AFTERTHOUGHT: After I reread my previous blog about all of the blogs I wrote this past year, one thought raced through my mind: “What an idiot!” I could have written a 200–250-page book for the price of all of those blogs. Knucklehead me. Bad me. Of course I'm kidding because I’m still in a celebratory mood.
While I’m in the mood on this blessed occasion, chuckle-wise, I offer the following Top 10 from actual police car video files from around the country (source unknown). ENJOY!
TOP 10 COMMENTS BY POLICE OFFICERS TO PERPS
10. "If you run, you'll only go to jail tired."
9. "Can you run faster than 1200 feet per second? Because that's the speed of the bullet that'll be chasing you."
8. "If you take your hands off the car, I'll make your birth certificate a worthless document."
7. "Relax, the handcuffs are tight because they're new. They'll stretch after you wear them for a while."
6. "You don't know how fast you were going? I guess that means I can write anything I want to on the ticket, huh?"
5. "The answer to this last question will determine whether you are drunk or not. Was Mickey Mouse a cat or a dog?"
4. "I'm glad to hear that the Chief (of Police) is a personal friend of yours. So you know someone who can post your bail."
3. "Yeah, we have a quota. Two more tickets and my wife gets a toaster oven."
2. "In God we trust; all others we run through NCIC (National Crime Information Center).”
AND THE NO. 1 COMMENT TO PERPS:
1. "You didn't think we give pretty women tickets? You're right, we don't. Sign here."
Thanks for reading. I’ll resume the WRITING series tomorrow with Tip 6: Write on topics about which you feel passionate. Write with fire, not a blanket to conk out your readers and then tuck them in.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
BLOGGUS INTERRUPTUS: My series on “writing” is on hiatus for 2 days so that I may use this blog to reflect on this past year’s 180 blogs and begin my new blog year with humor. “Writing” will resume soon. Sorry for any inconvenience this may cause.
BLOG REFLECTIONS
My Experience. Are you kidding me? Who would ever thought I would be measuring time in blogs. Since my 2 incredible daughters (Corinne & Marissa) persuaded me to start blogging exactly 1 year ago, I’ve learned a lot. Blogging has been an amazing experience. It has motivated, inspired, cajoled, and, sometimes, even pinned me up against the wall in a half-Nelson to write. Thinking in 200–400-word chunks is different from 2000–5000-word articles and 50,000–100,000-word books. A blog seems manageable and attainable.
The Alternatives. The article and book alternatives are considerably more formidable and, at times, seem to be more within the realm of Don Quixote’s “Impossible Dream.” That’s why they mean so much on our vitae. It’s kind of difficult to harpoon a windmill on a horse; in fact, it’s nearly impossible to even find a windmill nearby these days. Where do they hide them? Maybe Sancho will know.
If I were still at Johns Hopkins or, for that matter, any other research university, the unrefereed, “unpublished” blog would be regarded as a meaningless waste of time (as opposed to a meaningful waste of time) in the context of annual productivity and faculty evaluations for annual review and promotion and tenure. Why bother? There’s no academic pay-off. If you want to blog, you do so for other reasons, and, in addition to everything else. Not so in the corporate or other worlds beyond academia.
My Niche. As I embarked on my journey into “Blog World,” I knew that few of my colleagues in the academic community read blogs and almost none writes them or comments on them, perhaps, for the reasons above. Over the past year, that was confirmed week after week, with the exception of a few spikes of interest in particular blogs or blog series. With a constantly increasing bombardment of job and family responsibilities pounding on academicians, it seems that the priority, time, and interest for my blogs, at least, remain relatively low. To attract a following in the thousands is unrealistic. That may not be the case for other writers’ blogs.
Fortunately, my niche has expanded slightly beyond the ivory tower to include writers, K–12 teachers, healthcare, corporate, IT, software, training, and coaching professionals from a bunch of countries, and students. You never know who may find value in what you write until you test the World Wide Focus Group (WWFG)! I did not expect that expansion and will intentionally consider that audience in future blogs.
What’s Next? A vacation. Haha. As year 2 begins, after this “writing” series is over, I will continue to search for topics that can
(1) provide you with important information at a glance, such as the Web 1.0–3.0 series,
(2) offer guidance that might take what you’re doing professionally or personally to the next level, such as writing and publishing, and
(3) make you chuckle and, maybe even, laugh out loud with my twisted brand of humor.
However, I really, really could use your help. REALLY! I would appreciate suggestions for topics and jokes and feedback on what’s working or not working in my blogs. I want each blog to be meaningful and valuable to you in ways that other resources are not. Let me know your thoughts. (NOTE: Of course, I will still continue to write articles, some of which may grow out my blog series, and try to finish my 14th book.)
In that spirit, tomorrow I will begin this next blog year with a totally meaningless and valueless Top 10 list. See you then.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
Yup, the results are finally recorded. Everything has been tabulated by the certified public accounting firm of Price-Is-Right, Namby, & Pamby. I know what you’re thinking. “What in the world of CPAs are you typing about?” Well, sentence-with-ending-preposition person, a survey was recently conducted and the results were just reported for your amusement.
SURVEY PURPOSE
One hundred college professors across this vast wasteland with a few cities sprinkled in for change of scenery were surveyed on their favorite 2010 Winter Olympic events in Vancouver. This is kind of an academic version of the popular TV game show “Family Feud,” just without the family, the feud, and the game.
RESEARCH STANDARDS
For those of you who are quantitative researchers, the technical aspects of this survey study are described below to allay any concerns you might have about its quality. The rest of you probably don’t care because you know of my incessant longing to write fictional, humorous blogs.
SURVEY DESIGN
Here are the steps in the execution of the study:
1. The sample was nonrandomly and wildly selected from the subscriber list of The Chronicle of Higher Education to yield an unrepresentative, biased collection of professors.
2. The survey was administered online by MonkeySee-MonkeyDo.com to maintain anonymity with a 24-hr response window (Is there any other?).
3. Faculty members only were asked one question: “Have you renewed your subscription to The Chronicle?” Wait, that wasn’t the question. It was: “What are your 3 favorite events you have watched during this 1st week of the Vancouver Olympics? (If you haven’t seen anything, wing it.)”
4. Respondents clicked their 3 faves from a list of all events to avoid spelling errors with words such as loogy, kurling, slalhom, moogles, and bathalonlon.
5. Based on an overall response rate of 39% (similar to my anticipated approval rating for this blog), frequency distributions of all events were computed. (Note: Stat has to be included somewhere here, right?)
6. The top 10 events were identified so they could be presented because I’m running out of blog material.
OOPS! I’ve just exceeded my word limit. The Top 10 will be presented tomorrow. Sorry. The bylaws of bloggering tell us not to exceed 300 words or we can be smacked by the owner of this network.
I bet you’re really excited. You don't want to miss this list. I've probably spent more than 5 minutes writing it.
COPYRIGHT © 2010 Ronald A. Berk, LLC
