Michael Blowhard writes:

Dear Blowhards --

October 5, 2005: Michael Blowhard praises Writely. March 9, 2006: Google buys Writely.

Ever since this blog began: Michael Blowhard harps on the topic of immigration. March 11, 2006: Tom Wolfe announces that the subject of his next book will be immigration.

Since the gods are taking close heed of my slightest brainwave, I thought I'd perform a a public service and pass along the rest of my predictions for the near future. Get ready for what's next.

• An actress desperate for a good role will create and star in a one-woman show.

• Bill Gates will convert Microsoft to a charity organization, appointing Angelina and Bono as co-CEOs.

• The health-tips industry will admit that it enjoys monkeying with our minds. "All it really boils down to is, don't smoke, get a little activity, don't get too fat, and prefer fresh food to packaged. Or maybe not. What do we really know anyway?" the industry's spokesperson will say.

• Research will demonstrate that happiness researchers aren't very happy.

• The pornography business will collapse. "I guess we've learned that there really can be too much of a good thing," one analyst will say.

• A Florida man will decide to relax about his potency. "It finally occurred to me that if my stiffy isn't as stiff as I want it to be, maybe all it means is that I'm not in the mood," he'll say.

• The Harvard liberal-arts faculty will admit that there are some differences between women and men, and that it doesn't make sense to get too politically worked-up about this fact.

• The Utne Reader will start running a lot of celebrity profiles. "A life spent wearing Earth shoes, worrying about pesticides, and protesting globalization -- well, it's just too depressing," the magazine's editor will say.

• New York City will become the world's largest flat-panel display.

• Richard Meier will convert to neo-classicism. "There's only so much you can do with geometry, empty space, glass, and white. It gets boring," Meier will say. "Besides, I've had it with imposing my highbrow preferences on the public. From now on, I'm dedicating my talents to helping regular people obtain housing that's a classy and satisfying version of what they already like."

• A libertarian living in Oklahoma City will take note of how the real world works.

• A woman in Indianapolis will throw out her collection of thongs. "You try spending the day with a string up your buttcrack," she says. "Besides, real men like panty lines."

• The Nobel Committee will award its first-ever Prize for Blogging.

• A graphic designer in Chicago will vow never again to use white-on-black print. "Serving the text and its meaning, and making the content readable and comprehensible, that's what it's all about," she'll say.

• An iPod will be elected President.

• NOW will open a swingers' club in Jersey City, the first in a projected worldwide franchise.

• Web 3.0 will emerge unbidden.

• Steve Sailer will be appointed editor-in-chief of The New Yorker.

• A woman in Mississippi will decide to stop analyzing her colleagues and dissecting her own emotions. "Who the hell cares what my co-worker meant by what she said to me this afternoon? Let alone how it made me feel?" she'll explain.

• Short story writers will rediscover plot and suspense. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but those are the basics of what fiction is about, aren't they?" a spokesperson for the O. Henry Awards will say.

• Graduate art schools will declare that innovation is overrated.

• Color laser printers will become the next hot gadget. Paper jams will multiply.

• The GNXPers will convert to evengelical Protestantism; Godless conducts the ceremony. "One day we woke up to the fact that a fundamentalism is a fundamentalism, whether or not it claims to be scientific. So we figured, why keep fooling around in the shallow end? Why not commit to the real fire-and-brimstone thing?" Razib will explain.

• Michael Blowhard will write and publish a blogposting that's considered to be much too short.

OK, so maybe that last prediction is a longshot ...

Best,

Michael

I shudder at the thought what would happen if you become a financial consultant.

Posted by: Tatyana on March 15, 2006 03:40 PM

Forget mere money. If you made this your platform and ran for president, you'd easily be elected -- on the basis of common sense. (iPods are not old enough to be legal candidates.)

That first prediction is a little suspicious. You may have realized that one of the criteria for successful predictions is to predict something (volcanism, floods, earthquakes, fires) that already happens all the time anyway.

Many of the other predictions I profoundly hope come true.

Prairie Mary

Posted by: Mary Scriver on March 15, 2006 04:14 PM

As they say about predictions, if you have to make them, be sure not to label the axes. If you have to label the axes, try not to date the document.

Posted by: Friedrich von Blowhard on March 15, 2006 04:21 PM

C'mon Michael. Get serious. I saw nothing in the way of a prediction about what people in this country are craving to know.

What about Jen? And Brad? Even J-Lo?

Posted by: Donald Pittenger on March 15, 2006 04:26 PM

Michael,

What's your beef with Virginia Postrel? Just a friendly, if puzzled, inquiry is all. I searched for some of your earlier posts and you seem to have a fairly high opinion of her. What gives?

Posted by: PatrickH on March 15, 2006 05:33 PM

The Utne Reader will...

