a lot. I'm sure that got passed on to a lot of deserving people. Yeah, right. It's just a small, grainy image with a crude icon and a cutesy title. Doesn't mean diddly-squat. Everybody on Blogger's going to have one before the month's out. Especially if they have to pass it on to twenty other trite, bilious, self-important hacks, as if it was some goddamn chain letter.

So, in order to actually accept one of these awards, I have to simultaneously overcome (a) the specious cranial inflation that stems from "winning" a blogging award, and (b) beat down the vitriolic commentary from behind. Fortunately, the humanist part of my brain—he doesn't show his face too often, but he's there when I need him—kicks into high gear. He invariably says Oh, Andrew, how can you not accept this award? No matter what that hectoring conservative may say, this award is a gift. It was given to you in good faith by a kindred spirit, a fellow blogger, one of your comrades-in-arms. They want to show their appreciation for what you do, for what you write, for what you have to say. You have thoroughly impressed them with your work, and they are honoring you for it. How can you in good conscience refuse it? Are you so callous? Are you so heartless and cold-blooded that you would refuse someone's well-meaning sentimentality? Would you spit on their accolade, no matter how insubstantial or intangible? Have you no empathy? Have you no gratitude? Have you no soul? You must write an acceptance speech this minute, young man. Accept this award, show your appreciation, and pass it on to other worthy recipients. This is not a chain letter you are passing on; it's unadulterated love and encouragement.

How can I say no to that?

So let's get on with the awards ceremony, then. Donna Hole, author of a marvelous and insightful self-titled blog, has presented me with the Soul Mates Award. And Claire Dawn, from the effusive, exotic and ever-informative Points of Claire-ification, has granted me the "Creative Writer" Blogger Award. It's ironic that I should get both these awards at the same time, because they both come with a set of unorthodox rules.

Let's begin with the Soul Mates Award.


I don't feel bad about accepting this one, because my personal friend distant acquaintance Christi, from A Torch in the Tempest, started it off as a kind of social experiment; and in general, social experiments are rather fun. The rules are:

• Pass it on to five recipients.
• Make up something (preferably inoffensive) about the people you sent it to. Assuming they are people, that is. I don't know if the milk cows have managed to penetrate the blogsphere or not. If they did, ignore 'em.
• Link to the people you gave it to (obviously; this is basic blogging etiquette).
• Link back to the original award post, which is right about here.

Alright then! Here are the recipients...and their retinue of falsehoods.

1. The vampire queen known only as propinquity survived the Great Romanian Purge of 1887 by hiding herself inside a crate of Czechoslovakian absinthe. During the two-month voyage to the United States, the absinthe absorbed some of her bewitching raspberry pheromones. A penniless confectioner later bought a bottle, took a taste, stole a taffy-puller, and invented Red Vines.
2. Jon Paul, similarly immortal, has participated in every major air conflict in the history of the United States. He dueled the Red Baron; bombed the Bismarck; splashed MiGs on the 38th Parallel; patrolled the Ho Chi Minh Trail; and I bet he will get a piece of the Martians whenever they beam down. During peacetime he wrote the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina under the pseudonym "Leo Tolstoy."
3. Better known as 006, Smithy infiltrated a premier Venezuelan terrorist cell in 1974 to pass information to British intelligence about the movements of Carlos the Jackal. Having successfully completed his mission objectives (rearranging Carlos's sock drawer, swiping his collection of Dire Straits records, and sleeping with his mistress), Smithy was cooperating with French agents when Carlos apparently "murdered" him. Smithy was forced to go into hiding, and is now working incognito on a guava farm in west-central Brazil, keeping MI6 abreast of international bacon prices.
4. Mary Witzl was President Richard M. Nixon's proofreader until fits of uncontrollable laughter barred her from working. Following this, she established a wind farm in Indio, California, promptly suffocating everybody in Palm Springs. Farther west, in Los Angeles County, a public holiday has been established in her honor. People celebrate it by removing their oxygen tanks for a split-second and inhaling a lungful of real air.
5. Entrepreneur Chick's five businesses are really a front for a top-secret clandestine worldwide organization known as the Cold Ducks, who are responsible for the ridges in Ruffles® potato chips, the discovery of Ludacris, and that weird eyeball hovering over the pyramid on the dollar bill.

