Thank you, Michael, for designating me a Blowhard, or even a semi-Blowhard. My friends think I am the real thing, and that gives me hope for the future. I appreciate the opportunity to participate in your conclave, along with Friedrich, Vanessa and your many regulars.

As you said in your gracious intro, I run a little joint of my own under the sobriquet Fenster Moop. Due to a series of personal issues, including a job change, I'd been slowing down the rate of my postings recently and, frankly, was wondering about the best way to continue blogging. When I got the invite from you, I jumped at the chance. I've been a regular reader of, and occasional poster to, this site for some time. I've always liked several things about it immensely: the conversational tone, the mixture of firm opinions with a willingness to be persuaded, the eclectic melange of topics and the slight bias toward viewing many matters, from politics to aesthetics, through a cultural lens. The latter inclination suits me just fine, as I discussed here.

I was at a Six Flags park recently and paid a couple of extra dollars (over and above the exorbitant entry price!) to sit through an alleged "4-D" experience--one of those helmet devices that supposedly puts you into a virtual reality. What a joke. To my mind, 2Blowhards does a far better job simulating a Viennese coffee house than Six Flags did simulating an Arctic roller coaster ride. So, as my nephew puts it, let the games start on!

A word first about Fenster, though. As I wrote in one of my first posts, here, Fenster is just a nom de plume, and I blog anonymously. I do so reluctantly, since anonymous kneecapping is all-too-easy. But I work in higher education and a number of my posts have dealt with the zaniness of that august institution (say, here, here and here). And if you know anything about the zaniness of higher education, I think you can appreciate that my desire to blog under my own name might conflict with the urge for self-preservation, and that anonymity represents prudence rather than weasel behavior. If you are not persauded to that view, I invite you to visit some of the sites that I consider role models, such as Critical Mass and University Diaries and J.V.C. Comments. They are excellent.

But while I started out with a slant in the direction of academe, I am interested in other topics too (Sharia law?, Cialis?), and have blogged accordingly. My own career is a melange--everything from academia to investment banking to government policy to political campaigning. So I am not afraid to be eclectic myself. Perhaps that's one of the reasons you've invited me to this particular coffee house.

As to Fenster his self, he's just a li'l swamp animal. Actually just a very minor character in the old comic strip Pogo. I've always like the name. Not a lot more to it than that.

Thrilled you're joining in!

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on September 3, 2004 12:26 PM

I'm jealous already.

What a wonderfully fluid writing style you have.

Posted by: ricpic on September 3, 2004 4:29 PM

Fenster's pretty slick, ain't he?

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on September 4, 2004 8:01 PM

Fenster Blowhard. The name just rolls off the tounge!

Posted by: Scott Wickstein on September 6, 2004 5:32 AM

I love that you posted a picture of the ol' swamp animal. He's cute!

Posted by: Vanessa Del Blowhard on September 8, 2004 11:37 AM

Shucks.

(blushes)

Now if Fenster can only get his head above water in his new job to find something to say.

Posted by: Fenster on September 8, 2004 2:52 PM






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