Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah?
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah!

- Excerpt from my opening statement at the press conference I held this morning to announce my decision to try to become America's next number one online journal writer starting on Jan. 20, 2001.  My advisers had assured me that all that blah blah blah would sap the energies and dull the minds of the questioners present.  If you still think they were right after reading the following transcript of that press conference, feel free to hire these seasoned professionals away from me for your own star-crossed campaign.
 

     A:  Now you see what's going on here?  Somebody floats a rumor, and the rumor drifts into your ears and corrupts your brain.  First rumor is free, but watch out 'cause they get more and more expensive as time goes by - you just wait and see.  Just say no!  Resist that old peer pressure to listen to every rumor that comes along.  They'll cloud your thinking and ruin your life.  Do you have any idea how many car accidents and train derailments occur because the driver was high off some rumor?  Enough said.

     Q:  Umm - have you ever done drugs?

     A:   I'm not gonna dignify that with an answer.  My reader doesn't care - he doesn't care!  OK?  Good writing  - that's what it's all about.  That's what my imaginary friend, Hans, looks for in an online journal, and that's what I intend to deliver.  You're playing the "gotcha" game but I just ain't gonna play.  It's beneath the dignity of the Internet.  Next question.

     Q:  You're on drugs right now, aren't you?

     A:  No, but I sure as hell wouldn't have stopped at six Tom Collins this morning had I known I was going to have to face such rude questions as this!

     Q:  Exactly what kind of drugs did you say you were on again?

     A:  That's a trick question!  That's a trick question and I resent it!  But even though I resent it, I'm gonna level with you - just because you remind me of me when I was young and idiotic.  So here's the truth - pay close attention.  Take the year Keith Richards was born.  Subtract from it the number of 3" lines of coke you can get out of a kilo of uncut Colombian nose candy.  Divide that by the number of puffs you can get out of an average doobie, circa 1979.  The number you get is exactly how many years I've been drug free.  It's just that simple.  Now let's move on.

     Q:  Exactly how close to a fatal overdose were you when you first got the idea to start this online journal?

     A:  I thought I'd made it as clear as I could but I guess someone present is a slow learner.  For the last time: I never took drugs in a month with an "o" in it.  I never took drugs while Dolly the cloned sheep was nursing.  From July 31, 1978 through August 5, 1978, the idea of taking drugs never crossed my mind.  I never took drugs in nursery school - not once.  I never once ran downstairs on Christmas morning expecting to find a special little package from Thailand's "Golden Triangle" under the tree.  When Reagan was in the White House I was so scared he was gonna get us all blown up that I couldn't even remember how to spell "drugs" let alone stop shaking long enough to find a regular supplier.  And I've never, ever - not once - taken drugs while passed out in an alcoholic stupor.  Now stop!

     Q:  If you're as good a writer as you claim to be, why didn't you put your talents to use filling out requisition and/or transfer forms during the Vietnam War?

     A:  I got a grade school deferment.

     Q:  Is it true that the only reason you got into grade school was because your father pulled some strings?

     A:  Look, I don't even know who my father was for sure!  You want to talk about my family, let's talk about the fact that this is my little sister's 50th birthday.  That's the kind of warm and fuzzy stuff journal readers are interested in!

     Q:  How can she be your "little" sister if she's ten years older than you?

     A:  Anorexia.  Now drop it.

     Q:  Any truth to the rumor that other online journal writers are paying you to post yours just to make theirs look better?

     A:  You'll have to ask them - since launching this campaign, I'm afraid I wouldn't know the truth if it leaped up and bite me on the nose.

     Q:  You recently made a promise to move your journal to a better, more reliable site.  Why haven't you?

     A:  Turns out all the better, more reliable sites have rules against posting the sort of stuff I write.  You know - nothing controversial, no put-downs, no profanity. 

     Q:  I think Angelfire has those rules, too.

     A:  Well, shit! 

     Q:  Can we quote you?

     A:  Actually, I think I got that from Jefferson.

     Q:  So you admit that you're a plagiarist?

     A:  Did I mention that I virtually never, ever took drugs while telling crude ethnic jokes at an orgy?
 
 
 

     We're sorry but that's all the time Mr. Birtcher has to answer your questions today.  He looks forward to doing this again just as soon as his rigorous writing schedule permits.  Until then, thanks for coming.  And please feel free to drink deeply from the bowl of Kool-Aid set up on the table in the jungle just outside this entry after showing your press card to the hooded server.