And now for the "Creative Writer" Award.


This one's fun, too. Pass it on to five bloggers first. I'll wait. Okay, done? Go on, do it already. Do you want that little humanist angel in your head to get after you? No, you don't. When you've finished, the jollity begins. Divulge seven things about yourself: six lies and one truth. The rest of us will try to guess the truth, while you sit back and laugh your head off. Let your readers stew for a couple of days, and then clue everybody in. (Ironic that this post is entitled the straight dope when it contains almost nothing but lies, isn't it?)

And so, the nominees!

• Jade hears voices
• Except for Antigone
• Life at Willow Manor
• I'll Think of a Title Later
• Points of Claire-ification (I'm sorry, I'm gonna have to bequeath this one right back to her; she's earned it. And she said I was awesome.)

And here are the lies:

1. I once read the entire Harry Potter series cover-to-cover without stopping. It took me just over 27 hours. I started at seven in the evening and finished up a little after 10 the following night. I had to take some breaks to eat pizza, go to the restroom, and run around my dorm a few times to stay awake, but I stuck to it and finished it.
2. I saw Dick Cheney speak live at my college. He came in early 2007 to help President Bush promote his Social Security makeover. I was impressed by how much more natural he was in person. He made an impromptu speech, cracked jokes, and took questions from the crowd. I actually passed within 100 yards of him on my way out the door.
3. When I was little, my mother, brother and I accompanied my dad on a business trip to Montgomery, Alabama. I don't remember much; basically, all I can recall is looking out of our high-rise hotel window and seeing all the other skyscrapers. There were lots of green trees and blue sky, too. I haven't been back since.
4. I'm good at riddles. When I was younger I had this big book of them that Ma had bought for me at some bookstore in Tennessee. I read and reread it until the pages were dogeared and the leaves were yellowed. When I got older and read The Hobbit, I pretty much knew every riddle that Gollum and Bilbo told each other. It might take me a minute or two, but I can almost always reason out the answer.
5. I've been in only one real car accident in my life. It happened my senior year in high school. I was driving on the wrong side of the road, and without a seat belt. Coming around a blind corner, I hit another car head-on. (The driver and passenger were okay, fortunately.) My head hit the windshield and put an enormous spiderweb crack in it. The highway patrolman said that if I'd been going any faster, I'd have smashed my chest against the steering column and killed myself. In the end, I got away with just a few scratches.
6. I can play five musical instruments: the piano, accordion, violin, harmonica and Jew's harp. I took piano lessons for about eight years, and still suck. I took a couple of violin lessons and then elected to fiddle. The accordion was something I got into after hearing a few good folk bands from Ireland and Newfoundland. I've always liked the harmonica, especially after my English friend Elaine gave me one that she'd bought in a toy shop in Prague. The Jew's harp was just something I picked up on the side, being an admirer of Snoopy.
7. I got to sample some absinthe at my last cocktail party. My buddy John and I split an $85 bottle of Mata Hari, brought it to my place, and got it all ready: glasses, absinthe spoon, sugar cubes, blue flames, the works. I was disappointed, overall. I abhorred the licorice flavor and didn't even see any green fairies as compensation. But at least I can say I've tried it now.

Figure that out if you can.

There, done. Man, that was hard. It was more difficult than I imagined to beat back the subconscious vitriol and accept these awards. And that's not even mentioning how tough it was to choose the proper recipients to pass 'em onto, make up some stuff about them, and invent some flagrant untruths about myself. Jeez... At some point (I don't know when) I'll get around to notifying everybody. If you're one of the nominees and you stopped in before I could get to you, I apologize.

And also...congratulations.