Well, it finally happened. After years of reading a wide variety of blogs and internet sites, someone has mentioned "The Utne Reader". Years ago, somebody showed me that "Best of the alternative press" magazine and I thought it was pretty interesting for a liberal rag...interesting and important. Turns out its importance (except for this one blog posting of yours) is basically zero.

Posted by: onetwothree on March 15, 2006 09:30 PM

Fabulous predictions, MB. I think you have all the important stuff locked up. Are horoscopes and stock-market advice next? We can only hope.

Posted by: Jonathan on March 15, 2006 09:56 PM

"A woman in Indianapolis will throw out her collection of thongs"

Whatever happened to Save the Whale(tail)?

Posted by: Peter on March 15, 2006 10:54 PM

The GNXPers will convert to evengelical Protestantism; Godless conducts the ceremony. "One day we woke up to the fact that a fundamentalism is a fundamentalism, whether or not it claims to be scientific. So we figured, why keep fooling around in the shallow end? Why not commit to the real fire-and-brimstone thing?" Razib will explain.

LOL. if i become a christian, bet on me becoming a orthodox calvinist or a roman catholic. but the p value is really low.

Posted by: razib on March 16, 2006 08:09 AM

And the Cubs will win the World Series!

Posted by: Shouting Thomas on March 16, 2006 08:40 AM

Shouting Thomas gave us the most important one of all, of course. One more: therapists will realize that astrology and exercise really holds all the answers, and recognize they never knew what they were talking about regarding all this you-must-give-it-to-yourself nonsense and start checking people's rising signs much more closely. One will note, "People keep staying in therapy for,like, fifteen years, and never get any better...then, y'know, they finally get that promotion they were after, or the date they wanted, and they are all happy...just like they thought they'd be. Maybe our clients WEREN'T neurotic after all---maybe they were just right."

Posted by: annette on March 16, 2006 10:26 AM

A hoot.

Thank you.

Posted by: Yahmdallah on March 16, 2006 11:08 AM

Tat -- If you have some money you want to invest, I'm available for consultations ...

Mary -- A common-sense-driven candidate for office, wouldn't that be lovely? As well as a change ...

FvB -- A good blog-posting would be on the topic of "how to cover your ass at work," wouldn't it?

Donald -- Jen will remain slim. Brad will remain buff. J-Lo's butt will begin to sag.

PatrickH -- I do like Virginia Postrel. Did I inadvertently say something mean about her here? Ooops. But what was it? I certainly didn't intend to.

Onetwothree -- I picked up an Utne Reader to kill time with on a plane flight the other day, the first time I'd looked at it in years. And I found myself wondering how people can bear to spend a lot of time in an Utne Reader state of mind. Everything in Utne-Reader-ville is such a slog, so fraught, so dismaying ... It's as though taking a little enjoyment in life as it is would ruin the whole Utne Reader vision. Too bad: it's a neat idea for a magazine. Are there leftie rags you enjoy these days?

Jonathan -- What a great idea: doing a blog-horoscope. The person doing it would have a huge readership in no time.

Peter -- I'm amazed that women have put up with thong mania for as long as they have, aren't you? I always thought thongs were fun as boudoir-wear, Euro-beach-wear, or stripper-wear. Ooh-lala. But as everyday clothing? Are women nuts? Not that I don't love catching the occasional glimpse of strap, of course ...

Razib -- You're always going over my head: now you're going to have to explain to me what a "p" value is. That GNXP blog is so darned high-end ...

Shouting Thomas -- The Cubs ... The Series ... Um: baseball, right?

Annette -- May that day come soon!

Yahmdallah -- Looking forward to your predictions.

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on March 16, 2006 12:38 PM

Sorry Michael. I guess I misconstrued that particular part of the post. Your 'predictions' looked like taking things/people and turning them around 180 degrees. When you 'predicted' 'A libertarian in Dallas will take note of how the real world works', I thought you were implying that up until now, Postrel had been doing nothing of the sort.

My oops.

Posted by: PatrickH on March 16, 2006 05:45 PM

Oh! No, my oops. Hadn't occurred to me to make the connection, though it obviously should have. I'm gonna change Dallas to someplace else. Thanks for pointing that out. Postrel's terrif.

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on March 16, 2006 05:59 PM

MB, I'll bet you could write horoscopes in an entertaining way. Many would read. You could syndicate, quit your day job. . .

BTW, what would happen to the circulation of the Utne Reader if it started publishing articles acknowledging that life in the modern USA is better than ever? They'd go out of business. When life is good lots of people will invent problems. It's human nature. Utne and similar gloom mongers cater to people who don't feel right unless they have something (preferably something big and abstract) to worry about.

Posted by: Jonathan on March 16, 2006 08:29 PM

p value.

Posted by: razib on March 16, 2006 10:11 PM

How about:
"The s--t will finally hit one of the 2 Blowhards' fans"?

Posted by: winifer skattebol on March 16, 2006 11:40 PM






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