Don't Call It a Comeback

I've been here for years. I really have.

And I'm determined to get this blog rolling again, starting right now and for the rest of this week. See, I've been in Cleveland for the past few days, visiting my sister, who's in grad school there. I drove nine hours each way (with two delightful traveling companions), and as much as I love driving (that's not sarcastic), I'm happy to be home. I have a few things to say about the city affectionately known as The Cleve (and non-affectionately known, I assume, as The City of Burned-Out Buildings), and many other subjects.

For now, I point you to this article in the New York Times about the equally hilarious and depressing notion of celebrities getting people to Twitter for them. I've always liked Shaquille O'Neal's sense of the absurd (yes, you read that correctly), and here's more proof:

The basketball star Shaquille O’Neal, for example, is a prolific Twitterer on his account — The Real Shaq — where he shares personal news, jokes and occasional trash talking about opponents with nearly 430,000 followers.

“If I am going to speak, it will come from me,” he said, adding that the technology allows him to bypass the media to speak directly to the fans.

As for the temptation to rely on a team to supply his words, he said: “It’s 140 characters. It’s so few characters. If you need a ghostwriter for that, I feel sorry for you.”